10 kilometres Open Water, Women

The pre-race favorite was Britain’s Keri-Anne Payne, two-time World Champion. Early in the race at The Serpentine, she and Hungary’s Éva Risztov controlled the pace with early challenges coming from Melissa Gorman of Australia and Haley Anderson of the United States. But by the halfway mark, Risztov had moved ahead and Payne had dropped back to fourth, trailing Anderson and Italy’s Martina Grimaldi, 2011 World silver medalist behind Payne. On the fourth of six laps, Risztov briefly switched to backstroke to better check on where her competition was, but she seemed comfortably ahead. Only on the final lap was she challenged when Anderson made a late move, but it was one that came too late as Risztov held on for the gold medal in 1-57:38.2, only 4/10ths of a second ahead of the American. Grimaldi came in three seconds later, holding off Payne for the bronze medal. Anderson’s silver medal came one week after her sister, Alyssa Anderson, had won a gold medal in the 4×200 relay as a prelim swimmer for the United States.