http://www.infobarrel.com/Michael_Phelps_Olympic_History published August 18, 2008

Michael Phelps Olympic History

by rizzle

This year, the name Michael Phelps is pretty much synonymous for gold medal.  Michael Phelps has proven himself as one of the greatest, if not the greatest Olympic athlete of all time.  

Although he has participated in three Olympics, he has 16 combined medals totaled from just two Olympic Games.  Not only does he have the largest medal tally in the history of the Olympics, he also has the largest combined gold medal tally. If that wasn’t enough, Phelps also holds the record for the most gold medals won in a single Olympic games.  

Michael Phelps is a monster, a swimming force not to be reckoned with and he is only 23 years old.  At 23, he still has enough gas in his tank to compete at minimum one more Olympic games which could bring his medal tally to an astronomic level; a level that may not be touched for a very long time to come.

As a tribute to Michael Phelps and everything he has dedicated his life to accomplish, I’ve compiled this list outlining his history in the Olympic Games.

In 2000 at the tender age of 15, Michael Phelps competed in his first Olympic event of his life.  The event was the 200 m Butterfly and Phelps placed 5th with a time of 1:56:50.

2000 Sydney Summer Olympic Overview
Event Place Time
200m Butterfly 5th place 01:56.50


In 2004, at the Athens Summer Olympic games, Phelps finally got his first Gold medal at the age of 19.  Phelps wound up winning six gold medals in this Olympics just missing tying Mark Spitz Olympic record of seven gold medals in one Olympic Games.  Phelps managed gold in following events with these corresponding times:

 2004 Athens Summer Olympic Overview
Event Place Time
400m Individual Medley Gold Medal, World Record 4:08.26
100m Butterfly Gold Medal, Olympic Record 51.25
200m Butterfly Gold Medal, Olympic Record 1:54.04
200m Individual Medley Gold Medal, Olympic Record 1:57.14
4 x 200m Freestyle Relay Gold Medal, American Record 7:07.33
4 x 100m Medley Relay
 Gold Medal, World Record 3:30.68
200m Freestyle
 Bronze Medal, American Record 1:45.32
4 x 100 m freestyle relay
 Bronze Medal
 3:14.62


In the midst of these events, Phelps achieved 2 new world records, 3 Olympic records and 2 American records; but we won’t stop there.  On top of the 6 gold medals Phelps won at the 2004 Athens Summer Olympic games, he also managed to win two bronze medals, bringing his medal tally to eight in one Olympic Games

In 2008 Michael Phelps competed in eight events at the Beijing Summer Olympics.  He qualified for five individual events and three team events.  After narrowly missing tying Mark Spitz Olympic record of 7 gold medals in one game back in 2004, Phelps was able to not only tie it in 2008, he also beat it by winning gold in all eight of the events he competed in.  To make the win even sweeter, every single event was either in a World record time, or an Olympic record time.


 2008 Beijing Summer Olympic Overview
Event Place
Time
400m Individual Medley Gold Medal, World Record 4:03.84
4 x 100m Freestyle Relay Gold Medal, World Record 3:08.24
200m Freestyle Gold Medal, World Record 1:42.96
200m Butterfly Gold Medal, World Record 1:52.03
4 x 200m Freestyle Relay Gold Medal, World Record 6:58.56
200m Individual Medley Gold Medal, World Record 1:54.23
100m Butterfly Gold Medal, Olympic Record 50.58
4 x 100m Medley Relay Gold Medal, World Record 3:29.34