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Swimming at the 1948 London Summer Games:

Women's 4 × 100 metres Freestyle Relay



Host City: London, Great Britain
Venue(s): Wembley Arena, Wembley, London
Date Started: August 4, 1948
Date Finished: August 6, 1948

Gold: USA United States
Silver: DEN Denmark
Bronze: NED Netherlands


After the individual 100m had been decided it seemed logical that the medals would be decided between four teams, Denmark, the USA, the Netherlands and Sweden. With a rejuvenated Greta Andersen included in their line-up, the Danes found themselves battling the Dutch for the gold medal as the last leg swimmers got under way. The United States and Great Britain trailed and appeared to be fighting only for the bronze but the last American swimmer was Ann Curtis. Curtis soon moved away from her British rival and began to make headway on the leaders. With just 15 metres to go she overtook the Dutch swimmer and with the crowd cheering wildly edged ever closer to Fritze Carstensen of Denmark. With a desperate final sprint Curtis touched the wall ahead of the Dane to break the Olympic record and clinch the championship. Curtis’ time of 1:04.4 was the fastest ever recorded though it could not be ratified as a world record because only the first leg of a relay is allowed to stand for record purposes

Final Standings

Rank Team NOC Medal
1 United States USA Gold OR
2 Denmark DEN Silver
3 Netherlands NED Bronze
4 Great Britain GBR
5 Hungary HUN
6 Brazil BRA
7 France FRA
AC r2/2 Sweden SWE DQ
5 h1 r1/2 Argentina ARG
5 h2 r1/2 Belgium BEL
6 h1 r1/2 Canada CAN