Rusty Wailes

Rusty Wailes is one of the few American rowers to have won two gold medals. The first came in 1956 when he rowed on the Yale eight that won the Olympic Games. He graduated from Yale in 1958, but helped their varsity eight to victories in 1957 and 1958 both at the Eastern Sprints and at the Harvard-Yale Regatta. In 1959, rowing for the Lake Washington RC, he teamed up with Ted Nash, John Sayre,and Jay Hall to win a gold medal in the fours without at the Pan-American Games. The following year, at the Rome Olympics, Dan Ayrault replaced Hall in the four, but they again won a gold medal.