Triad Olympian Kathleen Baker Sets NCAA Record

Kathleen Baker, a swimmer with local roots, is still winning two years after her stellar performance in the 2016 Olympics. 

Scouts had their eyes on the Winston-Salem native when she started setting records for her age group as a youth, long before she qualified for the Olympics.

Now swimming collegiately for the University of California at Berkeley, Baker hasn't stopped setting the pace. On Saturday she broke a five-year-old American and NCAA record for the 200-meter backstroke with a time of 1:47.30, beating the previous mark by half a second.

Baker earned a silver medal in the 100-meter backstroke and gold as part of the 4x100-meter medley relay in Rio. That historic win netted the United States its 1,000th all-time gold medal.

When she made her first post-Olympic appearance in Winston-Salem, she was greeted by hundreds of fans, many of them young girls, and was also given a key to the city.