Phelps now has more career gold medals than Argentina, India and Jamaica (sorry, Usain Bolt).
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He carried the Olympic flag at the opening ceremonies for the 2016 games and swam his way to six medals – five gold and one silver – in the days that followed.
Phelps was elected a team captain for the first time in his fifth Olympics and truly seemed to enjoy being around his fellow swimmers.
“This is what I wanted to finish my career”, he said this weekend. I knew this was the last race that I ever had, the last Olympics that I ever had. “This is what I wanted to finish my career with”.
“Nicole and I want to travel a little bit and I know there’s some places that she wants to go and see, and I want to go and see and just love life”. Being able to cap it off with these Games is just the ideal way to finish.
“He’s a father figure to me”, Phelps said of Bowman, his coach since age 11 who he followed to Arizona when Bowman was named ASU’s swim and dive coach past year.
Monica Puig won Puerto Rico’s first gold medal in any sport in Olympic history, upsetting Angelique Kerber in the women’s tennis singles final.
“Michael may not be competing anymore but he is still going to be very involved in the sport”, said teammate Ryan Murphy.
At Beijing 2008, Phelps won all his eight events to surpass what was thought to be the most insurmountable record at the Games, the seven-gold haul at a single Olympics by Mark Spitz at Munich 1972, prompting the Munich hero himself to pay tribute to his young compatriot. “He’s opened a lot of doors for all of us”. Four years ago, Phelps sat down with Matt Lauer and announced the London Olympics would be his final Games, but clearly, things didn’t pan out that way.
“This accomplishment, I can’t wrap my head around”, Phelps said.
No other athlete in Olympic history has both dominated his sport so completely at his apex and maintained dominance over such an extended period of time.
His comeback endured a huge setback with his second drunken-driving arrest in 2014, which led to Phelps being banned from the 2015 world championships. I think your mind really controls everything.
Plus, according to the Washington Post, Congress is actually considering passing legislation to make Olympic winnings tax free. “I couldn’t be happier with how things ended”. Adrian pulled away on the freestyle to win in an Olympic-record time of 3 minutes, 27.95 seconds. “Italian people really wanted this gold and it was more hard than I expected”.
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More than anything, Phelps can’t wait to spend more time with his family.
