While Michael Phelps was training for the 2008 Olympic Games, there was a practice in which Bob Bowman broke his swimmer’s goggles on purpose so Phelps would know what it was like to swim with water in them. Cut to the 200 Fly at the 2008 Olympic Games and Phelps’ goggles filled with water.
Phelps didn’t panic and went on to win the event, 1 of 8 he earned gold medals in at the meet.
16 years later, Bob Bowman is still finding unique ways to prepare his athletes mentally for the challenges they may face at an Olympic Games and still come out on top. Hubert Kos, who trained with Bowman leading into Paris and earned a gold medal in the 200 back, shares a story of how Bowman helped him prepare for adversity.
Did he grow up in the US?! Kos sounds like he’s from Northern California
He’s originally Hungarian. Google him if you want
I know people in swimming are very sensitive when you talk about their personal finances (I heard a rumor that Summer M’s parents got real heated when swimswam brought it up), but he comes from a very well-to-do family.
Folks from well-to-do families in Eastern Europe tend to have more English language education early on and more exposure generally to English (especially native speakers) and therefore a significantly lighter accent.
He went to a dual language school and his father is half Irish. And yes, his family is quite well-off.
Interesting he would tell a story about a training experience geared toward discipline in maintaining lane positioning.
After his freshman year, before he won 200 Back at worlds, he had at least two instances of a nasty interaction with the lane line, going into the 100 turn (one a 200 IM and one a 200 Back). The IM was a race against Kalisz at the 2023 Sun Devil Open. I think I wrote a comment at the time that he lost about 1-2 seconds from the flags in and lost the race to Kalisz by 1.6 – 1:57.5 to 1:59.1.
Never saw that issue in competition again. Bowman magic?
Interesting enough Leon said much the same thing as Hubie in an interview in France with on a show sponsored by Louis Vuitton
As to Coach Bowman’s mental preparation for a meet.
Any chance there is an Orange-White meet recap or full results in the works?
Posted😎
https://swimswam.com/kos-maurer-germonprez-shine-as-texas-opens-season-with-orange-white-intrasquad/
#MentalRevolution