He has been a champion in all walks of life.
However, despite a dominant college career and a gold medal from last summer's Olympic Games, former Michigan swimmer Tom Dolan probably never inspired people like he did last night at the Kellogg Eye Center.
The LSA senior, who suffers from exercise-induced asthma, was part of the University of Michigan Pediatric Pulmonary Division's Family Asthma Series.
The presentation also included Michigan men's swimming coach Jon Urbanchek, Dolan's personal physician Dr. Martin Hurwitz, and Michigan pediatric asthma fellow Dr. Wan Chong-Tsai.
However, among the group of knowledgeable speakers, Dolan was the obvious show-stopper. The audience for the presentation consisted primarily of children with asthma as well as their parents.
As Dolan entered the room, children watched with wide eyes and cameras flashed. His presence excited the children beyond words, as most smiled and pointed in silence.
Dolan understood the difficulties his young admirers face daily, yet he encouraged the children to press on through recollections of his past experiences.
"I have had (asthma) since I was 12 years old, so I'm going on nine years of having to deal with it and having to learn to how to get around it and overcome it," he said.
During his visit, Dolan also made sure to stress to the children that it was possible to live and succeed in athletics with asthma.
"You are not the outsider or the loser," he said. "When I was growing up, kids who had asthma were seen as people who weren't great athletes. To those people I can say, 'Look, you're wrong.'"
The primary reason for Dolan's visit was to kick-off the American Lung Association of Michigan's annual Christmas Seal Campaign, of which Dolan is chairperson. Dolan spoke of why he was involved with the program.
"One of the messages I want to get across is that having asthma - yes, it is a setback," he said, "but no - it doesn't mean that you can't go ahead and do the things you want to do day in and day out."
And when he came to Michigan, Dolan did, in fact, do the things he wanted to do. During his swimming career with the Wolverines, Dolan racked up nine NCAA championships and was a 15-time All-American.
Urbanchek played the role of the consummate optimist upon Dolan's arrival to Ann Arbor. Urbanchek immediately devised a system to take advantage of the few positives of Dolan's asthmatic condition.
"What (we) said was let's make (Dolan's asthma) something positive. (Dolan breathes) less than the rest of the athletes.
"Tom's body is adapted to working without air - he does more work anaerobically, without air. So we turned it around and made something which was supposed to be bad and made it good."
Modern medications control exercise-induced asthma for most individuals. However, Dolan is anything but a typical person.
Being an internationally-competitive athlete poses restrictions on the swimmer, particularly in the usage of asthma medications. Nevertheless, Dolan remains unfazed for the most part.
"It is frustrating sometimes," he said, "because there definitely are medications out there that could help me to the point where the pain would be much more reduced."
By International Olympic Committee standards, it seems that Dolan should have no reason to complain, especially in light of their recent advancements.
"The IOC has been particularly understanding," Hurwitz said, "to accept a number of asthma medications that were actually banned a number of years ago."
So with complications from medication banning, Dolan's entourage has had to move forward in his treatment - without the use of the best asthmatic drugs.
However, Urbanchek feels that the Dolan's medical attention has been just fine.
"You would never have heard of Tom Dolan 10 years ago," he said, "because we did not have the know-how we have now."
But we all have heard of Tom Dolan, despite the setbacks. And this is the idea that Dolan drives home to children just like him.
"(Having asthma) doesn't mean that you can't walk out that door every morning knowing that you can go 110 percent and give everything that you have - no matter what you do."