Michael Phelps: Built to destroy records

By Misty Poe
Times West Virginian

August 18, 2008 04:36 pm

— When it comes to certain sports, there’s always one name that stands out — a person that God seems to have made just to play that sport.
No, not just play the sport. Excel at it. Define it.
Babe Ruth. Pete Sampras. Tiger Woods. Michael Jordan. Wayne Gretsky. David Beckam. Serena Williams.
And in the pool?
Michael Phelps. Wow. What can you say? It was like his body was built to destroy world records, many of them his own.
At this writing, Phelps had seven more gold medals than he had when he came to Beijing a couple of weeks ago. The medal count may be eight by the time you read this, but we have deadlines. If I’d have held this piece until after his final relay race Saturday night, your paper may not have been on your doorstep when you woke up this morning.
But back to the pool.
200-meter freestyle.
200-meter butterfly.
400-meter individual medley.
4x200-meter freestyle relay.
100-meter butterfly.
200-meter individual medley.
4x100-meter freestyle relay.
And in every single race, with the exception of the 100-meter butterfly, Phelps has broken the world record.
What can you say? Well, you can say he’s bad for the sport (Serbia).
You can say that fingertips mean nothing (France). You can say that you can beat him (Ryan Lochte).
But it doesn’t mean anything. The man can win a race blindfolded — literally. He proved it when water filled his goggles during in one of his gold-medal-winning, world-record-breaking performances.
And as a swimmer, Phelps has done a great deal for the gold medal standings of his country. At the most recent count available, the United States had 16 gold medals, seven belonging to the coolest guy in the pool.
We have Michael Phelps. China? They have Project 119. When China was awarded the 2008 Summer Olympics, they created Project 119, a program referring to the number of medals available to win in track and field, swimming, rowing, sailing and canoe/kayak. In the Sydney games, the Chinese only took home one medal in these sports. So they’ve been systematically training athletes in a way to keep the most gold medals in China in the medal-rich sports. Is it working?
Well, in a way. They have 27 gold medals compared to our 16. But we’ve got them on overall medal count — 54 to 47.
The experts have placed their bets. Analysts from PricewaterhouseCoopers have projected that it will be a close race, but by the time the torch goes out, the medal count will be 88 to 87, China. And nearly everyone else says its China’s year.
But we’d rather hear from our readers than the experts. Last week we asked our online readers at www.timeswv.com, “Which nation is poised to take home the most gold medals in the 2008 Summer Olympics?”
Well, for the first time in the history of the online poll, we’ve had a response with not one single vote. It seems like the 98 voters last week don’t take the Russians very seriously. Not one single vote for Russia was cast, though they’ve taken home five gold medals.
And China? For 30.61 percent of the voters, the home-field advantage can’t be beat.
And then there’s the 69.39 percent of our voters who believe that Project 119 is just as silly as “Project Runway.” Those voters say 2008 is golden for USA.
Well, we’ll see. We’ve got one more week.
This week, let’s leave Beijing and get back to Washington, D.C. We want to hear about your predictions for Barrack Obama’s vice presidential candidate.
Log on. Vote. E-mail me.
Misty Poe
City Editor
mpoe@timeswv.com