California - 10-Year-Old Boy Breaks Michael Phelps’ 100-M Butterfly Record

Michael Phelps’ record has been broken. It was accomplished by a kid who sought out to chase his idol’s record and went on to fulfill his goal.

10-year-old Clark Kent Apuada broke Phelps’ record in the 100-meter butterfly. It was a record Phelps made more than twenty years ago, in 1995, when he was about the same age as his fan, Apuada now.

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Phelps record stood for almost 25 years but Apuada really set his sights on breaking his superhuman idol’s record. Apuada shaved a full second off of Phelps’ time at a swim meet in Moraga.

Dubbed as “Superman” because of his name and swimming prowess, Apuada has been swimming competitively for four years and young as he was, he was determined from the beginning to chase Phelps’ record.

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Apuada said: “After my first swim meets, I just felt the motivation to keep swimming. And at that age, I learned that Michael Phelps had a record and I wanted to beat it.”

The boy is just so happy for his incredible feat. He shared: “Being a Michael Phelps record-breaker is amazing because Michael Phelps is one of the largest swimming icons in the world.”

Michael Phelps proved to be a gracious idol, champion, and sports hero as he immediately congratulated Apuada’s feat upon learning about his record being broken by the boy from Salinas.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Big congrats to <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/clarkkent?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#clarkkent</a> for smashing that meet record!!! Keep it up dude !!<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/dreambig?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#dreambig</a></p>&mdash; Michael Phelps (@MichaelPhelps) <a href="https://twitter.com/MichaelPhelps/status/1024765399592652801?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 1, 2018</a></blockquote>

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<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Just showed <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/ClarkKent?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#ClarkKent</a> your tweet- you just made his day!!!! He says thanks <a href="https://twitter.com/MichaelPhelps?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@MichaelPhelps</a> and whoa!</p>&mdash; Jamie Yuccas (@jamieyuccas) <a href="https://twitter.com/jamieyuccas/status/1024771969219092480?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 1, 2018</a></blockquote>

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Apuada’s coach, Travis Rianda, said the boy is “truly a rare talent.” Rianda said of his charge: “He’s starting to see what hard work, dedication, and truly loving what you’re doing - how contagious that can be.”

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Apuada says it’s just a star and he’ll keep on dreaming and work for his goals. His ultimate target is to swim in the Olympics. The young boy hopes to follow Phelps onto the medal stand, and hopefully, break more of his records, too.

The boy said: “He’s really fast. So that gives me the fire and the drive to keep swimming and swimming, and try to be as fast as him… or even better.”’

Source:

https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2018/08/01/10-year-old-swimmer-breaks-michael-phelps-100-meter-butterfly-record/