Coronado High grad Cortney Jordan conquers fear to reach third Paralympic Games

Eight-time swimming medalist Cortney Jordan was initially terrified of the water.

Her grandfather Jarrett helped establish the International Swimming Hall of Fame and her father, also Jarrett, swam competitively but the future Paralympian shied away at first.

Jordan was born with cerebral palsy, which affects the parts of the brain that control movement, balance and posture. Her disability made her anxious anytime she had to dip her toes in.

“I was so terrified and I hated it because my body had always failed me on land,” Jordan said. “If it fails me in the water I’m drowning and that’s terrifying.”

The Coronado High School graduate finally learned to swim when she was 5 at a hotel in Yakima, Washington, that her family stayed at when moving to Alaska. Soon swimming became Jordan’s form of physical therapy, one she will take to her third Games in Rio as she swims in six events starting Thursday.

The 2016 Paralympics begin Wedneday with opening ceremonies in Rio de Janeiro.

“With my disability I am in extreme pain all the time,” Jordan, 25, said. “One of the places I’m not in pain is the water. It makes me feel like I’m young.”

Full of Surprises

Jordan was due to be born the last week of August but instead arrived on June 24. Her mother Nancy was in the hospital two months before she was born because doctors were afraid she could miscarry.

Cortney needed full oxygen for five days and arrived home weighing four pounds. A neonatal specialist told her parents everything in her life would be delayed, and she couldn’t walk until she was almost two.

But then things started to pick up.

“I knew when she turned 2 1/2 and she started talking a blue streak, and she started reading at four, they might’ve had a bad diagnosis on her,” Nancy Jordan said.

After reading came swimming, and her first competitive meet came in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Cortney couldn’t move her left arm enough to break the plane of the water in a freestyle race but still finished.

“I was crying so hard,” Nancy Jordan said. “This one lady looked at me and said ‘I’m sorry she came in last’ and I just looked at her and I said, ‘You don’t realize, she finished.’”

Cortney Jordan swam at her first disabled meet when she was 13 and competed at the Beijing Olympics when she was 17. She won bronze in her first race, the 200-meter individual medley, and her parents told each other that night their daughter had an amazing career even if she never won another medal.

She won silver the next night in the 400-meter freestyle and pocketed four medals total in Beijing. She won another four in London, where she served as team captain.

“She’s always surprises us like that,” Nancy said. “She’s just the most laid back person and the sweetest person … but you put her in the water, she really wants to win.”

Getting recognition

Cortney Jordan is swimming the 50-, 100-, and 400-meter freestyle, the 200-meter individual medley, the 100-meter backstroke and the 50-meter butterfly in Rio. While it’s a long shot, she has a chance to medal in all six events.

“I don’t think there’s another athlete of Team USA who could do that,” said her coach, Brain Loeffler. “In a close race I think she really has the desire and willpower to get her hand on the wall before her competitor.”

Loeffler often worked with Jordan at 6 a.m. during the school year so she could work three jobs while getting her master’s in elementary education from Loyola University in Maryland. Jordan has wanted to be a teacher since she lined up her stuffed animals by a chalkboard when she was four, and her mother describes her as so obsessed with learning that her idea of poolside reading is Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina.

She will start as a long-term substitute teacher when she gets back from Rio, but first come the Paralympics. Jordan is sponsored for the Games by 24-Hour Fitness, one sign the event is growing in awareness, as is the fact NBC and its networks will provide a record 70 hours of coverage in Rio.

“These athletes are incredible. They face such insane obstacles to get to where they are and to see them perform, we are true athletes and I’m excited we’re finally getting the recognition we deserve as athletes,” Jordan said. “Not just as disabled athletes. As athletes.”

Ben Gotz is a sports reporter for the Las Vegas Review Journal. Contact him at bgotz@reviewjournal.com. Follow on Twitter: @BenSGotz