If you’ve been following Coach-Con as it’s evolved over the past few months, you’ll probably know that it’s about time for us to announce the assistant coaches we’ve invited to attend. We’re really excited about the attendees – it’s a diverse group of rowing coaches who come from different types of programs from all over the country. But before we tell you who they are, a little background first.
George Pocock, Pocock Racing Shells founder and legendary Olympic rowing coach, was infamous for lending a hand to any coach who asked – whether in the launch, on the dock, or in the shop. 100 years later, that’s still important to us at Pocock Racing Shells. Behind every fast varsity team are great freshman and assistant varsity coaches. Whether it’s because of busy head coaches, or limited budgets, or the lack of available education for rowing coaches, by and large, most are figuring things out as they go. We hope Coach-Con can contribute to the sport by facilitating two days of in-depth, intense conversations and discussions on the topics that assistant coaches care most about.
We hoped the idea would resonate, but we never thought we’d get the response that we did. It was nothing short of staggering, and it reinforced our hunch that this is exactly the kind of education that assistant rowing coaches need. We received over 75 applications from over 60 schools for just 12 spots. It was obvious that everyone gave the application a lot of time and thought, which didn’t make the job of whittling the pool down to 12 easy at all. Tremendous thanks to all the assistant coaches who submitted applications, and their head coaches for their nominations. So here we go, the Coach-Con class of 2012:
Alison Abrams, San Diego State University Women: Alison started rowing at San Diego State, and was a coxswain there for four years, along with summers at San Diego RC, USRowing Dev Camp, and Riverside. She started coaching rowing at SDSU in 2005 and has been there ever since, coaching the novice women.
Andrea Buch, Syracuse University Women: Andrea started rowing in high school at Blood Street Sculls/Lyme Old Lyme High School. She rowed at Kansas, and her coaching resume includes high school and masters at BSS/Lyme Old Lyme, the University of Louisville novice women, US Junior National Team Women’s Dev camp, and currently as an assistant at Syracuse.
Andy Foltz, University of Minnesota Women: Andy started rowing at Western Washington, and picked up coaching rowing while still in college. He spent time with the Everett Rowing Association and Sammamish Rowing Club before becoming the volunteer assistant at the University of Washington. He’s currently the Novice Women’s Coach at Minnesota.
Stephen Frazier Wong, UNC Chapel Hill Women: Stephen started rowing at Rollins College, and after graduation started coaching there while training for the National Team. He raced at the World Championships in 2002, 2003, and 2004 in the light double and quad, and started coaching the freshman at UNC in 2005 after retiring.
Anne Kennedy, Dartmouth Women: Anne rowed at Dartmouth, also making the U23 team in ’06 and ’07. After graduating she spent two years training in Princeton, and coached at Cal and Santa Clara before being hired at Dartmouth in 2010.
Andrea Morand, UMass Women: Andrea started rowing at Shrewsbury High School, and continued at UMass Amherst. She started coaching as the Grad Assistant at UMass before a brief stint at Amherst College. She now is the Assistant at UMass.
Nich Parker, Columbia Lightweight Men: Nich started rowing at Ohio State, and began his coaching career at his alma mater. He moved on to be the freshman coach at Purdue, followed by stints as an assistant for the Yale then Columbia heavyweight men, and a Junior National Development Team coach. He currently is the freshman lightweight coach at Columbia.
Justin Price, UCLA Women: Justin started rowing at UCLA, then moved to coaching at Notre Dame as the freshman men’s coach for three years. He returned to UCLA as a women’s assistant in 2009.
Vita Scaglione, Oregon State Women: Vita rowed for the University of Michigan, where she became the volunteer assistant for two years after graduating. She then spent three years at Washington State as the novice coach before returning to Michigan for two years as the novice coach there. In 2006 she Vita moved to Oregon State, where she is currently the assistant varsity coach.
Spencer Washburn, Princeton Heavyweight Men: Spencer started rowing in high school at Phillips Academy, then went on to row for Princeton. After graduating, he was the varsity girls coach at the Hun School before returning to Princeton as the lightweight men’s freshman coach. He became the heavyweight men’s freshman coach in 2009.
Julia White-Hoppe, UC San Diego Women: Julia began rowing at OSU, and continued training on the National Team in Princeton. While training, she coached the freshman boys and then varsity girls at the Hun School. She moved back to the west coach in 2009 and has been coaching the novice women at UC San Diego since.
Gabe Winkler, Oregon State Men: Gabe started rowing at the University of Vermont, then transferred to and graduated from Cornell. He trained in Princeton for 10 years, making 7 National Teams – rowing as both a lightweight and heavyweight, in sweep and sculling boats. He started coaching at Rutgers as the lightweight men’s assistant, then moved to OSU in 2008 as the novice men’s coach.
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