The 200 Fly

This is my race.  The 200 fly is what I set a world record in seven years ago.  I had enormous expectations for myself in Beijing for this race.  As I was standing on the blocks getting ready to start this race though, my goggles were bothering me.  I had no time to fix it.  This was my race that I am expected to win by a landslide.  This is what I have been working on throughout my swimming career.  An assistant swimming coach for Michigan saw something was wrong from their television in Norway.  As the beep went off, I dove immediately in.  The goggles started leaking right away.  I was just worried about going fast at this point.  After 50, I thought the leak wouldn’t be that bad and mess up my vision or anything.  At 100, though, everything started getting blurry more and more.  With about 75 meters to go, I couldn’t see anything.  This is where all my training is put into place.  I had been taught that there is a regular progression of strokes from leg to leg.  The final leg would have about 19 or 20 strokes.  I started counting during the third leg.  I nailed the turn perfectly.  It was all out now to the final wall.  I hit stroke twenty and wasn’t at the wall.  I just glided toward the wall after the 21st stroke.  I immediately took my caps and goggles off and blinked like crazy to be able to see.  Once my vision returned, I saw my name next to the number 1.  It was also a world record time of 1:52.03.  Four golds down, four more to go.