Gregory "Greg" Efthimios Louganis (born January 29, 1960) is an American Olympic diver and author.
He received the James E. Sullivan Award from the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) in 1984 as the most outstanding amateur athlete in the United States.
[edit] Early life
Louganis is of Samoan/Swedish descent. He was raised in California by his adoptive parents, a Greek-American couple. He attended Santana High School in Santee, California, and Valhalla High School in El Cajon, California.
[edit] Diving career
At sixteen Louganis took part in the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, where he placed second in the tower event, behind Italian sport legend Klaus Dibiasi. Two years later, with Dibiasi retired, Louganis won his first world title in the same event with the help of coach Ron O'Brien. In 1978, he accepted a diving scholarship to the University of Miami where he studied theater, but in 1981 transferred to the University of California, Irvine, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts.
Louganis was a favorite for two golds in the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, but an American boycott of the games prevented him from participating. Louganis won two world diving titles in 1982. In the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, with record scores and leads over his opponents, Louganis won gold medals in both the springboard and tower diving events.
After winning two more world championship titles in 1986, he repeated his 1984 feat in the 1988 Seoul Olympics, although not without difficulties: he suffered a concussion after hitting his head on the springboard during the preliminary rounds while performing a reverse 2½ pike. At the time of the incident he did not disclose to the public that he was infected with HIV. It was 1994 when Louganis announce to the world that he was gay. He took part in the 1994 Gay games as a diving announcer as well as putting on a diving exhibition for capacity crowds. In 1995, Louganis cowrote his autobiography, Breaking the Surface, with the assistance of author Eric Marcus. In that book, Louganis detailed a relationship of domestic abuse and rape. It was in that book that he also disclosed to the world that he was HIV positive, having been diagnosed a few months before the Seoul Games. As expected at that time, most of his corporate sponsors dropped him as a client when they heard the news of his HIV status. The exception was swimsuit manufacturer Speedo, who retained him as an endorser of their products until 2007. After his announcement, people in and out of the international diving community began to question Louganis's decision not to disclose his HIV status at the time of his head injury during the 1988 Seoul Olympics. Their concern was that because of the bloody nature of his injury, Louganis placed all of his diving competitors at risk of being exposed to HIV. The United States Olympic Committee expressed great concern about the possibility of HIV exposure. [1]
He completed the preliminaries despite his injury, and went on to repeat a similar dive during the finals, earning the gold medal. In the 10m finals he won the gold medal performing a 3.4 difficulty dive in his last attempt, earning in total 638.61 points, surpassing silver medalist Xiong Ni by only 1.14 points. His comeback earned him the title of ABC's Wide World of Sports "Athlete of the Year" for 1988.
[edit] Personal life
Greg Louganis is openly gay. After he tested positive for HIV in 1988,[2][3] he recounted his story in a best-selling book Breaking the Surface co-written with Eric Marcus. The book spent five weeks at number one on the New York Times Best Seller list. His story was also documented in the 1996 Showtime movie Breaking the Surface: The Greg Louganis Story with Mario Lopez playing the lead and Louganis narrating.
He also produced a video diary called Looking To the Light, which picked up where Breaking the Surface left off. In the years since his diagnosis was made public, Louganis has been an outspoken HIV awareness advocate.
In the late 1980s and 1990s, he took on a number of roles in movies, including Touch Me in 1997 and David Oliveras' debut movie Watercolors in role of Coach Brown, a swimming instructor in a high school.
In September 2000, he appeared on Hollywood Squares as a member of famous Olympic gold medalists "Dream Team", competing in a special week of the nationally-syndicated game show series, broadcast as a tribute to the 2000 Summer Games. The episodes marked the first time that all these champions came together for this kind of television competition.
In the October/November 2010 issue of ABILITY Magazine, Louganis stated that the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy is "absurd," "unconstitutional," and a "witch-hunt." He added that "gay men and women have been serving this country for years. . . [it's] basically encouraging people who are serving our country to lie to each other." [4]
Also in 2012 he appeared in the second to last episode of IFC's comedy Portlandia.
[edit] Dog agility
Louganis currently competes actively in dog agility competitions with his dogs, Dr. Schivago, Captain Woof Blitzer, and Dobby. Most of his current competitors are named for characters in the Harry Potter series.[5] He published his book For the Life of Your Dog co-written with Betty Sicora Siino.
[edit] Coaching
Since November 2010, Louganis has been coaching divers of a wide range of ages and abilities in the SoCal Divers Club in Fullerton, California.[6]
[edit] Filmography
Films in which Greg Louganis has appeared:
- Dirty Laundry (1987) as Larry
- Inside Out III (1992) as Max in the segment "The Wet Dream"
- Breaking the Surface: The Greg Louganis Story (narrator)
- It's My Party (1996) as Dan Zuma
- Broken Record (1997 TV movie) as Coach Hill
- Touch Me (1997) as David
- Watercolors (2008) as Coach Brown
- 30 for 30: "Tim Richmond: To the Limit" (2010)
- Portlandia, season 2/ episode 9, (2012) as himself
[edit] References
- ^ "Error: no
|title= specified when using {{Cite web}}". http://aids.about.com/od/clinicaltrials/a/olympics.htm. http://aids.about.com/od/clinicaltrials/a/olympics.htm.
- ^ "Breaking the Surface" (his book on his life and diving career)
- ^ Times Mirror article: Olympic Diver Louganis Reveals That He Has AIDS
- ^ Cooper, Chet (October/November 2010), "Don't Ask(We Asked), Don't Tell(We Told)", ABILITY Magazine, http://abilitymagazine.com/Greg-Louganis.html
- ^ Zeigler, Mark (June 13, 2009), "Life for Louganis more about dogs than diving", The San Diego Union Tribune, http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/jun/13/1n13louganis00465-life-louganis-more-about-dogs-di/
- ^ Crouse, Karen (Feb 20, 2011), "Louganis is Back on Board", The New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/21/sports/21louganis.html?hp
[edit] External links
| Persondata |
| Name |
Louganis, Greg |
| Alternative names |
|
| Short description |
American college platform diver, international platform diver, Olympic gold medalist |
| Date of birth |
January 29, 1960 |
| Place of birth |
El Cajon, California, United States |
| Date of death |
|
| Place of death |
|
