When Michael Phelps scripted history with the most number of gold medals at a single Olympics with eight at the 2008 Beijing Games, he broke a 36-year-old record that had been established by a fellow American swimmer.
When 22-year-old Mark Spitz won seven gold medals at the 1972 Munich Olympics, it was an unprecedented mark which many believed would never be broken again. That he set new world records in all seven events just made the achievement even more incredible.
Competing without goggles or the cap, and a mustache that defied the belief that body hair reduced speed in the pool, he swam his way four individual gold medals – in 100m and 200m freestyle and the 100m and 200m butterfly, and helped the United States win the three relay races. This took his personal tally to 11 Olympics medals, with a silver and bronze apiece.
Spitz’ Munich story is part inspirational and perhaps a bit hysterical. It came on the back of public failure at his first Games and a moment of pressure almost got to him even after he had won his first five gold medals in Germany. But once in the pool, there was no stopping the American.
A child prodigy, Spitz had made his name as a swimmer even before he was 10 years old... with 17 national age-group records and he was named the world’s best 10-and-under swimmer. By 16, he won the 100m butterfly at the national AAU championships and the next year in 1967, he won five gold medals at the Pan-American Games.
Emboldened by his performances, he believed and openly claimed that he would win at least six gold medals at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico. But that prediction backfired as he won only two team gold medals in the 4 x 100m and 4 x 200m freestyle relays and two individual medals - a silver in the 100m butterfly and bronze in the 100m freestyle.
This failure at a very young age could have had a lasting impact on him but Spitz focussed on improving and all but erased the Mexico failure by rewriting the history books.
He was named the World Swimmer of the Year in 1969, 1971 and 1972 and by Munich, was back on radar as the man to beat. This time, with the much-talked about facial hair.
The story goes that Spitz, with his full mustache, was questioned about whether he was going to shave it at both the trials and the Olympics. Just to be funny and contrary, said he was not because it helped him.
“There were so many people talking about this moustache, because they had never really seen anything like that before on an elite swimmer. And I thought it was kind of hysterical so I kept it. And it didn’t seem to hinder me whatsoever and maybe, in one sense, the commotion around the fact I had the moustache was distracting enough to give me an edge over my competitors,” he told the Olympics website.
He then added more drama to it when the Russian swimming coaches asked him about it with a made-up answer.
“I don’t know what prompted me to say this, but I stroked my moustache and said, ‘This moustache deflects the water away from my mouth and allows me to get a lot lower and more streamline in the stroke and therefore [makes me] less likely to swallow water, and it allows me to swim faster and helped me break a couple of world records last month.”
According to Spitz, by 1973 Championships, the Russian men’s swimming team all grown mustaches.
But Spitz’ streak in the swimming pool was turning out to be no joke. Over a period of eight days, Mark Spitz entered seven events – with heats and semis – and won all seven and set a world record in every single one.
However, after the fifth gold medal, Spitz considered pulling out of the 100m freestyle for fearing of losing his perfect record.
“I was thinking of scratching. I had only qualified third for the final and didn’t want to swim it. Besides, up until then, I’d won five golds and, barring a DQ, I knew we would take the medley relay. So I felt assured of winning six golds, all in world record time. No one else had ever won more than four. I figured six-for-six was infinitely better than six golds plus a silver or bronze, and I knew my teammate, Jerry Heidenreich, was going to be very hard to beat,” he was quoted as saying in Swimming World Magazine. He attested to this in an interview with BBC but has also said, in other interviews, that those were just rumours.
But his coach convinced him otherwise, and the rest is history. In a way, Spitz’ seven was one of the brighter moments from the tragedy-marred Munich Games.
Here’s Spitz talking about his 1972 Olympics feat, from medals to mustache
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