They ought to give Jason Lezak two gold medals, a sword and shield for that effort! What a hero! From Associated Press: "... When his veteran teammate touched the wall, Phelps let out a scream of triumph, punching his arms in the air as teammates Garrett Weber-Gale and Cullen Jones joined him in the celebrations."Unbelievable! Jason finished that race way better than we could have even asked for," Phelps said. "For that last 50, I was thinking 'this is going to be one close race'.
"The last 10 to 15 metres were incredible. I lost my voice, and I was definitely pretty emotional after that."
Trailing at the final turn, Lezak relentlessy pursued Bernard, but it wasn't until the final 10 meters that the American was able to pull level and, finally, edge ahead as he touched with an astonishing split of 46.06sec. ..." [Splits at Swimming World]
14 comments:
Simply incredible. I think I woke up the neighbors screaming myself. THAT was the Olympics. I also have to say that Katie Hoff's effort was extremely gutsy. Really wanted her to win that after putting it out there like that.
Best. Relay. Race. Ever.
What an AWESOME RACE!!!!!!
I thought we were toast at the last 5 meters. It was over, and then that unique, body-surf, lope to Lezak's stroke as he hugged the lane, and the last look at each other with one meter to go, it was the most powerful race I have ever seen. :-D
Awsome race. I think the 4 X100 Free at the 2000 Olympics might edge it out as number 1 race ever. But this is easily a close second.
That relay leg redefined the term "Studly". From now on any clutch relay leg should be referred to as "going Lezak on em"!
Chris W
Chris, Sam, I am still inspired and I wish I could have signed up for Nationals now so I can race long course just one more time this year!
AI, That was the best race ever. This will go down in sporting history and the greatest relay ever.
My favorite relay will still be the Shirley Babashoff; Kim Peyton; Jill Sterkel and Wendy Boglioli defeat of the East Germans, but this was surely the greatest comeback.
BTW, do you know where we can get all the splits? Are they posted anywhere?
YEs, they are at SwimmingWorld Magazine.com
http://www.swimmingworldmagazine.com/lane9/news/18757.asp?q=Olympics,%20Swimming:%20%3Cfont%20color=red%3EFlash%3C/font%3E%20United%20States%20Crushes%20World%20Record%20in%20400%20Free%20Relay,%20Eamon%20Sullivan%20Claims%20100%20Free%20Global%20Standard
Amazing race. Great to see Phelps' dream still alive.
Performance of the evening for me (yes I am bias) was Rebecca Adlington of Great Britain winning the Gold in the 400 Freestle. Britain's first Gold medal in women's swimming for 48 years!! Add to that fact she beat the reigning Olympic and World Champions, along with the current World Record holder. On top of that (as Tony has pointed out in the past), they keep closing all the swimming pools in Britain!
The incredulous look of disbelief on Bernard's face....
Effing priceless!
Its going to be a duel in the pool when Bernard and Lezak are in the finals of the 100M freestyle!
AI --> And it sure was, nm you should've seen Bernard's face yesterday after he won Gold !
...As he was sitting on Sullivan's lane line with his back to him gloating. Nonetheless, it still won't take away the fact that the guy who placed third spanked him when he had a half-body-length lead.
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