KEY POINTS:
Many watching at the Water Cube will ask the question for many years yet: Was it eight golds, or seven golds and a question mark?
After a dismissed protest, Serbian officials conceded Michael Phelps had won the gold medal for the 100m butterfly by the slimmest margin (0.01s)
yesterday but there was disquiet among people unwilling to believe the technology over what their eyes had told them - that Serbia's Milorad Cavic had won and ended Phelps' record medal quest.
Cavic seemed philosophical. "I heard some talk about protests being filed but I am not thinking about that," he said.
But many at the pool, using the naked eye and video replays, thought the Serbian had touched Phelps out. "I am not about fighting it. If they eventually decide in my favour, well, then okay, but I did have a long finish and Michael had a short finish," said Cavic.
"I am just happy to be here. I retired from swimming 18 months ago so to be here - and be the man who could have stopped Phelps - is incredible."
Serbia did file a protest with international swimming body FINA on the basis that the Serbian touched first but maybe without enough pressure to trigger the electronics. But the pool touchpads are regarded as infallible and maybe the Serbian started his final glide too early.
There is no doubt Cavic started his finishing glide too early. There is also doubt over the visuals - because Cavic was underwater and Phelps lunging over the top of it - and that can lead to distorted views.
"We filed the protest but it is already over," said Branislav Jevtic, Serbia's chief of mission for all sports. "They examined the video and I think the case is closed. The video says [Phelps] finished first. In my opinion, it's not right, but we must follow the rules. Everybody saw what happened."
Cavic added: "Technology is not perfect so it is possible it was wrong. Everything is possible but I am not angry about this."
FINA referee Ben Ekumbo of Kenya said there was no doubt who won after a review of the super-slow replay. "It was very clear that the Serbian swimmer touched second after Michael Phelps," he said. "One was stroking and one was gliding."
So Phelps kept his phenomenal Olympic run alive, equalling Mark Spitz's 1972 record of seven golds at one Olympics when the electronic technology maintained he touched ahead of Cavic.
Touched? If he beat Cavic, it was the merest fingertip, a cuticle, a measurement by micrometer that somehow got a lunging Phelps to the wall ahead of the Serbian.
Phelps had been charging hard after being down by almost half a body length at the turn. He said afterwards he was shocked to have won: "I thought when I did take that half-stroke [at the end], I thought I lost the race there, but I guess that was the difference in the race."
If he did win, it was an optical illusion. Disbelieving fans and media personnel looked at one another uncertainly as the electronic system flashed up: Phelps by 0.01s. Surely the Serbian had touched first.
So Phelps won by a fingernail and the New Zealand men's 4x100m medley relay team will now play a hand in history. Phelps will race in his final event - the 4x100m medley relay - in which his US team is the hottest of favourites and give him his record eighth gold medal. Barring accident or disqualification, Phelps will enter history at 3pm NZT.
However, even that is no gimme - at last year's world championships, Phelps' American team-mate Ian Crocker false-started in the heats and the team was disqualified, stopping Phelps at seven gold medals.
But if history is made, it will be witnessed - and contested - by four young Kiwis who turned in arguably the best pool performance by New Zealanders at these Olympics; Moss Burmester's brave 200m butterfly swim against Phelps perhaps excepted.
Daniel Bell, Glenn Snyders, Corney Swanepoel and Cameron Gibson smashed the New Zealand record by five seconds, clocking the sixth-fastest qualifying time. It was the first time a New Zealand relay swimming team had made an Olympic final.
