By Stephen J. Thomas<\/p>\n
ATHENS, Greece. August 17. WORLD record-holder Michael Phelps added a second gold medal to his collection when he touched in 1:54.04 to win the 200m fly. <\/p>\n
Phelps, who led the entire way, was under world record pace for the first half of the race but visably tightened with twenty-five meters to swim. Holding strong, he recorded history's second fastest time to beat Japan's faast-closing Takashi Yamamoto in an Asian record 1:54.56. Brit, Stephen Parry, who was second through the final turn, finished third in 1:55.52, a Commonwealth record.<\/p>\n
"I was really hurting on the third lap. I knew the other guys were coming in strong, so I just hoped I could hit the wall first," Phelps said He did. Just barely.<\/p>\n
Yamamoto, who was closing quickly on Phelps, said: "I was aiming at gold. "I have nothing to regret. This is the result I got after giving my best, so I think this is the best result with my skills right now." <\/p>\n
Parry, who was fourth in this event at last year's World championships in Barcelona, exulted: ""I am absolutely made up. Great Britain needed a medal and I'm happy to get it!"<\/p>\n
These three men occupied the top three spots the entire race and were never seriously challenged. Poland's Pawel Korzeniowski, 19, set a national record of 1:56.00 in finishing fourth.<\/p>\n
Defending Olympic champion Tom Malchow was eighth in 1:57.48, precisely the time he swam in the semifinals.<\/p>\n
\nMen 200m Butterfly Finals <\/b><\/p>\n
Record Splits Name NOC Location Date
\nWR 1:53.93 25.95 54.89 1:24.28 PHELPS Michael USA Barcelona (ESP) 22 JUL 2003
\nOR 1:55.35 26.21 55.75 1:25.27 MALCHOW Thomas USA Sydney (AUS) 19 SEP 2000 <\/p>\n
Event No: 14 <\/p>\n
Rank Lane Name NOC R.T. 50m 100m 150m Time Time
\nBehind
\n1 5 PHELPS Michael USA 0.78 (1) 25.55 (1) 54.45
\n28.90 (1) 1:24.54
\n30.09 1:54.04
\n29.50 OR
\n2 6 YAMAMOTO Takashi JPN 0.71 (3) 25.98 (3) 55.21
\n29.23 (3) 1:25.07
\n29.86 1:54.56
\n29.49 0.52 AS
\n3 4 PARRY Stephen GBR 0.69 (2) 25.90 (2) 55.16
\n29.26 (2) 1:24.90
\n29.74 1:55.52
\n30.62 1.48
\n4 3 KORZENIOWSKI Pawel POL 0.78 (5) 26.37 (4) 55.51
\n29.14 (4) 1:25.62
\n30.11 1:56.00
\n30.38 1.96
\n5 7 GHERGHEL Ioan ROM 0.85 (4) 26.32 (5) 55.96
\n29.64 (5) 1:25.99
\n30.03 1:56.10
\n30.11 2.06
\n6 2 WU Peng CHN 0.78 (6) 26.47 (8) 56.25
\n29.78 (6) 1:26.30
\n30.05 1:56.28
\n29.98 2.24
\n7 1 SKVORTSOV Nikolay RUS 0.90 (7) 26.63 (6) 56.22
\n29.59 (7) 1:26.33
\n30.11 1:57.14
\n30.81 3.10
\n8 8 MALCHOW Tom USA 0.75 (8) 26.64 (7) 56.23
\n29.59 (8) 1:26.64
\n30.41 1:57.48
\n30.84 3.44<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Stephen J. Thomas ATHENS, Greece. August 17. WORLD record-holder Michael Phelps added a second gold medal to his collection when he touched in 1:54.04 to win the 200m fly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":71945,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7861","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-zzzzzzzzz"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\n