Biggest Gold Medal Winners: Where Are They Now?

Swimming sensation Michael Phelps butterflied his way into the history books in Beijing when he won his record tenth career gold medal. Not that becoming the first Olympian to reach double digit golds slowed the 23-year-old Aquaman down. He's now up to 12 golds already (six in Beijing) and is hoping to tack on two more this weekend. But no matter what happens, Phelps, who already has endorsements with Visa (V), Speedo, AT&T (T) and PowerBar, will see his earning potential grow.

While Phelps could be become the richest Olympian in history, he's not the first to surge to the top of the career gold medal field. Four other Olympic stars reached what was then the pinnacle of nine career gold medals, which lead to varying degrees of post-competition success.

Athlete: Paavo Nurmi
Country: Finland
Sport: Track and Field
Gold Medals: 1920 (3), 1924 (4), 1928 (2)
"The Flying Finn" dominated middle and long distance running in three Olympic Games, and also competed in amateur races all over the world, including touring before sold-out crowds in America in 1925. Nurmi hoped to end his career by winning gold in the marathon at the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles. Only, the amateur rules used to be much stickier than they are today. The International Amateur Athletes Federation (IAAF) stripped Nurmi of his amateur status for allegedly taking too much money in travel expenses for a race in Germany, thus barring him from competing in the Olympics. He continued to compete in Finland as a "National Amateur," but his running days were basically over. Instead Nurmi, who made a small fortune in the Finnish housing industry, took time to train future Finnish runners. In 1952, Nurmi lit the Olympic Flame at the summer games in Helsinki, and when he died in 1973, he received a state funeral.

Athlete: Larysa Latynina
Country: USSR
Sport: Gymnastics
Gold Medals: 1956 (3), 1960 (3), 1964 (2)
When 18-year-old American Nastia Liukin won the women's gold all-around gymnastics medal on Friday morning in Beijing, speculation immediately stared over whether Liukin, or 16-year-old teammate Shawn Johnson, would be able to compete again in four years. But in another era, the USSR's Latynina won her first Olympic gold medal at 21-years-old and her last gold at age 29. Over three Olympic Games, the Ukrainian-born gymnast not only claimed nine gold medals, but she also grabbed the record for most total medals won (18). After her last Olympics in 1964, Latynina coached the Soviet gymnastics team from 1967-1977. Later, she helped plan the 1980 Moscow Summer Olympics. Latynina has kept a low profile since then, but she has been honored by the Ukrainian government for her Olympic feats.

Athlete: Mark Spitz
Country: USA
Sport: Swimming
Gold Medals: 1968 (2), 1972 (7)
One of Phelps' goals in Beijing is to pass Spitz for the most gold medals in a single Olympics, a feat Spitz accomplished in Munich in 1972 when he set seven world records en route to seven gold medals. After this Herculean feat, Spitz tried his hand at show business, briefly appearing on TV shows like The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and Sonny and Cher's Comedy Hour. When that didn't pan out, Spitz started his own real estate business in Beverly Hills while continuing to endorse companies like Xerox (XRX), Kodak (EK), General Motors (GM), General Mills (GIS), Swatch and of course, Botox (AGN). At the age of 41, spurred on by a million dollar offer from filmmaker Bud Greenspan, Spitz tried to make a comeback at the 1992 games in Barcelona. He failed to qualify.

Athlete: Carl Lewis
Country: USA
Sport: Track and Field
Gold Medals: 1984 (4), 1988 (2), 1992 (2), 1996 (1)
Lewis entered the '84 games in Los Angeles hoping to match Jesse Owens' feat of four track and field gold medals in a single Olympics. Coca-Cola (CCE) offered Lewis a marketing deal before the '84 Olympics, but Lewis and his agents turned it down, claiming he’d be worth more after his Olympic successes. However, this gambit failed, but not because Lewis didn't win his four gold medals. This long jumper was grounded after coming off as arrogant and calculating, not appealing traits to the American public. Coke rescinded the offer while Nike (NKE), who had Lewis under contract for a few years, stopped using him in U.S. ads. Lewis went on to win gold at three more Olympic games, but the country never embraced the track star. In recent years he's tried to make it as an actor, appearing in dramatic roles in several movies as well as on TV shows, usually as himself.

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