I learned how fast you can go from being an international hero to being a reference in a joke on a late night talk show.

This is my 20th year in the sport. I've known swimming and that's it. I don't want to swim past age 30; if I continue after this Olympics, and come back in 2016, I'll be 31. I'm looking forward to being able to see the other side of the fence.

You can't put a limit anything.

Other nights ... I visualize to the point that I know exactly what I want to do: dive, glide, stroke, flip, reach the wall, hit the split time to the hundredth, then swim back again for as many times as I need to finish the race.

Our time on Earth is already short enough. For me, it's like every single day I try to be as happy as I can. It's crazy to think about. We never have enough time. That's always the thing. We always want to do more. So it's about being able to spend time on the things that are most important to you. Life is a lot easier that way, and obviously life is pretty difficult a lot of the time.

I think with practice, you can being whatever you want to be, and with a goal you can go in any direction that you want to go in.

I don't like to be second in anything. I was trying, I just wasn't going anywhere.