Phelps, 31, could win his 23rd gold in the 4x100m medley relay on Saturday.
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The 21-year-old Singaporean touched the wall in 50.39s, almost one second ahead of a joint-silver finish of 51.14s shared by Phelps, South Africa’s Chad le Clos and Hungarian Laszlo Cseh, and smashing the Olympic Games record of 50.58s. They swam in different semifinal heats, with Schooling winning his and Phelps getting beat by Cseh in the other.
Joseph Schooling was working on a school essay one morning in 2008 when Michael Phelps showed up to train at his club in Singapore ahead of the Beijing Olympics.
Ms Lee Bee Wah, a member of Parliament, said on Facebook that she was glad she had asked Singapore’s Defense ministry to let Schooling defer his National Service obligations to let him focus on training. “I’m sorry if I don’t seem like I’m full of emotions right now”. “I actually got to meet his family on my way down”.
In his previous three finals, Phelps had never been better than fifth after the first 50. “I’m really honored and privileged to have swam alongside these great names, people that have changed the face of our sport”, said Schooling to Channel NewsAsia.
While Phelps’ loss left the crowd in shock, Katie Ledecky restored some normalcy at the pool with another dominating performance, handily break the world record in the 800 freestyle.
Nothing was too intimidating to the Americans.
And Ervin’s victory came in the 50m freestyle, his second gold in the event after a tie with Gary Hall Junior at Sydney 2000.
Maya DiRado gave the Americans another gold, pulling off a furious rally on the final lap to upset “Iron Lady” Katinka Hosszu of Hungary. The bronze went to Canada’s Hilary Caldwell.
His tally now reads 22 golds, three silvers and two bronzes.
Ledecky was barely breathing hard.
Schooling will receive S$1 million ($743,000) for his gold medal as part of a programme aimed at encouraging studious Singaporeans to excel in sport.
Beyond that, Ledecky pointed to a US trials format that sets up the team to perform well at the Olympics. Then, Ervin walked away from swimming, skipping the next two Olympics while he embarked on a journey to find his objective in life.
Turns out, it was swimming all along.
The U.S. holds the world record, at 3:52.05 – a time that the American team clocked at the London 2012 Games. Now, improbably, he’s back on the top of the podium again.
The Singapore president is now visiting Rio de Janeiro from Aug 11 to 15 to support Team Singapore at the 2016 Summer Olympics.
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“Singaporeans back home must be as thrilled as I am, to see Schooling being crowned as THE best in the world”.
