Ryan Held couldn’t sing along to the US national anthem with his teammates. Michael beamed and kissed his medal as the emotional team stood on the podium and received their medals.
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Standing between Adrian and Phelps, Held bent his head and brought his left hand to his face as the anthem blared.
“These guys are awesome, they will be there in four years – you got this, I am out”. “I was too exhausted to cry, I didn’t think I could cry”, Held said. “I’ve heard the national anthem hundreds of times, but as soon as that played it was just something different”. He captured a pair of bronze medals at the 2004 Athens Games alongside six gold medals.
“They were making us cry”, said Phelps, who had a tear roll down his cheek while posing for photographers.
Phelps, who came out of retirement for one last crack at the Olympics, will be in the 200m butterfly heats on Monday having seen the relay display cap a superb night of swimming with three world records broken.
Adrian smiled as he comforted his younger teammates.
“I wanted the first 200 to hurt as little as possible and I really felt like I could build into it and really explode that last 50”, she added after leading the race from start to finish. Held followed with 47.73, maintaining a.47 second lead for this Olympic swim team.
The whipping gusts that disrupted athletes and spectators alike were just a prelude to the winds of change that roared through Rio de Janeiro on Sunday night: Serena and Venus Williams lost an Olympic doubles match for the first time.
The victory maintained a run of USA success in the event, with the Americans medalling in every 4×100 freestyle relay raced at the Games since it was first included in 1964.
“That’s something I’ve had the privilege to be a part of since 2004, and I’m hoping to have the opportunity again”, Phelps said.
Emotions spilled over during the victory ceremony when Ryan Held and Dressel started crying. “Michael and Adrian, they’re like, ‘Once in a lifetime experience, let’s go after it, have fun, let the emotions feel you'”. If I never get an Olympic gold medal I can live with myself knowing I’ve given everything I could in my swimming career.
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Diana Taurasi and the US women’s basketball team opened their Olympics with a record rout, smashing Senegal 121-56 while setting Olympic marks for most points in a game, margin of victory and assists (36). It’s a objective that seems to be serving him well based on last night’s performance.
