Tinder Hook-Ups Off the Hook Among Sochi Athletes
Olympic-gold snowboarder Jamie Anderson confesses she and the other female athletes are checking out "a lot of cuties" in Sochi with the dating app Tinder, according to US magazine.
The 23-year-old from Lake Tahoe, Calif., said matchmaking has reached new levels in the Olympic Village.
"Tinder in the Olympic Village is next level," she told US. "It's all athletes! In the mountain village it's all athletes. It's hilarious. There are some cuties on there."
But, she warns, the preoccupation with Tinder can be "way too distracting," so she deleted her account.
And it seems to have paid off. Anderson clinched gold in the women's slopestyle event on Feb. 9.
Tinder is an app that lets you know if there's someone nearby who you might like. You can anonymously like the other person or pass on them, but if both people like one another, then a match is made.
The social networking tool may be new since the last Winter Olympics, but with 3,000 athletes in the prime of their lives from around the world packed into Sochi, they're bound to seek an outlet through electronic means or otherwise.
"It's like making the ingredients of a huge stew - a stew of sexual ingredients," said Dr. Judy Kuriansky, a sex therapist and clinical psychologist at Columbia University's Teachers College in New York City. "There is stress, which causes tension, and anxiety and energy, and a massive outpouring of chemicals in the body - adrenaline and endorphins. It's a powerful concoction of chemicals."
"Everyone knows the runner's high," she said. "Olympian athletes certainly have it - it's orgasmic."
Kuriansky said all the beautiful and fit athletes tend not to "think about their conscience."
"Winners or losers, on top of the world or devastated, it tends to make you grab the moment - carpe diem," she said. "This is your moment."