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BEIJING – Michael Phelps' third gold medal at the Beijing Games stirred much less emotion than the previous two.

After blowing away the 200-meter freestyle field Tuesday morning by more than a body-length in a world record-shattering time of 1 minute, 42.96 seconds, Phelps offered an abbreviated fist pump and briefly raised his right forefinger.

Yes, no matter what else transpires in his final five races at the Water Cube, Phelps indeed is No. 1, or at least tied. He matched Mark Spitz and Matt Biondi for most career Olympic swimming medals with 11, and he tied Spitz's career mark for most swimming golds with nine.

In addition to Spitz, the nine career golds ties Phelps with track stars Carl Lewis and Paavo Nurmi and gymnast Larissa Latynina for most in history.

"To be tied for most Olympic golds of all time, with those names, in Olympic history – and the Olympics have been around for so many years – it's a pretty amazing accomplishment," Phelps said.

He said he was not aware of the record until his coach, Bob Bowman, mentioned it this year. As Phelps walked off the deck Tuesday, Bowman said, "Well, you're tied."

"I just looked at him and thought, 'That's pretty cool,' " Phelp said.

Phelps is still less than halfway to Spitz's record of seven gold medals in one Olympics. But if you use the Olympics of four years ago as a gauge, he has cleared his two biggest obstacles.

The 4x100 freestyle relay and 200 freestyle were the only events he did not win in Athens, when he accumulated six golds and two bronzes.

In Beijing, he has won both – though he certainly owes an eternal debt of gratitude to relay teammate Jason Lezak for his sensational anchor leg comeback.

"I hate to lose," Phelps said. "Getting third in the 200 free four years ago, when I do lose in a circumstance like that, it motivates me more to try and swim better.

"In the past four years, I've been able to make some pretty significant drops in the 200 free."

Phelps says we don't know what his personal goals for Beijing are because he hasn't stated them and they haven't been published.

But surely, somewhere on his mental checklist, he is telling himself, "Three down, five to go."

What other target might he have? Perhaps it is winning all his events with world-record times, as Spitz did in 1972.

Phelps is 3-for-3 in that category, too. He started the Olympics by obliterating his own 400 individual medley record by 1.41 seconds. Tuesday, he broke his 200 freestyle record by nine-tenths of a second.

Two of his three remaining individual events are in his specialty, the butterfly. Another is the 200 IM – and as Phelps showed in the 400, no multistroke swimmer in the world can touch him.

In his pursuit of Spitz, Wednesday looms as the most grueling one-day test, with both the 200 fly and 4x200 freestyle relay being contested.

"I couldn't ask for anything else as far as my first three medal races," Phelps said. "I think we've done everything that I wanted to do so far.

"With two possible relays coming up and still seven more individual swims [including heats], the only thing I can do is take one race at a time."