NKY native, Workforce USA Olympics swimming coach Frank Busch dies at 75

By Syedali Mallikar

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Legendary swimming coach Frank Busch has died at age 75, September, 2026


Frank Busch, a legendary swimming coach who bought his begin within the Cincinnati space, died Sunday at age 75.

Busch, a Covington Catholic graduate and former Cincinnati Marlins coach, spent the majority of his profession with USA Swimming and the College of Arizona.

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Busch was Arizona’s head swimming coach from 1989-2011 and led each the Wildcat males’s and girls’s groups to a nationwide championship in 2008. His swimmers gained 49 NCAA particular person titles and 31 NCAA relay titles. He earned NCAA Coach of the Yr honors six instances and was named Pac-12 Coach of the Yr 11 instances. Busch additionally served on the Workforce USA teaching workers for the 2004 and 2008 Summer season Olympic Video games.

He’s a member of the Arizona Sports activities Corridor of Fame, Pima County Sports activities Corridor of Fame and American Swimming Coaches Corridor of Fame.”Coach Busch is a training icon in swimming circles, and his influence stretches all through our sport, from the membership stage to the school stage to the Olympics,” Arizona swimming and diving head coach Ben Loorz mentioned in a press launch. “Our program would not be the place it’s at this time with out the inspiration he created. Our ideas and prayers are together with his household and family members.”

Busch was born and raised in Edgewood, Kentucky, the place he began teaching swimming at age 16 on the Brookwood Swim Membership in Edgewood. He set age-group swimming data there and later set nationwide data whereas swimming for the Cincinnati Marlins. He swam and performed water polo for Loyola College (Chicago) and was inducted into the college’s corridor of fame.

Legendary swimming coach Frank Busch has died at age 75, September, 2026

From 1974 to 1978, he was head coach of the Northern Kentucky Piranhas age-group and senior groups. He then spent a season as an assistant coach for the Cincinnati Marlins in 1979-1980, throughout which era the membership put collectively six swimmers on the 1980 Olympic workforce and had three world swimming data.

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From the 1980-89, he was head coach on the College of Cincinnati, teaching greater than 35 All-Individuals.

In 2011, he turned nationwide workforce director for USA Swimming proper earlier than the 2012 London Olympics, the place he helped coach American swimming icons Michael Phelps and Katie Ledecky. Busch served as USA Swimming’s Nationwide Workforce director from 2011 till 2017, main the U.S. swim workforce to 31 medals on the 2012 Olympics and 33 on the 2016 Video games in Brazil.

Ledecky gained her first gold medal in 2012, crushing Janet Evans’ American mark of 8:16.22 in 800 freestyle, set in Tokyo in 1989.

Busch was quoted in an article that was posted within the Enquirer again then: “It is one of many greatest shocks I’ve ever seen within the Olympics. Stuff like this simply does not occur.”

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USA Swimming posted a tribute to him on its social media, saying, “USA Swimming mourns the passing of Frank Busch, a beloved coach, chief, mentor and good friend whose influence on our sport spanned generations. He devoted his life to swimming and to the folks inside it, leaving an immeasurable influence on athletes, coaches, and the USA Swimming group. Frank might be deeply missed.”

Ledecky shared the put up on Instagram and commented on it, saying “Sending numerous like to Patty and the Busch household. Frank all the time confirmed such care and kindness towards athletes, coaches, and their households. And he all the time knew learn how to encourage us.”

Web sites devoted to swimming have been accumulating tributes posted to him.

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Busch’s son, Peter, shared the information of his loss of life on his Instagram account. He mentioned within the put up that Frank met his spouse, Peter’s mom, Patrice, in faculty at Loyola (Chicago). That they had 5 kids and 7 grandchildren.

Peter wrote a tribute, saying, partly, “(My) dad was a person of religion who firmly believed that God would solely take him when it was his time. I take numerous consolation in understanding that’s the absolute reality … My dad actually was a exceptional man … He touched lots of, if not hundreds of lives as a coach and mentor. My dad was old fashioned. He preached exhausting work and humility. One among his favourite sayings was that the true measure of a person was not the scale of his pockets, however the dimension of his coronary heart.”

This text initially appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: NKY native, Workforce USA Olympics swimming coach Frank Busch dies at 75





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