Josh Davis (swimmer)


Joshua Clark Davis is an American former competition swimmer, Olympic gold medalist, and former world record-holder. Davis represented the United States at two consecutive Summer Olympics.
Margaret Swan Forbes taught him how to swim.

College and international career

He attended the University of Texas at Austin, where he swam for coach Eddie Reese's Texas Longhorns swimming and diving team in National Collegiate Athletic Association competition.
At the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, he won gold medals by swimming for the winning U.S. teams in the 4×100-meter freestyle relay and 4×200-meter freestyle relay. He earned a third gold medal by swimming for the first-place U.S. team in the preliminary heats of the 4×100-meter medley relay. He also competed in the 200-meter freestyle, and finished seventh in the event final with a time of 1:48.54.
Four years later at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, he served as the captain of the U.S. swimming team. At the 2000 Olympics, he won silver medals swimming for the second-place U.S. teams in the preliminary heats of the 4×100-meter freestyle relay, and the final of the 4×200-meter freestyle relay. He again competed in the 200-meter freestyle, finishing in fourth place in the final with a time of 1:46.73.
He also swam for the U.S. national team at:
Completed in 2001, the newer natatorium at North East independent school District's Virgil T. Blossom Athletic Center in San Antonio was named in his honor.
In February 2009 four of Davis' Olympic medals—three gold medals and one silver medal—were stolen from his car after he returned from a swim clinic in St. Louis. On February 13, 2009, cleanup crews found the medals outside one of the Salvation Army's Boys and Girls Clubs in San Antonio. The medals were returned to Davis at a news conference later that night.
On June 1, 2016, Davis was named as the first coach of Oklahoma Christian University's swimming programs, charged with building men's and women's teams for competition that will begin with the 2017-18 season. It is Davis' first collegiate coaching job. Oklahoma Christian University is one of three universities in Oklahoma offering intercollegiate swimming.
Davis and his wife Shantel live in Edmond, Oklahoma, and have six children.