First-Time Olympic Swimmer Simone Manuel Is Perfectly Nicknamed ‘Swimone’

Simone Manuel is heading in to her first Olympics next month in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and based on her nickname, it was her destiny.

Before the 19-year-old was a Stanford University student preparing for her first Olympics, she was on a club swim team, where one of the parents of a fellow swimmer nicknamed her “Swimone”.

“I think one time she was saying like, ‘Simone swims…’, ‘Swim, Simone.’ Then when she said it, like, it all came together and she was like, ’Swimone!’ she tells Us Weekly of the fateful naming. “So after that a lot of people have called me Swimone!”

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