Katie Ledecky’s health challenges: From Olympic gold to POTS diagnosis

Katie Ledecky is accustomed to breaking new ground. At the 2024 Paris Olympics, she became the most decorated U.S. female Olympian ever and the first woman to win four golds in the same event, the 800m freestyle, across four Games.

However, a few years earlier, Ledecky ventured into a different kind of challenge: addressing a health issue.

The issue began in 2015 during the World Aquatics Championships in Kazan, Russia, where Ledecky won five gold medals and set three world records. Despite the successes, she experienced severe heat and lightheadedness at a team dinner after her final race. Initially attributing it to exhaustion, she didn’t give it much concern.

Upon returning to the U.S. to prepare for the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Ledecky continued to sense something was amiss.

“It was…weird,” the 27-year-old wrote in her book, which was released in June. “I was swimming okay. But I was super inconsistent. I would have a couple of good practices, and then I would have a day or two when I had absolutely no energy. Some days I couldn’t walk around without dizziness. I remember wrapping practice and struggling to get back to the locker room. Every swimmer has peaks and valleys in training, but to be so strung out? My desire to work hard was there. I just had no juice. I kept wondering, Am I sick. And if so, with what?”

Ledecky mentioned that her former coach, Bruce Gemmell, recommended she see a specialist at Johns Hopkins in Maryland. There, she was diagnosed with postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), a condition where individuals experience rapid heart rates, lightheadedness, fatigue, or other symptoms upon standing up from a sitting or lying position, according to NewYork-Presbyterian’s Health Matters.