Bill Weaver from North Carolina Master Swimming has swum at the highest levels of the sport. And while most elite swimmers don't care to put themselves on the line in competition very often Bill has embraced it. Bill, with his infectious passion for the swimming, discusses his triumphant return to swimming post-COVID and how it's become more than just a pastime for him. His arduous five-day-a-week training routine and anticipation for the upcoming meets truly exemplify his commitment.
Bill trains and competes with Masters superstar Erika Braun and share a bound that inspires and pushes them towards their goals. Let's together celebrate the spirit of perseverance and passion that champions like Bill and Erika encapsulate and maybe, just maybe, you'll find the spark to pursue your own dreams.
And hey, while you're feeling motivated, why not drop us a five-star review on iTunes? Stay connected with us on social media for more such inspiring chats. Thank you for listening!
Bill Weaver from North Carolina Master Swimming has swum at the highest levels of the sport. And while most elite swimmers don't care to put themselves on the line in competition very often Bill has embraced it. Bill, with his infectious passion for the swimming, discusses his triumphant return to swimming post-COVID and how it's become more than just a pastime for him. His arduous five-day-a-week training routine and anticipation for the upcoming meets truly exemplify his commitment.
Bill trains and competes with Masters superstar Erika Braun and share a bound that inspires and pushes them towards their goals. Let's together celebrate the spirit of perseverance and passion that champions like Bill and Erika encapsulate and maybe, just maybe, you'll find the spark to pursue your own dreams.
And hey, while you're feeling motivated, why not drop us a five-star review on iTunes? Stay connected with us on social media for more such inspiring chats. Thank you for listening!
Welcome to the award-winning Champions Mojo hosted by two world record-holding athletes. Be inspired as you listen to conversations with champions and now your hosts, kelly Palace and Maria Parker.
Speaker 2:Hello friends, welcome to the Champions Mojo podcast. I am your host, kelly Palace, and, as usual, I am with my co-host, maria Parker. Hey Maria, hey Kelly, it's great to be with you here today. Yes, and Maria, this is a special edition of Champions Mojo from the pool deck and we have a great interview for you today. It's brief, it's short, but it's powerful.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and we. I wasn't there, but I was able to listen to the interview and some great takeaways.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we hope you'll stick around and catch the takeaways. And here we go. I'm on deck with Bill Weaver, part of North Carolina master swimming, and they just won first-ever regional team. Erica Bronze here with us and we're at the Routing Games, 15th annual classic master swimming. We're on deck, in fact, roddy's in the background doing a clinic for kids, which is awesome. Bill, you went on and fly just now and you beat some pretty serious names. People know Dan Letano on this podcast. In fact, dan Letano's podcast is the number one downloaded show that I've ever recorded. Yeah, that's a bright one. I'm sorry.
Speaker 2:Erica, yours is very popular too, so you beat Dan. So give us a little bit of a round on your swimming.
Speaker 4:I swim in a high estate back in the 90s mid 90s, there's a three-time big team champion of the whole. Back in sale, america, there's a US national team that had to fly in the 90s 20 years ass and started swimming again just after COVID and bad in the master's and love it. To be honest, recently my wife and I were re-accurated from the Cleveland area to North Carolina and now I'm swimming at TAC in that area. We're a bunch of other great people and so it's just it's been an awesome experience and a great avenue to meet a lot of fun people and get reconnected with swimming.
Speaker 2:This is such a great story because I always talk about Erica Bronze and in fact, we kind of have a joke. It's like a meme within our show that I have to mention Erica Bronze name in every episode, and I just got interviewed by self and I mentioned you, erica. So I love that you guys swam together from high school. But one of the things that people who were really good when they're young, especially on an actual team like you were, they fear master streaming because they're not going to live up to what they used to be. So what is your mindset when you come in and you're like you know, I may get beat.
Speaker 4:It's funny you say that it kept me out of this sport for a long time. I just always I couldn't stop measuring myself with where I used to be, and I know I just age, perspective change and now I just I love it, I enjoy every moment and my body doesn't hurt like it used to, so I've given myself enough time before my shoulders didn't heal, so that helps a lot. See, I'm not picky all the time, so I don't know. I just different perspective. Age helps us grow a little bit, so it's been good.
Speaker 2:What is your training? Like a little bit to go as fast as you did today, and the tell us exactly what was your time in the Hunter flying Sure force meters.
Speaker 4:I was 57.94 today in the Hunter family.
Speaker 2:How did you build into it so you weren't frustrated and you're not in pain, which you know is a great thing? How did you build into it? What is your training like now?
Speaker 4:My wife loves this new master's son, it's her social outlet, and so she got me into it and got me back into it. Coming out of COVID, it was just this great opportunity just to get back in to society, to be honest and just get around people with like-minded interests. And that was really the driver, and I really didn't have any expectations in terms of performance, and so because of that, it allowed me to make an easy entry and now I swim quite about five days a week. One of those is on my own and then the other four are with the team and it's just been a blast.
Speaker 2:Mark and I my husband, who also swims together, which is nice. We have never samed the TAC Titan pull-up, so we were like blown away. And obviously Erica trains there, and what is that training environment like for masters?
Speaker 4:It's a lot of fun, it's competitive, there's a lot of strong personalities there and we're always pushing each other, but there's also a lot of encouragement and it's like the old adage there's safety in numbers and so it's just fun to go and show up in the morning and know that you're going to see all these familiar faces and just pre-peeple.
Speaker 2:Did you exceed or meet or fall short of your goals for the Rowdy Gaines meet this weekend?
Speaker 4:I would say that I met them. I didn't have a lot of real high-end goals. It's first meet I've done this season and so this was my baseline. So I want to come here, figure out where I was ran into short-course meters. I had to race short-course meters since the 90s, so this case, getting back into it, we've got another short-course meter we will do later in December, so we might put a little more emphasis now that we've done. Never been here.
Speaker 2:That was my next question. So do you think there will be more meets, maybe a Nationals? How far are you willing to take this little thing?
Speaker 4:Yeah, we're probably going to get a North Trieste in December, and I swam last year too, so I think the 50-year-old 50-to-25, that it is a henna yard fly record last year, so take another shot at that for sure.
Speaker 2:Wow, you broke the national record after just being back that short of a time.
Speaker 4:I did. Yeah, it was fun.
Speaker 2:That's great. So, mill, you're 51 and you were on a relay world record this summer. Are you going to set your goals that high for another world record, maybe individually, now that you have a national record and a relay world record?
Speaker 4:Yeah, probably the chase is the fun part. Right, it's nice to hit goals, but really the pursuit is kind of what drives you and what gets you up in the morning. So I'll absolutely take a shot at it while I can.
Speaker 2:So I always talk about how much Erica inspires me, erica Braun and truly Erica's always whole of advice. And, like I said, I just got interviewed and somebody said what's the difference? Why are you dropping? Because I said two national records in this meet I would hold it and so Erica set I don't know three national records and one world record.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so three national is one world for Erica. But Erica always takes the time to help me, give me advice. She gave me a piece of advice at a Nova meet which I had a bad meet. She's like this is what you need to do, this is what you need to do. And so how has Erica and Plowinsch are swimming, and especially since she's been friends since she was in high school.
Speaker 4:It was funny. I moved to the carry area and started swimming attack and we were swimming for a couple of weeks, maybe a month, and didn't realize that we swam together growing up. So that was a fun revelation. She's great, she's always very positive and she's always encouraging people to be positive and not get too negative and she's afraid to push and challenge. She's challenged me to work on my backstroke start and sure enough, I'm making some. How's that going? You know what. We go back and forth a little bit on it, but it's fun, it's playful and you know what. And she's right. I got to change that and I'm working on it and I even tried it today in the 25 backstroke. I wouldn't say it went that great, but I tried it.
Speaker 2:Very good, my last question before I ask you the very last question what advice would you give to other swimmers that were a lead and that just are afraid to get back into masters? What advice might you give them?
Speaker 4:You know what, just start going. Really, the routine of it is, to me, what keeps me going. I mean, I try to take some time off occasionally, like weekly, but the days that I don't swim, honestly I don't feel as good. So going to swimming and being in the pool is what makes me feel good and then that's what makes me tick. But I think that you just got to get into a routine and find other reasons to be there.
Speaker 2:Okay, so you kind of answered this very last question, but I always ask everybody what does being in the water mean to you? Or what is that feeling when you're underwater or you're by yourself? What do you feel spiritually, being in the water?
Speaker 4:I couldn't really put my finger on it. When I was away from the sport I coached also, so I was in the sport but not in the water and I couldn't put my finger on it. But I really miss that time to myself, to be honest, just that alone quiet time where I can really just mull through my life and what's going on and not necessarily overanalyze, but just that quiet time to myself. Things are real simple when you've got water around you and everything's quiet so down. I love that head.
Speaker 2:That is an answer I don't think I've gotten, which is just simple. I love it. Life is simple and we need that, don't we In today's society? Yes, you do. Thank you so much for being on the show. It's a pleasure meeting you.
Speaker 1:Stay tuned for the takeaways.
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Speaker 1:And now the takeaways.
Speaker 2:Okay, Bill Weaver, obviously an elite pedigree in swimming and gets to train with Erica Braun and their friends and they swim all the way together way, way back. So we really focused on Bill, even though Erica was always encouraging him.
Speaker 3:We always got to talk about Erica. She's part of her program. Yeah, we do.
Speaker 2:We've got to say Erica Braun. It was such a great thing that Erica introduced me to Bill to get to interview him, because he was not on my radar. We had many takeaways on this one, but what was your first?
Speaker 3:one. There were so much in there, as you said. But I think the thing that sort of hit me in the gut the most because I've experienced this as well is that he said things are simple when you have water all around you. That was his. What does swimming mean to you spiritually, or how do you feel when you dive in the water? That was the response. He said I love the alone, the quiet time. Things are simple when you have water all around. I think that's so true. The world is so busy, you're always impacted, but when you're just in the water, there's nothing. Nobody's talking to you, you're just to you in the water. I thought that was beautiful and I've experienced that swimming as well.
Speaker 2:Yes, the old sensory deprivation.
Speaker 3:Yes, that's what it is.
Speaker 2:It really can work in your favor when you need it. And sometimes, if you don't want to hear your thoughts, you hear them. So it's a ruthless truth is there. But that was a great takeaway and I loved when he said the chase is the fun part, because I would say it's kind of like the journey, not the destination all that.
Speaker 2:It's so true. What gets you up in the morning is the chase, and almost the weight of gold was that documentary that Michael Phelps did that once you hit that goal, it can be a problem. Yeah, they get up and go after things. So the chase really is the fun part, and I'm just going to add real quick that I would love to see more people who were elite swimmers get back at his swimming. And I said what would you tell him?
Speaker 3:And he said just do it, get out of your head. Stop comparing yourself to your previous champion self. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. So it was great and so glad we got to have Bill on the show. And thanks, eric, I thought that was great. All right, another great one, ray, I love you. Love you too. Bye-bye.
Speaker 3:Bye-bye.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to the Champions Mojo podcast. Did you enjoy the show? We'd be grateful if you would leave us a five star review on iTunes to help others find us, and we'd also love to hear from you. We're on all social media platforms or you can reach us at championsmojocom.