On the afternoon before the opening ceremony of the Rio Olympics, Michael Phelps sat atop the dais in a grand room. The dais was on a stage, and the stage was high above a mass of journalists lined up in an endless row of chairs that made Phelps appear as if he was the secretary general of the Olympics. Which is what, with more medals than any Olympian ever, he has sort of become.  The occasion was the announcement of America’s top swimmer as his country’s flagbearer at the following night’s opening. It was an immense honor for a man who already had 18 gold medals and was about to add to that tally. Phelps had never shown much interest in carrying the flag in previous Olympics. In fact, until this year, he had never walked in an opening ceremony, given that his previous competition schedules demanded he swim the following mornings and he didn’t want to tax his legs by standing for hours on the stadium floor. But even if there hadn’t been a race on those first Saturdays in Beijing or London he probably wouldn’t have joined the parades. He was too locked into his swimming life to pay much attention to anything outside.  His Olympics were not communal experiences in the way Olympics are meant to be. He was more the sullen, driven swimming machine, wrapped tight in a managed package to be opened every night right about primetime on NBC, and then boxed up again for the next 23 hours. But on this day he looked with new interest at the wall of television cameras facing him and the sea of heads craned toward him. A wistful smile crawled across his lips. He looked, well, content.  Related: Why Michael Phelps is still great at an age when most swimmers have faded  “Before, I would really have my headphones on and not really talk to anybody,” Phelps said. “I’m much more open and relaxed now.”  On that day, as he strolled across the athletes’ village, he spotted Novak Djokovic walking the other way. They gave each other knowing nods in the way transcendent athletes do upon encountering one another. In the past, Phelps would have kept walking. This time he stopped.  He approached Djokovic and asked for a picture as if he were a teenage rower from Toledo, dazzled at the sight of a tennis star. In previous Olympics he would not have stopped for anyone, not even Djokovic. And he would never have condescended to request a photograph. It just wasn’t his style.  By now, his story is a familiar American sports fable, rising from the Baltimore suburbs to win six gold medals in Athens and another eight in Beijing, a national hero with nothing to say. He may have been the star of the Olympics but he was devoid of any depth beyond the pool. One day in Beijing, I asked someone who knew him well at the University of Michigan – where he trained – what the US’s great sports champion was really like. Phelps was likable enough the man said, but his personal life was a void, with nightly trips into Windsor, Canada, to play Texas hold ’em. It sounded like a sad existence – an American superstar seeking the escape of seedy casinos in another country.  Then came the photo of him holding a bong, which caused Kellogg’s to pull him off boxes of Corn Flakes. He grew bored of swimming. He quit. He came back. He scrambled to get ready for London and won four more golds and two silvers. A fantastic performance for most, but a downturn compared to his brilliance in Beijing. Two years later, he was arrested for a DUI – his second such transgression in 10 years. He was suspended from swimming for six months, went to rehab and came out changed. He told his story to Sports Illustrated last fall and talked about building himself back. In subsequent interviews he has described a new joy in his life. He is engaged to his longtime girlfriend Nicole Johnson and they have a baby boy, born in May, named Boomer. He rededicated himself to swimming and came to Rio as hungry as he seemed all those years ago in Athens and Beijing.  Related: Michael Phelps on another golden hour: 'There wasn't a shot in hell I was losing'  He wept that night last week, when US Olympic officials told him he had been picked to be flag bearer. The player who seemed to care only about swimming and then acted ambivalent about even that, found he had come to care more about all of this than he ever had before. He had found a forum in the home of his greatest achievements. Only at the end did he find out how much he loved it.  “Things I’ve done in my career have started to set in over the last two years,” he said, sitting at the dais. “This time around will be a lot more emotional than any past Games for me. This has to be one of the coolest things I’ve ever done.”  Later he added: “The biggest change is that it’s given me a clear head in the pool. It’s given me a much clearer head outside the pool in my family life and my personal life too. I think I’ve just been able to enjoy life. I’ve been able to experience things that I might have taken for granted in the past.”  Phelps keeps calling these Olympics his last as if he is trying to convince himself that at 31 he is done with the Games, that he will be too old and weary to make the four-year push for Tokyo in 2020. Sometimes he drops the word “if” into sentences about the end. But even he seems unable to fool himself any more. The end is coming and he appears determined to win as much as he can before he goes.  He bursts enthusiastically around this new group of US swimmers, seemingly as excited about their success as they are. Katie Ledecky, the American star in just her second Olympics, has called him “inspiring”.  “I can’t say how much of a leader he has been,” she said the other day.  Asked about this on Thursday, Phelps nodded. He was standing in a hallway at the Aquatics Center after a qualifying heat he had seemed to thoroughly enjoy. He talked with ease, laughing at times in a situation where in the past he might have been too impatient to have perspective.  “I’m probably more open and outgoing than in the past,” he said. “We do have a very young team, and so anything I can teach them in my last couple days as a US swimmer I’m proud to.”  Soon he will walk away with the last of his medals dangling around his neck. He steps into fatherhood and into a great unknown: what do you do when you have won more medals than anybody ever and have to start again at something else? Nothing will ever compare to the rush of these races, of the roar of the crowd and the constant affirmation that he – yes he – was the best in the world over and over again. Now he talks about fatherhood and baby outfits and the thrill of knowing his son has seen him swim even if the child has no idea what he is seeing.  If this is indeed the last chapter he goes out on top, not as a fading champion with a tormented life.
For so long an intensely focused swimming machine, the most successful Olympian ever is opening up and relishing his last moments representing the US