HW # 8, Due Monday, September 15th!

For Monday, read the Michael Phelps article below. Pull the 5Ws and H from story, create an inverted pyramid, write a new lead for the story and a new headline.

Steps for writing a lead and for writing a headline are in the post below this one.

See you in class!

-Mr. Donohue

Lezak, Not Phelps, Puts On a Show

By KAREN CROUSE

BEIJING — Would Michael Phelps’s bid for eight gold medals in the Beijing Games dissolve in a pool at the Water Cube on Monday? The answer was a resounding No.
Not over Jason Lezak’s 32-year-old body.

Lezak, swimming the anchor leg of the United States’ 4x100-meter freestyle relay, hit the water a half-second after Alain Bernard of France, who came into the race as the world-record holder in the 100-meter freestyle.

“I knew I was going to have to swim out of my mind,” Lezak said, adding, “I had more adrenaline going than I’ve ever had in my life.”

Dragging off Bernard, who was hugging the lane line that separated them, Lezak made up ground, but with 25 meters remaining it appeared as if he would run out of pool. Trailing Bernard by half a body length, Lezak put his head down and surged to the wall.

A three-time Olympian, Lezak had been in this predicament before. He anchored the American 4x100 relay teams at the 2000 and 2004 Olympics that came up short. This time, he was part of a photo finish.

When the water settled, the giant video scoreboard showed that Lezak had out-touched Bernard by 0.08 of a second. Phelps’s pursuit of Mark Spitz’s record of seven swimming gold medals in one Olympics remained alive with a little help from his mates. Lezak’s split of 46.06 seconds was the fastest anchor leg ever, by 0.73, and his personal best by over 1.2 seconds.

“His last 50 meters were absolutely incredible,” Phelps said. “He had a perfect finish.”

After Lezak touched, Phelps, who swam the first leg, raised his arms and let out a primal scream. Garrett Weber-Gale, who swam second, came up from behind him and swallowed him in a hug.

The United States was timed in 3 minutes 8.24 seconds, shattering by nearly four seconds the world record that its B team had set the previous night. France won the silver in 3:08.32. Australia, benefiting from a world-record setting lead-off swim of 47.24 from Eamon Sullivan, was third.

Bernard, who in a matter of minutes lost the 100 world record to Sullivan and the relay gold to Lezak, was bereft. He broke down in tears in the pool and later in the mixed zone.

His teammate, Frederick Bousquet, who split a blistering 46.63 on the third leg, said, “We believed in the gold medal until the end.” He added, “The touch made the difference and experience overcame talent.”

Though not well-known outside of swimming circles, Lezak, a native Southern Californian, has a reputation in USA Swimming for being the Mariano Rivera of sprinters. “Jason is the most phenomenal closer I’ve ever seen in my life,” said Cullen Jones, who swam the third leg.

After making the turn, Lezak said he momentarily lost the courage of his convictions. Bernard had a 0.6 of a second lead and Lezak was not sure he could reel him in. “I’m not going to lie,” he said. “The thought really crossed my mind for a split-second, ‘There’s no way.’ ”

Then he reminded himself that he was representing his country and this was the Olympics and he was not getting any younger so he had to make the most of this chance. “In five seconds I was thinking all these things,” Lezak said. “And I got a super charge.”

With his surge, Lezak kept alive Phelps’s drive to break Spitz’s record and collect a million-dollar bonus from Speedo. Asked if he would demand a cut if Phelps succeeds, Lezak grinned and joked, “We’ve already talked about that.”

Phelps, 23, was timed in 47.51 on the first leg, an American record, nearly half a second faster than he clocked at the United States Olympic trials but behind Sullivan's 47.24. Only the first relay leg can qualify for records because it comes with a traditional standing start. Phelps joined his teammates in the ready room with one lackluster morning swim behind him.

In the semifinals of the 200-meter freestyle, the second of his five individual events, Phelps never held the lead in his heat, botched his finish and qualified fourth with a time that was two seconds slower than what he clocked at the trials in July and one second slower than his target number.

“I just wanted to save as much energy as I could for the relay,” Phelps said afterward, between labored breaths.

He and his teammates knew they had to be at their absolute best if they were to hold off the world, which has gotten the best of the Americans in the past two Olympics. As thunder rumbled over the bubble-wrap ceiling of the National Aquatics Center, Phelps stepped to the blocks.

The quartet of Nathan Adrian, Jones, Ben Wildman-Tobriner and Matt Grevers gave Phelps and Co. the swimming equivalent of the pole position — Lane 4, in the middle of the pool — by qualifying first in the heats Sunday night. In the process, they gave everybody the time to shoot for, eclipsing by 0.23 of a second the world record with a clocking of 3 minutes 12.23 seconds.

The squads from France and Australia also finished under the existing record of 3:12.46, setting up a final delivered all the bang of a fireworks show.
At the United States Olympic trials in July, Lezak, Weber-Gale and Phelps posted sub-48 second swims, which until the Games had been matched this year by only two others — Bernard and Sullivan.

Lezak, Weber-Gale and Phelps sat out the preliminaries to conserve energy. In what proved to be a competition within the competition, the four Americans who did swim were essentially racing one another for the opportunity to team with Lezak, Weber-Gale and Phelps in the final.

Jones, a Bronx native who grew up in New Jersey, won the honors by clocking the fastest split, a 47.61 on the second leg. In 2006, Jones became the first African-American to break a long-course world record when he was part of the United States relay team that set the global mark that fell Sunday night.

All eyes Monday were on Phelps, but the pressure was on the French, who had never won a medal in the event and were trying to win their country’s first swimming relay gold.

In the heats, the French had rested their two fastest swimmers, Bernard, who broke the world record in the 100 freestyle twice in March, and Fabien Gilot, who has the sixth-fastest time in the world this year.

The uncertainty of the outcome was a decided departure from 1972, when Spitz counted three relays among his seven golds. In those days, United States dominance meant there was never much drama in the relays. Going into the ’72 Munich Games, the Americans had won every Olympic gold awarded in the 4x100 freestyle and medley relays and 8 of 13 in the 4x200 freestyle.

Since then, the rest of the world since has caught up to the United States, the globalization of the sport reflected most dramatically in the relays. In 2000, the Americans were upset by Australia in the 4x100 freestyle, and in 2004 they finished third behind South Africa — which returned for its defense unchanged from 2004 — and the Netherlands.

Returning the Olympic crown in the event to the United States was a high priority, Phelps said. “A couple of days ago we had a guys-only meeting where we shared some stories going back and forth about the hopes we have for this meet,” he said.

The French had made their hopes public. Their trash talking might have been their undoing; it motivated the Americans. “It fired me up more than anything else,” Phelps said.

However many more Olympic medals Phelps wins, his legacy is secure and so, now, is Lezak’s. “I just happened to have the swim of my life at the right time,” Lezak said.