Macalester College Athletics

The 2010-11 season marks Bob Pearson’s 22nd year at the helm of  Macalester’s swimming teams.  The programs have shown steady improvement since Pearson’s arrival.  Since the fall of 1989, Macalester aquatics teams have recorded 168 school records while garnering 69 all-conference and 21 All-America selections. 

Prior to coming to Macalester, Pearson spent three years as the head coach of the St. Anthony Swim Club and two years as a special assistant with Northern Lights Aquatics.  During those stints Pearson’s swimmers turned in Zone, Junior National and National Age Group Top-16 times.  He then moved on to Columbia Heights High School and took the team to three straight winning seasons with a program that had not won more than two meets in a season.

Pearson is also very involved in shaping the future of swimming.  He is currently serving on the Board of Directors for the College Swimming Coaches Association of America (CSCAA), the oldest organized coaching group in the United States.  Pearson is also a former member of the NCAA Swimming and Diving Rules Committee (Chair from 2005-07), and  is active in USA Swimming as a member of the Safety Education Committee, which he chaired from 2001-2003, and is a long-time member of the Minnesota Swimming Board of Directors.

In May '06, Pearson was presented the Richard E. Steadman Award at the College Swimming Coaches Association of America (CSCAA) annual awards banquet. This award is conferred annually to a swimming or diving coach in high school, club or university ranks, who, in the opinion of the International Swimming Hall of Fame, the CSCAA Forum and the CSCAA, has done the most to spread happiness in Coach Steadman's beloved sport of swimming and diving.

Pearson has been a featured speaker at many local, regional and national coaches clinics and has been a regular contributor to publications such as Poolside Magazine.  Coach Pearson played a key role as the head counselor at both the Stanford and UCLA Swim Camps, and more recently as the founder of the Macalester Swim Camp.  He has also been a featured guest clinician at Nike Swim Camps across the country.

Coach Pearson has been named MIAC Coach of the Year five times and is a life-long resident of Minnesota.   He graduated from Anoka High School in 1981 and then went on to Hamline University, where he was an all-conference swimmer, earning a B.A. in 1985.  Pearson has since completed a Master’s in Athletic Administration at the University of St. Thomas.