The Greatest women's distance race in history? You bet. It was neck and neck all the way to an 8:05.62 victory for Katie Ledecky, Empress of Endurance, in an epic three-way thriller of an 800m freestyle here in Singapore this evening.

It was as if the fastest 800m race in history, three women under 8:08; one on 8:12, another 8:15, an 8:18, an 8:20 and, last home, an 8:26, from Japan's Ichika Kajimoto, the champion of the 3km knockout over at Sentosa for the open water events the week before last.

It was if a dam of potential backing up behind Ledecky for 13 years had finally spilled to quench the 800's wait for new growth fit for a new season.

Worth repeating:

• Gold: 8:05.62 Katie Ledecky – championship record
• Silver: 8:05.98 Lani Pallister (AUS) - Oceania record, inside Ledecky's former championship record - and 10-sec chopped off her best this year
• Bronze: 8:07.29 Summer McIntosh (CAN) - also inside Ledecky's former championship record
• Fourth: 8:12.81 Simona Quadarella (ITA) European record

The 16-length race had been billed as a clash of:

• Ledecky, the unbeaten American queen of distance swimming aiming for a record seventh 800m World title; vs
• McIntosh, a prodigious and versatile teenage talent on the ascent as a three-times Olympic champion in Paris at the age of 17 who last month confirmed she would challenge Ledecky in her signature event for the first time. She had clocked a Commonwealth record of 8:05.09 at Canadian trials, within a second of Ledecky's freshly minted 8mins 04.12 World record, set this spring nine years after she had taken the pioneering pace of 800m down to low 8:04 for the first time.

The gauntlet chucked, Pallister, coached this season by Dean Boxall at St Peters Western after years under the guidance of her mother Janelle Elford, a 1980s Olympic distance freestyle swimmer for Australia - jumped down to an 8:10 on the clock at Australian trials.

Not only might she be a third challenger on the edge of the fight but she would bring a touch of swim royalty to the party: she's the goddaughter of Aussie legend of sprint swimming Dawn Fraser ... and feisty comes with the territory it seems. Certainly, it soon became clear that Pallister would not be playing second fiddle.

To cut a long story of splits short (check the result sheet below to confirm the constant closeness of a neck-and-neck), Ledecky was the pace-setter and quarry the whole way, rivals either side of her riding on the American's wave.

Just as it was with Lotte Friis in their tremendous battle over 1500m back in 2013, and just as it was when Ledecky fell ill in 2019 bit recovered well enough to take on Quadarella over 800m in trying circumstances, the now winner of 40 gold medals, 11 silver and three bronzes in Stars and Stripes since 2012, proved the ultimate racer among ultimate racers this day.

The three fighters were so evenly matched and barely budging in the tight queue of middle lanes that the surge from McIntosh, and her fast flip into the turn with 100m was as tangible as the 0.14sec by which the Canadian teen got her feet on the wall.

Was the tide about to turn in the sprint for home? The only same-event four-times Olympic champion in women's swimming history had the answer: you shall not pass!

Ledecky, coached by history man Anthony Nesty (1988 Olympic 100m, butterfly champion and the first black swimmer ever to claim Olympic gold in his sport) at the Florida Gators, hit back immediately with a pugilistic fervour that all but parted the water in a way Moses himself would have been proud of, as she drove her head to the helm of pace once more.

Never having played hunter, Ledecky leapt back into the role of hunted like a leopard hanging on to its spots. Those few, at most, metres into and out of the turn the only stretch of water in the battle that Ledecky relinquished the part she's played so well: the greatest quarry in the women's distance freestyle pool.

So bruising was the battle that McIntosh, who excels on all four strokes, her strength to be found in 200 and 400m events, got half way home down the last length still in contention before it became clear that 800m was about 25m too far for the growing star of mid-distance versatility in a cliffhanger with the queen, and now lady in waiting, of 800-1500 swimming.

It says much for the blistering nature of the three-way that among things barely noticed at first was an 8:12.81 European record from Simona Quaderalla that took down the 8:14.10 in which Rebecca Adlington set the continental mark for gold at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games four years before a 15-year-old called Katie Ledecky broke British hearts when she took the title from her at London 2012.

Here's the result

We'll be talking about this moment for decades to come. The American lifted her seventh World title in the 16-length race since 2013. That tally is an all-time, all-events record haul for the global showcase event dating back to 1973. You might find a run of seven titles in the same event over 12 years in a local backwater somewhere in world swimming - but at elite, world-class level, never before.

At a press conference, Ledecky said:

“It was a fabulous race, 8:07.29 getting third, that’s under the championship record. We had such a fast field in there. And I remember when I set the goal to break 8:10.00, and at the time I think that was a really crazy goal. And now to see three in one heat under that is awesome and it was really fun to be a part of it."

“Of course, (it was) stressful at times, you get 36 hours in between preliminaries and finals, and I don't know about you (turning to Lani P, but you feel like you’re sitting around twiddling your thumbs, waiting for the race to come. But I was excited just to be there and to be at these world championships and to finish out the season on that note.”

Her plaudits will bounce back at her throughout life: Ledecky has been the magnet that drew towards her the very talent she met head on today. That's world-class sport.

And should anyone feel there's a sense of 'disappointment in a bronze for young McIntosh, consider that 8:07 and the pressure off a race with Ledecky and Pallister and all of that any which way round for each athletes - and then let's take a very brief dip into the history spilling from all sides of the race:

• it was Ledecky who broke British hearts at London 2012 when she took Becky Adlkinbgron’s 800 crown from her at just 15 years of age. Since then, the American has won every subsequent 800m title. She matched Fraser’s pioneering three golds at consecutive games in Tokyo and then in Paris last year became the first to make it four in a row.
• They may call it the “Singapore Sling of swimming” but whatever term emerges as the popular description of the greatest women's distance race ever, there's one aspect of the actual so-called “Race of the Century”, at the Athens 2004 Olympic Games, that draws the eye. That race delivered a young Michael Phelps to the den of the mighty Thorpey (Australia’s Ian Thorpe) and Hoogie (The Netherlands' Pieter van den Hoogenband) over 200m freestyle. The young American emerged with a bronze medal that then helped to fuel the greatest Olympic career in history.

Perhaps McIntosh will be the young Canadian to whom something similar happens. When she leaves Singapore, with a soaring campaign in the vault and a stack of valuable experiences and lessons in her armoury, she'll be waving farewell to coach Brent Arckey - a mentor who has done a phenomenal job with his team at Sarasota Sharks - and down the line heading to Phelps' mentor Bob Bowman in Texas - a mentor with a stack of experience from his Golden Rules days and the steep learning curve he travelled on with the G.O.A.T.

Meanwhile, the champion anew was asked what was going through her head over the last 200m. Ledecky replied:

“I think the whole last 200, I just kept telling myself to trust my legs. Believe it or not, I’ve actually gotten a little better at kicking, which, you know, I kind of got tired of everyone saying I don’t kick, so finally got a little better at that. And just at the end, I kind of just kept telling myself ‘trust, trust, trust’. I had to go the whole way. The last 100, I don't know what you felt, but it’s like you don’t want to push it too early, because then you get a little afraid that you're going to die at the end. So it was definitely just trying to build into each 100 and yeah, just keep going.”

Pride was mentioned. Was she proud to have stood tall in the face of a towering challenge? Here's her great answer, with my favourite gem no longer hidden highlighted: “This is my favourite event. It was my first gold. Even in practice, if I’m doing 800s, I kind of tell myself that.

"I kind of have this fake rule that I don’t lose 800s. So whenever we’re doing 800s in practice, that’s when I really try to get up there with Bobby, and I tell myself that. It's my favourite event. It probably always will be. I love the mile as well. But you know, the first event that you do something special in is always going to mean a little more. And yeah, I'm happy with this.”

Registered readers can read on as we reflect what unfolded at a press conference with Ledecky and Pallister in the conference room adjacent to the media work room in the presence of Ledecky's parents, Mary Gen and David - and what a pleasure it was to meet them.

The place was buzzing with the energy generated from an unmissable race at a pioneering pace ... so, here we go... and below the quotes from the athletes, a table of Ledecky's complete medals record event by events, year by year throughout her entire career.