US Athlete celebrates Independence Day with Golden Medal

GWANGJU – No better way to celebrate the ‘4^th of July’ – ‘Independence Day – for an American with a gold medal victory … and that’s exactly what athlete Sarah Henry did, clocking the best time in the Women’s 400m Individual Medley at the Universiade in Gwangju. When asked about her feeling of winning a golden medal on such an important day for Americans, she said: “It means everything, it doesn`t get any better than that. I hope when everybody wakes up in the morning, and discover that I got a golden medal, that`ll be my gift for them.”

She didn`t forget to mention the hard times she had to persevere. “I tore my ACL (Anterior Cruciate Ligament) twice! And I had several knee injuries, and I`ve been out of the water a lot because of that, so that was a huge setback for me, which made me think that I would never take off my shirt again, so, to come back and win a golden medal is definitely a huge thing for me.”

Meanwhile, she hopes that the American Media is doing her best job on covering this event, because she wants her parents, her friends, and mainly all of the Americans, to know about her achievement at the Universiade. “It`s really great because back home in the US, things are very competitive, in the games it`s like everyone is enemies, you want to beat everyone. But here we are all friends, representing the US, which makes this Universiade is a great thing to go through.”

Sarah said with a very sad tone that this is her last Universiade, since she graduated this year, but hopes to participate in the Olympics and do her best to repeat the same achievements, because she thinks now that the Universiade has made her ready for the next big sporting event.

Mahmoud Khairy, (EGY) FISU Young Reporter