Updated: 2008-08-22 10:07:11
Sheila rides LiangLiang in the Modern Pentathlon Women’s Riding Show Jumping. (Photo credit: Clive Rose/Getty Images)
The first woman to compete in four Olympic Games in three different sports will be going for gold in Beijing on August 22.
“If you look for any kind of reasonable, objective standard, it would be, Okay, who got to the top of their sport, and then who got to the top of the world in a second sport? Deion Sanders, Bo Jackson, Jim Thorpe. It’s a fairly narrow group. Sheila is near the top of the world in a third sport. Nobody’s ever come close to that before,” explained coach Lew Kidder to ESPN.
Sheila Taormina’s Olympic story started with a gold medal win as part of the US 4 x 200m Freestyle Relay team in the Atlanta 1996 Games. With this achievement, she retired from competitive swimming and confined herself to a life of traveling around the United States giving motivational speeches and coaching swimmers.
But her drive to strive came back in 1998. She signed up for a Triathlon competition in her hometown, excelled, and was then urged to try out for the US team for the 2000 Summer Games. She had never run or biked competitively before, but that was not something that could stand in this determined athlete’s way. Taormina not only made the Olympic delegation, she amazingly came in sixth in Sydney after only two years of training.
Encouraged, she kept up with her new sport, and in 2004, took the title for the Triathlon in the World Championships. In the same year, she went on to Athens to participate in the Olympics, but finished a disappointing twenty-third as cramps kept her far away from the podium.
Sheila(L) takes on Qian Chen of China in the Modern Pentathlon Women’s Fencing Epee One Touch. (Photo credit: Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)
With all this experience behind her, Taormina looked as if she was ready to withdraw from the Olympic arena again, until a comment by US athlete Eli Bremer lit up her spirited flame once more. Bremer noted that if Taormina could qualify for the Olympics in a third sport, she would go down in history books as the only woman to do so.
And so, the versatile Taormina, who lives by the Olympic motto “swifter, higher, stronger,” decided on the Modern Pentathlon. This meant learning to do well in sports that she has been training in, swimming and running, but also excelling in sports she had never even understood before, shooting, fencing and horseback riding. Her athletic learning curve is astounding; before 2005, she had never participated in any of those new sports in any capacity. Now, she is representing the United States in the quest for Olympic gold in the Modern Pentathlon event.
“I have to say Pentathlon has been much more stress. Shooting makes me more nervous than anything. You must focus on it mentally. I think I have more fear in this Olympics than I did in 1996,” said Taormina while receiving reporters in Beijing’s Olympic Village on August 19, three days before her Modern Pentathlon debut.
“But my goal is the process of enjoying the Olympics again as I did the first time in 1996. I just want my mind being present on those things and see what the results will take me,” she continued.
Sheila crosses the finish line in the Women’s Triathlon Competition at the XIV Pan American Games in Santo Domingo. (Photo credit: Donald )
To Taorima, sports are an enjoyable way to better oneself. “I don’t want to be disappointed by myself. If I can do it, I will. It’s not a good thing to regret. Life is to be enjoyed, we are created to enjoy life,” she said.
On the more practical side of things, training for the Modern Pentathlon and her Beijing performance, without the monetary support of corporate sponsors, has been difficult.
“This is an expensive Olympics,” Taormina explained. Only five of her family members are in China to cheer for her, a stark change from the 20-25 fans she had behind her in her past three Olympic appearances.
Luckily, Sheila is not alone in this expensive campaign. Her older sister, Sudee, has designed and is selling T-shirts to promote the Modern Pentathlon and Taormina’s journey in China.
Considered by some as one of the world’s best athletes, and with a strong, supportive fan base behind her, Taormina is ready to prove that she can swim, bike, run, fence and ride horses with the best of the best on Friday.
“I have all the different hardships to be dealt with — anxiety, burning passion, financial stress. My prayers will not change at night, no matter what the results are. I have so many friends and family loving me. What can I worry about?” said Taromina with a bright smile.
