Multiple gold medal winning swimmer Michael Phelps is making headlines once again – but they are decidedly more positive now. As you may remember, Michael got in a little trouble after his Olympic victories. He was photographed smoking weed, was arrested two times for DUI, had a little stint in rehab and was suspended from competition. For a while, it seemed he’d go down in history as the “bad boy of swimming.”
Well, the tide has certainly turned for the 30-year-old athlete. After retiring from swimming in 2012, he got back into the water and is planning to compete in his 4th Olympics in Rio next year. Michael received the award for Male Athlete of the Year at the USA Swimming Golden Goggle Awards (which is actually a thing) in Los Angeles on Sunday. He explained “It feels good to be back in the pool again and to be happy in the pool again, actually wanting to do it again. I think for a couple of years I was checked out.”
In addition to his return to competition, Michael and his fiancee, 29-year-old former Miss California Nicole Johnson, recently announced they were expecting their first child, a boy. Michael made the announcement via his Instagram account. Nicole showed off her baby bump in a tight fitting dress on the red carpet at the Golden Goggle Awards.
Did Michael’s “little swimmers” produce a future aquatic Olympian? That remains to be seen, but Michael recently told US Magazine, “If he wants to swim, I’ll let him. But I’m not pushing him. Everyone’s been commenting like, ‘I guess he’ll be in the Olympics in 2032, but no… if he wants to swim, he’ll swim, but he’ll definitely be water safe, that’s for sure.” Competition + fatherhood should hopefully keep Michael out of the deep end. (See what I did there?)
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