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After Gretchen Walsh was the dominant social media force of Team USA at the US Olympic Swimming Trials, pulling in 20,000 new followers, it was her butterfly cohort Torri Huske who dominated the rising-stardom at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games among American swimmers.

Huske, who led all American swimmers with 5 Olympic medals, won the 100 fly over Walsh in Paris, picked up a silver in the 100 free, and won three relay medals – including as the hero leg of at least two of those. That combined success, and the ample airtime that went with it, resulted in her picking up over 77,000 new followers on Instagram, an increase of 237% versus her pre-Olympic number.

She was one of five American swimmers who at least doubled their followings at the Olympics – including Gretchen Walsh, who again had a huge jump from 50,100 to 104,000. Others who more than doubled their followers included Anna PeplowskiChris Guiliano, and Luke Hobson.

While Peplowski’s exposure in the pool as a relay-only prelims swimmer was fairly limited, she put out a lot of creative and entertaining content on social media to grow her following. She did especially well on TikTok, where several videos got millions of views.

The biggest gainers by raw numbers were the swimmers who entered the Games with the most followers, and who based on past Olympic results got most of the NBC love. Katie Ledecky grew her following from 633,000 to 909,000, while on the men’s side, Caeleb Dressel went from 647,000 to 734,000.

Swimmers were more active in building their brands on TikTok during the Olympics than they usually have been (most Team USA swimmers are not active on public TikToks). That’s especially true for the women’s team. For example, Regan Smith now has 54,200 followers on the platform, Kate Douglass has 16,200, Abbey Weitzeil has 30,700, Torri Huske has 10,700, Anna Peplowski has 38,200 and Gretchen Walsh has 20,300.

Women’s Team

Swimmer Instagram Instagram followers Pre-Games Instagram followers Post-Games Total Increase Percentage Increase Individual Medals Won
Torri Huske @torri_huske 32,600 110,000 77,400 237.4% 2 3
Anna Peplowski @anna_peplowski 3,685 8,963 5,278 143.2% 0 1
Gretchen Walsh @gretchwalsh2 50,100 104,000 53,900 107.6% 1 3
Katharine Berkoff @katharineberkoff 6,734 13,000 6,266 93.1% 1 1
Alex Walsh @alexwalsh7 61,700 118,000 56,300 91.2% 0 0
Kate Douglass @kaatedouglass 54,800 102,000 47,200 86.1% 2 2
Claire Weinstein @claire_weinstein 8,470 14,900 6,430 75.9% 0 1
Alex Shackell @alexandrathebeast 8,629 15,000 6,371 73.8% 0 2
Paige Madden @paigemadden1 16,800 27,500 10,700 63.7% 1 1
Erin Gemmell @eringemmelll 4,017 6,533 2,516 62.6% 0 1
Emma Weber @emmalweber_ 4,448 7,072 2,624 59.0% 0 1
Katie Ledecky @katieledecky 633,000 909,000 276,000 43.6% 3 1
Katie Grimes @_katie.grimes_ 36,700 49,800 13,100 35.7% 0 1
Regan Smith @regansmith4 106,000 140,000 34,000 32.1% 3 2
Emma Weyant @emmaweyant 48,300 58,700 10,400 21.5% 1 0
Phoebe Bacon @baconswims 13,200 16,000 2,800 21.2% 0 0
Abbey Weitzeil @abbeyweitzeil 30,700 35,000 4,300 14.0% 0 2
Lilly King @_king_lil 144,000 153,000 9,000 6.3% 0 1
Erika Connolly @ericajadebrown 22,600 23,800 1,200 5.3% 0 1
Simone Manuel @swimone 241,000 251,000 10,000 4.1% 0 2
Total 1,527,483 2,163,268 635,785 41.6%
Average 76,374 108,163 31,789

Men’s Team

Swimmer Instagram Instagram followers

Instagram followers Pre-Games

Total Increase Percentage Increase Individual Medals Won
Chris Guiliano @_chrisguiliano 6,654 13,900 7,246 108.9% 0 2
Luke Hobson @luke_.hobson 3,635 7,416 3,781 104.0% 1 1
Jack Alexy @jackalxy 11,600 21,800 10,200 87.9% 0 2
Bobby Finke @robert_finke 52,600 94,600 42,000 79.8% 2 0
Nic Fink @finknic 25,600 42,700 17,100 66.8% 1 2
Keaton Jones @keatonjones_swim 2,163 3,321 1,158 53.5% 0 0
Hunter Armstrong @hunterarmstrong_ 18,700 28,400 9,700 51.9% 0 2
Charlie Swanson @cswanson16 2,461 3,718 1,257 51.1% 0 2
Matt King @matt_king445 3,298 4,968 1,670 50.6% 0 1
Carson Foster @carson24foster 37,100 50,600 13,500 36.4% 1 1
Aaron Shackell @aaron_shackell 6,908 8,905 1,997 28.9% 0 0
Luke Whitlock @luke.whitlock_ 2,366 2,870 504 21.3% 0 0
Kieran Smith @kieransmith 18,700 22,400 3,700 19.8% 0 1
Josh Matheny @josh_matheny 3,655 4,341 686 18.8% 0 0
Thomas Heilman @thomas_heilman_ 19,500 23,100 3,600 18.5% 0 1
Ryan Murphy @ryan_f_murphy 200,000 236,000 36,000 18.0% 1 2
Drew Kibler @drew_kibler 25,000 29,300 4,300 17.2% 0 1
Caeleb Dressel @caelebdressel 647,000 734,000 87,000 13.4% 0 3
David Johnston @davidjohnston14 5,789 6,452 663 11.5% 0 1
Ryan Held @heldilox 22,700 25,100 2,400 10.6% 0 1
Shaine Casas @shaine_casas 31,800 35,100 3,300 10.4% 0 1
Luca Urlando @lucaurlando 9,125 10,000 875 9.6% 0 0
Matt Fallon @mattf196 6,017 6,569 552 9.2% 0 0
Brooks Curry @brooks_010 7,975 8,557 582 7.3% 0 1
Blake Pieroni @blakepieroni 32,200 34,100 1,900 5.9% 0 1
Chase Kalisz @chasekalisz 76,600 77,300 700 0.9% 0 0
1,279,146 1,535,517 256,371 20.0% 20 52
91,885 124,380 32,494

Only Open Water Swimmers



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