Joe Bottom, Date of Birth, Place of Birth
TweetJoe Bottom
American swimmer, Olympic gold medalist, world champion, former world record-holder
Date of Birth: 18-Apr-1955
Place of Birth: Akron, Ohio, United States
Profession: swimmer
Nationality: United States
Zodiac Sign: Aries 
About Joe Bottom
- Joseph Stuart Bottom (born April 18, 1955) is an American former competition swimmer, Olympic silver medalist, and former world record-holder in the 50-meter freestyle, 100-meter butterfly and 4×100-meter freestyle relay.Born in Akron, Ohio, Bottom moved with his family at age 11 to Santa Clara, California, where he was a member of the Santa Clara Swim Club under noted swim coach George Haines.
- He attended Santa Clara High School, where he contributed to the Panthers numerous California Interscholastic Federation – Central Coast Section championships and set several Section records from 1971–73.Bottom attended the University of Southern California (USC), where he was an All-American swimmer for the USC Trojans swimming and diving team from 1974 to 1977.
- He graduated in 1977 with a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering and was a member of Eta Kappa Nu and Tau Beta Pi.
- In 1977, he was the first swimmer ever to crack 20 seconds in the 50-yard freestyle, at 19.70.
- He held USC's record for 50-yard freestyle until the 2006–2007 season, and has the third fastest 100-yard freestyle and sixth-fastest 100-yard butterfly times in school history.
- He won five NCAA individual and 4 relay titles with the Trojans.
- He was the captain of the 1977 Trojans swim team.
- Known for an easygoing personality, Bottom was a fierce competitor during meets.At the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Bottom won the silver medal in the 100-meter butterfly and came in sixth in the 100-meter freestyle.
- He also won a gold medal as a member of the 4×100-meter medley relay team, swimming in the qualifying round.
- At the prime of his career, he was unable to compete at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow due to the U.S.
- boycott.During the inaugural, 1973 World Aquatics Championships in Belgrade, Bottom took silver in the 100-meter butterfly and gold in both the 4×100-meter freestyle and 4×100-meter medley relay events.
- At the 1978 World Championships in Berlin he took gold in the 100-meter butterfly as well as the 4×100-meter medley relay.
- He won nine U.S.
- national championships between 1974 and 1980.On August 27, 1977, at the East Germany-United States dual meet in East Berlin, Bottom broke Mark Spitz's five-year-old 100-meter butterfly world record with a time of 54.18 seconds.
- The night before the record-setting race, Bottom suffered from insomnia and took a sleeping pill only to oversleep and miss his usual pre-race warmup swim; incredibly, he broke Spitz's record anyway.
- He was also a part of the team that set the new 4×100-meter freestyle relay world record on September 1, 1974.In 2007, Bottom was inducted into the USC Athletic Hall of Fame; several of his records set at USC remain unbroken.
- He was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 2006.Bottom currently resides in Chico, California, where he is a management consultant and serving as Senior Manager in Accenture's Marketing Sciences Practice within the Retail Products Industry.
- His younger brother, Mike Bottom, also swam at USC where he was a three-time All-American (1975–77); Mike is currently one of the world's top sprint coaches and coaches the University of Michigan swim team.
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