NANTERRE, France — Turns out, those comparisons to Michael Phelps weren't farfetched at all when to comes to Léon Marchand.
They certainly weren't a burden for the 22-year-old Frenchman.
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Marchand completed one of the most audacious doubles in swimming history Wednesday night, winning the 200-meter butterfly and the 200 breaststroke about two hours apart at the Paris Games.
Two grueling races. Two very different strokes. Two Olympic records. Two gold medals.
Take that, Phelps.
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Thrilling the home fans and claiming the spotlight even on a night when Katie Ledecky romped to another gold medal, Marchand claimed his second and third victories at La Defense Arena and stamped himself — with the Olympics not even a week old — as one of the faces of these games.
After rallying to beat world-record holder and defending Olympic champion Kristóf Milák in the 200 fly with a finishing kick for the ages, Marchand made it look downright easy in the 200 breast.
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He led all the way, touching in 2 minutes, 5.85 seconds as more than 15,000 fans — many of them holding up cardboard cutouts of his smiling face — nearly blew the roof off La Defense Arena.
“Léon! Léon! Léon!” they screamed, a chant that was sure to carry on through the night in Paris.
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