Ray Looze

Hey everybody, it's Lily.
I'm back.
We're here for a very special edition of Unfiltered Waters at Indiana with my coach Ray Luz.
We had a great conversation about training and superstitions and what makes him tick outside of the pool.
And I can't wait for you guys to tune in.
Yes.
So make sure you guys hit that subscribe button.
I'm going to keep saying it.
But on a personal level, it was it was really cool to see just coach and swimmer after a decade.
I have to throw that in there.
Just talk.
You can just tell there's such a mutual respect there.
And you can tell why it worked for as long as it did.
And I mean, he is going to be like in your life forever with your babies and everything.
And so I think that's just such a testament of when the coach and athlete relationship extends beyond the pool.
And it's beautiful.
Absolutely.
Without further ado, enjoy our conversation with Ray Luz.
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Ray, Luz, welcome to Unfiltered Waters Day in the Life.
Good to be here.
Yes.
Thank you for giving me a break from swim camp and every recruiting, everything that's going on.
They're barely hanging in there because it's the last week of swim camp.
Appreciate it.
Yeah.
What is what does your day look like when you have swim camps?
Um, get up super early, come in, uh, hope that the elevator to my temporary office works.
Because if it doesn't, that's 16 floors up.
And we've had all sorts of power outages, and I've had to walk those 16 floors like early in the morning.
It is.
It is, but I'm like heart rate 180 by the time that's done.
And then just do a little workout planning, then go and coach the varsity practice, go right in um to a presentation for the campers, and then coach camp.
And then I get like about an hour and a half to like work out, eat lunch, or walk right now, walk around making recruit calls.
I just walk around the stadium, you know, try to be in a quiet spot, and then back to a swim camp practice, back to a varsity practice, then drive home making recruit calls, and then into the evening.
So and then we have the meet, the the pro meat too.
So but this this is pretty this has happened before where all these things kind of hit at one time.
So then you just fall into your bed.
Yeah, like I feel like that sounds exhausting.
Are you are you out on the boat just after you have to be?
I will I try to be.
I would be if I lived at your house.
Like today, if I can, I'm gonna get on the boat maybe sometime after four.
That's my goal.
I think you could do it.
Because then then, you know, no phone, just you know, really peaceful.
So I live on a lake about 30 minutes away.
Okay.
And people in Indiana think that's like living three hours away.
It is.
But we were having this conversation.
We were having this conversation 30-minute drive growing up in California was like normal.
So yeah.
So I I'm fine with it.
But people when people come to my house, they're like, You live way out here?
Oh my gosh.
I go, but look, look at where I look.
You give incredible views, I'm sure.
What type of boat?
Like, what do you do on the boat?
Is it chill?
Are you fishing?
Um, not much of a fisherman, but I like watching them.
Um, I have a pontoon boat, like you know, with a nice sound system, and my wife and I sit in the captain's chairs and we just piddle around and look at the houses and see what people are doing with their backyards.
Because, like, when you have the lake backyards, they they do a lot of cool stuff.
So we just like interacting with the people, and then you'll pass somebody and you'll stop, kind of anchor for a little bit, chit-chat.
And those people know nothing about swimming.
It's kind of out in the country, so that's nice too.
So, kind of your way to just be Ray and not Ray the swim coach.
Correct.
That's needed.
They it's it's it's a wonderful escape.
So the the commute's well worth it.
I think that was a good transition for you guys.
Because they you you all used to live in town.
Yep.
And then kind of as as the kids got older, you you transitioned and you guys redid the house, didn't you?
Yep.
Yeah.
Redid the the lake house.
So, like if you you know, I used to live eight minutes from campus and your work, you end up working on Saturday afternoon, Sunday, you know, when people, oh, I'm here.
Can you meet with me?
And you know, you just don't say no.
But when you live 30 minutes away, it's like, no.
So I live 30 minutes away, sorry.
That's good.
Yeah.
I'll miss you.
So I was gonna ask, so it's been tw has it been twenty-two or twenty-one?
That I've been here?
Yeah.
Um 24 actually.
24, okay.
And then 21 with the women and the men.
Okay, so that's probably greeting.
Yeah, I got my first year was 02, 03, coached the men for like three years, and then added the women.
How do you balance men and women?
I didn't do it very well in the beginning.
So it was kind of this cycle of like we got the men going really good, won a Big Ten title in 2006 like quickly after being really, really bad, and then moved, you know, then the women got added in and they won like four Big Ten titles, but then the men declined.
So it really took until like 2019 where they both won at the same time.
It took it took decades to learn how to give both, you know, equal attention without kind of, you know, going more w one gender to the other.
And um, you know, just learning how to meet the needs of of different different people, like females needs different things than males need, and vice versa.
So it just it took a long time, and I'm still learning.
So the longer I coach, the more humble I get too.
Like, this is really a complicated job.
It's extremely complicated.
Yeah.
You don't know that as a young coach.
You're like, how hard can this be?
But it's people, people are challenging and they change, and it's super fun to, you know, to get to interact with people that are 18 to 22.
I love that.
But you know, it's kind of an ever-moving target.
You guys are, and you especially are constantly innovating and trying to find new things and trying to find new ideas and and test this out and test that out with whether it be with the men and the women or doing something in front stroke group.
How do you how do you come up with all those ideas?
Where where does that creative mindset come from?
Well, you know, as you know, it's kind of more of a partnership here.
And I've learned a lot from the swimmers.
So they know they can change practice.
Like you've changed a lot of practices.
Talked my way out of a lot of things, yes.
Yeah, but you know, she wanted to be great.
She was she was a champion.
So most of the suggestions she made were really, really good ones.
Whether it was more difficult, easier, uh, it was maybe just a better way to do it.
She's super smart.
And there's a long list of people like that that made suggestions, and and it's really helped us innovate.
And, you know, I I want I don't want something to be boring.
So I like lots of toys and equipment.
Like we've been, you know, playing around with metal weighted paddles for some time now.
When we had Zayn Grothy here, he helped make the prototype of a weighted paddle.
And then we finally got like everybody these metal paddles.
Now they're like, if you were to swim with them all the time, they're probably super dangerous.
Like I would never want like an age group team, but they're for like technique, they're for drilling to help you with your catch.
But uh, I think the swimmers like having something, even a small something to look forward to that's different.
Yeah.
Change of scenery, change of change of equipment.
Well, I keep hearing it over and over, whether it was this morning or talking to Van, talking to Lily, like everyone keeps saying, like, it's so personalized here.
Like, I mean, that to me is extremely difficult when you have a team of you know, men, women, what's like 40, 50 swimmers.
Like, how do you go about when you're writing a set or writing a practice, how do you go about creating that personalization?
It's it's kind of a simple formula.
We've been doing the same cycle here for a long time.
And like I was telling you this morning, it's it's kind of from the John Urbanachuk Urbanachek tree with a couple slight, you know, this over here, this, you know, getting changed, but but all the same stuff's in there.
And we all adhere to that cycle.
So if you want to coach here, you can write your own workouts and do it your way.
Adhere to the cycle.
And then it it allows us to have multiple groups.
Like what Van is doing is is the latest group, which is super sprint.
Yet, yet he's doing things.
If we're if he's doing lactate, we're doing lactate.
So he can still be when when when his job allows, integrated into a practice, even if it's for just a few reps.
So that allows us to not have it be overwhelming, you know, because you're you're doing the same energy system.
Okay.
That makes sense.
I mean, at the beginning of the season, there's a giant spreadsheet.
And it's got Monday a.m., Monday PM, Tuesday a.m.
two a.m.
And it says every group that you're in.
And it's different for almost everyone.
That's really cool.
Yeah.
Which I think I've never seen that anywhere else.
I think that's something super special that we do, and I think we take a lot of pride in.
Um that you guys uh there there aren't a lot of programs where the coaches are as attentive to their athletes as they are here, at least that I have ever witnessed.
It allows us to give a very individualized amount of volume and like quality work to each athlete.
So, like if I want you to go 40,000 in a week, I can give that to you, and I can give that to you with the perfect amount of quality versus aerobic work.
Because there's all these moves that can be made.
You know, just moving you from this group to this group, then that that just lets us fine-tune and kind of drop the, you know, the pin right on the head of the needle.
Yeah, that makes sense.
Something I find fascinating about you with your philosophy around using Urban Check and colors, I feel like coaches who have that thought maybe aren't as open to things that Van is doing and you know, can McAvoy.
And it feels like you have a very curious mind, like open mindset of like, no, like there has to be something valuable in that.
So I guess like, can you talk through how you do both?
Well, I've always wanted to see something like that, but the the opportunity never presented itself until about a year ago.
And we were just watching the results of the 50, and Van was standing next to John and I, and Van goes, that's when we saw the winning time, it was like 26-9, and Van goes, that's that's slow.
And I go, Yep, we're not gonna get any medals there.
And I go, but you know, like you could do that with like a little bit of training.
And um John and I had talked to Tim Lane, Cam's coach, who we both know.
And um, you know, then John talked to Van and was like, okay, let's give this a try for like eight weeks.
Um, and we actually got to see Tim in uh Singapore.
Oh, okay.
And um asked, you know, John had called him before that, but then we got to talk to Tim who's married to one of my former swimmers, Kristen Sahosky.
Oh my god, wow.
Yeah, really strong connections there.
And he just kind of went through.
We go, Do you really go go like 5,000 a week?
And he goes, We're down to three.
Were you like?
Really?
And I go, can can could people do like more than just a 50 with that?
And he goes, I think so.
So um, you know, so we that's kind of the process that you know van is going through right now because Van had some success in the 50 and then did a decent hundred, and he's like, it'd be great to be on relays.
And it's like, you gotta do a hundred if you want to do that.
Yeah, and um he really didn't add a lot of volume.
I mean, maybe he went like 3,000 more, but it's basically 1,200 to 1,500 a practice.
That's it.
But it but he works really, really hard at it.
Yeah, really hard, and he has a massive aerobic base, massive from years and years and years, all the way back to Multnomah Athletic Club in Oregon.
And Cam had that massive aerobic base too.
Yes.
So Greg asked me to make up to to to kind of go over what Van's doing because there's a fear that this will erode our sport.
Because it's yeah, it's it's attractive.
It is, yeah.
It's attractive.
Thank you for saying this because I I kind of brought it up to Van and I, you know, he's not a swim coach, but I do think there needs to be because we don't want to lose our distance in 400 diamers and milers over this.
And I think our minds, I'm not even gonna say I'm a distance person in comparison to Katie, but like as someone who trained like a distance person for so long, our minds are like 100%.
You know, how is it working?
I'm like the last person that you would have expected to even be involved in this.
I'm like, I saw that and I was like, okay, Ray.
Like that's I mean, I just think it's to me, it shows to me, an incredible coach is someone who can evolve and can flex.
You know what I mean?
So I think like it's it's really interesting the way that you've embraced it.
Well, my favorite word is no.
So can confirm.
When people, you know, ask, hey, can I do that too?
No.
Um, you know, so we try to assess the people that it might work for.
So we tried it with a couple college guys, and one, it was it worked pretty well for he kind of fell apart at the end of like the Big Ten championships.
The other it was like, you know, it was nothing different than the other training.
So, you know, it's something we've probed on, and of course, people have gotten line to ask if they can do it too.
But I think that there's there's you know, guardrails or criteria of who it would work for.
And if it's not gonna work for that person, no.
What's the criteria?
Um, I think I think it's important to have the base already established.
Well, like, like Matt King, for example, you would think that he would be a guy that would want to do it, yet he hasn't he hasn't asked.
I think he I think the really smart people that know themselves don't even ask.
They're like, that won't work for me.
Um now younger people might want to like like I got asked by a lot of club coaches, like, well, like how would we do this with like high school high schoolers and stuff like that?
Uh I think you have to have a base, but I also think you need to be a very explosive athlete, somebody with a um a lot of a lot of twitch.
So somebody with a massive vertical jump, like like a consummate sprinter.
And and then you also have to have good stroke, good strokes already.
And the way you get good swimming technique is we're sport of repetition.
It's like swinging a bat or swinging a golf club.
That takes many, many repetitions to refine.
So Van put those repetitions in, Cam did.
So the stroke was there, and then you give them, you know, the heavy weight lifting.
Um, like like Van's a monster.
He's he's stronger than anybody in the United States swimming.
You find me somebody that's stronger than that guy.
Stronger than Caleb?
Oh, by far.
Really?
I should ask him number one.
Yeah, Caleb might be a better athlete.
Because I remember somebody telling me like Caleb could have been like a D B at Florida on the football team because of his athleticism.
But like Van is is massively strong, you know.
Um, he's gotta be and it's not even close.
I think he's like 15-20% stronger than anybody I see in the United States swimming.
And I know we have big guys, but you know, pound for pound, he's a beast.
Just he's winning his weight class.
Yep.
I mean, but he put the put the work in.
You know, you heard about I'm sure he told you about his mom and his uncle, and um he he can do do some really impressive stuff like his weighted pull-ups.
You know, he and John lift together, and John's still got him in weighted pull-ups.
John Long can do a hundred pounds, and Van's at 90.
That's for how many reps?
Uh, three.
Which is which is impressive.
That is impressive.
Yeah, but you know, Vans Van's got the whole, you know, resume that you would think would make this successful.
So that was part of the reason that you know we kind of went into it and it was an experiment.
The other thing I would love to try is like short pool swimming, like have a 20-yard pool and do a lot of swimming in a 20-yard pool.
I love that.
I think it would be really, really fast.
For sure.
So a lot of turns.
A lot of turns, turns get good, fast swimming.
Turns get real good.
Turns get real good, but especially for, yeah.
Like, how do you think about?
Obviously, you guys are coming off a really great NCAA season.
You also, we haven't even talked about this, but you have a this pro group.
So, how do you think about the NCAA season and how it then flows into successful PamPacks?
Well, you know, in Indiana we do tons of long course swimming.
So even in the collegiate season, we'll do minimally two, if not three, long course workouts a week.
Really?
No matter what.
That's just that.
You know, the kids are like, well, why do we have to do this Saturday long course meet right before NCAA's?
We have all these people that they want to win Olympic medals.
They wanna they want to set records internationally.
So we're very committed to being in a long course pool.
And I feel like we can do we can do a really good long course race on command.
Like Lily used to be able to swim great.
She actually did some of her best swims when she was only doing three long course practices.
Because I do think that a sp a a stroke like breaststroke can get a little beat up when you do too much long course.
Definitely.
We had a season, I remember, I I believe it was the year before, it must have been the year before Tokyo because we had to do so much long course because we had to separate.
Yeah.
Um that's right.
On on both ends and swim both ends.
And that year, we were all in such incredible shape because all we were doing was long course all the time.
How the college kids did, I don't really remember, but we swam pretty well in Tokyo.
I do remember that.
I was gonna say, Yeah, I think that went pretty well.
It went pretty well.
So who are you away?
I feel like I don't see a lot of interviews of like just you away away from being a swim coach.
Yeah.
Like what do you what makes you tick?
What are your hobbies?
Like what just keeps you, Ray, the person, happy?
Yeah.
Boating is a hobby.
Yes.
So I boat a lot.
So what's a lot?
Uh I have a 2021 p pontoon that has 500 hours on it.
Five hundred hours.
When did you get it?
Twenty twenty.
Oh, it's it's it's like you bought it.
So that's like, you know, that's a hundred hours a season.
That's a lot.
Yeah.
So lives on that boat.
Yeah.
Yeah, so I I try to get out on the boat a lot because I just shoot I really enjoy it.
Um I love history, so I'm a total nerd.
A total nerd.
And Lily Era.
What?
What era is like your all of the above.
Uh yeah, just kind of anything that's interesting.
You know?
I love animals, so Lily and I always bonded.
Send a lot of dumb animal videos.
Stupid animal things.
Um I like humor.
So I love like to joke around or just watching funny things.
So just simple stuff like that.
You're really into genealogy for a little while there.
Oh, I love genealogy.
Wait, I don't even know what is genealogy.
Well, so 23 and me.
You've heard of this?
Oh, yes.
Ancestry.
Oh.
So my sister's the one that's done like everything, but it's like, you know, fasten your seatbelt before you take a deep dive on your family.
He's had some good stuff come up.
Really?
Oh, yeah.
My sister's like, I found some stuff.
Like she she always thought our dad our dad's you know your parent will go, we're related to Indians.
I hear that all the time.
And my dad was like, We're related to Indians.
And my sister goes, I found the Indians in the family tree.
And I go, Really?
And she goes, You're not gonna believe this.
You are related to Pocahontas.
And that was like the funniest thing.
I put that in like my Instagram.
You were obsessed.
Stop.
Oh, yeah.
It was wild.
And then my son goes, No, it's true.
My son goes, Yeah, dad, but you and 600,000 other people can say that.
So it's like it's not that unique.
Got it.
Not really that unique.
Oh, I have one for you that we found out.
I am oh, what's it?
I think I am fourth cousins with James Madison.
Oh.
Founding father.
Uh-huh.
Is that why your signature is so like big and loopy?
Maybe.
I don't know.
That's if James Madison has that big signature.
Yeah.
Doesn't he?
John Hancock.
So I'll like what I'll watch.
I'll like watch the biggest.
The nerds talking right here.
That's okay.
James Madison is great.
Okay.
That's fair.
Oh, one other thing about you that makes you tick, you are highly superstitious.
Oh.
Yeah, it's a problem.
Okay.
It it well, give me some examples.
Well, if you're gonna be superstitious, you have to be committed.
You do.
So, you know, if if you have good success, then you know, and you're wearing a certain pair of socks or underwear, you gotta ride that out until it goes away.
That's commitment.
So you like you're doing, you know, you're washing your underwear in a hotel sink, you know, just stuff like that.
It's it's that's not where I thought you were gonna take that.
Well we have some other options.
Now that's that's the truth, but there's all so wearing certain clothing items or eating certain foods.
Like for a while there, it was pizza for me.
And um but yeah, I've gotten away from that now just for need for personal health.
You need both that's good.
Yeah, I was just putting on too much weight, you know.
Um Hey, Singapore was great to us though.
Yeah.
After that, yeah.
Yeah, the Singapore diet that we were on.
Yes.
We can call it that.
USA swimming Singapore diet.
Nice.
Not the recommended way, but did the trick.
Yeah, get get the job done.
My favorite thing you used to do, you don't do it as much anymore.
He felt the need to feed the pool gods.
So he would throw loose change into the pool.
I got it from Eddie Reese.
Yeah.
It was his thing, and I got it from Eddie Reese.
And in Tokyo, I got caught.
And the Japanese do not like change in their pool.
Apparently, it's a frowned-upon behavior.
And I told Eddie about it, and I go, I got caught, and he goes, That happened to me in Beijing.
Oh my god.
And so I was like, you know, I don't need to be like thrown out of this meat over this stupid habit.
Can you imagine?
That broke that habit.
But it was so funny.
You'd see people like, you know, Lily or or Allison Schmidt.
I found a quarter.
Oh, yeah, we'd find it, and he'd get so mad at us.
He's like, put that back.
That's not fair to me.
They would find I I found a quarter.
Like these Olympians that have all the money in the world, and they're so excited about finding a dime.
Sometimes you need to find the lucky penny at the Olympics, and that's all you need.
Only if it's on heads.
Yeah.
But that's over.
Okay, so what's the latest?
What is the latest?
Um or is it is it unlucky to tell the superstition, or no?
I feel like I've kind of I've broken that that habit recently.
So like yeah, like lately I haven't really had a lot of like superstitious You haven't need you haven't needed it.
I have a lot more talent than I'll have my, you know, I like to put my my program in front of my face.
Oh yeah, like football coach.
Like sometimes I'll cross my fingers.
You still do it.
And I try to hide it because it's embarrassing.
I don't want people to go, look at he's worshing they swim fast.
At Olympic trials, this was this was bad.
Josh was swimming the hunter breast that night, and you were like, I you had a thing for the first two days in the meet.
You're like, I'm not going on, I'm not gonna go watch on deck, I'm gonna watch from the warm-up pool.
And then Josh got third, and then you watched every other race on the deck after that.
That'll so that'll do it.
Yeah.
Yeah, like I would watch in the warm down pool.
That worked really well for me in 2021.
Like everybody did for the most part what they what you wanted them to do, and that's hard at Olympic trials.
And then and then when Josh failed to make the hundred, I'm like, well, I'm getting out of here.
No more warm down pool because it's lonely over there.
I was watching you watch, and I was like, you know, you're like by yourself, and everybody goes in to watch like the real race, and yeah.
That screen, yeah, that screen can make you feel very isolated.
It does end with poor performance, so then you're free.
Yeah.
But for bad reasons.
Well, you're on the PamPax staff this summer.
You have six athletes, which is incredible.
Do you do you enjoy being on those trips?
I feel like it's like a pressure cooker for coaching.
You know, it's it's really hard work.
Yeah.
Um, and especially if you do, if you have the approach to to give more than just to the people that you're connected with.
Yeah.
So I I try to anybody that I'm assigned, even if it's not somebody I coach.
Um, like like Luca for last summer, um, I worked with Neil on him, and I mean, all the credit to Neil and Luca, but like I called Neil like every single day from you know, from like Thailand back to Georgia until he arrived at the meet just to make sure that every little thing so that you know that athlete felt like they were getting exactly what their club, their coach would give them.
And if you multiply that, you know, by the people you might be responsible for, you know, it's it's a lot of hard work.
But I think that's what it takes, you know, for USA to have a good performance.
Like, I take a lot of pride in somebody doing well that is not like that I'm responsible for for just a week or two, I take a lot of pride in that because like, you know, this is for the country.
Yeah.
So I don't think people, I think people don't realize that, and maybe it's outsider sport, but whenever I tell someone like, oh yeah, like it's you don't have your coach there unless they're selected for the team, I think it's incredible when I see coaches like yourself step up because like you feel abandoned if you don't have like you don't you're especially if it's your first team, you're there and you're like, I I have I I don't have my person, you know?
And so having coaches like yourself step up and be like, no, no, no, like I've got you, I think is what draw I think when that doesn't happen, success fails.
And when that does happen, we swim our best.
We've ever swum.
The the best like mentor I had with that was watching John Urbanichuk do it again and again and again.
Like he would just step in and he would give you what you needed, but like he would coach.
Yeah, he would coach, he would say the things that he's he was he was doing that when he came on trips with us well into his 80s.
Yeah.
And it was so cool to see.
Yeah.
Every single time.
You know, like because you're afraid to like coach somebody that maybe, you know, you're afraid to say something that maybe they really need to hear, like, you need to go faster in this set, or hey, let's let's do this differently, or give them specific stuff.
So like I would just try to know, okay, what did what does you know this person need to do in this race?
Because I want to be able to tell them that with conviction, you know, not just go, well, good luck, some fast, you know, because sometimes you need to hear more than that.
Yeah, absolutely.
Especially at like I feel like that time in you know the little mini camp is like the most vulnerable, could be scariest time leading into the meet.
So you need someone to give you the words that you need.
Yeah, or to help you just get through, you know, prelims, semifinals, finals, and the strategy of doing that.
So like your best race happens at the right time, you know, and I I just think you can't be afraid to coach.
Yeah.
So that's great advice.
All right, last question.
If there was a word that described you as a coach and then you as just a husband guy living on this planet, what would those two words be?
Okay, so different like so me as a coach.
Well, I've got to give all the credit to Noel Pepowski for teaching me sleigh.
Slay.
I love I love the word sleigh because it I love that you're picking it.
It's fun, it's fun to use, it exemplifies excellent, excellence, and high performance.
It's like complimentary, it's positive, you know, it's humorous, you can do lots of things, you know, with it.
So I love that word in terms of like swimming.
So yeah.
Do you say that to your swimmers after a great swim?
Oh yeah.
He says it all the time.
He screams it at practice.
Sly.
Oh yeah.
Yeah, or you know, you can kind of put it in front of the, you know, somebody's name.
Yeah, I just I just think it's it's hilarious.
And I know it's kind of old now and whatnot, but Anna says it still, so it's gotta have some coolness.
Yes, and then what was that other question?
Uh like a word that defines just you as a human being.
Passionate.
Like, I love what I'm doing.
I mean, like, it's it's super hard, but like like I get up in the morning and I'm like, this is what I chose to do.
Like, I'll never forget um there's a picture I look at every day, and I got it over in um Budapest because um I like to walk, as I as I was telling you.
So I've got all these walking partners on the national team with coaches and stuff like that.
And we were walking on the Danube River.
We'd walk down one bank over a bridge and back, and we kept passing these shoes, hundreds of shoes that were that were on the riverbank that were bronzed.
That were they were bronzed, bronzed, bronzed, like a baby shoe is bronzed.
Okay, and I was like, I finally like asked our like our guide or interpreter, like, what's that?
And she goes, that was the the Jewish people in World War II, and they were marched to the river, told to take off their shoes, and then you know, put it into the river.
And um, you know, I've been to a lot of Holocaust museums just and it and it's um, you know, the shoes were more valuable than the people, but I look at those shoes, I've got a picture picture of the shoes over my sink, and it just reminds me of like how lucky I am to live in this country, to get to represent the country at international competitions, to get to do what I want to do, you know, and I know that's kind of a serious thing, but it's like I'm really grateful, really passionate about you know what swimming has given me and what I can, you know, give to people.
Like it's it's it's coaching is a job where you can really make people better.
Like our class is the best class, like I think in this university.
Like, you know, there's Indiana University, but like if you're on our team, that's Oxford.
You it's like I want that to be the best, and I want you to learn, you know, just a ton and have that be your your biggest memory, you know, when you leave.
That's beautiful.
Yeah.
I really like that answer.
I was waiting for you to loop it back around.
Well, I heard I I was listening to Van's interview, and I'm like, I'll be prepared with all these things, and you you got me.
I like wasn't I didn't you were listening.
I didn't I didn't I didn't get really asked what I thought I would, so I was not as prepared as I wanted to be.
What did you think I was gonna ask you?
The same questions as Lily and Van got.
Because like Lily was like, you got me with that, and I go, Oh yeah.
Yeah, it's not gonna get me, but she didn't ask that.
You know, I'm never prepared for anything, so what would what would you if you had to give Lily a word besides Lily?
What would you what word would you put to her having coached her for how many years?
Ten.
Ten years.
Confidence.
And this is not a word, but deep self-belief.
I've never worked with a person that had more confidence or deep self-belief in themselves than Lily King.
Like remarkable, amazing level of confidence.
And I give a lot of the credit to her parents because they were tough on her.
You know, like if she failed, they let her fail.
And um, but she was able to do some amazing things when she needed to.
And you know, she never mentioned, like, well, I don't feel so great tonight or whatnot.
She, I mean, how many you won the 100 breaststroke from basically 2015 US Open.
You didn't win that one, but you won the 100 breaststroke all the way until 2021.
Every single race for a female breaststroker, yeah, like high-level worlds, Olympics, NCs, you name it, never lost a race.
And that's you know, and I would warn her, I'd be like, You could lose this.
Did you how'd you take that?
Not well.
I I can't say it here.
No, she would be like, I'm not going to lose.
And it might be super close because you know, I was right to some degree, but like she she just, you know.
Magnets in the fingers, baby.
Yeah, like to the wall.
Like I show the swim campers lots of videos of her races, and one of my favorite is Annie Laser and her in the two breast.
And Lily is dying in that the the Olympic trial race.
She's dying.
Yet she fought it, fought it off and ended up getting second.
You didn't win, but you, you know, I knew where first or second.
I was playing the heat.
Yeah, first or second's all that really matters.
So, and I watch that like every single week, and that's kind of fun.
That was a team effort race, definitely.
That's what I'm saying.
That was that was team swimming.
That was team swimming.
Yeah, it wasn't.
And people don't do that.
They should.
They should work with your trading partner to race.
Yeah, because that what's the point?
It's a win it's a win for both of you.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, cool.
Well, thank you for having us.
Thank you for hosting us.
This has been amazing.
So well, thank you very much, and thanks for having Lily on because she's gonna move away here in about a week, and this this is it.
So I got to see her swim a practice with you this morning for the last time, probably in Bloomington.
Oh no, and um, you know, to get to do this kind of is really special because she's so busy, so stressed out, selling house, moving, you know, just all that stuff.
This would never have happened if you didn't do this podcast.
So thanks for that.
Of course.
Getting sappy on me.
I know.
Can you guys I'll leave you guys hug?
Now we're good.
We're good.
We don't need to hug, but she needed to hear that.
So yeah, yeah.
Damn, right?
I'm good.
Yeah.
But been a good ride.