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2017 Annual Awards - Performance Coach of the Year Part 2

We continue to take a look at the Performance Coach of the Year in preparation for the 2017 Annual Awards that will take place on 25th November, 6.30pm at JetPark in Auckland.

The nominations for the Performance Coach of the Year are

  • Aaron Bunguard
  • Glen Wilson
  • Joanne Williams
  • Nick Mita

To be eligible for the Performance Coach of the Year the coach must be working with athletes at a District Representative Level or above, and / or working with a District Performance Squad.

When deciding a judging panel considers the following:

  • Coach development - number of modules attended and other learning opportunities taken
  • Coach activity - number of hours coached and types of programmes / services offered
  • Athlete outcomes - evidence of improving players / teams performances to achieve results
  • Coach's impact - influence that the coach has had on participation / membership

The third finalist is Joanne Williams. Jo is a member of the Cambridge Racquets Club.

Jo was the 2017 World Junior Girls Team Coach – her role is to assess players, identify what they need to work on, support them to create and work on their own individual performance plans, monitor their progress and prepare them for future NZ representation.

Jo has organised training camps hosting junior girls squad members or individual players. This year the World Junior Girls Team made it to the quarter finals.

Jo draws upon knowledge from many years of being coached herself, her own coaching experiences, her time as an international player where she gained a WR of 6, her Sports Science Degree, her Accreditation as an Exercise physiologist, along-side many other Coach development workshops and courses she has attended, which she applies when working with these elite athletes. Jo also was a participant in the Sport NZ PCA programme.

When working with these players, Jo completes a comprehensive health assessment on each person documenting every aspect including their physical wellbeing, their technical and tactical capability, their mental wellbeing, and understands the importance of getting balance, looking at the athlete as a whole person with a life outside of squash. The health of the athlete is the basis of her coaching, ensuring they get balance, eat well, recover well, move well etc as she understands it’s not just about on court coaching. Jo definitely takes an Athlete Centred Coaching approach, puts an emphasis on fun and ensure the programmes are individualised as much as possible.

Jo's nomination reads "Even though Jo is coaching our top NZ junior girls team she mainly likes to have an impact at a grass roots level. As Jo says herself, “High performance starts at the grass roots, which is why I like to stay in that area”."

Jo is the Hillary Scholars representative for the Waikato which she does on a voluntary basis. Jo is happy to be involved in any way she can for the betterment of squash in the Waikato and nationally due to her passion and love of the sport. She has the best interests of squash at heart and her dedication to learning and improvement has brought about a fresh way of thinking which is filtering through to other coaches in the Waikato and NZ which is benefiting more of our players of all stages and ages.

Jo's nomination read "We can always rely on Jo to lend a helping hand as required and her contribution is always professional and of high quality."

Our last finalist is Glen Wilson. Glen has worked at numerous squash clubs throughout the Auckland and Northland region in 2017.

Glen took on the Auckland Senior and Junior teams halfway through the year following the resignation of the previous coach and has excelled in the role in the short time he has been coaching with Squash Auckland. Glen coached the the Auckland Senior Men and Women's team to second place in their respective divisions at the Senior National Inter-District Teams Event in Napier.

Glen also took on the role of the Auckland Junior team coach alongside Mark Waldin and led the Boys team to a win in the Junior National Inter-District Teams Event in Christchurch while the Girls team finished one place ahead of their seeding in sixth (along with close losses to the 2nd and 3rd seeds in pool play). Glen also personally coaches two of the players who won age group titles, Leo Fatialofa (U15 Boys) and Apa Fatialofa Jr (U13 Boys).

Most notably Glen was the coach of the NZ Doubles team which collected two golds and a bronze at the World Doubles Champs in Manchester in August, matching the fantastic achievement of 2016 which he was also the coach for. He has recently been appointed by Squash NZ as National Coaching Manager, was the Coach/Manager for the NZ Women's World Team in 2016 that finished 7th after being seeded 8th, and will lead the NZ team to the Commonwealth Games in April 2018.

Glen's work in the High Performance arena for Squash NZ has been excellent over the past year, and no doubt he will be aiming for plenty of future success with his upcoming coaching and managing roles.

Congratulations Jo and Glen on being a finalist in the Performance Coach of the Year Award.

Glen World Dubs


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