Mikaela Jenkins

The Backstory:
Mikaela Jenkins was born with proximal femoral focal deficiency, causing her left leg to be shorter than the other. Just eight months later her left foot was amputated and was fitted with a prosthesis at a year old. Jenkins began swimming at age 4 and has since competed on her high schools team, her local club team, as well as the U.S. Para National Team. At the 2019 World Championships she earned a gold medal in the 100m butterfly and silver in both the 4x100m freestyle and 4×100 medley. After having an extra year to train and prepare, Jenkins is ready to take on Tokyo.

Away from swimming:
Jenkins continues to further her education through schooling, and maintains a healthy balance between competitions, homework and social life. She loves travelling and experiencing new things, but equally enjoys being welcomed home by her two dogs and two cats. Like most young people, Jenkins is also a fan of watching TV and Movies when she has the time.

In their own words:
“Kicking always is going to be my downfall because I’m just never going to have as much power as other people. But, again, it’s just working on strengthening my one good leg enough to where I can keep up during sets in practice and I don’t have to go in my own lane and do my own thing. I want to be competent enough in every area to swim with everybody else.”

“I have to do my dives differently than other swimmers and kicking, I’ve had to really work on strengthening my right leg and making sure both legs work together.”

“In a way, I’m grateful for it being postponed a year. It was definitely disappointing, but it did give me some relief because I was not mentally prepared to take on that meet this year [2020]. So I think it has given me a lot more time to think through how I want to approach my swims and approach that whole meet.”

Learn More:
Team USA Page
IPC Page
14 News: “Mikaela Jenkins Makes 2020 U.S. Paralympics Swimming National Team”
Team USA: “A World Champ at 16, Mikaela Jenkins Eyes Tokyo”
Courier Press: “Reitz Swimmer Mikaela Jenkins Wins Gold Medal at Para World Championships”
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