The men's 200 metre individual medley event at the 2008 Olympic Games took place on 13–15 August at the Beijing National Aquatics Center in Beijing, China.

U.S. swimmer Michael Phelps blasted a new world record to defend his title in the event, and more importantly, claim his sixth Olympic gold, twelfth career, and fourteenth overall medal. He established a sterling time of 1:54.23 to lower his prior standard from the Olympic trials by almost six-tenths of a second (0.60). Hungary's László Cseh added a third silver to his collection, finishing with a European record of 1:56.52. Phelps' teammate and archrival Ryan Lochte earned a bronze in a time of 1:56.53, just a hundredth of a second (0.01) behind Cseh. The podium placements also replicated the results of the 400 m individual medley, held on the first day of the Games.

Brazil's Thiago Pereira finished fourth with a time of 1:58.14, and was followed in the fifth spot by Japan's Ken Takakuwa, in an Asian record of 1:58.22. A full second later, Great Britain's James Goddard posted a time of 1:59.24 to earn a sixth spot, while Canada's Keith Beavers (1:59.43) and Goddard's teammate Liam Tancock (2:00.76) rounded out the finale.

Records Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.

The following new world and Olympic records were set during this competition.

Date Event Name Nationality Time Record August 15 Final Michael Phelps 1:54.23

Results

Heats Rank Heat Lane Name Nationality Time Notes 1 5 4 Ryan Lochte 1:58.15 Q 2 4 4 László Cseh 1:58.29 Q 3 5 5 Thiago Pereira 1:58.41 Q 4 4 6 Ken Takakuwa 1:58.51 Q, AS 5 4 7 Bradley Ally 1:58.57 Q, NR 6 6 4 Michael Phelps 1:58.65 Q 7 5 7 Alessio Boggiatto 1:58.80 Q 8 6 2 Takuro Fujii 1:59.19 Q 9 5 1 Keith Beavers 1:59.19 Q, NR 10 6 1 Darian Townsend 1:59.22 Q, AF 11 6 6 Vytautas Janušaitis 1:59.63 Q 12 3 1 Gal Nevo 1:59.66 Q 13 6 5 James Goddard 1:59.74 Q 14 4 5 Liam Tancock 1:59.79 Q 15 5 6 Leith Brodie 1:59.96 Q 16 4 3 Dinko Jukić 2:00.57 Q 17 5 3 Tamás Kerékjártó 2:00.60 18 6 3 Brian Johns 2:00.66 19 6 7 Diogo Carvalho 2:00.66 20 3 6 Mihail Alexandrov 2:00.70 NR 21 5 2 Dean Kent 2:01.12 22 6 8 Alexander Tikhonov 2:01.21 23 3 5 Ioannis Kokkodis 2:01.22 24 3 8 Jeremy Knowles 2:01.35 NR 25 2 6 Gard Kvale 2:01.52 NR 26 4 2 Łukasz Wójt 2:01.54 27 2 3 Miguel Molina 2:01.61 28 2 4 Vadym Lepskyy 2:01.73 29 3 7 Saša Imprić 2:01.83 30 1 7 Omar Pinzón 2:02.28 31 2 2 Tomáš Fučík 2:02.85 32 1 5 Chris Christensen 2:02.93 33 4 1 Brenton Cabello 2:03.08 34 3 4 Qu Jingyu 2:03.15 35 4 8 Martin Liivamägi 2:03.56 36 2 5 Nicholas Bovell 2:03.90 37 3 3 Dmitriy Gordiyenko 2:03.92 38 1 1 Andrejs Dūda 2:04.18 39 5 8 Robin van Aggele 2:04.33 40 3 2 Markus Deibler 2:04.54 41 1 2 Mehdi Hamama 2:04.91 42 2 8 Serkan Atasay 2:05.25 43 2 1 Leopoldo Andara 2:05.71 NR 44 1 4 Park Beom-ho 2:06.17 45 1 3 Iurii Zakharov 2:07.01 46 1 6 Danil Bugakov 2:10.04 2 7 Andrew Bree

Semifinals

Semifinal 1 Rank Lane Name Nationality Time Notes1 3 Michael Phelps 1:57.70 Q2 4 László Cseh 1:58.19 Q3 5 Ken Takakuwa 1:58.49 Q, AS4 1 Liam Tancock 1:59.42 Q5 6 Keith Beavers 1:59.43 Q6 2 Darian Townsend 1:59.65 7 7 Gal Nevo 2:00.43 8 8 Dinko Jukić 2:00.98

Semifinal 2 Rank Lane Name Nationality Time Notes1 4 Ryan Lochte 1:57.69 Q2 5 Thiago Pereira 1:58.06 Q3 1 James Goddard 1:58.63 Q4 3 Bradley Ally 1:59.53 5 2 Takuro Fujii 1:59.59 6 6 Alessio Boggiatto 1:59.77 7 8 Leith Brodie 2:00.57 8 7 Vytautas Janušaitis 2:00.76

Final Rank Lane Name Nationality Time Notes 5 Michael Phelps 1:54.23 6 László Cseh 1:56.52 EU 4 Ryan Lochte 1:56.53 4 3 Thiago Pereira 1:58.14 5 2 Ken Takakuwa 1:58.22 AS 6 7 James Goddard 1:59.24 7 8 Keith Beavers 1:59.43 8 1 Liam Tancock 2:00.76

References

External links Official Olympic Report