Patty Caretto

Patricia Sarena Caretto (born January 4, 1951), also known by her married name Patricia Brown, is an American former competition swimmer, 1968 Olympic competitor, and 1964 world record-holder in two distance freestyle events. She is a former world record holder in the women's 800-meter and 1,500-meter freestyle, having set world records in those events on eight occasions.

Patty attended Whittier High School, where she competed with her High School team at least for a year after the Olympics and graduated around 1969, nearing the end of her competitive swimming career. Some of her earliest swimming experience came when she swam with the Whittier Swim Association.

Rosemead, City of Commerce Swim clubs
Her most significant swim training occurred as a young age group swimmer with the highly competitive City of Commerce Swimming Club, in Commerce, California, formerly Rosemead Swim Club under Hall of Fame and future Olympic Coach Don Gambril. Gambrill observed Patty swimming with the Whittier Swim Association, and was able to bring her to his own club. Gambril's Rosemead Swim Club and then City of Commerce Clubs often attended national championships and had an exceptional women's team that included 1964 Olympians Sharon Stouder, Sandy Nitta, and Jeanne Halleck Craig.

1964 World Records
On July 30, 1964, at only 13, Patty set her first two world records at the AAU National Championships at California's Foothill College in Palo Alto. She completed the 1500-meter in 18.30.5, breaking the standing women's record by 13.5 seconds, and then set a new women's world record for the 800-meter free at the same meet with a 9:07.5. Patty was just over 5 feet at 13, and around 100 pounds, but she bettered many of the men's times in the 1500 event at Nationals.

Her trademark competition stroke technique, known as the windmill, included rapid arm strokes with decreased kicks, around two-beats per two strokes. Unfortunately for Patty, an outstanding distance swimmer, her world record breaking events, the 800 and 1500-meter events were not part of Olympic competition in the 1964 Olympics, to be held that summer.

Caretto dominated the 1500-meter event for a number of years, setting three world records in the 1,500-meter freestyle, one in 1964, discussed above, and then subsequent records in 1965, and 1966. An Olympic medal may well have been her legacy, had the 1964 Olympics included the mile, 1500-meter swim. Continuing to demonstrate strengths as a distance swimmer, while swimming for the Commerce Swim Club, she won the AAU outdoors in the 1,500m or 1,650y freestyle in 1964 through 66, and won the AAU indoor 500-yard freestyle in 1965.

Patty did not qualify in the September, 1964 Olympic trials in New York, because she failed in the 400-meter qualifier against three world record holders. The shorter distance did not suit her distance swimming strengths.

Olympic trials
In the late August 1968 Olympic Trials in Los Angeles, Patty received a 9:18.5 in the 800-meter freestyle qualifier, placing her 8.1 seconds behind first place Debbie Meyer, a California-based swim athlete who was coached by Sherm Chavoor at the Arden Hills Swim Club in Sacramento. To beat Patty, Meyer swam a 9:10.4, which bettered Meyer's own pending world record of 9:17.8, and smashed her formerly standing 1968 record of 9:22.9. Meyer, who also set world records in the 200 and 400-meter swims, dominated the trial's distance events. Though Patty's time was 4.4 seconds faster than Debbie's former standing world record set in 1968, it could not better Debbie Myer's new world record times.

1968 Olympics
Later in October, after travelling to the '68 Olympics in Mexico City as a 17-year-old, Patty placed fifth in the final of the women's 800-meter freestyle, despite a high American ranking in the event. According to a Los Angeles Times account, she had been struggling with illness during that time. By 1968, longer distances in practices for women training for distance events had become more common in America, and Patty had stiff American competition. Her time of 9:51.3 was 12.7 seconds behind the time of bronze medalist Maria Ramirez of Mexico, who may have benefitted from training at higher altitude during much of her swimming career. Though the American women's team had trained for altitude at Colorado Springs, the Mexico City altitude affected the times of all the American women swimmers in the event. Debbie Myer finished 13 seconds behind and Pam Kruse finished 15 seconds behind her respective time in the 1968 Los Angeles Trials the prior month. Affected by altitude, fatigue, and recent illness, Patty finished a full 30 seconds behind her former qualifying time at the 1968 Los Angeles Trials the previous month. The American women's team was strong that year, and Debbie Meyer's time still set an Olympic record, with Americans taking three of the top five places.

Long Beach State College
Around 1969, Patty attended Long Beach State College, where she swam for one year, under the management of her former coach Don Gambril, who began his coaching there in 1967. Patty also swam some with the Phillips 66 Swim Club under Gambril in her later competitive years.

Post-Olympics
Caretto married her Cal State Long Beach classmate, in 1971. She taught physical education to students with motor-skill or learning disabilities in Garden Grove Unified School District in California and married Sam Brown, her second husband. The couple had two children.

Caretto was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame as an "Honor Swimmer" in May, 1987.