Women's Swimming & Diving 8/30/2023 3:00:00 PM

Aggie Swim Coach Helps Team USA Bring Home Gold at World University Games

DAVIS, Calif. — The trip of a lifetime started with a phone call. On the other end of the line was USC Swimming associate head coach Peter Richardson. Richardson asked UC Davis women's assistant swimming coach Carl Weigley to be his head assistant coach for Team USA at the World University Games.

"He called and asked, and I said yeah," recalled Weigley.

It was a simple enough decision for Weigley to make. Having dedicated the better part of three decades to the sport, Carl had an intimate understanding of just how significant an opportunity like this was. A two-time national champion at Fresno Pacific University, Carl went on to compete in the 2012 and 2016 Olympic trials, placing in the top 15 of the 100 Fly, just shy of the necessary Olympic qualifying time.

"As an athlete your goal is always to try to represent the US. I came close several times but never quite got on the national team, so then being able to have that experience as a coach was pretty special."

Having coached Weigley at Fresno Pacific, Richardson knew he had a trustworthy presence at his side. "Carl was the glue for our ten person staff," Richardson said of Weigley. "I placed him in charge of coaching our best athletes."

Weigley traveled down to USC for three days of training camp before packing up and heading to the Games.

Short on time to prepare and with limited familiarity of the athletes in his charge, Weigley had to be resourceful in order to thrive in his role on the staff. He reached out to each of his swimmers' home coaches in order to better "be a chameleon" and blend in to suit the needs of each athlete.

"I think the most helpful thing is talking with their coach and learning what makes them click in order to provide a similar calming presence for them throughout the meet," he said.

The FISU (International University Sports Federation) Summer World University Games is a multi-sport athletic event held every two years for student-athletes from around the world. This year's games, Chengdu 2021, included athletes from 115 countries.

Held in Chengdu, China, the Games came after a two year COVID-caused postponement, though FISU maintained the branding, hence the Chengdu 2021 titling.

Chengdu, the capital of China's Sichuan province, is one of the country's largest and most important cities. The city is best known for its giant pandas, excellent and often spicy food, and a number of historical Chinese sites. Carl with panda Chengdu 2021

The team arrived in Chengdu four days before the competition began, so Weigley used his time away from the pool to adventure in his surroundings. Leveraging the free public transportation access allowed by his Games credentials, Weigley and other members of the team would ride the subway without a destination in mind, then emerge to explore new neighborhoods.

This method of navigation led to Weigley and a few other members of the coaching staff becoming the first foreign diners in a Chengdu restaurant, the owner of which then offered the group a house special.

The Games began with the Opening Ceremony on July 28 in Dong'an Lake Stadium, a brand new venue built specially for the event.

"It was a goosebump moment," Weigley said, recalling the feeling of walking out with Team USA into the sold-out 70,000 person stadium.

The swimming competition began on August 1 and continued through the 7th. Weigley noted that one of the biggest challenges facing the athletes was the amount of time spent competing. Some were incredibly busy, while others only swam a few times.

"It's a grueling meet, it's seven days…some people are swimming individual events and relays throughout the meet and are very much trying to manage their energy and recovery and all that. We had other people who were swimming one individual event and that was at the end of their meet so there's five days of competition before they swim…when you're trying to keep your mental edge and focus, and you're not competing, that's hard. It turns into a mental thing."

The mental side of swimming is where Weigley thrives as a coach. Richardson noted that one of Weigley's coaching strengths is his calm leadership style and ability to bring people back down to the present moment. This ability was acutely important at a fast and large-scale meet like Chengdu 2021. Several competitors had flown directly from World Championships, which concluded a week before in Japan. Such a challenge, Weigley remarked, can weigh on a swimmer.

"You go to big meets and you are putting so much more pressure on yourself than anyone else can…it's big, it feels big…having gone through an Olympic period, having seen the mental battles, I learned you can only control what you are doing in your own lane."

Weigley's goal in shrinking the moment is to help the athlete build and maintain confidence ahead of their race. In Chengdu, he told his swimmers, "It's just a swim race, you've been doing this since you were six years old."

For Weigley, confidence is paramount, not just with the athletes, but for himself and other coaches too. "If you're not confident, or sending mixed messages, that's just not good."

A staple of Weigley's coaching method is to identify the abilities of all the athletes and coaches around him and then work to amplify those strengths in order to build individual and team-wide confidence. He attributes this strategy to a foundational moment in his swim career, a time when he almost left the sport entirely.

"I had a coach that literally changed the course of my life," he said. "I quit swimming in high school, I just wasn't into it anymore." A local club team coach came by his school and dropped a note off, which convinced Weigley to give swimming another shot. "Had he not done that, I probably never would have gotten back into swimming."

"He knew I had more to give to this sport and thought it would be a shame if I didn't see it through."

Weigley works to pass on that sense of belief to the swimmers he works with today. "It's why I am a coach today, because you can have that type of impact on people."

Team USA finished out the week of racing with seven medals. One of Weigley's swimmers, an incoming freshman at UC Berkeley, picked up the only gold medal won by any American athlete at the games.

Chengdu 2021 concluded with a spectacular Closing Ceremony performance, which Weigley could only compare to a Beyoncé concert with an unlimited budget. "It was two-hours of insanity," he said.

"It was a fun trip," Weigley concluded. "I got to meet a lot of amazing and talented people, and just being in that atmosphere was pretty memorable."

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