Америкалық суға түсуші Лаура Уилкинсонның өмірі мен мансабы

American diver
the diver

Laura Ann Wilkinson (born November 17, 1977, in Houston, Texas) is an American diver, 3 time Olympian, and Olympic gold medalist. She is the first woman to win the three major diving world titles. Wilkinson retired in 2008. After nine years of retirement, she returned to competition in 2017 and placed 2nd at Nationals. She trained for her fourth Olympic Games (2021) at Texas A&M University's swimming and diving facilities but did not qualify.

Wilkinson was born and raised in Houston, Texas and lived with her parents, Ed and Linda Wilkinson. She attended Klein High School in Houston before going to University of Texas. As a child, Wilkinson was a gymnast, but had to give up on the sport after a growth spurt during puberty made her too tall to continue. It was then that she turned to diving. When she first started diving, a teacher told her she was too old to start a new sport and was later kicked off her high school team because they thought she was a "waste of space".

Wilkinson finished in fifth place at the 2004 Summer Olympics, but had left an impact on her competitors. Several of them repeated the techniques she used at the 2000 Olympics by starting their dives with a handstand.

On June 26, 2008, Wilkinson qualified as a member of the 2008 U. S. Olympic Diving Team in diving by taking first place in the trials. She announced her retirement and this Olympics would be her final competition.

In 2017, after nine years of retirement, Wilkinson returned to competition and placed 2nd at U. S. Nationals. She trained full time for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics—which would have been her fourth Olympic Games (delayed until 2021 due to the COVID 19 global pandemic), but did not qualify for the team. Their fourth child, Dakaia, joined the family from Ethiopia in March 2018. She also travels around the country speaking to girls at The Revolve Tour, a Christian girls' conference. She had major surgery on her neck in 2018 to repair damage to discs injured by her diving career.