Athletes, they're just like us. Everyone out there is looking for love or something like it from time to time, and Tinder has become one of the most popular ways to link up with other singles without even having to leave the house. For some of us, that's convenient because we don't feel like washing our hair. For others, it's convenient because they're very busy living the lives of a professional athlete. The Tinder use of athletes is actually so high at the Olympics that Tinder compiles data about it. And shares it! Lucky for us. This year in Rio, they determined that women who played table tennis got the most right swipes out of any other athletes, and men in tennis took the lead. Of course, this data is skewed by how many people in each category are actually on Tinder... as well as listed their sport on the app. So for example, if none of the swimmers put that they were a swimmer in their bio, then they wouldn't be included in the stats. But people find and recognize them anyway. Here are 15 athletes that you might swipe by on Tinder.
15 Ryan Lochte
Swimmer Ryan Lochte was totally open about his time on Tinder, and he had a verified profile and all. His current girlfriend Kayla Rae Reid won't say how she met him... but it sounds like they met on Tinder. She said that “He was on Tinder. I might be on Tinder. That’s all I’m going to say about it.” Okay Kayla. She of course also mentioned that “he’s a good-looking guy and gets a lot of female attention," but that "he also has more depth than you can possibly imagine. He has this mental focus where he can just shut the entire world out and perform even when millions are watching.” Hmm. Maybe he should have used a bit more of that depth and mental focus before he decided to "fabricate" a story about getting robbed at gunpoint in Rio. Or maybe because of his focus he literally was able to forget about anyone else might be involved in that situation besides him? Maybe he's so deep that he isn't even in touch with reality all the time? Or he was just really drunk and didn't want to get in trouble. If Kayla and Ryan don't end up working out, I'm sure you'll be able to find him there again and find out.
14 Boris Berian
American middle distance runner Boris Berian has been spotted on Tinder as well. The 23-year-old lives in Big Bear, California, and is originally from Colorado Springs, Colorado. Boris is a track and field 800m Olympic finalist and World Indoor Champion. He actually has a pretty sweet story of how he ended up at the games at all, so he might be a nice guy. Boris was a star athlete in high school and college but then he ended up losing his eligibility at Adams State University in Colorado because of his bad grades. Forced to get a job, he ended up working at McDonald's. He didn't stop training, however, and kept that up while he was sleeping on a friend's couch. His mom told him to drop his dream of becoming an athlete and become a firefighter, but he kept going. It obviously paid off because now he's an Olympic star. And he's still only 23 so it didn't really take that much time. In an interview, his mom said: “I was sure he would regret dropping out of college. He wanted to run. To a mother, that doesn’t seem achievable.”
13 Ronald Schoeman
South African Olympic gold medallist swimmer Ronald Schoeman is verified on his Tinder profile... except that his age is totally wrong. His profile listed his age as 30, but he's actually 36. He probably reasoned that he would be left out of some women's search results but once they saw his swimmer's body they would realize that he still looks better than many 30-somethings and they wouldn't care that we was lying. Roland has been called South Africa’s most successful swimmer, and he walked away with his gold in the 2004 Athens games. His Tinder profile says that in addition to being an Olympic and "world champion", he is also "ranked 4th in the world for thumb wrestling," and like literally everyone else in the world he likes red wine and pizza. Ronald has competed in the last four Olympic games but he did not make the squad for a fifth time. He got a third place time of 22.75 on the 100 free. For perspective, the number one guy's time was 22.13 and the second spot went to a 22.55 speed. Literally, seconds to change a life. Oh well, maybe he'll find a girlfriend.
12 Dimitris Koulouris
Dimitris Koulouris is another swimmer on the app, and the 25-year-old looks pretty hot. But he also has a girlfriend named Stella, as gathered from his Instagram page. If you feel like you want to refer to him as Greek God after seeing his body, that actually makes sense because he is Greek. Imagine that! There's not a ton of information about Dimitris online, so it's unclear what's happening here. His Tinder profile could be a fake since it's not verified, he could have broken up with his girlfriend and not removed his recent photos with her, he could be on the app for pure entertainment, or maybe he's still with his girlfriend and still looking for a new girl for some reason. He is certainly not the first person in a relationship to be spotted on the app... because there are even some married folk on there. Personally, I have seen guys on Tinder who I know are in relationships at the moment... but maybe they just haven't deleted the app but aren't actually still swiping away? One would hope, no town is big enough for that to go unnoticed for long.
11 Ali Zein
Handball player Ali Zein lists world traveling in his bio, but to chat with the 25-year-old athlete after swiping right you're going to have to be able to write in Arabic. And then also to be able to read in Arabic. Ali is from Egypt, where the national handball team of Egypt is controlled by the Egyptian Handball Federation. Apparently, the Egyptian national handball played really well in the 1990's which helped to get some worldwide attention on the sport. Although Ali wasn't around for that part of its growth, because he wasn't actually born until 1990. The Egyptian team caused a huge upset when they beat out the former World champion Romania in the 1995 World Men's Handball Championship held in Iceland. Sounds pretty intense. Handball sort of seems like a mixture between basketball and soccer, but I could be very wrong. Ali Zein is not to confused with Ali Al-Zein, who is a Lebanese actor and voice actor.
10 Taylor Phinney
U.S. cyclist Taylor Phinney rides professionally for UCI ProTeam BMC Racing Team when he's not hanging out in the Olympic village. The Boulder, Colorado born 26-year-old might have had a genetic head start in the cycling world, since his parents are former Olympic medal winner and professional road cyclist Davis Phinney, and former Olympic gold-medal-winning cyclist and speed skater Connie Carpenter-Phinney. Like, how could he not be a cyclist? He started racing and winning at the age of 15. He had a year where he was out of action, after breaking some bones and requiring surgery to heal up again. But heal he did, and ultimately made it to the Olympics. Before the games, he sounded pretty confident that he would do well. He has said, "I'm going to devote the next couple of months to really training specifically for the time trial course down in Rio. It is hilly, but there's also some solid sections of flat, fast parts of the course. I'm not going to stand on a rooftop and scream that I'm a favourite, but I'll tell you that I wouldn't want to go unless I could do well, and doing well for me is winning a medal."
9 Dustin "Dreddy" Brown
Dustin Brown is on Tinder as "Dreddy" if you are looking for him. The German/Jamaican tennis player plays both singles and doubles, and he made the choice to choose tennis over other sports at a very young age. As a kid, he played tennis, football, judo, and handball, but decided to focus on tennis alone when he was eight. (Side bar: who has that much focus at the age of eight to determine your future profession? Olympic athletes, that is who.) Dustin has said: "When I made the decision to pursue tennis instead of football, of course, I wanted to be successful. I did not want just to end up playing for a club somewhere." At the age of 20, he was able to travel around to play and keep his career moving forward since his parents gave him a Volkswagen caravan that he could sleep in on the road.
8 Serge Gnabry
German soccer star Serge Gnabry who plays for Arsenal recently popped up on the app as well. He played really well in Brazil this Olympics, which lead to him getting a bid from Bundesliga. While playing for Brazil this year he got six goals, which helped lead the team to a silver medal win. Growing up Serge was initially a talented sprinter, but decided to go the route of soccer or "football" as everyone else in the world likes to call it. The 21-year-old was actually going through some challenging times on the field, taking a nosedive in his career after once being considered the next big thing at Emirates. He's had some problems with both his knee and his back that have kept him down for periods of time, which obviously doesn't work that well when your job is to be up and running around with expert precision. But with his performance at the Olympics this year, he's not only drawing attention to the fact that Olympic soccer really can matter in the industry, but he also played well for his country which had an otherwise so so games.
7 Dan Wallace
Scottish swimmer Dan Wallace pulled a silver medal at this year's Olympics. His Tinder profile pic is him and a fellow swimmer posing on a balcony with open robes. But like, without anything else on underneath. Quite alluring. It's not like they're showing their junk or anything because they're covered up, but still. Wonder who snapped the pic. The 23-year-old's profile says that he loves to party, so you know what that means. I guess, idk, that can have multiple meanings to be fair. But sounds like he's looking for some fun. And wouldn't you, after winning a medal? Like time to chill out for 24 hours or so before he has to start training again for the next race. Dan started his career in his homeplace of Scotland, but then went to the University of Florida and became a gator where he joined the swimming and diving team. He recently tweeted "Hate it when your Olympic medal sets off the security scanner ooops." But with the cry/laugh and Olympic medal emojis added in.
6 Rickie Fowler
American golfer Rickie Fowler is on the app, with a profile picture of him playing golf while wearing some colorful board shorts, hat, and sunglasses. Apparently, shirts and shoes are not necessary out on the green. Rickie has been ranked as the number one ranked amateur golfer in the world (for 37 weeks), and plays for the PGA team. Rickie and another golfer named Justin Thomas are for some reason in the process of growing out their mustaches for the upcoming FedEx Cup playoffs. They have been snapchatting their mustache growing glories. The practice, of course, is borrowed from the tradition in hockey to grow out their beards. Rickie is mostly a self-taught golfer, which he perfected while in high school in Murrieta, California. He went to Oklahoma State University and currently lives in Jupiter, Florida. He went pro in 2009 and immediately landed deals with Titleist and Rolex as soon as his professional career began.
5 Thanasi Kokkinakis
Australian tennis star Thanasi Kokkinakis is also on Tinder. Unfortunately for Thanasi, when he arrived at Rio this year, his bags didn't arrive with him, and then he got a stomach bug in Brazil that forced him to take some down time. Then just this week when he returned to training after recovering from the stomach bug, he strained a pectoral muscle, which is going to keep him out of the U.S. Open and possibly the Davis Cup as well, so that's a huge bummer. Damn, like can Thanasi catch a break right now? Maybe he can find someone on Tinder to help nurse him back to wellness, or bring him some good luck, or something. According to his manager Rick Montz, "He was hitting some high forehands and he kind of felt it just a little bit. It's worse than a strain, so it's going to take a couple of weeks, probably, of not hitting, for that to heal." The good news is, that Thanasi has also had a pretty bad back injury, and this year at the Olympics it didn't cause him any troubles. So there's that.
4 Mike Hartfield
Mike Hartfield has had a strange year. The long jumper was added to the Olympic team last minute after another member was injured and had to withdraw. So he went to the Olympics, but then he ended up placing fifth at the Olympic trials, which means that he didn't get to compete at the official games in Rio. He entered the competition with the fourth best jump in the world and then walked away in fifth. Some of the other jumpers managed to pull their best jumps to date. A little up, a little down. (How weird is it though that being the fifth best in the world at something is considered losing. So dramatic. Most of us are not fifth best at anything when the rest of the world is being taken into account as well.) Mike competed collegiately for the Ohio State Buckeyes track team, where he ended up establishing himself nationally. In 2014 he wasn't performing all that great, so it's awesome for him that he was able to step things up and get called in as an alternate this year. Mike is of course, also on Tinder
3 Jared Goldberg
Jared Goldberg is an American alpine skier and a member of the United States Ski Team's alpine skiing program, as well as a Tinder user. His bio says, "I will make you laugh." The Boston born athlete competed at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi and has some top 15's in the World Cup. He's currently training for the 2017 World Cup. Jared's family moved to Utah when he was four, which is when he spent a lot of time freeskiing at Snowbird. He started racing at the age of six and never stopped. He's also a musician, because why limit your talents when you're literally good at everything, am I right? he plays a bunch of different instruments which are mostly of the stringed variety, but he's not opposed to some drums. But since drums are the easiest to travel with, he takes along a ukulele and a harmonica while he's on the road. He's also interested in the banjo and the sitar. Cough, overachiever, cough.
2 Auston Matthews
Auston Matthews is an American ice hockey player currently playing for the Toronto Maple Leafs of the National Hockey League. He was the number one draft pick of 2016 for the NHL and has also played for the U.S. National U18 Team in the USHL where he helped them win some medals. Auston is only 18, so he's just barely legal to be on Tinder at all. Welcome to the game, Auston! Auston was born in San Ramon, California but grew up in Scottsdale, Arizona where he learned to play ice hockey. This might sound counterintuitive at first since Arizona is hot as sh!+, but that's exactly why there's ice hockey at all. It's better to play sports indoors than outdoors in that state. There are a lot of athletes in his family so he came out kicking, and if you ask his father he was more talented at baseball than at hockey, but the kid went with his passion instead. He started going to games at the age of two, and he started playing at the age of five.
1 Kyle Wilson
New York Jets player Kyle Wilson joined Tinder in 2014 and decided not to put his real profession on there. In some situations, you'd think he would want to advertise the fact that he was a professional football player because of the attention. But the fact that he didn't is actually pretty sweet, and he wasn't the only guy on his team to make the same choice. They're looking for love people, not jersey chasers trying to get themselves some NFL money and future athlete babies. In his words, he explained, “You don’t want anything too easy.” Got it. He's not the only one on his team who's decided to give the app a go. Calvin Pryor is another Jets player on there, but he unlike many of others he did not try to conceal his identity. He's perhaps a little more open on what he's looking for in a lady? At one point there were an estimated 11 different Jets players swiping away. We wonder if they were matching with the same girls...
