When did you start canoeing ?

Summer of ’69. (My wife Jenny’s favourite ‘get up and dance’ record!)

How did you get involved in canoeing ?

I joined Royal Canoe Club on the same day as my long time great friend and fellow coach, Trevor Hunter. We were both refused membership as we were only 12 and you had to be 16 to join. Fortunately, the club captain at the time was a real character called Frank Russell, an ex boxer and ex R.A.F. He volunteered to take us under his wing and keep us out of mischief. Playful left hooks kept us in line, but I can remember them really hurting! He is still close to both our hearts and memory lives on with our coaching boat at Royal called ‘FRANK R’.

Royal Canoe Club had an amazing history of producing great racing paddlers through the decades from the 1950’s to the present day. I was fortunate to be part of a great club and taken to my first race by George Richardson, who is still coaching the young kids at Royal and taking them to their first races.

I must mention Mark Giddings, because he had such an influence on my development as a junior paddler and spent many hours as a volunteer coaching myself and Trevor Hunter. He was a thinking coach, probably ahead of his time in Great Britain. He taught us how to paddle and more importantly, how to think.

How did you get into coaching from being a paddler ?

After taking a complete break from the sport to start a family and make a living, we moved to Shepperton, just 300m across the river from Elmbridge Canoe Club. Roland Lawler gave me my first opportunity for coaching (Thank you Roland) in the autumn of 1993 with a group of 4 young boys, Tim Brabants, Paul Darby-Dowman, Dave Smith and Ian Sergeant and 1 girl, Anna Hemmings.

Was it a difficult transition ?

Not really. Canoeing is something I feel passionately about, especially sprint canoeing. I had a great group of athletes to work with. In the days when I was competing as a senior athlete, we did not have coaches. Although this may have been a disadvantage to me as an athlete, it was probably an advantage to my coaching career because we had to be self analytical.
The only difficulty came where we wanted to push the boundaries outside of the normal club system which was required to achieve these young athletes’ goals. But this is only normal if you want to achieve at the highest sporting level, you have to continuously push the boundaries and experiment.

What is the secret of coaching a good paddler and what attributes does a good coach need ?

There are no secrets but :

• Effective communication is the key to all good coaching and athlete relationships.
• The coach and athlete relationship has to be built on mutual respect and this has to be earned.
• You both have to be passionate and enjoy what you do.
• Athletes’ and coaches’ vision and goals need to be aligned.
• Really listen to what your athletes are telling you; it is their body and mind that is doing the work.
• Work smart, but work extremely hard.
• The basic ingredient is a high quality athlete who genuinely wants to be the best in the World and is prepared to make the sacrifices necessary to achieve their dreams.
• Always be there for your athletes and never let them down.
• Always have an open mind and be willing to learn from others.
• Never be afraid to push the boundaries and experiment with new ideas.
• Have an eye for detail and technique.
• Be appreciative of all the people including the parents, who help these athletes to achieve their goals.
• He needs continued support around him. I would never have been able to coach at this level without the unwavering support from my wife Jenny and my family; there should be an award for wives and partners.
• Never work with animals or computers. Most people who know me, know my dislike of computers. They are fine as a tool for information but never use it as a communication tool with your athletes. Talk to them.

What has been your career highlight ?

I haven’t got one; there have been so many special ones.

I have had the privilege of working with 2 young athletes (Paul Darby-Dowman - now a coach) and Tim Brabants (still competing) through their entire paddling careers and this has been very special to me, seeing young aspiring athletes reach their full potential on the World stage.

The obvious ones that have a special place are :

Paul Darby-Dowman/Tim Brabants winning Great Britain’s first Junior World Championship Gold in K2 500m in Japan 1995. Never doubting themselves, knowing that they wouldn’t be the fastest down the 1st 250m, playing it cool, sticking to their race plan and winning the race in the last 10 strokes.
    
Then, the following day, Tim winning the Bronze in the K1 1000m.

This was their 1st World Championships as athletes and mine as a coach, so it was extremely special.

A skinny Tim Brabants winning Bronze in the K1 1000m at Sydney Olympics at the age of 23 – Great Britain’s first Olympic Sprint Medal.

European Championships 2004 – Olympic Qualification

Ian Wynne      Silver K1 500m
Paul Darby-Dowman/Ian Wynne Bronze K2 1000m
Tim Brabants    Silver K1 1000m

Ian Wynne – Athen’s Olympics

K1 1000m Bronze – going to his boat on crutches after twisting his ankle the night before, getting off a bus. An Olympic medal from the mind and heart.

A beefed-up Tim Brabants winning K1 1000m World Championships in Duisburg 2007 against the true racer Adam van Koeverden. This goes down as one of the most exciting K1 1000m final ever raced, where the lead kept changing.

An unstoppable Tim Brabants in the form of his life to win OLYMPIC GOLD in Beijing 2008. Won it from the first stroke! Britain’s 1st canoeing Olympic Champion. To cap it, he went out the following day and won a Bronze in the K1 500m.

There were many other fantastic performances from these athletes and a young Ross Sabberton at World Championships, European Championships, World Cups and domestic regattas that made me very proud of them.

Have things changed much throughout your canoeing career?

The basic fundamentals of the passion for the sport and feeling privileged to work with genuinely appreciative world class athletes hasn’t changed.

We now have a lot more support in the sport through funding, provided by UK Sport, Sport England and the Lottery and this is now making a difference, allowing the athletes to train full time and want for nothing in terms of their preparation in warm weather, competition programme, equipment and science support.

It has come a long way since 1995, when we had to raise £5000 to send the team to Japan and get the boats freighted out free of charge through a kind friend of one of the paddlers. We did not have a regatta course to train on; we trained on the river with ribbons as markers on the trees and on the canal and lake at Shepperton when the river was flowing too fast or was too bumpy at the weekend.

We all miss the retired Laurence Oliver who was a fantastic team manager and a stabilising influence on many of our young paddlers.

However, we now have some fantastic coaches working with our athletes across all the disciplines, producing World and European Champions in 200m racing and Women’s racing. We finally have a great team and I am very proud to be part of it.

None of this would have been possible without the funding and a management team with John Anderson at the helm, Alan Williams and all his hard work over the years as Team Manager, when he was organising everything in the early days.

We now have a new generation with Brendan Purcell doing a good job as head coach and leading a fantastic team of support staff.

By: GB Canoeing