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The turnaround of Cross Country Canada under Wood’s direction as national team head coach was palpable and impressive. He was the man who put Beckie Scott and Sara Renner on the world stage and was at the helm during Chandra Crawford’s incredible gold medal performance at the Torino Games. But as much of a mainstay as Wood has been at the head of the program, murmurs of athlete unrest from Canmore trickled through the community in recent years. The job of senior team Head Coach was handed over to Norwegian Arild Monson in 2008 after a decade under Wood who assumed the title of Team Leader.
Monson’s tenure was a short ride as he was abruptly let go with less than a year to the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, and was replaced by Norwegian guru, Inge Braten. Braten left the Canadian program as planned after the Vancouver Games.
In April, Cross Country Canada hired long-time US Ski Team member, coach, and Beckie Scott’s husband, Justin Wadsworth, as the Canadian national head coach. Wood was given new responsibilities at that time as the “manager of National Ski Team operations and coach development.”
As contentious as such transitions can become, Wood paints an amicable separation. “It’s a personal life style decision,” said Wood by telephone. Wood’s girlfriend lives in Rossland, BC, from where he has commuted for some time to Canmore for National Team work. There are local coaching opportunities in Rossland which Wood is exploring and despite the now-formal separation, he says he will “still have contact with the national team” continuing to work with them on a contract basis. “When you’re at the international level, life is run by the World Cup calendar. This (move) gives me flexibility. It’s better for my personal life.”
While amicable, Cross Country Canada executive director, Davin MacIntosh, felt the gravity of Wood’s decision on the national program, but said the move was not contentious. “We’re sad to see him go,” he commented. According to MacIntosh, CCC conducted a comprehensive analysis of the program after Vancouver. With the recent hiring of Justin Wadsworth, he said they had all their human resources in a good place for top international performances. “Dave was in an important piece (of the structure). It’s unfortunate he’s decided to move on. We have our work cut out for us to fill his shoes.”
May 12th, 2010 at 7:26 am
1. Marty Hall, Gatineau, Quebec says:
May 11th, 2010 at 8:36 am
This has been a very messy break-up that has been building for at least the last3-4 years and has been a weakness of this program since the 70s. Where coaches are caste aside helter skelter. It has always been and it still is a BOD driven association. I know from my direct experience after 10 years as Head Coach, with the National Team, that I left for reasons that would lead me to other things I wanted to do in this sport, but that decision was made ever so much easier to make knowing that the BOD would no longer be an issue in my team life.
CCC’s Board has major problems staying in the Board room and has the problem of inserting it’s self into the day to day operation of the program, in many cases over riding the directions and decisions of the ED, High Performance Director and the coaching staff.
They have availed themselves to the athletes directly, individually and as a team, and have in instances mandated program changes. At this time the ED is definitely in a fight with them for control of the National Team program. These people like Jim McCarthy, Bruce Jefferies and Georgia Manhard are well seasoned in these kinds of battles for control. They will deny this, but I’ve experienced it first hand in my 10 years at the helm and in conversation with these people directly since then.
The skiers have just shot themselves in the foot, as they are blinded by their own success, and don’t realize that this success is from the very program that they are trying to or have brought down. They are not capable of making these decisions that will keep them on track in this international arena. That is the responsibility of the new Head Coach.
I wish Just Wadsworth, the new Head Coach, all the best in this continuing battle, as it is the culture of CCC to have this political control. So, be ready for interference. It is a many headed horse that runs this team.
Also, with Dave Wood now gone, what happens to the training program direction, the Sports Science involvement and all those years of international experience and knowledge. The strength of this man’s dedication, international intelligence and team direction will be missed these next 4 years.
The team should be the focus and that focus should be the responsibility of the professionals that have been hired to carry out this mandate of international excellence.
These top skiers are well taken care of, are earning good salaries, have great life styles and have Dave to thank for bringing this about when he finally got control of the program in ‘98.
Well, in it’s finality, the one out come of all of this is the skiers have the burden of proving that they were right. I’ll be watching, I know that.
May 12th, 2010 at 8:56 am
I have to agree with Marty about the state of CCC and how the board functions. A good board of directors should be “nose in and hands off” but this is not happening. Roger Jackson once told me that the reason why rowing Canada was doing so well in the 1990’s was that they had great coaches and that they left them alone to do their jobs.
The one thing that was missing this spring after the Olympics was a consultation process between CCC, the coaches and the athletes. At the end of every season professional sports teams conduct individual exit interviews with each coach and athlete to discuss the season. It is a time for frank and honest appraisals of each side by the other side. This should have happened in March, but did not. As a result decisions were made by CCC about re-hiring coaches and administrators without all parties feeling that they had had a chance to give feedback.
So, Dave was re-hired, Tom Holland was re-hired and Justin Wadsworth was hired with little or no input from athletes. I am not saying that these decisions were incorrect, but it left the skiers feeling left out of the process and without a voice. This led to a very strong backlash in the team for any and all decisions and a very strong push back from the skiers.
It is a very connected age that we are in now, with a Gen Y group of skiers that feels that they need to be heard when it comes to how the NST should be run – especially with the great results from the Olympics. This is not good or bad, but just the way it is and everyone needs to understand this.
Dave has left the team far better than he found it, and that is probably the best measure of his success. Regardless of your personal feelings towards him, xc skiing in Canada is way ahead of where it was in 1998 when he became head coach.
Every xc skier who is a member of CCC owes Dave a big thank you. I hope that CCC is planning a big thank you party for Dave right now.
XC ski racing should be seen as a team sport that is athlete centered, but coach driven. Without great coaches there would not be fast skiers. Andd volunteers are there in a supporting role only to provide vision and direction, not management. Let the professionals do their job.
May 12th, 2010 at 12:01 pm
Most importantly Canada/WE are finally developing world class cross country skiers but for the 50 years I have been involved with cross country in Canada we have been unable to develop political leadership that understand our sport. It seems to me that is the “nature of the best” in our country. It is a very dangerous situation and now it has really blown up in our face with Dave Wood resigning!
I am an advocate for a total Canadian program, we must learn from our own experiences and failures. Our program must be Canadian and built on Canadian know-how. We are going to be best because our program is built on our own culture/milieu and experiences and not on some other country’s experiences. I hired the first foreign coaches for our NST program, I have watched them all and not one of them have left any kind of legacy in Canada.
As I see it, in the last 30 years we have developed one great big cross country resourse in Canada; namely Dave Wood. He has the knowledge and understands what we learned in the 70’s,80’s plus his own experiences in the 90’s and in the new century. The other resourse we have is our waxing team, they are world class. As to the other people in our support staff are early learners.
Needless to say, we should have had a person training under Dave, I thought this would happen now after the Olympics? And how difficult will it be to find such a person. First of all this person must be totally commited to live for cross country skiing 24/7 for the nest 10 years, then he must be sport smart, must be able to ski technically correct, have great people skills and be politically savy.
My God where do we find such a person? We better hire Dave Wood as a consultant!
March 14th, 2011 at 10:13 pm
Trying to contact Marty Hall – re: Lovett Cross country skis
You are the first person I have come across to comment on this –
and I found you here.
leecluley@gmail.com