It’s the highest-ranked sports administrator in the world — the president of the International Olympic Committee.
The next IOC president, starting in June 2025, will be an Auburn alum and a former star on Auburn’s two-time national champion swim team.
Kirsty Coventry is a Zimbabwean swimmer, politician and sports administrator. She is the first-ever woman and African to be elected IOC president. She is currently serving as Minister of Youth, Sport, Arts and Recreation in the Cabinet of Zimbawe since September 2018.
A former five-time Olympic swimmer and world record holder, she is the most decorated Olympian from Africa.
Coventry was recruited by Auburn University’s highly-rated swim team. She accepted and swam competitively for Auburn. The Lady Tigers won the collegiate National Championship for swimming in 2003 and 2004.
At the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece, Coventry won three Olympic medals: a gold, a silver, and a bronze. In the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, she won four medals: a gold and three silvers.
Paul Chingoka, head of the Zimbabwe Olympic Committee, described her as "our national treasure." Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe called her "a golden girl" and personally awarded her $100,000 in cash after her 2008 Olympic performance.
In 2016, Coventry retired from swimming after her fifth Olympics, having won the most individual medals in women's swimming in Olympic history.
She has been a member of the IOC and was elected in 2018 as chairwoman of the IOC Athletes' Commission, the body that represents all Olympic athletes worldwide.
War Eagle and Go Zimbabweans!
Jim ‘Zig’ Zeigler writes about Alabama’s people, places, events, groups and prominent deaths. He is a former Alabama Public Service Commissioner and State Auditor. You can reach him for comments at [email protected].
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