Triple Olympian Adam Pine is confident Australia’s Paralympic swimmers will be stronger, fitter and faster when the 2020 Paralympic Games roll around in four years’ time.
One of Australia’s most celebrated athletes himself, from the Sydney, Athens and Beijing Olympics has just been re-appointed as Swimming Australia’s Paralympic Program Manager for the next four years.
Pine, 40, was responsible for the planning behind Australia’s successful Paralympic campaign in Rio this year that netted our swimmers 29 medals – nine gold, 10 silver and 10 bronze.
Swimming Australia’s General Manager of Performance Wayne Lomas has welcomed Pine’s re-appointment, saying: “It’s exciting to have Adam on board and leading our Para Program to Tokyo.
“Alongside his vision for our future, Adam’s depth of experience in elite sport, knowing what it takes to achieve Peak Performance, is incredibly valuable.
“His personal search for excellence and willingness to innovate make him a great fit for our program.
“I’m really excited to continue working alongside Adam and his team on the road to 2020”
Australia’s swimmers emerged as a dominant force in Rio with an exciting group of new faces joining tried and true champions with “girl power” trio Ellie Cole, Lakeisha “Lucky” Patterson and Maddison Elliott to the fore, the Australians provided some amazing performances over 10 exciting days of inspirational competition.
And one of those new faces, rookie Paralympian Rachael Watson inspired the whole team at her first Games – completing a fairy tale finish for the Australians when she flew ahead in the final stages of the 50m freestyle to grab a gold medal on debut.
Watson had to wait until the final night of the meet to stand atop the podium but no doubt it was worth the wait for the 24-year-old Queenslander, who suffers from cerebral palsy and motor neuropathy following Guillain-Barre Syndrome.
She became the first Australian Paralympic swimmer classed S5 or below, to win gold this millennium, setting a new Paralympic record of 40.13 in the women’s S4 50m freestyle.
“It was a matter of swimming making a difference to her life – a young girl who struggled to get out of bed and now she is a Paralympic champion – that’s the kind of real satisfaction you get out of making a difference to someone’s life from this program,” said Pine, who has been at the helm since 2013 and has been responsible for leading one of the most successful and integrated programs in Australian sport.
Swimming Australia has been at the forefront of integrating all of its elite swimmers both Olympic and Paralympic in an inclusive and highly successful program.
And Pine is confident Australia’s Paralympic swim team for Tokyo can only go from strength to strength over the next four years.
“Post London, we had a largely a new group of athletes and we really didn’t have great expectations for Rio,” said Pine.
“We knew we had a talented, emerging group to join some of our experienced swimmers like Ellie Cole and Brenden Hall.
“But with the rest of the world really on the rise we thought medals in 2016 would be hard to come by.
“Under the direction of head coach Brendan Keogh and with support from the likes of Brendan Burkett and a dedicated team of coaches and staff they prepared the team well and our results were above what we expected.”
“But we need to continue that professional approach. Fitness levels can improve and we want our team to be stronger, fitter and faster and we are getting there.
“We have taken some huge strides but there is more movement to come.
“These guys are really starting to look like athletes and they would not look out of place on an Olympic team.
“Their daily training environment is not unlike any high performance centre with sports science, strength and conditioning and nutrition.
“The culture was already developing when I came on board but there is a real close knit nature about this group when they travel and work as a team and we aim to continue to build on that base.
“We even get a lot of positive response from other nations, even the USA who have a hugely successful program but their coaches recognised that the Australian team know what they’re about when they walk onto pool deck.
“And we only have 125 licensed swimmers and 37 of them are on the team.
“We are building on that and there is an improving group of 11 to 13 year-olds who we will look forward to in the future.
“When we do discover talent we have the processes and coaches to up-skill them quite quickly and can accelerate them.
“We may not have the numbers, the population or the factory like other nations but our approach is the same.”
Pine said the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in 2014 was the turning point of the current era and that continued through 2015 and into 2016.
“To see the integration of our swimmers at the Gala Dinner was very special.”
Pine will now aim at getting the team prepared for next year’s Paralympic Swimming World Championships in Mexico City and the high altitude challenges that will go with that.
And then there is the 2018 Commonwealth Games which will see 12 events included on the swimming program and will involve around 20 athletes.
Pine is also working on a plan to bring the 2018 Para Pan Pac Swimming Championships to Australia with several major centres already showing interest.
For Pine and his team the next four years is about re-setting, rehearsing and refining before they arrive in Tokyo in 2020 and many of the Rio team that created such a huge impression will be ready to improve on Australia’s already growing status on the Paralympic pool-deck.