Olympics: Phelps' record start

Beijing, swimming, men's 400m individual medley

Olympics: Phelps' record start

Michael Phelps coolly launched his bid for Olympic immortality by breaking his own Games record for the 400m individual medley in the opening day heats at the Water Cube aquatic centre.

The American, seeking to eclipse Mark Spitz's haul of seven gold medals set at Munich in 1972, recorded a time of 4min 7.82sec to qualify fastest for this morning's showdown with his compatriot Ryan Lochte. He admitted that he had been determined to send a message of intent to his rivals from the outset. 'I wanted to be in the middle of the pool for the final because that's going to give me an advantage,' said the 23-year-old.

There are a potential 19 further races still to go for Phelps to edge past Spitz's record. All that remains now is to prove his fast start was not a premature splash in the pan.


BEIJING Michael Phelps arrived in China this week unnoticed; making his way through the Beijing International Airport under the cover of a mustache that gave him a striking similarity to swimming's first poster boy Mark Spitz.

Phelps will have much of the planet's undivided attention when he steps atop his starting block at the National Aquatics Center shortly after 6:30 Saturday night Beijing time (3:30 a.m. PDT) for a 400-meter individual medley heat, the first of 17 races in his historic bid to win eight gold medals at the 2008 Olympic Games.

The mustache will be long gone.

"I want to be the first Michael Phelps," he said. "Not the second Mark Spitz. I'm by no means downplaying his accomplishments, what he did is - was and still is - the greatest Olympic performance of all time."

At least for another week.

Phelps has never viewed his quest for eight golds - five individual events, three relays – as Mark Spitz plus 1, a chance to one-up Spitz's seven titles at the 1972 Games in Munich. He didn't grow up with the iconic poster of Spitz on the wall of his North Baltimore bedroom. In 2001, shortly after Phelps became the youngest male world record holder in history, breaking the 200-meter butterfly record at 15 years, nine months, and began considering attempting seven or more events at the 2004 Games, his longtime coach Bob Bowman pulled him aside.

"We need to talk about Mark Spitz," Bowman said.

"Who's Mark Spitz?" Phelps replied.

"Mark Spitz won seven gold medals in one Olympics," Bowman said.

"Pretty good," Phelps shrugged.

No Phelps has been driven by a desire to revolutionize his sport and in that regard he has already succeeded. "I want to change swimming," he said. Phelps has set a total 21 world records in five individual Olympic events. His eight medals (six gold) in Athens were the most in a single non-boycotted Games.

"Because of Mike the sport is covered differently now," said Aaron Peirsol, himself a three-time Olympic champion and one of several swimmers whose bank accounts have grown thanks to Phelps raising the sport's profile. "Mike's changed the way people look at the sport."

And when they look at it. In perhaps the biggest indicator of just how much Phelps has indeed changed his sport, Olympic organizers moved swimming's medal finals to the morning in China so NBC can televise the races live in the U.S.

And now Phelps, having survived a sometimes rocky transition from goofy Baltimore teenager to global superhero that included a DUI arrest and earlier this year, is ready for prime time.

"What I've been looking forward to for the last four years is finally here," he said.

"I've had some life-changing experiences and I've been able to get through some things this year," Phelps continued "I'm happy with where I am right now. I feel the best I ever have."

He won five individual events at last months U.S. Olympic Trials, setting world records in the 200 and 400 individual medleys, despite according to Spitz's expert eye, not being fully tapered.

"So I would expect that you are going to see him win by margins and set times that have never been done before, and he'll be unbelievable," Spitz said.

But is he invincible?

"I see three different areas that he would run up against as a difficulty," Spitz said pointing to the 400 IM, the three relays and his August 16 100 butterfly showdown with world record-holder Ian Crocker in the race where Phelps could equal Spitz's seven gold medals.

Although Phelps has set the last seven world records in the 400 IM, some U.S. coaches say he could be vulnerable against rapidly improving Floridian Ryan Lochte. Lochte's runner-up Trials mark of 4 minutes, 6.08 seconds was the second fastest mark ever, and more than two seconds faster than Phelps' winning time in Athens.

"I would keep an eye on Ryan Lochte," said U.S. men's head coach Eddie Reese said.

"He has no control of the relays or what will happen," Spitz said. "He'll only participate as one of the members so there is always the risk of someone false starting or the team that tries to place them in the finals maybe does not get there. You don't know."

Actually Phelps kind of does. The U.S. finished a disappointing third in the 2004 Games' 4x100 freestyle relay. This week France's Alain Bernard predicted he and his teammates would "smash" Phelps in the U.S. in the 4x100.

Should Phelps survive the French threat and Lochte in the 400 and 200 IMs he should cruise into the 100 butterfly final with six golds and counting. "If I had to pay money to see one race at these Games it would be the 100 fly," said U.S. national team coach Mark Schubert.

In the 100 butterfly, Phelps and Crocker have provided swimming with its most compelling rivalry over the past decade, combining for the 17 fastest marks of all-time and lowering the world record by nearly 11/2 seconds in the process.

Phelps first set the world record in the 2003 World Championships only to lose it to Crocker's Beamonesque 50.98-second upset victory in the final. Crocker lowered the world record to 50.76 at the 2004 Trials and then to 50.40 at the 2005 Worlds.

But Phelps won both in Athens and at last year's Worlds, edging Crocker by four-hundreths of a second at the Olympics, five-hundreths at Worlds. Phelps won last month's Trials 50.77 to 51.62.

With a victory in the 100 butterfly Phelps should be home free. In the 4x100 medley relay, swimming's final event in Beijing, a U.S. that could boasts three world record-holders will be one of the biggest favorites of the Olympics.

But Saturday night he steps on the blocks, history and 17 races in front of him, with a clean slate and a clear mind, no thoughts of Lochte or Crocker or even Spitz.

"Nothing," he said. "Absolutely nothing. One of the guys actually asked me today, when I push off, am I exhaling or am I holding my breath underwater? And my answer was, 'I have no idea.' I don't think about anything when I swim. I just get in the water and race."