Michael Phelps: The Best Olympic Swimmer Ever

Michael Fred Phelps (born June 30, 1985) is an American swimmer. He has won 14 career Olympic gold medals, the most by any Olympian, and is often cited as the greatest swimmer and one of the greatest Olympians of all time. As of August 2, 2009, Phelps has broken thirty-seven world records in swimming.

Phelps holds the record for the most gold medals won in a single Olympics, his eight at the 2008 Beijing Games surpassed American swimmer Mark Spitz's seven-gold performance at Munich in 1972.

Overall, Phelps has won 16 Olympic medals: six gold and two bronze at Athens in 2004, and eight gold at Beijing in 2008. In doing so he has twice equaled the record eight medals of any type at a single Olympics achieved by Soviet gymnast Alexander Dityatin at the 1980 Moscow Summer Games. His five golds in individual events tied the single Games record set by Eric Heiden in the 1980 Winter Olympics and equaled by Vitaly Scherbo at the 1992 Summer Games. Phelps career Olympic medal total is second only to the 18 Soviet gymnast Larissa Latynina won over three Olympics, including nine gold.

Phelps's international titles and record breaking performances have earned him the World Swimmer of the Year Award in 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, and American Swimmer of the Year Award in 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008, and 2009. He has won a total of fifty-four career medals thus far in major international competition, forty-five gold, seven silver, and two bronze spanning the Olympics, the World, and the Pan Pacific Championships. His unprecedented Olympic success in 2008 earned Phelps Sports Illustrated magazine's Sportsman of the Year award.