The Olympic gymnast hasn’t been resting on her laurels since bringing home gold from Beijing in 2008. Among other things, Shawn has become a major body-positive role model and has spoken out about being judged on her body at the Olympic level. “It was always frustrating for me, because in my career, I was not the stereotypical gymnast body that everybody seemed to think was perfection,” said Shawn at a press event for Dove’s #MyBeautyMySay campaign earlier this year. “I was always compared to Nastia Lukin, my teammate, who was six inches taller, long and lean, and flexible, and I was what [the] media would describe as bulky, stocky, powerful, too big, too short, too fat.” As a coach and a mentor, she’s doing her part to make sure the next generation of female athletes don’t face the same kind of ridiculous comments. (Train like an athlete with Women’s Health’s All in 18 DVD!)
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