Thorpe Beats Pretenders With 120 Strokes

There should have been trumpets, fireworks, processions, showers of rose petals. Instead it looked, to the naked eye, just like any other race in the swimming pool, albeit one attended by a full house of 8,090 spectators, including the members of several royal houses, with camera lenses pointing from every direction and a northerly breeze stiffening the flags above the grandstands. This was the hottest ticket of the games, and Ian Thorpe rose to the occasion.

Thorpe's victory in last night's 200m freestyle final, ahead of Pieter van den Hoogenband of Holland and Michael Phelps of the United States, came in a new games record time. His fifth gold medal also took him ahead of the runner Betty Cuthbert and the swimmers Dawn Fraser and Murray Rose in Australia's all-time Olympic rankings.

What the 21-year-old from Sydney does has no need of fanfares. When Thorpe launches himself into the water, drama is guaranteed. Last night, under challenge from old rivals and a young pretender, he reasserted his authority with an unanswerable display of lissom speed and an implacable competitive spirit.

The young pretender was, of course, Phelps, the 19-year-old street kid from Baltimore whose 6ft 9in wingspan makes him so formidable in the butterfly event. Phelps came to the line last night still hoping to equal Mark Spitz's 1972 mark of seven gold medals in the pool in a single Olympics, with a bonus of $1m (£550,000) from his kit manufacturer as the added incentive.

Freestyle, however, is Thorpe's domain. On Saturday he took the gold medal in the 400m, getting the touch ahead of his Australian compatriot Grant Hackett, the last man to beat him over the distance, seven years and four days ago. But the race was so close that many thought they saw signs of an era coming to a close, and imagined that Phelps might be the man to pull down the curtain.

Two years younger than Thorpe, the American looks like the product of a different generation altogether. He arrived in the pool last night wearing, as usual, an enormous pair of silver headphones, inside which some rap record or other was starting a war in his head. When the announcer spoke his name and the crowd cheered, he made no sign of acknowledgement.

Phelps took up his station in lane three, two away from Thorpe. Between them stood Van den Hoogenband, who denied the Australian a fourth gold medal in front of his home crowd in the Sydney 200m four years ago. On Phelps's other flank was Hackett, nursing hopes kindled by the memory of beating Thorpe over the distance only a month ago.

After wiping his take-off board with an American team towel, Phelps stretched his legs, sat for a few moments in his chair and finally removed his headphones before peeling off his warm-up suit. Simultaneously, Thorpe was stripping down to the trademark black all-in-one skinsuit that covers his arms and legs to wrists and ankles.

Afterwards the statistics showed that Thorpe had produced the most leisurely reaction to the starting gun of all eight swimmers, his 0.90sec contrasting with the 0.75 next to the names of three others, including Simon Burnett, the 21-year-old from Oxford in lane seven.

Thorpe hit the water with his usual perfect entry, his massive frame barely disturbing the surface and his body seeming to gather speed even before his arm had come over for the first of the 120 strokes that would carry him to the finish. But it was Van den Hoogenband, the oldest man in the race, who set the pace, pulling a few inches ahead of the Australian as they neared the end of the first 50 metres and touching in 24.44sec.

For three laps Thorpe stayed on the 26-year-old Dutchman's shoulder, a second adrift in time but always a menacing presence. Rick Say of Canada, third at the end of the first length, soon gave way to Phelps, whose surge completed an arrowhead formation at the head of the race.

As they came out of the final turn, Thorpe attacked. And when the black shape moved up, Van den Hoogenband was powerless to defend his title. The Australian switched on a final burst that brought the crowd to their feet and gave him victory by 0.52sec, a massive margin in so tight a race.

"This race became a big deal," Thorpe said afterwards, "but I wasn't focusing too much on that. I just wanted to make sure I swam the race well. That's the way I've been successful in the past, by not bothering about what my competitors were doing. It was a good race tonight, but I don't remember much about it. That's true of a lot of my best races. You just let your body do what you've trained it to do, and it becomes something that's almost mechanical."

Behind him came Phelps, who swam the fastest final length of all but failed to catch the tiring Van den Hoogenband by a mere 0.09sec.

"Now we're even," Thorpe said to Van den Hoogenband as they trod water and looked up at the scoreboard, "it'll be an even more exciting race in Beijing." Phelps ducked under a rope, shook hands with both of them, and paddled off towards his next race, no longer a threat to Spitz's record.