Fred Schmidt

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Fred Schmidt
Personal information
Full name Frederick Weber Schmidt
Nickname(s) "Fred"
National team  United States
Born (1943-10-23) October 23, 1943 (age 81)
Evanston, Illinois
Height 6 ft 2 in (1.88 m)
Weight 185 lb (84 kg)
Sport
Sport Swimming
Strokes Butterfly
College team Indiana University

Frederick Weber Schmidt (born October 23, 1943) is an American former competition swimmer, Olympic champion, and former world record-holder.

He began swimming competitively at New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois. He was part of one of the greatest high school swim teams ever, in 1961. The team won the Illinois high school championship, and various team members held every high school national record at the time. The New Trier High School team placed third in the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) championships that year behind the Yale and Indiana University teams. He then joined coach Doc Counsilman's Indiana Hoosiers swimming and diving team at Indiana University.

At the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan, he received a gold medal by swimming the butterfly leg for the winning U.S. team in the men's 4×100-meter medley relay, setting a new world record of 3:58.4 with teammates Thompson Mann (backstroke), Bill Craig (breaststroke), and Steve Clark (freestyle).[1] He also received a bronze medal for his third-place finish in the men's 200-meter butterfly, clocking a time of 2:09.3.

He held the world record in 100-meter butterfly (58.6 seconds) from August 20, 1961 to April 24, 1962.

He later entered the U.S. Navy, became a SEAL, and participated in the recovery of several capsules in NASA's manned space flight program.

See also

References

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External links

  • Fred Schmidt – Olympic athlete profile at Sports-Reference.com
Records
Preceded by Men's 100-meter butterfly
world record-holder (long course)

August 20, 1961 – April 24, 1962
Succeeded by
Luis Nicolao

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  1. "1964 Summer Olympics – Tokyo, Japan – Swimming"databaseOlympics.com (Retrieved on April 29, 2008)