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≡ USA SWIMMING: CROSSROADS ≡
Olympic swimming relay gold medalist Brent Lang was elected as the new Chair of USA Swimming on Tuesday, to serve through the remainder of the resigned Natalie Coughlin’s term, to September 2029.
Lang won an Olympic men’s 4×100 m Freestyle relay gold at the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games and a 1991 World Championships 4×100 m Free relay gold. He spent more than 20 years at digital care coordination and communications pioneer Vocera Communications, and was Chair and chief executive into 2022, when it was acquired. He is continuing in the high-tech medical field with multiple companies today.
Relative to USA Swimming, Lang crucially served as a board member of USA Gymnastics from 2018-24, joining in the midst of the Larry Nassar abuse scandal and helping the guide the organization through the process of settlement and restructuring.
Lang was only elected to the USA Swimming Board on 27 September to a four-year term by the House of Delegates, but is now Chair less than six weeks later.
He joins USA Swimming at a time when the organization is looking to re-establish dominance in the pool on the international level, find new funding and expand its base of participation among youth swimmers, coaches and parents.
Lang inherits a new executive team at the federation, with Kevin Ring appointed as chief executive on 4 September, coming from sports marketing positions with the PGA of America and Legends Golf. Decorated ex-Stanford and Olympic women’s coach Greg Meehan was hired as National Team Managing Director last April, to take charge of the development and performance of the American swim teams at the World Aquatics Championships and the Olympic Games. Marketing and communications chief Jake Grosser was elevated to Chief Operating Officer last July.
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Lang’s election makes a new interview by SwimSwam.com co-founder Mel Stewart, the 1992 Olympic 200 m Butterfly and Medley Relay gold medalist – and Lang’s teammate on the 1991 U.S. World Championships team – with sprint star Caeleb Dressel even more compelling.
Stewart posted the 90-minute-plus talk with Dressel, 29, the nine-time Olympic gold winner, who covered all kinds of things, including about his future. The short answer is, he’s not done yet, saying:
“I’m not ready to be done, and I love the water too much. And kind of the biggest thing after Paris [2024] was I don’t want to let my demons in the sport override how much I love the sport and that be the reason that I end my career early.
“I don’t think that’s fair to swimming, the sport in general. And I don’t think it’s fair to myself. I love it too much to let the bad parts just take control. So, still working on getting a handle of the the bad parts, the baggage.
“But the water’s always been kind to me. It always will be. And I don’t ever want that ever want that to change. So yeah, I mean I’m still putting in a lot of work, but right now it’s just, it’s new. It’s fun. I’m sure there’ll be some hiccups along the way, but I’m game for it. And right now I’m very, very excited for the future.”
Dressel won a Paris 2024 Olympic gold in the men’s 4×100 m Free relay, a silver in the 4×100 m Medley and gold in the Mixed 4×100 m Medley, swimming in the heats. In his individual events, however, he was sixth in the final of the men’s 50 m Free and did not make the final in the 100 m Butterfly. He had won both of those events at the Tokyo 2020 Games.
Dressel said he has left his long-time training base at the University of Florida, explaining that there was nothing wrong there, but that he needs a different situation now.
Asked about the doping-friendly Enhanced Games next May in Las Vegas, Dressel was clear that he is not interested, but noted that the lure of a big payday demonstrates a hot issue in the sport which needs to be addressed:
“I think the bigger issue at hand is you have people willing to sacrifice their whole reputation, their whole swim career because they weren’t getting paid enough within the sport. … I feel like World Aquatics and USA Swimming and all the governing bodies should see the bigger picture here.”
If they weren’t already, Lang, Ring and Meehan are now all on notice.
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