Sorry, I know that you have to be tried of hearing me talk about Matthew Mitcham, but the boy is an icon and a hero for many gays. I am proud to have him on our side. Rats off to ya Matthew!
HE KISSED him briefly in the stands and gave him his Olympic bouquet. Later, outside the glowing blue Water Cube, Matthew Mitcham and his partner, Lachlan Fletcher, firmly embraced, both shedding tears. Next it was his mother Vivien's turn to hold her golden boy, and more tears fell.
"Coming out publicly, that was a first," said Vivien. "The highest score awarded to an Olympic dive ever, another first. How many more firsts can this child get? Can you find something else to be first in? He's just done so well. He deserves it."
Just as he has shown flipping around at 10 metres high, Mitcham has shown no fear about disclosing his sexuality. He was the first Australian athlete to go to an Olympics openly gay.
Carefully nursing Mitcham's Olympic bouquet, Fletcher spoke of the incredible journey that
the diver had taken to the top. Fletcher has been the one constant over the past two years.
He was his rock when Mitcham retired in his late teenage years suffering anxiety and depression. He watched him become a stunt diver at the Sydney Royal Easter show, supported his fight back into the sport and now to win Olympic gold.
"It's been so up and down," Fletcher said. "When I first met him, he was pretty unhappy, he wasn't liking the diving in Brisbane at all, he didn't want to do it, wasn't happy being there.
"It took a lot for him to retire and stop doing it because it had been his life for so long. He wanted to try and be happy again. He took time to do normal things that people do.
"Then after five or six months he started to really miss it again and he had the opportunity to dive with Chava [Sobrino, his coach]. He started that and loved it ever since, every second of it, which is great to see him happy all the time."
"The biggest thing he was worried about was people paying more attention to that than his actually diving," Fletcher said. "And I suppose that kind of did happen a little bit. Hopefully, now it won't be so much of an issue any more."
Mitcham was 30 points behind top Chinese favourite Zhou Luxin before the last attempt. Fletcher said he felt "stupidly nervous" as Mitcham went for his final dive.
Sobrino, who was instrumental in reviving Mitcham's career, was gobsmacked by the final dive. "It was his best dive and that's why we put it at the end," Sobrino said.
"The expectancy of that dive was around 106 to 108 points. But not 112, never. He did it at the right time, at the right moment, in the right pool with the right crowd, so I'm pretty happy and we got the right medal."
It was the eighth and last medal in a sport that China dominates and was expected
to sweep. Mitcham cried and bounced around the pool deck before climbing up to the stands to embrace Fletcher.
"It's going to take a while to sink in," Mitcham said. "My cheeks hurt from smiling. My face hurts from the chlorine. My legs are sore from jumping up and down. I'm in pain and I'm tired. But I'm so happy."
Via The Age
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