Imagine that you are once again watching the opening ceremonies of the 2004 Summer Olympic Games — athletes dressed to match as they boast their country’s flag, wave to fans and smile for the myriad of cameras flashing at them. Moments after the mob of American competitors files onto the track at Olympic Stadium, another exceptionally large contingent marches out beneath a banner that reads, “University of California.” Although it may sound absurd, it’s not as far-fetched as one might think.
One hundred and ten athletes with UC connections traveled to Athens, Greece, in order to demonstrate their kinesthetic prowess against the world’s best, earning 36 medals, including 13 gold, 10 silver and 13 bronze — a medal count that would have made the University of California the seventh leading “country” in the world, behind only the United States, Russia, China, Australia, Germany and Japan.
UCSD has been home to three athletes, including 20-year-old current UCSD student Carrie Johnson, who raced in the K-1 and K-4 flatwater sprint canoe kayak events, former Triton star pitcher Alex Cremidan, who represented host country Greece on the baseball diamond, and Melanie Benn, a quadruple amputee. She will swim in the freestyle and backstroke events at the Paralympic Games, which takes place between Sept. 19 and Sept. 27 in Athens.
Johnson’s Olympic bid was marked by her April 15 qualifying race on Lake Merritt in Oakland, Calif., where she charged past former Olympians Kathy Colin and Ruth Nortje in the K-1 500-meter race to snatch her place in the Summer Games. Johnson shocked onlookers, who were largely consumed with the battle between Colin and Nortje, by passing the race favorites and crossing the finish line nearly two full seconds ahead of second-place finisher Colin and three seconds ahead of internationally fourth-ranked Nortje. Johnson went on to finish the K-1 500-meter race in 12th overall in Athens.
Cremidan, a 23-year-old graduate of Thurgood Marshall College, plays for the South Bend Silver Hawks, a Single-A farm team of the Arizona Diamondbacks. In 2002, while pitching for the Greek national team in an Olympic qualifying game, Cremidan threw a no-hitter in his team’s 21-0 trouncing of Slovakia. Greece placed seventh out of eight teams in the final Olympic standings.
Benn, a native of Ann Arbor, Mich., who now resides in San Diego, acquired her disability from meningococcal meningitis in 1995. She competed in her first Paralympic Games in Sydney, Australia in 2000, where she won the silver medal in the 20-point relay competition. Other crowning achievements going into the games include first-place finishes at the 2004 Paralympic swimming trials in the 50-meter freestyle, 50-meter backstroke and 100-meter freestyle events.
The Paralympic Games are the most intense international athletic competition for individuals with physical disabilities. The competitors at the Paralympic Games are year-round athletes who have to qualify for their events and who get cut from teams, exactly as they do in the Olympics. It is not to be confused with the Special Olympics, which is for individuals with intellectual disabilities.
Twenty-two-year-old UC Berkeley alumna Natalie Coughlin was the individual UC medal leader with her two gold-medal showings in the 100-meter backstroke and 800-meter freestyle relay events, two silver medals in the 400-meter freestyle relay and the 400-meter medley relay events and a bronze medal in the 100-meter freestyle.
UCLA was once home to five of the gold medal-winning U.S. softball players, including 33-year-old Lisa Fernandez, 23-year-old Tairia Flowers, 24-year-old Amanda Freed, 26-year-old Stacey Nuveman and 22-year-old Natasha Watley. Fernandez won her third gold medal in three Olympic competitions and is regarded by many as the country’s best softball player.
Joy Fawcett, a 36-year-old veteran of the American national women’s soccer team and graduate of both Berkeley and UCLA, helped lead her squad to the gold medal.
Pete Cipollone, a 33-year-old UC Berkeley alumnus, helped his boat on to gold medal stardom in the men’s eight rowing.
In track and field events, UCLA representatives Joanna Hayes, 27, and Monique Henderson, 21, each pulled out gold medals. Hayes won the 100-meter hurdles event while Henderson blazed to team victory in the 1600-meter relay.
Women’s beach volleyball sensations Holly McPeak, 35, and Elaine Youngs, 34, brought home bronze medals in their event. McPeak is an alumna of UCLA and UC Berkeley; Youngs attended UCLA.
The collective success of UC athletes is nothing unusual in Olympic competition, though 2004 proved to be the most fruitful year for those competitors. In the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney, University of California captured 34 medals — an impressive achievement that was set only to be shattered by the athletes of 2004, just as the current mark of 36 could easily be reset in the next Summer Games in Beijing, China.