Michael Phelps Defends Himself After Shark Week Fiasco

There has been much criticism about the fact that Michael Phelps didn’t actually race against an great white shark during Shark Week. Discovery Channel promoted it as “Phelps vs. Shark: Great Gold vs. Great White,” and much of the promotions surrounding the stunt made it seems as if he’d be in the water with one of the ocean’s greatest predators. Needless to say, people weren’t happy and made their comments known via social media.

Phelps has finally commented.

For those that didn’t tune in, Olympic medalist Michael Phelps did in fact race in the open water, however, he raced against a Computer Generated Image (CGI) of a shark that was going the same speed as an actual great white shark. Beings that Phelps couldn’t see his competition, and was in no danger, was one issue that fans expressed. Additionally, the stimulated shark ended up beating out Phelps by two seconds, so it was all disappointing for viewers who were excited for it.

During a Facebook live session, Phelps showed some attitude to social media critics.

“If somebody actually wants to get in the water and race side-by-side with a great white, go ahead. You’re not going to get the shark to swim in a straight line,” he said. “And, uh, yeah, it would be interesting to see. We’ll leave it at that.”

He also admittedly enjoyed the experience, despite all of the disapproving comments via social media.

“It’s hard to swim in a cage when you’re next to a shark. Like, it wouldn’t be able to move at the right speed,” he said. “So how we did it was the best way that we could do it. And I thought it turned out incredible, again. I’m gonna say that for the rest of my life because I absolutely loved it.”