The men's 1500 metre freestyle event at the 2024 World Aquatics Swimming Championships (25 m) was held on 10 December 2024 at the Duna Arena in Budapest, Hungary.
Records.
Prior to the competition, the existing world and championship records were as follows.
Background.
Florian Wellbrock of Germany headlined the men’s 1500 metre freestyle field as the world record holder, having set a mark of 14:06.88 in 2021. Since then, his fastest time was 14:25.41 from 2022, leaving questions about his current form. France’s Damien Joly, silver medalist at the 2022 Short Course World Championships, entered with a national record of 14:19.62 and made the Olympic final in Paris. Hungary's Zalán Sárkány (14:23.31), along with Tunisia’s Ahmed Jaouadi (14:24.68), posted competitive times over the previous year. Both were Olympic finalists in Paris. Seventeen-year-olds Kuzey Tunçelli (14:38.61) and Kazushi Imafuku (14:36.32), from Turkey and Japan, respectively, also featured. Imafuku won the 1500 m at the Singapore World Cup. Other entries included Sven Schwarz, Luca De Tullio, Victor Johansson, and Charlie Clark. Kirill Martynychev, competing as a neutral athlete, entered with a personal best of 14:25.24 set at the 2024 Russian Short Course Championships.
"SwimSwam" predicted Jaouadi would win, Wellbrock would come second, and Sárkány would come third.
Results.
The slowest heats were started at 11:45, and the fastest heat at 18:50.