Summer Olympics: 400m winning times 1896-2020

The 400 meter sprint has been featured in every Olympic Games for men since Athens 1896, while the women's event was introduced in 1964. Michael Johnson of the United States is the only male athlete to have won the event twice, while Marie-José Pérec of France and Shaunae Miller-Uibo of the Bahamas are the only women to have done so. U.S. sprinter Valerie Brisco-Hooks (in 1984), along with Johnson and Pérec (in 1996), are the only athletes to have won the 400m and 200m double, while Cuban runner Alberto Juantorena (in 1976) is the only athlete to have won both the 400m and 800m events. The current men's world record was set in the 2016 Olympics by South Africa's Wayde van Niekerk, while Pérec still holds the women's Olympic record she set in 1996, although the world record of 47.6 seconds, set by Marita Koch (Olympic gold winner in 1980), has stood since 1985. Male athletes from the United States have claimed the gold the most times, with 19 gold medals in total, while the women's event has been won by athletes from a wider variety of nations.

Gold medal winning times in the Men's and Women's 400m Sprint at the Summer Olympics from 1896 to 2020 (in seconds)

Year	Men	Women
Tokyo 2020	43.85	48.36
Rio 2016	43.03	49.44
London 2012	43.94	49.55
Beijing 2008	43.75	49.62
Athens 2004	44	49.41
Sydney 2000	43.84	49.11
Atlanta 1996	43.49	48.25
Barcelona 1992	43.5	48.83
Seoul 1988	43.87	48.65
Los Angeles 1984	44.27	48.83
Moscow 1980	44.6	48.88
Montreal 1976	44.26	49.29
Munich 1972	44.66	51.08
Mexico City 1968	43.8	52
Tokyo 1964	45.1	52
Rome 1960	44.9	-
Melbourne 1956	46.7	-
Helsinki 1952	45.9	-
London 1948	46.2	-
Berlin 1936	46.5	-
Los Angeles 1932	46.2	-
Amsterdam 1928	47.8	-
Paris 1924	47.6	-
Antwerp 1920	49.6	-
Stockholm 1912	48.2	-
London 1908	50	-
St. Louis 1904	49.2	-
Paris 1900	49.4	-
Athens 1896	54.2	-

Loading statistic...

Download

Source

Show detailed source information?

Already a member?

Sources

Use Ask Statista Research Service

Release date

2021

More information

Region

Worldwide

Survey time period

1896 to 2021

Supplementary notes

This data was collected using the official Olympic.org site, as well as a spreadsheet from the Guardian that includes data from 1896-2008 (available here), 2012 and 2016 data was compared with that from Encyclopaedia Britannica, and several news outlets were used to update the table when medals were reassigned (i.e. for doping offenses).

The winning athletes (male listed first) and their represented countries are as follows:
1896 - Thomas Burke (US)
1900 - Maxwell Warburn Long (US)
1904 - Harry Hillman (Canada)
1908 - Wyndham Halswelle (Great Britain)
1912 - Charles Reidpath (US)
1920 - Bevil Rudd (South Africa)
1924 - Eric Liddell (Great Britain)
1928 - Raymond James Barbuti (US)
1932 - William Arthur Carr (US)
1936 - Archibald Franklin Williams (US)
1948 - Arthur Wint (Jamaica)
1952 - George Rhoden (Jamaica)
1956 - Charles Jenkins (US)
1960 - Otis Davis (US)
1964 - Mike Larrabee (US) & Betty Cuthbert (Australia)
1968 - Lee Evans (US) & Colette Besson (France)
1972 - Vince Matthews (US) & Monika Zehrt (East Germany)
1976 - Alberto Juantorena (Cuba) & Irena Kirszenstein (USSR)
1980 - Viktor Markin (USSR) & Marita Koch (East Germany)
1984 - Alonzo Babers (US) & Valerie Brisco (US)
1988 - Steve Lewis (US) & Olga Bryzgina (USSR)
1992 - Quincy Watts (US) & Marie-José Pérec (France)
1996 - Michael Johnson (US) & Marie-José Pérec (France)
2000 - Michael Johnson (US) & Cathy Freeman (Australia)
2004 - Jeremy Wariner (US) & Tonique Williams-Darling (Bahamas)
2008 - LaShawn Merritt (US) & Christine Ohuruogu (Great Britain)
2012 - Kirani James (Grenada) & Sanya Richards-Ross (US)
2016 - Wayde Van Niekerk (South Africa) & Shaunae Miller (Bahamas)
2020 - Steven Gardiner (Bahamas) & Shaunae Miller-Uibo (Bahamas)