Patricia McCormick - Determined To Succeed

Robert Condon, in his book Great Women Athletes of the 20th Century, quoted McCormick as saying, "That defeat was the greatest thing that ever happened to me because all of a sudden I knew I could win the Olympics… I realized that at Los Angeles I was working with world-class athletes every day."

She married Glenn McCormick in 1949 and started competing under her married name. Glenn, an airline pilot and aspiring Olympic diver, later became her coach. McCormick's training regimen consisted of 80 to 100 dives a day, six days a week. She persevered despite various injuries—a gash on her head requiring fifty stitches, chipped teeth, welts, a loose jaw, and a cracked rib.

The hard work quickly paid off. That same year, she won the National Platform Championship. She did it again in 1950, adding the one-meter and three-meter springboard titles. She won all five national titles in 1951. In all, she won twenty-seven national titles. She also won three gold medals in two appearances at the Pan Am Games.