Katie Ledecky

Kathleen Genevieve Ledecky (born March 17, 1997) is an American competitive swimmer who holds the record as the most decorated female swimmer ever and the most decorated American woman in Olympic history, with 14 Olympic medals—nine of them gold. She is considered the greatest female swimmer of all time.

At the World Aquatics Championships, she has won a record 18 individual gold medals. She currently holds world records in the women's 800-meter and 1500-meter freestyle (long course) and the 1500-meter freestyle (short course), and previously held records in the 400-meter freestyle (long course) and 800-meter freestyle (short course). Her international debut came at the 2012 London Olympics, where at age 15 she surprised everyone by winning gold in the women's 800-meter freestyle. Four years later, at the 2016 Rio Games, she was the most decorated female athlete, taking home four golds, one silver, and setting two world records.

At the 2020 Olympics, she became the most decorated U.S. female athlete and the first American female swimmer to win an individual event in three consecutive Olympiads. In 2025, she won gold in the 800-meter at the World Championships, making her the first swimmer—male or female—to win seven world titles in the same event. Across the Summer Olympics, World Championships, and Pan Pacific Championships, she has earned 58 medals (41 gold, 14 silver, 3 bronze) and broken 17 world records.

Her achievements have earned her Swimming World's Female World Swimmer of the Year a record five times. She was named Associated Press Female Athlete of the Year in 2017 and 2022, international female Champion of Champions by L'Équipe in 2014 and 2017, U.S. Olympic Committee Female Athlete of the Year in 2013, 2016, and 2017, Sportswoman of the Year by the Women's Sports Foundation in 2017, and the ESPY Best Female Athlete in 2022. In 2024, President Joe Biden awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Ledecky was born in Washington, D.C., and grew up in Bethesda, Maryland, to Mary Gen and David Ledecky. Her paternal grandfather, Jaromír Ledecký, came to New York City from Czechoslovakia as a student in 1947, later became an economist, and married Berta Ruth Greenwald, an Ashkenazi Jewish woman, in Brooklyn in 1956. Through her paternal grandmother, Ledecky has relatives who died in the Holocaust. Her mother is of Irish descent. Raised Catholic, she still practices the faith and often prays the Hail Mary before races. Her uncle Jon Ledecky is a businessman and co-owner of the NHL's New York Islanders.

She started swimming at age six, influenced by her older brother Michael and her mother, who swam for the University of New Mexico. She attended Little Flower School through eighth grade and graduated from Stone Ridge School of the Sacred Heart in 2015. In high school, she twice set the American and U.S. Open record in the 500-yard freestyle and twice set the national high-school record in the 200-yard freestyle. Before 2012, she swam summers for the Palisades Swim Team in Cabin John, Maryland. In summer 2012, she trained with the Nation's Capital Swim Club under Yuri Suguiyama, then under Bruce Gemmell through the 2016 Olympics. She accepted an athletic scholarship to Stanford University, swimming for coach Greg Meehan. In December 2016, she and gymnast Simone Biles were chosen as sponsors of the USS Enterprise, the first Olympians given that honor. She earned a Bachelor of Arts in psychology with a minor in political science from Stanford in December 2020, graduating in June 2021.

At the 2012 U.S. Olympic trials in Omaha, her first senior national competition, she made the team by winning the 800-meter freestyle in 8:19.78, more than two seconds ahead of Kate Ziegler. She also placed third in the 400-meter freestyle (4:05.00) and ninth in the 200-meter freestyle (1:58.66). Her third-place time in the 400 was the fastest ever by a 15- to 16-year-old American. At 15 years, 4 months, and 10 days, she was the youngest American at the 2012 Games.

In London, she qualified for the 800-meter freestyle final by placing third in the heats (8:23.84). In the final, she stunned the field, winning gold by more than four seconds with a time of 8:14.63, then the second-fastest ever, just behind Rebecca Adlington's world record. She broke Janet Evans' American record from 1989. By the 200-meter mark, she had a nearly body-length lead. Her 400-meter split was 4:04.34, a personal best that would have placed fifth in the individual 400-meter freestyle. At 750 meters, she was 3.42 seconds ahead of Mireia Belmonte García and 0.31 seconds under world record pace. She won by 4.13 seconds, missing the world record by 0.53 seconds. That gold was her first international medal.