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

Women's 100 metre freestyle at the Games of the XVI Olympiad
Venue	Swimming and Diving Stadium
Date	29 November (heats) 30 November (semifinals) 1 December (final)
Competitors	35 from 16 nations
Winning time	1:02.0 (WR)
Medalists
Dawn Fraser  Australia Lorraine Crapp  Australia Faith Leech  Australia

Swimming at the 1956 Summer Olympics
Freestyle
100 m	men		women
400 m	men		women
1500 m	men
Backstroke
100 m	men		women
Breaststroke
200 m	men		women
Butterfly
100 m			women
200 m	men
Freestyle relay
4×100 m			women
4×200 m	men

The women's 100 metre freestyle event at the 1956 Olympic Games took place from November 29 to December 1. This swimming event used freestyle swimming, which means that the method of the stroke is not regulated (unlike backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly events). 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.

Records

Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were:

World record	Lorraine Crapp (AUS)	1:02.4 s	Melbourne, Australia	25 October 1956
Olympic record	Judit Temes (HUN)	1:05.5 s	Helsinki, Finland	26 July 1952

The following records were established during the competition:

Date	Round	Name	Nationality	Time	OR	WR
November 29	Heat 1	Lorraine Crapp	Australia	1:03.4	OR
November 29	Heat 5	Dawn Fraser	Australia	1:02.4	OR
December 1	Final	Dawn Fraser	Australia	1:02.0	OR	WR

Results

Heats

Rank	Heat	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	5	Dawn Fraser	Australia	1:02.4	Q, OR
2	1	Lorraine Crapp	Australia	1:03.4	Q, OR
3	4	Faith Leech	Australia	1:04.9	Q
4	5	Natalie Myburgh	23x15px South Africa	1:05.1	Q
5	5	Virginia Grant	23x15px Canada	1:05.1	Q
6	5	Shelley Mann	United States	1:05.4	Q
7	1	Joan Rosazza	United States	1:05.5	Q
8	3	Marrion Roe	New Zealand	1:05.9	Q
9	4	Zsuzsa Ördögh	Hungary	1:06.5	Q
9	2	Nancy Simons	United States	1:06.5	Q
11	3	Valéria Gyenge	Hungary	1:06.6	Q
12	1	Helen Stewart	23x15px Canada	1:07.1	Q
13	1	Jeanette Myburgh	23x15px South Africa	1:07.1	Q
14	4	Kate Jobson	Sweden	1:07.3	Q
15	3	Birgit Klomp	Germany	1:07.7	Q
16	4	Susan Roberts	23x15px South Africa	1:07.9	Q
17	2	Katalin Szőke	Hungary	1:08.0
18	4	Christel Steffin	Germany	1:08.1
19	2	Kati Jansen	Germany	1:08.3
20	1	Anita Hellström	Sweden	1:08.5
20	5	Frances Hogben	Great Britain	1:08.5
22	2	Odile Vouaux	France	1:08.6
23	2	Fearne Ewart	Great Britain	1:08.8
23	3	Héda Frost	France	1:08.8
23	4	Hitomi Jinno	Japan	1:08.8
26	1	Irène Sweyd	Belgium	1:08.9
27	4	Gladys Priestley	23x15px Canada	1:09.2
28	3	Blanca Barrón	Mexico	1:09.5
29	5	Ginette Jany-Sendral	France	1:09.9
30	3	Yoshiko Sato	Japan	1:10.3
30	5	Shoshana Rivner	Israel	1:10.3
32	1	Winifred Griffin	New Zealand	1:10.4
33	2	Setsuko Shimada	Japan	1:11.8
34	1	Margaret Northrop	Kenya	1:12.8
35	3	Gertrudez Lozada	23x15px Philippines	1:13.7

Semifinals

Rank	Heat	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	1	Dawn Fraser	Australia	1:03.0	Q
2	2	Lorraine Crapp	Australia	1:03.1	Q
3	1	Faith Leech	Australia	1:05.2	Q
4	2	Marrion Roe	New Zealand	1:05.3	Q
5	2	Virginia Grant	23x15px Canada	1:05.5	Q
6	2	Shelley Mann	United States	1:05.5	Q
7	1	Joan Rosazza	United States	1:05.9	Q
8	1	Natalie Myburgh	23x15px South Africa	1:06.0	Q
9	2	Nancy Simons	United States	1:06.1
10	2	Kate Jobson	Sweden	1:06.1
11	1	Valéria Gyenge	Hungary	1:06.4
12	2	Susan Roberts	23x15px South Africa	1:06.6
13	2	Jeanette Myburgh	23x15px South Africa	1:06.7
14	1	Zsuzsa Ördögh	Hungary	1:06.9
15	1	Helen Stewart	23x15px Canada	1:06..9
16	1	Birgit Klomp	Germany	1:07.9

Final

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
	Dawn Fraser	Australia	1:02.0	WR
	Lorraine Crapp	Australia	1:02.4
	Faith Leech	Australia	1:05.1
4	Joan Rosazza	23x15px South Africa	1:05.2
5	Virginia Grant	23x15px Canada	1:05.4
6	Shelley Mann	United States	1:05.6
7	Marrion Roe	New Zealand	1:05.6
8	Natalie Myburgh	23x15px South Africa	1:05.8

Key: WR = World record