23-year-old underdog American swimmer overcomes huge deficit and wins gold by a fingertip

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American swimmer Maya Dirado pulled off one of the best comebacks of the entire Olympics on Friday, winning the gold medal in the 200-meter backstroke by .04 seconds, a mere fingertip over Hungarian swimmer and heavy favorite Katinka Hosszu. 

Hosszu entered the race with three gold medals, won in dominating fashion, and raced out to a body-length lead in the 200. 

Here's Hosszu's lead earlier in the race:

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But Hozzu wouldn't go away, using a big underwater kick on the final turn to bring herself closer to Hosszu. 

Still, in the final few strokes it looked like Hosszu would win once more. They came to the wall together, and Dirado's fingertips touched first.

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Earlier this Olympics, Dirado took home a bronze in the 400m IM, while Hosszu set a world record en route to gold. Dirado also won a gold as part of the 4x200m. The Stanford grad and future McKinsey employee, who is 23 and married, now adds an individual gold to her impressive tally.

 

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