Swimming at the 1956 Summer Olympics – Men's 100 metre freestyle


The men's 100 metre freestyle event at the 1956 Olympic Games took place between November 29 and 30.

Competition format

The competition used a three-round format. The advancement rule followed the format introduced in 1952. A swimmer's place in the heat was not used to determine advancement; instead, the fastest times from across all heats in a round were used. There were 5 heats of 6 or 7 swimmers each. The top 16 swimmers advanced to the semifinals. There were 2 semifinals of 8 swimmers each. The top 8 swimmers advanced to the final. Swim-offs were used as necessary to break ties.
This swimming event used freestyle swimming, which means that the method of the stroke is not regulated. Nearly all swimmers use the front crawl or a variant of that stroke. Because an Olympic size swimming pool is 50 metres long, this race consisted of two lengths of the pool.

Results

Heats

Five heats were held, the fastest sixteen swimmers advanced to the Semifinal Round. The swimmers that advanced are highlighted.
RankHeatSwimmerNationTimeNotes
14Reid Patterson56.8,
24Atsushi Tani57.1
33John Devitt57.2
41Jon Henricks57.3
52Manabu Koga57.7
65Gary Chapman57.8
61Dick Hanley57.8
82Aldo Eminente58.0
95Bill Woolsey58.2
103Paolo Pucci58.3
105Ronald Roberts58.3
123Hiroshi Suzuki58.4
123Paul Voell58.4
145Gyula Dobay58.5
144Carlo Pedersoli58.5
162Vitaly Sorokin58.6
175George Park58.8
181Billy Steuart59.2
193Kenneth Williams59.4
203Dennis Ford59.5
211Lev Balandin59.6
222Cheung Kin Man59.8
221Karri Käyhkö59.8
221Hans Köhler59.8
254Haroldo Lara59.9
262Horst Bleeker1:00.1
264Habib Nasution1:00.1
285Dakula Arabani1:00.2
284Alex Jany1:00.2
282Sergio Martínez1:00.2
312Peter Duncan1:00.4
321André Laurent1:00.7
325Wan Shiu Ming1:00.7
343Sri Chand Bajaj1:01.6

Semifinals

Two heats were held; the swimmers with the fastest eight times advanced to the Final Round. The swimmers that advanced are highlighted.
RankHeatSwimmerNationTimeNotes
11Jon Henricks55.7,
22John Devitt56.4
32Gary Chapman56.9
31Dick Hanley56.9
52Reid Patterson57.1
61Atsushi Tani57.4
71Aldo Eminente58.0
72Bill Woolsey58.0
91Hiroshi Suzuki58.0
102Gyula Dobay58.1
102Manabu Koga58.1
121Vitaly Sorokin58.2
132Paul Voell58.6
141Paolo Pucci58.8
152Ronald Roberts58.9
161Carlo Pedersoli59.0

Final

RankSwimmerNationTimeNotes
Jon Henricks55.4
John Devitt55.8
Gary Chapman56.7
4Reid Patterson57.2
5Dick Hanley57.6
6Bill Woolsey57.6
7Atsushi Tani58.0
8Aldo Eminente58.1