NBC had its best night of the Rio de Janeiro Olympics on Tuesday, registering 33.4 million viewers for a broadcast that included live coverage of Michael Phelps winning his 20th and 21st gold medals, more gold for swimmer Katie Ledecky and the dominating performance of the USA women’s gymnastics team.
Advertisement
On Tuesday night, Michael Phelps and Katie Ledecky proved that they are unstoppable in the water.
Ledecky won her second gold of these Games. The Golden Bears are more excited about the collective strength their swimmers have shown at the Olympic Aquatics Stadium. But her struggles underscore how fleeting Olympic fame can be, coming every four years in between long-winded promises by USA presidential candidates.
“It really wasn’t that bad”, said Phelps, who won both the 200 butterfly and 4×200 freestyle relay late Tuesday night. We needed to get them a good lane tonight. “I’m going to keep it up”.
Twenty four gold medals will be up for grabs across 19 sports Friday, with Michael Phelps, the most decorated Olympian of all time, looking for yet more gold as he takes to the pool again.
Russia’s Evgeny Rylov led the way in the 200 backstroke, followed by China’s Xu Jiayu, Australia’s Mitch Larkin and Americans Ryan Murphy and Jacob Pebley. Victor of three golds and five medals overall in London four years ago, she battled depression and didn’t qualify for an individual event in Rio.
This performance comes at a time when the gap between American swimming and the rest of the world appeared to be closing.
Only one other swimmer in the race, Australia’s Emma McKeon, got within a second of Ledecky’s four-lap time.
Ledecky overhauled Australia’s Tamsin Cook to take her team home in 7min 43.03sec, beating the Aussies into second place with Canada third.
Missy Franklin, who raced in the preliminary heats, not be on the nighttime relay. He also captured gold previous year in the World University Games.
Stanford now has gold medals in three events, tying it with Italy and Great Britain for the eighth-best “country” in the world. “It’s the best thing I can do for my country”.
On overtaking her Australian opponent, Ledecky said: “I was prepared for any circumstance, whether we were ahead or behind”.
On Wednesday night, she let her 4×200-meter freestyle relay teammates join in on the fun, carrying the United States to victory in the 4×200-meter freestyle relay on Wednesday night. But she is struggling here. She has admitted that she is baffled by her results.
“This week’s gone great so far and I think I’ll be able to top it off well in the 800m”, she added.
That the Americans are in this position – leading Australia and others by 14 medals midway through – is remarkable given Franklin is yet to contribute.
The win also gives Allison Schmitt her first gold medal of the games, and her second overall as she earned a silver medal in the 4×100-meter freestyle relay.
Advertisement
“It’s the whole team”, Bowman said. “This will come to me tomorrow”.
