Swimming at the 1972 Summer Olympics – Women's 100 metre freestyle

The women's 100 metre freestyle event at the 1972 Olympic Games took place between August 28 and 29. 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.

Medalists

Gold	Sandy Neilson  United States
Silver	Shirley Babashoff  United States
Bronze	Shane Gould  Australia

Results

Heats

Heat 1

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
1	Gabriele Wetzko	East Germany	1:00.40	Q
2	Tatyana Zolotnitskaya	Soviet Union	1:01.24	Q
3	Claude Mandonnaud	France	1:01.34	Q
4	Guylaine Berger	France	1:01.54
5	Judit Turóczy	Hungary	1:01.57
6	Sharon Booth	Australia	1:02.07
7	Kirsten Strange-Campbell	Denmark	1:03.83
8	Susana Saxlund	Uruguay	1:04.91

Heat 2

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
1	Enith Brigitha	Netherlands	1:00.02	Q
2	Anke Rijnders	Netherlands	1:00.76	Q
3	Judy Wright	Canada	1:01.97
4	Chantal Schertz	France	1:02.82
5	Edit Kovács	Hungary	1:03.00
6	Lucy Burle	Brazil	1:03.12
7	Marcia Arriaga	Mexico	1:03.66
8	Ileana Morales	Venezuela	1:04.13

Heat 3

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
1	Magdolna Patóh	Hungary	59.47	Q, OR
2	Sandy Neilson	United States	59.51	Q
3	Hansje Bunschoten	Netherlands	1:00.82	Q
4	Eva Andersson	Sweden	1:01.88
5	Susan Edmondson	Great Britain	1:02.29
6	Françoise Monod	Switzerland	1:02.43
7	Heather Coombridge	New Zealand	1:02.95
8	Hsu Yue-yun	Chinese Taipei	1:04.77

Heat 4

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
1	Shirley Babashoff	United States	59.51	Q
2	Wendy Cook	Canada	1:01.20	Q
3	Mary Beth Rondeau	Canada	1:01.46
4	Leanne Francis	Australia	1:01.90
5	Lesley Allardice	Great Britain	1:02.07
6	Inger Andersson	Sweden	1:03.40
7	Diane Walker	Great Britain	1:03.40

Heat 5

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
1	Jutta Weber	West Germany	59.72	Q
2	Jenny Kemp	United States	1:00.42	Q
3	Sylvia Eichner	East Germany	1:00.64	Q
4	Angela Steinbach	West Germany	1:01.66
5	Nadezhda Matyukhina	Soviet Union	1:02.14
6	Margrit Thomet	Switzerland	1:02.33
7	Laura Podestà	Italy	1:02.88

Heat 6

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
1	Shane Gould	Australia	59.44	Q, OR
2	Andrea Eife	East Germany	59.73	Q
3	Heidi Reineck	West Germany	1:00.39	Q
4	Grethe Mathiesen	Norway	1:01.47
5	Yelena Timoshenko	Soviet Union	1:01.68
6	Shigeko Kawanishi	Japan	1:02.13
7	Khriska Peycheva	Bulgaria	1:03.43
8	Virginia Anchestegui	Mexico	1:04.99

Semifinals

Heat 1

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
1	Shirley Babashoff	United States	59.05	Q, OR
2	Magdolna Patóh	Hungary	59.64	Q
3	Heidi Reineck	West Germany	59.66	Q
4	Andrea Eife	East Germany	59.71	Q
5	Jenny Kemp	United States	59.93
6	Anke Rijnders	Netherlands	1:00.84
7	Wendy Cook	Canada	1:01.26
8	Claude Mandonnaud	France	1:01.88

Heat 2

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
1	Shane Gould	Australia	59.20	Q
2	Sandy Neilson	United States	59.41	Q
3	Gabriele Wetzko	East Germany	59.46	Q
4	Enith Brigitha	Netherlands	59:75	Q
5	Jutta Weber	West Germany	59:90
6	Sylvia Eichner	East Germany	1:00.73
7	Hansje Bunschoten	Netherlands	1:00.79
8	Tatyana Zolotnitskaya	Soviet Union	1:01.12

Final

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Notes
	Sandy Neilson	United States	58.59	OR
	Shirley Babashoff	United States	59.02
	Shane Gould	Australia	59.06
4	Gabriele Wetzko	East Germany	59.21
5	Heidi Reineck	West Germany	59.73
6	Andrea Eife	East Germany	59.91
7	Magdolna Patóh	Hungary	1:00.02
8	Enith Brigitha	Netherlands	1:00.09

Key: OR = Olympic record