A Short History of the World Swimming Coaches Association
The WSCA Beginnings and Purpose
WSCA began in 1989. The founders were Paul Quinlan (ASCTA Director – Australia), Coach Yutaka Terao (millionaire-coach-businessman-swim school owner from Japan), and John Leonard (ASCA).
Yutaka was the first president. He was NOT part of the governance of the Japanese Federation. They said, "He does not do things in the correct way (meaning he did not kiss the ring of the federation)." He was very wealthy and funded our initial work to the tune of $70-100,000 for about five years. In today's dollars, that is about $208,000, and none of it paid for staff. We were all strongly supported in the beginning by Forbes Carlile, Australia, Peter Daland, USA, and Nick Theiry, Canada, who all felt they were too old to lead, but wanted to help and did, significantly.
The purpose of the WSCA was to stand up to FINA, the IOC, and the key National Federations and give the media non-US opinion from the world's coaches. We focused primarily on anti-doping and governance of our sport for the good of the sport worldwide. "Governance" meant anti-corruption. Everything began as anti-doping but gradually became anti-corruption because the WSCA realized that even doping was just a symptom of the disease of corruption.
Hate is not too strong a word to use between FINA and the WSCA. There was some respect, with the strongest and most active dislike. FINA has tried and continues to try to kill the WSCA. FINA's active focus on getting rid of the WSCA has made sponsorship development difficult because FINA gives swim businesses a choice, "It's either them or us. If you work with them, we have nothing to do with you," and they get cut off from all the FINA meets events and conferences.
WSCA was quite effective in anti-doping awareness and some aspects of real-world anti-doping, but until we cure the disease of corruption, the symptom of doping will persist. The sad truth is that FINA could end doping with a snap of its fingers (checkbook).
WSCA created change in that FINA made a paper "Coaches Commission" for "coaches' input," which it never cared about in the slightest. The Bureau appointed Peter Daland as the first chair. Peter also was the 2nd WSCA President after Yutaka, so they were "nodding their head" towards WSCA. The next chair was Alan Thompson, Australia, who succeeded Peter as WSCA president. So, the first two chairs of the FINA Coaches Commission were WSCA Presidents.
FINA appointed John Leonard to the Coaches Commission, as well, and he did a lot for FINA Coach Education from that position. John was there for 12 years until Cornel killed Fran Crippen in the open water swim in Dubai. Then John resigned and blasted Cornel.
The WSCA anti-doping history fills 12 notebooks with thousands of pages of work. The WSCA essentially forced FINA to sound like they were anti-doping, though they never actually were.
WSCA attempted at various times to do coach education. It was never very successful because ASCA has the most respected program globally, so WSCA left coach education to ASCA.
We have had a variety of Presidents:
1. Yutaka Terao – Japan – 5 years.
2. Peter Daland – USA – 5 years.
3. Alan Thompson – Australia – 5 years.
4. Niels Bouws – Germany – 4 years.
5. George Block – USA – 12 years.
6. Jon Rudd – Ireland/England – is currently Vice-President for WSCA Europe and is "in line" to become the next President.
WSCA lost some focus over the past few years due to doping becoming both politically unsolvable and less prioritized. The WSCA was also reluctant to take the obvious next step and challenge FINA on running world swimming. We didn't have the money to challenge FINA, nor the support of ANY of the major swimming nations. They all live in (needless) fear of FINA and the IOC.
We took an "experimental" step, which led to the founding of both the WSA and the ISL.
The WSA
We need to establish an alternative Federation that serves SELFLESSLY, unlike the FINA/IOC model, which only "serves" selfishly. FINA cannot reform itself. Corruption is the basis for its entire governance and power structure. Currently, corruption is not only destroying real governance; it is more damaging to world swimming than is doping. All over the developing (swimming) world, the best swimmers are left home when it comes time for big meets.
When the ASCA (and, ironically, even FINA) does clinics around the world, the pattern we all see is the first day is full of enthusiasm and energy. About halfway through the second day, that starts to dissipate. On the third day, there is real depression. Coaches say, "Why should we coach better? We already have the best swimmers, but they can't afford the bribes, so they never get selected." The swimmers say the same thing. "Why should we train harder? We are the top swimmers, but we never get selected." There are excellent coaches and swimmers in those countries, but they are having their life sucked out of them by corruption.
We thought that we could solve this by creating a series of "elite" meets around the world, not governed by FINA, that would compensate swimmers fairly (on areal professional model) and allow the best swimmers to compete because the federations wouldn't be involved. To do this, we formed the WSA.
Nearly as soon as we did this, three (3) things happened.
1. We learned that there was no athlete leadership.
2. The founder of the ISL read our Constitution and contacted John Leonard.
3. Our members emailed us and asked for grassroots services, NOT elite swimming.
We modeled the (elite) WSA after the PGA, where the athletes own the events. It is another individual sport with separate tours all over the world with some crossover. Swimmers were unable to organize themselves the way golfers did. There were/are all sorts of reasons for that, but we had to learn that the hard way.
The ISL
The founder of the ISL called John and said that he read our Constitution, and that was what he wanted to do. We were failing because we didn't have a checkbook. The ISL founder is a billionaire swimming fanatic. It made perfect sense for us to help him develop the professional league. What the ISL is putting together may someday rival the Olympics IF they can make the finances work. If they support all the athletes well, they will compete strongly.
99% of the world's swimming population never goes to the Olympics and just wants well-run, non-political, selfless competitions in their country, that are NOT corrupt.
The WSCA set about working to build a WSA that can do that can serve as an alternative sporting organization where anyone in any country can ignore their federation and just do their own thing.
The ONLY monopoly that the Federations have is access to the FINA events and the Olympic Games. Everything else can be done by anyone who wants to do it RIGHT (in the sense of serving the swimmers). The European Commission (legally) ended FINA's self-declared monopoly on swimming competitions, and that monopoly is on the way to being terminated in US courts, as well.
The WSA becomes the selfless organization that truly serves. It is a tool in the WSCA toolbox. When a group of our members wants to develop meets – all the way up to a WSA Championship – the WSCA can use the WSA as the "International Federation." When they need education or training camps or consulting, we are the WSCA. We just have different hats for different functions.
The WSCA Today
We now have three (3), clearly defined areas of activity for each organization. The WSCA works primarily on advocacy. We are a unified voice for coaches internationally. The regional WSCA branches serve as the voice for coaches within that region.
The second service area for the WSCA is coach education and certification. Our membership wants a common standard of certification that recognizes all the credible national certifications, as well as provides our own. We are doing that.
The WSA is the vehicle for arranging meets that are outside of the FINA umbrella. This sanctioning process works from learn-to-swim to international competition below the FINA B level. It is primarily being used today by international schools worldwide.
The WSCA serves as both advisors and adversaries to the ISL. We provide them with our best possible advice on seasons, meets structure, etc., but when we feel that commercial interests have overtaken the swimmers' best interests, we oppose them.
In the 31 years of the WSCA's existence, we have evolved continuously to meet the needs of the world's coaches, but we have never lost sight of our primary role as the voice of those coaches.