Moment of pride for prodigal daughter

“I’m over the moon, so honored, and thankful to have been chosen as Uganda’s female flag bearer,” Muzito told Saturday Monitor, from her base in Florida, USA before travelling to France on Wednesday.

The 21 year old’s journey to the Olympics has been a voyage of a lifetime. She broke out at the age of six at Dolphins Swim Club Kampala and was a sensation from the start.

There was a sense of loss at the club when she relocated to Sweden in 2013 and even more for the country in 2016 when she represented Sweden at the European Junior Championships in 2016 and European Youth Olympics Festival in 2017. But for her innocent soul at the time, it was never a change of allegiance but a need to maximize an opportunity.

Making it count

“It was a big culture shock moving to Sweden. After growing up in Uganda, I had to learn how to adjust to the new culture. Although it got easier since I speak Swedish.

“Sweden is ahead when it comes to swimming facilities instead of just one short course pool. I would have the possibility to train in both a short course and a long course pool. The balance between school and swimming was also different to Uganda’s.

“Later in high school, I attended a sports school that allowed me to swim during school hours and combine it with my swimming. Our school days would end around 3pm, and then we would have practice after. All that in addition to three morning practices that started at 8 to 9.30am

“I was happy to represent Sweden. Being part of any national team is a great achievement for any athlete. You learn a lot from competing at such levels,” Muzito shares.

In 2017, she suffered a shoulder injury from training that slowed her down even though it was not as bad as feared.

“I had to rest my shoulder for a while and do rehab. While combining other forms of practice, such as having more kicking sets in the pool and more dry-land and weights,” she adds saying injuries are common for swimmers.

Dolphins coach Tonnie Kasujja says the injury helped Muzito "concentrate on building the right tissues for competition" and is in awe of "how she developed herself before injury into a swimmer that competed at the top European youth level and now into one putting up podium finishes for the country at continental level". More on this later.

The prodigal daughter

Talk of Muzito returning to swim for Uganda started filtering through in 2021 towards the end of the Covid-19 lockdown but was never substantiated until late 2022. At the time, it was actually feared that it would take a window of four years from the time she makes her intention to ‘change nationality’ clear to World Aquatics.

When she came to swim for Dolphins at the Uganda Swimming Federation (USF) National Championships in 2023, there was never really any conviction that she would swim for the Pearl of Africa. In fact she stayed clear of the topic in an interview with this newspaper.

“I always knew I wanted to return to where it all started, give back to the community, and try to raise Uganda’s profile in the swimming world. But I also wanted to inspire the young girls at home and show them they have a place in this sport,” she now admits.

“Dolphins is the root of my swimming career. It is where I found my love for the sport. Our team was big, and we had such a great group of young swimmers around my age with a good coaching staff. From all the hours we spent training, I learned how hard work pays off. Most importantly, I learned how to have fun throughout the process. Swimming has always been something I enjoy doing and that is what has kept me going this far,” Muzito shares.

She won hearts at those Nationals and was missed at the 2024 edition. Kasujja, who will also be with the team in Paris, says they could not alter her training for Paris so they decided to excuse her from swimming at the Nationals.

Anyway, most of the people in the arena that day had never seen Kirabo Namutebi lose a swimming race in over eight years but on July 2, 2023, Muzito did it twice in the 100m and 50m freestyle.

Most of the people present that day were left stunned and must have left wishing she was Ugandan. USF had no option but to exploit all means to expedite her return to the national team. Somewhere, in between, her focus to make it to the Paris Olympics also intensified.

Leaving no stone unturned

In November 2023, USF got the all clear and she was immediately informed of her pending debut at the World Aquatics Champions in Doha the next February.

Her warm up for Doha came at the ISCA Open in USA, where she clocked 26.17 in 50m free and 56.34 (a national record) in the 100m freestyle. In February, she helped the Ugandan team, which included Namutebi, Mukalazi, and Jesse Ssengonzi – with whom she will swim in Paris, lower the mixed 4x100m freestyle and medley relay national records to 3:40.35 and 4:09.94 respectively. She also equaled Namutebi’s 26.01 women’s 50m freestyle NR at the time.  

But her return in the 100m free was 56.55 – the best performance at the time for any female swimmer wearing national colours but not better than her ISCA time. Overall, the performance made her first choice for a place at the Paris Olympics as her World Aquatics points from the 100m free – 764 points – were better than the 709 that Namutebi managed for the 50m free at the 2023 World Championships in Fukuoka, Japan. At the time the rule said that swimmers would be considered for Olympic universality slots depending on their performances in the World Championships.

Since switching back her allegiance to Uganda, Muzito has been working around the clock to make up for lost time.

In March, she made herself available for the African Games in Ghana alongside Mukalazi, Tendo Kaumi, Ambala Atuhaire and female compatriot Tara Kisawuzi. It helped because shortly after these Games, the rule for Olympic wildcards changed to allow countries apply for the slots based on their swimmers’ best performances at any Olympic qualification event.

Olympic ticket

In Ghana, Muzito lowered the 100m free record to 56.01 and won a bronze medal thereby almost rubber stamping her Olympic ticket as the new time came with 786 points.

The rule change also meant that she had to utilize every available opportunity as Namutebi, who was also seeking to make it to her second consecutive Olympics to follow in the footsteps of their predecessor Jamila Lunkuse, was not resting. Next up for Muzito was the TYR Pro Series in Texas in early April but the hunt there in terms of lowering times was not as successful.

Muzito then gathered her swim bags and left for Angola for the Africa Aquatics Championships, where her 56.78 in 100m free earned her gold while the 25.88 earned her bronze just two microseconds behind Namutebi with silver. Namutebi gained 761 points for her new time.

The two girls then went to Bahamas but they both did not do much to alter the selection mathematics. In the end Muzito’s 56.01 from Ghana got the nod for Uganda’s universality slot and she could not hide the excitement when the announcement filtered through on July 3.

"A dream becoming a reality. Thanks to all that have helped me get this far and for the continuous support! The little girl in me is bursting with joy. We made it!” she posted on her Instagram. 

While the Olympics are the pinnacle of sport, Muzito, who will be the fifth Ugandan swimmer to compete at this level after Namutebi, Lunkuse, Aya Nakitanda and Supra Singhal, is fortunately not looking at Paris as the end of it all.

“I want to keep working hard and improve to the best of my potential.”

At a glance

Name: Gloria Muzito

Date of birth: November 29, 2022

Olympic Event: Women’s 100m free (swimming)

Major events: World Championships 2024, Africa Games 2023, Africa Aquatics Championships 2024

Local club: Dolphins

Education

Since April 2021: Florida State University (Bachelors in Sports Management)

*Also swims for the College D-1 Swim Team

2018-2021: Sundsvalls Gymnasium, Sweden (Behavioral Science)