New mom and swimmer Dana Vollmer just won two Olympic medals and inspired strong moms everywhere
Olympic swimmer Dana Vollmer was at the top of her game in the London 2012 Olympics. She won a Gold Medal and set the World Record in the Women’s 100-meter Butterfly, and she didn’t know how she could top it. Dana decided to retire, and she had a baby. While she was pregnant, she realized she wasn’t done. She told the Washington Post that she felt so “out of control” with my body that she decided to get back into swimming.
This weekend, Dana became only the second female swimmer to win an Olympic medal after giving birth.
Dana won a silver medal as a part of the Women’s 4×100-meter Relay as well as a Bronze medal in her signature 100-meter Butterfly. The only other woman to win a medal after having a baby was Dara Torres. Why is it that more athletes don’t continue competing beyond motherhood? It could be because competition is grueling, and the hours required to get back into shape are intense.
The Olympics landed only 17 months after Dana’s son was born, so she had to train hard!
In fact, only five months after giving birth, Dana was competing in the 2015 World Championships. Dana told NBC that “getting back in shape was hard.” She said, “It was hard to even finish warm-up. It’s not like I could just come home and sleep all day. I was a new mom.”
Luckily, she had a pretty solid training buddy.
She posted about her journey as #mommaonamission. She told NBC that she even started Arlen on swimming when he was only six months old.
And when you have a cute kid like Arlen, you can charm all the competition!
Here Alren meets Swedish Olympian and the Gold Medalist in the 100-meter Butterfly, Sarah Sjostrom.
And little Arlen really knows how to work a crowd.
Check out the little guy’s “Team Mommy” shirt.
She’s such an inspiration to strong moms everywhere.
We’re so excited to hear Dana’s story. And we hope that it becomes more common to see mom swimmers, because seeing Dana race is really pumping us up.
