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Olympic moms: 13 mothers compete for Team USA

The “Celebrating Moms” series of commercials by Proctor & Gamble during Olympic coverage is a tear-jerking ode to sacrifices mothers make to support their kids’ athletic careers. But what about athletes who are mothers, themselves?

Elite athlete moms have the same run-of-the-mill work/life balance as the rest of us. But these 13 Olympic moms do put parenting – both its challenges and rewards – in a new perspective.

8. Candace Parker – Basketball

Eric Gay/AP
Candace Parker, right, is grabbed from behind by Croatia's Jelena Ivezic, left, during the second half of a preliminary women's basketball game at the 2012 Summer Olympics on July 28, 2012, in London.

Candace Parker has a back-and-forth schedule that would seem daunting to most parents, but she and her husband Shelden Williams, who plays for the Brooklyn Nets in the NBA, take it in stride. They know it's not forever.

Ms. Parker, plays in the WNBA for the Los Angeles Sparks, but during the "off-season," she takes 3-year-old daughter Lailaa to Russia where she also plays professionally. 

Parker told Redbook magazine that this schedule is flexible enough to meet the needs of her family.

"When Lailaa doesn't want me to go to practice, I'll say, 'Mommy has to go do her job. It's how we eat,'” she said. “So once, she came over with some pennies she had collected and said, 'You don't go to practice today.' That broke my heart, but then again there are a lot of moms out there who work 9 to 5 and don't have the flexibility I have. Any day of the week, I can bring Lailaa to work with me. I feel blessed in that way."

Parker is competing in her second Olympic Games with the US women’s basketball team, going for her second and the team’s fifth consecutive gold medal.

Prior to playing for Team USA in Beijing in 2008, she led the Tennessee Volunteers to their second NCAA national championship where she was also named Most Outstanding Player of the Final Four for the second year. Parker was also the top pick in the 2008 WNBA draft, selected to play for the Los Angeles Sparks.

In her first game with the Sparks, Parker scored 34 points, the most points for a first game in the league. She won the WNBA Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player, the first person to win both in the same season.

The US women’s basketball team will play Australia in the semifinals on Aug. 9.

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Mark Sappenfield
Editor

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