Park Tae-hwan

Park Tae-hwan is a retired South Korean competitive freestyle swimmer, born in Seoul on 27 September 1989. He became the first Asian man to win the Olympic 400 metre freestyle when he took gold at the 2008 Beijing Games, where he also won silver in the 200 metre freestyle, and he added two more silver medals in the 200 and 400 metre freestyle at London in 2012. He was also the first South Korean swimmer to win any Olympic medal in the sport. Across his career he collected five world titles and twenty Asian Games medals, and he held three Asian records in freestyle events. He was known for his range from the 100 metres to the 1,500 metres and for very fast reaction times off the block. His career was interrupted by an eighteen month suspension after a positive doping test confirmed in January 2015 that was later traced to an injection given by his doctor.