LAUSANNE, Switzerland — (AP) — After all his Olympic medals were destroyed in the Los Angeles fires, swimming great Gary Hall Jr. set an unexpected record replacing them at IOC headquarters Monday.
Ten Olympic medals awarded to one athlete on the same day.
“I’ll do a better job of taking care of these,” Hall Jr. quipped receiving the new set of five golds, three silvers and two bronzes earned swimming for the United States at three Summer Games from 1996 to 2004.
The originals burned four months ago at his home in the Pacific Palisades area of the city that will host the next Summer Games in 2028.
Replacing them by presenting 10 at the same time was “a unique ceremony,” said International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach.
“I don’t think that it happened ever before and I hope it will never have to happen again,” Bach told Hall Jr. “We hope also to give you a moment of relief and joy which will help you now in the further process to get over what you had to go through with this tragedy.”
Hall Jr. spoke with emotion about being supported by family, former teammates and old Olympic rivals like Australia stars Ian Thorpe and Michael Klim.
“Having friends and family I am a very lucky man,” he said. “The support that I was offered from the athletic community has buoyed me through the darkest of nights.”
He brought with him to Switzerland a deformed gold medal later recovered from the home he fled with his dog, Puddles, after grabbing his insulin medication.
“It’s got some character,” Hall Jr. said of the burned gold at the Olympic ceremony. “The value of friends outweighs the value of objects. We live in a time of capitalism, consumerism and you realize when you lose everything, how little of it you truly need.
“Character cannot be taken away, it cannot be burned and it cannot be lost.”
Thorpe was among the first people to contact Hall Jr. during the January fires.
“I don’t know how he knew,” Hall Jr. said of the surprise call from Thorpe, who was part of the Australian 4x100-meter freestyle team that took gold ahead of the U.S. at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.
“That is what this (Olympic) family is about — rivals and friends. I am just so appreciative to all of them. I can’t thank the Olympic movement enough for their support through this very difficult time."
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