America's Grandparent Olympian

John Dane and Austin Sperry compete in the Rolex Miami OCR qualifying for the Olympics. Photo by sailingcv.com

Sailor John Dane competes for Olympic glory in Beijing as the only grandparent on the U.S. team

For the spectacle alone, the Summer Olympic Games in Beijing are must-see TV.

But if you're looking for a special athlete to root for, one you can really identify with, you're in luck: This year, Team USA features an actual grandparent. And John Dane, a 58-year-old grandfather of two from Gulfport, Miss., has one of the more remarkable stories of any athlete on the national team. He first tried to qualify for the 1968 U.S. team, when he was 18. He finished second in that season's Olympic trials, but kept coming back. He entered each of the next six trials, finishing as high as fourth, third, and second again, but he always fell short of making the national squad.

"Yeah, when you finish second your first time out, you kind of get the feeling that the next time is going to be it," Dane told Grandparents.com with a laugh. "I've had a lot of 'next times.'"

He was speaking on his cell phone from the Chinese port city of Qingdao, 350 miles from Beijing, where the sailing competition will take place. It was 9am in the eastern United States on August 6, but 10pm in China. One could hear laughter and the clinking of glasses in the background. Dane was at an Olympic team dinner that was just wrapping up, two days before the squad was set to walk into Beijing's new National Stadium for the Opening Ceremonies.

"A thrill," he said. "This rates at the top of the list. It's a dream come true. It's just a wonderful experience to be able to be here representing our country and trying to win a medal and bring it home. It's the greatest experience."

Despite his setbacks over the decades, Dane persevered. In 2005, he paired with a new crewmate for the two-man event — his son-in-law, Austin Sperry. Dane's daughter, Sally, met Sperry in 1999 at a regatta in Mississippi. Last year, at the U.S. Olympic trials, Sperry helped Dane finally earn a ticket to the Olympics.

Dane is the only grandparent competing on a U.S. Olympic team, although there are several coaches who are grandparents, including men's basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski.

Dane has seven children and two grandchildren — an 8-year-old boy and a 2-year-old girl. His granddaughter is too young to understand everything that's happening right now, but his grandson is completely on board. "He thinks it's really cool that his 'Paw-Paw' is going to be at the Olympics," Dane said.

But there's more to Dane's story than just 40 years of perseverance. There's another angle. Dane is the CEO of Trinity Yachts Inc., a company that builds luxury yachts that cost upward of $60 million. His headquarters, based in New Orleans, and his home, in Pass Christian, Miss., were both destroyed by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

But Dane quickly regrouped. He purchased 100 mobile-home trailers for his employees, kept his office in New Orleans, and moved his production facility to Gulfport, Miss. The company has thrived since then. Before Katrina, Dane had 550 employees; he has almost 1,000 now.

Dane's sailing partnership with his son-in-law grew out of the tragedy as well. The hurricane ruined but did not completely destroy Sperry's home. As Dane looked for a new place to live, and Sperry began to salvage his own home, 12 members of the extended family moved into a houseboat Dane owned that had somehow survived the storm. The two men figured that if they could live together, they could compete together.

So after 40 years of trying to make it to the Olympics, Dane is finally there, going for the gold. Sailing experts consider him a serious medal contender. If he wins, "It won't change me," he said. "It's not like it's going to propel me on to another career or something like that."

Dane paused for a moment, and laughed. "I mean, I don't think people will be lining up for endorsements or anything like that," he said. "But if it makes me super-cooler in my grandkids' eyes, well, that would be awesome to me."

For a guide to watching the Olympics with your grandchildren, click here. Track John Dane's results in the sailing competition at nbcolympics.com. Elsewhere on Grandparents.com, meet 10 of our favorite celebrity grandparents, read our interview with Speaker of the House and grandmother Nancy Pelosi, and find out the 25 reasons kids love grandparents.