The Local Weekly The heart and soul of our communities with news and information about the Sunshine Coast
This month we focus on two very special coaches, Marie Telder and Chuck Bertrand. Both of these fabulous folks have been nominated for Special Olympics provincial awards: Marie, for the Howard Carter Award and Chuck for the Grassroots Coach award.
During her six years on the Coast, Marie was Head Coach for Aquatics, Active Start and Fundamentals and Assistant Coach for Bocce. She has been involved in fundraising and a performance improvement project. She has acted as speech coach and mentor. In her coaching capacity, Marie has also attended Regional, Provincial, National and World Games.
Marie will be moving soon to Port Alberni with her new husband Jim Tolborg. We will miss her warm smile and her encouraging coaching style. It’s comforting to know that other athletes will benefit from her tutelage in the future.
Chuck Bertrand’s coaching and refereeing abilities and his unique way of being able to find any athletes’ talent has garnered him admiration on the basketball court, softball diamond and floor hockey arena. When Chuck is officiating he takes care to include all athletes in the game, allowing everyone the time and the space to shine. His fair and inclusive style encourages all our athletes to perform at their best.
Chuck is the coach for the Provincial Golf Team for Summer Games, helps develop Special Olympics golf programs and has organized regional qualifiers on the Sunshine Coast.
In addition to these two coaches, we also benefit from the unsung endeavours of countless volunteers in all aspects of SOSC. A special thank you goes to Don and Wendy Sherwood for their donation of a mobile music system to our local SO chapter. I’m sure it will be put to good use. We will be celebrating the efforts of all volunteers at an appreciation dinner on Saturday May 28 at the Gibsons Royal Canadian Legion.
Recently, in the world of softball, Coach Randy Younghusband reported that there were two exhibition games played between the Coquitlam Tigers and Sunshine Coast Ravens. Scores are not important in this friendly competition but our Ravens were happy to be preparing for the regional qualifier in PoCo in June. They gave each Tiger a Sechelt pin and enjoyed a yummy cookout prepared by parent volunteers.
Thrilling news about Rhythmic Gymnastics came from coach Grace Gardner: Teresa Presley, Amanda Boghean and Linsey Davidson travelled to Burnaby for a regional qualifier, where they performed ALL new routines masterfully. They and their coach must be proud of what they have accomplished this season.
