Michael Phelps became the first male swimmer to win the same event at three successive Olympics when he clinched the men’s 200m individual medley gold on Thursday.
Phelps, who won the event in Athens and Beijing, relegated world champion Ryan Lochte to silver while Hungary’s Laszlo Cseh took bronze.
Phelps led all the way and got his giant hands on the wall first in a time of one minute, 54.27 seconds, just outside Lochte’s world record of 1:54.00 that he set last year in the final at the Shanghai world championships.
Lochte, close to exhaustion after winning bronze in the 200 backstroke half an hour before the medley, held on to finish second, just 0.63 behind Phelps.
Only two swimmers had ever won the same individual event at three successive Olympics, both women — Australia's Dawn Fraser, in 100 freestyle in 1956, 1960 and 1964, and Hungary’s Krisztina Egerszegi in 200 backstroke in 1988, 1992 and 1996.
World record for Soni, again
American Rebecca Soni broke the women's 200m breaststroke record for the second time in two days to successfully defend her 200m breaststroke title. Using her trademark late kick, Soni clocked 2 minutes, 19.59 seconds to improve on her own mark from Wednesday's semifinals by 0.41 seconds.
It was the sixth world record in the pool at these games.
{{/usCountry}}It was the sixth world record in the pool at these games.
{{/usCountry}}With this win, Soni became the first Beijing swimming gold medallist to successfully defend a title in London.