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Reliving Michael Phelps’ journey to 19

When Michael Phelps swam the last leg of the relay for the American team, he knew there was one thing for certain – he will be listed as the greatest sports athlete ever.

Calm and composed as his true self, Phelps swam the last 200m with ease, thereby leaving his indelible mark on every possible record he wanted. After the 4x200m relay, he accomplished a feat no human has achieved before – he has won 19 Olympic medals.

Meanwhile, after winning the silver medal at the 200m Butterfly, Phelps had equaled Soviet gymnast, Larisa Latynina’s record of the most medals ever won by an Olympian. The 19 medals that he has won will now validate who the greatest sportsman/woman ever is, and not many can refute that. The title now definitely belongs to Michael Phelps. In fact, nobody in the near future seems even a little certain that this will ever be repeated.

From his first medal at Athens in 2004, till his 19th hoorah at London, here, in this article, we shall take a look at every one of those 19 medals he won – those 19 that helped us realize that we witnessed a true global sporting icon rewrite history books.

Athens 2004

  1. Gold and WR in 400m Individual Medley

Phelps finished three seconds clear of his compatriot Erik Vendt and four seconds ahead of his future rival in Beijing, Laszlo Cseh. The Baltimore Bullet was a clear cut favorite to win this event comfortably. 18 more to go!

Bronze in 4x100m Freestyle Relay

Michael Phelps’ good friend and butterfly mate, Ian Crocker gave what many critics describe as the worst start for the American team. When Crocker finished his leg, the Americans were far behind the rest of the competition and hence, to finish third was considered an achievement. Ronald Schoemen, the best short distance freestyle swimmer at the time, and the South Africans bagged the gold medal whereas the Netherlands finished second – an inch ahead of Team America.

Bronze in 200m Freestyle

Termed the Race of the Century, the competition on the final event for Phelps featured Ian Thorpe (Phelps’ childhood idol) and Pieter van den Hoogenband. Phelps, who initially did not participate in this event during the American team trials, was vehement to compete against his swimming idol. Despite him finishing third to Australian, Thorpe and van den Hoogenband, Phelps exclaimed his joy in having competed against the best freestyle swimmers of his generation.

Gold and OR in 200m Butterfly

Michael Phelps went on to break Tom Malchow’s Olympic record with a time of 1:54:04. Irrelevant to his victory, the world first got a glimpse of Asian supremacy through Takashi Yamamoto, whose performance was termed as inspiration to Asian swimmers today.

Gold and NR in 4x200m Freestyle Relay

An hour after a WR performance in the 200m Fly event, Phelps along with Ryan Lochte, Klete Keller and Peter Vanderkaay finished the combined 800m relay race in a time of 7:07:33, beating Ian Thorpe and Australia who were just 13 milliseconds behind. The Americans were vindictive to seek revenge following their split second loss to the Aussies in the Sydney Olympics.

Gold and OR in 200m Individual Medley

Two days after a hectic night at the pool for Phelps, Mr. “I break too many records” came out to beat compatriot and best bud, Ryan Lochte with an Olympic Record time of 1:57:14. His first three splits in the medley were well within WR time but however, a relaxed finish and weak competition from his opponents at the end stopped MP from breaking another World Record.

Gold and WR in 100m Butterfly

Ian Crocker, who held the world record before the race, said he favored himself highly unlikely to beat Phelps’ momentum. Well, that’s exactly what happened. By a fraction of a second, Phelps beat Crocker and won the gold with that setting a new world record. This victory also gave Phelps an automatic entry into the finals of the 4x100m individual relay but he deferred as a sign of gesture to let Crocker win that elusive gold.

Gold and WR in 4x100m Medley Relay

Since Phelps took part in the preliminary rounds of the relay, he was awarded the medal after a world record performance from Crocker and the American Team. With this, Phelps won more gold medals in an Olympic Games than any athlete, par Mark Spitz. Many dubbed him to come back to Beijing and tie Spitz’s long lasting 7 gold medals record from Munich ’72.

Beijing 2008

Gold and WR in 400m Individual Medley

Michael Phelps began Beijing with a bang. A short while after setting a new World Record in the preliminary heats, Phelps itched closer to Spitz’s record by winning this event in another World Record time, bettering his own feat by two seconds. Ironically, the men who finished third in this event would go onto seek revenge from Phelps, four years later at London.

Gold and WR in 4×100 Freestyle Relay

Hadn’t it been for Jason Lezak who swam the lap of the Olympics to beat Alain Bernard and the French in the final lap of this race, Phelps’ dreams would have been shattered. Lezak began with more than half a body width behind Bernard but made it up during the final stretch of the race. Phelps’ celebration after the race only justified how nerve=wracking the encounter was. 2/8 = 75% to go.

Gold and WR in 200m Freestyle

Phelps, who already held the world record in this event, beat Korean, Park Tae-Hwan. At the end of this race, Michael Phelps won 9 gold medals – a feat achieved by only five other humans, one being Mark Spitz.

Gold and WR in 200m Butterfly

A day after winning his third gold medal at Beijing, Phelps was raring guns to give a shot at his fourth. The Flying Fish as he is called by his beloved fans nearly lost the race when his goggles were filled up with water for the last 100m. However, he managed to beat Hungarian, Cseh by seven-tenths of a second, thereby recording another World Record time.

Gold and WR in 4x200m Freestyle Relay

An hour earlier, he was at the podium claiming his gold medal from the 200m Butterfly. Now, he was part of the American team and spearheaded the defense of their gold from Athens. Breaking another record, Team USA now became the first team swimming the 4×200 relay in less than seven minutes.

Gold and WR in 200m Individual Medley

Equaling his personal record of 6 gold medals from Beijing, MP raced Cseh and Lochte to another world record time, breaking it by a massive two seconds. Tired of counting, eh? MP now stands on 12 Gold Medals and 14 Olympic Medals.

Gold and WR in 100m Butterfly

Phelps would go onto sing the “Star Spangled Banner” for a record 13th time at the Olympics, and for the seventh time at Beijing. However, his finish ahead of Serbian, Milorad Cavic stirred controversy on who touched the wall first. Omega came out to say that Phelps won the race because he used more force than Cavic to touch the wall whereas few images indicated Cavic to clearly be behind Phelps at finish.

Despite protests from the Serbian contingent to review the finish, Phelps was declared as the winner and equaled Mark Spitz’ 36-year-long Olympic Record of seven gold medals in a single Olympic Games. As expected, media fervor hyped Phelps’ relationship with Omega since he was one of their endorsers and this raised more questions over MP’s seventh gold medal at the Chinese capital.

Cavic soon wrote in his blog, “People, this is the greatest moment of my life. If you ask me, it should be accepted and we should move on. I’ve accepted defeat, and there’s nothing wrong with losing to the greatest swimmer there has ever been.”

Three Olympic Games and finally, Phelps levels Spitz’s record – the question was will he go one better?

Gold and WR in 4x100m Medley Relay

Aaron Peirsol, Brendan Hansen, Jason Lezak and Michael Phelps took on the challenge to complete the latter’s challenge to win eight gold medals in an Olympics. MP’s dream finally came true when Lezak swam and held onto the lead which Phelps won following a split 50.1 seconds butterfly in the third leg of the race – the fastest ever for the event. History saw itself unfold when Michael Phelps – soon to become the greatest Olympian ever – achieved what no man thought was possible: win 8 gold medals in one Games.

Speaking at a press conference, Phelps highlighted the value of his coach, Bob Bowman, who he knew since the age of 11. He further mentioned his mother and sisters for sticking by him through all the rough times. Asked what is his biggest motivation was, Phelps quoted Ian Thorpe who believed he can’t win eight medals because of the tough competition in today’s swimming.

Shortly afterwards, Mark Spitz spoke with ESPN and described Michael Phelps as the greatest sports athlete and racer to walk on this planet.

London 2012

Silver in 4x100m Freestyle Relay

Phelps, following a disastrous Individual Medley performance, swam the first leg of the race. His time was bettered by nobody except France’s Yannick Agnel who swam the victory leg of the race, edging past Ryan Lochte. Michael Phelps now had 17 medals and was destined for glory.

Silver in 200m Butterfly

This being Michael’s trademark event, Phelps was considered a heavy favorite and looked sure to win his first gold at London. While his 18th medal was confirmed, a young South African named Chad le Clos stunned the swimming world by capturing gold. 5/100th of a second proved to be the difference here.

1 more to go, Michael, one more!

Gold in 4x200m Freestyle Relay

Four Olympic Games and 21 races later, Michael Phelps won his 19th medal. First went Ryan Lochte, then went Conor Dwyer after which swam Ricky Berens. Irrespective of what they swam, there was only one man stealing the limelight. Finally, Michael Phelps surpassed the only record he wished he passed a while ago – the most Olympics medals by an athlete.

Six minutes, 59 seconds and 70 milliseconds – that is how much it took Michael Phelps to win his 19th Olympic Medal and his 15th gold.

Michael Phelps – will there ever be a man more invincible than this Baltimore native?

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