Swimming at the 2000 Summer Olympics – Men's 4 × 200 metre freestyle relay
The men's 4×200 metre freestyle relay event at the 2000 Summer Olympics took place on 19 September at the Sydney International Aquatic Centre in Sydney, Australia.
After defeating the Americans to capture the 4×100 m freestyle relay title four days earlier, the Australians added another relay gold medal to their hardware in the event by the delight of a raucous home crowd. Dominating the race from start to finish, the Aussie foursome of Ian Thorpe, Michael Klim, Todd Pearson, and Bill Kirby posted a sterling time of 7:07.05 to demolish a new world record and cut off the former Soviet Union's 1992 Olympic standard by almost four seconds.
Team USA's Scott Goldblatt, Josh Davis, Jamie Rauch sent Klete Keller to be an anchor for a second-place battle. Trailing behind the Dutch and the Italians with only 25 metres left, Keller fought off a tight challenge with a split of 1:47.75 to snatch the silver for the Americans in 7:12.64. Meanwhile, the Netherlands moved from fifth-place turns by Martijn Zuijdweg, Johan Kenkhuis, and Marcel Wouda to race on the final stretch for the bronze in 7:12.70, after producing a superb anchor of 1:44.88, the fastest split of all time, set by Olympic champion Pieter van den Hoogenband.
The Italian team of Andrea Beccari, Matteo Pelliciari, Emiliano Brembilla, and Massimiliano Rosolino missed the podium with a fourth-place time of 7:12.91, holding off the fast-pacing Brits' Edward Sinclair, Paul Palmer, Marc Spackman, and James Salter by seven-hundredths of a second. Germany, Canada, and Russia rounded out the championship finale.
Records
Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.The following new world and Olympic records were set during this competition.
| Date | Event | Name | Nationality | Time | Record |
| September 19 | Final | Ian Thorpe Michael Klim Todd Pearson Bill Kirby | 7:07.05 |
Results
Heats
| Rank | Heat | Lane | Nation | Swimmers | Time | Notes |
| 1 | 2 | 4 | Grant Hackett Bill Kirby Todd Pearson Daniel Kowalski | 7:14.27 | Q | |
| 2 | 1 | 4 | Chad Carvin Nate Dusing Jamie Rauch Klete Keller | 7:17.22 | Q | |
| 3 | 1 | 5 | Andrea Beccari Klaus Lanzarini Simone Cercato Matteo Pelliciari | 7:17.69 | Q | |
| 4 | 2 | 3 | Heiko Hell Michael Kiedel Christian Keller Stefan Herbst | 7:19.95 | Q | |
| 5 | 2 | 6 | Martijn Zuijdweg Mark van der Zijden Johan Kenkhuis Marcel Wouda | 7:20.67 | Q | |
| 6 | 2 | 5 | James Salter Andrew Clayton Marc Spackman Edward Sinclair | 7:20.69 | Q | |
| 7 | 1 | 3 | Mark Johnston Brian Johns Mike Mintenko Rick Say | 7:21.45 | Q | |
| 8 | 1 | 6 | Andrey Kapralov Aleksey Yegorov Sergey Lavrenov Dmitry Chernyshov | 7:23.58 | Q | |
| 9 | 2 | 2 | Dragoș Coman Cezar Bădiță Răzvan Florea Ioan Gherghel | 7:24.06 | ||
| 10 | 1 | 1 | Attila Czene Zsolt Gáspár Jácint Simon Bela Szabados | 7:24.48 | NR | |
| 11 | 2 | 7 | Jacob Carstensen Henrik Steen Andersen Jeppe Nielsen Dennis Otzen Jensen | 7:24.63 | ||
| 12 | 1 | 7 | Igor Koleda Pavel Lagoun Dmitry Koptur Valeryan Khuroshvili | 7:24.83 | ||
| 13 | 1 | 2 | Edvaldo Silva Filho Leonardo Costa Luiz Lima Rodrigo Castro | 7:26.42 | ||
| 14 | 2 | 1 | Sergey Fesenko Igor Snitko Artem Goncharenko Rostyslav Svanidze | 7:32.16 | ||
| 15 | 2 | 8 | Athanasios Oikonomou Dimitrios Manganas Spyridon Bitsakis Spyridon Gianniotis | 7:35.77 | ||
| 1 | 8 | Andrei Pakin Dmitri Kuzmin Aleksandr Shilin Ivan Ivanov |