Abrahm DeVine, a member of the U.S. men’s national swim team and an NCAA champion at Stanford, has come out as gay in an interview with Swimming World magazine.

“I’m a gay athlete. There aren’t too many of us, so when I came out to my college team, that was a really tough time for me,” DeVine said.

DeVine, the 2018 NCAA champion in the 400 individual medley, Pac-12 swimmer of the year and 2016 Olympic trials competitor, said in the interview with David Rieder that his struggles with being gay almost led him to quit the sport, but he reconsidered after talking with a former teammate, Max Williamson.

With the encouragement of Williamson, DeVine told his Stanford teammates and they embraced his decision wholeheartedly.

“I remember that being a pretty emotional time, and just feeling my whole team wrap around me and feeling that love in a place where I hadn’t really felt it, that was definitely pretty special for me,” DeVine said. “Just seeing them kind of prove me wrong was definitely special, something I’ll never forget.”

DeVine is a senior and can still compete for a spot on the 2020 Olympic team. It’s cool that he’s doing it as an openly gay athlete. We have done quite a few stories on openly gay swimmers and it is not surprising that DeVine was accepted by his Cardinal team.

You can follow Abrahm DeVine on Instagram.

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