LONDON – Michael Phelps is turning his final Olympics into quite a victory lap, and don’t fret about American swimming after he’s gone.

Led by a pair of high schoolers, the post-Phelps era appears to be in very good hands.

In what amounted to a symbolic changing of the guard Friday, Phelps claimed the 17th gold medal of a career that has just 24 hours to go — on the same night one teenager, Missy Franklin, broke a world record in the backstroke and another, Katie Ledecky, took down a hallowed American mark that was set nearly eight years before she was born.

“This has sort of turned into the youth Olympics,” Franklin said. “There’s so many members of the team that are coming up this year that are going to carry on this incredible generation.”

Incredible, indeed.

His long arms whirling through the water, Phelps was seventh at the turn in the 100-meter butterfly, but he brought it home like a champion. That, in a sense, sums up his Olympics farewell. He got off to a sluggish start but has three victories in the past four days, and it’s almost certain he’ll take home one more gold Saturday in the medley relay.

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This was the final race he’ll do alone.

“I’m just happy that the last one was a win,” said Phelps, who will likely finish with twice as many golds as anyone else. “That’s all I really wanted coming into the night.”

He’ll swim the butterfly leg of the medley relay, an event the U.S. men have never lost. That streak should carry on, with the Americans sending out an imposing quartet that includes three gold medalists (Phelps, freestyler Nathan Adrian and backstroker Matt Grevers), plus a guy who won bronze (breast stroker Brendan Hansen).

It’s unfathomable to think the Phelps era could end with anything less than a performance that puts him atop the podium one last time, gold medal No. 18 around his neck.

“I don’t think Michael is going to let anything go wrong in that race,” said Eric Shanteau, who swam the relay for the U.S. in the prelims.

Just minutes before Phelps took center stage at the Olympic Aquatics Centre, Franklin set a world record in the 200 backstroke, the 17-year-old’s third gold in London. Another American teen, 19-year-old Elizabeth Beisel, claimed the bronze.

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“I can’t believe what just happened,” said Franklin. “In that last 25, I knew I was giving it everything I had because I couldn’t feel my arms and legs and I was just trying to get my hand to the wall as fast I could.”

Right after Phelps was done, Ledecky — the youngest member of the U.S. team at 15 — nearly broke the world record in the 800 freestyle, denying Britain’s Rebecca Adlington a repeat before her home fans. Adlington settled for bronze in a race Ledecky dominated from start to finish, falling off record pace only in the last 15 meters.

But no one has dominated like Phelps, who increased his career overall medal total to 21.

“He’s the king of the Olympic Games,” said his butterfly rival, Serbia’s Milorad Cavic.

Even though Phelps didn’t go as fast in the final as he did in the semifinals, he actually won by a relatively comfortable margin compared to his two previous Olympic wins in the 100 fly: four-hundredths of a second over Portland’s Ian Crocker in 2004, then one-hundredth of a second against Cavic at the Beijing Games four years ago.

That was the victory that kept Phelps on course to win a historic eight gold medals in China.

This was about going out in style.

 


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