Phelps on his way to record Olympic gold medal haul
August 10, 2008
Here is a summary of the first medal session at the Beijing Olympic swim meet.
Michael Phelps has smashed the 400m IM world record as he took his first step towards a record eight Olympic swimming gold medals at a single Olympics.
Phelps beat his previous world record time of 4:05.25 and set a new world mark with a time of 4.03.84.
His teammate Ryan Lochte was around half a body length from Phelps in the breaststroke however Phelps powered away in the freestyle to record a comfortable victory where he was around one and a half body lengths in front of Hungary’s Laszlo Cseh who won the silver in a time of 4:06.16, with Lochte taking the bronze.
Libby Trickett moved into the women’s 100m butterfly final with a win in her semifinal with a time of 57.05, just 0.03 ahead of USA’s Christine Magnuson. The second semifinal was won by Australia’s Jessica Schipper in a time of 57.43 ahead of China’s Zhou Yafei.
In the men’s 400m freestyle final Australia’s Grant Hackett took the early lead, at the 150m mark South Korea’s Taehwan Park moved to the front and was just 0.03 ahead of Hackett. 0.62 was the advantage at the 250m mark with Park ahead of Hackett. The Australian swimmer then faded as others came through.
Park pulled away to win the gold medal ahead of Zhang Lin from China and USA’s Larsen Jenson. Park’s winning time was 3:41.86 which is still more than a second off Ian Thorpe’s world record of 3:40.08
Stephanie Rice claimed Australia’s first gold medal at the Beijing Olympic games with a win in the women’s 400m individual medley. It was Zimbabwe’s Kirsty Coventry who tested Rice. Coventry was 3.83 ahead of world record split at the 200m mark Rice not far behind. Katie Hoff as the current world record holder was never looking likely to win. Rice won the gold in a new world record time of 4.29.45.
The last gold of the day went to the Netherlands in the 4 x 100m freestyle relay.
Germany lead early in the race before the Netherlands made their move in the third leg. They took a half body lead into the final leg ahead of USA and Australia. The lead was 1.96 at the 350m mark and they held on for a gold medal in a new Olympic record time.
The first medal session of the swimming saw the gold’s shared across four nations.
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