On this day in 2008, Michael Phelps won his eighth gold medal in the Beijing Olympics - breaking a 36-year old record in the process.
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Michael Phelps is without a doubt one of the greatest Olympians in the history of the Games. The American swimmer is considered by many as the greatest athlete in Olympics history. It’s not hard to see why; his tally of 28 medals is more than what many nations have cumulatively managed. He also dominated the sport of swimming from 2004-16 in unprecedented fashion. Phelps made collecting gold medals in the sport seem like the easiest thing in the world. What’s more, he was in the game for a long time. People tend to forget that he made his Games’ debut in 2000 as a fifteen-year old!
Nevertheless, if there was any edition of the Games most synonymous with Phelps, it was 2008. The Beijing Games saw him win an unprecedented eight gold medals. Incidentally, the eighth of those medals was won on this very day 13 years ago.
Let us look back at how Phelps did what many had deemed improbable.
The 2004 Olympics saw Phelps announce himself to the world. He won eight medals – 6 gold and 2 bronze. Given he was 19 years old when he accomplished this, the assumption was that he would only get better in time.
As it turns out, the assumption proved spot on – and how. Going into the 4 x 100 m medley event on August 17, 2008, Phelps had already won seven medals – all gold.
This was notable for two reasons. One, he bettered his own gold medal tally from 2004. Secondly, he equalled the record of Mark Spitz who won those many in the 1972 Munich Olympics.
Spitz’s record had stood the test of time until that point. But if there was any swimmer who could break that record, it was Phelps.
The US team were the favourites going into the 4 x 100 m medley event on August 17. Besides Michael Phelps, the team featured Brendan Hansen, Aaron Peirsol, and Jason Lezak.
Not only did the team win the medal, they did so in world record time. They won the gold in a time of 3 minutes and 29.34 seconds.
They finished a whole 0.7 seconds ahead of silver medallists Australia. What’s more, the time was a whole 1.34 seconds faster than the previous world record, also held by the USA.
Yet it wasn’t a case of total domination by USA. Indeed, when Phelps dived in to complete the 100m butterfly leg, which was the third part of the race, USA were behind both Australia and Japan.
But Phelps showcased just why he was already considered in the conversations for best Olympic athlete ever. He finished his leg in 50.1 seconds, which was a record fastest butterfly split for the event.
His swift time also gave teammate Lezak a lead of over half a second going into the final leg. Lezak comfortably kept that lead and Team USA won the gold.
This, of course, meant that Phelps had broken Spitz’s record too. Afterwards he nonchalantly suggested that no record in the world is ever safe.
“Records are always made to be broken no matter what they are. Anybody can do anything that they set their mind to,” Phelps stated.
Spitz, however, was far more effusive in his praise for Phelps. “It goes to show you that not only is this guy the greatest swimmer of all time and the greatest Olympian of all time, he’s maybe the greatest athlete of all time. He’s the greatest racer who ever walked the planet.”
Few would disagree with that.
