The International Swimming Hall of Fame has announced 12 honorees from seven countries for its induction class of 2024. These 12 individuals will officially be inducted in a ceremony in October.
- Honor Swimmers: Lars Frolander (Sweden), Daniel Gyurta (Hungary), Dana Vollmer (USA), 1976 Olympic Gold Medal winning women’s 400 free relay team from the USA (Shirley Babashoff, Wendy Boglioli, Kim Peyton, and Jill Sterkel)
- Honor Divers: Alexander Despatie (Canada), Yuliya Pakhalina (Russia)
- Honor Artistic (Synchronized) Swimmer: Virginie Dedieu (France)
- Honor Water Polo Players: Carmella “Lilli” Allucci (Italy), Vladimir Akimov (USSR)
- Honor Coach: Dennis Pursley (USA)
- Honor Contributor: Dale Neuburger (USA)
- Honor Paralympian: (To be named later)
The Hall of Fame did not provide an explanation for why there was a delay in naming the Honor Paralympian.
After 6 Americans were inducted last year, four of the 11 named inductees in 2024 will be Americans (with one of those inductees, the 400 free relay, including four Americans).
Two members of the class are deceased. One, Kim Peyton, swam on that 1976 Olympic gold medal winning relay that is famous for being the only American women’s gold medal at that meet and upsetting the women of the East German state-sponsored doping regime. Of that relay, Babashoff and Sterkel are already in the Hall of Fame as individuals.
The other posthumous inductee is Soviet water polo player Vladimir Akimov, who was the captain of the 1980 gold medal winning Soviet men’s water polo team.
Peyton died in 1986 at 29-years-old from a brain tumor, while Akimov died in 1987 at 34-years-old from a head injury sustained during an assault.
American Dana Vollmer won five Olympic gold medals and seven total medals in spite of a heart condition that caused doctors to recommend always having a defibrillator poolside when she swims.
Her Olympic haul included a barrier-breaking 55.98 in the 100 fly in 2012, making her the first woman under 56 seconds in that event.
In 2009, she was named the Honda Sports Award winner for swimming & diving as the outstanding college female swimmer of the year. In total, she had 24 All-America honors at Florida and Cal, three individual NCAA titles, and in 2009 let the Cal women’s swimming & diving team to their first NCAA team championship.
Vollmer retired in 2019.
Sweden’s Lars Frolander was the 2000 Olympic gold medalist in the 100 fly, adding a pair of relay silvers in 1992 and 1996. While he reached the top of the sport in 2000 (and again at the World Championships in 2001), a big part of his legacy is also his longevity – he competed at six consecutive Olympic Games from 1992 to 2012.
All three Honor Swimmer inductees in the class won Olympic gold medals. Hungary’s Danie Gyurta took gold in the 2012 Games in the 200 breaststroke eight years after winning silver in 2004 at just 15-years-old. He was also the back-to-back-to-back World Champion in the 200 breaststroke from 2009 through 2013. His stretch from 2010-2014 in that event was one of the single most-dominant event runs in swimming history: at one point, he simultaneously held the World Championship in long course and short course, the European Championship in long course and short course, the Olympic gold medal, and both 200 breaststroke World Records.
Other Olympic champions in the group include Carmela Allucci of Italy, who won gold with the Italian women’s water polo team in 2004 and carried the Italian flag at the closing ceremonies – making her the first female water polo player to ever be a flag bearer at the opening or closing ceremonies of the Olympics.
Yuliya Pakhlaina won five Olympic medals, including gold in 2000 in the 3-meter synchro competition with partner Vera Ilyina (who has not yet been inducted into the ISHOF).
Virginie Dedieu of France never won Olympic gold because her specialty event, the solo routine, is not an Olympic competition. She was the World Champion consecutively in 2003, 2005, and 2007, though, and won bronze in women’s duet at the 2000 Olympic Games. Alexander Despatie of Canada won Olympic silver in 2004 and 2008 on the 3-meter springboard and has individual World Championships in all three individual competitions (1-meter, 3-meter, and 10-meter platform).
Two individuals were also inducted for their work outside of the pool. American swim coach Dennis Pursley is a five-time Olympic coach in a career that spanned the globe. A pioneer in the professionalization of coaching, he was on the US staff at the 1980 Summer Olympic Games, became the first head coach of the Australian Institute of Sport in 1981 and became the first US National Team Director in 1984, leading Team USA to three-straight medal-topping finishes in 1992, 1996, and 2000.
Then in 2008 he became the head coach of British Swimming and led the team into their host Olympics in London in 2012. After that, he returned to the US to coach the University of Alabama, where he led the men’s team to four top-10 finishes before retiring in 2019.
American sport administrator Dale Neuburger was inducted as an ISHOF Honor Contributor. Having a long career in the sport that spanned many roles, Neuburger was a member of the Board of Directors for the USOC from 1994 through 2002, the Chef de Mission for the US delegation to the 2004 Olympic Games, and is currently serving a second term as treasurer of World Aquatics.
Neuburger is a former director at Burson Cohn & Wolfe Sports Practice – an organization that has numerous financial tendrils into the aquatics world, including running campaigns for powerful elected positions in the sport, leading to a 2017 back-and-forth with then-European Aquatics president Paolo Barelli, who accused Neuburger of corruption. A case in front of the Court of Arbitration for Sport found in favor of Neuburger.
What does The International Swimming Hall of Fame take into consideration when they select people for induction (a general question I have had for years since I do not know)?
Is less weight / consideration placed on World Championships since it has ‘only’ been around since 1973?
What about short course meters, it has grown in popularity, media coverage and prize money since at least the 1970’s, although World Aquatics have reduced that in the last 5 years or so (used to be up to 12 World Cup stops in a season that lasted almost 3 months), which gave rise to the ISL as WA reduced the number of meets.
What about continental championships such as Pan-Pac, Asian Games,… Read more »
It’s a vote by board members who aren’t really any more-or-less qualified than any of the rest of us to make a choice, but all have their personal favorites.
So priority is given, for example, to their childhood heroes (see: US 1976 free relay). The board is almost-entirely American, so they all have big patriotic feels about that.
There are also a lot of political appointments (this is why the Swimming World Magazine partnership made so much sense for them until the apparently recent sale to a board member – Swimming World Magazine could trade hall of fame inductions for other favors they needed). Dale Neuburger, for example, is an ISHOF donor and an American, so he checks a lot… Read more »
I’m shocked that the 1976 Women’s US 4×100 FR wasn’t inducted into the IHOF a LONG time ago! Watching video of that performance today gives me tears and chills. Absolutely the best relay performance in history, as far as I’m concerned!
Great class! Forgot how long Frolander competed…
and man, I feel old now…. 🙂
I remember watching him go :46 at conference champs my frosh year. That was an otherworldly time back then ha ha!