March 25, 2010 (Ottawa, ON) – The Coaching Association of Canada’s Women in Coaching (WiC) program will hold its annual National Coach Workshop on March 26-28 at the Briars Resort, Jackson’s Point, Lake Simcoe, Ont. Olympic and Paralympic performances will be the focus of the workshop.

“The workshop brings together Canada’s top female coaches only days after our most successful Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games ever,” says WiC consultant Sheilagh Croxon of Toronto, a two-time Olympic coach and head synchronized swimming coach at the Granite Club. Of the seven female coaches on Canada’s Olympic coaching staff, six contributed to a medal-winning performance. Forty-one Canadian women won six gold, six silver, and three bronze medals (see full list below). At the Paralympics, two female coaches, one in Para-Alpine and the other in Para-Nordic, played significant roles as six female athletes won seven gold, four silver, and four bronze medals. “Incredible performances and vivid testimony to the talent and expertise women in sport bring to this country. Through the experts who will make presentations at the workshop, national team coaches and up-and-coming coaches will learn first-hand what it takes to excel on the world stage.”

Presenters include Xiuli Wang of Calgary, the award-winning coach of medallists Kristina Groves and Clara Hughes; Melody Davidson of Calgary, who coached the Olympic women’s hockey team to the gold medal; Theresa Schlachter of Calgary, an Own the Podium high performance advisor who coached skeleton athletes to three medals at the 2006 Olympic Winter Games; and sport psychology expert Dr. Penny Werthner of Ottawa, whose clients at the 2010 Games included the freestyle ski team and the women’s curling team, both of which won medals.

National and assistant coaches from cycling, ice hockey, athletics, triathlon, ringette, baseball, and synchronized swimming will be joined by former hockey star Danielle Goyette of Calgary, now head coach of the University of Calgary Dinos; Shauna Flath of Vancouver, national coach of the senior women’s squash team; Paralympic rowing coach Anne-Renée Thibault of Montreal; national adaptive water ski coach Pat Messner of Ottawa; Carol Love of Peterborough, head rowing coach at Trent University; and Brenda Van Tighem of Calgary, assistant coach of the University of Calgary Track and Field Club. Also in attendance will be the five women coaches currently participating in WiC’s National Team Apprenticeship Program (more info here) — and representatives of several national sport organizations.

The workshop facilitator is Dr. Dru Marshall of Edmonton, the Deputy Provost at the University of Alberta, and an exercise physiologist whose coaching career at university, provincial, and national levels spans more than 25 years.