Page 1 of 1.

The Watties Coach of the Year Awards was held in Auckland in November last year, announcing New Zealand's top volunteer coaches for 2007. The annual awards are jointly sponsored by SPARC and Watties, with the aim of saying ‘thanks coach’ to the country’s deserving volunteer coaches.

Coaches inspire people and facilitate individual, team, and community enjoyment of sport. The spirit of volunteer coaching, the diversity of age, experience, and the wide variety of sports New Zealanders play, combine to make these awards unique.

To select the winners of this year’s awards, more than 2,900 nominations from around New Zealand were received for the regional judging rounds. Each Regional Sport Trust held its own local event, nominating coaches to represent their region in the national Watties Coach of the Year Awards in four different categories. This year’s national winners were:

• Watties Student Volunteer Coach, won by 18-year-old Shivendra Narayan, Year 13 student at Howick College and the school’s basketball coach;
• Watties Lifetime Volunteer Coach, awarded to Canterbury Westland’s Ethna Rouse, coaching for 53 years across tennis, netball and cricket;
• Watties Newcomer Volunteer Coach, won by Manawatu-based Bridget Percy, Paihiatua hockey coach for two years;
• Watties General Volunteer Coach, awarded to Anne Stillwell, swimming, netball and touch coach for the Kaikohe community.

A view from the winner’s stage

Bridget Percy, winner of the Watties Newcomer Volunteer Coach Award, has been coaching for only two years. She spends 10-15 hours a week coaching five hockey teams of kids, aged 5 - 13. Coaching the children of schools that are too small to field their own hockey team, Bridget has grown the teams in the Paihiatua Bush Hockey Club from one to five since she started.

For Bridget, the regional and national awards evenings were a fantastic surprise.  “I was wide eyed and really humbled by the calibre of the people there. It was a professional event while informal enough to make everyone feel at ease. I liked the way they profiled every person nominated for an award – they spoke so well of everyone. Listening to the profiles, I thought that it was pretty amazing to hear about the things that people can do. I certainly didn’t think there was any chance of me winning. I hadn’t prepared anything like a speech,” says Bridget.

Like the Oscars, the announcement of each award is preceded by a profile of the winner. We asked Bridget what it was like when she realised that it was her profile that was being read out. She explained that she couldn’t breathe, “I was humbled by the dedicated people at this event. And it was a long way from Paihiatua. Somehow I managed to thank the people who needed to be thanked.”

The glitz of the awards may be far from Paihiatua, but a good attitude and some innovative approaches to coaching have brought Bridget along on her coaching journey. Coaching five hockey teams of different ages simultaneously, Bridget’s got the right attitude to keep going. “I believe in total participation and giving it a go. I wouldn’t turn away anyone from taking part. Likewise, my approach to age is to take down barriers to achieving - what the thirteen year olds can do, can be modelled to the five-year-olds. They are capable of learning the same things”.

Dedicated volunteer coaches deserve applause

The Awards night was a huge success and we are looking forward to seeing who will be nominated for next year’s awards.

Mike McHugh, Team Leader Coaching, SPARC, and Tall Ferns national coach, said the selected coaches stood out, but that all volunteer coaches deserved to be there.

“From the youngest to the oldest, the most experienced to the least, they all offer something special. These awards thank coaches for their hard work, but they also show the wider community that volunteer coaches are highly valued for what they do. SPARC, Watties, players, teams, parents, clubs – the list goes on - all get to say ‘thanks coach’ with these awards.”