Mormon athletes in the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro took home a gold medal in water polo, one silver in shot put and three bronze medals in weightlifting, volleyball and rugby.
• Sami Hill, 24, of Santa Barbara, California, is part of the gold medal-winning USA women’s water polo team. She’s one of the team’s goalkeepers and in the UCLA Ward of the Los Angeles California Stake. It’s the USA women’s team’s second consecutive gold medal in the event.
• Valerie Adams, 32, of New Zealand, has a silver medal to add to her collection of awards from women’s shot put in a competition. This one came down to inches in the final of six throws. Six-foot-4 Adams, who has been training in Switzerland, was married in the Hamilton New Zealand Temple earlier this year. She had won gold in 2008 in Beijing and 2012 in London.
• Sarah Robles, 28, of the Armand Bayou YSA Branch, League City Texas Stake, won bronze in the 75-kg-plus weight class in women’s weightlifting. It was the California native’s second Olympics.
• Taylor Sander, 24, was part of the bronze medal-winning USA men’s volleyball team, and he helped the team come back from two initial losses to get to the semifinals. The 6-foot-4 outside hitter played on Brigham Young University’s volleyball team during college and is a California native.
• Ashley Steacy, 29, of Lethbridge, Alberta, was on Canada’s bronze medal-winning rugby sevens team. It’s the first year rugby was in the Olympics.
• Bruna Beatriz Benites Soares, 30, of the Amambai Ward, Campo Grande Brazil Stake, was on the Brazilian women’s soccer team that was fourth after the game was tied and went to a shootout. This was her second Olympics, and in 2012 in London, the team won silver.
• University of Utah alumna Leilani Mitchell, 31, was part of the Australian women’s basketball team, which was fifth overall after a narrow loss in the quarterfinals. Her mother is an Australian native and the 5-foot-5-inch point guard, who has played in the WNBA, was born in Richland, Washington.
• Jared Ward, 27, of Kaysville, was sixth in the men’s marathon. The returned missionary is an adjunct statistics professor at Brigham Young University. His wife is due with their third child in September.
• Akalaini “Bui” Baravilala, 25, a native of Honolulu, was a member of the USA women’s rugby team, which was fifth overall in the competition.
• Provo native Maka Unufe, 24, was on the USA rugby sevens men’s team, which was ninth overall in the tournament.
• Lucia Palermo, 30, of the Benavidez Ward, Buenos Aires, Argentina, Litoral Stake, was 17th overall in single sculls rowing in Rio, which is her third Olympics.
• John Nunn, 38, of Bonsall, California, competed in the 50 km race walk and was 43rd with a time of 4 hours, 16 minutes and 12 seconds. Fifty kilometers is about 31 miles. About 18 competitors didn’t finish the race and another dozen were disqualified. This is the third Olympics for the U.S. Army staff sergeant.
• Jake Gibb, 40, a University of Utah graduate and Bountiful native, and Casey Patterson, 36, a Californian and Brigham Young University graduate, competed in beach volleyball and didn’t advance to the quarterfinals.
• Lydia Casey Jele, 26, of Botswana, competed in the women’s 400-meter race. She was sixth in her heat and 27th overall.
• Peter Bol, 22, of the Thornlie Ward, Perth Australia Southern River Stake, competed in the men’s 800-meter race. The South Sudan native was sixth in his heat and was 41th overall in his first Olympics.
• Patricia Taea, 23, of the Cook Islands, was in the women’s 100-meter sprint. In the preliminary round, she was second in her heat. She qualified for the next round and was eighth in her heat. Rio is her second Olympic Games.
Gymnasts Mykayla Skinner, 19, of Gilbert, Arizona, and Jackson Payne, 24, a returned missionary from Alberta, Canada, were alternates for their respective countries’ teams.
Email: rappleye@deseretnews.com, Twitter: CTRappleye