The SwimSwam Podcast

Rex Maurer is coming off of the meet of is career, going 6-for-6 in lifetime bests across freestyle, backstroke, and IM events. This of course was highlighted by a 4:04.45 in the 500 free, which broke the hours-old American record set my his Texas training partner, Carson Foster. Maurer gives perspective on why he left Stanford to come to Texas, what training with Bob Bowman is like, and how the longhorns look to approach the rest of the NCAA season.

SwimOutet.com launched their Tech Suit Review November 19th. Joining me on the SwimSwam Podcast to breakdown the behind the scenes process we have Olympian and 3x World Championships medalist Mary-Sophie Harvey, and we have the Director of Social Media & Influencer Marketing Reese Gonzales. All of the major tech suit brands were tested. How the elite swimmers, on behalf of SwimOutlet.com, maintained an unbiased opinion providing their essential feedback is interesting--adding clarity and insight to anyone making the decision to invest in their racing swim-tech. I hope you enjoy the pod!

Today on the SwimSwam Breakdown, we are talking Mid-Season weekend and Golden Goggles.

Today on the SwimSwam Breakdown, we have a mid-mid-season check-in, dissecting the swims we've seen so far from the Mid-Season meets across the country.

Cumulatively, over the 3 stops of the 2024 World Cup circuit, Kate Douglass and Regan Smith broke 5 worlds records, 11 American records, and earned over $330,000. And they did it all for the plot. Even though the duo planned to attend the World Cup together months in advance, neither had many expectations going into the series after taking substantial time out of the pool following the Olympic Games in Paris. Both Smith and Douglass' number one priority was enjoying their time together and rolling with whatever was thrown their way, which ended up being quite a lot. However, the Olympic champions took what came to them in stride, improving at each of the three stops and ending the series as the top two performers and money earners.

Freshman Erika Pelaez showed out in her first official dual meet with NC State last week against Arizona State. Not only did she win every event she participated in, but in her first individual race, the 200 free, she broke an NC State school record, clocking a 1:43.14. Pelaez shares her perspective on what has gone so well for her at NC State so far as well as what her summer was like competing for Team USA at the Jr Pan Pacific Championships in Australia.

This week on the SwimSwam Breakdown, we are discussing the World Cup, the Texas vs Indiana Dual Meet, and Michael Andrew training at Arizona State.

At the NC State-Arizona State dual meet last weekend, wolfpack freshman Leah Shackley won the 100 back in dominant fashion, touching in 50.40. This not only cleared the field by over .4 but it also earned her an Individual NCAA 'A' cut, making her one of four women to achieve that feat thus far this season. Shackley speaks on what has been going so well for her at NC State so far and how she has adjusted to the training in Raleigh.

Tatjana Smith (Schoenmaker) is a 4x Olympic medalist, 2x Olympic champion, and South Africa's most decorated Olympian in history. After winning gold and silver in Paris, Smith announced that she would retire from competitive swimming. Smith sat down with SwimSwam to share how her retirement came about and what it has been like for her so far. The breaststroke specialist gets raw about the highs and lows of stepping away from a sport that has been such a big part of her life for well over a decade.

After breaking the world record in the 50m butterfly (SCM), Noe Ponti sat down with SwimSwam to discuss his experience at the world cup so far. After placing 4th and 5th in the 100 and 200 butterfly at the Paris Olympics, Ponti took a long break from the pool before returning to training. At present, he is mentally relaxed and it seems to have an effect on him physically as well. Not only did Ponti break the world record in the 50 fly in Shanghai, he also won the 100 fly in Shanghai and in Incheon, losing his goggles in the latter but still prevailing.

Today on the SwimSwam Breakdown, we are discussing all things college swimming... plus Kate Douglass's world record in Incheon.

Malmsten COO Christian Malmsten details his family's long history of support providing lane lines for Olympic swimming competitions going back to the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal. Malmsten supplies lane lines for the recent Pairs Olympic Games, and Malmsten will supply lane lines for the upcoming 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.

This week on the SwimSwam Breakdown, we are discussing the ridiculous weekend of SCM racing that included the World Cup stop in Shanghai and the Virginia-Florida NCAA dual meet.

After breaking his neck 6 months before the competition and then contracting COVID during the competition, Zac Stubblety-Cook still walked away from the Paris Olympic Games with a silver medal in the 200 breast. The Australian breaststroke specialist takes us through his whirlwind Olympic saga, what kept his head level through all of it, and how he's running a coffee business on the side.

At the tender age of 15, Australia's Tim Hodge participated in his first Paralympic Games in Rio. 5 years later in Tokyo, he was chasing gold and came close, leaving Japan with 2 silver medals a 1 bronze. In Paris, after breaking a world record and becoming World champion in 2022 and 2023 in the 200 IM S9, Hodge finally touched the wall first, winning gold in his signature event. Speaking with SwimSwam, Hodge documents the work he put in and changes he made from 2021 to 2024. From switching coaches to racing the 400 free, it was all worth it for the Para athlete who is now on top of the world.

Claire Weinstein had a whirlwind summer that saw her win medals at both the Olympic Games and Jr Open Water World Championships. The new high school graduate takes us through dealing with sickness throughout the Olympic Trials and training camp, winning her first Olympic medal, and competing in (and winning) the 3k knockout sprint in Italy.

In the span of 2 years (2021-2023), Maggie MacNeil won essentially every major title in swimming that she could: Olympic Champion, World Champion (LCM and SCM), NCAA Champion, Commonwealth Games Champion, Pan American Champion, and world record holder. Last week, following the 2024 Paris Olympics, MacNeil announced she was retiring from competitive swimming. Speaking on the SwimSwam Podcast, MacNeil said she was ready to pursue other things in life and knew even before the 2024 Paris Olympics that retirement was on the horizon for her. MacNeil will look to pursue law school starting in the fall of 2025, with potential internships abroad occupying her first 6 months of next year. Currently, she is working on a 6-week intensive LSAT course. Listen as the Canadian swim star reflects fondly on her time in the pool and dives into some of her favorite moments throughout the last 5 years.

This week on the SwimSwam Breakdown, we discuss the upcoming Shanghai World Cup, the NCAA landscape, and WADA losing over 2,000 drug tests.

After coming off of a sensational NCAA season, Josh Liendo kept his momentum rolling in Paris, walking away with a silver medal in the 100 fly. The Canadian sprint star was also a part of a podium that featured 2 Canadians, himself and Ilya Kharun in the 100 fly, which is the first time that has happened since 1976. Liendo breaks down his performances in Paris, revealing how he approached his program from a mental and physical standpoint. He talks about technique in butterfly and freestyle and what changes he felt were integral to earning his spot on the podium. The Florida junior also previews the coming NCAA season, noting that we may see him competing in a 200 IM or 200 fly at a dual meet or mid-season competition.

On the eve of the 2024 Australian Short Course Nationals, Olympic champion Lani Pallister was kind enough to sit down with SwimSwam and discuss her last 8 weeks of swimming and life. Pallister admitted that she pushed through the urge to take a break from training after Paris to prepare to compete in the Surf Lifesaving as well as Short Course World Championships (via AUS short course nats). On Day 1 in Adelaide, Pallister hit a lifetime best in the 200 free (1:52.73) to win the event. After 20 minutes of talking short course swimming, potato sack racing, and the weather in Australia, Pallister dives into her experience in Paris. After qualifying for 3 individual events, Pallister ended up dropping 2 of them. Her coach, MIchael Bohl, advised dropping the 400 free to conserve her energy for the 800/1500 frees, then she contracted COVID, which led her to drop the 1500 free a few days later. Pallister bounced back in time for the 4x200 free relay, where she swam prelims, earned a spot in finals, and swam a key leg in the final to help Australia earn their first gold in the event since 2008.

Todd DeSorbo is fresh off serving as Team USA's head women's coach for swimming at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris. The UVA head coach reflects on training camp, the Olympic Village, and the Games themselves, happy with the overall performance of the team and himself. DeSorbo also discusses the NCAA realm, including how he's navigating recruiting in the new NIL landscape and what the Virginia team has in store for this fall.

Florent Manaudou has medaled in the last 4 Olympic 50 Freestyles, winning gold in 2012, silver in 2016 and 2020, and now bronze at his home Olympics in Paris. It hasn't been an easy path for the sprint legend though. Florent starts by speaking honestly about his emotional highs and lows coming off of the Olympics. He is already back in the pool training with the goal of competing at the 2024 Short Course World Championships and ultimately the 2026 European Championships in Paris. He goes on to recount his 2023-24 season leading up to the Paris Olympics. Manaudou admits he had been miserable for much of his career, only focusing on the outcome of his performances and diving into a depression when they didn't go his way. This year, Manaudou took more ownership of his swimming, doing what he wanted in and out of the pool to keep his body and brain healthy and happy.

After only swimming in relay prelims at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Mollie O'Callaghan has been on an absolute warpath on the international swim stage since, capping it off by winning individual gold in the 200 free and relay gold in the 4x100 and 4x200 free relays in Paris. Just before Tokyo in 2019, O'Callaghan had considered herself primarily a backstroke swimmer who swam sprint freestyle. But as she's progressed under coach Dean Boxall, she's dipped her toes more and more into mid-distance freestyle training and racing. That was highlighted last year at the 2023 World Championships, where she won a world title in the event and broke a 14-year-old world record. Listen to how O'Callaghan reflects on her progression in the pool over the last 5 years and her experience in Paris.

Katharine Berkoff secured her spot in Olympic history by contributing to a USA 2-3 finish in the women's 100 back, earning a bronze medal with her third-place finish. The 25x NCAA All-American also earned Olympic gold as a member of the 400 medley relay prelims team. For Katharine, making her first Olympic team was a generational accomplishment, as her father, David Berkoff, was not only her inspiration growing up but also an Olympic swimmer in his own right. After the Paris Games, father and daughter got the Olympic rings tattooed on them.

Carson Foster finished his summer as a first-time Olympian and a 2x Olympic medalist. Returning to Austin this fall, Foster is going through a ton of change. His longtime coaches at Texas, Eddie Reese and Wyatt Collins, are now replaced by Bob Bowman and his staff. In his personal life, Foster just married his longtime partner, Meredith, and is now living with her. SwimSwam spoke with the world champion about his whirlwind summer and all the changes he's adapting to now in Austin.

Torri Huske finished 4th in the 100 fly at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo. A year later, she won the world title in the same event. At the next year's world championships after taking on an extreme course load at Stanford, still managed a bronze in the event. And finally, in Paris, Huske topped the podium once again... plus much, much more. It's no exaggeration to say the Paris Olympics was Torri's best international competition to date. Not only did she score gold in the 100 fly (55.5), but she also won silver in the 100 free (52.5) and as a part of the 400 free relay (52.0) as well as gold in the mixed 400 medley relay (Free, 51.8) and 400 medley relay (Free, 52.4). Huske breaks down the training she did leading into the Games, how her less-than-ideal experience last summer helped her learn moving into this year, and what she did to improve her relay starts.

Olympic champion Lydia Jacoby recently announced her decision to forego her remaining 2 years of NCAA eligibility and transition to being a professional athlete. Jacoby will continue to pursue her degree in fashion at Texas and for the time being, train in Austin. However, this will allow her more flexibility to travel, rest in the fall, and compete in events like the World Cup and Pro Swim series. Jacoby openly discusses her decision in addition to her summer of travel, going to New York Fashion Week, and what her swimming might look like moving forward.

Antonio Lutula has been the head coach at the Swedish National Centre in Stockholm since January 2022 and has already accomplished what many coaches wait a lifetime for. He led sprinting superstar Sarah Sjostrom to Olympic gold in both the 50 and 100 freestyle in Paris, her first Olympic titles in both events. Lutula discusses what coaching at the National Centre is like, why Sarah Sjostrom has been so consistent in racing, and what were the keys to winning gold in Paris.

Fresh off of leading Arizona State to its first NCAA team title in program history, Bob Bowman announced he would be leaving to head up the swim and dive program at Texas. A number of athletes left Arizona State following this announcement, either to follow Bob Bowman to Austin or pursue their swimming at other programs. One athlete who had trained under Bowman and was expected to follow him (from the outside) was freshman Ilya Kharun. The Canadian national had seen vast improvement under Bowman in just one year, capping his season with an NCAA title in the 200 fly. However, having built a life and community in Tempe already, Kharun opted to stay and train under newly named head coach and ASU alum Herbie Behm. It seemed to work for the rising sophomore, as he qualified for his first Canadian Olympic team and left Paris with 2 bronze medals in the 100 and 200 fly. In this podcast, Kharun discusses his decision to stay at ASU, what training with coach Behm has been like, and how he managed his event load in Paris and wound up on the podium twice.

Hunter Armstrong was one of the more surprising narratives from Team USA at the 2024 Olympic Games. While the former world record holder in the 50 back narrowly missed the final of the 100 back, his freestyle seemed to more than make up for it. He split 46.7 to help the men win the 400 free relay then was given anchor duty on the 400 medley relay, where he split 47.1 and touched for 2nd. In this discussion, Amrstrong doesn't hold back about a number of topics. He's describes losing his grandfather (Cancer), primary coach (Matt Bowe, moved from Cal to Michigan), and girlfriend (break up) all in the span of 8 months and the depression that sent him into. This caused Armstrong to routinely miss practice and not be at his best in training during the spring of 2024. Armstrong also speaks on wanting to be on the 800 free relay in Paris, being afraid of racing backstroke, and being a volunteer swim teacher for special needs children. This is a can't miss discussion with one of Team USA's best athletes.

Ben Proud had won every accolade out there in the 50m free: LCM World title, SCM world title, Commonwealth champion, European champion. But in Paris, he finally earned an individual Olympic medal, touching second for silver. Ironically, it came at a point in his career when he wasn't focused on the result of the race. After Tokyo, Proud almost stepped away from swimming entirely. He knew something about his approach to swimming had to change and it did in 2022. In the last two years, Proud has loved swimming and now feels he can continue on for at least through the end of 2025.

In just 12 months, Hubi Kos became a world champion, NCAA champion, European champion, and finally Olympic champion, taking gold in Paris in the men's 200 back. With Leon Marchand as his training partner and Bob Bowman as his coach, Kos has made great strides in the pool over the last 18 months since he's lived in the US. Kos explains that Bowman obviously knows how to train athletes bodies but what really sets him apart is how he prepares his athletes mentally. Because of the rigorous challenges Bowman puts his athletes through on a daily basis in practice, Kos says it makes navigating the Olympic Games feel easy.

Thomas Nguyen is best known now for being a contestant on the 21st season of The Bachelorette. But before that, he was an NCAA DII All-American for Florida Southern and trained with SwimAtlanta in hopes of representing Vietnam in the 2016 Olympic Games. Listen to what Nguyen has to say about his experience in the dating and swimming pools over the last few years.

Hong Kong's Siobhan Haughey showed out in Paris, winning bronze medals in the 100 and 200 freestyles, both of which were the fastest fields in history. That put Haughey's overall Olympic medal count at 4 (after winning double silver in Tokyo), making her the most decorated Olympian in Hong Kong's history. The world champion and NCAA All-American joined the SwimSwam podcast to discuss her experience in Paris, her iconic partnership with Chanel, and having no real training base but still staying at the top of her game.

"It’s extremely challenging to help swimmers develop skills that win races. It’s overwhelming trying to teach skills to each and every athlete, particularly when it seems like no one is listening. And everything that’s learned seems to disappear once it’s time to start training, or when it really counts in championship races that matter. The solution isn’t to get better at what you’re doing. You don’t need new drills, you don’t need new cues, and you don’t need an expensive video system. You need a different approach." Listen to how coach Andrew Sheaff is changing how he looks at teaching and learning for both swimmers and coaches.

10-time Olympic swimming medalist Caeleb Dressel is happy to be back on his Florida farm after the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. His results were mixed. He knows that. He knows he fought hard, and he didn't exactly have the Olympic Games he wanted. At a minimum, he's just glad he did it, went to Paris, because there were two moments when he thought he might not go at all. Dressel thought a repeat of the 2022 World Championship would happen, when he abruptly left in the middle of the competition. After making The U.S. Olympic Team at the U.S. Olympic Trials, in the middle of the meet, Dressel considered pulling out. Mentally he was battling---at war in his head. His wife, parents, and therapist were all there, all supporting him. So, he pushed on. After the U.S. Olympic Trials, Dressel considered pulling out again. He wondered if it would be better to give other, up and coming swimmers a shot at the Olympic stage. Dressel battled these thoughts. At one point, he considered only swimming the Olympic relays. It all made sense in his head. We now know Dressel completed his Olympic schedule, and in this podcast he gives a beat-by-beat account of what he experiences. It's real, raw, and courageously vulnerable.

Sarah Sjostrom dreamt of winning Olympic gold in the 100 free. Literally. She had a dream about herself winning a gold medal in the 100 free. Then did it. Sjostrom, the world record holder in both the 50 and 100 freestyle, had achieved everything in the sport there is to achieve in both events outside of individual Olympic titles in both. Coming into the Paris Olympics, Sjostrom herself wasn't even sure that she was going to swim the 100 free. But once Paris kicked off, the Swedish sprint star ended up competing in both and it paid off for her as the world saw her crowned Olympic champion twice in her two signature events.

Heading into 2024, Kate Douglass had pretty much everything one could have on a swimming resume: NCAA champion, American record holder, and world champion. In Paris last month, she added Olympic champion to that list. When the competition was over, Douglass walked away from the 2024 Olympic Games with 4 medals, 2 from Team USA relays (gold, silver) and two individually from the 200 breast (gold) and 200 IM (silver). Listen to Douglass' experience in Paris and her plans for swimming moving into the fall with short course meters on the horizon.

Heading into the 2024, Regan Smith had been one Olympics, won 3 medals there, won 9 world championship medals, won an NCAA title, and set 3 world records. But none of it was enough to make Smith feel good about her accomplishments in the pool. Since the 2022 season, Smith has been slowly working on changing how she views her swimming and the success that comes with it. For much of her career, she would enter a race and feel immense pressure to win, to the point that she would derail herself before she even hit the water. Heading into her races in Paris, she was able to see herself as a fan might, as pure entertainment, and with that came the freedom to swim her own race. Regan walked away from Paris with 3 silver medals in her individual events and 2 gold medals as a part of Team USA relays. Listen to the growth Smith has made as she describes taking control of her swimming and having pride in her accomplishments.

Gretchen Walsh barely missed making the 2020 U.S. Olympic Team in Tokyo, but she made up for it at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, winning four medals. Gretchen had a lot of naysayers from outside of the United States. Swim fans knew she was great based on her 2024 NCAA DI Championships performance, clearly the greatest in history. Many critics felt her yards (NCAAs) to meters (Olympic pool distance) talent would not convert. Gretchen proved her critics wrong with a fantastic Olympic debut. Gretchen takes SwimSwam's Gold Medal Mel Stewart through each of her races, and she looks ahead to the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.

Norwegian swimmer Henrik Christiansen came into his 3rd Olympic Games looking for memories in the pool but left with much, much more. After going viral during the Games on TikTok for a video featuring one of the Village's chocolate muffins, Christiansen ran with it and soon became known as the Olympic Muffin Man. Listen to what inspires Christiansen both in and out of the pool (aside from muffins) and how he's feeling after the whirlwind experience of his 3rd Olympics.

At the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, Kaylee McKeown became the first woman to ever win back-to-back Olympic titles in both the 100 and 200 backstroke. She also became Australia's most successful individual medalist with 4 golds. And surprisingly, she's just as human as the rest of us. From how she reflects on Paris, you wouldn't immediately realize her success there. McKeown is a high achiever and constantly pushing herself to great heights, which she admits can sometimes be a downfall and lead to low self-confidence. The backstroking legend is candid about how she handled herself throughout the meet, even when fatigue set in the later stage of competition and she earned a bronze medal in the 200 IM because of a DQ.

After his 3rd Olympics in 2021, Cam McEvoy was burnt out with swimming and retired, thinking that was it for his swimming career. After 2 years of studying high performance within weight lifting, track, and cycling, McEvoy wondered if principles from each sport could be applied to swimming. The sprint star decided to give swimming one last chance, but he was going to do it on his terms. When he proposed his training plan to many coaches, many turned him away. But once he found Tim Lane through fellow Australian swimmer Bobby Hurley, the pieces fell into place. Over the next year and a half, it was trial and error while McEvoy and Lane completely revamped what swim training could look like. Cam was barely counting yardage with many workouts not cracking 1,000 meters. But he was putting in work and the results came, with Cam registering more sub-22 50m freestyles in that year than he had in his entire 13-year career combined. Listen to what "The Professor" of swimming says about how we train in swimming and what worked for him in his pursuit of Olympic gold.

9-time Olympic medalist Ryan Murphy unpacks the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. Murphy takes us inside the Olympic Trials to the Olympic Games process, sharing insights, stressors, and the mood as Team USA worked through the grueling 9-day event. Murphy details his 100 back, mix medley leadoff, and the 4x100 medley leadoff. Murphy also digs into the 200 back where the 2016 Olympic champion under-swam the semi-final costing him a lane in the Olympic final.

French Swimmer Leon Marchand won 4 Gold Medals at the Paris Olympics, going a perfect 4-for-4 in his individual events. Marchand was coached by Bob Bowman leading into the Olympics, the same man who helped Michael Phelps win 8 gold medals at the Beijing Olympics in 2008. Bowman takes us into the Olympic Games and shares behind-the-scenes stories of what made Leon's accomplishment so great in Paris.

After missing Olympic qualification for Tokyo in the pool, Moesha Johnson decided to dip her toes into open water racing. In 2 short years she became a world champion, and one year after that she won her first Olympic medal, a silver in the 10k. From strategizing how to race in the Seine River to going viral in TikTok during the Games, Johnson recalls her experience in Paris in full.

SwimSwam photographer extraordinaire Jack Spitser has documented swimming at the highest level for years and is just coming off of his biggest competition yet: the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. Spitser recalls the ups and downs of travel, work/life balance (aka all work and no life), and navigating unexpected road bumps during an Olympics Games. Between having bed bugs and photographing 10+ sports over the course of two weeks, Jack gives his full perspective on his time in Paris.

The Notre Dame men’s swimming program has been suspended for a minimum of one academic year after an investigation into potential gambling. The men’s swimming and diving programs are coming off their best combined finish at NCAAs in school history as they were 10th at the 2024 NCAA Championships. Just after U.S. Olympic Trials in June, the school announced that the law firm, Ropes & Gray LLP to conduct an external review after “potential issues with the culture” of the team. Sources have told SwimSwam that the investigation has been ongoing at least since January and authorities were allegedly monitoring activity during US Olympic Trials. The review found that gambling was an occurrence for most of the team members that were set to return for this upcoming season. Swimmers place “over/under” lines on swims at meets. One former member of the team says they even took wagers on “how many women would cry after their races.” In addition to betting on swimming, some of the athletes participated in betting on other sports such as the NCAA March Madness tournaments.

At the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, Dan Wiffen became the first Irish swimmer to win a gold medal in swimming since 1996. After winning double distance gold at the 2024 World Championships earlier this year, the Loughborough resident swam a gutsy race in the 800 free and came out on top ahead of USA's defending champion, Bobby Finke. Wiffen explains the mindset that helped him achieve this feat and how he celebrated afterward. The distance specialist also debriefs his first (and last) foray into open water after competing in the 10k race in the Seine River.

Bobby Finke walked away from the Paris Olympic Games as the back-to-back champion in the 1500 free, the world record holder in the same event, and USA's only individual male gold medalist in swimming. The distance phenom walks us through his experience in Paris, from the bittersweet feeling of earning silver in the 800 to topping the podium on the last day of competition. Finke also shows his fun side, admitting just how bad his "off" practices can get and reflecting on his limited relay experience as a distance swimmer. He proposed having a mixed 4x50 free relay in which you can only participate in if you swam a distance event at the Olympics.