The 19-year-old from Cardiff, racing in his first Olympic final, finished just five strokes behind Grant Hackett, the Australian world record holder and defending champion, and only 0.66sec shy of the silver medal, which went to American Larsen Jensen.
Where the 18-year-old American was chasing a million-dollar prize if he beat Hackett, Davies, 19, was racing for the reputation of the Great Britain team. His medal fulfils performance director’s Bill Sweetenham’s prophecy that the team would return home with just two medals.
No man beyond Hackett, 24, and fellow Australian Kieran Perkins, the 1992 and 1996 Olympic champion, had ever dipped below 14min 50sec before. But in a battle of David and the Goliaths of distance freestyle, Hackett defended his title in an Olympic record of 14min 43.40sec, with Jensen, 18, and Davies following home in the third and fourth fastest times ever, 14min 45.29sec and 14min 45.95sec.
“I’m surprised at that time, I didn’t think we were going that quick,” Davies said. With his parents cheering him from the stands, he also became the first British swimmer to hold the European record over 1500m since Scot Ian Black in 1958. He and Jensen were drawn into uncharted waters by Hackett, who won the race by the initial sprint that gave him a 4m lead over the first 50m, and the sprint that brought him home to the title down the last 50m. There was nothing to split the medal winners in the middle of the race, as they clocked a 59-second average every 100m. A few weeks before the Games, Davies, European junior champion, had been clocking sub 58second splits, a touch under what was needed to match Hackett’s world record of 14min 34.56sec.
After finishing sixth in 15min 9.71sec, Britain’s Graeme Smith “I wish to pay tribute to him,” Sweetenham said. “He has been ranked in the top 10 in the world in his event for the past 11 years. That is outstanding,” Davies also paid tribute to Smith, whom he said had provided the inspiration to work hard towards his achievement last night.
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The medley relays brought events in the pool to a thrilling climax. World records fell to Australian women in 3min 57.32sec, and American men, in 3min 30.68sec — and also to Aaron Peirsol, who led his team with a world record of 53.45sec on the opening backstroke leg.
Germany’s quartets took the men’s silver and the women’s bronze in European record times of 3min 33.62sec and 4min 00.72sec. Britain’s women finished fifth with 4min 4.39sec, but were disqualified for a faulty takeover.
Davies’s medal ensured that the British team left the pool in high spirits after a week with many lows, but still a threefold improvement on the number of finalists and semi-finalists at Sydney 2000.