“I could just swim, that’s the only thing I could do at that point. I couldn’t take them off; I had two caps on. I couldn’t rip them off; I couldn’t fix them. I couldn’t empty the water out. …I couldn’t see. I was trying to see the T on the bottom, trying to judge my turn and the finish, but I was more or less just sort of counting strokes. I sort of know how many strokes I take per 50 and I was hoping that I was going to be dead on and that I was going to be able to hit the wall perfectly. I was able to get my hand on the wall first and it was a best time, but I think I was just disappointed that, that I know I can go faster than that and it just disappoints me that my goggles — I did have a malfunction — but there’s nothing I can do and I handled the situation the best way that I could.”
Michael Phelps on his "wardrobe malfunction" in the 200-meter butterfly at the 2008 Olympics