Five takeaways from Olympic swimming prelims in Rio

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RIO DE JANEIRO — Swimmers wrapped up their first session of the Rio Olympics on Saturday afternoon. Heading into Saturday night’s finals — the men’s 400 IM, men’s 400 freestyle, women’s 400 IM and women’s 4x100 freestyle relay, all beginning at 9 p.m. ET — here’s what you need to know:

1. The U.S. swim team should secure its first medal of these Olympic Games pretty quickly. Americans Chase Kalisz and Jay Litherland qualified first and fourth for Saturday night’s 400-meter individual medley final. Kalisz out-touched one of Japan’s stars (Daiya Seto) with an impressive swim to win his heat Saturday morning in 4:08.12 — in what was also his first swim at an Olympics. Kalisz, who trains alongside 22-time Olympic medalist Michael Phelps, said Phelps’ advice to him before the swim was to treat it “just like any other race.”
2. A strange but true fact: This will be the first Olympics since 2000 in which neither Michael Phelps nor Ryan Lochte will swim on the first day of competition. Phelps won gold in the 400 IM in both 2004 and 2008, and Lochte won gold in the same event in 2012. This grueling race has been a source of pride for American men for quite some time; it remains to be seen if Kalisz or Litherland can step up and snatch gold tonight from either Seto or Kosuke Hagino.
3. Katie Ledecky has officially begun her quest for five Olympic medals at these Games. She swam the anchor leg of the women’s 4x100 freestyle relay Saturday afternoon and also had the team’s fastest split by almost an entire second (52.64). It’s not official yet, but we expect that Ledecky will also swim the final tonight. It’ll still be an uphill battle for the Americans, though, considering how strong Australia’s sprinters are. Cate Campbell, who anchored for the Aussies in the prelims, posted an astonishing 51.80 split time as Australia also set an Olympic record in 3:32.39. Should be a fun final tonight.
4. Can Dana Vollmer make history? Vollmer, who gave birth to her son, Arlen, 17 months ago, would be the first American female swimmer to win gold after having a baby if she’s able to successfully defend her gold medal in the women’s 100 butterfly. She had a great morning swim — posting a 56.56, the third-fastest time in the world this year — and won her heat. Vollmer qualified second behind Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom heading into Saturday night’s semifinals. The final is Sunday night.
5. Swimming got its first goosebumps-inducing Olympic moment. Here’s what happened and why.

PHOTOS: SWIMMING IN RIO