Two-time U.S. Olympian Steve Clark died on April 14, 2026, according to Swimming World Magazine. He was 82 years old.
Clark won three Olympic gold medals as a relay swimmer at the 1964 Games, competing in finals on the 400 free relay, 800 free relay, and 400 medley relay.
Under modern rules he would have had two more as well, swimming in heats of the 400 and 800 free relays at the 1960 Olympics in Rome, but prelims relay participants didn’t receive medals until 1984.
In 2005, he donated one of his gold medals to his alma mater, Yale.
“The gold is still shiny but the ribbons are as faded as I am,” said Clark at the time. “I don’t want to live on past athletic glory. That’s not the way I was raised, and that’s not why I am giving the medal to Yale. There are a lot of people in our Class who did great things. This is more of a tribute to my coach at Yale, Phil Moriarty, who has been a father figure to me.”
He swam for Yale in the program’s heyday and was a six-time NCAA Champion. That included winning the first-ever NCAA title awarded in the 200 yard freestyle in 1963 after the NCAA swapped it from a 220-yard freestyle.
Steve Clark’s NCAA Titles
- 1963 – 200 free
- 1964 – 100/200 free
- 1965 – 50/100 free, 400 free relay
Clark was a very good short course swimmer in an era before short course World Records were recognized. According to the International Swimming Hall of Fame, he was the first man to go under 21 seconds in the 50 yard free, under 46 seconds in the 100 yard free, and under 1:50 in the 200 yard free.
In long course, he set the World Record in the 100 meter free twice: once in 1961 (54.4) and tying it on a relay leadoff at the 1964 Olympics with a 52.9. The latter record would last for almost three years. That made him the first man under 53 seconds in the 100 meter free.
Clark suffered a case of shoulder tendonitis at the 1964 U.S. Olympic Trials, or else that 100 free might have been an individual gold medal as well.
ISHOF also says he was the first man to break two minutes in the 200 meter free, though the swim was never recognized by FINA as a World Record.
After graduating from Yale, he enrolled at Harvard Law. In 2009 he gave back to the sport by agreeing to serve as the chairman of the group Attorneys for the Promotion and Defense of Swimming, a group assembled to provide legal advice, advocacy, and litigation support, pro bono, for college swimming programs that were being cut.
Clark was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 1966.
Yes, one of the greats! When he was a senior at Los Altos High School (coached by Nort Thornton, later Cal’s great coach), he swam at the 1961 AAU Championships. This was televised by CBS Sports, with topflight announcer Bud Palmer calling the race.
The American record then for the 100 yard free was 48.2. In that race, the freshly-head-shaven Clark went 46.8, thus becoming the first man under 48 and 47 seconds — in the same race! Quite a feat! (Back then, a hand touch on the wall was required on each turn — even on flip turns.)
[If my memory serves me, Don Schollander was the first person to be officially recognized as breaking 2 minutes in the… Read more »
My role model as a young swimmer back in the day…….always very humble.
At an Olympic Club dinner in 1988 at Schroeders Cafe in San Francisco, Nort Thornton was asked by Don Hill, ‘What’s the difference between Steve Clark and Matt Biondi?’ Nort replied, “Six inches in height’.
RIP to a legend
A nice article to a great steward of swimming.
Would be nice if a group of attorneys and high power people would form a modern “Group for Promotion and Defense of Swimming” in this generation.