When a person thinks about Australia and its national sport, near the top of that list is almost always swimming. Why? That’s because Australia has a rich and decorated history in the pool. Our biggest rival in that department is the USA.
The USA men’s swimming team has an extraordinary record in the pool and have dominated at the Olympics. They have won a total of 281 medals (127 Gold, 91 Silver and 63 Bronze) with their closest competitors being Australia only 98 medals in total. (31 Gold, 31 Silver and 36 Bronze). The United States have been so dominated in the pool that if you combine all the gold medals won by the top 13 counties, the USA still has more.
A major reason the USA is so successful is because of their college system. The most successful Division I swimmers are often the swimmers you see winning these gold medals. The competition is divided into two major categories, individual events and relays. In the individual events, there are five types of races; freestyle, backstroke, butterfly, breaststroke and individual medley events (all four strokes in one race). There are also two major types of relays; freestyle relays or medley relays.
The school with the most championships is unsurprisingly Michigan who is responsible for the greatest Olympian of all time, Michael Phelps. They have won 12 National Championships but are closely followed by Ohio State University and the University of Texas on 11, USC on nine titles and Stanford University and Auburn University on eight championships each.