Tom Daly will be competing in his fifth Summer Olympics.
An openly gay diver was today confirmed by the British Olympic Association as part of Team GB's diving squad. It stands for Great Britain.
Previously, Daly and his synchro diving partner Noah Williams had secured a spot to represent their country in the synchro diving competition at the Paris Olympics. However, securing a spot for your country and being selected to fill that spot are two different steps.
Mark England, Team GB's Head of Mission, said: “I would especially like to congratulate Tom on becoming the first British diver to compete in five Olympic Games. “It's a great achievement.”
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It was almost a formality, as the duo of Tom Daley and Noah Williams had won gold at the British National Diving Cup at the end of 2023. Still, being officially named as a fifth consecutive Olympian is a milestone for an openly gay athlete.
They won silver medals at the world championships earlier this year.
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Competing and competing in five Olympic Games is a huge accomplishment for any athlete. What's even more impressive is that Daly mostly left the sport a few years ago after playing in Tokyo.
He said he returned to diving primarily because he wanted his son to see his father compete in the Olympics. Her eldest son Robert Ray with husband Dustin Lance Black is now 6 years old. He was only 3 years old during the Tokyo Summer Olympics. The Paris Games will offer him a chance to watch his father dive, given that there were very few people in the stands for the Tokyo Games.
The family's newest addition, son Phoenix Rose, who is only 1 year old, won't have that chance.
Daley already has four Olympic medals in his trophy case. This includes the gold medal he won in synchro diving at the Tokyo Olympics with his diving partner Matty Li.
He has also won three bronze medals, including a synchronized match with Daniel Goodfellow in 2016.
If he can win another medal, Daley will join a small group of five-time Olympic medalists. That would include Greg Louganis, who is generally considered the greatest male diver of all time. Louganis' four Olympic gold medals and one silver medal would have been even greater had it not been for the U.S. boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics.
Either way, Daly is about to do what she set out to do: jump into the Olympics in the stands in Paris with her husband and sons. His fifth and final Olympics may be the most memorable of them all.