Greg Louganis
From Freepedia
| Gold medal | 1984 Los Angeles | Diving Men's 3m springboard |
| Gold medal | 1984 Los Angeles | Diving Men's 10m platform |
| Gold medal | 1988 Seoul | Diving Men's 3m springboard |
| Gold medal | 1988 Seoul | Diving Men's 10m platform |
| Silver medal | 1976 Montréal | Diving Men's 10m platform |
Gregory Efthimios Louganis (born January 29, 1960) is an American diver of Samoan/Swedish descent, adopted by a Greek-American family. He won back-to-back Olympic titles in both the 3 m and 10 m events.
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History
At age 16, Greg Louganis took part in the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montréal, where he placed second in the tower event, behind Italian Klaus Dibiasi. Two years later, with Dibiasi retired, Louganis won his first world title in the same event.
In 1978, he accepted a diving scholarship to the University of Miami. He would later transfer to the University of California, Irvine in 1981, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts.
Olympic Games
Louganis was a major favorite for two golds in the Moscow Olympics. But an American boycott of the games, instituted by U.S. President Jimmy Carter, in protest of the Soviet invasion and occupation of Afghanistan, prevented him from participating.
Four years later, with the Games in Los Angeles, Louganis (who in the mean time had won two world titles in 1982) grabbed his revenge: with record scores and leads over his opponents, Louganis won both the springboard and tower event.
After winning two more world championship titles in 1986, he repeated his 1984 feat in the 1988 Seoul Olympics, although not without trouble. In one of his jumps in the 3 m springboard event (See the following section about this), Louganis hit the diving board with his head, but the resulting injury proved not heavy enough to stop him from winning the gold medal.
His 1988 Olympic incident and the question of morality
During his 1988 Seoul Olympics competition, he had an accident in one of his jumps in which his head hit the board and was injured and with a bleeding head he fell into the water. At that time he knew he was diagnosed with the HIV virus, but at that time the scientific community didn't know that the HIV virus cannot be transmitted by flow of blood in water.
In the news
In 1994, Louganis publicly announced he was gay and took part in the Gay Games. The following year, in 1995, Louganis also announced he had AIDS, something he had actually known since early 1988.
A 1997 made-for-TV movie and book entitled "Breaking the Surface: The Greg Louganis Story" starring Mario López coveres the highlights of Louganis' life.
External links
Categories: Cleanup from August 2005 | 1960 births | Greek-Americans | Swedish-Americans | Gay athletes
