Michael Phelps
Michael Phelps
Michael Fred Phelps II is an American competition swimmer and the most decorated Olympian of all time, with a total of 22 medals in three Olympiads. Phelps also holds the all-time records for Olympic gold medals, Olympic gold medals in individual events, and Olympic medals in individual events for a male. In winning eight gold medals at the 2008 Beijing Games, Phelps took the record away from fellow American swimmer Mark Spitzfor the most first-place finishes at any single Olympic...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionSwimmer
Date of Birth30 June 1985
CityBaltimore, MD
CountryUnited States of America
I knew it would take a world record to win this race, ... He was better prepared than I was for this race. The Texas guys have awesome starts and turns -- two things I don't do well. Those are two things I need to improve on before Athens.
I think sometimes I guess you see records, say you want to get there and use that as motivation. In a way, it's kind of cool if there is a possibility to rewrite history and be up there with the greats of Olympic history.
I wanted to get the fastest time in the world this year, but with everything going on, it's a pretty decent swim, ... I knew I was under world record pace. You could tell by the crowd. You can always tell at these meets when something good is going on because of the crowd.
We wanted to see how close we could get to the world record. We'll take that for right now.
Records are always made to be broken no matter what they are. Anybody can do anything that they set their mind to.
With everything that's been going on, it's probably a decent swim for right now.
This was a dream come true for me, ... Ever since I was a little kid, I was dreaming of this. But when I saw Erik over there, it was even more incredible.
There were times I wouldn't come to practice, because it didn't excite me. It wasn't interesting. I was kind of going through the motions.
I wouldn't say anything is impossible. I think that everything is possible as long as you put your mind to it and put the work and time into it.
Bob has clearly stated that he's dropping the bomb on me, ... Hopefully we can change a few things in the upcoming year and improve on this.
Bob and I have gotten into it a number, number of times.
We wanted to split our relays up and see what would happen, ... It was a good way to end the meet.
We wanted to secure the top spot, we wanted to be safe on the relay takeoffs, ... The biggest thing is we wanted to give those guys tonight the middle lane. We expect a fast swim from those four guys.
I'm a little worried about the work. It's a big step up from high school.