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.

It turned into more than that...