I swam my brains out.
We all love to win, but how many people love to train?
I'm trying to do the best I can. I'm not concerned with tomorrow, but with what goes on today.
Life is everchanging, if you cease to change, you cease to live.
It has nothing to do with swimming. That happens to be my sport. I'm trying to see how far I can go
There's a difference between over-training and over-exercising. Over-training can be you're trying to do something at high performance, but when you're over-exercising it just means that you don't have a life. And there are obviously people who go to that extreme.
When I went to the Olympics, I had every intention of shaving the moustache off, but I realized I was getting so many comments about it — and everybody was talking about it — that I decided to keep it.
If you are relaxing and subconsciously thinking about your coming race, you are going to perform at just about 100 percent efficiency.
If you have a lane, you have a chance.
If you want to be Mark Spitz then go for it. If you want to be Michael Phelps then you'll have to work for it. Nobody should wake up to a lower expectation of themselves.
So in my mind I own a lot of house records still
The only side effect of too much training is that you get into better shape. There is nothing wrong with that.
If you're fail to prepare, you're prepared to fail.
And if you have high cholesterol, you would feel the same as if you had low cholesterol because there are no side effects, no symptoms of having high cholesterol.
In my day, at 12 years old, which was 38 years ago, we worked out in summer months for two and a half hours. Today someone in that age group might work out for four hours, two hours in the morning and two at night
Yes, I believe that the art of winning is through intimidation, and not necessarily do you have to speak about it.
Everyone loves to be loved.
If he wins seven golds and ties what I did, then it would be like I was the first man on the moon and he became the second. If he wins more than seven, then he becomes the first man on Mars. We'd both be unique.
(American swimmer, 1972 Summer Olympics, on winning seven gold medals Inspirational) I swam my brains out.
I am not qualified to talk about the diet. Simply because I am not a dietician.
One of the most difficult things for people who have been successful in sports is adapting to the daily world where you can't get an answer from someone until 5 o'clock tomorrow. There is always an excuse. Living 40 or 50 years like that doesn't get too exciting after a while
I always wanted to be a dentist from the time I was in high school, and I was accepted to dental school in the spring of 1972. I was planning to go, but after the Olympics there were other opportunities.
I'm at the depot, and I'm not going anywhere. That's better to deal with than having to deal with the unknown. And the unknown is they don't want to fail. They don't want to pay the price unless there's a guarantee they're going to get there
Past performance speaks a tremendous amount about one's ability and likelihood for success.
I got beat real hard and heavy in the Olympic Games in 1968 by a guy who swam an incredible race one time in his whole life, but he did it right at the right time. I'd like to be that guy now. Maybe that's what I'm going to have to pull out of my hat to make the Olympic team.
