Amy Van Dyken Learns a New Stroke

On the eve of her induction into the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame, the six-time gold-medalist swimmer is happily making a splash on

By Lynn DeBruin

Never mind that she was a guest at Arizona’s private Superstition Mountain Golf Club and that the water was a pond on No. 18. Amy Van Dyken wasn't about to back off a challenge.

So when a local DJ half-jokingly said he could beat her across the water, she pulled off her shoes and socks, then her hat, and stripped down to her black sports bra and shorts.

Then she dove in.

When she emerged, the six-time Olympic gold medalist was $100 richer—even if she looked like a drowned rat walking to the clubhouse.

“Hey, it was a really good ball,” she told the perplexed bag boys afterward.

That was two years ago, and, if anything, it showed Van Dyken hasn't changed much from her Olympic days.

She's still confident, full of vigor, sarcastic and never boring.

But while she jokes that in her newest endeavor—golf—she's more likely to hit a cart girl than the green, the 6-footer has plenty of game. She routinely bombs 250-yard drives and can hit a perfect sand shot at times. Yet she doesn’t have any desire to take this to the level she did with swimming, which will earn her induction into the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame Class of 2008 on June 19 in Chicago.

“If I didn't go a certain time or win or whatever, I felt I was letting down my family or my coach and, at the Olympics, my country,” she says. “Here, if I hit a bad shot, hey, whatever. It's not that big a deal, and I'm not bumming the whole country out.”

Though she retired from competitive swimming, Van Dyken, now 35, is as busy as ever. She has filled her post-swimming years with everything from radio talk shows to sideline reporting for the Denver Broncos, speaking engagements, charity work and commercials.

And every day, she is exercising, whether it's the 75-minute, body-sculpting classes she calls “pure hell,” the long runs to get ready for the next triathlon, or the spin and yoga classes she needs to keep her happy. “When I first retired, I wanted to beat everyone in yoga class. How you do that I'm really not quite sure,” she admits.

Taking up golf four years ago has allowed her to crank it down a notch. The woman infamous for spitting into an opponent's lane before races doesn't need to intimidate or stress. “In swimming, I spit because I knew I could beat people. Here, I'm just having fun,” she says.

And that is what she is doing on this 90-degree spring day at Grayhawk Golf Club in North Scottsdale, where the giant saguaros are bursting with flowers and every palo verde tree is covered in yellow. Jackrabbits are hopping about the fairways, geckos are darting between the sandstone, and an occasional prairie dog and chipmunk pop by to show how alive the desert is.

Van Dyken is her usual upbeat self, outfitted head to toe in Nike (one of her sponsors) as she prepares to fit in 18 between meetings with AT&T and Wellements (two other sponsors).

As she approaches the starter, she's holding a big “I'm not in the mood to be stared at” water jug that she takes to yoga class. Not far behind is husband Tom Rouen, better known for years as punter for the Broncos, looking even fitter than he did when he was in the NFL. Rouen taught her the game, and he's the one who still casually lines her up on drives and putts, and provides pointers here and there as they go.

But don't think for a minute this is the stressful scene of a husband trying to give a lesson on the course. Everything about them, and their game, is relaxed and free-flowing.

But there was one rule Rouen imposed early.

“'You know, babe, you're not good enough at this game to cuss, so don't do it,'“ she recalls him saying.
So she doesn't.

When she booms a 240-yard drive on No. 4, then skulls the next shot, she's yelling, “Sugar!”

She would say it a dozen times or more around Grayhawk's difficult Raptor layout en route to a 102. While the triple-digit score looks bad on the card, it easily could have been a 90 or better.

Her best round to date was an 87 at Scottsdale’s Camelback Golf Club, and her play improves week by week.

She's certainly much better now than she was three years ago when she signed up to play in the American Century Celebrity Golf Championship at  Lake Tahoe with the likes of Rick Rhoden, Michael Jordan and John Elway. She admits she thought it was a scramble, not stroke play, and found herself, well, scrambling. Still, she managed to keep things fun and entertaining, hamming it up with a cartwheel after a rare birdie.

“By the end of the second day, people in the gallery were chanting for it,” she says. “By the end of the third day, we were like, 'We're so over this.'“

But when NBC pleaded for one more to open its weekend telecast, she agreed, even though she was wearing a skort.

Her agent/caddie told her simply to aim away from the camera.

“So they open up the entire telecast with me doing a flippin' cartwheel,” she says, laughing again.

Not exactly her dream moment on a golf course.

Rather, she says, she'd like to break 80, just one time. Or get a hole-in-one.

The latter she nearly did during only the second round of her life when she bladed an iron, saw it hit the front edge of the green, then hop up and hit the pin.

“My only thought was, 'If that goes in, I quit,'“ says Rouen, a single-digit handicapper who has never had an ace.

Luckily for them, the ball stopped an inch away.

So they play on, 2-3 times a week in Scottsdale, where they live about half the year, and maybe twice that in the summer in Keystone, where they have a condo.

Buying a home in Arizona proved a no-brainer after a vacation there six years ago.

Van Dyken, who has battled asthma her entire life and began swimming to strengthen her lungs, doesn't need to use her inhalers in the dry desert. They live on the 14th hole at Grayhawk’s Talon Course with their black lab, aptly named Georgia after the 1996 Olympics where Van Dyken became the first American athlete in history to win four gold medals (including the 50-meter free and 100 butterfly) in a single Olympiad.

She'd go on to win two more golds at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney.

Though she was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame last year, the Olympic honor during her first year of eligibility left her humbled and excited.

“It's weird. It still hasn't sunk in,” she admits.

Then again, she points out in self-deprecating style, she went to college on an athletic, not academic, scholarship.

“It takes me a lot longer,” she quips.

Unlike 40-something Dara Torres, a nine-time Olympic medalist, Van Dyken has no desire to stage any comeback in the pool.

That's not to say she still isn't drawn to the water.

Consider No. 16 on Raptor. Her tee shot finds the hazard, but is still visible in the shallow end about a foot off the bank.

Van Dyken grabs her sand wedge and splashes in, leaving her glasses coated with pond water.

She stands there laughing afterward, half-shocked as when she won gold in the fly, but definitely pleased with the effort.

“Anything to save a stroke,” she says.

Van Dyken's Card

Handicap: 20
Memberships: None
Sticks: Driver: Nike Sumo, once grips are done (King Cobra now); 3 & 7 woods: Nike Sumo Square 4 to A-wedge; Nike Sumo 22-degree rescue club; TaylorMade Rescue Dual; Putter: -Nike Ignite
Best Score: 87 at Camelback Golf Club, Scottsdale
How Swimming is Like Golf: “Your hips. It's where you get your power.”
Favorite Golf Expression: “Did you trip over your skirt?”
Favorite Pros: Phil Mickelson and Paula Creamer
Dream Foursome: John Elway (“Because he never gave up.”), Roger Clemens (“Because of the intimidation factor.”) and Wonder Woman (“Because I want to ask her how she finds the invisible jet.”)