Swimming: Big gun to make big gains

Jan Cameron. Photo / Paul Estcourt

When Mark Regan left the Denmark swim programme last year Jan Cameron kept a watching brief, expecting Australia to snap up his services within days.

She kept waiting ... and waiting.

Finally, with no job offer on the table, she called on the persuasive talents of former Australian head honcho Don Talbot, by now working out of Christchurch's QEII pool.

"I said to Don, 'How about helping me get Mark Regan?' He thought it would be fantastic for the programme," Cameron said.

"We're very, very happy we've realised that. He's an exciting, innovative, team coach. He's going to make an impact, he already has in the few days he's been here.

"We're going to go forward in leaps and bounds now."

Quality does not come cheap and in this case Peter might not have been robbed to pay Paul, or Mark as the case is, but he has had to volunteer some cash.

"Certainly we have had to rejig the budget, yes we have," Cameron said. The pressure from Sparc is for us to deliver in the now. That is Mark's role."

Cameron said an extensive review with Sparc at the end of last year had identified the need for a "big gun" to make big gains. Cameron's talents were being spread too thin as she tried to juggle her administrative role with hands-on coaching.

"To get the big gains, we assessed we needed to have a big gun come in and spend a lot of front-on time with the coaches and the swimmers without having to do all the other things I was doing."