Free Breaking the Surface by Greg Louganis Page B

my first Olympics, and I’d won a silver medal. That was a lot to be proud of. Unfortunately, I had so little selfconfidence that I couldn’t see it, and there was no way I could defend myself against Dr. Lee’s outburst. I counted on his approval in the same way I had counted on the approval of my past coaches and my parents. And when I got just the opposite, I thought I had only myself to blame. It never occurred to me then that Dr. Lee was out of line.
    When Dr. Lee was done yelling at me, I went off to a little waiting area near the pool to get ready for my final dive. I thought that at some point he would come back to see me, but he didn’t. I interpreted that to mean that he was so angry with me that he didn’t want to see me. I tried to stay focused and said to myself over and over again, “One more dive, and it’s all over.”
    Just before I got up to walk over to the platform for my last dive, Dr. Lee came up to me and said that even though the gold was out of reach, I should show them what I was made of. He said, “Go out and nail your last dive.” I heard it, but it didn’t sink in. At that point, I was too hurt to really hear anything Dr. Lee had to say.
    The last dive was a front triple-twisting one-and-a-half, one of my more consistent dives. I could always find vertical, no matter what was going on around me or in my own head. So I climbed the ladder to the platform, shut everything out—the audience, my competitors, the judges, Dr. Lee, and my doubts—and executed the dive. Beyond knowing that it was an adequate dive, I had no idea how it went.
    After I finished my dive, I went to get dressed for the awards ceremony. Then I walked with the other two winners to the waiting area where we stood before they announced us. Klaus came over to me and put his arm around me and said, “Next time, Moscow 1980, I see you win two gold medals.” That felt wonderful. It was like the passing of the torch from one of the greatest divers in the world. It meant a lot to me, especially because Klaus had won a silver medal in Tokyo when he was seventeen, and now he’d won his third Olympic gold medal. Given all the competitiveness and lack of good sportsmanship I saw at the Olympics, it was surprising and wonderful to see such a gracious winner.
    As soon as the ceremony ended, my mom came down from the stands to meet me on the deck. We hugged, and both of us cried. She was crying because she was thrilled; I’d won the silver. I was still crying because I’d let everyone down. I thought everyone, from Dr. Lee to the people in the stands, expected me to win the gold medal. So I was still feeling ashamed for having lost. I didn’t think of myself as a winner, although with the exception of Dr. Lee, everyone else did, including my father. He was there with Mom, and he put his arm around me and whispered in my ear, “I’m very proud of you.” It didn’t make sense to me, and I thought he was just trying to be nice.
    Before we left the pool hall, an American official came up to me and thanked me for my ninth dive, which confused me even more. He said, “I thought we’d have to protest the scores.” He and the other American officials felt the judges had been scoring me low and Klaus high since the start of the platform finals. So even if I’d nailed my ninth dive, he believed I wouldn’t have scored high enough overall to win the gold.
    The scoring of dives is subjective, and judges are not immune to human emotion. I was the young newcomer with no Olympic record. Klaus had an established record. He was a favorite, who had proven himself over and over again. It made sense that he got the benefit of the doubt. It would be the same situation in 1988, when I was the old-timer being challenged by a young upstart and I would get the benefit of the doubt.
    I had no way of knowing if the judges were scoring me low at the Olympics. I had nothing to compare it to, and since I missed my ninth dive, it didn’t make a