The American formidable foursome, who each won a medal in their respective individual events, clocked in with a time of 3 minutes, 53.13 seconds to give the United States its 1,000th gold medal awarded at the Summer Games.
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In the boxing ring the serious business begins with the men’s light flyweight final where Yurberjen Martinez is vying to become the first Colombian to win Olympic boxing gold.
Murphy broke Aaron Peirsol’s 6-year-old world record in the 100m backstroke during his lead-off leg, clocking 51.85 and shaving 0.09 off the old record.
One brought the U.S. its 1,000th all time Olympic gold medal and the other produced Michael Phelps’ 23rd all-time title on sport’s biggest stage. If this is indeed the end for Phelps, this was a good way to go out to say the least.
In the stands, his fiancee, Nicole Johnson, bounced along to the music with their son, three-month-old Boomer, cradled in her arms.
Michael Phelps stood on the blocks, bent over.
Elaine Thompson of Jamaica won the women’s 100-meter title in 10.71 seconds, ending fellow Jamaican Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce’s bid to win the event for a third straight Olympics.
Britain were sixth following Walker-Hebborn’s backstroke leg, but a blistering breaststroke stint from Peaty – a split time of 56.59 – saw the fastest qualifiers surge into the lead. The team entered this year with 977 medals since the first Olympics in 1896 and has now won 23 medals in Rio to reach the incredible milestone.
Venus Williams can become the first tennis player with five career Olympic golds, pairing with Rajeev Ram against Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Jack Sock in an all-American mixed doubles final.
Phelps, who insists he will not compete in the Tokyo Games in four years, has enjoyed a superb Olympics in Rio, adding five golds to his astonishing haul.
“I mean 1,000 gold for the U.S. is a nice number”.
While the teams’ lineups won’t be released until an hour before start time, we haven’t heard a peep about Phelps possibly not racing.
In Olympic history, nobody comes close to the U.S.in medals.
She clocked 24.07 in the one lap event, just two-hundredths of a second outside the Olympic record, and two hundredths ahead of U.S. rival Manuel.
Pernille Blume won gold with a furious sprint from one of the pool to the other.
Earlier in the night, Manuel took silver in the 50 free. Aliaksandra Herasimenia of Belarus earned the bronze in 24.11.
“It turned out pretty cool”, Phelps said, another gold medal around his neck.
It was another huge disappointment for sisters Cate and Bronte Campbell of Australia.
And Simone Biles and Kohei Uchimura, the undisputed sovereigns of gymnastics in Brazil, are in the hunt for a third Games gold.
Connor Jaeger of the United States took the silver in 14:39.48, while the bronze went to another Italian, Gabriele Detti, in 14:40.86.
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The night, though, belonged to Phelps, who walked out of the arena for final time carrying an American flag handed to him by his mother from her front-row seat, right next to Johnson and little Boomer.
