Interscholastic Coach of the Month Award - February 2020
February 18, 2020 | By
We're back with this month's NISCA Interscholastic Coach of the Month Award, recognizing high school coaches across the country! Coaches are the backbone of any swim team and frequently the unsung heroes of an athlete's success.
They are the instructors, motivators, teachers and role models for many young athletes and swimmers. That's why it's important to us at SwimOutlet.com to partner with organizations like the National Interscholastic Swim Coaches Association (NISCA). Every month, we recognize a different coach across the U.S. with our SwimOutlet.com Coach of the Month Award.
This month's SwimOutlet.com Coach of the Month spotlights Tim Sirois, a 29-year coaching veteran with 16 years at Highland Park High School in Highland Park, IL. Congrats!
Name: Coach Tim Sirois
School: Highland Park High School
Hometown: Highland Park, IL
Years Coaching: 29 years all together, 16 years at Highland Park H.S.
Biggest Team Success: We've worked really hard to build a swimming community in Highland Park that values hard work and strives for excellence. The current culture of the team is one where the upperclassmen mentor the newer team members both athletically and academically. We won a Sectional championship last year (the 1st one in 40 years), and we've won our conference title several times, but I'd have to say that the biggest team success has been the foundation that has been built where guys enjoy working really hard and love coming to the pool. It is a real positive environment to train in and a great place to coach.
Favorite Thing About Coaching: I enjoy how important my job is as a teacher and as a coach. I take that responsibility very seriously, and know that each day I have an opportunity to teach, to coach, and to learn. We have a great team that is super supportive of each other. Our coaching staff is the same way and it is nice to coach where the staff learns from each other, helps each other and cares so much about the athletes on our team.
Favorite Drill: When working on technique, we tend to build the stroke from the end of stroke forward to the catch-phase, so we take a "backward shaping" approach to technique. Each athlete is different, so we build technique around their individual needs. The one constant, however, is that we spend quite a bit of time working underwater skills for each swimmer, and I really like working on skill progressions for turns. You get a lot of return on investment making sure that swimmers get into and out of the walls quickly, and then have explosiveness off the wall. I believe this is something that needs to be done daily in order to have an impact for a high school swimmer.
