Unfiltered Waters

In this episode of Unfiltered Waters, Katie Hoff is back hosting, recording fifteen days postpartum and launching a new run of episodes with Australian swimmers. Her first guest is Olympic champion, world champion, and world record holder Mollie O'Callaghan, who made the gutted call to pull out of the Pan Pacific Championships after stress fractures turned up in her back right before Trials. So how do you walk away from a full season of work and still call that choice smart.

Mollie walks through the process: seeing a back specialist, checking in with him repeatedly between Trials and the Commonwealth Games, and getting cleared to race modified instead of sitting out. She still logged a time Katie calls legendary despite the injury, before referral pain and stalled progress ruled out Pan Pacs. She never watched the actual racing, tracking results instead to support the thirteen teammates who competed, and framing every meet, missed or not, as a stepping stone toward LA 2028. She and Katie also cover the altitude tent she trialed for the first time this season under coach Dean, sleeping through three blocks built around a Flagstaff base, a Darwin camp, and the run into Trials.

Along the way, the conversation goes places most swim interviews don't: dislocating her knee the first week back after her Olympic year break, buying and moving into a new apartment mostly alone while her family was overseas, badly learning to drive a manual car and bunny hopping through it, and choking on candy behind the blocks with a teammate before a final at the 2022 World Championships. She calls herself a workhorse who trains the same way she has since age fourteen, and admits Dean often has to rein her in.

Underneath the racing talk is a real look at what intensity costs her. She now sees a sports psychologist weekly, calls herself a nervous racer whose nerves show, and is candid that the Trials before her home Olympics were the worst meet she has ever experienced mentally, glad in hindsight it happened there and not at the Games. Staying process focused instead of outcome fixated is ongoing work, and it lands differently coming from Katie, relearning her own version of balance with a newborn at home.

Whether you're a swimmer rebuilding a season around an injury or someone who has never touched a pool but loves a good comeback story, this episode delivers. Watch the episode, then head to the comments and let us know: what is one setback you have reframed as a stepping stone instead of a loss? Subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast platform, and follow us on social media (https://linktr.ee/unfilteredwaters) for clips, bonus content, and updates throughout the week.

Note: at the time of this recording, Mollie's return timeline was still open, with Short Course Worlds and the end of September Australian Trials as her key checkpoints, so her comeback status may look different by the time this episode airs.

FOLLOW MOLLIE O'CALLAGHAN ON:
Instagram: @mollie_ocal

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#UnfilteredWaters #Swimming #MollieOCallaghan #KatieHoff

In this episode of Unfiltered Waters, Katie Hoff is back hosting, recording fifteen days postpartum and launching a new run of episodes with Australian swimmers. Her first guest is Olympic champion, world champion, and world record holder Mollie O'Callaghan, who made the gutted call to pull out of the Pan Pacific Championships after stress fractures turned up in her back right before Trials. So how do you walk away from a full season of work and still call that choice smart.

Mollie walks through the process: seeing a back specialist, checking in with him repeatedly between Trials and the Commonwealth Games, and getting cleared to race modified instead of sitting out. She still logged a time Katie calls legendary despite the injury, before referral pain and stalled progress ruled out Pan Pacs. She never watched the actual racing, tracking results instead to support the thirteen teammates who competed, and framing every meet, missed or not, as a stepping stone toward LA 2028. She and Katie also cover the altitude tent she trialed for the first time this season under coach Dean, sleeping through three blocks built around a Flagstaff base, a Darwin camp, and the run into Trials.

Along the way, the conversation goes places most swim interviews don't: dislocating her knee the first week back after her Olympic year break, buying and moving into a new apartment mostly alone while her family was overseas, badly learning to drive a manual car and bunny hopping through it, and choking on candy behind the blocks with a teammate before a final at the 2022 World Championships. She calls herself a workhorse who trains the same way she has since age fourteen, and admits Dean often has to rein her in.

Underneath the racing talk is a real look at what intensity costs her. She now sees a sports psychologist weekly, calls herself a nervous racer whose nerves show, and is candid that the Trials before her home Olympics were the worst meet she has ever experienced mentally, glad in hindsight it happened there and not at the Games. Staying process focused instead of outcome fixated is ongoing work, and it lands differently coming from Katie, relearning her own version of balance with a newborn at home.

Whether you're a swimmer rebuilding a season around an injury or someone who has never touched a pool but loves a good comeback story, this episode delivers. Watch the episode, then head to the comments and let us know: what is one setback you have reframed as a stepping stone instead of a loss? Subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast platform, and follow us on social media (https://linktr.ee/unfilteredwaters) for clips, bonus content, and updates throughout the week.

Note: at the time of this recording, Mollie's return timeline was still open, with Short Course Worlds and the end of September Australian Trials as her key checkpoints, so her comeback status may look different by the time this episode airs.

FOLLOW MOLLIE O'CALLAGHAN ON:
Instagram: @mollie_ocal

SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS
endlesspools.com/unfiltered to unlock $1,000 off

#UnfilteredWaters #Swimming #MollieOCallaghan #KatieHoff

In this episode of Unfiltered Waters, Elizabeth Beisel and Todd Anderson fill in for Katie Hoff, a week from having her baby girl, and sit down with Team USA breaststroker McKenzie Siroky right before the Pan Pacific Championships. She's coming off a personal best in the 100 breast at nationals, capping two hard months when her stroke feel vanished. She tracks nearly every metric of her training. So how does one of the most data driven swimmers on the team find her way back by feeling instead of measuring?

McKenzie ranks her outside of pool priorities: nutrition first, then recovery and sleep, then mental work like meditation and breath control with a sports psychologist she calls Dr. Joe. She wears a Whoop and has hit strain scores over 20, though she ignores it on race day, going best times in yellow and red. Her best lift is a 195 pound bench, chasing 200 right after Pan Pacs. Todd asks about the suit that ripped fifteen minutes before her nationals final, and she walks through the breathing reset that got her back on the block.

Along the way, the conversation goes places most swim interviews don't: hosting the team for Saturday pancake brunches off her Blackstone griddle, thirty pancakes at a time, plus wood fired pizza nights with homemade sourdough crust. She traces her breaststroke to family history, her mom swam at Michigan State too. She and teammate Moana treat practice like an actual race, speaker on the deck included, to rehearse the nerves. She admits she doesn't always know what a lactate based target split is supposed to feel like, she just trusts it and goes.

Underneath the technical talk is a real account of what it costs to lose your feel for the thing you're best at. McKenzie describes two months so frustrating she was near tears most practices, calling her aunt and dad from the car to find one thing to control each day. The fix wasn't more structure, it was less: slower practice, no intervals, feeling her stroke again instead of measuring it. It's a lesson that lands harder given how much of her identity runs on tracking numbers, a contradiction Elizabeth is well suited to draw out of her.

Whether you're a swimmer who tracks every number in training or someone who has never touched a pool but loves a good return to form story, this episode delivers. Watch the episode, then head to the comments and let us know: what's one thing you've learned to control when everything else feels like it's slipping? Subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast platform, and follow us on social media (https://linktr.ee/unfilteredwaters) for clips, bonus content, and updates throughout the week.

Note: this conversation was recorded ahead of the 2026 Pan Pacific Championships, so McKenzie's answers reflect where her head was heading into the meet, not how the racing actually went.

FOLLOW MCKENZIE SIROKY ON:
Instagram: @kenzie_siroky

#UnfilteredWaters #Swimming #McKenzieSiroky #ElizabethBeisel #TennesseeSwimming

In this episode of Unfiltered Waters, Elizabeth Beisel and Todd Anderson fill in for Katie Hoff, about a week out from giving birth, and sit down with Olympic medalist Katharine Berkoff right before the Pan Pacific Championships. She's coming off a hard lesson in Singapore last year: getting sick and having to trust her training instead of her control. The 100 back is the race she says has her heart. So what does it take to let go of what you can't control and still call it a successful meet?

Katharine breaks down swimming straight outdoors: staying close enough to the lane line to catch it in her peripheral vision, turning her head side to side when wind kicks up chop. Her Pan Pacs lineup is the 50 and 100 back plus relays, and the 100 is the one she trains hardest for. She tried Pilates for the first time before a meet in Indianapolis, and a reformer session left her shaking on the easiest setting. Elizabeth asks when wind becomes a real problem, and Katharine has a clear answer.

Along the way, the conversation goes places most swim interviews don't: adopting a kitten named Chowder, already famous for chaos in the car; her dad's hobby of tracking mountain lions, including the time he followed a blood trail to a kill site and got stalked back himself, pistol in pocket just in case; and her plans for her next backpacking trip. Asked about that goal, she brings up a hiker who got impaled by his own trekking pole and hiked out with it still in him, admitting that unlike her father, she is not a risk taker.

Underneath the racing talk is a real reckoning with legacy and self trust. Katharine is candid about her father, Olympian David Berkoff, admitting they rarely talk swimming, and that his brief stint coaching her ended fast because his input frustrated her. She traces her stubborn self belief to making her first sectional cut at nine, and to when it first wavered at Junior Nationals, watching girls already on the national junior team. Her fix, then and now, is trusting her process looks nothing like anyone else's. It's a thread that lands harder coming from Elizabeth.

Whether you're a swimmer learning to trust your own process or someone who has never touched a pool but loves a good father daughter story, this episode delivers. Watch the episode, then head to the comments and let us know: what's something you've had to let go of to actually enjoy competing? Subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast platform, and follow us on social media (https://linktr.ee/unfilteredwaters) for clips, bonus content, and updates throughout the week.

Note: this conversation was recorded before the 2026 Pan Pacific Championships, so Katharine's answers reflect where her head was heading into the meet. By the time this episode airs, the meet itself will already be over.

FOLLOW KATHARINE BERKOFF ON:
Instagram: @KatharineBerkoff

#UnfilteredWaters #Swimming #KatharineBerkoff #ElizabethBeisel #PanPacs2026

In this episode of Unfiltered Waters, Elizabeth Beisel and Todd Anderson fill in for Katie Hoff, about a week out from giving birth to her daughter, and sit down with Emma Weyant ahead of the Pan Pacific Championships. It has been a strange year for her: a full training block with no Olympic Trials to break it up, and one of the hardest, most rewarding stretches of her career. So what does it take to trust a year of work you haven't gotten to prove yet?

Emma walks through the overhaul that has reshaped her stroke work: heavier backstroke sets on power days, sometimes pulling backstroke with buckets while everyone else swims freestyle, a callback to band sets from her club days. Adding Pilates to dryland has helped her mobility and eased some hip issues. At Pan Pacs she's swimming the 400 free and 200 IM, training the 400 free daily alongside Katie Ledecky after a 4:07 at Fort Lauderdale. Todd asks her to name the biggest change, and backstroke is the answer without hesitation.

Along the way, the conversation goes places most swim interviews don't: her walkout song pick of Getaway Car by Taylor Swift, a Shake Shack double cheeseburger with bacon as her cheat meal, a deep dive into hair care science that has her dreaming up a chlorine specific product line, and getting talked into her first spray tan by Katie Ledecky. She admits she still hasn't gotten the TikTok color analysis everyone keeps pushing her toward, joking she can never tell gold from silver when the trend hits her feed.

Underneath the training talk is a real reckoning with what comes next. Emma graduated in August, studied for the LSAT, did well, then chose to push law school back a year rather than close the door on swimming. She's leaning into a word her coach repeats to her, courage, separating it from confidence: one is doing something bold and unexpected, the other comes from consistency and trust. She traces that shift to a breakthrough race in Fort Lauderdale a year ago, when she stopped chasing her old self and started building someone new. It's a shift Elizabeth is well positioned to draw out of her.

Whether you're a swimmer trying to figure out your own next chapter or someone who has never set foot on a pool deck but loves a good identity story, this episode delivers. Watch the episode, then head to the comments and let us know: what's the difference between courage and confidence in your own life right now? Subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast platform, and follow us on social media (https://linktr.ee/unfilteredwaters) for clips, bonus content, and updates throughout the week.

Note: this conversation was recorded ahead of the 2026 Pan Pacific Championships, so Emma's answers reflect where her head was heading into the meet, not how the racing actually went.

FOLLOW EMMA WEYANT ON:
Instagram: @emmaweyant

#UnfilteredWaters #Swimming #EmmaWeyant #ElizabethBeisel #FloridaSwimming