Impressed yes but it sure doesn't make him the greatest ever Olympian. Michael Johnson live the BBC coverage last night said he had been there a week and was bored and couldn't wait for the proper stuff to start. When castigated by the presenter he basically said that if the sprinters could do the 100m forwards, backwards and every which way they too could win bags of Golds. Interestingly swimming has 38 medals against track and fields 50 something.
I have a kid who aspires to Olympic swimming trials in 2012. The times posted by the Olympians are remarkable by comparison to even the best collegiate atheletes. By comparison to this elite Olympic group, Michael Phelps is truly a phenomenon.
There will be very few chances to ever see such an elite athelete in a lifetime. I am happy to have the chance to see so much swimming. (Could live without so much synchro diving and volleyball, though...would rather see more other stuff.) As for forwards and backwards running, I'd say that's a pretty glib simplification of the sport of swimming. Why then, has not a previous swimmer since Spitz, way back in the 70's, won 'bags of Gold'? An ignorant remark, I'd say.
