Barbara Jahn
Barbara Jahn

Last College:
UC Santa Barbara '73

Position:
Women's Head Coach

Experience:
37th year


05/02/2012

Fifth Aggie Idol Supports Team Davis

Women's tennis wins in both Group and Individual/Duo categories

Jahn is now in her fourth decade at the helm of the UC Davis women's swimming program, having guided the team from AIAW Division III through the ranks of NCAA Division II to Division I status. Entering her 37th year, she owns the unusual distinction of earning Coach of the Year honors in four different conferences. She captured that award numerous times in the Division II Northern California Athletic Conference, won it again in the team's final year of the multi-divisional Pacific Collegiate Swimming Conference (2003), then garnered similar honors in the last season of the Big West Conference (2010). Most recently, she earned the inaugural award at the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation championship in 2011.

Since the university completed its transition to NCAA Division I, Jahn has guided the Aggies to new levels of success. In 2008-09, the women's team earned a second-place at the Big West Championships, with Heidi Kucera capturing Athlete of the Year accolades. Kucera, in turn, became the first female swimmer of the D-I era to automatically qualify for the NCAA Championships, where she competed in three individual events.

A year later, just the third official year of D-I competition, Jahn led the 2009-10 UC Davis women's swimming program to its first ever Big West Conference championship. Under Jahn's guidance, the Aggie women won six titles at the conference championship en route to a program-best 864 points. 

Then in 2010-11, Jahn mentored UC Davis to eight individual MPSF titles and the team championship. Linda Hermann was selected as Athlete of the Year while Liliana Alvarez - who later competed at the NCAA Championship - was named Freshman of the Year.

During her tenure at UC Davis, Jahn has coached a multitude of All-Americans, including two student-athletes - Anna Pettis and Kristi Wheeler - selected as part of the NCAA Division II swimming team of the decade for the 1980s. Her student-athletes have been widely recognized on the university level as well. Kobayashi won the campus's Hubert Heitman Award for a second time in 2005, becoming the fourth Barbara Jahn protegé to capture the honor as outstanding female athlete of the year. Additionally, three of her swimmers have won the W.P. Lindley Award as the university's top scholar-athlete of the year.

On the vaunted rosters of the Cal Aggie Athletics Hall of Fame, no fewer than four of her student-athletes are listed: Anna Pettis Scott (1991), Kristi Wheeler-Hussain (1993), Jamie McClellan (1999) and Mary E. Fiedler-Althof (2001).

Jahn is a respected member of the faculty at UC Davis, teaching a number of aquatics courses in the exercise biology program.

A 1973 graduate of UC Santa Barbara, Jahn was also a diver for the Gauchos. She received her degree from UCSB in cultural anthropology with minors in ergonomics and coaching.

Jahn earned her master's degree in kinesiology from UCLA in 1975. She and her husband, Tom, reside in El Macero.