Michael Phelps

[Oscar_Wilde]

Whadda ya think of 'im?

Personally I'm a Jesse Owens fan. He made Hitler's head explode.

[Flarey]

There are great athletes in every generation. It is impossible to objectively determine which one is the greatest.

But Michael Phelps is without a doubt one of the great athletes in this generation.

[davesmistress]

Hes the greatest in this field since Mark Spitz....no one else has won so many or set world records doing each one.

Thanks for the new thread

[iamnobody]

No doubt, he's a great athlete - one of the best of all time. Like Flarey, I don't think you can objectively qualify or quantify an athlete in comparison to other athletes unless they compete against each directly in their primes - so if they don't, and especially if they're in different sports, the comparison is moot. In terms of subjective opinion (the only comparison that can really be made) the greatest athletes of modern times (since those are the only ones we've really seen) are Phelps, Spitz, Carl Lewis, Jesse Owens, Tiger, Jordan, Favre, Eric Dickerson, Gale Sayers, Jim Brown, Jim Thorpe, Dr J, etc... The point is, there are so many fantastic athletes who've contributed so much to sports that trying to distinguish a "greatest" or even a short list of contenders is an exercise in futility. The best thing we can do is try and enjoy watching the great competitors we have do their thing.

[davesmistress]

thanks for the posts

[Pervysage]

He is great at what he does but something about a fish out of water comes to mind when i try to think of him as the greatest

[shinichi]

hes pretty darn good, but hes nothing more than a great swimmer, we need to see him get out and run, naa jk but hes good at what he does

[fes753]

He's a great athlete, not the greatest since there's such a diversity in sports. But beating Spitz's record and winning 8 gold medals is a pretty awesome thing to do.

[timtom]

I'm kind of on phelps overload right now.

[ultrace]

he is a amazing guy

[Uzziel99]

He is a good athlete... but how would you determine the greatest athlete anyway? Is he good at other stuff too?

[Ginko-san]

Sure he is a great athlete but I don't really believe in him.. Too good I think .Maybe he is like Armstrong .. Not very clean .

[murph20]

The thing to remember with modern athletes, especially those who are in the Olympics, is that they work with scientists to maximize their efficency. For Michael Phelps, he began a strict regime of regular weight-lifting to improve his ability to swim against the water resistance as well as consuming an average of close to 10000 calories on a daily basis.

For one, he should be commended for his dedication to this strict regime.

However, at the same time, the modern athlete is overwhelmingly the result of scientific advances with modern athletes, such as Michael Phelps, ub irder to maximize the athlete's results with minimal output to conserve strength and energy, especially with the 400m events (in Phelps' case). That is part of the reason that Michael Phelps was able to set 7 world records in the 8 events he participated in. Michael Phelps adjusted his butterfly and freestyle to accomodate for what scientists found to be the most efficient. It is not surprising that the the two top medal winners are the United States and China, the two front-runners for the major powerhouse in the world.

P.S.

I hope Michael Phelps maintains his humility when he starts earning an annual income of 150 million from endorsements. I would hate to see such a great man ruined by fame and money.

[iamnobody]

...Or be found to be the product of illicit substances. While it's unlikely due to his extra testing efforts, we've already seen some of our most hopeful aspiring legends fall.

[Oscar_Wilde]

The thing to remember with modern athletes, especially those who are in the Olympics, is that they work with scientists to maximize their efficency. For Michael Phelps, he began a strict regime of regular weight-lifting to improve his ability to swim against the water resistance as well as consuming an average of close to 10000 calories on a daily basis.

For one, he should be commended for his dedication to this strict regime.

However, at the same time, the modern athlete is overwhelmingly the result of scientific advances with modern athletes, such as Michael Phelps, ub irder to maximize the athlete's results with minimal output to conserve strength and energy, especially with the 400m events (in Phelps' case). That is part of the reason that Michael Phelps was able to set 7 world records in the 8 events he participated in. Michael Phelps adjusted his butterfly and freestyle to accomodate for what scientists found to be the most efficient. It is not surprising that the the two top medal winners are the United States and China, the two front-runners for the major powerhouse in the world.

P.S.

I hope Michael Phelps maintains his humility when he starts earning an annual income of 150 million from endorsements. I would hate to see such a great man ruined by fame and money.

Indeed, he also has Lil' Wayne to pump him up before races, a luxury previous generations of olympians did not have.

[XAppleCyderX]

He is a great athlete, but I hate how they only focused on him and none of the other athletes. Like the things that said 30 minutes until Phelps at the bottom of my T.V. screen, that really pissed me off.

[xXxBLYNDS1DExXx]

In terms of the olympics, it seems that you cannot dispute the fact that he has surpassed both the record for total gold medals won by an individual and number of gold medals won during one Olympiad. That, in effect, makes him the greatest Olympic athlete of all time, until someone wins more medals than him.

[daeryn]

One of my friends was talking about this the other day, saying that in these olympics alone he made like $40 million on endorsements... for about 10 minutes in the pool. I realize that completely discounts training efforts and the like, but think about it - the only thing he 'produced' was the time spent in that pool, with people cheering him on and generally going nuts, and then giving the US another set of medals.

In terms of records being set, don't forget that there is a difference between the pool this year and in other years that olympic races have been ran - they were calling the water cube "the fastest pool ever", and it gave its advantages to everyone who swam in it. Phelps may have set world records, but on at least one occasion wasn't someone else literally a split second behind him? I'm not going to cheapen his victories over others in the same environment, but I have to wonder how those times would have been in the same pool that generated the previous record.

So overall... yes, he's a great athlete. He did good in the extremely brief competition that measured his performance, and from here on out he will look good on commercials and magazine ads. But I don't think he is the 'Greatest' athlete... nor do I think I would apply that term to any athlete currently alive. Time will tell if a 'Legend of Phelps' will spring up around his accomplishments, but I don't think it compares to the legends of greats that had to prove themselves not once every four years, but many times, sometimes weekly or near-daily, over the course of a very long season.

My two cents.

-Daeryn

[st3nroh4ever]

Michael Phelps Trolled The Whole World!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[datret]

I'm a huge swimmer, like I swim before school and after year round, but I've never liked Phelps.