Medical school beckons Thompson Ten-time Olympic swimming medalist doesn’t rule out comeback attempt

DEDHAM – Andy Read stood on Violette’s Beach early Sunday evening and watched his girlfriend autograph T-shirts, her hair dripping wet and her body wrapped in a white towel after she swam in the Beach to Beach Swim for Breast Cancer for a local charity.

Read enjoyed the picturesque Maine setting of pine trees and lake, but he was itching to get Jenny Thompson back into their car for the drive back to Portsmouth, N.H. Read had to go to work the next day, and he is helping Thompson, the 10-time Olympic medalist, pack up their home for a move to New York City.

Green Lake is a long way from where Thompson was a year ago when, as a member of the U.S. Olympic swim team, she was in Sydney, Australia trying to add to her pile of international medals and acclaim.

Life is more mundane these days for Thompson, one of the most decorated Olympians ever.

So mundane that the big news of late, Read said, was the couple received word a few days ago about an available apartment in upper Manhattan. Apartments are hard to come by, and Thompson will start medical school at Columbia University this fall.

But the biggest change may be that swimming isn’t a daily activity for Thompson any more. She isn’t officially retired, but she doesn’t miss the long workouts.

At the height of her training, Thompson was up to 12,000 yards per day in the pool. Sunday’s 21/4-mile swim between Jenkins Beach and Violette’s Beach was the longest swim she’d done recently.

“I was feeling the pain, especially with no rest in the middle,” she said with a laugh.

Still, Thompson was able to complete the swim in about 54 minutes – by far the fastest of the 12 swims Sunday – and stopped less than five times to look up and get redirected. Read was one of three guides who kayaked alongside her.

“It’s more difficult as a pool swimmer to gauge how far you have to go so I would stop from time to time to see if I could see where I was going,” she said. “But I had great guides. They helped me go the straight and narrow.”

The sight of Thompson swimming in Green Lake, surrounded by kayakers, was heartening for those working the charity event but it’s a long way from the Olympics, world championships, U.S. nationals and Pan American Games – the big meets at which she was a regular medalist in the 1990s.

The 28-year-old Thompson has won eight Olympic gold medals, the most for any U.S. woman. Her 10 Olympic medals are the most of any U.S. female swimmer and third on the all-time U.S. swimming list. She holds the most career U.S. national titles by an active swimmer.

In last summer’s Olympics Thompson picked up three gold medals (the 400-meter freestyle relay, 400 medley relay and 800 free relay), a bronze in the 100 free and was fifth in the 100 fly.

Thompson is also the world record-holder in the 50- and 100-meter fly events and the 100-meter individual medley (short course).

She was named the Women’s Sports Foundation Sportswoman of the Year later that year.

Now, with other opportunities in front of her, including a new life in a new city and medical school, Thompson doesn’t miss the daily rigors of training. But she isn’t ruling out a return to competition.

“I haven’t really missed it until recently, watching the world championship results,” she said. “I think medical school and other things in my life are more of a priority. If it seems feasible to make a comeback at some point in my life, I may do that.”