PARIS — Team Silver needed a golden girl, and here came Kate the Great Douglass to the rescue.
Understated in temperament, underrated in toughness, impeccable in technique, Douglass was the hero America wanted and needed in the pool at these Paris Olympics. Her long-gliding breaststroke is so gorgeous that it looks effortless and might even feel that way at times—“It’s kind of just relaxing sometimes,” she said—but winning the 200-meter breaststroke Thursday was hardly soft stuff.
