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People > Notable Norkans > Jill Sterkel

Jill Sterkel

Jill Ann Sterkel (born May 27, 1961) is an American former competitive swimmer, Olympic champion, and former world record-holder. Sterkel won four medals in three Olympic Games spanning twelve years. She is currently the women's head coach of the Texas Longhorns swimming and diving team at the University of Texas at Austin.
Picture
Photograph of Jill Sterkel courtesy of Jerry Krieger.
Sterkel was born in Hacienda Heights, California. Her father is Jim Sterkel, the namesake of the University of Southern California's Jim Sterkel Court. She graduated from Glen A. Wilson High School in Hacienda Heights. She subsequently attended the University of Texas in Austin, Texas, where she swam for the Texas Longhorns swimming and diving team in the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) and National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) competition from 1980 to 1983. As a senior in 1983, Sterkel won the NCAA national championships in the 50-yard butterfly (24.26 seconds) and 100-yard butterfly (53.54 seconds). She won back-to-back Honda Sports Awards for Swimming and Diving, recognizing her as the outstanding college female swimmer of 1979–80 and 1980–81.
Picture
Photograph of Jill Sterkel courtesy of Jerry Krieger.
Sterkel represented the United States in three Summer Olympics. As a 15-year-old at the 1976 Summer Olympics, she won a gold medal in the women's 4x100-meter freestyle relay with her teammates Kim Peyton, Wendy Boglioli, and Shirley Babashoff. After the U.S. women's team had been outshone in nearly every event by their East German rivals, Peyton, Boglioli, Sterkel, and Babashoff achieved a moral victory by not only winning the relay gold medal but also by breaking the East Germans' world record in the event final. Individually, she competed in two other events, finishing seventh in the 100-meter freestyle and not advancing beyond the preliminary heats in the 200-meter freestyle.

Sterkel qualified again for the U.S. national team at the 1980 U.S. Olympic Trials, but because of the American-led boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics, she could not participate in the 1980 games held in Moscow, Russia.

At the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, California, she swam for the gold medal-winning U.S. team in the preliminary heats of the women's 4x100-meter freestyle. Starting at the 1984 games, relay swimmers who swam in the heats but did not compete in the event finals were eligible to receive medals. As a 27-year-old at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, she again swam for the U.S. team in the preliminary heats of the 4x100-meter freestyle relay and earned a bronze medal for the team's third-place finish.

She was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 2002.

Sources

Wikipedia.com

Texas Swimming and Diving Hall of Fame website (April 2016).

Krieger Jerry. "Olympic Champ Has Norka Roots". Norka Newsletter. Summer 1999.
Last updated December 8, 2023
Copyright © 2002-2025 Steven H. Schreiber
  • Home
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    • A Land of Ethnic Diversity
    • Cottage Industries >
      • Sarpinka
      • Mills
    • Language
    • Population
    • Military Service
    • Crime and Punishment
  • History
    • Timeline
    • Origins of the Colonists
    • Catherine's Manifesto 1763
    • Why go to Russia?
    • Recruitment 1766
    • Planning 1764-1766
    • Marriages Prior To Emigration 1766
    • Voyage to Russia 1766 >
      • Ship Transport 1766
    • Journey 1766-1767
    • Founding of Norka 1767
    • Early Years 1767-1769
    • Norka 1769
    • Pallas Report 1773
    • Pugachev Raid 1774
    • Norka 1775
    • Norka 1798
    • Norka 1811
    • Napoleons Soldiers
    • Norka 1834
    • Daughter Colonies 1850s >
      • Neu-Norka
      • Oberdorf
      • Brunnental
      • Rosenfeld (am Jeruslan)
      • Neu Hussenbach (Gaschon)
    • Privileges Lost 1871-1874
    • Immigration 1875-1924 >
      • To the United States >
        • Colorado
        • Ft Collins Colorado
        • Globeville Colorado
        • Mason City, Iowa
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        • Lincoln, Nebraska
        • Sutton, Nebraska
        • Burlington, Oklahoma
        • Weatherford, Oklahoma
        • Canby, Oregon
        • Portland, Oregon
      • To Canada >
        • Duffield, Alberta
        • Ponoka, Alberta
        • Spruce Grove, Alberta
        • Stony Plain, Alberta
        • Vegreville, Alberta
        • Arcola, Saskatchewan
      • To Germany
      • To South America
    • Famine 1891-1892
    • Norka 1898
    • War & Turnoil 1904-1906
    • World War 1914-1918
    • Revolution & War 1917-1922
    • Soviet Rule 1918-1941
    • Famine 1921-1924
    • Famine 1932-1933
    • The Great Terror 1936-1938
    • Deportation 1941
    • Repression 1941-1956
    • Cultural Loss 1957-2006
    • A Culture in Peril
    • Recent Times
  • Traditions
    • Food and Drink
    • Clothing
    • Holidays >
      • New Year
      • Fastnacht
      • Lent
      • Easter
      • Ascension Day
      • Pentecost
      • Founder's Day
      • Harvest Festival
      • Jahrmarkt
      • Christmas
      • Anniversaries & Birthdays
    • Crafts
    • Games
    • Folk Medicine
    • Superstitions
    • Nicknames
    • Folk Music
    • Church Music
    • Funerals and Burials
  • Religion
    • Planning and History >
      • Norka Reformed Church 1767-1864
      • 1909 Norka Parish Report
    • Pastors >
      • Johann Heinrich Fuchs
      • Johann Georg Herwig
      • Johann Baptist Cattaneo
      • Lukas Cattaneo
      • Emanuel Grunauer
      • Friedrich Börner
      • Christian Gottlieb Hegele
      • Christoph H Bonwetsch
      • Gottlieb N Bonwetsch
      • Wilhelm Staerkel
      • Woldemar Sibbul
      • David Weigum
      • Friedrich Alexander Wacker
      • Emil Pfeiffer
    • Church Practices >
      • Baptism
      • Confirmation
      • Weddings
      • Communion
      • Prayers
      • Parochial Certificates
    • Church Buildings
    • Church Organs
    • Bell Tower
    • Brethren Movement
  • Resources
    • Family Research
    • Research Resources >
      • Arrival Records 1766
      • Descendant Charts
      • German EWZ Records
      • Soviet Gulag Records
    • Maps
    • Glossary
    • Bibliography
    • Periodicals >
      • Die Welt-Post Letters
      • Sonntagsblatt der Omaha Tribune
    • Related Links