Were You A Witness To USA Swimming History?
Eight one-hundredths of a second.
Don't blink or you'll miss it.
You can employ as many cliches as you would like, but the moment itself, void of all literary descriptions, was, what many may consider, the greatest comeback in Olympic history.
Take away all the hype and pressure to produce a gold medal to keep swimming icon Michael Phelps' dream of eight in a single Olympics alive; take away all the fuel and inspiration the Americans used from French anchor Alaine Bernard, and you still have an epic comeback.
Now add all that I subtracted, and you can see why this was nothing short of greatness. For a sport in America that rarely gets recognized outside of the Olympics, swimming has arguably matched the expectations that the men's basketball teams of years past had produced.
How many other Americans scheduled the relay into their evening schedule last night? How many families came together, for a period of just over three minutes, to witness history?
The moment captivated the imaginations of so many, although it took place half a world away. I'm almost positive the entire country cheered in unison as NBC flashed their super-imposed “United States” with the number one denoting first place across lane four, and high fives were shared while fist pumps were displayed from Maine to California.
I'm also positive many citizens said something similar to what I said before and during the race, “Stick it to the French,” and then after the results were in, it became, “They did stick it to the French!”
“The Americans? We're going to smash the Americans. That's what we came here for,” Bernard said before the relay.
Well, it appears by the dejected facial expression following the American's win and the way he was the last to leave the pool, that his hopes and dreams were the ones that were smashed.
It wasn't so much the margin of victory or the statement by Bernard that made it so special; those factors just added to the sweetness of being victorious. It was the way in which it was completed. It was in fact a comeback...of epic proportions.
For the final leg of the relay, a short fifty meters, Bernard had led by, at times, what appeared to be at least three-fourths of a body length, and possibly a full body length. There was no way USA captain Jason Lezak should have come back.
With the team's biggest cheerleader, Michael Phelps, yelling words of encouragement from just behind the starting blocks, Lezak inched his way back into the race. Each stroke moved him closer to Bernard. Each stroke cut Bernard's lead by inches.
Just about a second before hitting the wall, underwater cameras showed both Bernard and Lezak take glances at each other, making the end even more dramatic.
And in the end, Lezak touched the wall just eight one-hundredths of a second before Bernard. If the final leg was any shorter than fifty meters, the French would have taken the gold. It was in that final meter, that final second, that the Americans prevailed.
After only two seconds, the results were displayed on the scoreboard, the official signal for the swimmers to begin the celebration. No one could believe it, as I'm sure it took most of us minutes to actually realize what happened.
Just seconds before, we all noticed Bernard's lead, and how it appeared insurmountable. Even though we remained optimistic, many of us probably kept the thoughts of losing in the back of our minds. But as Lezak closed the gap, that optimism became more evident. There became a chance and opportunity to win, to make the greatest comeback ever.
And it happened.
Jason Lezak not only kept Michael Phelps' goal of eight gold medals in one Olympics alive, but he did something greater than that. He produced a moment that few Hollywood writers could even dream of scripting.
On the biggest stage in the world, the United States once again prevailed, and Lezak entered United States Olympic history lore, adding to the mystique and dominance of United States swimming.
