The Voice of Swimming: Olympian Rowdy Gaines on The Sport That Saved His Life

28:10I figured it wasn't going to work. I was going to get cut. But swimming stuck, and it changed my life. So I grew up in Florida, knew how to swim, Rich. I mean, water was part of my DNA. It's part of the fabric of who I am growing up. My greatest memories are around water. My parents water skied for a place called Cypress Gardens. We lived on the same lake. They would take the boat across the lake to work every day and back. But I just never did it competitively until I got to high school. I had heard you share about this with the Unfiltered Waters podcast girls. Oh, Kate and Missy. Katie and Missy.

28:48Yeah. And you mentioned that your decision to try out for swimming was motivated by this friend that you had who had some ocular issues, like he was eye challenged or something like that. Very true. And he was your buddy and you kind of went into it together, thinking you were just doing it to help him out of solidarity with your friend. Very true. He was, you know, I miss him every day. There isn't a day I don't think of Bobby. He passed away, he got a year after our high school, not to get into the weeds with it, but he was struck by lightning while water skiing and passed away. Yeah, so it was a tragic ending to a life and just a great guy.

29:31We used to take him driving, my buddies and I. Turned 16, I got my parents' station wagon. We'd take him to a mall parking lot and let him drive, you know. He was completely blind in one eye and 90 % in the other. So he was, you know, he was legally blind, but he wanted to try out for the swim team. And I said I'd help him. And, you know, this is January in Florida. The water's cold. you know there are no heated pools in Florida and so we'd go in his backyard and I remember swimming in this 10-foot pool it seemed like and then we'd go out and sit in the sun and try to warm up we'd swim in there for about 10 minutes and go warm up and finally got up the nerve to try out for the swim team when tryouts happened and we both made it uh-huh he didn't stick with it and the coach who who the the swim coach was the same coach as the football coach that had cut you?

30:16Yeah. Same guy. Coach Bill Woolwine, still alive, still coaching. Great friend to this day, 45 or so years later. Yeah, he kind of felt sorry for me. And I said, I'll let you hang. Did you hear about that story where we had a swim meet two weeks after I started? I still in that dribble. I'd swim my head up. I was like one of those eight and unders running into the lane lines and he put me on an E relay, not an ABC or D relay, honest to God truth. I was on there with a chess club guy and a couple of band members and, but I out split everybody on the team. It was 200 free relay. And so it was like, it was a moment for him like, oh, this guy might be pretty good.

31:04And for me, it was a moment of, I just didn't get cut. It wasn't, I didn't start thinking about. But just the right amount of validation for this kid that loves sports that finally found something where maybe he might have some potential. It's exactly, exactly to the epitome of how I felt. But how long before it locked in like, oh, maybe there's even something more here? Because as I understand it, it was only like two and a half years between that moment and you breaking your first world record, which is insane. Yeah. Is that true? Started in February of 76 and broke two world records on relays in the summer of 78.

31:49So yeah, I guess about two and a half years, yeah. From a kid who was swimming with his head out of the water to breaking world records with a coach who is fundamentally a football coach. Oh, yeah. I'm still trying to understand how this happened. He had no idea what he was doing. I mean, he ended up quitting football coaching and just doing swimming, but we both started. Literally, it was his first year, my first year, and we were learning together. But it happened fast. I was blessed. You know, the Lord blessed me, Rich, in many ways to be able to have that kind of, I feel, talent. And once I found out that this was the sport I fell in love with, I was going to do everything in my power.

32:36to get better at it. Going to the library and checking out books. I check out stacks of books. I remember reading Mark Spitz's 50 Meter Jungle, Deep Water by Don Sholander, checking out books by Doc Councilman. And I just immersed myself into the sport. I sent 50 letters to colleges, finding out what I need to do to get a scholarship. And all of them said, hey, you need to start training two a days. Well, we didn't do two a days. So I would sneak - And there was no club team in Winter Haven. No, no club team. I mean, our high school. And so I would sneak into motels, not hotels, motels and swim in their heated pool.

33:19And there were like four or five of them. So I'd sneak in one, last about a week, get kicked out and then go to another one and then go to another one. Wow. Ride my bike to it. I still hadn't had my license yet. So those are the kinds of things that I did because I just fell in love with it. It wasn't like I still had no dreams of being an Olympian. I just wanted to get better. And I didn't even think about college scholarship yet. I just, these people told me these are the things you had to do to get better. So I would. Did you have a conscious sense or awareness that this was like sort of a path of salvation for you?

33:55I mean, you mentioned, you know, you were kind of going down a darker path. You'd found this thing. You clearly understood that you held some promise and that this could be like a path away from that other, like were you like, was that happening unconsciously or consciously? No question, absolutely. I knew, well, I just said, I was close. You know, I knew I was close to something that, you know, if I look back on it now, it would have been tough, you know? Like self-destructive, like drugs and alcohol Or like crime or what are we talking about here? Wow. All of the above. I don't know about crime.

34:37I didn't do anything criminal. But you were just wayward. Sneaking to motels. Like where were mom and dad during that time? Mom and dad, my mom was there. My parents were, and my dad still is. My mom passed away, but my mom and dad were always there for me. But you know, they went out. My parents divorced when I was little. So, you know, I live with my mom and, you know, She'd go out. She's remarried. I love my stepfather. I had a great upbringing from that side of things. But I just, you know, my friends were awesome. We just started drinking at first. But I could just tell my inner being was that, you know, you have the...

35:21Sure. The wolf, yeah. Which wolf is talking about? Both shoulders. And that guy that was the bad guy was kind of leading things and said, do this, do this. Yeah. You know, but I don't blame anybody but myself. There was nobody leading me down that path. My friends were great. They were innocent. My parents were awesome. There was nobody that was pointing me down that dark direction except myself.

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39:21When you look back now, obviously, you know, in the rear view mirror, everything kind of makes sense. You're like, well, this happened and then this happened and it was, this is the way it was meant to be. But do you extract meaning from that? I know you talk to people all over the country and travel and do a lot of public speaking. And I think, you know, a lot of people go through through some version of that in their life. And either they take that left turn or they take that right turn. But not everybody, you know, stumbles into something that makes them an Olympic champion. So how do you kind of share the wisdom of that experience in a helpful way for other people?

40:01I guess it's, I guess it's my belief that, you know, and it sounds so corny, But I think we were all put on this earth for a very specific purpose, whether you believe in God or not. I think there's no way we were just kind of thrown down here. And, you know, I think we all have a gift to share with the world. And sometimes it takes longer for others to discover that gift, you know, and sometimes they never do. and for me, I just try to tell people that there's no reason for anybody to tell you you're any different than me. You know, I was a skinny little kid from Winter Haven, Florida. I lived six miles out on a dirt road and grew up from very humble beginnings.

41:01but I wish I had something much more philosophical to tell you. But for me, it's really about, I think my advice has always been, not to have this whole weight of the world on your shoulders. I think for a long time I did that. I thought there's some things of my childhood that were, again, had nothing to do with my family, but just something happened that I just can't talk about quite yet. But at some point I will. But after that happened, it was like, you know, the guilt and the shame and putting all that on my shoulder, never being able to talk to anybody. And instead of relying on the people that love you and care for you so much.

41:54And that's what I ended up finally doing is like, it's okay to have people help and support you. It started early on as my family. And then when I met my wife, she was a huge part of that. I've been able to talk to her about many of the things that happened to me. And she's been my rock in many ways. So it's taken a long time. Dude, I mean, it's... Yeah, but every instinct when you're in that is to push it down and compartmentalize it and like really just like be in this relationship with shame, right, and never tell anybody what's going on. I still live with that though, Rich. Yeah, it's hard.

42:37It still had, and that's why I try, I still live with that shame and that guilt. So,

42:46you know, I, I, no, I, I do. And it, it, you know, it's there, but, uh, fortunately I've, you know, therapy has helped and, you know, my wife has helped a lot. So I, you know, I think, um,

43:11you know, I think it's going to be okay. And that's what I try to tell other people, my own children, my own grandchildren. I just had a conversation with one of my daughters and she was just having a bad day. And just, I said, it's gonna be okay. You're gonna be okay. And I couldn't really say anything that helped too much. I just, yeah. But just being there. Yeah. It was said to me early on that shame can't survive the light. And as much as we wanna keep those things in abeyance, it's only in kind of releasing them and sharing them that we can find some peace and freedom in it. But it holds on tight, man.

43:55And I think it's, thank you for sharing that. It's not easy to talk about these things. No, it's not. But I think it's helpful and empowering for other people to hear. I've heard you talk about that. We all go through shit, man. Dude, I talked, I heard you last night. These dark moments can be amazing teachers. Yeah, so. I've heard you say many, many, many times like swimming saved my life, but I think I have a deeper understanding of just how true that is, I think for you. I've never talked about it before. So not in that kind of depth. And not only did it save your life, it gave you an entirely new one.

44:38So you went up at Auburn. did you have a sense when you arrived there that, you know, Richard Quick, I mean, like you're going from basically this football coach turn, you know, and then now you have Richard Quick early in his career, obviously, who would go on to just be one of the absolute legends and icons of swimming coach history, right? And he really, you know, set you up for tremendous success. Yeah, he did. And believe it or not, Rich, and a lot of people remember this, but Eddie Reese recruited me. He was at Auburn and he coached at Auburn before he went to Texas. So Eddie recruited me out of high school.

45:20He was one of only two schools to recruit me. I wrote letters to 50 schools and didn't get recruited by Western Kentucky and Auburn. And Eddie would call me all my senior year. And it's a long story, but he had seen me swim somewhere and knew that I had the potential. You know, Eddie is, I mean, he's like - Sure, yeah, this isn't like a swimming podcast. There's a lot of people have no idea who that is. Who Eddie Reese is. He's the greatest college swim coach in history. At Texas and just, you know, basically oversaw a dynasty for decades. We have Mount Rushmore, right? He's in that Mount Rushmore.

45:58And so I swam with him my freshman year and certainly flourished. and then he went to Texas and then Richard came in. And so I had the best of both worlds. I had that beginning with Eddie and then I had the rest of the way with Richard and he went to Texas not to get into details, but he coached the women, Eddie was coaching the men. So after I graduated from Auburn, I went down to Austin and spent two years with both of them. And I'd swim with Richard mostly, but also swim with Eddie too. So I had two of the greatest coaches in history coach me those last two years. And what if you could sort of crystallize the wisdom that you learned from them, not just a sport level, but on a life level, like what did those guys teach you that you still carry with you today?

46:47Well, from Eddie's standpoint, the sense of humor, deprecation of perspective, you know, he was so good at that.

47:05And Colin tells that story where Eddie, he was a head coach in 2008 and they're at 400 free relay. And they're getting ready to go out. Michael Phelps going for eight gold medals, Jason Lezak anchoring, the story of that relay. A lot of people do, even if you don't know swimming. And the last thing he said to the guys when they were walking out, he goes, don't F it up. I mean, that's the kind of, You know, and it really helped me. And when I was like wide eyed, it helped me with that sense of humor. And obviously his knowledge is just amazing. He had the knack of that perfect taper for Richard.

47:47You know, I think everybody needs that. That person in their life that they can go to outside of the pool. And Richard was my second father. I love the man more than I can ever begin to tell you. And talk about there isn't a day that goes by, there really isn't that I don't think of Richard and his love and his passion for the sport. I mean, you knew him and he was, I learned a lot about passion for what we have in our sport from him and the love of it and the ability to, I mean, I remember him saying, you have to eliminate the NT words from your vocabulary. We are not going to say can't, don't, won't, et cetera.

48:42We are going to be positive in every respect. And I was a bit of a negative guy, you know? I was still kind of up and down and never was perfect, obviously, but he helped transform that in a big way. What do you think are the qualities that define the best coaches? Like what is the ultimate coach in your mind as somebody who's been around sport and elite performance for so long? Well, I think the amount of, the number of people that you have talked to, you probably know that better than I, well, I know you know that better than I do. But for me personally, I think patience is a really big thing for me.

49:23I need somebody that, you know, this sport will chew you up, man. And you really need patience for that pupil of yours. You need to have the wherewithal to be able to understand what they're going through. Richard certainly had that in so many ways. Eddie did too, but spent most of my career with Richard. And I think for Richard, I think for a coach in general, you cannot be afraid to fail. You have to take risks. I think that status quo type coach is going to fall into, oh, it worked this year, so it's going to work next year, you know, and Richard never did that. If we were successful one year, he was still not afraid to experiment the next year, try something different in a tape or in a or something in the weight room, dry land, you know, he was constantly experimenting, you know, and that's tough to do, you know.

50:30And I think the last thing is to be able to have that trust, to build that trust with that athlete. That athlete has to trust that coach implicitly. Can I tell you a very quick story? Mm-hmm. Um, so the, I swam the third day of the Olympics and that's a long story. I'll make it short, but, um, I started the track start, you know, I was the first swimmer. You were the only one doing it. In 84. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, but the whole idea was, uh, in, in 82, I had a really bad start at the, uh, at the world championships where I first started it. And, and, uh, So for the next two years, man, I was the last one out of the water every day.

51:16You know, it was like my goal, this noble goal. So for that 15 minutes every day, I'd practice my start. But I'd do the same cadence, Rich. So I'd take your mark and I'd go real slow and try to time it, you know, when this gun went off. Anyway, long story, third day of the Olympics. Back then, there were three starters. Well, one starter, Richard noticed on the first day, was very quick. guy from Panama, take your Mark Mang, came to me the next day, we have to change your start. You've been working on this for two years, but you've got to come down fast. If you don't, there's a chance, maybe not, but there's a chance that this guy starts your race.

51:54So he literally, you know, the day after the first day, that whole second day before I swam the third day, we practice coming down quicker. Wow. The last thing you want as an athlete at the Olympics is to change anything, right? Dude. Yeah, that must have freaked you out. At the Olympics. I mean, a week before or whatever, but like a day before. But it gets back to what I was saying about trust. I trusted him implicitly. At first I was taken aback, but once he said, trust me, I was all in. So I think the trust is incredibly important. But trust is built as a result of a relationship, right? There's something different about a coach telling a swimmer what to do, they do it and they succeed versus like a dynamic where there's a back and forth where the coach is listening to the athlete as much as the athlete is listening to the coach.

52:51Fourth thing, communication. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Critical. So everybody knows or most people know that you had this successful 1984 Olympics, three golds, you won the 100 freestyle and you were on two gold medal winning relays, is four by 100 freestyle and four by 100 medley relay. 10 world records, I think, along the way. Is that right? Don't know. Something like that. I really, I couldn't tell you. I like that you don't know. Something like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think people probably don't appreciate the fact that you were actually at your peak in 1980 and 1981 and you were a victim of the 1980 Olympic boycott.

53:36I wanna understand that I have, you know, we have some mutual friends who were also members of that team, John Moffat. Yeah, I think he was 16. I think he was the youngest person to make the 80 team. He was like 16 years old. Yeah. And through John and others have met others who were members of the 80 team. At the time you were supportive of President Carter and the boycott. I know there's a documentary that just came out. There was a screening that both of us, you're a protagonist in this movie. You weren't able to go, I wasn't able to see it. But walk me through like that whole like experience.

54:10Well, the problem with the boycott for those that are not old enough to remember was our country decided not to attend the Olympic games, which were in Moscow in Russia because the Russians had invaded another country, Afghanistan, ironically. And so at that time, our country thought, they were hoping for two things to happen. A, for the Olympics to be moved from Russia to another country, another city, or B, influence the Russians to leave Afghanistan. And it's just hard for me to believe, and hindsight's a beautiful thing, that somebody who's much smarter than me say, this is not gonna work, guys.

54:56You really think the Russians loved it that we didn't come. Because they just, their propaganda promoted more medals for them. They loved it. They didn't have a problem with it because they could promote what they wanted to. And the second thing is, do you really think the Russians were gonna leave Afghanistan because we weren't going to the Olympics? Do you think Putin really cares that his athletes weren't able to come to Paris? It's hard to imagine that now with our kind of fractured attention spans. It was a monoculture there. I mean, the world really did stop when the Olympics were going on in a way that isn't the case now.

55:29No. But even so, it's such a stretch. Yeah, and again, I understand my hindsight on it all, but the best scenario would have been to go over there and kick their ass. And then it would have been a much better situation for us that we could promote and they would see and they could not deny. It didn't happen obviously. So the problem with us is it's every four years. We don't have a World Series or Super Bowl. It's the Olympics. And it is every four years. And... An athlete's life can come and go in a span of four years. Imagine playing the Super Bowl every four years. It's sort of like World Cup in soccer.

56:13That's why it's so big, because it's so rare. And I had my day in the sun. I was blessed because I had 1984. The real true heroes, the ones that I constantly think of, are the ones like Craig Beersley, who we were talking about. A lot of your audience probably doesn't know who Craig Beersley is, but he would have won the gold medal by a second and a half in 1980, one of the greatest swimmers in history. He gets third at our Olympic trials. They take the top two only in 1984 and will always be a part of that ghost Olympic team. So yeah, the boycott broke my heart in many ways. But again, I feel very fortunate and blessed that I had 84.

56:53In the wake of that, I mean, I think you were like world swimmer of the year in 1980. Yeah, 1980. So, I mean, this really was meant to be like, this was your moment, right? And you were stripped of it. did that take you back to some of the, you know, harder kind of emotional spaces that you would work so hard to, you know, kind of graduate from as a teenager? It did a little bit, Rich, but I will tell you, I was 21 in 1980, that spring and summer. And, you know, my times that year would have won five gold medals. You never know when you get there. But again, I was so young. I didn't know what the Olympics were.

57:34I remember I just started swimming four years earlier. So I knew I missed something big, but I didn't realize Olympics. I mean, okay, I've got NCAAs next year. So I didn't appreciate it until after 84. It was more heartbreaking, believe it or not, after I had the experience of 1984, knowing what I missed in 80 and so many others obviously missed in 80. I mean, I knew it was big and I was heartbroken and all of that. I had taken a whole year off of school basically to train for the game. So if I had to do it all over again, I certainly wouldn't have done that. And, but I didn't have the real breakdown like so many did because I was still pretty young and felt like I've got my senior in college and college swimming was much more important to me anyway.

58:27Sure, but at 21 or however old you were when you graduate from college, swimming is done. Nobody was continuing to swim. And I quit too, I retired. Not only because there wasn't, nobody was, there was no sponsorship dollars. You weren't allowed to even take money even had it been made available. So nobody would continue into 22, 23, 24 at that point. So it was quite radical for you to decide, I'm gonna keep going. It was. Which is so difficult to wrap your head around now because you see these medalists all over the place who are in their late 20s and like, oh, well they got a couple, maybe they have two more Olympic, it's like that would just blow the minds of anybody back in 1984.

59:17Yeah, I agree. But again, I lived so much in the present as a kid at 21, I didn't think so much about my future. You know, so I was just thinking about the summer nationals and summer trials of 80. And, you know, I just I didn't have the wherewithal to be able to peek ahead and know how much it would it affected me. But, yeah, I retired after 81 for six months. I retired. It wasn't quit. I just retired like everybody else did. but I think it was my father who kind of came to me at the end of that six months it was the end of the summer right after my NCAA championships that's when I retired and he said are you going to be able to live with yourself for the rest of your life and say what if you know are you going to be able to look in the mirror or listen to the national anthem or watch the Olympics down the line and consistently ask yourself what if what if I had done this what if I had gone for it and it really woke me up to saying, you know what, you're right.

1:00:23I need to do this win, lose, or draw. And that's when I went to Richard and said, I wanna come back and try to make a run for this. And he said, you need to do this, this, and this, and let's give it a run. And it was not easy. I mean, I remember moving off to Texas and working as an, about a year and a half, I worked as a night clerk in a hotel. I had the 8 p.m. to 4 a.m. shift. And then going right to morning workout after that? Pretty much. And then sleep all day. Yeah. And then go to afternoon workout and rinse and repeat. In 1983, the rules changed a little bit though with respect to finances.

1:01:03But it was still tough. What happened in 1983 was our sport came to us and said, you can make money outside of swimming. The money has to come to our federation and you turn receipts in for your cost of living. So in the end of 83 for about six months, which worked perfectly because I was flat broke, lived off macaroni and cheese and Cap 'n Crunch cereal. I was able to turn my receipts in for my electric bill and gas for my car. It's just like you do now, right? And then I would do a clinic and make$500. I'd have to send it to USA Swimming. but then they would send me funding back. So it all had to funnel through the organization.

1:01:52Yeah, it had to funnel through the organization. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, that's so wild. I know. I laugh about it now. Can you imagine? I know, I know. I mean, they don't even do that in college anymore for crying out loud. High school. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's funny, you go on social media, and everyone's, here's how you optimize your diet for performance. Like, these guys are broke. They're eating Captain Crunch and ramen and just staying up all night, like working late shifts just so they can, I mean, you know, how many Olympians out there who are here in Paris I still think there are some that do that.

1:02:23Have some version of that story. Absolutely. You know. I still think there are a lot of athletes that still have to do that. I think there's some myth busting that has to happen. Absolutely. There's this idea that these guys are all, you know, like living on big sponsor dollars. And it's really just the top 0.1 % of the athletes that you're seeing on TV. And the vast majority of everybody here has endured some version of your story in order to be here, especially those three or four jobs or whatever it is. Exactly right. Especially those sports that don't get a lot of recognition at all, rowing and weightlifting, et cetera, et cetera.

1:03:03I'm sure they have - Well, there's much more obscure sports than those too. Yeah. Nonetheless, you show up at trials, you don't qualify for the team in the 200, but you do make it in the 100. You end up in 84. We don't have to rehash all of the races, but you experience Olympic glory. I'm curious now as a commentator, when you see guys like Caleb or, I don't know, the guys who are older, like Ryan Murphy, guys who've been around for a long time, do you have like a kind of an extra layer of empathy for those guys because of your own personal experience and knowing what it's like to kind of like like be eking it out and holding on.

1:03:44And then, you know, just getting that last final victory before you ride off into the sunset. Yeah, sure. I always have a little special place in my heart for those guys that have stuck around longer than even I did. And, you know, you take a look at somebody like Murph who guys like an engine, man. I can't imagine going three Olympics. Look at Katie. I mean, it's just, yeah, crazy, unbelievable. what they go through in day in and day out. And they have to make a living doing it pretty much. And that's tough. I didn't swim for money. And I think that was fortunate. I think the pressure of swimming for money would have weighed too heavily on me.

1:04:29I literally swam for the love of it. But now you have to swim for the love of it and swim for money and to try to etch out a future perhaps because of swimming. So yeah, I always feel a certain amount of love for those kids that have been sticking around for a long time. The other thing that's really hard to fully appreciate unless you've lived it is what it must be like to focus your entire life on this performance goal, all leading up to this Olympic games and succeed, win or lose, whatever happens. One day you're in it and there's all this attention on you and it's all about you and your performance.

1:05:11And then the next day you're a civilian. And that transition has got to be extremely difficult, even for people who have done their best to prepare for it. And I think there's a lot of athletes and I know it's changed and we can get into kind of mental health discussion. But for those athletes who feel like it's an indulgence to even think about what you're gonna do next, because it's taking your eye off the balls and might undermine your performance. You can almost foresee the existential crisis on the horizon when reality sets in. And for the first time, they have to think, well, what am I gonna do now?

1:05:50Yeah, I mean, that's what I was saying earlier about the fact that I was so much about living in the present, like tomorrow. Okay, what am I gonna do tomorrow? Yeah, I had long-term goals, but I was just trying to get through day by day. it was just such a grind all you could think about was just making it through the next practice you certainly had didn't have any long-term goals as far as outside the water I mean you knew you were getting a your your degree and and stuff but I didn't have any idea what I was going to do my father was a motion picture director and I thought I wanted to go into filmmaking somehow but I didn't know specifics because I was so wrapped up in what I was doing and that's the way they are now and it's no different and then all of a sudden it comes to an end and again it may be somewhat first world problems but they're real first world problems and the fact that there is a tremendous amount of letdown and for me I was I went into to real depression, I think.

1:07:00Back then it wasn't analyzed or we didn't have the kind of mental health help that we do now, but man, for about two months, I was not suicidal or anything. It's not surprising. I would have to believe that's an incredibly common experience. I mean, I'm reminded of the HBO documentary. Michael. The Weight of Gold that, yeah, Michael was behind and Peter Carlisle. It's a great documentary. Yeah, which kind of goes into that whole thing. It really did. If you haven't seen something about what we're talking about, you need to go watch that. That will explain everything in an hour and a half. I can't let you just gloss over the fact that your dad was a motion picture director.

1:07:40You were named after, from Rawhide, right? Is that true? That's a true story. Clint Eastwood. Your dad, like in Florida was directing motion, like directing movies? Well, he directed a couple of movies, but he mostly did television commercials. So you remember the, he had some commercials. You remember the Die Hard Battery commercial by Sears, you know, frozen on a lake for six months. He did all those. Oh, wow. He did all the Wausau insurance commercials. He did a lot of Chicago city commercials, Dodge trucks, Farrah Fawcett, all the Farrah Fawcett Dodge car commercials. Wow. She did all the Jack Nicklaus commercials for all the stuff he did.

1:08:22Jack liked him the best. So yeah, he was mostly a commercial television director, but he's directed a film called Scuba and another small film. And so with Lloyd Bridges back then Lloyd Bridges. Wow. Yeah. So he was a - And you thought, so that was interesting to you. Yeah, I'd go on shoots with him and be a runner. And so he'd like, he'd give me a stack of$20 bills, Rich. And he'd say, I need quiet on this set. He's shooting a outdoor commercial on something. and say, I need quiet, do what you have to do with these 20s and make sure it's quiet. So this guy start a lawnmower, I'd go give him$20, be quiet for now.

1:09:01Some guy start his car and I think, you have to hear you. So yeah, that's what I do. Yeah. So then I guess it's not as much of a leap to, imagine a career in broadcasting, but how did that come about for you? I did a battle of the network stars swimming for a fledgling network called ESPN, like in 1985, early 85. And I did the swimming part. It was in Orlando. I got called by it. I had an agent back then. He said, you know, they want you to, are you interested in doing that? I said, yeah. Anyway, it's more weeds to it than that, but I just loved it and, and got asked to do another battle of the corporate stars.

1:09:46And And again, these are all kind of little ESPN things back in the ESPN days of what do they call now? And they show the old classic ESPN stuff. Anyway, and I started and I did Goodwill Games, Ted Turner, big thing and tried out, I auditioned for 92, didn't get it. But I got the triple cast, which was awesome. John Neighbor was doing it before you, is that? 88, John did it. And then in 92, Michael Bryan and Mary Waite did it. And they were kind of thrown to the wolves, never had any kind of experience. And, you know, it was tough on them. And I felt really, and if I had done the same thing they had done, I wouldn't be doing commentating anymore.

1:10:34But because I did triple cast, I was able to, everything was live, no editing, just down and dirty, do it and leave, you know. And for me, that really helped me a lot, gain the experience I needed. And then I auditioned in 96 with Greg Gumbel, called some race. They didn't tell me what race. They said, okay, you're just going to call a race. And I got 96 and been doing it ever since.

1:11:06I own a bunch of spectacles. And I made the grave error the other day of donning a normal non-Roka pair on my indoor trainer when I was riding my bike indoors. And I got to tell you, it was a disaster. Every three to five seconds, I had to take my hands off the handlebars and push my glasses back up my nose until I got so frustrated I just tossed them aside. This is the dilemma of every active but optically impaired person I know. and as someone who has relied upon eyewear every single day since I was five years old, it is also the source of endless aggravation. Thankfully, now eradicated thanks to Broca, the stylish performance eyewear company founded by two former Stanford swimming teammates of mine who have gifted everyone like me and quite frankly, the world with their fashionable line of super lightweight prescription glasses and sunglasses with patented no-slip nose and temple pads that are just impervious to sweat.

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1:12:41What do people not understand or appreciate about how difficult this job is? Because it looks like you're just, you know, like you're just cheering or whatever, but there's a lot going on. I got to spend a little bit of time with Craig Hummer. You know, Craig Hummer. I know, Craig Hummer very well, very dear friend. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know you guys are buddies. For a very long time. And he was an incredible swimmer, but most of his broadcasting is in rodeo. It's like he's doing this sport that's totally different, but he was back here doing college swimming for the Olympic Broadcasting. What is it called?

1:13:14Olympic Broadcasting Network, OBN. OBS, yeah, yeah, world feed. And he was just giving me kind of a primer or a quick lesson on like the challenges of, you gotta know everything about all these people. It's coming at you fast. You gotta have it right on your fingertips. Like what's going, like, are you being fed information? Like, how does it work? What are the brass tacks of the process? So, yeah, you know, the criticism is justified a lot sometimes when I don't read the people that live in their parents' basement and patrols. Nor should you, Rowdy. No, no, I don't read that stuff. I don't read the good stuff very much either, but I get it, you know, where people say, God, this guy, what is this guy talking about?

1:14:00But I challenge people. Sometimes I've had a troll or two that I've heard about and I've invited them to the booth and it really changes their perspective. Have at it. Yeah, it's a little bit different. In fact, we have like an auction item every year at our golden goggles for USA Swimming. And the item is to commentate a race with, in the booth at one of the pro swims. And usually it's person that, you know, been a little critical, not all the time, but they go, oh my God, I had no idea. I'm so sorry. Because that's the pro-swim. The reason is you have three or four people talking into your ear and you have to listen to all those people while you're talking.

1:14:45So I have my producer. I have Dan, Tommy Roy, our longtime producer, who's the best in the business. I have Mike Unger, who is usually the guy that, did you ever see that movie Broadcast News? Holly Hunter and William Hurt. And William Hurt's calling the news. He's really good at doing the news, but he's an idiot. Right. And so she's kind of telling him what to say. And he's so good at listening and telling the audience what she's telling him. So he's kind of my Holly Hunter. He didn't tell me what to say, but he'll say, oh, he was 32-3 on that split. And I can say without looking 32-3, watch lane eight.

1:15:28I can say watch lane eight. So he's talking and then our director every once in a while chimes in. So I have three, four people talking and sometimes they're all talking at the same time. And they're all asking me questions. Or they're all telling me. That would cause an anxiety attack, yeah. So my wife has gone in the booth with me before and she's listened for like two minutes. She has to take the headset off. She can't do it. It creates so much anxiety. but you know I'm used to it now but it is it's a lot to handle you know Elizabeth did it with me in Tokyo for the first time and it it she'll tell you it was it's not for the faint of heart it's not digging ditches not you know pulling weeds or whatever but it's it's it's it's a lot more challenging and difficult than people think when they watch the rowdy cam or whatever and to say all I do is get to jump up and down, which I do.

1:16:21But at the same time, I'm listening to people at the same time. And when Michael comes into the booth, I mean, he's wearing headphones also. So is he like, is Dan, Mike, like, yeah, you're balancing who's talking next. What are they gonna say? How are we gonna make this all work? Are they hearing something different in their headphones? Are they hearing the same thing you're hearing? No, they don't talk to Michael very much. I see. They kind of leave, because again, it's very disorienting if you haven't been able to do that before. You know, I remember Michael early on, he doesn't do this anymore, but early on when we were in Tokyo, you know, the producer would answer, ask him a question, yes or no?

1:16:59And he'd go, yeah. Like on the air, you know, because he didn't know that. You forget, you got a hot mic. So, but Michael's awesome now. He's like, he's such a great expert, but yeah, you have to be prepared for that. So I think for me now and Dan, they know that they can talk to Dan is just, he is the goat. It is unbelievable. You think Mike - What makes him so good? Like what is the talent? Well, the first and foremost talent that he has Rich is preparation. When I sit here with you, you are prepared. When I watch your stuff, I go, man, that dude is prepared. He knows more than the guy he's talking to.

1:17:45But only through preparation. You know, you can't, I don't, it's, you learned that from swimming too. Like you can't, you can't fake, you don't, you can't and you don't wanna fake it. No, and he doesn't fake it. That's why he's so prepared. If you understood what he did, you talk about a day in the life, he will get there in Paris. He got there, well, first of all, he'd watch prelims, take notes all during prelims and he'd get there about one o 'clock, 8.30. I mean, right after prelims, he'd go to the pool. 8.30 is finals, right? And he'd meet from one to four with our stat people, our researchers.

1:18:21There's two of them. Along with Mike Unger. But they sit there for three hours and talk. Nothing but that night in finals. And each swimmer who's swimming and kind of the history of that swimmer. And he'd make notes and everything. And then we had a production meeting from four to six. And then he'd go back and take more. He'd spend six hours just doing notes, man. This goes on for days. He's ultimately prepared. And plus, he's so good at talking. I still get flustered sometimes when people are talking to me and count me down. Okay, you need to fix this edit. We have five seconds. Okay, five, four, three, two, one, go.

1:18:59And you can see him in lane number four doing this. What a great asset he's been to USA Swimming. And they're counting me down, five, four, three. And I have to end it before Dan talks on the next link. So it's complicated. but the point is he's so good at it. It's mind boggling. I get anxiety. I have anxiety listening to him when he had fixes to do. It's a thing of beauty. It really is. At the same time, I feel like if you were at home watching the Olympics, you'd be yelling at the TV in a similar way, right? That would still be going on because you are, you are, this incredibly knowledgeable person about the sport and knows how to communicate what's going on in a way that not only informs the public, but gets them excited.

1:19:44But at the same time, you're a super fan and you have personal relationships with like probably all of these people, right? And I would imagine maybe you have favorites or you know some of these kids better than you know others, but you've got to maintain some level of objectivity in the booth at the same time, right? I do, I get excited about any swimming. I mean, I get more excited about American winning. I'm not gonna lie, I do. But you should have seen me when Leon won. I mean, it was so bloody cool. I was jumping up and down just like I did when they showed the other one a couple of days ago with the women's relay or mixed relay, I guess it was.

1:20:21I was jumping up and down just as much of Leon. They might not have shown it, but I was, I love great swimming and Summer McIntosh. I was going crazy. I, you know, I love it. And, but we are broadcasting to primarily an American audience. I'm not doing the world feed. I'm not doing what Craig Hummer's doing. I'm doing in an NBC feed to America. And I'm gonna get excited when an American does well. I just the way I am, I'm not going to change. Even amongst the Americans, because you know all these kids so well. And I do know some better than others. so I know more about their journey than others.

1:21:07I know, for example, I don't know about Aaron and Alex Shackle's journey. They were brother-sister that made the team this year, very young, 17 and 19. But I know their dad so well. Nick swam for Auburn, Olympian, just a great guy. Love that guy. I've known him forever. So I get a little bit more excited about his kids. I don't know his kids. I met him. We went to Croatia for their camp, spent three or four days with the camp and you get to know him a little bit. but I don't know him like I know Reagan Smith or like I know Kieran Smith who swam the 400 men and Reagan swam the 200 fly that Alex Shackle swam.

1:21:43So, but I got excited about Alex making that final and not 200 fly, that was cool. It was awesome. It was cool also to see Michael so excited about Leon, you know, there's something really cool about that. And obviously Leon swims for Bowman and the likes of there's connectivity there. It was pretty cool, pretty incestuous there, wasn't it? In a way it was like Bob was his father and now he's like a brother of Leon. And yeah, it was awesome. And so that I think that's one reason why he knew so much about the race itself, obviously and Leon's relationship, Bob's relationship. And so I went in that form and I am, I kind of let him do his things.

1:22:27I kind of shut down for the most part. If you listen to that race, I'm not talking very much. Uncharacteristically quiet. I know. Let the goat say his piece. Yeah, let the goat do what he does best. You mentioned Summer McIntosh. I think she is a gigantic breakout star. I think LA 28 is gonna be all about her. She is, she's huge. She's the whole package. She is the whole package. And it reminds me a little bit of Kate Douglas, you know, doesn't get real excited about, it doesn't have these huge highs or lows. It's very, very consistent. And just one of the true superstars in our sport in the future, 17 years old, got great genes and is gonna continue to have great success.

1:23:16One of the things that I haven't heard you speak that much about is the fact that in 1991, you contracted Gillian Barr syndrome. That's how you say it, right? Guillain-Barre. Guillain-Barre. I said it completely wrong actually. Most people say Guillain-Barre, but it's two French guys who discovered it actually. Guillain and a Barré. Tell me what that is. I know you spent like two months in the hospital and suffered some pretty serious, but temporary paralysis. Yeah, I'm walking around one day and feeling great. And within 24 hours, everything just shut down. You know, it was sort of like I started doing everything in slow motion.

1:23:58I got this tingling feeling in my fingers and toes, like when your foot falls asleep or something, and it just didn't go away. So I thought I was just had the flu or something. I didn't know that it was anything too serious. But my wife, again, the hero that she was, she said something's wrong because I was starting to not be able to even walk. and she literally picked me up, put me in the car, took me in the emergency room. And how compressed of a time period was that? 24 hours. Wow. Yeah, it happens very fast for the most part. Sometimes it's a weird disease, you know, it's an autoimmune disease.

1:24:35It's not something that's contagious and people still don't know how you get it. It's a lot of people think you get, you've had the flu or cold and it mutates into this virus. um i had some doctor tell me i got it from eating sushi in japan because i was in japan the two weeks prior but nobody really knows but i know what basically there's a there there's a mylon sheath that protects your nerves and it shreds that sheath so your nerves short circuit so yeah i completely paralyzed for i spent three or four months in the hospital and then got out and had of relapse and it's been another month or so.

1:25:18So yeah, it took a while before I was able to kind of relearn how to do all. Like all your motor skills. All my motor skills. How long did that take? Until I felt completely normal again, about a year to where the T I still have tingling, that's never left. I'm used to it now, it doesn't affect me, but it's like when your foot falls or hand falls asleep, I still have those feelings.

1:25:48But my, you know, we had two children, two young children, Emily and Madison, and I got it in 91. Oh yeah, and Savannah must've been born too. She was born in, no, no, she wasn't born yet, 94. So that was tough on my family. How is that treated? Is there some kind of antiviral? They use a plasma pharesis treatment back then. Again, I don't know the scientific part of it. I wish I had somebody from the Guillain-Barre syndrome organization, but basically it's like a dialysis. They go in with a tube, get all the antibodies out of the blood and then have it flush back in with clean blood. And so I had to go through that, which was really painful, at least in the beginning, after about three or four weeks, it started getting less, but it was, and had to relearn how to do everything all over again.

1:26:48I didn't be fed. It was just like being paralyzed. You know, I couldn't move anything, but I could feel the pain. It was paralysis, but if you stuck a needle in my hand, it hurt. Wow. That was the difference. It wasn't paralysis, like you couldn't feel anything. So the pain was excruciating because the pins and needles feeling was at an all time high. So when you touch, you know how you, your foot falls asleep and you kind of slap and go, ah, that hurts. That's how it was, but times a million. And is there a risk of recurrence or are you cured? And it's in the past? I have a higher risk of occurrence, 10 times more likely for it to reoccur than the average person, but it strikes one in a hundred thousand people is the stats on it.

1:27:33So even though I have a more or likelihood, I've never had any issues with it. You're not supposed to get a flu shot, even had a neurologist few years. In fact, when you get your flu shot, it says, have you ever had a Guillain-Barre and you're not supposed to get a flu shot. But I had a neurologist tell me several years ago, you're fine now, you go ahead and. Here's the ripple though. After that, this period of time in which you have to relearn all your motor skills, you end up getting back in the pool and you break these age group national records in the 53 and the 140? It was not big a deal.

1:28:08Do they still stand? Do you know? I have no idea. You don't know. What did you go like? Well, I was 91. I was 32. So yeah, in fact, that age group, 30 to 34 in master swimming, I broke every world record from 50 to 1500. Of course, there's only three people in my age group in master swimming. So maybe here's, I read in 2011, okay, much later. You broke a couple of records in the 50 to 54. And you went like 21 three in the 53. Like you were like 54 years old. Yeah. 100 meter long course, 54 six. Yeah, maybe. Do you know those records still around? Do you know? I don't know. You don't know? I don't know, Rich.

1:28:54But here's the thing. All right, going back to 91, you know, in the wake of that, learning how to move again and do everything. Same obsession. You do get back in the pool. And in 96, you qualify for the Olympic trials? Yeah. Like swimming basically. To swim, I was able to make the team. Yeah, I know, you end up not competing in trials though. Right, because NBC offered me the job. You made the cut, you were 35, you were the oldest at that time. Yeah. And I never hear anyone talking about this. No, I don't talk about this. Yeah, yeah. No, I don't know if I've ever talked about it, but yeah, in 96, I was just swimming masters and I made the cut and I thought, oh, this would be cool.

1:29:39I think I may go to trials just for the fun of it. Right, right. But then I had to audition already and NBC offered me the job and they kind of said, hey, listen, you can either swim or you can come do work for us. And I said, ah, it's not that important. So I wasn't gonna make the team, so. Your real job is water safety. Yeah. You're known for these NBC gigs, but there's a lot of time in between these, right? And I was surprised to hear how much you travel in regards to your responsibilities with stepping to swim. So let's talk a little bit about like water safety, why you're so passionate about it.

1:30:19Yeah, dude, I'm so glad you asked me about it because it really is my passion now. It breaks my heart when I see a child drown. And we were talking about it before we came to the studio. And I said, you know, a lot of people don't know it's the number one cause of death in children, ages one to four. It's number two in the five to four teenage group. Is that global or is that US? US, it's worse global. Vietnam, it's through the roof. I get a Google alert every time a child drowns and I get four or five a day. and uh and the reason why it's so heartbreaking is because i know how unnecessary it is or how unnecessary it was when i write read about it for the most part not all the time but for the most part it was so unnecessary because if that child had just known and had taken swim lessons they would have been able to save their own lives because the key to life-saving skills for that that child to float on their back.

1:31:18That's a natural skill that a child has to be able to float on their back. And it's easily taught. It's not hard to teach a child to do that. And so our goal at Step Into Swimming is to be able to provide that kind of funding to those grant organizations, or to those learn to swim organizations to be able to provide those children, especially in those low income areas, the ability to take swim lessons. Because if they take a swim lessons that reduces that risk of 90%. So I'm not trying to throw too many stats at you, but I beg parents, please, I beg you never take your eye off your child because 70 to 80 % of drownings happen in front of adult.

1:32:01We were talking about that. Within 10 feet of that adult, it's because of this. It's because of this right here. Looking at your phone. Right? That parent becomes distracted. A child can drown in as little as 30 seconds. We don't have time to do that right now. But if I started to stopwatch right now and did 30 seconds, it wouldn't take long. 30 seconds, it could take longer, but it can take as little as 30 seconds. So that parent has to be that first line of defense. Secondly, barriers, which are critical. But the third thing is put your kids in swim lessons because we can't watch our kids 100 % of the time.

1:32:38It's been proven. I mean, all the, you know, there's so many drownings happen because a parent, and no fault of their own, but there's distractions in life. And, but if you have that child, they're usually not missing more than a few minutes. And most drownings with children happen with their clothes on. So my granddaughters took this ISR class. You don't have to go that far, but at the end of their course, they put them in the water with all their, in fact, winter clothes, right on their back. Wait 30 seconds, minute, the parents gonna be back and they save a life of incredible heartache. So I'm very proud of our organization and what we've been able to do.

1:33:21We'll give a million and a half dollars away this year and hopefully give a lot more in the future. Yeah, that's great. Drowning doesn't discriminate. If you don't know how to swim, you don't know how to swim. You're at your peril, but it certainly impacts at-risk youth and lower socioeconomic communities, communities that don't have access to swimming pools. We were talking earlier about the fact that it's a systemic issue as much as it is one of parental or personal responsibility because a lot of these municipal pools are closed. Public pools are, you know, when I was a kid, there are public pools everywhere.

1:34:03where there aren't so many anymore. So access is a problem. Affordability is a problem. It's an economic problem. Even if you have a pool in your area, can you afford that? And when you have parents who never learned how to swim or there's a weird relationship with pools or water, there's an intimidation or some other kind of emotional barrier there, you have to contend with that as well. So it's a complicated issue that I think in order to solve is more than just like, well, we just need to make swim lessons accessible to people because there's a lot, there's kind of a lot going on right there.

1:34:39And we were also chatting, like I had the opportunity to see Cullen Jones do a panel on this very issue. And also just the issue of inclusion writ large in swimming, right? Like representation matters. There aren't that many people of color in this sport. At this Olympics, we had a couple of really interesting stories. Josh Liendo, this star ascendant of course, and Simone Manuel and some other people, but they're few and far between. And I think we need more people like that, that inspire these young kids, people of color who are living in these communities and don't share that kind of equal access.

1:35:16Because when people see people like Cullen, it inspires them just like Tiger Woods inspired a generation of young golfers. So. So wouldn't it be cool though, one day that we wouldn't have this conversation? Yeah, I would like to not have this conversation. Yeah, I would like to not have this conversation. I mean, I had this conversation with other people 20 years ago and it's a bummer that we're still talking about it. One day I'd love to be able to just say that's the norm. We don't have to talk about getting more people of color involved in the sport and we're still not there. We've got a long way to go and this old white guy is not gonna be able to help, But somebody like Colin Jones, who's such a hero to that community and such a hero to the water safety advocacy effort, is a guy that can do it.

1:36:04Simone Manuel can do it. Josh Liendo can do it. There's so many out there. Maritza Cry, I can think of a million names that have been so good at that. But I can tell you, our organization really is trying to concentrate on that black community, that African-American community, especially because an African-American child is much more likely to drown than their Caucasian counterpart, five times more likely, in fact. And so we did a study a few years ago. I say we, USA Swimming and the University of Memphis and UNLV. And not to get into details too much, but they found the number one reason that African-Americans don't know how to swim is because it's generational fear.

1:36:46That fear is passed down from one generation to the next. So it was your point just a minute ago that we need to do more on the education part, as well as just giving money out to organizations for swim lessons. We need to change that first and foremost. If you're afraid to swim, please don't be afraid to put your child in swim lessons. But access is incredibly important because that's the number two reason. We want to try to bring the lessons to the children because these are working parents. It's hard to get a kid to swim lessons at a local Y. They work. and how do you do that? So we wanna try to go to those apartments, those abandoned pools, get them refurbished.

1:37:24And I think our organization, the Pool and Hot Tub Alliance, which is the kind of the governing body of Step in a Swim is trying to think of ways to do that. How do we rehab pools? How do we get those pools open in those communities? Yeah, just drive them around Los Angeles. There's tons of them everywhere and they're just empty. Crazy. I think that's one of the legacies that LA 28 should really build on. And so Janet, wherever you are, Janet Evans, along with Casey Wasserman, if you're listening to me, I want you guys to help me out in this plan here, this four year plan. Have you talked to Casey about this?

1:37:58I haven't talked to Casey, I've talked to Janet. Yeah, I saw Casey at Charles, but I didn't talk to him. He was too busy, but yeah, I've talked to Janet several times, but it doesn't matter whether they partner, they got enough on their plate. It's not gonna stop us. It's such a monumental obligation to pull off LA 28. Can you imagine? I just... Here's what I heard. You probably already know this, but this was news to me. We've seen the news reports that the pool is gonna be in SoFi. But... Second week. Right, that's the thing I didn't know. Swimming has always been the first week and track has always been the second week and they're flipping it.

1:38:34Like when was the last time that happened? So they're gonna have track and SoFi and then when that's done, then they're gonna build the pool and host the swimming. No, I don't... Is that right? No, maybe. I'm not a hundred percent sure, but my understanding is they're going to have opening ceremonies in SoFi. The track is gonna be in the Coliseum. Oh. And after opening ceremonies, they're gonna build the pool. They have that week to build the pool. That makes a little more sense. Because there's no way they can have track. They can't do that in a day. No, no, no, no. So I think the track is gonna be in the Coliseum.

1:39:10And I think they're gonna have the swimming the week after the opening ceremony. And the village is going to be at UCLA? I don't know. Good question. Yeah, it's gonna be interesting. It makes sense to have probably two like we did in 84. We had one at UCLA, the big one was at USC, but I don't know where - It just occurred to me, it should have struck me immediately earlier, but LA 28 being your last commentating, 84 being your first Olympics. And as an athlete, there's a real beauty in that. When you think of we are here for a purpose, there is more going on that maybe we realize, like there's a certain poetry to that.

1:39:54Yeah, it's gonna be a great way to wrap things up, Rich. It really will be. LA is such a great town and I know they're gonna do a wonderful job. It was magical in 1984, and I don't expect anything less. in 2028. What is your daily fitness health regime? Like, how do you take care of yourself? Do you get in the pool still? Swim every day. What does it look like? You do, every day. I have an endless pool at my home. Oh, you do? And so I swim in, and when I'm at home, I swim in that. But buddy, I find a pool. Here, no. Forget about it. Yeah, it's not happening. But I swim six days a week. I'm pretty religious on it, if I can.

1:40:38You know, when I'm traveling to a city, I'll swim in my residence in 20 foot pool. If I have to just do this, you know, I'll do whatever it takes to find a pool. I haven't been able to do it here because of work, but I did swim in the warmup pool here at the Olympics a couple of times, but yeah, I swim every day. I don't do anything else. I just swim. No gym work, no strength training, no cold plunge sauna, any of that kind of stuff. I love cold plunge. Yeah, it's pretty good. I love cold plunge. Do you have one? I know, but I'm working with a company soap that's gonna help me out, I think. And I love it.

1:41:18It's hard. Do you do it? I do. I love it. How long, what temperature and how long? I keep it at 41. Oh my, get the hell out of here. Get in for like, just like three to five minutes. No way. And I have a sauna and I'll go back and forth. But you can build up to it. You can build up to it. Oh my God. But you really need like 90 seconds is sort of the minimum effective dose. Oh, then it was worthless. I got in here, they had them at the warmup pool and it was 50 and I don't think I lost 30 seconds. But the difference between 50 and 41, you can't really tell the difference. It's not, when it's cold, it's cold.

1:41:56So you're recommending it be that cold 41? It doesn't have to be. I just keep it that like, that's the lowest, that's the coldest setting. So you have one at your home and do you have a, you say you have a hot tub? And have a sauna and the plunge. Oh, sauna and plunge. It's a lot easier if you're in the sauna and then you get in the plunge because you're boiling hot. It's a little bit easier to get in. So you don't do hot tub, but you sauna. Correct. Is that better than doing hot tub? I think it's better, it's better, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's a whole new world waiting for you out there.

1:42:28I can still discover it at 65. It's coming your way, I have no doubt about that. I have no doubt. The final thing I wanted to ask you about is how all of your experiences have impacted your role as a dad, as a father, family's clearly like, you know, number one priority for you. So being around all these high performers, being an Olympic champion, that can be intimidating for a child, right? Do I have to live up to this? How do you think about how you've parented, you know, being a girl dad and having all these, you know, being in a household of women. I mean, they're grown now, but. Well, the great line I have is, I play with Barbies and I like it.

1:43:11That's my line. That will now be the title of this podcast. No, a better title is I sit down to go pee now. That's how bad it is.

1:43:24I've made a lot of mistakes as a father. If I had to do it all over again, and I would do things differently. My wife has been the rock. She's been the one that's been the steady guiding force in choosing the right path. I've been, I travel so much and it's tough. And so I have to give her a lot of credit. I think maybe my biggest problem and maybe my biggest asset in the same way is I have unconditional love for my kids. and that's that's a two-edged sword you know and uh but it's just i just being a girl dad maybe that's what part of the problem maybe part of the problem is i'm still dealing issues with my kid and i don't want them to suffer in any kind of form or fashion so i've i've made mistakes but i got four amazing girls yeah i love each and every one of them five granddaughters that i'm I'm addicted to, but none of them really swam.

1:44:31Madison's sitting right over there. She said her line is I'd rather eat dirt than swim dad. Yeah, not interested. Not interested. Any athletes or no? They all played sports and we had sort of a rule in our house, my wife did, is they had to choose something in afterschool activity. We have one daughter that played in band her whole high school career. And another one that did soccer. or Madison was in the drama club for years and Isabel did stuff. And so they all did stuff, but swimming really wasn't one of them. Our oldest swam for a while in high school and stuff, but nothing real serious. And you're right, it was tough.

1:45:12And I don't think I put pressure on them. I probably should have, but I would kind of remove myself from the swimming. They all tried swimming, but it was like they show up and they go, you know, the peers, you're not as good as your dad. I need, what's the deal? Where's your - Why play in this sandbox where there's always gonna be this measuring stick that you could never live up to. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. And I think that kind of pressure they just didn't like, so they never really went for it. My wife was better. I think there's a fine line between shoving and nudging. My wife was really good at nudging.

1:45:49She never shoved, but really good at nudging. I was never good at anything and I should have nudged more. It's hard, it's hard to know. I feel like we all parent, we either parent exactly the way our parents parent it or we parent in opposition to them. That's right. Because we all have certain emotional needs that weren't met, right? And so when we become a parent, we make this promise to ourselves like, well, I'm not gonna make that mistake. But we often, you know, go too far in the other direction. Like I'm a huge softy, you know? I think like, oh, maybe I could have been a little bit, pretty soft with my kids.

1:46:23I mean, but I have the unconditional love thing. Right. But I don't, I'm not a, You have girls, boys? Two girls and two step sons. Two step sons. So are you a little easier on the boys? I mean, I'm easy on the girls. I'm easy on all of them. Oh, are you? Yeah, I'm pretty easy on all of them. You sound like me. But then I see, you know, I'm like, oh, maybe I should have laid down the law. I don't know. I just say, I can't get, I can't find it in me to do it, you know? And they're not. I'm the same way. I mean, the boys played sports on and off, but none of them were seriously in athletics. The girls couldn't care less.

1:47:01They're all artists, musicians, painters, sculptors, they're doing other things. And I want them to pursue their dream in the same way that I was blessed with the opportunity to do that. Like that's all I want for them. And those dreams might take longer. They might take longer, they may not manifest. I try to tell them. But there is no circumstance in which it's gonna be some version of my dream for them. It's not supposed to be that way. Right. That's exactly right. That's a great philosophy. It can't be your way. And listen, I've made a lot of mistakes too. I'm not trying to say like, I've got this all figured out.

1:47:35It's hard. It's really hard to be a parent. I know I don't. And then they get older and it's not like the problems go away. They become just more complicated. And then you realize, well, this is just the way it's gonna be for as long as I'm alive. Especially girls. Yes. Girls, piece of cake up until about 12, and then they turn 13 and they become the devil. Oh no, I'm not kidding. They're Satan. I've lived through this. Yes, I understand. And then they come back to angels around 18 or 19. Yeah, they come back around. But you don't think they're going to, and then they do. I think boys, I don't have any, but my sister has two boys.

1:48:11They were like the devil until they turned about 13, and then they become great. It's just the opposite for girls. In general, don't write to me and say, It's not true. I'm just speaking from personal experience. And I'm kidding about Satan, by the way. Don't write me about the devil or anything. I'm kidding. Yeah, you're gonna get in trouble, old man. I know. But we have Madison here to keep you safe. She's been running your social media and doing a bang up job. Like you have won the hearts and minds of millions of people all over the world. The way that you're kind of translating Rowdy's personality into these video clips.

1:48:48I just, I said this to you before the podcast, but I absolutely love it. You're doing a great job. Yeah, she's done a great job. She had three companies hire her here. I was gonna say like after this, you're gonna be in high demand. Like people are gonna wanna hire you to do this. It's good stuff. And I'm not much on social media. That's why I said I followed you for so long on Twitter and you've kind of drifted away from that. And I just still can't do Instagram or Facebook. I just, but she's done a great job and it's good. I need to do it. I'm just so guilty. Do you need to do it? No, you're right.

1:49:18I don't really need to. You don't have to. I don't think you have to. Only if it's fun and there's something nourishing about it. But I do think I would say that it's enjoyable for someone like me and I'm sure a lot of other people to like, you know, I like seeing your videos. I mean, it's incredible. My wife, I can tell you, dude, I'm serious when I say this. I'm not just saying it. She has been inspired by you. And that's pretty cool to be able to say, this is my wife, she's not a swimmer, but she talks about some of the great, she's talked to me along the way and I knew your name obviously.

1:49:53And, but I just didn't pay attention, but I started, I told you before we came on, I started doing a deep dive on you last night. I was going, holy shit, this guy's amazing. I appreciate that. That means a lot, Matt. True. I wanna release you back to your life. We're in Paris. We shouldn't be stuck in a studio here. You should be with your family, enjoying yourself. No problem. But I'm not gonna let you go without just acknowledging this gift that you've blessed all of us with. You have this beautiful infectious enthusiasm for sport. It comes through the screen and it allows all of us to not just understand the beauty of the sport of swimming, but to fall in love with sport.

1:50:35And this thing that means obviously so much to both of us and it's a real gift that you have and you share it so liberally. and I just, I appreciate it, man. And I adore you, I'm a huge fan. And I've been following you, like you, even though we haven't, maybe we met, I don't know if we've ever met. I think we have met. We might've met at some meet or somewhere along the way. Or at least online or something. Well, we definitely met online. We definitely had a couple of things over the years online, but I was trying to remember if we actually met in person. If we had, it was in passing quickly. Back in when you were swimming, maybe.

1:51:07Yeah, maybe. But I feel like you're this person who, you've been present in my conscious awareness, is like my entire adult life, right? So it was a real honor to spend this time with you. I appreciate it. Definitely mutual my friend. Thanks. Definitely mutual. Cheers. And if not beforehand, I will definitely see you in Los Angeles in 2028. You got it brother. All right, go enjoy Paris. Peace. Awesome. Yeah. Yeah.

1:51:42That's it for today. Thank you for listening. I truly hope you enjoyed the conversation. To learn more about today's guest, including links and resources related to everything discussed today, visit the episode page at richroll.com where you can find the entire podcast archive, my books, Finding Ultra, Voicing Change in the Plant Power Way, as well as the Plant Power Meal Planner at meals.richroll.com. If you'd like to support the podcast, the easiest and most impactful thing you can do is to subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, and on YouTube, and leave a review and or comment.

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1:53:02Portraits by Davy Greenberg, graphic and social media assets courtesy of Daniel Solis. And thank you, Georgia Whaley, for copywriting and website management. And of course, our theme music was created by Tyler Pyatt, Trapper Pyatt, and Harry Mathis. Appreciate the love, love the support. See you back here soon. Peace. Plants. Namaste.

1:53:33Thank you.