Léon Marchand, qualified for the final of the 200m medley, is getting closer to his Olympic quadruple in Paris

The Frenchman, already a triple gold medallist in these Olympic Games, achieved the best time in the semi-finals of the 200m medley on Thursday.

The Paris La Défense Arena pool has become his swimming pool. The day after his historic double in the 200m butterfly and 200m breaststroke, Léon Marchand was already back in competition on Thursday, August 1, and secured his qualification for the final of the 200m medley. In a discipline where he won the last two world championships he competed in (in 2022 in Budapest and in 2023 in Fukuoka), he will try, on Friday (at 8:43 p.m.) to win a fourth Olympic title in four races in Paris.

Back on the starting block just over 12 hours after being crowned in the breaststroke, the TOEC runner-up swam relaxed in the heats, still achieving the third fastest time of the entrants in 1’57″86, more than three seconds off his personal best. An afternoon of rest later, he lowered his mark by more than a second and a half to make his mark in the semi-finals and take the best time (1’56″31), similar to what he had already achieved in the 200m breaststroke and 400m medley with the now-known sequence and two big victories in the final.

In a race that started strongly in the butterfly, the Toulouse native moved into third position after the first length before taking the lead on the back and widening the gap in the breaststroke as he has become accustomed to doing. “I was a little tired before the race”confessed the new darling of the French public, who specifies having been “full on from start to finish”. Now it’s time for a night and an afternoon of recovery before trying to become the first Frenchman to win four gold medals in a single edition of the Olympic Games.