It isn’t every day you come face to face with your childhood idol – and defeat him at the Olympics.
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Michael Phelps of the United States won the Olympic 200 metres individual medley yesterday to capture the 22nd gold medal of his career and become the first swimmer to win the same event at four consecutive Games.
South Africa’s world champion Chad Le Clos, who shared the 100m butterfly silver medal in London with Russia’s Yevgeny Korotyshkin, was seventh.
“I’m just ecstatic. I don’t think it has set in yet”.
“It’s insane. It still hasn’t sunk in yet”, said Schooling at the press conference after the race. All the adrenaline is running through my veins right now.
“It’s like a dream come true”.
Celebration and praise has poured in from his countrymen back home, who flooded social media early on Saturday morning with congratulations for their man in Rio. “Need to create a new one for that”, he said. I love watching her swim, absolutely love it.
With regard to the 2008 photo of him as a 13-year-old with Phelps that has been doing the rounds on social media, Schooling said, “Michael and the USA team came to Singapore for a training camp in ’08 before they went to Beijing to acclimatise, and they came to the country club that I trained at”.
“We just celebrated Singapore’s 51st birthday and this Olympic win was such a ideal present for our country”.
“This isn’t as tragic as that but this is Singapore’s Kennedy moment, where people will remember when Joseph Schooling won gold at the Olympics”.
Singapore’s prime minister Lee Hsien Loong has congratulated the swimmer on his Facebook page.
Singapore has spent millions trying to win more medals at the Olympics, including offering a Foreign Sports Talent programme which grants promising foreign athletes citizenship, as well as a S$1 million ($743,494.42) prize for gold medals.
His tally now reads 22 golds, three silvers and two bronzes.
“It is an incredible feat to compete among the world’s best, stay focussed, and emerge victorious”.
“We’re here for you and we’re all so proud of you”.
The hashtag #josephschooling trended on Twitter just after Schooling’s win, with many congratulating him on his success.
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I wanted to be like him as a kid.
