One down, seven to go. Michael Phelps, of the United States, trounced the
opposition in the first of his eight events at the Water Cube breaking the
400m individual medley with a world record of 4min 3.84sec. Beijing is about
one or two highlights for most athletes. For Phelps it is about eight steps
to the temple of heaven in the pantheon of greats. His efforts here could go
down as the greatest single sporting performance in history.
Cheered on by President George Bush, Phelps raced inside his own world record
pace throughout the eight lengths, turning in second place only once: his
team-mate Ryan Lochte, world record holder on backstroke and one of those
tipped as capable of stopping Phelps in his flow, sprinted into contention
after the butterfly. Phelps craves a challenge, and given one, he has never
failed to rise to the occasion. Having split 31.27sec on the first length of
backstroke, the reigning Olympic and world champion put in a 30.20sec blast
towards the half-way mark. Lochte tried to respond but his confidence was
cracked and with Phelps piling on the pressure on breaststroke, the American
challenger had no response when Laszlo Cseh, the European champion from
Hungary, drew level and then moved ahead before the turn into freestyle.
World champion and record holder on freestyle, Phelps had the gold in his
grasp going into the last 100m. In the fastest home-coming split ever seen -
56.79sec - Phelps set his eighth world record in the 400m medley since 2002
with a time of 4min 3.84sec, compared with the 4min 5.25min at which he had
held the mark since the US Olympic trials at the end of June. Laszlo Cseh
(HUN) shattered the European record to take silver in 4min 6.16sec, with
Ryan Lochte, of the US, claiming bronze in 4min 8.09sec.
"I'm pretty happy," Phelps said. "That was a pretty emotional
race. I knew it was going to be a tough race all the way through. Looking
and seeing all three of us together pretty much at the 200 [metre mark], I
wasn't really comfortable with having that close of a race. I usually have
more of a gap, but it made my breaststroke a lot stronger. The freestyle is
just downhill. The freestyle is all adrenaline."
Phelps touched the wall and spun around so quickly to see his time that he
bumped his head on the wall. He pumped both arms in the air, and quickly
spotted his mother and two sisters in the stands at the Water Cube. He then
looked in the opposite direction, where Bush was waving his American flag. "I
looked up and he waved the flag and nodded his head," Phelps said. "That
was a pretty cool feeling to have the President say congratulations and have
him in the crowd."
On the medal stand, Phelps could barely hold back the tears as The Star-Spangled
Banner played. Laughter rang out too, when the anthem was suddenly cut
short with a scratchy sound that resembled a needle running across an old LP
disc. Phelps has much more to come over the next week: 200m freestyle, 100m
and 200m butterfly, 200m medley and three relays.
Lochte, who believed that Phelps was beatable, said: "I did everything I
could, so that's all I can ask for. But he was amazing. Setting another
world record, you can't ask for anything else. That was a great way to start
off the meet for USA."
Australia got off to a great start too, with a world record of 4min 29.45sec
by Stephanie Rice in the women's 400m individual medley. Rice held off a
strong challenge from US-based Zimbabwean Kirsty Coventry, who became the
second woman to break the 4min 30sec mark, in 4min 29.89sec. The world
record had stood at 4min 31.12sec, set by Katie Hoff, of the US, who took
the bronze.
The first session of finals delivered the first-ever Korean Olympic swimming
champion. Park Tae-hwan, the first Korean world champion last year, claimed
gold in the 400m freestyle to deliver on half of his promise: there was no
getting past Ian Thorpe's world or Olympic records but by setting an Asian
record of 3min 41.86sec, Park stood out in what was the tightest and fastest
400m field ever seen.
Grant Hackett, of Australia, set the pace over the first 100m, but it was Park
all the way from 150m to the end. Behind Park, six out of the seven other
finalists swam within a stroke of each other for much of the eight lengths.
At 200m, Zhang Lin, of China, was in eighth place and was still sixth with
50m to go. He then put in a sprint for the last 50m to bring China its first
Olympic swimming medal among men. The bronze went to Larsen Jensen, of the
US.
Britain had what performance director Michael Scott described as a
"workmanlinke start" in the pool. There were two national records in the
4x100m freestyle: Francesca Halsall opened with a 53.81sec split that shaved
0.46sec off her own British solo 100m record, while Caitlin McClatchey, Jess
Sylvester and Mel Marshall went on to set a British record of 3:38.18 for
7th place in a final won by the Netherlands in an Olympic record of 3min
33.76sec.
That kept American "supermom" Dara Torres, 41, from her ambition to bookend a
career with a gold medal to match the one she won as a member of the sprint
relay as a 16-year-old in Los Angeles in 1984. Torres had nothing to be
ashamed of: she put in the second-fastest split, of 52.44sec, in the final,
after a 52.34sec for Trickett, world record holder in the individual event,
and helped the US to the silver medal, ahead of Australia. Leading off for
Germany, Britta Steffen set an Olympic record of 53.38sec for the solo 100m.
Hannah Miley, Britain's first finalist at the race pool in Water Cube,
finished sixth in the 400m medley. "Going in fourth and coming out sixth is
not what you want," Miley, who at 4min 39.44sec was some 6 seconds outside
her best, said. "But it's my first Olympics and I have to take everything I
can and learn from it. If I had swum faster in the heats and was in the
middle of the pool maybe I could have got in the mix."
Jemma Lowe, 18 and one of the Smart Track squad selected in readiness for
London 2012, will also get experience in an Olympic final: after squeezing
into the semi-finals of the 100m butterfly in 16th place, Lowe equalled her
own British record of 57.78sec to progress to the final in sixth place and
within a stroke of the time that it is likely to take to win a medal
tomorrow. The favourite for the title is world champion Libby Trickett, of
Australia.
"I had a really good feeling this morning," said Lowe. "I had a really good
rest last night and I think practicing for morning swims at the trials
really helped. Last night was really weird. I felt a bit rushed but this
morning I felt more like I normally do in competition. I watched my race
back from yesterday and thought the start wasn't so good and neither was my
turn, so I went out a bit harder today. Hopefully I'll be able to give it
that little bit more tomorrow."
There will be no final for Britain's Chris Cook, one of only seven men ever to
break the minute on breaststroke but only able to swim 1min 00.81sec for
15th place in the 100m breaststroke. Norway's Alexander Dale Oen set his
second Olympic record, of 59.16sec, after 59.41sec in the heats. Victory
would make him the country's first Olympic swimming champion.
