USA's Michael Phelps races in the men's 400 metre individual medley final at the Aquatic Centre in the Olympic Village at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London on Saturday, July 28, 2012.Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
Sunday highlights one of swimming's great events: the men's 4 x 100-metre freestyle relay; a race brimming with history and drama and all things unexpected.
In 2000, the Americans, in all their glory, promised to smash their Australian counterparts "like guitars" only to lose and watch the Aussies play air guitar on the pool deck in Sydney. In 2008, the French were en route to what seemed a sure gold medal when American Jason Lezak caught Alain Bernard on the final stroke to steal the show.
The U.S., Australia and France are all back in the mix at the London Aquatics Centre and, based on predictions, the Aussies are favoured to finish first. That's because they have freestyle ace James (The Missile) Magnussen, who swam the anchor leg in Sunday's heats and could be thrashing it out American anchor man Michael Phelps.
The ever-aggressive Magnussen has posted the best 100-free time in the world this season and is planning to break the world record of 46.91 set Brazil's Cesar Cielo. (Cielo did it in a now-banned body suit.)
Magnussen was quoted before the Olympics saying he wouldn't care if he swam the 100 in a minute as long he won. But he couldn't help but add, "I'll be doing everything in my power to break that world record because I want to be considered the fastest man in history."