Second Acts: Athletes Turn Torchbearers After the Olympics
WALL STREET JOURNAL.Tuesday February 16, 2010.
Article by Dennis Nishi.

Olympic athletes know a lot about sacrifice since most have had to juggle jobs and college with rigorous training schedules. And they often end up putting their professional lives on hold like speedskater Eric Heiden who scaled back on medical school. so he could become a professional road-racing cyclist. Freestyler Kirstie Marshall even had to go into debt to personally finance her own way onto the national team.But winning medals is just the end of the first act for the following seven Olympic athletes.

All have gone onto successful post-Olympic careers, reinventing themselves to become doctors, lawyers, business owners and politicians. And they didn't simply discard one career for the next. They've been able to apply their experiences as athletes—the drive, goal-setting and dedication— to become better at their new jobs.

Most aspiring figure skaters live and breathe the sport, but Debi Thomas never wanted to give up her dream of going to medical school. "People used to tell me that you can't win World [Figure Skating Championships] and go to Stanford at the same time. Of course, the more they said impossible, the more I wanted to prove them wrong," she says. Indeed, Ms. Thomas was the first African American figure skater to win the U.S. National and the World Championships—all while going to school.

Ms. Thomas went into the 1988 Olympics in Calgary with high expectations. She had repeatedly fought for the World Championship title with East German skater Katarina Witt, and their rivalry was billed by the media as the "battle of the Carmens" since both women planned to skate their long routines to Bizet's tragic opera. She says she didn't have the right mental mindset going into the competition and had lost confidence at the last minute. She had even considering quitting. "I learned a lot about sports psychology," she says. "Even if you're well trained and you're physically ready for a competition, your body is not always going to go out there and perform," she says.

She faltered early in her free skating routine after two-footing a landing on a combination. She never recovered, winning a bronze behind Elizabeth Manley and gold winner Katarina Witt. It was a very disappointing loss, she says. But, she had planned to retire from skating whether she won or not. "Knowing I had my medical career to look forward to made it easier to take," says Ms. Thomas, who returned to Stanford the following fall. She graduated from Northwestern University's medical school in 1997.

Specializing in adult reconstructive surgery, Ms. Thomas works as an orthopedic surgeon at the Bone and Joint Center in Terre Haute, Ind. The 42-year-old says her days as a skater provide her with helpful insight in diagnosing patients with sports-related problems. Inducted into the U.S. Figure Skating Hall of Fame in 2000, Ms. Thomas says she keeps her connection with the Olympics. She's served on the U.S. Olympic Committee Sports Medicine Advisory Board and was on the advisory board of Athletes Against Drugs.

"Figure skating was a pretty individual sport," she says. "I've grown up a lot since those days and enjoy being part of a team now. Being a doctor is about working with nurses, therapists, anesthesiologists, and I've learned more about team play being a doctor than when I was in sports."."