Rowing: Wright overlooked for coaching job

Hamilton's Ian Wright says he doesn't give up easily and is not about to quit New Zealand rowing.

The successful Hamilton Boys' High School rowing coach admits he is bitterly disappointed he has been overlooked to coach at the New Zealand junior men's eight that is likely to include the bulk of his Maadi Cup-winning school crew at the world junior rowing championships

Wright has offers of professional coaching positions in Australia and the man who put together the Hamilton Boys' High rowing programme, Glenn Ross, said it would be a tragedy if New Zealand rowing lost him.

"I've been able to observe both of them at work and this guy is as close to Harry Mahon in his ability to coach as we have had," Ross said.

"We're going to lose him. He'll go overseas if his way is blocked here, just like Harry did, just like Sam Le Compte (an established Australian national coach) did and just like Rusty Robertson did years before all of them.

"This is history repeating itself."

Ross claims politics have kept Wright out of the job, that because he is so intense, has such a burning desire to win, speaks his mind and is so successful he has rubbed the people who make the appointments up the wrong way.

"But he gets the results and he's held in such high esteem by everyone he has coached at both school and elite level."

Wright, whose school crew rowed a cracking time of 5min 53sec to win the Maadi Cup at Lake Karapiro last Saturday, is determined to stay and said he saw his immediate future in New Zealand.

"It would have made sense from the point of view of continuity for me to coach the junior eight if the majority of it are going to be Boys' High rowers but that's up to the selectors," said Wright, who rowed at three Olympics and seven world championships for New Zealand.

"I still have ambitions of coaching at the highest level in New Zealand and I'll probably stay at this stage. I don't give up easily."

The volunteer position of coach of the national junior boys' eight to row at the world junior championships in Germany in August has gone to former Waikato coach Brett Crowe, who was in charge of the New Zealand men's coxless four who finished fifth at the Athens Olympics last year.

That four is this year to be coached by Chris Nillson, who has just been appointed on a six-month contract as elite high performance head coach Richard Tonks' fulltime assistant.

Nillson, a New Zealander, coached the United States men's coxless four to gold medal at the 2003 world championships and was assistant coach of the US men's eight that won at the Athens Olympics.

"His availability has created a bottleneck of coaches at the top level," New Zealand Rowing chief executive Craig Ross said.

Wright has already coached at world under-23 and elite championship level, with the men's development crews going on to form the basis of New Zealand's top male rowers.

"I got a taste of it, I enjoyed it and thought I was relatively good at it," he said.

"My job is to make winning crews and that's all I aim for."

Wright plans to phone NZ Rowing high performance commissioner Barrie Mabbott to find out where he figures in the national body's reckoning.

Craig Ross, who was not part of the process that appointed Crowe and girls' coxless four coach Dale Maher (Rangi Ruru Girls' School), said NZ Rowing recognised Wright's skills and believed his time would come.

"He's too good a coach not to use at some stage in the future and we hope to work with Ian in the near future to help shape his involvement in New Zealand Rowing," Craig Ross said.

NZ Rowing's new high-performance plan, which has just been signed off by Sparc, identifies coaching as the next most important phase in the development of the sport in this country and funding is in place to set up four regional high performance centres, each run by high-performance coaches.

- NZPA