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Tears, Tears, Tears: There may be no crying in baseball, but there have been plenty of tears shed at the Olympics. American swimmers Ryan Held and Caeleb Dressel could barely hold it together Sunday after winning gold in the men’s 4x100-metre freestyle relay.

“I tried to tell myself I wasn’t going to cry, I was too tired to cry, but then as soon as the national anthem started playing, tears just started rolling down my face and I couldn’t fight it,” Held said.

“Oh my God, they were making us cry,” teammate Michael Phelps said. “The younger guys started crying, I started crying. I told them it is OK to sing, it is OK to cry.”

According to a Wall Street Journal study of medal ceremonies at the London Olympics, 25 per cent of female gold medallists cry during the ceremony, while eight per cent of men cry. But when men cry, they cry harder.

The study didn’t address why some athletes cry and others do not, although Canada’s Sandrine Mainville had her own theory about why she cried after winning bronze in the women’s 4x100-metre freestyle relay Saturday and Taylor Ruck and Penny Oleksiak, both 16, did not. “Maybe they still don’t realize how important it is,” she said.

Whole lot of medals: If

Michael Phelps were a country, he would rank third all-time in Olympic swimming medals. His 19 gold medals (and counting) are more than Germany (18) and Japan (17). Even the combined total (18) of the Soviet Union (nine), Unified Team (five) and Russia (four) would not outrank him. Only the United States (129, including Phelps) and Australia (33) rank higher.

Water baby: Take heart parents if the last thing your child wants to do is jump in the pool or put on a pair of cleats. He or she may still grow to love a sport. Adam Peaty, the Brit who won gold in the men’s 100-metre breaststroke Sunday, was terrified of water growing up.

“I think the days are gone that I’m crawling up my mom’s arm from the pool,” he said. “I didn’t want to shower when I was younger, so that’s how scared I was.”