Nancy Hogshead-Makar


Nancy Hogshead-Makar, J.D., née Nancy Lynn Hogshead, is an American swimmer who represented the United States at the 1984 Summer Olympics, where she won three gold medals and one silver medal. She is currently the CEO of , an organization leading targeted efforts to advocate for equality and accountability in sport. Focus areas include equal play, such as traditional Title IX compliance in athletic departments, sexual harassment, abuse and assault, as well as employment, pregnancy, and LGBT discrimination. In 2012 she began working on legislative changes to assure club and Olympic sports athletes were as protected from sexual abuse. In 2018, the was finally enacted.

Swimming

Hogshead's family is from Iowa. She was born in Iowa City, Iowa but her family moved to Florida shortly afterwards. When she was 11 years old, her family moved to Jacksonville, Florida, where she would meet coach Randy Reese and be exposed to a team oriented towards nationals. By age 12 she had qualified for the U.S. Senior Nationals and held the national age-group record in the 200 individual medley. Her first American Record was in the 100y butterfly in 1977. Nancy left home to train for the 1980 Olympics while still in high school, with the University of Florida swim team, or FAST. She qualified for the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow in the 200m butterfly and the 400m individual medley, but the American-led boycott kept her home.
Duke University offered Hogshead its first swimming scholarship. There, she was again undefeated in dual meets and set a school record in eight different events; one of which stood until 2011. She was a four-time ACC champion and two-time All-American. She is the first woman to be inducted into the .
In 1981, Duke University red-shirted Nancy after she was raped while running between campuses, and suffered from PTSD for several months. In the fall of 1982, her coach enticed her to return to the pool by offering her a scholarship and a position on the team if she merely showed up at the competitions. Entering competitive swimming awakened competitive juices.
In January, 1983, Nancy left Duke to train full-time for the 1984 Olympics in California. This time she switched from butterfly to freestyle. She won additional national titles on her way to qualifying for the 1984 US swimming team.

Olympics

At the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, she won three gold medals and one silver medal, becoming the most decorated swimmer at the Games. She competed in the first event of the Games, the women's 100m freestyle, where she won in a tie-finish, with American teammate Carrie Steinseifer. They were both awarded gold medals. Hogshead also won golds in the 4 × 100 m freestyle and the 4 × 100 m medley teams, and a silver medal in the 200m individual medley.
Her international career started in 1977, at the age of 14, when she broke her first American Record. That year, she was the only American swimmer to be ranked number one in the world in an international event.

Professional career

Hogshead returned to Duke University to finish her undergraduate degree in 1984. During the summer of 1985, Hogshead interned at the Women's Sports Foundation, at the urging of Donna de Varona. The organization had a strong influence on her career direction and she has worked with the organization for thirty years. She served on the board of trustees from 1987 to 1993 and as its President from 1993 to 1994. She was their Legal Adviser from 2003–2010, and was their Senior Director of Advocacy from 2010–2014.
In 2014, Hogshead-Makar founded Champion Women.

Legal career

Hogshead is a high-profile advocate of gender equity in sports and a specialist on Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. After receiving her J.D. degree from Georgetown University Law Center, Hogshead returned to Jacksonville for private practice at Holland & Knight, LLP. She represented student-athletes and universities in Title IX matters.
From 2001 – 2013, Hogshead-Makar was a tenured professor on the faculty at Florida Coastal School of Law in Jacksonville, where she taught first-year torts and sports law courses, including "Gender Equity in Athletics."
From 2004 – 2012 she was the Co-Chair of the American Bar Association Committee on the Rights of Women.
From 2009 – 2013 she was a board member on The Forum for the Scholarly Study of Intercollegiate Athletics in Higher Education, and served on the editorial board of the Journal of Intercollegiate Sport.
Since 2011, she has served as a board member on the Aspen Institute, "Sport and Society".
She was an advisory board member of the 2011 – 2017
From 2007 – 2010, she served on The Florida Governor's Council on Physical Fitness. The council provided Governor Crist with a state plan of action to promote physical fitness and nutrition, particularly among children.
She has been an evaluator for missed drug tests by the United States Anti-Doping Agency from 2003–2014.
She was a founding member of FCSL's Sports Law Center, offering students a certificate in Sports Law program, from 2004 – 2013.
Hogshead-Makar has testified in Congress numerous times and has served on two Presidential committees on gender in sports.
In 2007, she co-edited the book with economist Andrew Zimbalist.
She has written numerous scholarly and lay articles. She is widely quoted and interviewed on topics related to gender equity, including participation, treatment, scholarships, sexual harassment and assault, and pregnancy discrimination.

Personal life

Hogshead married Scott Makar, a fellow lawyer at Holland & Knight, on October 10, 1999, and hyphenated his surname to her maiden name. Her husband served as Florida Solicitor General upon his appointment by Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum in February 2007. He is currently a state appellate judge, serving as a member of the Florida First District Court of Appeal. The couple has a son, Aaron, and twin daughters, Helen Clare and Millicent.

Asthma

During the 1984 Olympics, she missed earning a fifth medal by 7/100th of a second, when she suffered a bronchial spasm that led to a diagnosis of asthma. After the initial disbelief, she accepted her condition and learned to monitor and control it. From 1984–1996, Hogshead-Makar lectured around the world about asthma management. GlaxoSmithKline sponsored her as she spoke to over 100 groups each year across the US and internationally. Hogshead earned the title of National Spokesperson for the American Lung Association. Hogshead authored the 1990 book, Asthma and Exercise, the first comprehensive book on the topic of asthma and sports. The book tells inspirational stories of athletes who learned to manage their condition.

Awards and honors