The number of Google searches in Singapore for “Joseph Schooling gold” spiked sharply after the 21-year-old won his 100m butterfly race at about 9.14am.
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While disappointed not to win what would have been his fifth gold medal in Rio and a staggering 23rd overall, Phelps predicted Schooling would leave his mark on the sport well beyond these Games. They all touched in 51.14. Schooling and le Clos both told him he should stay on for four more years. That’s what happened in 2012, when Canada’s Derek Drouin, Britain’s Robbie Grabarz and Qatar’s Mutaz Essa Barshim all won high jump bronze.
Phelps, who finished in a three-way tie for silver, is the three-time reigning gold medalist in that event and had already claimed four gold medals in each of the finals he swam in Rio de Janeiro.
Schooling claimed first place with a time of 50.39, a new Olympics record.
“The hundred back was a real confidence booster”.
The South African had shocked in 2012 by pipping Phelps to the Olympics gold in the 200 m butterfly, but has had no similar joy this time.
Phelps’ mother, Debbie, sounded bullish on her son competing in what would be his sixth Olympics where he’d be 35 years old.
Shields has never won an individual long-course title on the global stage but he was in the American team that won the 4x100m medley at last year’s long-course world championships in Kazan, Russia. We always strive for accuracy, but when writing non-stop for about 12 hours a day, you’re going to make mistakes.
It seems nearly impossible for three athletes to finish at the exact same time, but such three-way ties had happened 20 times before at the Olympics, according to sports historian Bill Mallon. The bronze medal went to the Russian contender Aliya Mustafina.
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“Doing the hundred back and having a good time in that helped me to realize that I could do better in the 200 back than I did at trials”. “I guess after I get my learner’s I’ll get my license”. He has 22 gold medals, but this was Schooling’s, and Singapore’s, very first.
