Pint-Sized Phenoms: Golden Teenaged Dreams

Some people just really luck out in the name department. Sixteen-year-old Arielle Gold recently won a bronze in snowboarding at the X Games.

Arielle Gold by Christophe Karabeva for EPA

Seventeen-year-old Gracie Gold came in sixth at the 2013 World Figure Skating Championships. But both will be aiming for gold at the 2014 Sochi Olymics.

Gracie Gold at 2013 World Championships by Tom Sczerbowski at USA Today-Sports

They won't be the only teenage stars gunning for gold in Sochi: seventeen-year-old Mikaela Shiffrin (who I've written about before) solidified her position as gold medal-favorite in Sochi when she won the world slalom title last month. [Another fun Pint-Sized Phenom update this month is that Caine Monroy, the nine-year-old cardboard arcade entrepreneur, inked a deal with William Morris!]

While fourteen-year-old racer Kaz Grala won't be able to compete in the Olympics, he is revving his engine for NASCAR, even though he is still quite young. Only an eighth grader he's expecting to go pro soon.

And because we don't want to forget non-athlete pint-sized phenoms, check out first grader Zora Ball. At seven, Zora is the youngest person to create "a full version of a mobile application video game." Perhaps Zora will challenge sixteen-year-old Lauren Marbe, who was just announced as having one of the highest IQs in the world.

Even without "Gold" in their names, it's clear that these pint-sized phenoms have golden futures. It's always amazing to keep track of such impressive kids in a variety of activities... Even if it is humbling!

Shrinking and Pinking: Shifting Sports

New shifts in sport have been all over the news lately. Danica Patrick is the first woman to shift into the pole position (the top qualifier) at the Daytona 500. And while the International Olympic Committee's unexpected and shocking decision to drop wrestling from the summer Games impacts more men than women, it's telling that women's wrestling was only recently added a few years ago. Lolo Jones is another summer Olympian facing a shift in sport. The hurdler announced in the fall that she was going to try her hand (or legs, I should say) at bobsledding. After making the team as a pusher, she actually won a gold at the World Championships late last month!

Lolo Jones competing in bobseld, Martin Meissner AP

It'd be pretty amazing to see her in Sochi after London; and hopefully no fourth place this time around.

Another London Olympian just made a sport shift as well. Canadian synchronized swimmer Tracy London has retired from her sport, but picked up a new activity. What is it? Pole dancing!

Photo by Celia Lavinskas

London and her company emphasize the health and acrobatics associated with pole dancing, and de-emphasize the other connotations. At least she isn't Suzy Favor Hamilton, right?!

While I usually emphasize female athletes here who are fighting or breaking barriers, male athletes often have to deal with difficulties and tough, sexist sports connotations as well. Here where I live in Massachusetts, male gymnasts were shocked when high school gymnastics was cut from the roster of approved sports. Even more shocking was that the spokesman for the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association, Paul Wetzel, spoke derisively of it as a "girls' sport." His comments provoked a backlash-- but not enough of one to help save the sport, which will likely become a club endeavor.

Just goes to show that shifting (of attitudes) still needs to happen when it comes to male sports as well. Given his thoughts on girls/boys sports, I'm guessing Wetzel won't be rooting for Danica Patrick in the Daytona though (he might like London's "pole" position better)... But I will!

Pint-Sized Teen Athlete Phenoms

When I was 16 I was thinking about college, driving, and my AP exams. The 16- and 17-year-olds I describe below seem similar-- but they are also thinking about medals, championships, and endorsement deals. Tennis is used to having young phenoms, though there has been a bit of a decline in recent years.  But an exciting crop of American girls is surging, embodied in Sloane Stephens-- the 19-year-old American who just beat Serena Willliams in the Australian Open.  Joining her is Taylor Townsend, who at 16 is the first American to hold the No. 1 year-end world ranking for junior girls since 1982. She's already been the subject of controversy after the USTA accused her of being out of shape for the US Open (she says she's in shape and it's just baby fat-- and this brought up a lot of issues about criticizing the appearance of female athletes, especially young ones) and she went pro this month. It will be interesting to see how her career develops, particularly alongside that of 17-year-0ld Madison Keys, who already has gone pro.  It appears Keys and Townsend are Florida classmates, though at the moment Keys is most-often compared to Stephens. With Twitter, agents, and the press in the mix for all three already we can surely expect a show in the next few years among these teen tennis phenoms.

Winter sports has its fair share of female teen stars as well. I wrote about Mikaela Shiffrin almost a year ago and predicted we'd be hearing her name a lot more in the lead-up to the 2014 Olympic Games.  Well I was right: Shiffrin was just featured in ESPN The Magazine's Next issue.  (In many ways her story is similar to golf pint-sized phenom Lexi Thompson, also profiled along with her in the Next issue.) A few days later a long, thoughtful profile of her also appeared in The New York Times. But my favorite quote from her so far is in the ESPN piece when she explained why she wasn't there to get her World Cup Rookie of the Year Award: "I didn't know it was an award, so I was completely unaware. The party where it was awarded was at a bar and I wasn't allowed in. Also, I was exhausted."

Someone who could probably relate to Shiffrin's exhaustion is 16-year-old Emery Lehman. Lehman (somewhat unusually he's the only adolescent boy featured in this post about athletes) is a speed skater and at the end of last month he won his first national title in the 5000 meters.

Emery Lehman by J.Geil

I predict we'll be hearing his name more as the Sochi games approach.

The biggest teen athlete phenom from the last Olympics-- Missy Franklin-- is still in the news. This time it's not for beating the best in the world, it's just for beating those who live nearby her. Franklin, who decided to forego millions in endorsements to keep her eligibility to swim in both college (which she'll be doing soon at Berkeley) and in high school. But many of the high schoolers, and their parents, who have to compete against her in Colorado don't like that the phenom races against them, according to The Wall Street Journal. 

What can I say about these terrible poor sports? Well, honestly, Madeleine Davies over at Jezebel said it best:

"It's really frustrating when Missy kind of shines above everything," said Bonnie Brandon, who before graduating last spring was Colorado's greatest-ever female high-school swimmer next to Franklin. "She's No. 1 in the world, and No. 1 in the state, and then I'm No. 2 in the state.…It's just hard being in close proximity," said Brandon, now a University of Arizona swimming star.

Why do you keep eating those sour grapes, girl?

I'm guessing a lot of teen athlete phenoms deal with sour grapes, but people should know better than to criticize a thoughtful 17-year-old for trying to help her friends and teammates in the national press.