Michael Phelps.... Deserving of the hype?

[--Pete]

Hi,

The one thing of interest to me there was the point that Phelps did not touch the wall with both hands at the same time. . . . Unless I'm mistaken, a racer finishes their time when they touch the wall in any way, not when the second hand hits the wall.

Couldn't find the Olympic rules or even the FINA rules online, but did find a primer for USA rules. Since both the USA and the Olympics rule sets are based on FINA, I suspect they are very similar. Note that in the breast stoke and butterfly, the swimmer must touch the wall with both hands on the turns and on the finish. I suspect that, on the finish, it's the second hand touching that is the official finish for that swimmer, but I didn't peruse this further.

--Pete