Olympics’ primetime coverage of the Games of the XXXI Olympiad from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, continued Friday night on the networks of NBCUniversal. Since then, she’s shaved more than nine seconds off it, leaving her rivals trailing in her wake.
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The 31-year-old Phelps still has a chance to leave Rio with 23 golds in his career. While the American team is not yet set, he could be swimming in the men’s 4×100 meter medley relay final. He wound up in a three-way tie for second with Laszlo Cseh of Hungary and Chad Le Clos of South Africa.
Above them stepped Schooling, having finished in an Olympic-record 50.39 seconds, exactly three-quarters of a second before the trio of silvers.
For the first time since Sunday, he had only one race to swim. Losing the last individual race of his career.
JOSEPH SCHOOLING: I wanted to be like him as a kid.
“I know it seemed counterintuitive, but he didn’t have to push that too hard”, coach Bob Bowman said.
And, yes, he actually said it was his final individual race.
“I’m just so happy”.
Carlin won the fifth Welsh silver of the 2016 Games in the pool just hours after cyclist Owain Doull won Wales’ first gold in Rio in the team pursuit.
And in the women’s backstroke, Maya Dirado produced a fantastic finish to deny Hungarian Katinka Hosszu at the wall in the women’s 200m backstroke.
Nathan Adrian of the United States took the bronze.
Ledecky and Debbie Meyer are now the only female swimmers to sweep the three longest freestyle races.
Currently, she is the current world-record holder in the 400-, 800-, and 1,500-meter freestyle.She won gold for the 200 meter freestyle and the 200 meter freestyle relay.
It’s fitting that Ledecky closed out these games with the 800: Back in 2012, it was her shocking win in this event (at age 15, she beat then-world record holder Rebecca Adlington) that announced Ledecky’s presence as a swimmer with superstar potential. DiRado rallied furiously on the final lap and got Hosszu at the touch to win in 2 minutes, 5.99 seconds.
“It felt faster than any event I had ever done before”, Ledecky said, “so I was pretty confident that I would be under that world record time”. And when the Olympics are done, they’ll be remembered as the latest in a long line of US swimming powerhouses. “It’s about setting goals and going after them”. Nathan Adrian of the United States took the bronze.
Yesterday, Ervin won gold in the 50-meter freestyle 16 years after he won it the first time. Then, Ervin walked away from swimming, skipping the next two Olympics while he embarked on a journey to find his objective in life.
A return to college eventually rekindled his love of swimming and the rest is destined to become Olympic legend. In Tokyo 2020 she will be back again at the biggest stage, closing down on the legacy of Phelps and her nearest competitor will not be another swimmer in the pool, but the target she sets for herself. The heavily favored USWNT, which had won gold at the previous three Games and has never finished with less than silver, is heading home with no medal.
She has been known to politely correct journalists when they get their facts wrong.
Ledecky met all of them, completing a dominant quad that has included 18 major global meet gold medals, 13 long-course meters world records and the title of face of the USA swim team, now that Michael Phelps is retiring.
“This is the first time I’ve ever seen her in tears”, added Ledecky’s superstar teammate.
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Gaines: “I know, he was on my couch for a while”. “That really meant a lot to me”.
