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Allison Stokke 9th Sexiest sportswomen : An Internet phenomenon

 

Allison Stokke born March 22, 1989 Newport Beach is an American pole vaulter from Orange County , California . In 2004, Stokke won a California state championship at the age of 15, and broke several national records of that age. Senior year of Newport Harbor High School, she reached 414 cm, which was in the year at the national level the second best result for senior women.

In May 2007, Stokkesta suddenly became an Internet phenomenon when popular sports themed blog boasted of his appearance.On May 29, Day Stokkesta and his popularity became front-page news in The Washington Post .All this attention was not the 18-year-old pole vaulter to mind.The case sparked debate on the internet power,the right to privacy,as well as double standards in relation to the assessment of female athletes in the appearance rather than the merits. The largest weekly magazine Der Spiegel your name on its website in June 2007, Stokke, “sex symbol against her will.”

She participated in competitive gymnastics for 10 years. She made the U.S. youth team in the 2005 World Youth Championships, but did not compete due to an broken leg.

Allison Stokke Awards and Achievements

She broke the county record in her senior season with a mark of 13-7.She got first place in the CIF Division II finals with a mark of 13-0.Took first at the Orange County Championships (13-0) and was named Female Athlete of the Meet
She was selected to USA Today’s All-USA Track Team and named to the Los Angeles Times’ Top Performers list.Set the freshman national record with a mark of 12-8 and named to the Los Angeles Times Girl’s Track All-Star team

Freshman Records (2008):
Posted a Cal freshman record of 13-5.75 (4.11m) at the Pac-10 Championships

Provisionally qualified for the NCAA indoor meet, as she recorded a then-PR of 13-1.00 at the MPSF Vhampionships to set the school indoor record (along with teammate Katie Morgan’s mark the same day) and the freshman record (both since broken)

Sophomore Records (2009):

Finished eighth in the pole vault at the Pac-10 meet with a clearance of 13-0.25 and earned an NCAA regional qualifying height of 13-9.75 (a personal best) at the Sacramento Open
Got Sixth at the NCAA West Regional meet (13-1.75) and 19th at the NCAA Championships (12-9.50), Cal’s top finisher in the pole vault at the MPSF indoor meet, taking seventh with a mark of 13-1.50 and best indoor height was 13-4.25 at the UW Invitational

Junior Records (2010):

Earned MPSF All-Academic (indoors), USTFCCCA All-Academic and honourable mention Pac-10 All-Academic (outdoors) honors and recorded a season-best vault of 13-5.25 at the NCAA West Preliminary Meet to finish 14th, just missing a berth to NCAAs (top 12 advance)
placed eighth at the Pac-10 Championships (12-6.25), recorded an NCAA provisionary height of 13-5.75 during the indoor season and fifth at the MPSF meet (13-1.50).

Her first appearance of Allison Stokke in the net. She looked so cute as the student of High School. The second picture from the left was the pic which shocked the world in 2007. Many people asked each other guessing who the athlete was. Her pretty pic was taken in 2004 during a High School track meet, where she was preparing to compete in the pole vault, and someone posted it to a web site. And, this was the beginning of the story.

Sooner, Many of other bloggers picked up the image and spread it to the world. Within days, thousands of Internet users had searched for Allison Stokke ‘s picture and leered. For the first week Stoke tried to ignore it and keep it from her parents.

Allison Stokke got fame in the few days, The Newport Harbor High School office received many requests for Allison Stokke photo shoots, and interview from Boston to Brazil. Finally, she felt violated, her body had been stolen and turned into a public commodity, commented with some sexual jokes. She reported to his father, Al Stokke who is a criminal defense attorney in Orange County, California.

In 200,18-year-old Allison Stokke walked into her high school track coach’s office and asked if he knew any reliable media consultants. Stokke had tired of constant phone calls, of relentless Internet attention, of interview requests from Boston to Brazil.

In her high school track and field career, Stokke had won a 2004 California state pole vaulting title, broken five national records and earned a scholarship to the University of California, yet only track devotees had noticed. Then, in early May, she received e-mails from friends who warned that a year-old picture of Stokke idly adjusting her hair at a track meet in New York had been plastered across the Internet. She had more than 1,000 new messages on her MySpace page. A three-minute video of Stokke standing against a wall and analyzing her performance at another meet had been posted on YouTube and viewed 150,000 times.

“I just want to find some way to get this all under control,” Stokke told her coach.

Three weeks later, Stokke has decided that control is essentially beyond her grasp. Instead, she said, she has learned a distressing lesson in the unruly momentum of the Internet. A fan on a Cal football message board posted a picture of the attractive, athletic pole vaulter. A popular sports blogger in New York found the picture and posted it on his site. Dozens of other bloggers picked up the same image and spread it. Within days, hundreds of thousands of Internet users had searched for Stokke’s picture and leered.

The wave of attention has steamrolled Stokke and her family in Newport Beach, Calif. She is recognized — and stared at — in coffee shops. She locks her doors and tries not to leave the house alone. Her father, Allan Stokke, comes home from his job as a lawyer and searches the Internet. He reads message boards and tries to pick out potential stalkers.
For the first week, Stokke tried to ignore the Internet attention. She kept it from her parents. She focused on graduating with a grade-point average above 4.0, on overcoming a knee injury and winning her second state title. But at track meets, twice as many photographers showed up to take her picture. The main office at Newport Harbor High School received dozens of requests for Stokke photo shoots, including one from a risqué magazine in Brazil.

Stokke read on message boards that dozens of anonymous strangers had turned her picture into the background image on their computers. She felt violated. It was like becoming the victim of a crime, Stokke said. Her body had been stolen and turned into a public commodity, critiqued in fan forums devoted to everything from hip-hop to Hollywood.

After dinner one evening in mid-May, Stokke asked her parents to gather around the computer. She gave them the Internet tour that she believed now defined her: to the unofficial Allison Stokke fan page ( http://www.allisonstokke.com), complete with a rolling slideshow of 12 pictures; to the fan group on MySpace, with about 1,000 members; to the message boards and chat forums where hundreds of anonymous users looked at Stokke’s picture and posted sexual fantasies.

“All of it is like locker room talk,” said Cindy Stokke, Allison’s mom. “This kind of stuff has been going on for years. But now, locker room talk is just out there in the public. And all of us can read it, even her mother.”

An impostor created a fake profile of Stokke on Facebook, a social networking site intended mainly for college students. Stokke’s classmates at Newport Harbor High School started receiving Facebook messages that seemed to be from Stokke — except she typed in Southern jargon and listed her interests as only “BOYS!!!!”

Last week, Stokke wrote a complaint letter to Facebook, and it immediately took down the fake profile. She hasn’t contacted any other Web sites, she said. Allan Stokke, a defense attorney, studied California’s statutes so he would know if he saw or read anything about his daughter that went beyond distasteful to illegal.

“Even if none of it is illegal, it just all feels really demeaning,” Allison Stokke said. “I worked so hard for pole vaulting and all this other stuff, and it’s almost like that doesn’t matter. Nobody sees that. Nobody really sees me.”

Last Friday night, Stokke stood underneath the stadium lights at Cerritos College here, 20 miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles. A few thousands fans had come to watch a postseason meet, and dozens of photographers and cameramen roamed the field. Before her first jump, Stokke tried to control her breathing as she chatted with her coach. A good jump here would qualify her for the state championship in Sacramento.

A former gymnast, Stokke had tried pole vaulting as a lark as a freshman in high school. Two months later, she set a school record. She won the 2004 state championship three months after that. Stokke had augmented her natural, pole-vaulting disposition — speed, upper-body strength and courage — by lifting weights three times each week. College programs including Harvard, Stanford and UCLA also recruited her.

During her meet at Cerritos College, Stokke cleared 11 feet, then 12 feet, then 13 feet and qualified for the state meet. By the time she stared ahead at a bar set 13 feet 6 inches, all other nine pole vaulters had maxed out. Stokke warmed up by herself, the only athlete left.

She loved pole vaulting because it was a sport built on intricacies. Each motion required calculation and precision. A well-executed vault blended a dancer’s timing, a sprinter’s speed and a gymnast’s grace. “There’s so much that happens in a vault below the surface,” Stokke said.

As the sun set Friday night, Stokke positioned her pole as if she were jousting and sprinted about 100 feet toward the bar. She ran on her tip-toes, like she’d learned from ballet. As she approached her mark, Stokke bent her pole into the ground and coiled her legs to her chest. She lifted upward, twisting her torso 180 degrees as she passed over the bar. It was a beautiful clearance, and the crowd stood to applaud.

Back on the ground, her vault accomplished, Stokke smiled and took in the scene around her. In the stands and on the field, she was surrounded by cameras.

Credits:http://www.washingtonpost.com/
 

 

 

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