Swimming Canada has announced that they will be cutting the High Performance Center – Victoria after the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in the latest move to reduce the center’s role in the country’s high performance infrastructure.
Last week, Swimming Canada announced that the center’s head coach Ryan Mallette would be moving from the Victoria HPC to the Ontario HPC effective immediately, with Brad Dingey taking over his role. That center, along with the Victoria NextGen program, will be closing at the end of the Olympics, however, with Canada saying that given limited resources, it makes sense to fully invest in 2 centers instead of 3: HPC-Ontario and HPC-Vancouver.
“Swimming Canada wants to ensure we have a robust High Performance Network across the country: for east and west, male and female, distance and sprint swimmers. We have to look at future athletes in centres, the resourcing that’s available, and all the considerations that go into how we best do that,” said High Performance Director and National Coach John Atkinson. “Focusing our investment on two High Performance Centres – one in the eastern part of the country, and one in the west – will allow Swimming Canada to continue to succeed in the coming years.”
The HPC – Victoria, located at Saanich Commonwealth Place, and the HPC – Vancouver, located at the University of British Columbia, were previously separated by only about 100 kilometers (60 miles).
The current HPC – Victoria group includes 5-time world junior champion Jade Hannah, two-time world championship medalist Eric Hedlin, Pan Am Games medalists Danielle Hanus, Faith Knelson and Jeremy Bagshaw, and Pan Pacific Championships medalist Mackenzie Padington.
Having no centre in Quebec makes no sense. Perhaps they will open one in Alberta as well.
The number of centers expands, contracts and will expand again one day and HPC Ontario is the shiny new toy now. Jade, Faith and Paddington skedaddling to greener pastures next year is a continuation of a trend of BC based swimmers voting with their feet. It could have been a powerful group if swimmers like Y. Kisil, R & K Smith chose Victoria over Ontario. Bad news is this in one less choice for Kyle Leibel, James LeBuke and Bailey Herbert.