Training, Trust & Family Fuel Breakthrough For Rex Maurer at University of Texas
At the end of the 2023-24 college season, Rex Maurer made “probably the hardest choice I’ve ever had to make.” After an up-and-down freshman season at Stanford, he saw an opportunity to advance his swimming career with a move to the University of Texas, with Bob Bowman taking over on the heels of leading Arizona State to a national title.
Maurer opted to make the move, and his initial results training at Texas have been astounding: the highly-recruited mid-distance swimmer from an elite swimming family qualified for semifinals in two events at the U.S. Olympic Trials before continuing to show progress in long course at the U.S. Summer Championships. And in the first half of his first Longhorns season, Maurer has suddenly become the country’s best mid-distance swimmer.
The signs of a breakout first presented themselves in early November when Texas hosted Indiana for a marquee dual meet as he swam best times in the 200 and 500 free, dropping almost one-and-a-half seconds from his previous top mark in the 200. That was a warmup for three weeks later, when Maurer clocked the fastest times in the country of all three of his individual events.
When Maurer arrived for the first finals session of the meet, he had already dropped two seconds from his 500 free time in prelims, getting under 4:10 for the first time. Prior to the evening session, he watched as Carson Foster, one of his new training partners at Texas, swam a time trial and clocked 4:05.81, a half-second faster than Kieran Smith’s American record of 4:06.32.
“When he got to the 300, we all knew he was going to be real close to the record, and he ended up breaking it by a decent amount, and I was excited for him,” Maurer said. “When I saw a time, it gave me confidence, because I do train with him every day. And Bob said to me, ‘You do train with him every day, and you win sometimes.’”
Rex Maurer — Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick
Upon his arrival in Austin, Maurer decided to “attach myself to the fastest guys,” a list of Bowman trainees that includes Foster and Olympic medalists Hubert Kos and Luke Hobson, with French superstar Leon Marchand soon to arrive as well. Maurer believed spending time with these elite international swimmers and studying them closely would be keys to his own improvement. “Carson is maybe even fed up with me,” Maurer joked.
But Foster knew his training partner could swim even quicker than he had in the 500, imploring Maurer to “go try and get it” before the sophomore stepped to the blocks for the official final an hour later. And indeed, Maurer shattered Foster’s briefly-held unofficial mark, recording a time of 4:04.45. The time was the second-quickest ever behind Marchand’s underwater-powered 4:02.31 from last year’s NCAA Championships.
The next day, Maurer posted a time of 3:34.19 in the 400 IM, cutting four seconds from his previous best time and becoming the fifth-fastest man ever, putting himself within striking distance of an almost-eight-year-old American record held by Chase Kalisz (3:33.42). As with the 500 free, no current college swimmer has ever been that quick. Later that same session, Maurer led off the Texas 800 free relay in 1:31.59, a best time by a half-second, and he concluded the meet with another best in the 1650 free, his mark of 14:30.47 quicker than last year’s NCAA-title-winning time and four seconds clear of anyone else in the national rankings.
“I felt like I was due for big drops,” Maurer said. “I didn’t know exactly how big of drops.”
Looking back, Maurer credits his success to his full-on embrace of Bowman’s training. Yes, Bowman has built a coaching résumé that rivals any other in the sport’s history, from his decades coaching Michael Phelps to his more recent accomplishments leading Marchand, Kos, Regan Smith and Paige Madden to individual medals in Paris, but the change meant some pretty significant adjustments for Maurer, who found himself swimming more volume than ever before and more intense swimming within every practice.
“It definitely took a little bit of adjustment period to get used to Bob’s training method and how he works,” Maurer said. “But I think I was able to commit to that and really embrace it really quickly, which I think has been a big part of why I’ve had so much success so far this semester, just trusting in Bob’s plan. It’s worked for other people, and I just have to trust that it will work for me, too.”
Support also comes from a group of people Maurer calls “probably the most important part of my swimming career,” his family. His parents, Erik and Lea, were both NCAA champions for Stanford, and Lea has spent years coaching high-level college programs, first the Stanford women and more recently as the head coach at USC. Rex’s older brother Luke also swam at Stanford, with the two brothers teaming up during the 2023-24 season, and Luke is now swimming a fifth year under Lea’s guidance at USC.
Rex appreciates having family members who understand his journey far better than most, including the pressure he feels and the technical aspects that can define a swim. His overall approach to the sport, he explained, comes from Lea “positioning swimming in a way that it’s beyond time,” and that set the bedrock for the training that has catapulted his career this season.
“She’s always highlighted to me how you need to find your why in swimming,” Maurer said. “My why is going to the pool and spending time with my friends. It’s a great two or so hours where you can just be with your friends, joke around and spend some time together.”
Now, the pool where Maurer spends the most time is the Lee and Joe Jamail Texas Swimming Center, and that’s where he will pursue his goals for the NCAA Championships in March, where he will be a key contributor on a Longhorns team with national championship aspirations. After that, he will shift his focus to long course, where another surge onto a senior-level U.S. national team is within reach in 2025.
“Although there have been a lot of big drops this season, consistency is key,” Maurer said. “Bob has preached that, and I have lived that, even before I started swimming for Bob, just really committing to the grind, staying on top of workout, really attacking every workout for years at a time.”
Super article, David. Great progress, Rex.