Start Swimmin' Trivia Quiz

"Start swimming" probably was said frequently to Lisa Flood, teasing her with her surname. And Lisa did start swimming - rather well. She was born in Scarborough, Ontario in 1971. She studied at Villanova University in Philadelphia, where she was the breaststroke specialist in the swimming team.

She won bronze on the 100m breaststroke and the 200m breaststroke in 1991 at the Panamerican Games. Four years later she would outdo this achievement by winning gold on both events, and adding a silver medal in the 4x100m medley relay. At the Olympic Games, Lisa Flood represented Canada on the 100m breaststroke in 1992 (result: final B, 14th place overall) and in 1996 (result: 10th place overall).

"Start swimming" was an advice Aleksandr Popov followed with all his heart. Hev was born in Sverdlovsk (Russia, at that time USSR) in 1971. Although afraid of water, he started swimming at eight years. At first he concentrated on the backstroke, later switching to freestyle. His first successes in international competitions came at the European Championships 1991 (long course), where he won gold on 100m freestyle, 4x100m freestyle and 4x100m medley.

In 1992 he participated in the Olympic Games in Barcelona. He won gold in the 50m freestyle and the 100m freestyle, thus fulfilling his nicknames "Russian Rocket" and "King of the Short Distance". In the 4x100m freestyle and the 4x100m medley, Popov did not swim in the heats but swam the best time for the Unified Team in the finals. Alas, it was only good enough for two silver medals, as the USA (with Matt Biondi) claimed gold twice.

At the 1996 Atlanta Olympics he once again started in several events. He won gold on the 50m freestyle and the 100m freestyle, and added two more silver medals (4x100m freestyle and 4x100m medley). His last medal at the Olympics was in Sydney in 2000: silver in the 100m freestyle.

"Start swimming" was the advice Franziska von Almsick heard often enough. She was born in 1978 in East Berlin. In 1992 she started her Olympic career, which resulted in a whopping ten medals. Alas, none of them were gold. So you may remember her as the most unfortunate multiple Olympic medal winner. But on the other hand, she amassed 22 gold medals in the European Championships and 4 in the World championships.

At the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, she claimed silver on the 200m freestyle and the 4*100m freestyle. She also won bronze in the 100m freestyle and the 4x100m medley. On to Atlanta 1996 - Von Almsick won another silver medal on the 200m freestyle and added silver on the 4x200m freestyle. She also won bronze in the 4x100m freestyle. At the Sydney 2000 games she added bronze in the 4x200m freestyle. And in Athens 2004 von Almsick won her ninth and tenth Olympic medal: bronze on the 4x100m medley and bronze on the 4x200m freestyle.

"Start swimming" is not the advice Federica Pellegrini needed much - she did do so already at a young age. She was born in 1988 in a small town in the region Venice. At the Athens 2004 games, she won silver in the 200m freestyle. In Beijing 2008 she outdid herself, winning gold in the same event. She would also qualify for the finals on the 200m freestyle for the Olympics in 2012, 2016 and 2020.

She was the first swimmer to win eight medals in a row at the World Championships in the same event: the 200m freestyle. Those eight medals, from 2005 to 2019, were four gold, three silver and one bronze. 

"Start swimming" was not a vain encouragement for Yang Yu. She was born in Hangzhou (China) in 1985 and was selected for the national swimming team in 1999. Her very first medal was in 2000 at the World Championship (Short Course). She won gold on the 200m freestyle. She also competed in the Sydney 2000 Olympics, but did not make the top-16.

At the 2004 Olympics in Athens and 2008 Olympics in Beijing, she was selected for the 4x200m freestyle. On both occasions the Chinese team with Yang Yu finished second, once behind the USA and once behind Australia.

"Start swimming" his parents will have said to Hiroshi Suzuki. And so he did. Suzuki was born in Aichi in 1933. He competed in the Olympic Games in Helsinki in 1952.

In the 100m freestyle, Hiroshi Suzuki and the U.S. swimmer Clark Scholes finished with the same time, 57.4 seconds (at that time, the clocks did not yet register hundredths of a seconds). So the jury had to decide the top two medals. They awarded the gold to Scholes and the silver medal to Suzuki. In the 4x200m freestyle relay, Japan (with Suzuki) claimed another silver medal, second to the USA who swam a world record.

Suzuki won both these events (100m freestyle and 4x200m freestyle) at the Asian Games in 1954. In 1956 Suzuki participated in the Melbourne Olympics, once again in these two events. Alas, he did not win any medal in Melbourne.

"Start swimming" was perhaps the encouragement the crowd had for Eric Moussambani at the 100m freestyle at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney. He was born in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, in 1978. When this country got a wildcard for swimming at the Sydney Olympics, Moussambani taught himself to swim (first in a lake, later in a miniature swimming pool in a hotel) and was selected.

There were in total 74 swimmers, divided over several heats. In one of the heats, Eric Moussambani had to swim against the Nigerian Karim Bare and the Tajik Farkhod Oripov. After false starts, both Bare and Oripov were disqualified, so Moussambani had to swim a qualifying time in an empty pool.

Whilst other heats showed the qualifying time had to be at most 50.38 seconds, Moussambani finished his heat in the Equatorial-Guinean national record of ... 1 minute and 52.72 seconds - more than double the needed qualifying time and almost double the time of the second worst competitor. The race was ultimately won by the Dutch Pieter van den Hoogenband. He subsequently halved his Olympic best; and started coaching the national team in 2012.

"Start swimming" was what Gustavo Borges probably often thought. He was born in 1972 in Ribeirao Preto, in the state of Sao Paulo. His swimming talent was first noticed when he was only nine years old. He started his international career in 1991, with a first set of medals (two gold, two silver and one bronze) at the 1991 Pan American Games. Over the years he would add twelve more Pan American Games medals.

In 1992 Borges competed at the Barcelona Olympics, and won silver on the 100m freestyle. At the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, Borges won bronze on the 100m freestyle and silver on the 200m freestyle. In 2000 he added another bronze Olympic medal, this time in the 4*100m freestyle. The last Olympic Games in which he competed, Athens 2004, gave him no further medals.

"Start swimming" may previously been an important encouragement for Charlene Wittstock, but since 2011 she has a totally different career. She was born in 1978 in Bulawayo (Rhodesia, nowadays Zimbabwe) and the family settled in South Africa. She competed for South-Africa at the Commonwealth games of 1998 and 2002, at the Olympic Games of 2000, and at the All-Africa Games in 1999.

She won three gold medals and one silver medal at the All-Africa Games 1999. In 2011 she married Prince Albert II of Monaco and engaged in humanitarian causes.

She founded the Princess Charlene of Monaco Foundation with as mission prevention of drowning accidents.

"Start swimming" was advice that Dawn Fraser really liked to follow, on the condition that it would be in clean water - she once declared she abhorred dirty water. She was born in the Sydney suburb of Balmain in 1937. She debuted at the Olympic Games in Melbourne 1956, with a gold medal in the 100m freestyle and a silver medal in the 400m freestyle. In addition, she was part of the team that won the 4x100m freestyle.

At the Rome Olympics 1960, she repeated her success on the 100m freestyle; and added two silver medals: the 4x100m freestyle and the 4x100m medley. And in the Tokyo Olympics of 1964, she was the first swimmer to win a third consecutive gold medal on the same event (100m freestyle). She also won a third silver medal in the 4x100m freestyle.