The Shooting Star: Kevin Durant, Country: USA, Sport: Basketball, Age: 27
He is the highest paid athlete in Rio. It is not just in wealth that Kevin Durant will stand among the tallest at this Olympics. The 6 ft 9 inches tall American is also one of the most gifted.
He played a key role in helping USA win the basketball gold in London. He was the top-scorer, with 30 points, in a surprisingly close final against Spain. He scored 156 points in all, from eight games.
The world had discovered Durant’s remarkable shooting skills long before the Olympics, thanks to the global reach of the NBA. Playing for Oklahoma City Thunder, he has been NBA’s Most Valuable Player and the leading scorer in four seasons.
Durant is also known for supporting philanthropic causes. In 2013, he donated $ 1 million to the victims of the Moore tornado victims.
Super Dan from China: Lin Dan, Country: China, Sport: Badminton, Age: 32
Lin Dan’s parents wanted him to be a pianist. How the male badminton players of his generation around the world wish he had listened to his parents. But, sports fans across the world are happy that he chose racquet over piano.
‘Super Dan’ is considered the greatest badminton player of all time as he has won everything on a badminton court. He is the only player to win the Super Grand Slam.
Dan, a rock star in China, who won the singles titles at Beijing and London wants to make it three in a row at Rio.
Pocket Rocket set to take off: Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Country: Jamaica, Sport: Athletics, Age: 29
She often changes the colour of her hair. On some days, it could be green. Pink on another day.
But what usually doesn’t change is the colour of the medal. It remains golden, most of the time. Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce is the greatest sprinter of her generation.
There are many who think she is the greatest of all time. Among them is a certain Michael Johnson, who has four Olympic gold medals in sprint.
Fraser-Pryce has two. She is, in fact, one of the three women to have won the 100m gold twice. At Rio, she would aim to be the first woman to score a remarkable ‘sprint hat-trick’.
The ‘Pocket Rocket’, who has seven World championship golds, is certainly one of the biggest stars of this Olympics. She had had a tough, deprived childhood before becoming the world’s sprint queen.
Come to think of it, Jamaica is home to the undisputed king of sprint, too — Usain Bolt.
All Grace: Kohei Uchimura, Country: Japan, Sport: Gymnastics, Age: 27
“He is a machine,” said American gymnast Jonathan Horton of his rival Kohei Uchimura. Not quite true.
Horton had meant, in a positive sense, that Uchimura might win all-around gold medals with machine-like regularity. The Japanese genius is all grace.
Few male gymnasts in history have been as elegant as Uchimura. Fewer have been as successful: he has won six all-around titles at the World Championship, in addition to the Olympic all-around gold in London 2012.
He has already been called by many as the greatest gymnast in history. Though Nadia Comaneci, the Miss Perfect from Romania, is not so sure, she admires his perfection. “If you see Uchimura in slow motion, everything is perfect,” she says.
Doing it for Daddy: Guo Wenjun, Country: China, Sport: Shooting, Age: 31
Guo Wenjun will be gunning for her third straight Olympic gold at Rio. She didn’t want the first one; in fact, she didn’t want to shoot at all.
Unable to cope with the trauma of living without her father, she had decided to quit the sport, a year before the 2008 Beijing Olympics. After the divorce of her parents, when she was a baby, she was raised by her father.
One night, while she was competing in a domestic tournament, her father left home, leaving a note for her coach Huang Yanhua, asking him to treat her as his own daughter. He did. He also asked her to win the gold at Beijing and suggested it might help bring her father back home.
Guo duly won the 10m air pistol in Beijing. She did an encore in London.
The phenomenon: Michael Phelps, Country: USA, Sport: Swimming, Age: 31
You don’t go to the Olympics for fun. But you are not Michael Phelps. Nobody is.
“I just want to have fun,” Phelps had told a reporter shortly before the London Olympics. Only he could have said that. There was nothing left for him to achieve. He had won eight gold medals in Beijing in 2008.
That made another American swimming legend Mark Spitz, whose seven gold in the Munich Games of 1972 had seemed unbeatable for decades, remark: “He is the greatest racer that walked the earth.”
The legend of Phelps grew further in London, as he picked up four more gold and two silver. His Olympic collection is 22 medals, 18 of them gold. That is double the number of gold India has won till date.
He had announced his retirement after the London Games. But, he is back in Rio. To have more fun, obviously.
'Dutchess' of drag: Maartje Paumen, Country: Netherlands, Sport: Hockey, Age: 30
She has been the face of Dutch women’s hockey for over a decade. Maartje Paumen is also one of the most recognisable faces in women’s sport across the globe.
She is one of the deadliest drag-flickers the game has ever known.
'Captain fantastic' has two Olympic gold medals already, but wants more. “After the Bejing Games, I had some doubts about Rio, but now there is none,” said Paumen, who has been the FIH’s Player of the Year in successive years.
She has done it all, being part of the World Cup-winning sides and being the top-scorer in major events. She is also the highest-scorer in the Olympics.
Though she missed the final of the Champions Trophy against Argentina with a toe injury, she is ready for Rio where she will be hoping to lead Oranje to an unprecedented third successive gold.
