The 21-time Olympic champion was a half a second ahead of longtime American rival Ryan Lochte, who was the second-fastest qualifier.
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“You’re going to bring tears to my eyes now”, Phelps told NBC’s Michelle Tafoya of the touching moment after a preliminary race in the 200m individual medley on Wednesday.
The course, designed by American architect Gil Hanse specifically for the Rio Games, features wide fairways and no rough to account for wind that can get up to about 40 miles per hour, and already has this week.
Phelps exulted after his victory, wagging his finger, raising his arms and orchestrating the crowd’s response.
After winning the 200m butterfly-his signature event-for the third time, Phelps stood triumphant in the pool, gesturing with bravado.
With the win, Phelps tied the record of the most individual Olympic titles set by Leonidas of Rhodes.
Michael Phelps holds his son Boomer while celebrating his win with his mother Debbie and fiancee Nicole Johnson (right). If Phelps makes it to the finals of the latter event as expected, he will take part in the 100-meter butterfly finals at 9:12 p.m. ET on Friday, August 11.
They are the two most decorated swimmers in Olympic history, with Lochte (whose 12 Olympic medals are second all time to Phelps’ 25) being pushed to the backseat only because he happened to be born just a year before Phelps.
“I believe Michael’s changed the way people think about swimming, he’s motivated people to think differently about the sport, given it a big profile”.
Defending champion Kohei Uchimura of Japan took home another gold medal after he barely edged out Ukraine’s Oleg Verniaiev by less than a point, 92.365 to 92.266. MORE: Top swimming images.
Lochte has two silvers and a bronze since they both first swam the event in 2004 in Athens, along with four world championships.
Prenot was edged by sixth-hundredths of a second by Dmitriy Balandin of Kazakhstan who gave his country its first Olympic swim medal of any kind. Russia’s Anton Chupkov landed the bronze in 2:07.70, with Koseki fading to fifth.
Belmonte Garcia claimed a pair of silver medals in London, including a runner-up finish in the 200 fly.
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Nathan Adrian took home a bronze medal for Team USA in the men’s 100 meter freestyle event, finishing less than a tenth of a second behind silver medal victor Pieter Timmers of Belgium. But he couldn’t overcome churning water down the stretch that led to Australian Kyle Chambers winning in 47.58 seconds.
