Sergio
Lopez was named Head Swimming Coach and Aquatics
Director at The Bolles School in 2007. Lopez
guides both the upper school swimming and diving
teams and the Bolles Sharks club program.
Lopez,
a native of Barcelona, Spain, and a 1988 Olympic
bronze medalist in the 200 meter breast stroke,
came to Bolles from West Virginia University where
he served as head coach of the Mountaineers’
men’s and women’s swimming and diving
teams since April 2004.
In
Lopez’s three seasons at WVU, both the men’s
and women’s team continually improved. He
guided the men’s team to its first-ever Big
East Championship in 2007 and was named Big East
Men’s Coach of the Year in 2006 and 2007. The
women’s team had the highest placing in program
history at the Big East Championships in 2007, finishing
third. Under Lopez, West Virginia’s swimming
and diving honors improved from zero to 18 All-American
honors, zero to 31 individual and relay Big East
champions (27 men, 4 women), two Big East men’s
swimmers of the year, and 11 Big East records (8
men, 3 women). During Lopez’s tenure,
West Virginia swimmers have also competed at the
World Championships, U.S. Nationals, European Championships,
World University Games, Mediterranean Games, and
Central American Games. Lopez served as coach
of the Mexican national team at the 2007 World Championships
in Melbourne, Australia.
During
his time in Morgantown, Lopez also founded and directed
West Virginia Aquatics, a USA swim club. Lopez
hired and oversaw a staff of a head coach and five
assistants to guide over 100 registered USA Swimming
members. He also organized swim meets and coordinated
fundraising efforts, helping to foster interest
and awareness of swimming in the community and state.
Prior
to West Virginia, Lopez served as associate head
coach of the Northwestern University swim program
in 2003 and an NU assistant from 2000-03. While
at Northwestern, Lopez helped the Wildcats’
program produce seven All-Americans, eight Big Ten
champions, eight Big Ten championship meet records,
a Big Ten swimmer of the year and a Big Ten freshman
of the year. Under Lopez's guidance, 43 of the school's
56 records were broken over four seasons.
While
at Northwestern, Lopez also served as head coach
of Wildcat Aquatics and Northwestern Aquatic Swimming
Association. He hired and oversaw the head
coach of the program and coached the men and women
during the summer season. He took five swimmers
to the 2004 Olympic Trials and 11 swimmers to the
2002 USA World Swimming Trials.
From
1997-2000, Lopez was head coach at Hillenbrand Aquatics
in Tucson, Arizona, where his responsibilities included
coaching the senior national training group. He
grew the senior-high school program from 12 swimmers
in 1997 to over 100 in the 2000 season.
Lopez
was the technical director at the Cantabric Swimming
Federation in Santander, Spain from 1996-97. In
1995-96, he served as a volunteer coach at Arizona
and in 1994-95 he was also a volunteer coach at
the Honved Swim Club in Budapest, Hungary.
Lopez
earned a National Coaches Title from the Spanish
Swimming Coaches Association in 1995. He holds
a bachelor's degree in independent studies in kinesiology
from American University, graduating in 1992.
Lopez
was a member of the Spanish national team from 1984-96,
joined by Bolles assistant coach Martin Zubero on
the squad. In addition to an Olympic medal,
Lopez won a silver medal in the 1993 world championships
in the 400 medley, has held European and U.S. Open
records in the 200 breast and has held or currently
holds 14 records in Spain, two at Indiana University
where he began his collegiate career, and eight
at American University. Lopez earned nine All-American
honors in the breast, 500 free and intermediate
medley at Indiana and American.
There
have only been three people from Spain winning Olympic
medals in swimming and all three are now employed
at The Bolles School. Joining Lopez in this
honor are Martin Zubero, who won the Gold medal
in the 1992 Olympics and his brother, David, who
brought home the Bronze medal for Spain in 1980.
Lopez
is married to the former Sandy Carlos and they have
two children, Harley (8) and Cobi (6).
