Olympic Champion, World Champion, and swimming’s biggest dominator, Katie Ledecky, announced her TYR Sport partnership at the Santa Clara stop of the TYR Pro Swim Series. TYR’s been making waves for many years, signing names like Matt Grevers and Ryan Lochte. Ledecky adds a big boost of power to the brand on the run-up to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.
Ledecky’s dreaming bigger, and she intends to grow the sport. Sound familiar? That was Michael Phelps‘ mantra his entire career, and now the biggest names in swimming are carrying the torch. Beyond the pool and as a pro, Ledecky’s already making her mark. She recently became the first female Olympian and first Olympic swimmer to grace the cover of National Geographic magazine.
When I see Ledecky, I still see that 15 year old kid who surprised the world, winning 2012 Olympic gold in the 800m free. She has come so far since then. Two years at Stanford, as a student and swimming with Coach Greg Meehan, has clearly empowered her. Asked what her message was for young kids, Ledecky said:
“I started swimming when I was kid, and I never thought I’d be in this position…. You know, what I always tell kids is not to limit yourself, and not be afraid to set scary goals…set goals that you think are impossible when you set them…”
I’m sticking by my previous Ledecky predictions for this summer:
- 200m free – 1:53.0
- 400m free – 3:56.4
- 800m free – 8:03.9
- 1500m Free – 15.18.1
- 400m IM? No clue. Help me here?
What are your predictions?
Like Katie Ledecky on Facebook here.
You can follow Katie Ledecky on Twitter here.
RECENT EPISODES
This is a Gold Medal Media production presented by SwimOutlet.com. Host Gold Medal Mel Stewart is a 3-time Olympic medalist and the co-founder of SwimSwam.com, a Swimming News website.
Whenever someone is talking about Katie Ledecky dreaming big I am always wondering if it was the case in her life when she dreamed of some target, worked hard for it and then was compelled to drop it realizing that this particular dream is above her natural abilities. She never talked about that. And that is strange for the girl who indeed was dreaming big. For example she said that not even being sure if she makes National Olympic team in 2012 whenever she dreamed about her competition at Olympics it was not making the final, not making podium, but the gold medal only.
If someone is dreaming within his/her limits it’s not a dream anymore. Was it anything… Read more »
Katie Ledecky has many great races and extraordinary world records but still my favorite is her first one in London: “someone who became so famous, so suddenly”. I can watch it again and again.
4:55.8 400 Free for first,
4:29.5 400 IM for second
Katie! We love you so much. You inspire us to keep going every day. We are cheering for you and thank you for leading the way!!!
I wonder how many events Ledecky will swim at nationals? In the past she has scratched the 1500 on the last day, having already qualified for international meets. I think she will swim the 400 IM at Nats but not Pan Pacs (first day schedule at PP: 800, 1br, 200, 4IM. Brutal.) She could make a very hard challenge at Katie Hoff’s AR.
If she plans to compete in 400IM at World Championships next year she has to make this provision for herself at Nationals in a month.
Now that she’s a pro swimmer, I hope Katie takes some public speaking lessons. She’s my favorite swimmer, and she seems like a really genuinely nice person. But sometimes Katie looks really uncomfortable in front of a camera, like she doesn’t know what to say.
Of course even if she were William Shakespeare, nothing she says could speak louder than her times in the pool.
She’s comfortable in front of the camera…. At Golden Goggles, standing in front of a huge room of peers, sponsors, and VIPs, 500+ people, she’s great. On camera, she talks like she does in person. She’s as authentic as any star athlete you’ll interview….
I think a key point is that Ledecky is not doing public speaking, but answering interview questions.
Um what? My only complaint is Ledecky is a little boring in her interviews, but she’s perfectly polished and always says the right thing.
Any pro athlete — especially ones with 7-figure endorsements— is well-advised to get presentation skills coaching. Indeed, often the sponsors insist on it. That means not only learning how you express yourself vocally, but also learning how to “stay on message,” and deal with odd questions and distracting situations.
I’d say that Ms. Ledecky is becoming a quite poised speaker. In past years, she’d shrug a lot when answering questions. That’s rare now.
I won’t mention names here, but one particular elite swimmer could greatly improve his/her presentation manner by eliminating “upspeak” in his/her answers. To my ear, “upspeak” is annoying.
You are right: she practically doesn’t shrug any more. But I think that that rather the result of being a college student for two years already then a result of special training. What hasn’t change is that she is choosing carefully words not to tell more than she wants to bypassing topics that she doesn’t want to talk about. Therefore her interviews sometimes looks very standard because she prefer to not share her plans and opinions.
From the pool deck, it looks like TYR has replaced Speedo as the premier suit company. Anyone else get that impression?
When it comes to sponsored athletes, they definitely have.
Speedo has made some bets on big names that haven’t paid off. Cordes, who doesn’t race as much as other National Teamers, Meili whose in law school, Becca Meyers who hasn’t clicked at USC, Conor Dwyer, who’s doing whatever he’s doing, Missy and her injuries, and aging Adrian, Beisel, who sort of retired at some point last year, Coughlin who’s retired…
Speedo has bet on a lot of the “USA Swimming favorites,” aka athletes that the federation pushes a lot as stars. Ledecky is obviously a superstar grab for them, but then there’s a lot of less-obvious athletes on their roster. Cody Miller, who has turned into an absolute boon. They’ve got Ledecky and Leah Smith, which means they have… Read more »
Ledecky is what great freestylers are like also decent in the other strokes. Shane Gould was a good 200 Im and Shirley Bashashoff had a pretty good 400 Im for her day. Jane Evans won the 400 IM.