Swimming went more than three decades before discovering someone to better the Olympic records set by Mark Spitz, but the wait to find a challenger to the mark set by Michael Phelps could last another century.
Spitz set the benchmark for Olympic swimming by winning seven gold medals at the 1972 Munich Games but Phelps raised the bar even higher in Athens.
The American teenager, unrivalled as the star of the pool in Athens, won eight medals, including six golds, to match Soviet gymnast Alexander Dityatin's 1980 record for the most medals at one Games.
He had been promised $1 million if he could equal Spitz by winning seven golds but he could potentially earn 50 times that amount after creating his own legacy.
"I just wanted to be the first Michael Phelps," he explained.
Phelps, 19, won both individual medley and both butterfly finals as well as two relay golds. He got a bronze in the 200 freestyle behind Ian Thorpe and Pieter van den Hoogenband and another in the 4x100 freestyle relay surprisingly won by South Africa.
He broke his own world record to win the 400 individual medley, the first of the 32 finals, and was still going strong at the end, beating his team mate and world record holder Ian Crocker in the 100 butterfly final.
{{/usCountry}}He broke his own world record to win the 400 individual medley, the first of the 32 finals, and was still going strong at the end, beating his team mate and world record holder Ian Crocker in the 100 butterfly final.
{{/usCountry}}Phelps gave up his spot in the medley relay final to Crocker who repaid him by ensuring the US won the gold in world record time. Although he didn't swim the final, Phelps got a medal because he raced in the heats.
The US topped the swimming medal count with 12 golds. Australia were second with seven followed by Japan with three and the Netherlands and Ukraine with two each.