We sat down with ISL star Siobhan Haughey . Haughey, who went undefeated in the 200 free in season 2 of the ISL, is currently in Hong Kong preparing for the 2021 Olympic Games. She takes us through what has been clicking for her in training and racing this past year as well as how establishing daily routines in ISL was key for her success. Click here to listen and subscribe on Spotify Click here to listen and subscribe on Apple Podcasts Click here to listen and subscribe on Podbean Click here to...
Jan 23, 2021•42 min•Ep. 405
Gary Hall Sr. is swimming royalty, a 3-time Olympian, U.S. Olympic Team Captain, Olympic Flag Bearer, father of a 10-time Olympic medalist (Gary Hall Jr.), World Record Holder, former President of the U.S. Olympians Association and the Head Coach / Chief Executive of the famous enterprise known globally as THE RACE CLUB (hyperlink: https://theraceclub.com Olympic icon Gary Hall Sr. makes me feel lazy—in the most positive way. He is a reminder of how to live your life daily with purpose. Case in ...
Jan 22, 2021•50 min•Ep. 404
We sat down with Jonathan Maccoll, head coach of the swimming and diving program at Rutgers University. SwimSwam reported last week that Rutgers would be redshirting a significant portion of its team this year , and Maccooll was kind enough to explain the reasoning behind this. In short, because things are ever-changing with the COVID-19 pandemic, Maccoll says every athlete's situation is different and the decision to redshirt this season is extremely fluid for whether it makes sense for that at...
Jan 21, 2021•37 min•Ep. 403
We sat down with Olympic champion Leah Smith , who was one of few national teamers who didn't attend a Pro Swim this past weekend. Leah was planning on attending the meet in Irvine, but as that one was canceled she opted to stay home and train. Smith details her last 10 months through the COVID pandemic, including prepping for ISL with Matt Grevers, being on a non-US based team for the ISL, and her newfound coffee love with all this time at home. Click here to listen and subscribe on Spotify Cli...
Jan 19, 2021•57 min•Ep. 402
As promised, we brought back Aussie legend James Magnussen for part 3 of his swimming story. Maggie brought us through the tail end of his career, post-2013 world champs all the way to the 2016 Olympic Games. Before his shoulder injury in 2014, Magnussen describes his plan for racing as much as he could and how he came to casually drop in-season 47s every time he hit the pool. It's worth a listen to hear this candid account of what being on top of the world can feel like... and how that feeling ...
Jan 19, 2021•38 min•Ep. 401
John Moffet is a renaissance man. In the pool he was a 1980 & 1984 Olympian, World Record Holder, World Medalist & Pan Pacific Championships Triple Gold Medalist. Beyond the pool, after graduating from Stanford, he built an impressive career in entertainment winning 3 Primetime Emmy Awards and a list of credits too long to detail here. (Google John Moffet producer director and go to IMDB.) Moreover, he's delivering all of that entertainment muscle to his new podcast SPORT LIFE BALANCE (s...
Jan 18, 2021•1 hr•Ep. 400
We sat down with world junior champion Jade Hannah . She talked us through her quarantine, which included open water swims in lakes and the ocean, biking and running for hours, and doing dryland workouts at home. Jade also walked us through training at the HPC-Toronto, and what swimming consistently with the likes of Penny Oleksiak , Kylie Masse , and more has done for her maturity as an athlete. Click here to listen and subscribe on Spotify Click here to listen and subscribe on Apple Podcasts C...
Jan 17, 2021•39 min•Ep. 399
We sat down with former world-record holder and Aussie breaststroke, Matt Wilson . Wilson took us through what his quarantine has looked like and some of the work that he's been doing in the lead-up to the 2021 Olympic Games. Wilson paces 30.lows in training consistently, indicating that we could see Anton Chupkov's 2:06.1 WR from 2019 go down come Tokyo. Click here to listen and subscribe on Spotify Click here to listen and subscribe on Apple Podcasts Click here to listen and subscribe on Podbe...
Jan 16, 2021•43 min•Ep. 398
We sat down with Cal breaststroke Ema Rajic , who had a big month of racing in November. After coming right off of the US Open in San Antonio, she went back to Cal for a dual meet with Stanford, where she broke her own school record in the 100 breast and went a lifetime best in the 200 breast. Ema breaks down what her quarantine was like before coming back to Cal, mainly training in Austin, Texas with Austin Swim Club. See one of Ema's workouts with Austin Swim Club here . Rajic also throws some...
Jan 15, 2021•38 min•Ep. 397
We sat down with national Jr. team member and #8 ranked recruit in SwimSwam's Class of 2022, Matt Fallon. Fallon competed at the Tigershark Swim Team Santa Claws Classic in Belton, Texas in mid-December, where he went a 53.52 in the 100 breast and 1:52.87 in the 200 breast, the latter putting him at #7 in the 17-18 age group all-time . Fallon explained how he's been training through COVID, his emphasis on building his aerobic base, and why he likes warming up all the way until 1-2 minutes before...
Jan 14, 2021•34 min•Ep. 396
We sat down with national team member Phoebe Bacon , who we saw in action in November at the US Open. At the US Open in Des Moines, racing fellow national-teamer Regan Smith, Bacon dropped a 2:09.16 200 back, 1:00.18 100 back, and 2:16.05 in the 200 IM. Bacon broke down what training at her new home at the University of Wisconsin is like and how she got through quarantine, documenting her time training in a 15-year pool. Click here to listen and subscribe on Spotify Click here to listen and subs...
Jan 13, 2021•37 min•Ep. 395
We sat down with Matt Mauser , the musician who wrote the music for Kobe Bryant 's podcast, Punies. Mauser's wife, Christina, coached Bryant's girls basketball team and was in the helicopter crash that took her and Bryant's life. Mauser candidly discusses the effects of losing his wife and enduring a global pandemic while trying to move through his career as well as raise and teach 3 children (ages 12, 10, and 4). One way he has been able to heal is in the pool, where he has a long history. Maus...
Jan 12, 2021•47 min•Ep. 394
Indiana University Head Coach Ray Looze unpacks the 2021 BIG TEN schedule, his plans for NCAAs, and proprioception (the perception of the position and movement of the body). I just call it Mind-Body Connection. Ray calls it the future of the sport and details his proprioception work at IU since 2015. Ray’s team (coaches and elite swimmers) are like an Aquatic Research & Development department innovating in eye-popping ways… Anyone who knows Ray should not be surprised… As a USC student-athle...
Jan 11, 2021•50 min•Ep. 393
We sat down with Catherine Breed , an NCAA All-American swimmer from Cal who was always a distance swimmer but now is seriously a distance swimmer. Catherine trains for marathon swims, which typically means swims that are over 20 miles in the ocean. In her most recent swim, the Monterey Bay swim, Breed broke the record for the fastest swim across the bay in a time of 2 hours and 53 minutes. Listen to Breed as she describes her training for events like this as well as some of her stories about sw...
Jan 10, 2021•38 min•Ep. 392
We sat down with Aussie mid-distance ace Elijah Winnington . Winnington made headlines just last month at the Queensland State Championships where he dropped PB's of 3:43 in the 400m free and 1:45 in the 200m free . Winnington was recently in a bit of a funk with his swimming, including during the period when competed at the 2019 US national championships in Palo Alto , California, and changed his entire lifestyle in the lead-up to that meet . He explains how moving to a new program has helped h...
Jan 09, 2021•41 min•Ep. 391
Matthew Marquardt is a senior on the Princeton swim team. Since the Ivy League canceled winter sports and he lost his season, Matthew decided he needed a new challenge. In fulfillment of a lifetime dream, Matthew is riding his bike across the country. By himself. He is on Day 10 now, and it’s expected to take 23 days total. To meet this time limit, he needs to cover over 100 miles a day. He started in San Diego and will end in Florida. His dad is driving the route crewing for him and staying wit...
Jan 08, 2021•31 min•Ep. 390
We sat down with Claire Adams , the University of Texas NCAA All-American who announced her retirement from swimming this past summer. Adams discusses her time at Texas and hits on the big learning curve she went through to make her senior season in particular so special. She also delves into her high school days at Carmel Swim Club in Indiana. Specifically, we discuss her 2016 Olympic Trials, a meet that heading into, she was a top contender to make the US Olympic team. However, she broke her h...
Jan 07, 2021•47 min•Ep. 389
We sat down with SwimSwam's 2020 Female Swimmer of the Year , Kaylee McKeown . McKeown re-wrote half of the Australian backstroke record book last year, setting new national records in the 100 and 200 backstrokes long course and the 200 backstroke short course. That short course record of 1:58.94 was also the world’s fastest-ever swim in the event , breaking Katinka Hosszu’s 2014 world record of 1:59.23. At the 2020 Queensland Championships (LCM), McKeown threw down a 57.93 to become just the se...
Jan 06, 2021•46 min•Ep. 388
We sat down with Baylor Nelson , the #2 recruit in the high school class of 2022 . Nelson tells us about his training during quarantine and his love for swimming that has been fostered since a young age. Nelson has had some phenomenal swims recently, most notably his epic battles with fellow North Carolina-native Sam Hoover in the 400 IM and 200 IM . Click here to listen and subscribe on Spotify Click here to listen and subscribe on Apple Podcasts Click here to listen and subscribe on Podbean Cl...
Jan 05, 2021•38 min•Ep. 387
We sat down with Maxime Rooney , the ISL newbie who made a big impact this season for the LA Current. Maxime breaks down the season in Budapest, detailing the ups and downs of competing in a 6-week bubble. He also shares about his personal day-to-day, including the importance of cooking, which he also documents on his Instagram as "Maxime's Meals". Rooney finishes by talking about racing under pressure, a topic in which he references an interview with James Guy about the dominance of his British...
Jan 04, 2021•50 min•Ep. 386
We sat down with Claudio Battaglini, the coach and father of age-group breakout swimmer Luca Battaglini . Claudio has been a coach of elite athletes for decades, originally training the world's top triathletes in his home of Brazil. He eventually got his Ph.D. and became a teacher and researcher, letting coaching go to the wayside a bit. However, as his son started to become a better and better swimmer, he started to get involved on deck and is now training a small group in North Carolina. Click...
Jan 03, 2021•40 min•Ep. 385
We sat down with World champion James Magnussen ... again. We had already spoken with James before but only got through the first year of his career on the international stage. So this time we covered another couple of years, including the lead-up to the 2012 Olympic Games. After his big breakout at the 2011 World Champs, Maggie says he had no major racing until the 2012 Aussie Olympic trials, where he dropped a legendary 47.10, the fastest time swam in a textile suit at that point by a longshot...
Jan 01, 2021•38 min•Ep. 383
We sat down with Jr World and Pan Pac champion, Lani Pallister . Lani is just coming off a very successful short course championships where she broke the Australian record in the 1500 . Pallister talks about how her recent move to train with Michael Bohl, along with her mom , has gone thus far and leading into those championships. Pallister has been coached by her mom from a young age and explains the ups and downs that can come with your mom being your coach. Click here to listen and subscribe ...
Dec 31, 2020•59 min•Ep. 382
We sat down with Carle Fierro , the head coach of Westchester Aquatic Club. She explained her philosophy on training club swimmers, which might differ from a typical, high-yardage program. Carle has had successful age swimmers at young ages, including current Virginia super-star Kate Douglass and breakout 13-year-old Claire Weinstein . You can check out what a week of Carle's training looks like here. Click here to listen and subscribe on Spotify Click here to listen and subscribe on Apple Podca...
Dec 30, 2020•43 min•Ep. 384
We sat down with World, NCAA and SEC Champion Zane Waddell. Waddell recently announced his retirement , to the surprise of many, as the Olympic year is around the corner and he seems to be in his prime. Waddell discussed not being able to financially support himself with only swimming and why he wasn't able to make the trip to Budapest to compete in the ISL as he had planned. Waddell has stayed exceedingly optimistic throughout this process however and is embracing his new journey into the corpo...
Dec 30, 2020•42 min•Ep. 381
We sat down with Swimming's favorite Harvard swimmer, Dean Farris , along with the head and associate head coaches of the Harvard Men's swim team, Kevin Tyrrell and Sam Pitter. We started the conversation by getting a good look into what training has been like for the Harvard men this semester, which is very different than a lot of other college programs we've talked to. I think one of the most exciting parts about the Harvard swimming tradition is the HYP (Harvard-Yale-Princeton) tri-meet at th...
Dec 29, 2020•37 min•Ep. 380
We sat down with National champion and Olympic hopeful, Ally McHugh. Ally documents what her training has been like in and out of the water since quarantine began when she was actually on a training trip at the Olympic Training Center. McHugh has become a student of the sport, trying to pick up tricks and tips in any way she can. This includes watching race video of her competitors, like Ariarne Titmus. McHugh describes what her takeaways were from Titmus and how she has implemented them into he...
Dec 28, 2020•54 min•Ep. 379
We sat down with swim-photographer extraordinaire, Becca Wyant . Becca has documented World Championships, US Nationals, and Pro Swim meets all over the country and photographed swimmers all over the globe. Becca's origin story is similar to many who now work in the swim industry: it started with swimming. But the rest is very unique in that Becca worked to follow her passions and carve her own path for herself, seeking fulfillment through creativity in whatever she was doing. This led her to a ...
Dec 27, 2020•56 min•Ep. 378
We sat down with Pavel Sankovich, the Belarusian swimmer who just had his 2nd child. Pavel takes us through how fatherhood changed his perspective on swimming as well as how he's tried to get back into the water the last several months. He's carried this new perspective into the pool as well as his teaching as he coaches young swimmers full-time. Sankovich also recalls highlights and stories of his career, detailing the intense training he put in while living in Europe and the US. Click here to ...
Dec 26, 2020•58 min•Ep. 377
We sat down with Olympic hopeful and NAG record slayer, Claire Curzan . Curzan has been ON one this quarantine, dropping best times seemingly every time she hits the racing blocks. Most notably, she registered a 56.6 100m fly at the US Open site in Greensboro , becoming the 3rd fastest woman in the event in American history. Curzan breaks that swim down, revealing that she actually wrote down '56 100 fly in Greensboro' in her goal journal before the meet even happened. Click here to listen and s...
Dec 25, 2020•36 min•Ep. 376
