Phelps essentially spent the next 100 seconds or so on a victory lap, the crowd’s cheers growing louder with each stroke.
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But the South African was silenced as his rival led for the last 150 metres to secure the gold medal on Tuesday.
Even a late “wardrobe malfunction” could not stop Michael Phelps from winning his 21st Olympic gold medal for the United States in the Rio pool yesterday.
The US swimmer has now won more medals since 2004 than the whole of Jamaica, New Zealand or the Netherlands.
For Phelps, the butterfly victory was especially sweet after the sting of the London defeat, where he misjudged his final lunge for the wall to let Le Clos steal the gold medal.
Much of the talk ahead of the rematch in Rio had centered on Phelps’ revenge mission – and he didn’t disappoint – he smashed it. London 2012 gold medallist Le Clos just missed out on the bronze, which was won by Tamas Kenderesi of Hungary.
It was another night of glory for Michael Phelps in the Olympic Aquatics Stadium in Rio de Janeiro on Tuesday (9 August) night as the great American swimmer won two more gold medals, taking his unequalled tally to 21, with a total of 25 Olympic medals.
“Having the amount of excitement (and) cheering that was in the stands during that race – I don’t know if I’ve heard anything like it”, said Phelps.
As he looked up at a boisterous crowd, triumphant for the 20th time in his unmatched Olympic career, Michael Phelps raised his hands and flicked them in his direction as if to say: “Bring on the world”.
Few could blame him after a hard night’s work – but while Phelps may be cooling down, Ledecky is only just getting started.
After Sarah Sjostrom beat Katie Ledecky in their semifinal it didn’t look as though Ledecky would be able to continue her streak of never losing an individual event in an global final. The forgotten man in this race will be Japan’s Masato Sakai, who touched in 1:53.40. The 27-year-old led from start to finish to win the gruelling multi-stroke event in a time just 0.46 outside the world record she set at last year’s world championships in Russian Federation.
“That was a really tough race and it hurt really badly”, Ledecky said. Tonight I came in the pool with a mission and the mission was accomplished. “I just had to dig deep”.
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“It was a stressful race and I feel good now it’s over”. I thought they were going to catch him but he pulled it off.
