Michael Phelps is sprawled on a couch in a Lower Manhattan hotel, sporting a beard, a gray beanie
cap, a white T-shirt and Under Armour sweatpants and sneakers, an athlete in repose. He’s in New York to accept yet another lifetime achievement award for his triumphs in five Olympic Games, another chance for him and others to revel in his past glories. What Phelps wants to talk about now, however, is the future. “I’ve spent decades staring at that black line at the bottom of a pool,” he says.
“I’m ready to do something new. I’m ready to channel my competitiveness into something else.”
Phelps, 31, is four months removed from what he swears was his last Olympics. The second phase of his life has begun, he says, and it has two main parts: He wants to create a brand that burns brightly for decades to come, but he also wants to become a global champion for the causes that mean the most to him—swimming and the wellbeing of children.
On the brand side Phelps is, of course, well established as a corporate pitchman. Under Armour, Omega, Intel, Activision and Beats by Dre are among his well-known sponsors. (Some of the lesser known: Master Spas, Krave and Sina Sports.) At the height of these sponsorships he earned an estimated $7 million a year. Many of the companies are longtime partners and plan to stay that way. “We hope he’s with us forever,” says Kevin Plank, CEO of Under Armour, which signed Phelps in 2010.
But Phelps is not content simply to be the face of someone else’s brand. In 2013 he left his longtime sponsor Speedo, and the following year he started a swimwear line called MP. He found a partner in Aqua Sphere, a swimwear and swimming accessories company, which now sells Phelps-branded suits that range from $40 to $475. “I’d like to someday have the biggest and best brand in swimming,” he says.
His business role model is, of course, Michael Jordan, whose Nike Inc. Jordan Brand sold $2.8 billion worth of shoes and apparel last year.
Swimming obviously isn’t as merchandisable as basketball, but Plank says Phelps’ ambitions shouldn’t be dismissed: “Michael has that special trait, the ability to be clutch and win when it counts, which he demonstrated over and over at the Olympics. I think he can be the king of all things water.”
Phelps’ other main post-Olympics goal involves his foundation, which he started in 2008 with the $1 million bonus he earned from Speedo for his record-breaking eight gold medals in Beijing. His biggest initiative is the im program (“im” for “individual medley,” one of his strongest events, and for the affirmation “I am”). The program focuses on making children “water-safe.” (Drowning is the leading cause of injury-related deaths for kids ages 1 to 14 in the U.S. and the third leading cause worldwide.) Phelps’ mother made him take a water-safety course when he was a boy, and he says that’s the reason he became a competitive swimmer.
The im program has 104 teams in all 50 U.S. states and another 176 in 33 other countries, and through it 16,000 kids have learned how to swim (for three-quarters of them, the program was their first time in a pool). “I’d like for that number to be 50,000 someday soon and then 100,000,” Phelps says. “The goal is to get every kid in the world water-safe.”
To accomplish these dreams, Phelps will need to become a lasting global icon, no easy task for even the most successful Olympians. Jesse Owens, in the end, was more a powerful symbol than a brand. Muhammad Ali’s boxing career spanned two full decades after his Olympic gold in 1960. And Caitlyn Jenner remains famous four decades after decathlon heroics in Montreal but for reasons no one could have foreseen in 1976.
Yet Phelps was no ordinary Olympian. He began as a 15-year-old prodigy in the 2000 Games and provided a glimpse of the greatness to come in the 2004 Athens Games. Then came the triumph in Beijing in 2008 and the weary wins in London in 2012, followed by the drinking and depression and the stint in rehab. All of which culminated in the redemption in Rio in 2016. In the end Phelps had won an Olympic record 28 medals, all but 5 of which were gold.
That level of longevity and excellence in the Olympics has given Phelps the kind of global profile most American athletes lack. And with his longtime agent, Peter Carlisle, Phelps has been laying the groundwork for a global presence since the beginning of his career. He started visiting China and making deals there five years before the 2008 Games (the Chinese call him the Flying Fish). Phelps and Carlisle used the same playbook for Rio—he made four pre-Olympics visits to Brazil and has since signed a deal with the Brazilian media giant Grupo Globo. And he will soon embark on a tour of Vietnam, Ethiopia, South Africa and Latin America.
Phelps, of course, has been through this before, when he retired for the first time after the 2012 Games. “This time is different,” he says. “Back then I just wanted to dig the deepest black hole and be left alone.” Now “life is so different and so much better. I have Boomer [his 8-month-old son] and Nicole [his wife]. I have other things to worry about than just myself.”
Phelps says he travels three weeks out of every month, and at meetings he doesn’t just show up for the grip-and-grin but really dives in. “I’m actually sitting at the table now during the discussions, asking questions,” he says. “Some of this is self-reinforcing. I want to be out there now. If I isolate myself as I’ve done before, I know the road I’ll go down, and I know it won’t be pretty.”
A question remains: Is he really done competing? “Yes, definitely,” he says, while admitting that he said the same thing in 2012. The 2020 Olympics is out of the question, but Carlisle has been floating an intriguing scenario regarding the 2024 Games. “I think Michael is 100% sure he’s done right now,” he says. “But what if the 2024 Games are awarded to Los Angeles? And what if there was a spot open on a relay team?” Carlisle leaves the thought there, as any good agent would.
Phelps just smiles when this idea is brought up. “I’m happy now,” he says. “And I’m excited for what’s ahead of me.”

The Flip Turn

Athletes do not have a choice about being role models. The only choice we have is whether we are going to be good role models or bad ones.” This was part of a speech by British basketball player John Amaechi at the Peace and Sport conference in Monaco in 2011.
Listening to Amaechi speak about the good a role model can do, I kept thinking back to Tiger Woods’ extramarital affairs. According to FORBES, Woods was the first athlete to make over $1 billion back in 2009. Since then, we have had the Lance Armstrong doping saga and the Oscar Pistorius Valentine’s Day shooting. These are top earning athletes who have inspired people and given back to society. However, they lacked integrity. Integrity gives longevity to success and fame.
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I never had a sporting role model when I was growing up because most of our stars were playing internationally and were never available. I didn’t have that person I could reach out to that would tell me just how tough my life was going to be yet motivating me to go for it anyway. Being a good role model is about having solid moral principles that guide behavior on and off the field. Role models make themselves available to spend time with people, to share their stories of success and overcoming challenges. They share their secrets in the hope of molding greater athletes and greater people. One person I look up to is Strive Masiyiwa, the Founder and Chairman of Econet Wireless. He may not be an athlete but he shows the responsibility that comes with success and this is guided by his ethics. Education for everyone is his aspiration.
Sport used to be everything to me. Now that I’m older and will soon be retiring from competition, I realize how significant education is. Sport must never take the place of education – it must assist with it. I was always an average student at high school but when I got to university I started applying the lesson I learned from training in my education. The sacrifices I had to make, believing that I could do it and my perseverance started paying off. The year I won my first Olympic gold was the same year I graduated as an ‘A’ student. Understanding what is important and highlighting your priorities is essential in conveying your message to others.
Motivational speaking is a love I found through sport because I’ve seen how it lifts people’s spirits and gives them the attitude they need to go forward. A priority of mine is speaking to children, to help motivate and guide them. I am often introduced as one of Africa’s greatest Olympians and am expected to tell you that it is okay if you are not great at school work because you can always become a sports star. I throw protocol out the window and very politely let the children know that this is wrong. Four months before my fourth Olympic Games in London 2012, I dislocated my patella and then two months later contracted pneumonia. This was a wake-up call for me and I suddenly thought that I might not make the Olympics. It was one of the most physically challenging times in my career but it made me grateful for the education I received. I had a contingency plan if the injury prevented me from ever playing sport again.
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Whoever we are, someone is always watching our behavior: a parent, a son or daughter, a brother or sister, a friend or even a person you have never met. Michael Phelps, the greatest Olympic athlete and a fellow swimmer, has recently been caught drinking and driving. This has nothing to do with swimming but because of his responsibility as a role model, he has been pulled off the United States swimming team for six months. This will take the spotlight off him until he can figure out what is important. It will also allow those who look up to him to realize there are consequences for your actions, no matter who you are.
We are all role models to someone. If we can maintain our integrity and become successful, we will not only be able to sustain ourselves but more importantly continue helping others.

What To Do When The Dream Breaks Down

The genius son of Mafalala has gone; the fast and deft feet that learned the game on the rugged streets of Maputo, in Mozambique, have been laid to rest. They called him the Black Panther and the Black Pearl; whatever they called him, he left defenders speechless in his wake.
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On the streets of Mafalala, as rough as a flying tackle, Eusébio learned the football that was to take him from poverty to stardom with a ball made out of newspaper wrapped with rags. Mafalala was a tough training ground of cuts, bruises, grit and stones; where, to this day, barefoot youngsters trap and pass. I have stood on that makeshift, sandy pitch in the twilight of another warm Maputo day, listening to the shouts of the young and hopeful. If you close your eyes, you can see the young Eusébio and Mario Coluna—two world class players who emerged from Mafalala—passing to each other and laughing their heads off. Maybe, I am merely a football romantic.
Eusébio’s mother’s house is a free kick’s distance away. The street that runs by it, is named after the man.
With his skill on the ball and explosive pace, Eusébio shone over football in his hometown like the sun. He signed for Sporting Clube de Lourenco Marques at 15 and soon caught the eye of scouts.
Legend has it that a chance encounter in a barber’s shop, in Lisbon, sealed Eusébio’s chance of a glittering career. In the barber’s chair was a scout, for Brazilian team Sao Paulo, who had just returned from Mozambique where he had been bowled over by the skilful young Eusébio. Listening to the scout’s story was legendary Benfica coach, Bela Guttman, who flew straight to Mozambique and persuaded the young man to sign for around $10,000. Eusébio’s mother put the money in the bank and said she wouldn’t touch it until her son had made it as a professional. Imagine that, in this age of avaricious football agents.
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There was controversy in Portugal before Eusébio kicked a ball. Sporting Clube de Lourenco Marques was a feeder club to Sporting Lisbon, who didn’t take too kindly to rival Benfica snatching a young star from under their noses. Sporting appealed Eusébio’s registration in a wrangle that lasted five months. Eusébio was cloistered by Benfica in a fishing village in the Algarve until it was all over.
Eusébio scored a hat-trick on his debut for Benfica; two weeks later, he scored a hat-trick in a friendly against Santos, which had Pele in the side, in Paris. Few, including Pele, had seen anything like him. He was a new breed of striker: fast, robust, good in the air, a master at free kicks with a fearsome shot; a forerunner of the great nimble goal scorers of the modern era like Maradona and Lionel Messi.
In an illustrious career, that exceeded all expectations, Eusébio scored 473 goals in 440 games in 15 years at Benfica. For Portugal, he played 64 times, scoring 41 goals. His finest hour was during the World Cup in England in 1966 where Eusébio scored nine goals in six games, winning the golden boot, and could very easily have won the tournament for Portugal. The 1966 Portugal side was considered the greatest ever and was captained by Coluna, the other sensation from Maputo. The Portuguese journalists christened the midfield colossus Coluna the “Sacred Monster” because he was both terrifying and beautiful.
The night before the semi-final, in which Portugal was to play England at Goodison Park in Liverpool, the English Football Association switched the game to
Wembley, in London. It meant the Portuguese traveled down from Liverpool by train, overnight, arriving sleepless and in poor shape.
Even then, Portugal lost narrowly 2-1 with Eusébio scoring the goal. You could not imagine this kind of conniving
gamesmanship in the game of today. No surprise that, in Portugal, this semi-final is known as the ‘Jogo das lagrimas’—the game of tears.
Eusébio also stamped his name on the European Cup and scored twice in a 5-3 win over Real Madrid in the final in 1962. After the match, the 19-year-old swapped shirts with his boyhood hero Ferenc Puskás.
In that game, Eusébio displayed his trademark politeness. Benfica were awarded a penalty and captain Coluna prepared to take it.
“Senor Coluna, may I take the penalty?” Eusébio asked.
The one man from Mafalala passed the ball to the other; Eusébio scored and the cup was secured.
In 1968, Benfica lost 3-1 to Manchester United at Wembley. Many remember the game for a superb solo goal by George Best; many more will remember it for the moment Eusébio stood and applauded United goalkeeper, Alex Stepney, for
saving one of his bullet shots.
That was the gentleman and sportsman Eusébio was—a humane and gentle spirit who lit up the game and did Africa proud.
In Mozambique, Eusébio was revered during his many visits, but never tempted to return home. Among some in
Mozambique there is a tinge of regret that the great man never brought his energy and skill back to the land of his birth. Coluna did; when his playing days were over he came back to coach the unfashionable Text Chimoio to the national championship followed by many years of work in the
administration of the game in Mozambique. Coluna, who played nearly 700 times for Benfica and 57 times for Portugal, is retired in the quiet suburbs of Maputo, a long ball away from Mafalala where it all began.
Maybe, Eusébio gave his all to the game in the name of Africa and that was enough for one life.

Tag: Sporting

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

The Flip Turn

What To Do When The Dream Breaks Down

Homage To The Black Panther And Sacred Monster