Phelps caps career with gold in Olympic relay

London, Aug 5 (IANS/RIA Novosti) American swimmer Michael Phelps won his 18th Olympic gold medal in his final competitive appearance Saturday to help the US to the 4×100 medley relay at the London Games.

Phelps’ 22nd career Olympic medal was won in three minutes, 29.35 seconds, two seconds ahead of a strong Japan team.

Phelps overturned an early Japanese lead on the second leg to put the Americans in the lead with a typically strong butterfly.

Matthew Grevers, Brendan Hansen and Nathan Adrian were his teammates.

A Japan team of Ryosuke Irie, Kosuke Kitijama, Takeshi Matsuda and Takuro Fujii claimed the silver in 3:31.26.

The Australians, featuring Hayden Stoeckel, Christian Sprenger, Matt Targett, James Magnussen, clocked 3:31.58.

It means Phelps’ final medal chest contains 18 gold, two silver and two bronze.

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Posted by admin on August 5, 2012. Filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry