McKeon’s toughness is cast in Rio bronze

The 22-year-old’s golden glory came as part of the fastest relay team of all time, but her third in Wednesday’s 200m freestyle final was achieved through pure grit.

Launching from lane seven, McKeon surged to the lead and maintained it for the first two laps.

In the end, she was swept up by the class of American gold medallist Katie Ledecky and Swedish runner-up Sarah Sjostrom, two of the greatest women’s freestyle swimmers of all time.

Bouncing back from the disappointment of missing a 100m butterfly medal and a slower 200m semi-final performance, McKeon stopped the clock in 1:54.92 to claim bronze.

“It’s about being tough,” McKeon said on the pool deck.

“I proved that to myself, that I can be out there in an Olympic final, where there’s a lot of pressure and just be tough.”

Australian teammate Bronte Barratt, racing next to McKeon in lane eight, was equal fifth in a personal best time of 1:55.25 at her third Olympics.

McKeon admitted doubting her ability on swimming’s biggest stage, after missing out on the 100m butterfly dais when she had qualified second fastest.

Then McKeon – who won four gold and two bronze at the Commonwealth Games two years ago – was sixth fastest for the 200m freestyle final, having touched the wall second in the slower semi-final heat.

However, he time in the final was just 0.09 seconds outside her Australian qualifier in April to book her ticket to Rio.

“I’m so happy, after (Tuesday) I was a bit unsure,” McKeon said of her medal prospects.

“My coach Bohly (Michael Bohl) just said ‘pretend it’s trials’, you’ve got Bronte right next to me and I race her all the time. Just pretend it’s back in April at the trials, where there’s not as much expectation on me, so that’s what I tried to do.”

McKeon’s personal triumph came before brother David narrowly missed out on a 4x200m relay medal.

Swimming the second leg, McKeon put Australia firmly in contention with a big final 50m, to touch the wall in second, 2.07 seconds behind the US, who provided the legendary Michael Phelps with a 21^st Olympics gold medal. 

Daniel Smith and 400m champion Mack Horton finished off the race, as the Aussies finished in 7:04.18, more than half-a-second behind bronze medallists Japan.

After the race, David was delighted with his split of 1:45.63, almost a second quicker than his national championships time and equal the Olympics qualifying efforts of Australian teammates Cameron McEvoy and Thomas Fraser-Holmes.

McEvoy withdrew from the race to focus on Thursday’s 100m freestyle final, while Fraser-Holmes led the relay team.

“I really helped to hold on for Tommy, he put us in a great spot and I was really pleased with the time,” David said.