Daley wows hosts by knitting scarf during qualifiers
It was one of the most unusual requests of an athlete of this or any other Olympics.
Tom Daley had arrived for the 10 metre platform diving event, and in his kitbag were knitting needles and the start of what he called a “dog jumper” that he is trying to complete for a friend while in Japan.
One of the officials had a different idea. They had brought a stuffed toy penguin to the diving pool and made a beeline for Daley: “Wouldn’t it be cute to have a little scarf for it?”
How most elite athletes might react to such a request moments before they were due to compete is probably unprintable. But Daley is not most elite athletes. And so, a day after he had revealed the knitted Tokyo cardigan that has been his main distraction since winning gold 11 days earlier, he spent most of a three-hour qualifying marathon producing a blue and pink scarf.
It went knit, dive, knit, dive, knit, dive, knit, dive, knit, dive, knit, dive. And, with his place in the semifinals secured as the fourth-best qualifier, Daley placed the scarf on the toy penguin and made his way back to the athletes’ village.
Leaving the venue, though, was a challenge. Aside from a handful of English-speaking journalists, there were numerous Japanese media, and while the Tokyo volunteers remained restrained, you could just feel their desire to get near him.
No one, not Caeleb Dressel, Adam Peaty, Katie Ledecky or Kaylee Mckeown, has been greeted with anything like such reverence at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre over the past fortnight. Daley’s Tokyo cardigan has evidently captured the imagination of an audience far beyond the United Kingdom.
Following his gold medal in the men’s 10m synchro on the third day of the Games, he revealed how knitting is helping his performance. “It’s made a massive difference,” he said. “There’s a long wait between the synchro and the individual and there’s a lot of time to think. My time to think has been replaced with knitting, and it’s been such a great and welcome distraction for me, to be mindful, but also resting. I’m someone that’s really bad at resting. I sit there. I fidget. I bite my nails.
“There’s something different for everyone to get their escape, and I’m grateful and lucky that I’ve found something that I enjoy.”