Phelps says he has removed his name from drug testing protocols

ByJOHNETTE HOWARD
November 22, 2016, 1:11 PM

— -- NEW YORK -- After five Olympic appearances, one halted retirement, and a record 27-medal haul that's unlikely to ever be matched, American swimmer Michael Phelps said at a USA Swimming event Monday night that he knows people don't believe he's really truly retired this time, either, given his recent success at the Rio Olympics.

But along with talking about the "secret" wedding he had just before this past summer's Games, he told another story about putting his retirement intentions down in writing this time. He said he has signed the paperwork to remove his name from the drug testing pool to underscore his seriousness that he is not coming back, adding he won't miss having to constantly update drug testers of his whereabouts for unannounced tests.

"It might be about two months ago now that I did it, [when] we came back from a trip to Milan," Phelps said as he held his infant son, Boomer, on his hip and paused on the red carpet at the Golden Goggles Awards in New York, an annual benefit for USA Swimming.

"I said to Peter [Carlisle, his agent], 'Get the papers, can we just sign these things so I don't have to do the daily updates and everything?' That was brutal. But, I mean, [making it official] is good.

"I'm still in the pool. And I'm still not coming back," Phelps added, breaking into a smile. "There's nothing that's going to change that."

Phelps also elaborated a little more on having not one but two wedding ceremonies with Nicole Johnson, his longtime girlfriend and Boomer's mother, in the past six months. Phelps said the first one was a "small little ceremony" in their backyard on June 13 to make it less problematic for Johnson and their son to travel. They didn't publicly announce it had occurred even by August at the Olympics, where Phelps still described Johnson as his fianc?e. The "real" wedding, Phelps added, was a more formal affair on Oct. 29 in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.

"It was small. We had just friends and family there. And it was perfect," Phelps said.