Olympic archive: Mark Spitz (1972/1990)

Until Michael Phelps won eight gold medals in a single games in Beijing in 2008, US swimmer Mark Spitz held the record, taking seven golds at the 1972 Munich Olympics, writes Ian Searcey.

A brash 18-year-old in 1968, Spitz had predicted he would win six gold medals at the Mexico games. In fact, he only won two – both in team events. Fiercely competitive and determined to make a big impression in Munich, “Mark the Shark” joined the famed Indiana University Hoosiers team.

Four years later in Germany, Spitz won the 100m freestyle, 200m freestyle, 100m butterfly, 200m butterfly, 4 x 100m freestyle relay, 4 x 200m freestyle relay and the 4 x 100m medley relay, setting new world records in all seven events.

Lucrative commercial offers began to flood in for the lavishly moustachioed 22-year-old Californian. He quickly announced his retirement from swimming and was whisked away from Munich to London almost immediately so that negotiations could begin.

Though reluctant to give much away, a serious, guarded Spitz stopped off at the ITN studios to meet Reginald Bosanquet and talk about his future, the chances of playing Tarzan, and his pride at being compared to controversial chess champion Bobby Fischer.

Eighteen years on, in April 1990, Ken Rees met a clean-shaven Spitz, now 40, as he returned to training in a bid to make the US swimming team for the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.

Only planning to swim in one event (butterfly), a more mature, more relaxed Spitz talked about why he was returning to the pool, about not to giving too much advice to his young teammates, and about his chances of winning another gold medal.

Sadly, he failed to qualify for Barcelona. But thanks to his incredible success in the pool in Munich, his place in Olympic history was already secure.