“I feel incredibly proud to say that I’m a gay man and also an Olympic champion,” said Tom Daley of the UK after he and his teammate Matty Lee pulled off a stunning performance in synchronised 10 m platform at Tokyo Olympics to take home a gold medal beating China’s Cao Yuan and Chen Isen by just one point.
The Olympic gold is a high point in 27-year-old Daley’s career that started at the age of 7. It also was an occasion for him to send out a message. He hoped his performance will inspire young LGBT people to realise “you can achieve anything”.
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The Tokyo Games are Daley’s fourth Olympics and his first partnered with Matty Lee in the synchronized event. At 14, Daley got immense attention in Great Britain after he competed in his first Games, the 2008 Beijing Olympics. He holds two bronze Olympic medals, one from the 10-meter platform dive in 2012 and one from the synchronized 10 meter in 2016.
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“It’s unbelievable, especially after Rio 2016, when I was extremely disappointed, because I thought that’d be my best chance of a medal,” Daley said. “But my husband said my story doesn’t end there. He said our son was going to watch me become an Olympic champion, and there’s a whole lot of your chosen family out here to support you,” he added, reports usatoday.com
Daley, who wept as he collected his medal, later showed off a pouch he has knitted to keep his prized possession. “This morning I made a little cozy for my medal to stop it from getting scratched,” he said with a laugh on Instagram.
The little knitted pouch as the Union Jack on one side and the Japanese flag on the other to commemorate the Tokyo Olympics.
“The one thing that has kept me sane throughout this whole process is my love for knitting, and crocheting and all things stitching,” he said.
Daley also thanked fans for following his Instagram account and supporting his knitting hobby during such a trying time.
