Because I own my name domain, I keep this domain active as a contact portal and to share a bit about myself in my own words:

I am passionate about protecting athletes from injustices in sport. I am currently devoted to my role as the Director of Athlete and International Relations as the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency. I was one of the first cohort of seven Olympians selected by the International Olympic Committee to study in the Erasmus Mundus Joint Master’s Degree program in Sport Ethics and Integrity.

BIO:

I grew up in Texas, Virginia, Germany, Maryland, and Florida as the daughter of a West Point graduate and Lieutenant Colonel in the Judge Advocate General’s Corps of the U.S. Army (father) and a teacher and seamstress (mother). My parents required that my brothers and I played at least one sport as a way to teach us that our health was an important skill and practice to develop for our lifetimes. I was seven years old and living in Virginia when I was presented with the only three options available in our community for girls: softball, soccer, or swimming. At this age, I was also standing on the local neighborhood corner challenging any kid who walked by to a running race after school, so perhaps my parents were also trying to save the neighborhood kids from further racing challenges! Because I loved to race, I chose swimming. I swam my first competitions in Virginia and continued in Germany when my father was stationed to Heidelberg and West Berlin for the next three years. I competed in the European Forces Swim League representing the Heidelberg Sea Lions and the Berlin Barracudas. After returning stateside at the age of 11, I started twice-daily training and focused on breaststroke events as a member of the University of Maryland Baltimore County Retrievers swim club. My family moved two years later to Gainesville, Florida, and I joined the University of Florida campus-based club team called the Florida Aquatics Swim Team. Living in seven different cities before high school was difficult, but having a swim team to be a part of in each new place made the process of constant change a lot easier. Plus, the exposure to a lot of different types of people and cultures was beneficial in terms of personal development. At 14 years old, I jumped from being tied for 71st in the country to placing 5th, in one day, at the 1992 U.S. Olympic Swimming Trials. It was then that I realized that the Olympic dream may actually be possible for me. At the same time, I was enrolled in the demanding, but great, high school curriculum of the International Baccalaureate program. I went on to win an Olympic silver medal at the Atlanta 1996 Olympic Games in the 400 Individual Medley, become a 13-time U.S. National Champion, NCAA Champion, an Academic All-American while at the University of Florida, and I helped pioneer the use of a new back-to-breast turn that is now used by all elite-level individual medley swimmers. More of my swim info is on wikipedia. I loved that swimming was so physically and mentally challenging, that I had the opportunity to race every day, and that I had the opportunity in my early career to spend so much time with teammates who were like older brothers to me. Throughout my career, I also had many wonderful open-water experiences as a part of training (see below for some images of some of my favorite dolphin encounters!).

One of my favorite races and proudest moments in my swimming career was setting a world record at the age of 16 in the 200 individual medley at the short course world championships in Palma de Mallorca in 1993. That record is still (as of 2023) the longest-standing world record in any women’s individual swimming SCM event of all time (the record stood unbroken for more almost 15 years). That race was fueled by my frustration on that day by the realization and observation that the anti-doping system in place was completely failing.

Unfortunately, I won multiple silver medals at top-level competitions to athletes who were later proven to have doped. The sacrifices athletes make, and the respect clean athletes show to their sport and their competitors by competing fairly, need to be honored and protected. When I watched, along with the rest of the world, the news of the Russian doping scandal unfold, I realized many more athletes would experience what I experienced as an athlete, years later, and after a system was put in place that was supposed to fix the issues plaguing the enforcement of sport fairness. My dream is that 1. all Olympic and Paralympic athletes’ dedication and sacrifices will be met with equal demonstration of dedication through action by those in positions of decision-making and influence. 2. That one day Olympic and Paralympic athletes will elect their international representatives in open and fair elections, and that 3. Athletes will have independent representation and an equal say in the rules and systems that govern their sports, and 4. That there will be fair, accessible pathways to restitution should athletes experience injustices.

Image credits - beach: photo by Photo by Ibrahim Rifath on Unsplash. Photos of me: In competition, Jed Jacobsohn/Allsport. On the Atlanta 1996 Olympic podium, Doug Mills/Associated Press. Talking about integrity in sport, Stephen McCarthy/Web Summit. Swimming with dolphins in Kona, Hawaii, 2006, Shane Gould.