Sullivan's 47.24 seconds swim off the blocks stripped the 47.50sec world record off French rival Alain Bernard, which he had held since the European championships in Eindhoven last March.
The Australian now holds both the 50m and 100m freestyle world records and has seized favouritism for both sprint events later this week at the Water Cube.
Sullivan, 22, had already been tagged the world's fastest swimmer after breaking the 50m record three times this year.
But Sullivan's achievement was overtaken by the Americans' adrenline-charged freestyle relay victory to keep Phelps on track to becoming the greatest gold medal winner at a single Olympics.
Although Phelps swam an American record lead-off leg, it was experienced anchor Jason Lezak who delivered the victory, mowing down France's vaunted sprinter Bernard in the final metres to complete a world record swim of 3min 08.24sec.
The French took the silver in 3:08.32 and Australia claimed bronze in 3:09.91.
All three medal-winning squads - as well as fourth- and fifth-placed Italy and Sweden - were under the world record of 3:12.23 set by the US heat swimmers on Sunday night.
(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed - AFP)first published:August 11, 2008, 10:42 ISTlast updated:August 11, 2008, 10:42 IST
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BEIJING, Aug 11, 2008 (AFP) Australian sprint ace Eamon Sullivan smashed the world record in the lead-off swim in the epic men's 4x100-metre freestyle relay which kept alive American Michael Phelps's eight gold medal dream at the Beijing Olympics on Monday.
Sullivan's 47.24 seconds swim off the blocks stripped the 47.50sec world record off French rival Alain Bernard, which he had held since the European championships in Eindhoven last March.
The Australian now holds both the 50m and 100m freestyle world records and has seized favouritism for both sprint events later this week at the Water Cube.
Sullivan, 22, had already been tagged the world's fastest swimmer after breaking the 50m record three times this year.
But Sullivan's achievement was overtaken by the Americans' adrenline-charged freestyle relay victory to keep Phelps on track to becoming the greatest gold medal winner at a single Olympics.
Although Phelps swam an American record lead-off leg, it was experienced anchor Jason Lezak who delivered the victory, mowing down France's vaunted sprinter Bernard in the final metres to complete a world record swim of 3min 08.24sec.
The French took the silver in 3:08.32 and Australia claimed bronze in 3:09.91.
All three medal-winning squads - as well as fourth- and fifth-placed Italy and Sweden - were under the world record of 3:12.23 set by the US heat swimmers on Sunday night.
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