Laura Cox
Class of 1977
Hometown: Los Alamitos
Current Residence: San Antonio, Texas
While her older sister Lynne may have captured most of the headlines, Laura Cox takes a backseat to nobody regarding her own list of accomplishments – as an athlete, coach and professional medical researcher.
At Los Al, Laura was the first female to win a Varsity letter in any sport — as a member of the swimming and league championship water polo team — which was otherwise all boys at the time. As a swimmer she set school records in the 50 and 200 freestyle.
She continued her athletic success as UC Santa Barbara where she set six school swimming records in her freshman year, and then the next three years at Old Dominion University in Virginia, where she set six more school swimming records and helped lead her team to the national championship meet. She returned to UC Davis where she led the school to two club water polo championships — water polo was not officially recognized by the NCAA until the mid 1990s, and earned All-American and MVP honors in 1983 and All-American honors in 1984. She was also a member of the US National team at tournaments in Berlin, Holland, Malta, Australia and Quebec.
As a coach she has has been an assistant at Washington and Lee University in Virginia, as well as a club swimming coach in Virginia and since 1985 in San Antonio Texas, She is a member of US Swimming’s Age Group Planning Committee, and Sports Science Committee and has chaired a Task Force Committee on Boys in Swimming and an Anti-Doping Advisory Committee. In 2010 she was the recipient of the “Ousley Award” for special service to the American Swimming Coaches Association (ASCA) and the sport of swimming. Specifically, she is being lauded for her work with ASCA on anti-doping.
Away from the pool she is a many times published, very well-respected biomedical researcher, most recently specializing in research into genetics and primate research. Most recently she has been recognized for her studies into the genetics behind cholesterol, hypertension and heart disease.
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