Charlotte Dujardin won 3 gold medals in dressage. That's pretty impressive.

---

Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

I think Phelp's dominance is pretty impressive too.

Four Olympics, Medley and an individual event of two different lengths is somehow less of an athletic accomplishment then winning a single race of a single distance over three Olympics?

~Matt

I think you could make a strong case that it is, or at least that he is the most special athlete ever. The pool of potential competitors in the 100M is huge...from the time kids are in primary school the fast sprinters are identified and steered towards athletics. Compare that to swimming or even more cycling where you have a limited number of kids that ever take it up far enough to determine if they have talent or not. And it is a very basic skill...anyone can go out and see how fast they can run 100M. He is faster than anyone ever, and not by a little bit but completely dominant. Bolt seems to win without even trying, and it seems as if every race everyone else is running for second.

I think the 100m is seen as the gold standard for athletic accomplishments because nearly everyone on the planet has been exposed to sprinting at one point or another, the sport has a very low barrier to entry as opposed to swimming, and thus the pool of athletes you have to be better then to be champ is much larger. Everyone can relate to the 100m sprint.

Swimming the 200IM might as well be gymnastics. For most, it's an impossible, highly specialized undertaking.

---

Long Chile was a silly place.

There are lots of great Olympic 1 time records that have not been broken in a long time,

- Bob Beamon's long jump (1968)
- Chistyakova in women's long jump (1988)
- Marita Koch in 400m
- Flo Jo in 200m

However, most individual records will likely be beaten at some point. It may take longer to get another Michael Phelps because he needs a strong group of swimmers to get the relay medals. There is also Ian Miller from Canada in Equestrian who competed in 10 consecutive Olympics. It's not in the same class as swimming of course, but still quite remarkable.

I think it will also be a long time until we see another person beat Bolt, particularly if Jamaica wins another 4 x 100. Not only would have have to stay injury free in a sport with lots of injuries, but he has to be on top of his game in both sprints over 12 years. Then, he also has to have 3 other world class sprinters on the team with no fumbles or miscues in the relay. I think that record is on the verge of being unbreakable.

There are all kinds of criteria you can apply to athletic accomplishments to gauge their greatness, but at the end of the day, it's all subjective. When you try to apply "objective" standards in order to make comparisons, you're not only doomed to fail, but you're going to miss a lot of athletic greatness.

The 100 is the premier track event, largely because it's the speed standard, and speed is fundamental. Also because the talent pool is so big.

But strength is also fundamental, and when was the last time you heard someone say a weightlifting victory was the greatest athletic achievement ever?

Longevity is impressive, but I don't know that it makes any single athletic feat more impressive in and of itself. Makes the athlete more impressive, maybe. Personally, I think Mike Tyson's utter destruction of the boxing world was at least as impressive, brief as it was. He was on a totally different level than anyone else in his prime.

I read an article the other day arguing that Phelps can't be considered the greatest athlete ever because he never faced a defender. I don't particularly buy that argument, but there it is.

Are specialists more or less impressive than generalists?

Lots of things to consider. As I'm sitting here thinking about it, I think the biggest thing to me is the degree to which an athlete dominates his/her field. How far ahead of everyone else are they? Sometimes that translates to longevity, sometimes not.

---

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

is this supposed to be in pink? that shouldn't even be an olympic sport

Ashton Eaton, Bob Mathias and Daley Thompson just yawned.

---

_________________________________
I'll be what I am
A solitary man

Either that, or is the feat greater to beat someone like that. US v USSR hockey, Douglas over Tyson, Rulon Gardner over Karelin. As you said, all subjective.

That was right after they said the same for Phelps and right before they said the same for Ashton Eaton. If I could listen to an all British commentary of the Olympics, I would.

Is Charlotte Dujardin the horse?

---

How does Danny Hart sit down with balls that big?

Nope, not pink.

Whether you like dressage or not, or think it belongs in the Olympics or not, winning an Olympic gold medal 3x is a very impressive feat. It's not like her competitors just sit back and let her win it. There are a ton of hours that go into preparation, you need to have talent and dedication to get there.

---

Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

Either that, or is the feat greater to beat someone like that. US v USSR hockey, Douglas over Tyson, Rulon Gardner over Karelin.

Depends. Are you beating someone like that at their prime? Or have they dissipated? Or was that particular victory a fluke? Etc.

I don't give much credit to Buster Douglas here, for example. Impressive win? Sure, and more power to him, nobody saw it coming. But beating that Tyson was nowhere near in the same category as the wins Tyson racked up before then.

---

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

What he’s done has never been done before, and it’s without question amazing. That said I don’t see it as the greatest sports achievement. I don’t even think it’s the greatest achievement of this Olympics. I was a sprinter in high school so I respect what goes into it, but sprinting is primarily genetics. Putting your head down and running as fast as you can for 100 or 200 meters isn’t nearly as hard physically or mentally as decathlon, swimming IM or winning metals in several different strokes. I think playing a playing a complete game of football or basketball took more out of me than sprinting for 10 or 20 seconds.

Phelps' swim accomplishments are amazing, but swimming unlike running is restricted to a much smaller group of people. There are facilities and opportunities to swim in the west, Europe and developed parts of Asia but the vast majority of the world's population has no chance to test how good they are. Almost all of Africa, India, most of China, central Asia, & Latin America does not get the chance - so Phelps' completion is dramatically reduced. For all we know the greatest swimmer of all time is herding cattle in Kenya and will never get a chance to swim.

Running on the other hand is universal. The Kalari Bushmen run, the Inuit in the Arctic run, everybody runs. And if you're REALLY fast you have a reasonable chance to compete on the world stage.

That's why for me, Bolt's accomplishment trumps Phelps'. Bolt is the greatest in a sport where everyone on the planet is a potential competitor.

---

Remember - It's important to be comfortable in your own skin... because it turns out society frowns on wearing other people's

ST has short memories. Two words: Iron Cowboy.

Julie Miller...

---

Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

The three gold medals is something nobody else has done in the Olympics marquis event. Then you gotta throw in that he won the first in a WR 9.69 while relaxing over the finish line, and the next was done in 9.62.. well, that's pretty damn impressive.

sprinting is primarily genetics. Putting your head down and running as fast as you can for 100 or 200 meters isn’t nearly as hard physically or mentally as decathlon, swimming IM or winning metals in several different strokes.

Fair point, but on the other hand, is genetic talent less impressive than mental toughness?

Is Babe Ruth a less impressive athlete or a more impressive athlete because of his lifestyle?

---

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

I think it's absolutely silly that people keep repeating this notion that everyone in the world runs. Almost nobody in the world runs like these guys run. The fact that you ran a sprint in a middle school field day meet doesn't make anyone a potential competitor with these guys. Their sport is nearly as specialized as swimmers. Tons of people swim. Tons of people run. Relatively few do so competitively, and even fewer do so at the top levels. And one of the major reasons fewer people swim is because it's harder than running.

---

Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

You don't think there's a much bigger talent pool of runners than swimmers?

Everyone has run. Not everyone has swam. Even in America, there are plenty of people who've never been in a pool and who can't swim. I'd bet there's hardly an able bodied person alive who hasn't been in a footrace at some point in their life.

Just from an infrastructure standpoint, you're going to have a bigger group of potential runners than swimmers.

---

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

I was a sprinter in high school so I respect what goes into it, but sprinting is primarily genetics.

There is genetics involved in Michael Phelps too, as there is in every Olympic athlete.

If it was primarily about genetics, there would have been other sprinters who won both the 100 and 200 in 3 consecutive Olympics. No one has ever come close.

Swimming the 200IM might as well be gymnastics. For most, it's an impossible, highly specialized undertaking.

Which is kind of my point. Everyone can run. Phelps is doing something that most people can't even do. He did it in more olympics and he did it in more actual events...and several relays as part of a team. I honestly don't even see how the two are in the same ballpark.

Same goes for Gymnastics. Be on the winning team, win two Individual events and do it in four olympics is a far greater accomplishment then winning a single event for three.

~Matt

There's a bigger talent pool, but that's kind of irrelevant. The talent pool in both swimming and running is big enough that there is almost no appreciable difference in the talent levels at the top.

Phelps isn't Phelps because he's the most talented swimmer in the world. We have no way to actually measure talent, but if we did, I can guarantee that he beats other athletes who are physically more "talented" than he is.

---

Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly