Florent Manaudou has won his bet!

The Frenchman won the silver medal in the 50m freestyle at the Tokyo Olympics on Sunday.

Untouchable, the American Caeleb Dressel set a new Olympic record by swimming in 21.07. 

Frenchman Florent Manaudou won the silver medal in the 50m freestyle at the Tokyo Olympics on Sunday, behind the American Caeleb Dressel, winning the bet to get back on an Olympic podium after a two and a half year break.

It brings a 20th medal to France in these Games.

Returning to the pools in March 2019, the 2012 Olympic champion and 2016 silver medalist swam in 21 sec 55, while Dressel set a new Olympic record (21.07) and the Brazilian Bruno Fratus took bronze (21.57).

A fourth Olympic medal

Placed in water line n ° 5, alongside Dressel, the 30-year-old Frenchman could not follow the extraordinary start of the Floridian, still as explosive and already in the lead at the end of the flow.

But Florent Manaudou won his fourth Olympic medal in three editions of the Olympics, adding the silver of the 2016 4x100m relay to his three individual charms. 

"It's hard to talk: third medal in a row. I stopped, I came back, it's been a difficult year. It proves that you shouldn't take your head, you just have to swim. The body knows how to do it. ", commented the sprinter to France TV.

Caeleb Dressel, left without an individual medal at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio but 13 times world champion since 2017, pocketed his fourth title in Tokyo, and will still aim for the 4x100m medley at the end of the morning.

Two and a half years break

The younger brother of Laure Manaudou, who launched the golden era of French swimming by winning the 400m of the 2004 Olympics at only 17 years old, has won his formidable bet.

Beaten for a hundredth in Rio by the American Anthony Erwin, he had abandoned swimming to try his luck in handball, his youthful passion, before plunging back into 2019.

If his first lap times had been encouraging (21.56 at the end of January 2020), confinement had interrupted his progress: before the Games, he skated this season between 21 sec 7/10 and 8/10, followed seven 50 m above the 22 sec in May and June, and stayed away from the European podium (5th) in mid-May in Budapest. But he had accelerated at the best time, in the series on Friday (21.65) then in the semi-finals the next day (21.53), happy to "live a fifth Olympic final" including those of the 4x100 m in Rio (silver) and Tokyo (6th)