Franziska van Almsick - The Unfulfilled Dream, Part 3

Some of the greatest athletes of the world have tried in vain to win an Olympic gold medal. We portray them in this series.

The name of her homepage says it all: Franzi - to Germans it's as simple as that. Even at age 38, Franziska van Almsick is called by and famous for her teenage nickname. It has become a household brandmark all over the country, in TV spots and the yellow press. But "Franzi" means business: When she criticizes Germany's swimmers as a TV expert or works as a fundraiser for the national athletes help network Deutsche Sporthilfe, there is nothing sweetheart about the woman, who - as a teenage girl - became the country's first post-unfication sports icon.

Still, one dark spot remains in van Almsick's career: She never won an Olympic gold.

When van Almsick (picture: Augsburger Allgemeine), one last product of the GDR's youth sports development program, burst onto the international swimming scene in 1992, she was just 14 years of age. On the early evening of July 27th, she stood on the starting block for the finals of the 200 meters freestyle at the Barcelona Olympics, having qualified in the fastest time. The German media were already nuts about their new darling from Berlin after she had taken bronze in the 100 meters 24 hours before. There was a real chance that the little girl could take it all.

But it was not to be. Van Almsick swam ahead of the pack for almost 180 meters, but on the home stretch, she zigzagged a little through the pool, perhaps due to a lack of experience. In lane five, American Nicole Haislett sneaked by the German wunderkind and beat van Almsick by one tenth of a second.

Nobody would have expected that this was going to be the closest van Almsick would ever get to an Olympic gold. What followed was a career of high drama with a lot of titles, records and profits from commercials, but no Olympic gold.

After becoming world champion and world record holder at Rome in 1994, van Almsick was again considered a heavy favourite for the 1996 Atlanta Games. But again, she could not stand the pressure in her best event, losing the 200 meters to Costa Rica's Claudia Poll, who was of German descent.

Things got even harder for van Almsick four years later at Sydney. Out of shape and with visible overweight, she had no shot at a medal. A German tabloid called her "Franzi van Speck" and a "pig". She rebounded from the disaster with another world record at the 2002 European Championships in her hometown of Berlin, but finished only fifth in the 200 meters freestyle at the 2004 Athens Games. When she retired afterwards, she had collected ten Olympic medals - four silvers, six bronzes, no gold.

When asked about that missing gold in August 2016, the now mother of two had no regrets: "For my personality, it was very good not to have achieved something in life.  I am happy and thankful for the life I live, I have two healthy kids, a wonderful family, I live humble - and I surely do this because I did not fulfil my biggest dream in life." (picture: dpa)

The Best of Summer - Bronze Medal: Barcelona 1992

Surely, Barcelona had history on her side. When the Catalan capital was awarded the 1992 Summer Games in October 1986, nobody knew that the world was just going through the last phase of the Cold War. Six years later, on opening night, July 25th, 1992, Montjuic Stadium witnessed the dawn of the Games of the new world order. The parade of nations was a caleidoscope of unifications and split-ups, comebacks and newcomers.

For the first time since 1964, Germany fielded a unified team (picture: imago), while the remnants of the Soviet Union were merely held together by the so-called "Unified Team" - a one-time construction that was replaced by the nations of the former U.S.S.R. four years later in Atlanta. Some new or reborn eastern European countries were already on the starting bloc in Spain: Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Croatia and Slovenia.

All in all, Barcelona ended almost two decades of Olympic boycotts. Cuba returned for the first time since Moscow 1980 under the eyes of a cheerfully waving Fidel Castro. Even North Korea was on the starting bloc again. 

Probably most important, South Africa ended her 32 year absence forced by apartheid politics with a team representing all ethnic groups. The women's 10,000 meter duel between Ethiopia's Derartu Tulu and South Africa's Elana Meyer (picture: Getty Images) became one of the symbolic highlights of these Olympics, with Tulu finally taking the gold. Both athletes afterwards ran their victory lap together.

But Barcelona also saw the first appearance of the so called "Independent Olympic Participant". While civil war had reaped havoc all over former Yugoslavia, her athletes were only allowed to start at the Games in single events. In the end, the competitors from Serbia and Macedonia won three medals - all in shooting

From a sporting perspective, the undisputed highlight of the 1992 Games was the U.S. basketball "Dream Team". The NBA stars put on the greatest single spectacle the Olympics had ever seen, with fans and international media going crazy. "Dream Team" head coach Chuck Daly put it that way: "This feels like being on tour with twelve rock stars."

The "Dream Team" was later often copied, but non of its successors came close to the quality, the aura, and the euphoria surrounding the original.

Amid this frenzy, its is often forgotten that Barcelona was one of the few cities to take great profit from staging the Games in the long run. In the six years before, the Catalan capital was virtually revamped and reinvented, especially the Olympic area on the Montjuic and the harbour quarter that hosted the Olympic Village.

Finally, 1992 provided one of the most emotional and inspiring episodes in the history of the Games and of sport at all. Center stage took 400 meter runner Derek Redmond from Great Britain. A world class athlete whose career had been plagued by injuries, Redmond tore a muscle after 150 meters of his semifinal run. He continued to limp towards the finish line. On the home stretch, he was accompanied and assisted by his father, tears all over his face. A memorable moment that shook the hearts of almost any spectator.

No wonder the IOC later used the images of Redmond's effort as part of a commercial campaign. The fitting title was "Celebrate Humanity".