She won the gold medal in the women’s 400 m freestyle at the 2004 Athens Olympics.
It was France’s first ever gold medal in women’s swimming and the first swimming gold medal won by a French man or woman since Jean Boiteux’s triumph in the 400 m men’s freestyle event in Helsinki in 1952. Manaudou won the silver medal in the women’s 800 m freestyle at the same Olympics. In that race, she had a quick start but was passed down the stretch by Ai Shibata from Japan.
She took the bronze medal at the women’s 100 m backstroke. She thus became only the second Frenchwoman to win three medals in a single Summer or Winter Olympic Games, the first being was the track and field athlete Micheline Ostermeyer in London in 1948.
Place of birth : France
