Carson Foster, 13-time All-American with Texas Longhorns, wins bronze at Paris Olympics

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Three-year Texas Longhorns swimmer Carson Foster captured the bronze medal in the 400-meter individual medley Sunday at the 2024 Paris Olympics.

Foster pushed past Great Britain's Max Litchfield in the final 50 meters to capture his first Olympic medal, finishing with a time of 4 minutes, 8.66 seconds. Litchfield was in silver medal position at the 350-meter mark but fell off the pace as Foster and Japan's Tomoyuki Matsushita made moves to get on the podium. Matsushita edged Foster for silver with a time of 4:08.62.

"There are so many people that deserve to have the medal with me, and I'm excited to go back and celebrate with them," he said. "It feels so good, so awesome to soak that up."

France's Leon Marchand turned in an Olympic record time of 4:02.95, leading wire-to-wire to win gold in front of his home fans at Paris La Defense Arena. Marchand trained under current Longhorns head swimming coach Bob Bowman while at Arizona State University.

Foster will swim in the 200 IM qualifying round at 4:44 a.m. CDT, Aug. 1. The semifinals are scheduled for 2:35 p.m., Aug. 1 with the finals at 1:43 p.m., Aug. 2.

Foster swam for the Longhorns from 2020-23 and helped the school win the 2021 NCAA national championship. He turned professional following the 2022-23 season at Texas. He ended up a 13-time All-American with three national titles in the 800 freestyle relay with the Longhorns.