National Team Coaching Staff

 

Peter Cookson - High Performance Director

Originally from St. Catharines, Ont., Peter Cookson became RCA's High Performance Director in early 2009.  He has more than 30 years of involvement with the sport of rowing at national and international levels.

Cookson, who coached South Africa’s women’s single sculler at the 2008 Olympics, began his coaching career in Canada in 1985 and was a leading coach for several prominent Canadian university programs - University of British Columbia, University of Western Ontario and the University of Toronto.  He has since coached in the UK, South Africa and Zimbabwe, and has been involved with the FISA (the international rowing federation) Development program in Africa. 

Cookson, a University of Western Ontario graduate, has also worked in coaching education for many years and produced the 2005 DVD called Effective Sculling Technique.

John Keogh - Performance Director, Women

John Keogh is an Australian who was a National Team athlete and coached in that country.

He joined RCA's staff in 2010 as a senior women's coach, and led the women's eight to an Olympic silver medal in 2012. 

Before coming to Canada, Keogh was a High Performance Rowing Coach in Great Britain working with its women's program at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

Keogh is based in London, Ont.

 
Al Morrow - Performance Director, lightweight men

Al joined Rowing Canada in 1986, and has held a variety of positions ever since.  He began working at the National Team Women’s Centre in London, Ont. in 1988. During this time he also coached Western’s women’s rowing team for 22 years.

From 1990 to 2005 Morrow was head coach of Canada’s national women’s rowing team. Under his leadership the women won 4 gold, 1 silver and 3 bronze medals at the Olympics and 7 gold, 5 silver and 6 bronze medals at World Championships. In 2008 he coached the Olympic bronze medal lightweight women's double and he assisted with the silver medal women's eight at the 2012 Olympics.

In 1999, the London, Ontario-based coach was recognized by the world rowing federation (FISA) as Coach of the Year.  He was  inducted into the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame in 2006.

He is currently the Performance Director for the lightweight men's program.

Martin McElroy - Performance Director, Men

Martin McElroy is the latest addition to RCA's High Performance team.

McElroy coached Great Britain's Olympic gold medal winning rowing men's eight at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games.

More recently, he was the Performance Director for Rowing Ireland, and in this role he was involved in all aspects of that country’s high performance rowing program. He has an MBA in the Management of Innovation and is an accredited Human Performance Improvement consultant.

Terry Paul - men's program

As a cox for the 1992 men's eight, Terry Paul helped the crew bring home gold for Canada from the Barcelona Games. Since then, he has gained much experience as a coach in Canada with the men's program and with the Swiss National Team.

Terry coached the 2002 World Cup gold medallist lightweight men's four, and women's double, and has been in charge of the Under-23 and non-Olympic programs. In 2006, he coached the Under-23 men's eight to a gold medal and the senior coxed four to a silver medal at the World Championships.

In 2008, Terry coached the men's pair to Olympic Silver in Beijing. He is based in Victoria, B.C.

Michelle Darvill - National Women's Development Coach

Olympian Michelle Darvill competed for Canada and Germany - winning World Championship gold in the LW 1x, LW2x and LW4x.

She has been involved in coaching since 1992 at the university, club and international levels. She has been an assistant coach with the Women's National Team, and 2007 Pan American Games women's team coach. Recently, she has served at the women's U23 coach, In 2011 the women's U23 women's eight won World Championship gold and the women's four also won gold in 2012 at the U23s.

 

Paul Hawksworth - Interim Program Manager - Para-Rowing

Hawksworth has been an assistant coach in Rowing Canada's National Team program, and was previously invaluable to the University of Victoria in the area of athlete recruitment and development. He has a particular passion for para-rowing as the twin brother of an active and disabled man who has never let physical barriers stand in his way of success.
Paul Hawksworth is based in Ottawa, Ontario. For more info, cdnpararowing@rowingcanada.org

 

Chuck McDiarmid - Development Coordinator-  bio to come.

For postings of part-time and seasonal positions, see our Job Postings Section .

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