Ken Wood

Ken Wood (8 October 1929 – 16 June 2018) was an Australian swimmer and swimming coach and a three-time Olympic medal winner. He was the head coach at the Redcliffe Leagues Swimming Club at Redcliffe, Queensland, on the northern edge of Brisbane.

Biography Before moving into swimming coaching, he was a used car salesman and a Sydney cab driver. Wood coached at the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) from 1983 to 1985. He left the AIS to coach at the De Las Salle College at Scarborough, Brisbane. In 2001, he moved to the Redcliffe Memorial Pool.

During his coaching career, his swimmers won 85 National Championships and 152 Age Group National Championships, won a total of 61 international gold medals, broke 15 World Records, and 110 Australian Records. Liu won gold at the 2008 Beijing Olympics as well as 3 world medals in the 200m butterfly. Ye won the 200m and 400m medley at the 2012 London Olympics.

After Australia failed to win any individual gold medals in swimming at the 2012 London Olympics, Wood criticised the current swimmers, saying that they were "fat" compared to the Chinese swimmers, and criticised their "embarrassing" fixation on social media and treating the games like a "social gathering".

After the 2008 Summer Olympics, one of his students, Jessicah Schipper, left him after he sold training programs to Chinese swimmer Liu Zige, who later defeated Schipper in the 200m Butterfly and broke Schipper's world record at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Death Wood retired from coaching at the age of 87 in March 2018 and died on 16 June 2018 at the age of 88.

Notable students Leisel Jones – coached from childhood through both the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney and the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens Geoff Huegill – coached from age 12 through both the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney and the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens Jessicah Schipper – coached from childhood through both the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens and the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing Melissa Gorman – coached from early teens through both the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing and 2012 Summer Olympics in London Kylie Palmer Kate Brookes-Peterson Liu Zige Ye Shiwen