Queen of Sport

Born in Bethesda, Maryland on March 17, 1997, Kathleen Genevieve ‘Katie’ Ledecky has been one of the dominant female freestyle swimmers of the early twenty-first century. She has won 10 Olympic medals, seven of which are gold, and 18 World Championship medals, 15 of which are gold, and holds world records in the 800 metres and 1500 metres freestyle events.

Ledecky made her international debut at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London as the youngest member of the US team, aged 15. Despite her tender years, she swam 8:14.63 in the final of the 800 metres freestyle to win the gold medal, smashing the Americas record, which has stood for 23 years, in the process.

Four years later, at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, she won five more medals, gold in the 200-metres freestyle, 400-metres freestyle, 800-metres freestyle and 4 x 200-metres freestyle relay and silver in the 4 x 100-metres freestyle relay. In so doing, she set new world records in both the 400-metres freestyle and 800-metres freestyle. Indeed, in the latter event, she swam 8:04.79, taking 1.89 seconds off her own world record, set the previous January, and finishing 11.36 seconds ahead of her nearest rival, Jazmin Carlin of Great Britain. Not altogether surprisingly, that record still stands.

So, too, does her 1500-metres freestyle world record, which she set in her preliminary heat at the TYR Pro Swim Series in Indiapolis in 2018. Again, her winning time of 15:20.48 took exactly five seconds off her own world record, set at the World Aquatics Championships in Kazan, Russia three years earlier.

At the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Ledecky won two more gold medals, in the 800-metres freestyle and 1500-metres, but suffered her first defeat in an individual Olympic event when second to Australian Ariarne Titmus in the final of the 400-metres freestyle. She also collected another silver medal in the 4 x 200-metres freestyle relay.

Although nearly 14 years younger than fellow jockey Hayley Turner, the fact that Hollie Doyle, 25, has been described as the ‘elder stateswoman’ of the weighing room is a reflection of her meteoric rise to the top of her profession. Regardless of age, Doyle has been, far and away, the more industrious, and successful, of the pair in recent seasons and has made a habit of breaking records along the way.

Doyle was still at school when she rode her first winner, The Mongoose, trained by David Evans, in a lady riders’ handicap at Salisbury on May 5, 2013. She subsequently became apprenticed to the Monmouthshire trainer and, later, to Richard Hannon, eventually riding out her claim in November, 2017. On November 21, 2019, Doyle became the third female jockey, after Hayley Turner and Josephine Gordon, to ride 100 winners in a calendar year and finished the campaign with 116 winners, thereby smashing the previous record, 106, set by Gordon in 2017.

Doyle enjoyed another year to remember in 2020, increasing her annual tally to 151 winners and finishing fourth in the Flat Jockeys’ Championship. On June 19, she rode her first Royal Ascot winner, Scarlet Dragon, trained by Alan King, in the Duke of Edinburgh Stakes, thereby becoming just the third female jockey, after Gay Kelleway and Hayley Turner, to do so. On August 29, she rode an 899/1 five-timer at Windsor, thereby becoming the first female jockey to ride five winners on the same card in Britain. In 2021, Doyle continued in similar vein, increasing her annual tally to 172 winners, including another 2, 521/1 five-timer at Kempton on March 3. With 74 winners to her name already in 2022, it is surely only a matter of time before the ‘Pocket Rocket’ wins the Flat Jockeys’ Championship.

Bo-Gyung ‘Lydia’ Ko was born in Seoul, South Korea on April 24, 1997, but moved to New Zealand with her family as an infant and became a naturalised Kiwi at the age of 12. She started playing golf at the age of five and became the most prolific teenager in the history of the game.

In January, 2012, at the age of 14 years, nine months and five days, Ko won the Women’s New South Wales Open on the ALPG Tour, now the WPGA Tour of Australia, making her, at the time, the youngest player, male or female, to win a professional golf tournament. As the winner of the inaugural women’s Mark H. McCormack Medal in 2011, she was exempt from qualifying for the 2012 US Women’s Open at Blackwolf Run in Kohler, Wisconsin, where she made the cut and finished lowest amateur in a tie for thirty-ninth place. The following month, Ko beat Jaye Marie Green 3 and 1 in the final match to win the US Women’s Amateur Championship at The Country Club in Cleveland, Ohio.

Two weeks later, Ko once again made history when, at the age of 15 years, four months, two days old, she won the Canadian Women’s Open at Vancouver Golf Club, thereby becoming, at the time, the youngest player ever to win an LPGA event. On February 2, 2015, at the age of 17 years, nine months and nine days, she reached number one in the Women’s World Golf Rankings, making her the youngest player, male or female, to achieve such a ranking. On September 13, 2015, at the age of 18 years, four months and 20 days, she won the Evian Championship at the Evian Resort Golf Club in Évian-les-Bains, France, therby becoming the youngest woman to win a major championship.

Born in Woolton, Liverpool on January 9, 1993, Katarina Johnson-Thompson, or ‘KJT’ for short, is an English heptathlete best known for winning the gold medal at the 2019 World Athletics Championships in Dohar, Qatar. On that occasion, she recorded the highest mark in the high jump, 200 metres, long jump and 800 metres to set a new British record of 6,981 points.

Following a ruptured Achilles tendon towards the end of 2020, Johnson-Thompson barely competed before the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, where the women’s heptathlon commenced on August 4, 2021. In the final event on the first day, the 200 metres, she suffered a fresh calf injury, which caused her to pull up and fall to the track writhing in pain. She eventually picked herself up and hobbled to the finish, but was subsequently disqualified for leaving her lane and withdrew from the competition.

Johnson-Thompson had competed in the heptahlon at two previous Summer Olympics, finishing thirteenth, behind compatriot Jessica Ennis-Hill, in London in 2012 with 6,267 points and sixth in Rio de Janeiro with 6,235 points. On the latter occasion, she jumped 1.98 metres in the high jump – one centimetre higher than any if the medallists in the individual high jump competion – setting a new British record in the process.

Johnson-Thompson had also competed in the heptathlon at three World Athletics Championships prior to 2019, although her results were a little disappointing. In Moscow in 2013 she finished fifth, just 28 points behind bronze medallist Dafne Schippers, but in Beijing in 2015 she finished twenty-eighth, and last, after three fouls in the long jump and in London in 2017 only fifth, after clearing just 1.80 metres in the high jump.