Michael Phelps' father, Fred Phelps, has been noticeably missing during much of the swimmer's history-making Olympics career. Michael's mother, Debbie, is often seen cheering for her son on the bleachers. Although Fred Phelps reportedly made an appearance at the London games, Phelps' father prefers to stay out of the spotlight. Many wonder if he will be at his son's last closing ceremony of his professional career.

Fred Phelps has worked for the Maryland State Police, and he parted company with Michael's mother in 1993 when Michael was just nine years old. They became distanced, but have since come to a closer relationship, although one would not exactly call them particularly close.

Fred has remarried since his split with Michael's mother and now lives in Baltimore.

In 2004 Fred and Michael had a brief reconciliation at the Athens Olympic Games, where Phelps won 6 gold and 2 bronze medals. However, in Beijing in 2008 he didn't travel to China to watch, preferring to catch up on his son's record breaking feats on the television.

Although he did not attend the Beijing Games in 2008, father Fred did state the following in an interview around that time, according to One India News: "I'm very proud of him and all he's done. This is not about me, it's about him."

Since that time Phelps' father has kept a low profile and prefers not to allow his disjointed relationship with his son distract the world from his son's amazing achievements.

Phelps swam his last at the 2012 London games. The 27 year-old has confirmed he will be retiring. 

"I've been able to do everything that I wanted," he said at a news conference, according to Newsday. "If you can say that about your career, there's no need to move forward. Time for other things." 

Phelps has plans to see the world. He hopes to go cage diving among sharks in South Africa with fellow Olympian, Chad le Clos. 

"I've been able to see so many amazing places in the world, but I've really never gotten to experience them," Phelps said. 

Although the star Olympian is moving on, he still plans to continue to be around swimming.

"I would like to try to take it to an even higher level than it is now."