Olympic Champion Zac Stubblety-Cook To Join Adam Peaty’s Coach Mel Marshall On The Gold Coast
Australia’s Olympic champion breaststroker Zac Stubblety-Cook has revealed he will link with celebrated British Olympic coach Mel Marshall on the Gold Coast as he kick-starts the next chapter of his career.
FRESH START: Zac Stubblety-Cook. Photo Courtesy: Delly Carr.
A move that will see the formation of another major breaststroke partnership for Marshall who has masterminded the career of arguably the world’s greatest ever breaststroker – triple Olympic champion Adam Peaty.
Stubblety-Cook could not have wished for a more credentialled coach to land in his backyard – only having to move from his Brisbane training base at Chandler an hour down Queensland’s M1 to the Griffith University program at the Gold Coast Aquatic Centre.
The Olympic gold and silver medallist and former world record holder over 200m breaststroke has spent the last eight years under master Australian Olympic gold medal coach, one of Queensland’s favorite sons Vince Raleigh.
Raleigh has taken the 25-year-old to the top of the world, but all good things come to a close and he has told Stubblety-Cook that he won’t be coaching at a High-Performance level in the future, moving on to the next stage of his life.
At 72, Raleigh has been one of the Australian Swimming’s longest serving and most successful National Team coaches.
Like Marshall and Peaty, together Raleigh and Stubblety-Cook have developed a gold medal winning partnership through two Olympic and World Championship campaigns – with Stubblety-Cook becoming the first Australian to win Olympic gold in the 200m breaststroke in Tokyo 2020 – the first since Ian O’Brien in Tokyo in 1964.
Raleigh setting Stubblety-Cook to break the world record for 200m breaststroke at the 2022 Trials in Adelaide, before winning the world title in Budapest.
Stubblety-Cook told ABC radio in Australia that he would be moving to join Marshall – the coach who has masterminded the extraordinary career of arguably the world’s greatest ever breaststroker in Peaty.
“Vince and I sat down and talked about the future, and he said he would be moving on from coaching to focus on the rest of his life and I will be making the move to Mel Marshall (at Griffith University) on the Gold Coast,” said Stubblety-Cook.
Marshall comes to the Gold Coast and into a program developed by Australian Olympic gold medal coach Michael Bohl – the man behind the Olympic gold medal successes of Stephanie Rice (2008), Emma McKeon (2016, 2020, 2024) and Kaylee McKeown (2024) – and who has taken a 12-month sabbatical.
Marshall coached Peaty to three Olympic golds among five medals; eight world titles among 12 medals; 16 European titles, the historic quadruple-quadruple – four golds at four straight championships and four Commonwealth golds among seven medals.
Peaty became the first man to break the 58-second barrier in the 100m when he went 57.92 in April 2015; the only man to have broken 57 with his shuddering 56.88 world record that has stood since July 2019 and the only man inside 26 seconds in the 50m with a WR of 25.95.
Why is Australia employing so many International coaches? Lots from GB.
Mel Marshall, Ben Higson, Dave McNalty?
Doesn’t Australia already have the best coaches? It’s not like our GB team had the greatest Olympics, but they still want our coaches.
Australian coaches have also worked with overseas swimmers so it’s a two way street .. so do you think Marshall was forced into the role like she didn’t want to come to Australia on her own volition by applying for the head position ?
Australia has underperformed with breastroke for quite some time at the highest elite level aside from ZSC. Costing medals/ranking in medley relays.