Shannon Miller remains the Most Decorated Olympic Gymnast in American History with 7 Olympic Medals! She is the only female athlete to be inducted into the US Olympic Hall of Fame – Twice! [Individual (2006) and Team (2008)]. With a combined total of 16 World Championships and Olympic medals between 1991 and 1996, she is the second most decorated gymnast, male or female, in U.S. history, behind Simone Biles, and the tenth most decorated gymnast from any country by her individual medal count.
Shannon has won an astounding 59 International and 49 National competition medals. Over half of these have been gold. In 1993/94 Shannon became the first US gymnast to ever win back to back World All-Around Titles and she is the first American female to medal in the individual all-around of a non-boycotted Olympics. Her tally of five medals (2 silver, 3 bronze) at the 1992 Olympics was the most medals won by a US athlete in any sport. At the ’96 Games, she led the “Magnificent Seven” to the US Women’s first ever Team Gold and for the first time for any American gymnast, she captured Gold on the Balance Beam. She is the first American gymnast to win an individual gold medal at a fully-attended Summer Games and cemented her place as the most accomplished gymnast, male or female, in U.S. Olympic history.
After retiring from Olympic competition, Shannon received her undergraduate degrees in marketing and entrepreneurship from the University of Houston and her law degree from Boston College. She then moved from Olympic athlete to advocate for the health and wellness of women and children.
Shannon launched her company Shannon Miller Lifestyle: Health and Fitness for Women in July, 2010. She continues to travel the country as a highly sought after motivational speaker and advocate for the health and wellness of women and children. Shannon’s seeks to empower women to make their health a priority through education and awareness.
In January of 2011, Shannon was diagnosed with a rare form of ovarian cancer. She had the baseball sized tumor removed successfully and followed up with an aggressive chemotherapy regimen. Shannon has remained open and public about her diagnosis and treatment and continues to empower women to make their health a priority. Shannon is currently cancer free and continues to be a strong advocate for early detection.
Shannon recently released her new book It’s Not About Perfect: Competing for My Country and Fighting for My Life. In her inspirational memoir Shannon encourages and empowers others to break through and overcome their own personal challenges.
Shannon remains involved with the sport of gymnastics and the Olympics as a commentator and analyst. In addition, She has partnered with Mancino Mats to create the Shannon Miller Collection (Training Tomorrow’s Legends) of gymnastics mats and padding and with A-1 Awards to create the “Dare to Dream” line of medals and trophies. She has also partnered with Alpha Factor to create her personal line of fitness apparel Salto and her gymnastics leotard collection that helps athletes look great and feel confident.
Recently, she established the Shannon Miller Gold Cup competition to help young gymnists learn some great ways to handle the non-gymnastics parts of competing such as nerves and mental blocks and receive important feedback directly from judges.
Shannon and her husband, John Falconetti have two children, son Rocco (2009) and daughter Sterling (2013).
As the most decorated American gymnast, Shannon Miller was a perfect choice as the keynote speaker for GymConUSA. The story of her struggles and triumphs during her career inspired a room full of coaches and gym owners. However, higher level themes she discussed like goal setting, perseverance, and positive attitude would touch any group she addresses at the human level.
Shannon Miller is a dynamic speaker with a passion to empower women. She touched our audience by sharing her personal testimony and gave compelling reasons why we need inner strength and support when we face challenges in our lives. She thoroughly engaged our audience and inspired hope in all who attended. She is a gift to us all!
She won seven Olympic Medals. She won multiple U.S. and World Titles in a career that left her the most decorated American gymnast of all time …and she won our hearts when she came to speak in Fairfield as part of the CT Challenge Speaker Series. As tough as she is tiny, with humor and a heart as big as any world stage, she inspired a crowd of close to 300, including more than 50 cancer survivors, with her take on winning, losing, falling and getting back up to land on top …as an athlete, as a person and in her own victory over ovarian cancer. She was so patient, compassionate and authentic to everyone who came–cancer survivors (young and old), aspiring gymnasts and the general public. Everyone felt lucky to have heard her speak. Her appeal is broad and timeless.
We want to personally thank Shannon for being part of the Sports and Fitness Tech Summit at the 2014 CES in Las Vegas. The positive feedback that we received for the conference has been very gratifying. We work hard to make the day run smoothly and keep our audience engaged, but without the contributions of our participants, we have no chance of an entertaining and informative conference. Shannon’s keynote was ideal, a perfect conclusion to the day’s proceedings. You have lived quite a life already and serve as a wonderful role model for people, fit or not. Finally, her graciousness was certainly appreciated at the end of a long and sometimes stressful day.