South African Le Clos shocked Phelps by winning gold ahead of his idol, in Phelps’ signature event, at the London 2012 Games.
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With the victories, Phelps now has 21 gold medals and 25 medals overall, extending his Olympic records.
Sakai, 10 years younger than Phelps, took silver, just 0.04 seconds, or half a fingernail, behind. Masato Sakai of Japan, yet another swimmer who grew up watching Phelps on television, won the silver medal, just.04 seconds behind. Four years ago, Phelps misjudged his finish – gliding a little too long after his final stroke – and was edged at the wall by South African Chad le Clos.
In a twist few had contemplated coming into the games, Bob Bowman, Phelps’ and the USA men’s coach, added Phelps to the 4×200 freestyle relay, scheduled to start about 70 minutes after the 200 butterfly.
But NBC is adding the viewership for prime-time telecasts on cable’s NBCSN (1.6 million) and Bravo (720,000) and people who streamed video online (about 300,000) to boost the number to 31.5 million – its “total audience delivery”. Australia’s Emma McKeon took the bronze.
Remarkably, Phelps has won more than twice as many Olympic gold medals as the athlete second on the list, former Soviet gymnast Larisa Latynina, who has nine.
“That was a really tough race and it hurt really badly”, said Ledecky. He became the oldest male swimmer to win gold in an individual event.
Phelps won his 19th Olympic gold in the men’s 4x100m freestyle relay at the weekend and if he feels greedy, there is more potential gold for him in the 100m fly and the 200m individual medley – events he has incredibly won at the past three Olympics.
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Her world record and season best of 8:06.68 is nearly a full 12 seconds ahead of Australia’s Jessica Ashwood, who is ranked second in the world. Ledecky looks like a lock to match Meyer, having already won the 200 and 400 titles and an overwhelming favorite in the 800, where she’s the world-record holder and far faster than anyone else in the world. I just did a time he hasn’t done in four years.
