As a 9-year-old, Caulkins had been preparing as a swimmer for barely a year when she viewed the 1972 Munich Olympics on TV, and concluded that she needed to swim in the Olympics and win a gold medal.[5] In a 1997 meeting, Caulkins acknowledged her Olympic dream as her motivation and motivation.[5]

Thirteen-year-old Caulkins contended in her first U.S. national swimming titles in 1976. After a year, she came back to the 1977 U.S. Short-Course Championships to set U.S. records in the 200-yard and 400-yard singular variety events.[6] She set a third U.S. record while completing second behind Canadian swimmer Robin Corsiglia in the 100-yard breaststroke.[6]

At 15 years old, Caulkins won five gold awards and a silver decoration at the 1978 World Championships in West Berlin.[7] She won the 200-meter singular variety, the 400-meter singular mixture, and the 200-meter butterfly, and was an individual from the triumphant U.S. groups in the 4×100-meter mixture transfer, and the 4×100-meter free-form relay.[7] simultaneously, she set four world records and one American record.[7] Largely because of her execution in Berlin, Caulkins won the 1978 James E. Sullivan Award, given by the Amateur Athletic Union in acknowledgment of the most extraordinary American beginner competitor of the year.[8][9] At 15 years of age, she was the most youthful ever beneficiary of the Sullivan Award.[10]

She took after her World Championship accomplishment with a progression of overwhelming completions in U.S. rivalry. At the 1979 U.S. Short-Course Championships in East Los Angeles, California, she set five U.S. records in the 100-yard breaststroke, 500-yard free-form, the 400-yard singular mixture, the 200-yard singular variety, and the 100-yard free-form on the main leg of the 400-yard relay.[11] She likewise helped her club group, Nashville Aquatic, win the 400-yard mixture hand-off and put second in the 800-yard free-form relay.[11] Despite setting the new records, notwithstanding, she was not getting it done; she was experiencing the delayed consequences of a viral infection.[11] Three months after the fact, she won four gold awards and two silvers at the 1979 Pan American Games in San Juan, Puerto Rico.[12]

Following her gold-award execution at the 1978 World Championship, Caulkins was required to win various decorations at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, Russia,[4][13] and met all requirements to contend in five individual occasions at the U.S. Olympic Trials, and likely would have been chosen as an individual from one of the transfer groups as well.[14] However, the U.S. Olympic group boycotted the 1980 Games at the command of U.S. President Jimmy Carter, following the Soviet Union's 1979 attack of Afghanistan. Caulkins' fantasy of Olympic gold was conceded by war and legislative issues, so she discreetly looked forward to 1984.[4][15]

As a 18-year-old secondary school senior, she set four American short-course records at the 1981 U.S. Short-Course Championships in Cambridge, Massachusetts.[16] In every one of the four occasions, she bettered her own beforehand set American record: the 100-yard breaststroke, 200-yard backstroke, the 200-yard singular variety, and the 400-yard individual medley.[16]

" She's the best swimmer that has ever been up until now, men or women. "

— Randy Reese, University of Florida and U.S. Olympic

Amusements swim mentor, on Tracy Caulkins, [17]

Throughout the following three years, Caulkins kept up her preparation regimen while going to the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida, where she swam for mentor Randy Reese's Florida Gators swimming and plunging group in National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) rivalry from 1982 to 1984.[18] Caulkins took after her more established sister Amy to the University of Florida, where Amy was at that point a set up individual from the Florida Gators swim team.[3][18] With Caulkins driving the route as a first year recruit, the Gators won the NCAA group title in 1982; the Gators completed second in 1983 and third in 1984.[18] Individually, in three years as a Gator swimmer, she won sixteen NCAA titles and twelve Southeastern Conference (SEC) singular titles, and got twenty-one All-American honors.[18] She was the SEC's Female Swimmer of the Year in 1983 and 1984, and was perceived as the SEC's Female Athlete of the Year in 1984.[18] She was the beneficiary of the Honda Sports Award for Swimming and Diving for three continuous years, perceiving her as the exceptional school female swimmer of the year.[19]

At the 1982 U.S. Short-Course Championships in Gainesville, the 19-year-old again won national titles in the 200-yard backstroke, 400-yard singular mixture, the 200-yard singular variety, and the 100-yard breaststroke.[20] With thirty-nine national titles to date, Caulkins outperformed the amazing Johnny Weissmuller's record aggregate of thirty-six.[20]

Indeed, even as she kept on winning against individual Americans in 1982 and 1983, in any case, she was drooping and falling behind her universal competition.[17] She set no new global records, and was progressively disappointed with her own particular performances.[17][21] At the 1982 World Championships in Guayaquil, Ecuador, she completed an inaccessible third in both the 200-meter and 400-meter singular mixture occasions against her East German rivalry, and neglected to put in the third occasion in which she was entered.[17] At the 1983 U.S. Long-Course Championships in Fresno, California, she completed five seconds slower than her own American record in the 400-meter singular mixture and completed second behind Mary T. Meagher in the 200-meter butterfly.[21] At the 1983 Pan American Games in Caracas, Venezuela, held later that month, she moreover won her two mark occasions in the 200-meter and 400-meter singular variety, however did not approach her very own bests.[17]

A short time later, Caulkins rededicated herself to mentor Randy Reese's thorough preparing methods.[17] In a global invitational meet of 26 countries held in Austin, Texas in January 1984, she crushed her East German adversaries in both individual mixture events.[22] At the NCAA national titles later that spring, she won four individual titles in the 200-and 400-yard individual varieties, 100-yard breaststroke, and 200-yard butterfly, and was an individual from the Gators' triumphant hand-off groups in the 4×100-yard and 4×200-yard free-form events.[18] She set new NCAA records in three occasions, and another American record in the 200-yard individual medley.[18]

At the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, California, Caulkins filled in as the skipper of the U.S. ladies' swim team,[23] lastly understood her youth long for winning an Olympic gold award. On July 29, she won her first gold decoration in the 400-meter singular variety, beating Australian Suzie Landells by more than nine seconds.[24] On August 3, she won her second gold award in the 200-meter singular mixture with an Olympic record time of 2:12.64, besting individual American Nancy Hogshead by more than over two seconds.[25] And later that same day, she won her third gold decoration by swimming the breaststroke leg as an individual from the triumphant U.S. group in the 400-meter mixture hand-off, together with colleagues Theresa Andrews (backstroke), Mary T. Meagher (butterfly), and Nancy Hogshead (freestyle).[26][27] She additionally completed fourth in the 100-meter breaststroke, one moment behind champ Petra van Staveren.[28]

Caulkins finished her opposition swimming profession having set five world records and sixty-three American records, and having won forty-eight national title titles.[23][29]