Commentary by Chuck Warner
Across America, swimmers and coaches begin their journey through the sport of swimming at pools like the one pictured at the Mermaid Lake Swim Club outside Philadelphia, Pa. On Saturday afternoon, the humidity wrapped like a massive hug around four to five hundred former swimmers and coaches that Coach Richard Shoulberg had helped mold into productive adults during his 46 years as teacher and coach at Germantown Academy.
The group traveled from all over the country with American swimming icons Karen LaBerge flying in for the festivities from San Francisco and Jeff Prior from San Diego. One guest explained the day, “It was an amazing life experience for so many of us. The sum total of the love and joy experienced is beyond mere mortals’ capacity to fathom.”
But the star products of Shoulberg’s coaching at this event weren’t just LaBerge, Prior, Olympian Brenda Borg or former world record holder Dave Wharton. They were the Shoulberg swimmers you never heard of whose character was softened by the fatigue of swim training and hardened like steel from a seldom-yielding coach with great expectations for them as an athlete, a student and a citizen.
Dr. Deb Weiler recalled how she trembled some 40 years ago when the booming voice of her coach thrust her forward as an athlete, but also reminded her to excel in school. She credits her “FASTLANE” practice in psychology to the inspiration of her coach.
Cheri Morrison who at four years old first met the coach at Mermaid Lake instigated one of the great encyclopedias of any coach’s human touch. Although Morrison (GA Class of ’78) turned into a diver by 11th grade at Germantown, last fall she took the time to provide a forum for past swimmers and friends to support Shoulberg in extending his stay at GA. More than 1600 folks responded with their testimony that is a remarkable read: https://www.change.org/p/germantown-academy-reinstate-dick-shoulberg.
The magical opportunity of any coach, including Dick Shoulberg, is swept forward by the wand of Americana that is waved by teenage coaches at summer pools that are opening all over the USA this time of year. While Australia bears swimmers out of the oceans and her Gold Coast, America’s champions tend to be born out of the summer pools like this one. The arm that eventually encircles the Olympic medal winner starts with the appropriately delivered challenge to kids from Wharton to Weiler. Some change our Olympic teams, some change their profession and others change the world. But a massive number ripen through their experience in the sport of swimming—and thousands of those adults have been bequeathed success by the wonderful life’s work of Richard Shoulberg.
After circling the globe coaching USA National Teams, conducting clinics and inspiring his charges, Dick Shoulberg is home again. Since his recent departure from Germantown, he is coaching his own new team back where he started at the Mermaid Lake Swim Club.
“I feel like I’m 25 years old,” Shoulberg revealed.
Saturday’s celebration culminated by cutting three cakes prepared by the culinary genius Ms. Morrison, who generated images of Shoulberg’s teams on the icing. For a change, on Saturday others served the coaching legend after 46 years of his serving scores of lives and spirits at Germantown Academy.
Why?
A common observation,“There is no one finer than Dick Shoulberg! He graces our world with strength, honor, courage and especially, humor even in the face of adversity!”
Jodi Schwartz :-)))