WOW. The Stories Of These 11 Olympians Need To Be Shared!

3. Eric Moussambani

Hailing from Equatorial Guinea, Moussambani competed in the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games, becoming a legend without even winning a medal. In fact, he swam his way into our hearts without even coming close to that. Eight months before his Olympic appearance in the 100m freestyle event, Moussambani didn’t know how to swim. And before he arrived in Sydney, he’d never even seen an Olympic-sized pool. However, the inspirational athlete overcame huge odds to make it to competition at all and ended up winning his heat in a time of 1 minute 52.72 seconds after his competitors were disqualified due to false starts. His time may have been the slowest in Olympic history, but he was able to reach the end of the pool and successfully captured the hearts of the millions watching the race.

4. Kerri Strug

In the midst of the gymnastics competition at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games, Kerry Strug under-rotated the landing of her first vault attempt and damaged her ankle. The US women’s all-around team was trailing the Russians, and only an incredibly strong performance from Strug on her second vault attempt would secure the gold medal. The dynamo refused to give up and performed her vault again, landing it perfectly the second time with a score of 9.712.