Michael Phelps, Lindsey Vonn, Natalie Coughlin, Mia Hamm and Michelle Kwan headline the 2022 U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Hall of Fame class.
The first class to be inducted since 2019 also includes an Olympic team (the 1976 U.S. women’s swimming 4x100m freestyle relay), a coach (Pat Summitt), two legends (Alpine skier Gretchen Fraser and hurdler Roger Kingdom) and a special contributor (Billie Jean King).
The Paralympians in the class: swimmer Trischa Zorn-Hudson, the all-time leader with 55 medals, including 41 golds, plus Alpine skier and cyclist Muffy Davis and David Kiley, who played basketball and raced in Alpine skiing and track and field. The Paralympic team selected is the 2002 sled hockey team.
The inductees were chosen by voting from the public, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic family, including athletes, and media.
The Hall of Fame will induct classes every two years moving forward. Previously, there were annual classes from 1983-92 and biennial classes from 2004-12 before it was revived for a 2019 class and now 2022.
Though Phelps retired in 2016 with Olympic records for medals (28) and gold medals (23), he was not part of the 2019 class that included John Carlos, Tommie Smith, Lisa Leslie, Nastia Liukin, Misty May-Treanor, Apolo Anton Ohno and Dara Torres (all of whom retired years before Phelps did).
Vonn, who retired in 2019, is the lone American woman to win an Olympic downhill title. She also holds the female Alpine skiing record of 82 World Cup victories. She is the fourth Olympic Alpine skier to be inducted after Andrea Mead Lawrence, Picabo Street and Phil Mahre.
Coughlin, who retired from international competition in 2016, shares a unique Olympic record. She won a medal in all 12 Olympic events that she entered, matching Finnish runner Paavo Nurmi and German dressage rider Isabell Werth.
Hamm, the face of U.S. soccer in the late 1990s and early 2000s, is the second soccer player to make the Hall of Fame after teammate Kristine Lilly. Hamm and Lilly were also part of the 1996 U.S. Olympic women’s soccer team that was previously inducted.
Kwan, an Olympic silver and bronze medalist and five-time world champion, is the eighth figure skater to make the hall, joining a group that includes Olympic gold medalists Dick Button, Dorothy Hamill and Peggy Fleming.
Other finalists who did not make the induction class included Summer Olympic champions Kristin Armstrong (cycling), Kayla Harrison (judo) and John Smith (wrestling) and Winter Olympic champions Shani Davis (speed skating), Cammi Granato (hockey) and Bode Miller (Alpine skiing).
An induction ceremony is scheduled for Jan. 24 in Colorado Springs, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic base.
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