Exclusive: Quick Resigns To Spend More Time With Family

By Phillip Whitten

PALO ALTO, Calif., April 19. RICHARD Quick, Head Women’s Coach at Stanford University and twice Head Women’s Coach of the US Olympic Team, explained his decision to retire after 17 years at the school in an exclusive interview with SwimInfo this afternoon.

Quick, 62, whose Stanford teams won seven national collegiate team championships during his tenure from 1989 to 2005, said what it all boiled down to was “wanting to spend more time with my family.”

“I’ve been thinking about retiring for the last five or six years,” he said, noting “I’ve discussed it with you more than once.

“I want to stress that the reason – the only reason I am stepping down is to spend more time with my family.

“When I was a younger coach and I heard older coaches say the same thing, I really didn’t understand. Now that I’m older, I understand completely.

“I have a grandson who is 13 and a granddaughter who is 10. I’ve only got a few more years to spend with them before they’re grown up, and I want to be a much greater part of their lives.

“If there were any way I could move them to Stanford, or vice versa, I would do so,” he said. [All of Quick’s family lives in Texas with the exception of his son, who lives in Los Angeles.] “I have the most fun spending time with them and I just simply did not want to miss my grandchildren growing up,” he said, referring to rumors that he was encouraged to resign from his post at Stanford.

“I feel I have been blessed being able to have coached at Stanford. It is one of the greatest institutions of higher learning in the world and it attracts the best student athletes.”

Asked if he might have any regrets about his decision to retire, the Hall of Fame coach replied: “Sure. There’s never a best time for something like this. There will always be women I’d wished I’d coached.”

Among the athletes Quick has coached are Jenny Thompson, Lea Loveless, Misty Hyman, Catherine Fox, Dara Torres, Tara Kirk, Shelly Ripple, Summer Sanders, KIrsten Caverly, Janet Evans, and many other storied names in the annals of American and world swimming.

Quick concluded by saying he is involved in Stanford’s search for a new coach to replace him. He also said that the Stanford Athletic Director, Ted Leland, indicated he will be hired as a consultant who will come to Stanford “three or four times a year.”

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