Sameera Al Bitar, sometimes listed as "Samira" or "Al-Bitar", (born February 21, 1990 in Jordan), is a 2-time Olympic swimmer from
Bahrain
Bahrain ( ; ; ar, البحرين, al-Bahrayn, locally ), officially the Kingdom of Bahrain, ' is an island country in Western Asia. It is situated on the Persian Gulf, and comprises a small archipelago made up of 50 natural islands and an ...
.
She was one of the first Muslim women representing an Arabian Peninsula country to swim in the
Olympic Games
The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a multi ...
Sydney Olympics
The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad and also known as Sydney 2000 (Dharug: ''Gadigal 2000''), the Millennium Olympic Games or the Games of the New Millennium, was an international multi-sport event held from 1 ...
four years earlier.
Bitar completed the 50m race with a personal best of 31.00 seconds, enough to win her heat but not enough to advance to the next round.
She again represented
Bahrain at the 2008 Summer Olympics
Bahrain competed at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China. The country sent a total of 15 competitors to the Games, competing in athletics, swimming and shooting,. This constituted Bahrain's largest Olympic delegation to date.50m freestyle. Her time of 30.32 was well ahead of second-place finisher in her heat, Benin's
Gloria Koussihouede
M. Gloria Koussihouede, occasionally listed in results as "M. Koussihouede", (born 4 April 1989 in Porto-Novo, Benin) is a swimmer from Benin. She swam at the 2004 and 2008 Olympics
The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the X ...
(at 37.09), but nonetheless insufficient to advance to the next round.
She recently graduated from The
George Washington University
, mottoeng = "God is Our Trust"
, established =
, type = Private federally chartered research university
, academic_affiliations =
, endowment = $2.8 billion (2022)
, presi ...
School of Business, where she majored in Finance and Sports Management.Not your average freshman , The GW Hatchet; published 2008-10-9, retrieved 2009-07-09.
Career
Represented Bahrain in two Olympics (Athens, 2004; Beijing, 2008), five World Championships (Barcelona, 2003; Montreal, 2005; Melbourne, 2007; Rome, 2009; Barcelona, 2013), and the 2006 Asian Games in Doha, Qatar.