The French 4x100m relay swimmers, Clément Mignon, Maxime Grousset, Charles Rihoux and Mehdy Metellase, qualified this Sunday for the final of the Tokyo Olympic Games.
Florent Manaudou did not take part in the playoffs and was saved for the last step on Monday morning.
The French swimmers in the 4x100m relay, vice-Olympic champions in Rio, qualified this Sunday for the final of the Tokyo Games, setting the fourth fastest time in the series, and will be able to count on the reinforcement of Florent Manaudou on Monday morning. Clément Mignon, Maxime Grousset, Charles Rihoux and Mehdy Metella swam in 3 min 12 sec 35 / 100th, behind the Italians (3: 10.29), the Americans who had chosen to spare their star Caeleb Dressel (3: 11.13), and the Australians of Kyle Chalmers, last torchbearer (3: 11.89). Manaudou, 2012 Olympic champion and 2016 Olympic vice-champion in the 50m, who aims to regain Olympic gold in the one-way trip in Tokyo next weekend, has also been preserved for the series.
"We did the 'taf', we all swam well. Fourth (chrono), it's very good, we will be among those who play the medal", summarized Grousset, who saw his first Olympics at 22 years old and has felt "a little bit of pressure" for her very first Olympic race.
"We will not have to be surprised tomorrow morning (Monday, night French time), it played tricks for some, we saw the finals of the two 400m, anything can happen in the morning, we will have to seize our chance ", he added.
"We will do everything to"
Silver medalist in 2008 in Beijing, gold in London in 2012 and again in silver in Rio, the French men's 4x100m comes out of a transition Olympiad after bringing together a generation of world-class sprinters, who amassed 13 medals in major championships. "I do not know who would not want to perpetuate the tradition, we will do everything to, that's for sure", promised Grousset.
"We all do club relays, but there, at the Games, it's another dimension, we must not get carried away on the competition, fall into the small traps of everyday life. They do a faultless, it is cool ", appreciates Mignon, already involved in the Olympic adventure five years ago. Absent from the 2017 Worlds in Budapest for lack of achieving the minimum requirements, the French raised the bar two years later in Gwangju (South Korea) by slipping into the final, finishing in last place.