Words matter. These are the best Diana Lopez Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.
Growing up with three older brothers and being the youngest and the only girl, my mom always made me tough. She’s taught me over the years how to be a strong, independent woman, how to carry yourself in a positive way and anything that my brothers can do, I can do.
I need that hug from my mom. She’s the Latin mother that hugs you and says all these sweet things to you in Spanish. It’s just comforting. She also gives me that strength.
I think our legacy will always be there. My brothers and I have carved a path for all taekwondo players, not just in the U.S.
Neither one of my parents played sports at a very high level when they grew up in Nicaragua.
My parents sacrificed so much for all of us. It makes me want to give back to them by being the best I can be.
Not only are we like the epitome of the American dream, we’ve been successful at the sport for so long that we know the Lopez name will always be part of the taekwondo world.
Do not sit next to my mother when she is watching one of her children compete because you will have fingernails down your back. She is a nervous wreck.
My mother was the oldest of nine children, five boys and four girls, so she had experience sharing responsibility for a large, sometimes loud group of kids.
When I tell people I’m going to the Olympics, they’re like: ‘What do you do, track and field? Pole vault? Are you a volleyball player?’ No one ever guesses tae kwon do.
It was natural for me to go to local tournaments with my mother and watch my brothers compete and sometimes be left with my mom at home while my dad would take my brothers away to different tournaments and competitions. So I started doing everything they did.
Before we came along, it would be like, ‘Yes, thank God, we have the U.S. as our first fight.’ Now it’s like, ‘Uh-oh, we have a Lopez in our division.’
Win or lose, I’m going to leave everything on the mat. That’s what gold medalists do.
If people look at me and, certainly, my brothers, and they see strength and guts, they’d have to know my parents. If they wanted to know why we’re so close as a family, that closeness comes from my mother and father.
I’ve been training super hard at the Lopez Taekwondo Academy in Houston, which belongs to my brother Jean. For me, I think confidence is the biggest thing; it’s all mental. I train with the best of the best, including my brother Steven, a five-time world champion who won Olympic gold medals.
When he was eighteen, my dad went off to college to become an architect.