‘The world’s getting faster’: business as unusual as US swimmers’ dominance erodes

The Americans topped the medal table in the pool in Paris but the men were close to going without an individual gold to show for their efforts

At a glance the Paris swimming medal table looks much as it did three years ago for the United States - top once again, both in golds and overall medals.

But the meet continued a narrative that emerged in Tokyo of supremacy maintained but dominance lost. When Bobby Finke retained his men's 1500m freestyle title on Sunday on the final day of the Olympic meet, he was salvaging pride for the American men rather than signing off from France with an exclamation point on behalf of his nation.