Who is Lydia Jacoby: 17-year-old swimmer Lydia Jacoby stunned teammate and returning champion Lilly King of the United States to claim gold in the women's 100-meter breaststroke on Tuesday morning in Tokyo. She is now the first Alaskan native to win an Olympics gold in swimming. The teen swam a scintillating final 50m and clocked in 1:04.95, edging South Africa’s Tatjana Schoenmaker (1:05.22) into second and upstaging King, who had to settle for bronze with a time of 1:05.54. King was chasing her second consecutive Olympic gold.
Jacoby is bringing home Alaska's first Olympic medal for swimming. She was also the first swimmer from the state to ever make the US team.
Here's what we know about Lydia Jacoby, the new swimming sensation:
A resident of Seward, Jacoby is the first Olympic swimmer and only the 10th Summer Olympian to be born in Alaska. Earlier, she had revealed how she had little chance of making it to the team last year but had been planning to come to Tokyo with her family to watch the Games before they were postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. She rigorously trained during the pandemic, even though the only pool in Seward was shut down for months. Thanks to her determination, the teen not only booked a berth for herself at the Games, but also claimed the gold.
Jacoby was one of Team USA’s Olympic trials surprises, swimming nearly three seconds faster than her pre-pandemic personal-best (1:08.12). She had finished second to King to qualify for Tokyo. She is one of eleven teenagers, ten of them being women, on the US Olympic swimming team.
Jacoby, whose parents are both licensed boat captains in Seward, started swimming at the age of six and initially took lessons as a child because of the amount of time her family spent on the water. She is now prepping to finish her last year of high school before going to study at the University of Texas, Austin. The swimmer also plays the stand-up bass. She is a singer and a guitar player too. The Alaskan native spent a few summers performing at folk festivals as a member of the Snow River String Band.
Feature Image Credit: AFP
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