Ryan Murphy's wife Bridget Konttinen expresses excitement on attending her 8th Golden Goggles Awards with the swimmer
Ryan Murphy and his wife Bridget Konttinen recently attended the Golden Goggles Awards on November 20. Ryan Murphy received the Golden Goggles Male Athlete of the Year award at the event.
Elated to appear at the Golden Goggles Awards for the 8th time, Bridget expressed her excitement in her Instagram story and shared a picture along with the caption:
"8th Golden Goggles with my favorite date"
Ryan Murphy and Bridget Konttinen dated for 11 years before getting married on September 30, 2023. They were college sweethearts studying at the University of California, Berkeley. The couple made their relationship public in 2012 by posting a picture of them kissing on their social media handles. Murphy and Konttinen got engaged in 2022.
Murphy and Konttinen got married in the Olympic Valley in the presence of friends and family. Besides embracing their wedding day amidst the snow-capped mountains, the couple had another reason to choose Olympic Valley. More so, the reason was related to Bridget Konttinen’s childhood.
Ryan Murphy revealed to People in an interview:
"Bridget grew up skiing in that area and her dad is from Finland, so skiing was a big part of their life at a young age. There's a lot of sentimental value for her"
Ryan Murphy’s award acceptance speech at the 2023 Golden Goggles Awards
While receiving the Male Athlete of the Year honor at the Golden Goggles Awards, Ryan Murphy credited swimmer Matt Grevers for showing confidence in him.
He shared an anecdote with Grevers from the 2012 Olympic trials. Murphy was 16 years old when he made it to the finals of the 100m backstroke race. Although he did not make it to the Olympic team, the young swimmer was elated by the small gesture that he received from Matt Grevers, a six-time Olympic medalist.
Right after the trials, the legendary swimmer came to him and encouraged him. Murphy shared at the award function:
"And right after that race, I was in the media zone. Not five minutes later, Matt Grevers walks by me. He taps me on the shoulder and he goes, ‘You’re next kid’, and I think that level of confidence that you had in me, that little urge to believe in me, that’s something that really meant a lot to me at that point in my career and I really do think it propelled me to a lot of success that I’ve had."
Eventually, Ryan Murphy made his Olympic debut at the 2016 Rio Olympics where he won three gold medals.