Gus Marker Trophy

On Friday, Kiwanis Club of Kingston will hold its annual sport banquet and awards ceremony at the Ambassador Conference Resort. This year marks the 31st anniversary of  the Kiwanis Sports Banquet that recognizes amateur athletes and teams in the Kingston area and district. Every year the banquet honors individuals, builders and teams and awards the prestigious Gus Marker Trophy to Kingston’s Amateur Athlete of the Year.

Gus Marker, last surviving member of the Montreal Maroons 1935 Stanley Cup championship team, was a long time Kiwanis member. He played ten seasons in the National Hockey League for the Detroit Red Wings, Montreal Maroons, Toronto Maple Leafs and Brooklyn Americans and after retiring to the Kingston area was an enthusiastic booster of amateur sport in the region.

Past winners of the Gus Marker Trophy have included boxer Mark Leduc (1992), hockey players Alyn McCauley (1996) and Jayna Hefford (1997), golfer Matt McQuillan (1999), and triathlete Simon Whitfield (2000).

This year nine finalists are in the running for the Gus Marker Trophy including Max Caron (football), Scott Harrington (hockey), Kerr Hutchinson (fencing), 2011 winner Augusta James (golf), Tyler Osborne (squash), Stephanie Rychlo (dance), Tyler Santoni (volleyball), and Alex Wright (BMX) and I was extremely humbled to be included as a finalist.

This year’s banquet will also honour two builders and three teams. Builders include longtime Church Athletic League coach Ken Ohtake and Sydenham Golden Eagles track and field/soccer coach Leslie Lawlor. Teams include the National Capital Bowl champion Frontenac Falcons football team, the Canadian Interuniversity Sport champion Queen’s Golden Gaels women’s soccer team and the Ontario Federation of Sport Athletic Associations champion Holy Cross Crusaders midget boys cross-country team.

If you are planning to be in the Kingston Area and are interested in attending the banquet, you call 544-1221 or 549-2020 for more information or tickets.

Coolest Thing Ever

This past summer, 19 year old Christopher Perkins stunned the World out dueling  a quartet of experienced and heavily favored veterans in the compound bow division at Turin, Italy to become Archery’s Senior World Champion.

Chris accomplished something not many people ever do and all the while he has remained quiet and humble, so his hometown is going to do the bragging for him. Athens, Ontario is honoring him with his very own street signs, how cool is that!

Read the entire World Archery article.

Congratulations Chris, believe me, no one deserves the recognition more.

My Coach Honoured

This past weekend was the Petro-Canada Sport Leadership Awards Gala, hosted by the Coaching Association of Canada (CAC), at The Fairmont Royal York hotel in Toronto. My coach, Kathy Millar of South Nation Archery was honoured as one of Canada’s top coaches and sport administrators for her coaching efforts with World Champion Archer Christopher Perkins.

The prestigious Petro-Canada Coaching Excellence Awards recognize coaches whose athletes have excelled at World Championships, Olympic and Paralympic Games and the Special Olympics World Games.

“Petro-Canada has supported the recognition of Canada’s coaches for 11 years and has recognized over 200 of Canada’s best. This year, as in years past, there is an incredible list of talented coaches that we are very proud to celebrate,” said Steven Keith, Director, Loyalty and Marketing Partnerships, Petro-Canada, a Suncor Energy business.

“The Government of Canada is pleased to support the Coaching Association of Canada and the 2011 Petro-Canada Sport Leadership sportif Conference as we recognize the critical role that sport leaders and coaches play in the development of athletes and sport inCanada,” said the Honourable Bal Gosal, Minister of State (Sport). “I commend their commitment to Canadian amateur sport and to achieving sport excellence.”

“Each one of these coaches exemplifies what the Coaching Association of Canada stands for,” stated John Bales, Chief Executive Officer for the CAC. “They are dedicated individuals that push themselves harder and harder each day by planning, researching, and actively listening so that they can be better for their athletes. We are truly proud of these award winners.”

The excerpt above is from Coach.ca.

Ms. Millar is the personal coach of Christopher Perkins (Athens, ON), who won the gold medal in the Men’s Compound Bow category at this year’s World Archery Championship.  At 19 and still a junior age athlete, Perkins was competing in his first-ever Senior World Championship. Using the momentum of his gold medal performance, Perkins and his two teammates captured the bronze medal in the Compound Bow Team event.

Ms. Millar has been personal coach to Perkins for the past five years. She is also the founder and Head Coach of the South Nation Archery Club in Winchester, Ontario.  Millar has been instrumental in the development of Perkins as an archer from the ‘Train to Shoot’ stage of Archery Canada’s Long-Term Archer Development (LTAD) model through to the ‘Shoot to Excel’ stage. “Kathleen’s confidence in my abilities and her keen attention to the coaching of the technical and psychological aspects of archery, have led to my steady progress and success at the national and international levels”, said Perkins.  “I have no doubt that without Kathleen’s coaching and guidance, I wouldn’t have won the gold. I’m also sure that under Kathleen’s continued coaching, I’m on the path to a long and successful career as a high performance archer.”

“I’m thrilled and honoured to have won this prestigious award. Christopher is a tremendous young man and athlete with lots of potential”, said Millar.  “My sincere thanks and appreciation to those that nominated me, the CAC and Petro-Canada.”

The excerpt above is from Archery Canada.

Kathy Millar truly exemplifies what it means to be a true top coach and in my opinion, no one I know deserves the recognition more. Congratulations!

Importance of Recognition

Recently my archery club, South Nation Archery Supply, hosted our annual awards ceremony; it is a chance to reflect on achievements of the club and present awards to all the hard working individuals of the club. It is awesome, we have a large potluck dinner (the food was amazing) and Kathy and Larry present medals, certificates, pins and flowers to everyone that earned them throughout the indoor season.

Our club also presents certificates of participation for those archers that left their personal comfort zone to try a provincial, national or even international tournament.  For the first time, I had the pleasure to be a guest presenter for the participation certificates at the national level. It was a real honour to be introduced as a role model for younger archers and extremely flattering.

“Recognition is the greatest motivator.” Gerard C. Eakedale

Recognition is one of the most powerful psychological tools. Badges, medals and trophies are achieved through hours, weeks, months and sometimes years of hard work. It is importance to recognize these achievements, especially with young beginner archers. It encourages archers to spread their wings and leaves their comfort zone.

To assist junior archers growth, Archery Canada introduced the badge system called Canbow. The Canbow system is a badge level system used to measure an archers’ growth through various stages of development including…

• Level 1: Basic Form and Safety (4 badge progressions)
• Level 2: Competency and Basic Equipment Knowledge (4 badge progressions)
• Level 3: Increased Skill and Physiology (5 badge progressions)
• Level 4: National Skill Level and Tournament Preparation (13 badge progressions)

This is a great system for archers to measure their development, especially for those junior archers who are just beginning and do not compete for medals in their club, provincially, nationally or internationally.

“I learned the value of hard work by working hard. “   Margaret M. Fitzpatrick

If your club is interested in implementing the Canbow system for your junior archers, checkout archery Canada’s website.