Forbes Carlile Pays Tribute to Terry Gathercole

(Forbes Carlile, 79, the legendary Australian coach and one of the most outspoken advocates of drug-free sport, wrote this tribute for swiminfo to Terry Gathercole, whom he coached when Terry was a swimmer and with whom he worked to keep swimming drug-free.

By Forbes Carlile

SYDNEY. May 30. TERRY Gathercole used to say I was his "only coach."

I have watched with pride his rise in swimming, first as world record-holder for the 200m breaststroke and then as a leading coach and administrator.

For a time, Terry coached professionally with Ursula and me, then branched out on his own and developed two swimming schools in Sydney, at Castle Cove and at Killarney Heights, both of which Ursula and I eventually purchased from him and his wife Carol.

He was the longtime coach of two Olympic champions (Ian O'Brien and Bev Whitfield) and one World champion (Linley Frame) and was a hardworking, painstaking
administrator, first with the New South Wales and then the Australian Coaches Associations. He became chairman of both bodies and was instrumental in
the formulating of constitutions which have placed them in the forefront of world coaching organisations.

In 1985 Terry played a prominent role in the
reconstitution of the Amateur Swimming Union of Australia, which became a more democratized Australian Swimming Inc., vastly developing its administration from being carried out "on the kitchen table." Terry
Gathercole's "rise" from a professional swimming coach to the position of President of Australian Swimming during the Sydney Olympic quadrennium was unprecedented in Australian sport. Struggling against almost overpowering odds of poor health, which saw him in a wheelchair for most of the Olympic year 2000, Terry played a large part in contributing to the success of the Sydney Games.

Terry Gathercole will be long remembered in Australian and world swimming with pride and affection.

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