--- title: Diana Flores: TIME100 Most Influential People in Sports 2026 description: Find out why Diana Flores was selected for TIME‘s 2026 list of the most influential people in sports. canonical: https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/diana-flores/ article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2026-06-09T12:01:01.125Z article:modified_time: 2026-06-09T12:01:01.315Z article:section: Sports og:title: TIME100 Most Influential People in Sports 2026: Diana Flores og:description: Find out why Diana Flores is on the list og:url: https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/diana-flores/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt523606b4640f5bcb/6a209b006c0c2c6db7791fb6/T100SPORTS-2026-Web-Diana-Flores.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y36.47 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME100 Most Influential People in Sports 2026: Diana Flores og:type: article twitter:card: summary twitter:title: TIME100 Most Influential People in Sports 2026: Diana Flores twitter:description: Find out why Diana Flores is on the list twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt523606b4640f5bcb/6a209b006c0c2c6db7791fb6/T100SPORTS-2026-Web-Diana-Flores.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y36.47 --- Jun 09, 2026 # Diana Flores by Tashan Reed  Chen Bin—Xinhua /Getty Images Flag football will step firmly onto the global stage at the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles, and Diana Flores is one of the key figures who helped it get there. The Mexico City native began playing at age 8 and made her country’s national team by 16\. As the quarterback and captain, she led Mexico to back-to-back gold medals at the World Games in 2022 and 2025 and was named MVP after the 2022 victory over the United States. She’s an ambassador for the NFL and starred in a flag-football advertisement that ran during the Super Bowl in 2023\. At the time, that was the biggest platform flag football had ever received. Since then, the sport has continued to gain momentum. Twenty-three states have sanctioned girls’ high school flag football as a varsity sport, colleges are offering Division I scholarships, and the NFL is creating professional leagues for both men and women. Flores, who will likely compete at the next Summer Games, recently collaborated on her first book, _Flag Football for Dummies,_ in hopes of helping more people understand her growing sport. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/diana-flores/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/diana-flores/"},"headline":"Diana Flores","datePublished":"2026-06-09T12:01:01.125Z","dateModified":"2026-06-09T12:01:01.315Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/diana-flores/","keywords":["list","franchise"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt523606b4640f5bcb/6a209b006c0c2c6db7791fb6/T100SPORTS-2026-Web-Diana-Flores.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y36.47&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Tashan Reed"}],"creator":"Tashan Reed","articleSection":"Sports","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt523606b4640f5bcb/6a209b006c0c2c6db7791fb6/T100SPORTS-2026-Web-Diana-Flores.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y36.47&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/sports/","name":"Sports"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collection/time100-sports/2026/diana-flores/","name":"Diana Flores"}}]}] ```