Joseph Schooling won the 2016 Olympic men’s 100-meter butterfly final in 50.39 seconds.
Swimming for Singapore in Rio de Janeiro, Schooling led from the start and set an Olympic record while earning his country’s first Olympic gold medal. He finished well ahead of the three swimmers tied for silver: Michael Phelps of the United States, Chad le Clos of South Africa and László Cseh of Hungary, each recorded at 51.14 seconds.
The victory carried extra significance because Phelps had won the event at the previous three Olympics and held the Olympic record of 50.58 from Beijing in 2008. Schooling lowered that mark by 0.19 seconds, although Phelps’s world record of 49.82, set in 2009, remained faster.
Schooling had also met Phelps as a child and regarded him as a hero, making the result an especially memorable Olympic storyline. The final is often confused with the semifinal, where Schooling swam 50.83; the winning final time was 50.39.