Swimming at the 2008 Summer Olympics – Women's marathon 10 kilometre

The women's marathon 10 kilometre event at the 2008 Olympic Games took place on August 20 at the Shunyi Olympic Rowing-Canoeing Park. It was a new event on the programme at the 2008 Games. The men's and women's marathon 10 kilometre races, unlike all of the other swimming events, were held in open water rather than a swimming pool. No preliminary heats were held, with only the single mass-start race being contested. This race is held using freestyle swimming, with a lack of stroke regulations. For most of the event swimmers use the front crawl, but modifications are used situationally, especially when swimmers reach feeding stations.

Open water swimming events require different tactics and showcase several different racing strategies that are more common to competitive cycling, marathon running and water polo than traditional pool swimming. It is one of the few Olympic sports where the athlete's coaches play a critical role during the actual event. The coaches have four opportunities to provide drinks to their athletes as the athletes swim by floating pontoons in the course. If the coach falls in the water, his or her athlete is immediately disqualified.

Qualification

The 25 swimmers qualified for the event by virtue of their placing at the 2008 World Open Water Swimming Championships held in Seville, Spain and the Good Luck Beijing Olympic 10K Marathon Swim Qualification Race held in Beijing, China.

Amputee swimmer Natalie du Toit of South Africa was among the starters.^[1]

Results

DNF - Did Not Finish

References