'Were they training clean?': Ledecky grilled on Titmus hype and calls for transparency in doping scandal

Katie Ledecky "likes her chances" of wrestling back a gold medal from Ariarne Titmus in Sunday's (AEST) glamour 400m freestyle showdown in Paris.

American icon Ledecky, who boasts seven Olympic golds, won the event at Rio 2016 but was dethroned by Australian superfish Titmus in a sensational swim at Tokyo 2020.

Titmus is the favourite to defend her title in France, with another Aussie champion, Grant Hackett, tipping her to "dominate" Ledecky in the event on Stan Sport's Paris Preview.

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But Ledecky didn't get to where she is by shying away from a challenge.

The 27-year-old told a packed Paris press conference that Titmus and Canadian teen sensation Summer McIntosh were simply making her better in the pool.

"I'm looking forward to the 400 free, day one. I like my chances," Ledecky said.

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"I'm prepared and ready to race. Those two have continued to raise the game, raise my game. I know that I have to bring my best.

"I think they know that they have to bring their best, so I think that's what you want in an Olympic race.

"We have the top three times ever in that race, we're the top three performers, I should say, and so that just makes for a great field."

The crack American swim team spoke to reporters for 32 minutes and doping was again a hot topic.

Ledecky said officials still weren't providing satisfactory answers after a bombshell April report that 23 Chinese athletes were allowed to swim in Tokyo despite testing positive to trimetazidine.

Eleven of those swimmers are competing in Paris after the World Anti-Doping Agency accepted the findings of a Chinese investigation that the results were due to contamination from a team hotel kitchen.

"They want transparency, they want further answers to the questions that still remain," Ledecky told reporters.

"At this point, we're here to race. We're going to race whoever is in the lane next to us.

"We're not the ones paid to do the testing. So we hope that the people that are following their own rules and that applies now and into the future.

"We want to see some change for the future so that you don't have to ask us that question. I hope everyone here is going to be competing clean this week.

"But what really matters also is were they training clean?

"So really, hopefully, that has been the case. Hopefully there has been even testing around the world."