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Michelle Obama will lead delegation to London for 2012 Olympics

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Los Angeles Times Daily Travel & Deal blogger

Guess who will be cheering on U.S. Olympic athletes this summer in London?

It’s really no surprise that First Lady Michelle Obama will lead the 2012 U.S. Olympic delegation and meet with athletes competing in the Summer Games. The White House made the announcement Friday the day before Olympic Day, which marks the birth of the modern Games on June 23, 1894, in Paris.

Obama has been committed to combating childhood obesity with her Let’s Move initiative. The announcement says she had hosted a mini-Olympic event for schoolchildren with Samantha Cameron, the British prime minister’s wife, in April, and addressed the opening ceremony for the 2012 Warrior Games competition for wounded military service members.

She will travel with a delegation that includes:

--Louis B. Susman, U.S. ambassador to Britain and Northern Ireland;

--Brandi Chastain, winner of two Olympic gold medals (1996, 2004) and one silver medal (2000) in women’s soccer;

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--Dominique Dawes, co-chair of the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition and a gold Olympic medalist (1996) who also won three bronze medals (1992, 1996, 2000) in women’s gymnastics;

--Gabriel Diaz de Leon, who won a gold medal in the Paralympicsin 1992 for the javelin and silver (1992) and bronze (1988, 1996, 2000) Paralympics medals for discus competitions;

--Grant Hill, member of the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition and Olympic gold medalist in men’s basketball (1996); and

--Summer Sanders, two-time Olympic gold medalist in women’s swimming in 1992. She also won a silver and a bronze medal the same year.

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