Riley Gaines

My heart rate was still high having just competed.

My adrenaline was still pumping.

And so the first thing that I thought ended up being the first thing that I said.

And the first thought that I had was just what you had just said, right?

Like, isn't this everything that Title IX was passed to prevent from happening?

What do you mean you're going to give the trophy to the man in the women's 200 freestyle?

I asked the question that no one dared ask all season.

And I said, why?

Which, of course, he didn't have an answer as to why.

They didn't give him a script of what to say when someone asked you the dreaded question of why.

And so his first excuse he came up with, he's stumbling on his words and he's, uh...

Well, we're actually just doing this in chronological order, he said.

And so I said, okay, do you mean alphabetical?

Because G comes before T. Otherwise, I literally have no idea what you're being chronological about.

Right?

We tied.

So again, what's your rationale here?

And finally, he realized that he didn't have a justification.

He didn't have an answer for this.

And so...