What was Matthew Mitcham the first to do?

Australia’s Matthew Mitcham, a retired diver and trampoline athlete, was born on March 2, 1988. He won the 10m platform diving gold medal at the 2008 Olympics and currently holds the second-highest single-dive score in Olympic history (at the time, it was the highest scoring dive ever). He became the first openly gay athlete to take home an Olympic gold medal as a result. He is also the first Australian man since Dick Eve at the 1924 Summer Olympics to take home an Olympic diving gold medal.

In the beginning, Mitcham competed as a trampoline gymnast. At the Chandler Aquatic Centre in the suburbs of Brisbane, he was discovered by Wang Tong Xiang, a coach with the Australian Institute of Sport Diving Program, and Mitcham continued with both diving and trampolining for a number of years.

What was Matthew Mitcham the first to do?

Since the Olympic Games in 1924, no Australian guy has won an Olympic diving gold medal. Australia’s victory prevented China from winning all of the diving gold medals at their home Olympics.
Mitcham also won bronze in the men’s 1m springboard event at the 2009 FINA Aquatics World Championships, four silver medals at the 2010 Commonwealth Games, and one gold and two silver medals at the 2014 Commonwealth Games to close out his career. All of these accomplishments were accomplished under Sobrino’s guidance.