Beijing ? The famous mustache is long gone, the jet black hair now gray.

Someone else already has taken his place as America’s greatest swimmer. The seven gold medals from another time gather dust in a California bank vault.

Mark Spitz could be excused for feeling conflicted. Anyone else might even be a bit bitter.

But he has watched every race, cheered every time.

And when Michael Phelps won his seventh gold by the narrowest of margins to tie Spitz’s record for a single Olympics, Spitz was cheering even more.

“I was almost giddy with excitement,” Spitz said. “It’s so befitting of Michael to do it like that. I won a race by a hundredth of a second like he did, and I’m not giving my medal back.”

Spitz has a lot of reasons to cheer, even from halfway around the world in Detroit, where he was watching the Phelps spectacle unfold on television after attending his youngest son’s basketball tournament.

Thirty-six years after he first cashed in on his Olympic medal haul, Phelps has helped Spitz feel golden once again.

“I’m ecstatic,” Spitz told The Associated Press by phone. “I always wondered what my feelings would be. I feel a tremendous load off my back. Somebody told me years ago you judge one’s character by the company you keep, and I’m just happy to be in the company of Michael Phelps. That’s the bottom line.”

Thanks to Phelps, millions who had never heard of Spitz now know his name. Those who know who he is now have a new appreciation for what he did.

The phone is ringing more than it did, and the speaking fee will surely go up.

About the only thing he has to complain about is no one invited him to the party to join in on the fun.

“This thing Michael did is probably going to spur a lot more life into me,” Spitz said. “But I’m still going to be who I am.”

Spitz had a chance to thank Phelps in person when NBC hooked them up just moments after Phelps tied his record, finishing one-hundredth of a second ahead of Milorad Cavic in the 100 butterfly.

It was one great swimmer to another, with just Bob Costas in between.

“I was going to be trite and say to him and ask him this question: What was the most difficult race and when did you know you had a chance to win seven gold medals?” Spitz said. “I don’t have to. It was tonight, and it was epic.”

Mostly, Spitz was pretty much forgotten until Phelps came along to challenge his record. For Spitz, the timing couldn’t have been better, though he genuinely seems to want Phelps to succeed.

Spitz would like to be in closer company with Phelps, but that’s another story. He complained recently that International Olympic Committee officials should have invited him to Beijing as a special guest to watch Phelps go for his record.

Spitz has brought his medals out only three times since 1972 – once when a French sports magazine paid him a bundle to replicate his iconic pose and twice when each of his two sons turned 7.

With Phelps making history, though, he may get the urge to visit them more often.

If nothing else, just to remind himself how golden he once was.