MELBOURNE, March 30 (UPI) -- Michael Phelps swam the first leg in the 4x200-meter freestyle relay, sending the U.S. team to a world record at the world swimming championships in Australia.
It was the fifth gold medal and fourth world record for Phelps in the championships and pushed the Americans' gold medal total to 13 and overall medal count to 26. Russia has 11 gold medals and 20 medals overall while China has nine golds among its 15 medals.
Phelps had the opening leg of Friday's relay and teamed with Ryan Lochte, Klete Keller and Peter Venderkaay for a time of 7 minutes, 3.24 seconds, bettering the world mark by 1.42 seconds.
The race marked the second world record of the evening for Lochte, who turned in a 1:54.32 in winning the 200m backstroke. American Aaron Peirsol, who had won the event in the three previous world championships, was second, 0.48 seconds back.
