Olympic Swimmer Simone Manuel Has Happy Relationship News To Share
Olympian swimmer Simone Manuel wanted to be at the top of her game for the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo during the summer of 2021. While she went into the games wanting to crush her best personal times, she failed to advance to the 50-meter freestyle final by placing sixth in the semi-finals, according to the official Olympic results. However, she did manage to clinch a Bronze medal in the Wwomen's 4x100-meter freestyle relay. Manuel also made it pretty clear that she didn't want to speak to anyone following her race, including the media.
She tweeted, "Please stop interviewing athletes right after a disappointing performance before they have any time to process anything. Trust me. They gave it their all. Nothing else people need to know at that time." If that weren't enough, she also pleaded for everyone to look at athletes as "humans with souls," adding that it is, "emotionally exhausting to coherently answer questions while trying to process the fact that people already saw you fall short of the goals you worked so hard for on the world's biggest stage."
One year later and it seems as though Simone Manual is in a better place so much so that she doesn't mind sharing her life changes and her very happy relationship news, too.
Simone Manuel is engaged!
Simone Manuel might not have gotten the coveted gold at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, but she did manage to snag someone else's heart of gold. People reports that the Olympian's boyfriend, Denzel Franklin, popped the question on July 3. Per Swim Swam, the couple met at Stanford where he was a football player, and Manuel was (naturally) on the swim team.
Sharing a few pics on Instagram along with her new bling, Manuel wrote, "Major changes outside the pool as well. Easiest and quickest 'YES'! Nothing tops being able to experience life's blessing and challenges with your best friend. So excited to continue this journey called life with you!"
As far as those changed inside the pool that she was referring to, Manuel announced that she would be moving to a new team in Arizona. Keeping with the Olympian spirit, Manuel will be training under Michael Phelps' former coach, Bob Bowman in her new home. Documenting her move to the Grand Canyon state, she wrote, "After a long and much-needed break, I have made major changes. I'm excited to announce that I will be training at ASU under the guidance of Bob Bowman, Herbie Behm, and the coaching staff at ASU!"
It sounds as though Manuel really excited for her future and all of those races in the pool she plans to crush, one stroke at a time.