Swimming at the 1976 Summer Olympics – Men's 100 metre freestyle

Men's 100 metre freestyle at the Games of the XXI Olympiad
Medalists
Jim Montgomery   United States   Jack Babashoff   United States   Peter Nocke   West Germany

Swimming events at the 1976 Summer Olympics
Freestyle
100 m		men		women
200 m		men		women
400 m		men		women
800 m				women
1500 m		men
Backstroke
100 m		men		women
200 m		men		women
Breaststroke
100 m		men		women
200 m		men		women
Butterfly
100 m		men		women
200 m		men		women
Individual medley
400 m		men		women
Freestyle relay
4×100 m				women
4×200 m		men
Medley relay
4×100 m		men		women

The men's 100 metre freestyle event at the 1976 Olympic Games took place between July 24 and 25. This swimming event used freestyle swimming, which means that the method of the stroke is not regulated (unlike backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly events). Nearly all swimmers use the front crawl or a variant of that stroke. Because an Olympic size swimming pool is 50 metres long, this race consisted of two lengths of the pool.

This was the first time in history that the 100m freestyle was swum under 50 seconds.

Medalists

Gold	Jim Montgomery United States (USA)
Silver	Jack Babashoff United States (USA)
Bronze	Peter Nocke West Germany (FRG)

Records

Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.

World record	Jim Montgomery (USA)	50.59	Kansas City, United States	23 August 1975
Olympic record	Mark Spitz (USA)	51.22	Munich, West Germany	3 September 1972

Results

Semifinals

Heat 1

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
1	Jim Montgomery	United States	50.39	Q, WR
2	Marcello Guarducci	Italy	51.35	Q
3	Klaus Steinbach	West Germany	51.62	Q
4	Vladimir Bure	Soviet Union	51.93	Q
5	Roberto Pangaro	Italy	52.68
6	Stephen Pickell	Canada	52.89
7	René Ecuyer	France	52.92
8	Andrei Bogdanov	Soviet Union	53.05

Key: Q = Qualified, WR = Olympic record

Heat 2

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
1	Jack Babashoff	United States	51.46	Q
2	Peter Nocke	West Germany	51.83	Q
3	Joe Bottom	United States	51.92	Q
4	Andrey Krylov	Soviet Union	52.32	Q
5	Michel Rousseau	France	52.36
6	Gary MacDonald	Canada	52.96
7	Martin Smith	Great Britain	53.11
8	Svante Rasmussen	Sweden	53.34

Key: Q = Qualified

Final

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
	Jim Montgomery	United States	49.99	WR
	Jack Babashoff	United States	50.81
	Peter Nocke	West Germany	51.31
4	Klaus Steinbach	West Germany	51.68
5	Marcello Guarducci	Italy	51.70
6	Joe Bottom	United States	51.79
7	Vladimir Bure	Soviet Union	52.03
8	Andrey Krylov	Soviet Union	52.15

Key: WR = World record

References

• 1976 Summer Olympics results: Men's 100 m freestyle, from http://www.sports-reference.com/; retrieved 2009-12-20.