By Anne Duggan
Last year was most definitely a banner year for Lynne Morrison and her athletes. Their achievements in 2011 earned Morrison the Ottawa Sports Awards female coach of the year honour for the first time in her career, but it’s 25 years of coaching local speed skaters that has given Morrison an appreciation of all aspects of the sport.
“It’s a very beautiful and technical sport,” explains Morrison, who has coached with the Gloucester Concordes club since 1990. “Coaching speed skaters is all about technique – the smallest detail can really affect a skater’s results.”
Morrison, who received the coach of the year distinction at the Wednesday, Jan. 25 banquet at Algonquin College, concentrates on minute details in her day job as well since she is a music teacher, specializing with the flute.
Speed skating has also brought Morrison and her family of four a focus. Both Morrison and her husband, Dave, are coaches with the club. Her eldest daughter Samantha, 20, now trains for speed skating in Calgary, while her youngest daughter Hannah, 17, is hoping to join her sister at the Olympic oval next year.
In fact, Morrison was brought to the sport of speed skating by another family member.
“I didn’t find this sport until I was 20 years old,” she notes. “I was at university and my future sister-in-law convinced me to try it because she did not want to go alone.”
Morrison, a Level 3 coach, feels her gender has given her a special place in the speed skating world. In the early years, she was the lone female coaching the skaters in their late teens.
“There are not that many women in coaching,” Morrison describes. “But we are getting more recently.”
She says it can often be easier for a female coach to connect with female athletes.
“It does give a different element to it, not technically, but it is easier to communicate with the girls,” Morrison explains.
Last year was a standout year in Morrison’s coaching career. Four of Morrison’s long-track athletes – Isabelle Weidemann, Camille Bean, Emily Rendell-Watson and Philippe Bergeron – took half of the eight coveted Team Ontario berths to the Canada Winter Games, which serve as a key springboard to national and Olympic teams.
She also served as provincial team coach at Canada Games, junior nationals and Canada Cup races.
“I spent every second weekend away with the team,” Morrison recalls. “We went to four Canada Cup qualifying competitions and then four of them made it to the Canada Winter Games. Last year was a big year.”