Phelps knocked off his own mark of 1:54.80 set at last month's US trials, his sixth world record of the games. -- AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
BEIJING - IN AN age where superlative sports performances automatically spark suspicion, Michael Phelps insisted on Friday that his record-setting swimming exploits are achieved fairly.
'Anyone can say whatever they want, I know, for me, I am clean,' Phelps said after winning his sixth swimming gold medal of the Beijing Games.
A champion's diet
Breakfast: Three fried-egg sandwiches with cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, fried onions and mayonnaise, two cups of coffee, a five-egg omelette, a bowl of grits, three slices of French toast with powdered sugar on top, three chocolate chip pancakes.
Lunch: A whole packet (.5 kg) of enriched pasta, two large ham and cheese sandwiches, a 1,000-calorie energy drink.
Dinner: Another half kg of enriched pasta, one whole pizza, another 1,000-calorie energy drink.
Six golds, six records
BEIJING - MICHAEL Phelps made it 6-for-6 at the Beijing Olympics, winning another gold medal on Friday and closing in on Mark Spitz with another world record.
Phelps dominated right from the start of the 200-metre individual medley and won in 1 minute, 54.23 seconds. He knocked off his own mark of 1:54.80 set at last month's US trials, his sixth world record of the games.
Ryan Lochte tried to pull off a daunting double, going against Phelps just 29 minutes after swimming the final of the 200 backstroke.
Lochte couldn't keep up, though he did hold on for bronze.
Laszlo Cseh of Hungary picked up his third silver of the games - all of them trailing Phelps.
Phelps hung on the lane rope in a familiar pose, admiring his time while his rivals gasped for breath. He extended his right hand to Lochte in the next lane, and the two friends shook hands and patted each other on the head.
Lochte got quite a consolation price: a world record and the first individual gold medal of his career in the backstroke. The laid-back American edged teammate Aaron Peirsol in 1:53.94 to break the mark he shared with Peirsol.
Lochte was known as 'Mr Runner-up' for his frequent second-place finishes to Phelps and Peirsol. Then, he stunned Peirsol at last year's world championships in 1:54.32.
Peirsol matched the time in beating Lochte at the US Olympic trials last month.
Peirsol won the 100 back in Beijing, but failed to match his backstroke double from Athens four years ago. He earned the silver in 1:54.33, while Arkady Vyatchanin of Russia claimed the bronze.
Phelps is just one gold away from tying Spitz's record of seven gold medals at the 1972 Munich Olympics. The 23-year-old Phelps was scheduled to return for the semifinals of the 100 butterfly about a half-hour after his win in the 200 IM; assuming he advances, he's try to equal the grandest of Olympic standards on Saturday.
If all goes according to plan, the record-breaker would come on Sunday's final day of swimming in the 4x100 medley relay. The Americans will be heavily favoured for gold in that one.
Rebecca Soni gave the US women's swim team a much-needed boost, setting a world record in the 200 breaststroke with an upset of Australia's Leisel Jones.
Soni had already claimed a surprising silver behind Jones in the 100 breaststroke, a race she wasn't even supposed to be in.
She took over when Jessica Hardy failed a doping test at the US trials and was dropped from the team.
Jones was out front over the first 100, but Soni came on strong at the end, finishing a full body length ahead of the Aussie in 2:20.22. She beat Jones' mark of 2:20.54, set two 2 years ago in Melbourne.
Jones claimed silver and Norway's Sara Nordenstam took bronze.
Lochte's win was the 20th world record set in swimming during the Olympics, with two days still to go. -- AP
Phelps is just two triumphs away from surpassing Mark Spitz's record of seven golds at one games, set in Munich in 1972.
His 12 career golds to date, including six from the Athens Games, are the most of any Olympian in any sport.
To underscore his supremacy, Phelps has captured all six of his golds in the Water Cube with world records.
Phelps's phenomenal effort has made him the story of the Games.
But the doping disgrace of one-time athletics golden girl Marion Jones, 100m world record-setter Justin Gatlin and Tour de France winner Floyd Landis, as well as the sordid tale of steroid use in Major League Baseball that emerged with the Mitchell Report, has made skeptics of sports fans in the United States and beyond.
Phelps is among the US Olympians taking part in a special US Anti-Doping Agency initiative called Project Believe, in which the competitors undergo extensive blood and urine tests beyond World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) rules to create baseline body chemistry readings for hormones and other substances.
Altered levels of such substances often indicate doping, so it is hoped the extra tests can help restore credibility to sport.
Phelps said that with the programme he had done all he could do to prove he is clean.
'I did Project Believe, where I purposely wanted to do more tests to prove it,' Phelps said. 'People can question all they want, but I have the proof and the facts are the facts.' -- AFP
