“Hey, why not watch Simone Manuel?” Michelle called out from the kitchen.

Day glanced at her mom, perhaps wondering why she would focus on anyone other than Ledecky. Then she peeked at the television again and saw Manuel was one of only two Black women on the U.S. swim team.

“You’re right; she looks like me, ” Day recalls saying.

In Rio, Manuel would become the first African American woman to win a swimming gold medal in an individual event.

More than seven years later, the Day family remembers that conversation as the first time Gabrielle recognized her distinctiveness. Now, as the top girls’ swimmer at Bullis, she deals with internal conflict: her love for the sport vs. the discomfort of being one of few Black girls participating.

Swimming is one of the least diverse sports in the United States. A 2021 demographics report from USA Swimming said just 1.4 percent of its 200,000-plus year-round swimmers identified as African American or Black. (Twenty-nine percent did not respond to the ethnicity question.)

In a sport dominated by White athletes, talented young Black swimmers feel the added pressure of participating in an arena where, as Day puts it, “nobody else looks like me.”

Day has planned to compete competitively since she waddled into a pool, but for other Black swimmers, the decision came much later. Bullis senior Joshua Black briefly participated in swim lessons when he was little but did not step back into the water until he was 14.

According to a 2017 study by the USA Swimming Foundation and the University of Memphis, 64 percent of African American children have little to no swimming ability — 24 percent more than White children.

Institutional racism and cost are at the heart of the disparity. After the desegregation of pools in the late 1940s, the overall attendance of municipal pools plummeted as many White families moved to private pools, where discrimination against Black people was allowed, according to Jeff Wiltse, author of “Contested Waters: A Social History of Swimming Pools in America.”

“There is a stereotype that Black kids can’t swim, and therefore we wanted to make sure that our kid could swim,” Michelle Day said. “It’s not a stereotype for no reason. There’s historical reasons.”

Swimming is also a less popular sport for African American children to try. Black grew up in Prince George’s County, which has produced some of the top basketball players in the country. He tried basketball and football before he started swimming competitively because that’s where his community was visibly represented.

When Black would tell peers he was attending a swim practice, he would brace for questions.

“We still need more Black gold medalists where they reach that top stage,” Black said. “Right now, I feel like [Black kids] default to [other sports].”

Matthew Brannagan, the swimming coach and a social studies teacher at Frederick Douglass High, said students at the Upper Marlboro public school are programmed from a young age to want to play basketball or football. Between the lack of flashiness and dearth of role models in swimming, Brannagan said most athletes are unaware of the opportunities and scholarships that are available.

USA Swimming, the national governing body for the sport, granted $150,000 in 2023 to focus on supporting clubs led by women and/or racially diverse participants and clubs that partner with historically Black colleges and universities. Though that funding only goes so far, many have taken note and see it as an invitation for inclusion.

When Day steps out of the pool after a heat, it is easy to notice a difference between her and her teammates. Strolling around the pool deck, other swimmers have ripped their head caps off, while the freshman has to leave hers on for an extended period so her hair doesn’t get damaged.

In the locker room, teammates will ask her, “How do you fit your hair in your cap?” or, “Why don’t you have to wash or redo your braids?” Such questions remind Day of the differences between her and other swimmers. She recognizes how the consistent cues of being an outsider can discourage Black children from getting into the sport.

“The lack of diversity can drive someone away,” she said.

There are other blatant examples of racism that Black high school swimmers have experienced. Douglass has a team exclusively of people of color; the school’s minority enrollment is 99 percent. In 2017, the Eagles’ swimmers were in the locker room when they overheard another team making racist remarks.

“Make sure you shower off because of all the Afro Sheen in the water,” Brannagan, who is White, recalls swimmers from the opposing team saying.

Brannagan said the treatment made his swimmers feel as if they did not belong.

“Then, when my kids light them up and beat a lot of them, it’s definitely a lot of: ‘What? Where’d they learn how to swim?’ ” Brannagan said.

Black said when he started swimming, doubt from the nearly all-White crowds added pressure to perform well. He wanted to beat any stereotypes.

Black and Day are among a diverse team at Bullis, but both said there are few Black swimmers on their club teams. Black has learned to drown out those implications.

“Before, I was swimming for other people, trying to prove them wrong,” he said. “Now, I’m more so swimming for myself and the goals I want to achieve.”

Joseph J. Lawrence Pool at St. Albans has a narrow deck, waves of heat rolling off the 83-degree pool and huddled swimmers to create a sticky atmosphere. In a meet with Bullis, Georgetown Day and Flint Hill, more than 75 swimmers stand together in anticipation of their individual heats.

Despite the large number of swimmers, a clear disparity exists. Nearly every swimmer from Georgetown Day and Flint Hill is White, while 45 percent of swimmers donning blue and gold are not, Bullis Coach Valerie Simon counts.

That’s not surprising, considering Simon’s backstory. The second-year coach swam under famous swim coach Jim Ellis, who in 1971 founded the Philadelphia Department of Recreation swim team, one of the only all-Black teams in the country. The story of the club is captured in the 2007 film “Pride.”

More than 100 of the team’s members attended college to swim, including Simon. Alongside her sister, Vanessa, Simon was the first Black women’s swimmer at West Virginia University in 1993.

Ellis, who was inducted into the American Swimming Coaches Association Hall of Fame, always reminded Simon to deal with any racism she faced in the water. Simon now emulates Ellis’s confidence. As she walks down the pool deck, the meet schedule clenched tightly in her right hand, she projects instructions to her 34 swimmers.

Simon’s story has already made an impact on the Bulldogs. When she took over, Bullis barely had enough swimmers to field a competitive roster. The coach’s history also played a role in Black’s and Day’s decisions to attend the Potomac private school.

Of the four schools Day toured, Bullis had the only minority swim coach.

“It played a huge role because having a coach and being able to look up to someone for help and advice who’s like me and has been in my position before, it’s inspiring,” Day said.

At the Dec. 14 meet, Black and Day dominated for Bullis. Black won the boys’ 200-yard individual medley, and Day swept her individual heats, winning the girls’ 100-yard butterfly and 100-yard backstroke.

Much has changed since Simon swam competitively, she said. There are club teams such as Kingfish Swimming (for which Black competed) that feature almost all Black swimmers. USA Swimming has created an outreach program to encourage economically disadvantaged youth to become USA Swimming year-round athlete members at a reduced fee.

The sport is still nowhere close to being equitable. Changing that will require swimmers such as Day to become visible in the Black community. An overhaul, beginning at the youth level, will take time.

“There are just so many avenues that weren’t available when we were younger,” Simon said. “Is the access equitable? No, it is not. But is there access? Yes, there is.”