In a sport littered with precocious prodigies, 41-year-old swimming mum Dara Torres shatters the mold.
Torres was a talented teen herself when she won her first Olympic swimming gold in Los Angeles in 1984.
Now she will tackle her fifth Games campaign in Beijing alongside teammates and rivals young enough to be her children.
PHOTO: AP
US superstar Michael Phelps, 23, calls Torres his “sort-of mom.”
Torres, whose daughter Tessa was born in 2006, says she prefers to think of herself as a “big sister” or maybe “aunt” to her teammates.
“It’s nice to be able to be there for the kids if they have questions,” Torres said. “They probably feel comfortable talking to me. I feel like I’m on their level on one hand, but I have all this experience on the other hand that I’m maybe not on their level. I’ll take that as a compliment that Phelps refers to me as the mom, but I don’t know if the kids think that.”
Torres owns nine Olympic medals, starting with that first relay gold in 1984.
Her five medals in 2000 capped a comeback from a seven-year retirement.
When she launched her latest return, Torres was aiming for another relay berth and she surprised herself with a victory in the 100m freestyle, ahead of American record-holder Natalie Coughlin, at the US trials.
“I was shocked when I touched the wall. I couldn’t see the scoreboard,” Torres said. “With my age and everything, I said ‘what does that say?’ Then I heard the announcer and I could kind of see it blurry. They need to make those numbers a little bigger up there for people my age.”
After winning the 50m freestyle at the trials, Torres has elected to forego the 100m freestyle individual event in Beijing, preferring to focus her energy on the one-lap sprint and relays.
Torres was 16 years old when she set a 50m freestyle world record in January of 1983. The following year she was part of the US 4x100m freestyle relay in Los Angeles that delivered her first Olympic gold.
Over the course of her “first” career, she went on to capture 4x100m freestyle relay bronze at the Seoul Olympics, and 4x100m freestyle gold as part of a world record-setting team in Barcelona.
Torres then left swimming, concentrating on a burgeoning career in modeling and media, until launching her first comeback in 1999, which ended with her five-medal haul in Sydney that included three individual bronze (50m freestyle, 100m freestyle and 100m butterfly).
As in her first return, Torres knows that her second comeback is bound to prompt speculation in a sports world weary of doping scandals.
This time around, after discussion with her coach Michael Lohberg, Torres has met that issue head on, volunteering for a US Anti-Doping program that tests a select group of athletes far beyond the World Anti-Doping Agency requirements.
“When Michael and I were in Rome and I had some pretty fast times, we sat down and said: ‘OK, now people are going to start talking,’” Torres said. “I wanted to be proactive.”
She told USADA’s Travis Tygart that she wanted extra testing.
“I told him I wanted to be an open book,” Torres said. “You can DNA test me, blood test me, urine test me, whatever you want to do, just test me. I want people to know I am doing this right, that I am 41 years old and I am clean and I want a clean sport.”
Having done what she can to dispel doubts, Torres says there is only one downside to her history-making bid.
“It’s sort of bittersweet for me because I made my fifth Olympic team, but I’m going to be away from my daughter for a month and that’s going to be real hard emotionally,” she said. “I’m happy I’m going to Beijing.”
Shohei Ohtani and his wife arrived in South Korea with his Los Angeles Dodgers teammates yesterday ahead of their season-opening games with the San Diego Padres next week. Ohtani, wearing a black training suit and a cap backwards, was the first Dodgers player who showed up at the arrival gate of Incheon International Airport, west of Seoul. His wife, Mamiko Tanaka, walked several steps behind him. As a crowd of fans, many wearing Dodgers jerseys, shouted his name and cheered slogans, Ohtani briefly waved his hand, but did not say anything before he entered a limousine bus with his wife. Fans held placards
Taiwan’s Tai Tzu-ying yesterday advanced to the quarter-finals at the All England Open, beating Kim Ga-eun of South Korea 21-17, 21-15. With the win, Tai earned a semi-final against China’s He Bingjiao, who beat Michelle Li of Canada 21-9, 21-9. Defending champion An Se-young defeated India’s P.V. Sindhu 21-19, 21-11. An on Wednesday cruised into the second round, unlike last year’s men’s winner, Li Shifeng, who suffered a shock defeat. South Korea’s An, the world No. 1, overcame Taiwan’s Hsu Wen-chi 21-17, 21-16 to set up the match against Sindhu. In other women’s singles matches, Taiwan’s Sung Shuo-yun lost 21-18, 24-22 against Carolina Marin of
EYEING TOP SPOT: A victory in today’s final against Storm Hunter and Katerina Siniakova would return 38-year-old Hsieh Su-wei to the world No. 1 ranking Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and Elise Mertens on Thursday secured a spot in the women’s doubles finals at the BNP Paribas Open after dispatching Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the US and Australia’s Ellen Perez 6-2, 7-6 (7/5) at Indian Wells. Hsieh and her Belgian partner Mertens, who won the Australian Open in late January, coasted through the first set after breaking their opponents’ serve twice, but found the going tougher in the second. Both pairs could only muster one break point over 12 games, neither of which were converted, leaving the set to be decided by a tiebreaker. Hsieh and Mertens took a 6-3 lead,
DOUBLES PAYBACK: Hsieh Su-wei and Elise Martens avenged their defeat in the quarters at the Qatar TotalEnergies Open against Demi Schuurs and Luisa Stefani Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei on Wednesday advanced to the semi-finals of the women’s doubles at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, California. Hsieh and partner Elise Mertens of Belgium dispatched Demi Schuurs and Luisa Stefani 6-1, 6-4 to set up a clash against Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the US and Australia’s Ellen Perez for a spot in the final of the WTA 1000 tournament. Hsieh and Martens made a blistering start to their rematch after they lost to Schuurs and Stefani in the quarter-finals at the Qatar TotalEnergies Open last month, winning three games without reply at the start of the first set