As an Olympic Games biathlete – alternating rounds of top-speed cross country skiing and rifle shooting – Tracy Barnes delivered under pressure.
Barnes, 32, came through again Wednesday – delivering the last baby of 2014 born at Mercy Regional Hospital.
The newcomer was Tiegan Olivia, 5 pounds, 12 ounces, who arrived at 8:24 a.m., and both mother and daughter are doing fine.
Mercy nurses presented Barnes and her husband, Gary Colliander, in his third season as head coach of the Durango Nordic Ski Club, with a basket of goodies, including clothing, for the newborn.
A gift basket and knit cap have been a long-standing tradition at Mercy for the first baby of the year. But a last-baby basket was organized when The Durango Herald decided to recognize the closer as well as the starting pitcher.
Tiegan got her name through no family tradition but from a wide search and the sound of a catchy name, Colliander said.
“We looked in baby-name books, and we Googled names,” Colliander said. “We liked Tiegan.”
Tiegan makes an immediate contribution to the family. Despite her late arrival, mom and dad can take a full 2014 income-tax exemption for their new dependent.
Tiegan, along with Tegan, Teigan or Teagan, derives from a Cornish word meaning “pretty.”
Pretty doesn’t translate to popular. A Social Security Administration website, which has a bank of more than 335 million births dating to 1879, shows that Tiegan wasn’t among the 1,000 most popular girl names in any year from 1914 to 2013.
Tracy Barnes, an Olympian in 2006, made headlines at the beginning of 2014 when she gave up her spot on the U.S. Olympic biathlon team that was to compete in Sochi, Russia, in favor of twin sister, Lanny, who was next in line.
The sisters put their biathlete training to use when they founded T.O.P. Shooting Institute that offers elite-level training for law-enforcement officers, military personnel and competitive shooters.
T.O.P. stands for The Olympian Project. Instruction teaches the physiological and psychological aspects of shooting under stress with an elevated heart rate, Barnes said.
daler@durangoherald.com
