Barbara L. Drinkwater

Barbara Lee Drinkwater (November 18, 1926 – September 30, 2019) was an American physiologist who specialized in sports physiology and was the first woman to be president of the American College of Sports Medicine (1988–1989). Prior to that, she also coached the Butler Bulldogs women's basketball team.

Biography Early life and career Barbara Lee Drinkwater was born in Plainfield, New Jersey, on November 18, 1926, and graduated in 1944 from Somerville High School as one of four students selected to speak at graduation ceremonies. After studying at Douglass College (BSc) and University of North Carolina at Greensboro (MSc), she obtained her PhD from Purdue University. (Sources differ as to what field the PhD was in.) Nicole R. Keith says that this was sports psychology,

Academic career As a researcher, Drinkwater specialized in exercise physiology and women's athletic health and, according to the Island Beachcomber, "pioneered research in the field of women's athletics". In December 1975, she told Sports Illustrated that the Fosbury flop, a jumping style used in the high jump, is "no good for women".

Drinkwater worked at the University of California, Santa Barbara Institute of Environmental Stress and the University of Washington Department of Kinesiology, before assuming leadership of the Pacific Medical Center Osteoporosis Research Laboratory She was awarded honorary doctorates of science by De Montfort University in 1999 and by the University of Toronto in 2001. She was the 1989 D.B. Dill Historical Lecturer and the 1994 Joseph B. Wolffe Memorial Lecturer.

She was also one of the founders of Women Sport International, and served as their treasurer and vice-president until 2011. She was a member of the International Olympic Committee Medical Commission's Medical and Scientific Group.

Personal life and death In 1983, she moved to Vashon, Washington, where she later started an animal shelter called Vashon Island Pet Protectors. She was also a camp counselor, licensed to pilot light aircraft, and a scuba instructor, and she played golf and collected rocks as hobbies.

Drinkwater died on September 30, 2019, in Gold Canyon, Arizona.