Katie Ledecky confirms she’s not even close to retiring after winning final gold of Tokyo Olympics

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After her final race of the Tokyo Olympics, Katie Ledecky answered the question no one — except, apparently, NBC — was asking. She has no intention of calling it a career after these Games and confirmed she’s eyeing Paris in 2024 and maybe beyond.

Ledecky completed her three-peat victory in the women’s 800-meter freestyle Saturday morning in Japan (Friday night in the U.S.), winning gold in the event at the 2012 London Olympics, 2016 Rio Olympics and, now, the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

With a time of 8:12.57, Ledecky swam to victory with little competition, as her Australian rival Ariarne Titmus won silver after finishing more than a second behind Ledecky at 8:13.83. Italy’s Simona Quadarella won bronze.

This was her seventh Olympic gold medal in total and 10th Olympic medal overall. At the Tokyo Games, she also won gold in the 1,500-meter freestyle, silver in the 400-meter freestyle, silver in the 4×200-meter freestyle relay and finished 5th in the 200-meter freestyle. She raced for 6,200 meters — or about 3.7 miles — this week.

“It’s awesome,” 24-year-old Ledecky told NBC in her on-deck, post-800 interview while panting. “I just wanted to finish on a really good note, and I’m so happy. In a lot of pain too.”

And then she was asked about retiring. Specifically, NBC’s Michele Tafoya asked Ledecky: “How will you decide if this is the last swim for Katie Ledecky?”

Ledecky seemed as taken aback by the question as so many others in the swimming world and immediately shut down any discussion of retirement.

“Oh, that was not my last swim,” Ledecky responded. “I’m at least going to ’24, maybe ’28. We’ll see.”

The 2024 Olympics are in Paris, while the 2028 Games are in Los Angeles. Ledecky continued:

“I just knew it was going to be my last swim here. You never take anything for granted. You don’t know if you’re going to be back at the next Olympics, so just try to soak it all in.”

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