Projo Sports Blog

By Larry Siddons
Bloomberg News

Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Michael Phelps spends his days at the Olympics wolfing down pizza and pasta, dodging text messages from friends and climbing to the top of the all-time winners' list.

Phelps won swimming's 200-meter freestyle today for his third gold medal of the Beijing Games and the ninth of his career. That total put his name in the record books with four others -- Mark Spitz, Carl Lewis, Paavo Nurmi and Larissa Latynina.

He may be all alone at the top within 24 hours.

Phelps has two finals tomorrow -- the 200 butterfly, where he has held the world record since March 2001 and qualified with an Olympic record today, and the 800 freestyle relay. A sweep would give him five gold medals for Beijing and a total of 11, as well as keep him on course to break Spitz's single-Games mark of seven, set in 1972.

"I'm not even halfway done yet," the 23-year-old American said at a news conference. "The most important ones are coming up. Tomorrow is a pretty big morning."

Phelps won his third gold medal with his third world record, finishing in 1 minute, 42.96 seconds to chop nine-tenths of a second off his old mark.

"It's incredible what he does, it really is," Peter Vanderkaay, the bronze medalist and a teammate of Phelps at Olympic and club level, told reporters. "Incredible."

Phelps is entered in five individual and three relay events in Beijing, comprising a maximum of 17 races in nine days. He gets a bit of rest by sitting out some relay heats -- what he calls "recovery periods" -- and keeps his energy up with trips to the cafeteria in the Olympic Village.

Carbs, Naps

"Eating a lot of pasta and pizza, a lot of carbs," he said. "And I sleep as much as I can."

A lover of the afternoon nap, Phelps said his rest has been disturbed by family members and friends texting him after his gold-medal finals, which are run in the morning in Beijing to accommodate prime-time television back in the U.S.

"They keep sending messages like, `I can't sleep, I'm so excited. How can you nap?"' Phelps said. "I'd send back `Well, I'm not napping if you're texting me."'

Vanderkaay has said that at Club Wolverine in Ann Arbor, Michigan, he sometimes beats Phelps in practice swims. At the Water Cube pool today, no one was beating the man known as MP.

Phelps dove into the water in Lane 6, third from the end after qualifying fourth last night, and was ahead by the time he surfaced. He led at every 50-meter split, progressively driving the world-record time lower, and won by 1.89 seconds.

'Open Water'

"I wanted to try and get into open water, and I was in the outside lane, so it was kind of difficult for the others to see me," Phelps told reporters. "I just wanted to get out there and try to hold on."

Park Tae Hwan of South Korea, the 400 freestyle gold medalist, was second. Vanderkaay was 2.18 seconds behind the champion.

"Phelps has such a tremendous kick," Park said through an interpreter at a news conference. "I must copy him. But I don't think I can be as good as Phelps."

The 200 freestyle was the one individual race Phelps lost four years ago in Athens, where he took six golds. He finished third that time, behind Ian Thorpe of Australia and Pieter van den Hoogenband of the Netherlands. They were the two fastest in the world and Phelps said he wanted to race them to say he went against the best.

Turn Trouble

On that night in Greece, Phelps did more than just show up. He swam what might have been his best technical race of the Olympics, with poor turns -- kickouts, as they're called -- keeping him from capturing the gold, according to Bob Bowman, his longtime coach.

"I hate to lose," Phelps said today. "It motivates me to swim faster. Over the past four years, I've been able to make some improvements in the 200 free. My kickouts are all I can ask for."

There have been no technical glitches in Beijing.

Phelps chopped 1.41 seconds off his world record in winning the 400 individual medley two days ago, and set an American record in the first leg of the 400 freestyle relay yesterday, a race won on a last-stroke lunge by U.S. anchor swimmer Jason Lezak. The Americans lowered the relay world record by almost four seconds.

Phelps cried on the medal stand after the medley and let out a scream when Lezak touched first in the relay. Today, there was no outward emotion as the Baltimore native scanned the scoreboard after the race and later listened to "The Star- Spangled Banner" played again.

He embraced his tearful sister in the stands as he left the pool deck with yet another gold medal that put him on an elite list.

"To be tied for the most Olympic golds with those names, it's a pretty amazing accomplishment," Phelps said. "It's definitely an honor."

 Tags  men's swimming Michael Phelps Olympics

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