LONDON — Not often do you witness an entire era coming to such a definitive and complete end.
Saturday night at the Olympic Aquatics Centre, the Michael Phelps era of Olympic swimming domination didn’t just splash down gently. It did a cannonball. And I am still wiping the chlorinated water off my face from the residual spray.
To be sure, this was merely one race. But when Phelps finished fourth — fourth! — in the 400-meter individual medley and his time was more than four seconds slower than gold medalist Ryan Lochte, it had the feel of something much larger and more profound. The spectators were palpably stunned.
So was Lochte, a USA teammate of Phelps.
“When I touched the wall,” admitted Lochte, “I think I was in shock. I guess I still am.”
Of course he was. An entire star-spangled nation probably still is.
That’s because we became so used to the routine. Before the start of each Olympic swim race, competitors enter the pool deck and sit down on small white chairs in front of their respective lanes, then take off their warmup suits. For Phelps, that chair always seemed more like a throne.
Ever since 2004, when Phelps won six gold medals in Athens, he would arise off his throne day after day and stroke his way to victory. It happened eight times in 2008, in Beijing.
But Saturday night, the throne turned back into just another little white chair. Phelps’ defeat ended a streak of 13 consecutive Olympic events in which he had earned a gold medal. And it wasn’t that close.
“I felt fine in the first 200,” Phelps said, “then I don’t know.”
The explanation wasn’t really that complicated. The 400 IM is considered the most difficult event on the swimming rota. It requires the most challenging training schedule and a mastery of four different strokes — two pool lengths each of the butterfly, backstroke, breastroke and freestyle.
After Phelps’ first two trips up and down the pool, he was still in contention, trailing Lochte by less than a second. But after the backstroke, it was 2.6 seconds. He was in major trouble. Two breaststroke laps later, Phelps was in fourth place. And that’s where he stayed.
The silver medal went to a Brazilian swimmer, Thiago Pereira. The bronze went to Kosuke Hagino of Japan.
Back in the day, Phelps would have eaten all of them for lunch. Now he just had indigestion.
“It’s just really frustrating to start off on a bad note like this,” Phelps said. “That’s all I can say. It’s upsetting. But I’ve got to move past this and prepare for my next race. Hopefully, we can finish here a lot better than I started.”
The problem for him is, Lochte will have something to say about that. They will face off again one more time at these Games, in the 200-meter individual medley Thursday. But anyone who watched Saturday’s race will wonder if the result can be any different.
Lochte is the same age as Phelps, 27, and has been his top American rival for the past five years or so. However, Lochte could never push through the Phelps barrier.
So why this time?
Simple and fundamental. Over the past four years, Lochte has worked harder to win it. After his third-place finish in Beijing’s 400 IM race in 2008, Lochte plunged almost immediately back into heavy training. Phelps decided to relax a little. He took a quasi-victory lap and enjoyed civilian life for almost two years before he began serious workouts.
After the medal ceremony, Lochte appeared to know exactly what his domination of Saturday’s race might mean.
“This is my year,” Lochte said. “I feel it. I’ve trained my butt off for four years.”