Michael Phelps Biography (Michael Fred Phelps)

Michael Phelps Biography (Michael Fred Phelps)

Michael Fred Phelps

In The News: American swimmer Michael Phelps set the all-time single Olympics gold-medal record Sunday (August 17, 2008) by passing Mark Spitz's 36-year-old record of seven.

Phelps won his eighth gold medal at the Beijing Games, swimming the third leg for the Americans in the winning four-by-100-meter medley relay. It was also his 14th career gold medal, another record.

Phelps also won gold at Beijing in the 4-by-100 individual medley, 4-by-100 individual relay, 200 freestyle, 200 butterfly, 4-by-200 freestyle relay, 200 individual medley and 100 butterfly.

Biography: Michael Fred Phelps was born June 30, 1985, in Baltimore, Maryland, to Fred and Debbie Phelps and grew up in the Baltimore neighborhood of Rodgers Forge. Fred, an all around athlete, was a state trooper and Debbie was a middle-school principal.


Phelps began swimming when his two older sisters, Whitney (born 1978) and Hilary (born 1980), joined a local swim team. Whitney tried out for the U.S. Olympic team in 1996 at the age of 15, but injuries derailed her career.

At age seven, Phelps was still “a little scared” to put his head underwater, so his instructors allowed him to float around on his back. Not surprisingly, the first stroke he mastered was the backstroke.

When Michael’s parents divorced in 1994, the kids went to live with Debbie and Michael grew very close to his mother.

After he saw swimmers Tom Malchow and Tom Dolan compete at the 1996 Summer Games in Atlanta, Michael started to dream of becoming a champion himself. He launched his swimming career at Towson’s Loyola High School pool.

Phelps then met his coach, Bob Bowman, when he started training at the North Baltimore Aquatic Club at the Meadowbrook Aquatic and Fitness Center. The coach immediately recognized Michael’s talents and fierce sense of competition and began an intense training regime together. By 1999, Phelps had made the U.S. National B Team.

At the age of 15, Phelps became the youngest American male swimmer at an Olympic Games in 68 years. While he didn’t win a medal at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, he would soon become a major force in competitive swimming.

During the spring of 2001, Phelps set the world record in the 200-meter butterfly, becoming the youngest male swimmer in history (at 15 years and 9 months) to ever set a swimming world record. He then broke his own record during the 2001 World Championships in Fukuoka, Japan, with a time of 1:54:58, earning his first international medal.

Phelps continued to set new marks at the 2002 U.S. Summer Nationals in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, establishing a new world record for the 400-meter individual medley and U.S. records in the 100-meter butterfly and the 200-meter individual medley. The following year at the same event, he broke his own world record in the 400-meter individual medley with a time of 4:09.09.

Shortly after graduating from Towson High School in 2003, the 17-year-old Phelps set five world records, including the 200-meter individual medley at the World Championships in Barcelona, Spain, with a time of 1:56:04. Then during the U.S. trials for the 2004 Summer Olympics, he broke his own world again in the 400 meter individual medley when he was clocked at 4:08:41.

Phelps became a superstar at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, Greece, winning eight medals (including six gold), which tied with Soviet gymnast Aleksandr Dityatin (1980) for the most medals in a single Olympic Games. Phelps scored the first of six gold medals on August 14 when he broke his own world record in the 400-meter individual medley, shaving 0.15 seconds of his previous mark.


He also won gold in the 100-meter butterfly, 200-meter butterfly, 200-meter individual medley, 4x200-meter freestyle relay and 4x100-meter medley relay). The two events in Athens in which Phelps took bronze medals were 200-meter freestyle and the 4x100-meter freestyle relay.

Just weeks following his triumph in Athens, Phelps was arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol in Salisbury, Maryland, after cruising through a stop sign.

He plead guilty to driving while impaired, and was sentenced to 18 months probation, fined $250 and had to speak against drinking and driving to high school students and attend a Mothers Against Drunk Driving meeting. Michael called it an “isolated incident,” but admitted letting himself and his family down.

Phelps soon followed coaach Bowman to the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, studying sports marketing and management. Bowman coached the Wolverines’ swim team and guided Club Wolverine, the club Phelps swims for.

Phelps continued to establish world records at the 2006 Pan Pacific Championships in Victoria, British Columbia, and the 2007 World Championships in Melbourne, Australia.

After the Beijing Games are completed, Phelps and Bowman plan to return to Baltimore as Bowman will take over as CEO of North Baltimore Aquatic Club.


Source: biography.com