Britta Steffen (born November 16, 1983 in Schwedt,
Germany) is a German swimmer who specialises in
freestyle swimming|freestyle, who is a former holder
of the world record in women's 100 metre freestyle.
In 1999 Steffen won six titles at the European
championships,and won a medal of Germany's freestyle
relay team by the summer Olympics 2000. At 2004, she
asked to swim the 4*100m rlay. But after the
Olympics, she took one year off all of swimming and
concentrated on her studies, which weren't finished.
At the Championships in Budapest on August 2, 2006,
Steffen clocked 53.30 in the women's 100m freestyle
event, breaking the world record and upstaging the
previous record of 53.42 set by Libby Lenton of
Australia. Even though Lisbeth Lenton swam a time of
52.99 on April 42007 during the mixed 400 metre
freestyle relay, this time was not recognized by the
FINA as world record, because the race is not
considered to be a FINA event.
At the same championships, Steffen was part of two
world record-breaking relay teams. First, the German
4x100m women's relay team of Dallmann, Goetz,
Steffen and Liebs took the Australian 4x100 Free
relay (Mills, Lenton, Thomas and Henry) world record
of 3:35.94, clocking a time of 3:35.22. The German
women's relay team of Dallman, Samulski, Steffen and
Liebs, then swam a time of 7:50.82 to take the
previous US 4x200 Free relay (Coughlin, Piper,
Vollmer and Sandeno) world record that stood at
7:53.42. She had recently participated in the FINA
World Championships in Melbourne and she placed
third in the 100 metre Freestyle event and placed
second in the 4x200 metre freestyle relay.
