Bienvenue, everyone, to the Leon Marchand Games.
Over the past week, the French swimmer has:
Become the first swimmer from any country since 1976 to win two golds in one day
Become the fourth swimmer ever to win four individual golds at the same Games (Phelps won five and four, Mark Spitz and Kristen Otto won four each)
Broken the Olympic Record in ALL of his four finals at Paris
OLYMPIC MEDAL TALLY | LATEST OLYMPIC NEWS | KEY DATES AT PARIS 2024
Coached by Phelps' old mentor, Bob Bowman, Marchand had come into this Games determined to make history and that's exactly what he's done. And he made it look so routine, while giving us, the fans, some unforgettable moments.
Take the 200m butterfly, his second event of the Paris Olympic Games. Marchand was second, and by a body length, behind Hungarian great Kristof Milak with 50m to go. It's the kind of lead Milak, the world record holder and defending Olympian champion, doesn't give away. That should have been that. Having scorched the 400 individual medley field by nearly six seconds (a veritable lifetime across that distance), Marchand would now be relegated to a silver.
Not quite. On the last turn of that 200 fly, Marchand stayed underwater a few split seconds more than Milak, and when he finally broke water, he was almost next to him. Over the next 30 odd metres, Marchand flew. The butterfly is a taxing event; over 200m it's almost impossible to even maintain pace at the end, let alone pick it up and yet here he was, eating up the water, and poor Milak and another Michael Phelps Olympic Record. It was one of the great last laps in Olympic history.
One hour later that same Wednesday night, he would come out and do it all over again, this time in the 200m breaststroke. And it wasn't even close: leading from first lap to the last, he won by nearly a whole second. In the process he had done what even the legendary Phelps hadn't managed (he never even attempted this): winning two individual golds in one night.
Two days later, on Friday night, he would come out and repeat his trick: a tight 200m individual medley field blown away by more than one and a half seconds. Four events, four golds.
As the medal tally stood on Friday, if Marchand were a nation he would have been tenth on the table.
The numbers alone underline his greatness, but it's the intangibles that truly drive it home.
The sheer volume of the crowd at the Paris La Defense arena, a cacophony that's rarely been matched inside an aquatics centre. The VIPs in the crowd losing it: from French president Emmanuel Macron to Phelps himself, everyone was swept away by the Marchand wave. It was so all pervasive in fact that the start of the decathlon's 400m had to be delayed miles away at the Stade de France because the crowd had learnt of Marchand's fourth gold and couldn't stop screaming. This is unprecedent mania. Every time his name was announced, or his face popped up on a big screen, Paris exploded in joy. His finals became appointment viewing, that last surge against Milak leaving everyone watching slack jawed.
As much as his medals impressed it was the manner in which he won them, the manner in which they were received that will leave a mark. The kind of mark that only the very greatest tend to leave, the kind that become identified with a particular Olympic Games.
So, move over Monsieur Phelps, the Olympic pool well and truly has a new king now.
And bienvenue, everyone, to the Leon Marchand Games.