Katie Ledecky is about to dominate the Rio Olympics
The 19-year-old is set to star at Summer Games
By Callum Ng, CBC Sports
At every Olympic Games an athlete delivers the most dominant performance, and during the first half of Rio 2016 there's a good chance it'll be American swimmer Katie Ledecky.
She could win 5 medals in 7 days
The 19-year-old won silver with the American 4x100 Free relay on Saturday. She also won the 400-metre free final on Sunday, setting a new world recrod. Still to come: the 200 final on Tuesday, the 4x200 freestyle relay final on Wednesday, and the 800 final on Friday.
No peers
Ledecky is undefeated (13-0) at major international meets since winning Olympic gold in the 800 free in London.
We're counting Pan Pacifics, world championships, and the Olympic Games.
11 career world records
Ledecky currently holds three world records: the 400, 800, 1,500 (not an Olympic event). She came close in the 400 and 800 at U.S. Olympic trials earlier this summer, not fully tapered, which means she could very well break them both in Rio.
No rookie
Ledecky won in 2012 as a 15-year-old. Four years later, her 800 world record of 8:06.68 is nearly eight-seconds faster than the time she won with in London.
Gold medals galore
She has won 14 international gold medals since the 2012 Olympics, if you count relays. Ledecky usually swims a leg of the 4x200 freestyle relay, aka the 800 freestyle relay.
Not a pro
Instead, she'll swim and study at Stanford this fall.
Youngest swimmer
She is the youngest member of the U.S. Olympic swim team — again. Ledecky's birthday is St. Patrick's Day, 1997.
A Michael Phelps in the making
She began swimming at age six. That was 2003, three years after Michael Phelps went to his first Olympic Games.
Many more Olympics
Like Phelps, Ledecky's birth year is perfectly timed for the quadrennial. She could swim two, maybe three more Olympics.