Kathy Fish and Nic Fink have been voted by the House of Delegates to open seats in the USA Swimming Board of Directors at Saturday’s Annual Business Meeting in Denver. There were only two seats on the 15 seat board up for a vote this year.
Fish retains her seat, as an at-large, independent director. She was voted in over Mike Donadio, the General Counsel of the NHL’s Pittsburgh Penguins; and Joe Crowley, a former member of the U.S> House of Representatives.
The vote was a referendum on the idea that swimming people should be running the organization. Neither Donadio’s nor Crowley’s bios mention swimming once. Crowley’s children used to swim, while Donadio played tennis at Union College.
Fish, meanwhile, will serve a second four year term. She swam for the Michiana Marlins as a kid and for the varsity team at Michigan State before the program was cut a few years back. She spent 20 years as a swim parent, was President of the Cincinnati Marlins club, and chaired the ‘A Matter of 50 Meters’ initiative that got the 50 meter pool built in Mason, Ohio.
Outside of swimming, she led the innovation program at P&G, the world’s largest consumer brands company and a department with a $2 billion budget.
She served as a vice-chair during her first term on the board.
Fink won over Andrew Seliskar for the open “10-year athlete” seat. Nominees for this USOPC-mandated seat must have represented the United States in the Olympics, Paralympics, Pan American Games, Parapan American Games, World Championships, or another event designated by the USOPC and USA Swimming as an elite-level event within the previous 10 years.
Fink, who competed collegiately at the University of Georgia, has had a late-breaking international career. He made his first Olympic Team in 2021, competing for the first time at age 28, and won his first Olympic medals in 2024 at age 31, winning gold in the mixed medley relay, silver in the 400 medley relay, and silver individually in the 100 breaststroke.
He has achieved most of his big career milestones internationally while working as an engineer.
Seliskar, meanwhile, swam collegiately at Cal, winning NCAA titles in the 200 IM, 200 free, and 200 breaststroke as a senior in 2019.
He began representing the US internationally in high school. That included racing at the 2013 World Junior Championships, winning gold in the 200 fly. He also has gold medals from Junior Pan Pacs, the World University Games, and Pan Pacs, plus a bronze medal in the 800 free relay at the 2019 World Championships.
He retired from competitive swimming in 2022 and took a job as a business analyst at McKinsey & Company.
Fink joins Anthony Ervin, Natalie Coughlin, Ashley Twichell Wall, and Maya DiRado Andrews as athlete representatives on the Board of Directors. He replaces the seat previously held by Katie Meili.
This is a Mess
You would think that having someone like Kathy Fish, that is brilliant and accomplished, in the swimming and the professional business world, would be able help to lead this terrible and dysfunctional organization into better times. Unfortunately, I have my doubts. It’s hard for one person to make a real difference in a den of snakes!
No complaints with either of these. I do wonder if there would be much benefit to having a former politician with government connections on the board.
It’s good to see the other types of people interested though with varied background though there has to be former swimmers or people with swimming ties either in politics or high level execs that could meet the desired resume when the next seats open.
Does anyone know of C level execs that are former swimmers or have kids that are currently or former swimmers?
Kevin Thompson
Bryan Jones
I could be wrong, but I think Bryan previously served several years on the board as an athlete rep. I don’t know if any former athlete reps have ever come back and served on the board in another capacity. I also don’t know if he’d ever want the job, but I could see Bryan as a good guy to lead the organization. Dude is brilliant.
David Berkhoff was Athlete’s Vice President, then came back to the board as a Coach memeber
Justin or Victoria Gmelich