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We are here to support your
needs. If your questions are related to workouts, meets, events,
goal setting, and other swimming related needs, please contact one
of the coaches. For all questions related to administrative, such
as dues, safety, or policy issues, please contact our
business manager, Scott Campbell at 750-1183
or by e-mail novabusinessoffice@comcast.net
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 Geoff BrownHead Coach, Senior Gold, Novice GoldEmail
 Geoff has brought excellence to his swimmers and
to the programs with which he has been associated. At each level of
competitive swimming, his teams and swimmers have been winners.
Beginning at the Tuckahoe YMCA in 1976, he turned lightweight
summer league programs into powerhouses, culminating in a lengthy
unbeaten streak at Raintree Swim and Racquet Club. At NOVA, that
pattern continues— state champions and championships, Senior
and Junior National qualifiers, Senior and Junior National
champions, Olympic Trials qualifiers. Geoff has been named
Virginia Senior Coach of Year numerous times in his career and has
twice been named NCSA Coach of the Year.
Though responsible for the overall guidance of the club, Geoff
directly supervises the Novice Gold and Senior Gold groups.
Geoff has watched a small age group program at the University of
Richmond grow from a clinic into what is now NOVA. Geoff also helps
oversee the SwimNOVA lessons program and is an occasional
instructor in that program.
Geoff graduated from the College of William
and Mary in 1977 and received his Master’s from University of
Virginia in 1979. His undergraduate degree is in biology while his
graduate degree is in English language and Literature. Geoff
received permission to proceed on his doctorate, but opted to turn
to coaching, his first love. He is married to the former Lisa
Johnson (uniting two of the world's more successful families
- Johnsons and Browns) and they have five children
and stepchildren: three boys, Gaites, Andy and Gavin
and two girls, Alaina and Emily.
 David SchreckAge group Dev. Silver, Age Group GoldEmail
 A
Richmond-area native, David graduated from Virginia Commonwealth
University with a degree in Health and Physical education. While in
college, he was both a swimmer and diver.
Previously a health and physical
education teacher at St Michael’s School, David joined NOVA
in 1998 on a part time basis while working with the Collegiate
School swim team and took over the Age group program fulltime in
1999. Having coached U.S. swimming since 1986, he has more than 20
years experience. David has coached numerous summer league and US
teams in the Richmond area producing many State champions, State
record holders, National top 16 swimmers and several National Age
group record breaking swimmers and relay teams. David has
also been recognized by his peers being voted the Age Group Coach
of the Year 5 consecutive years (2001 - 2006)
He and his wife
Jennifer, have two sons and a daughter, Quinn, Xander and
Hayley.
 Brent St. PierreSenior Silver, Novice GoldEmail
Brent will joined this season. He has spent the past 10
years leading CCA to a series of impressive team and individual
performances. Brent began his coaching career at his alma
mater, East Carolina, serving as assistant coach from 1994-1997.
Some career highlights include:
- 2005 Virginia
Swimming Senior Coach of the Year
- 2004 Virginia High School Coach of the Year
for Independent Schools
- Conference Champions at ECU
1994-1997
Brent and his wife of seven years,
Babette, have three children, Christopher, Andrew, and Maddie.
Brent will be working with our Senior level and Age Group
swimmers.
 Diane CayceSenior Dev. Gold PM, Senior Dev. SilverEmail
Diane Cayce comes to us from Typhoon Aquatics
and her resume is loaded with superlatives. A James Madison
graduate (Health and PE), she has been honored as Virginia’s
Age Group Coach of the Year on multiple occasions. She is a little
vague and a lot modest when it comes to enumerating her honors, but
she has coached over 100 swimmers to National Top 16 honors and has
been the Age Group Coach for three Olympians, the latest of whom is
Katie Hoff (of North Baltimore, 2004 Olympian in 200 & 400 IM).
Several of her swimmers have set National Age Group records. Before
her most recent stint at Typhoon, she coached in the Richmond area,
first at VACS, later at Poseidon.
 Drew HirthAge Group Silver, Age Group Dev. GoldEmail
Drew joined our full-time staff in Fall
2006 and quickly worked his way to being placed in charge of Age
Group Silver. Drew also works extensively with Novice Gold,
Age Group Development Gold and Age Group Gold. Drew directs
the Swim-A-thon and is Mark’s right hand man in keeping the
facility in order. Like Leigh, Drew was a NOVA swimmer as an
age grouper and Senior swimmer. He attended Virginia Tech on
a swimming scholarship.
 Leigh Robbins PetersonSenior Dev. Gold AMEmail
Leigh joined the NOVA coaching staff in September of 2000 but she
is by no means a new comer to the team. Leigh was a NOVA swimmer
and team captain for over 10 years. Her coaching experience spans
all levels, Novice through Senior, developing numerous State
Champions and nationally ranked swimmers over the last ten
years. As a resident of Virginia Beach, Leigh served as the
Head Age Group Coach of the TIDE Swim Team for five years and
helped develop that program into one of the top age group programs
in Virginia. In May of 2000 Leigh was honored as Age Group Coach of
the Year for Virginia Swimming. And in May of 2005, Leigh was
honored, along with coach Geoff, as Senior coach of the year in the
State of Virginia. Leigh Currently works with the Age Group
Development Gold and Senior Development Gold AM.
Leigh was recently married to Terren
Peterson. They have two beautiful daughters Kaya and
Sanna.
 Mark KutzMasters, Senior AssistantEmail
Mark
Kutz has been with NOVA for 5 years. His first couple were somewhat
behind the scenes, tweaking and maintaining our pool operations.
Along with his coaching duties Mark is now our fulltime director of
pool operations. Mark has coached most recently at the Richmond
Racers and he too brings a wealth of experience to NOVA. Mark
graduated from VCU with a degree in Health and PE and was captain
of the swim team his Junior and Senior years. His coaching pedigree
is extensive: the CAC Rams (a precursor to the current NOVA team),
VACS, BRAC (precursor to the PSDN club), Poseidon and the Richmond
Racers. He was head age group coach with the CAC Rams, BRAC and
Poseidon. He was also head coach of BRAC for one season and guided
their senior team to a tremendous, achievement filled year.
He and his wife, Valerie, have two children, Amanda and
Ian.
 Michael McKeeNovice, Dev. Silver, AG PrepEmail
 Mike came to our program for the first
time in 2008 highly recommended and experienced with many of the
local swimmers. He is a graduate of Virginia
Tech. Mike started swimming competitively for Woodmont
at the age of 8. When he was 14 he took his swimming career to the
next level by joining Poseidon. After that, Mike’s talent and
love for swimming increased exponentially. In his last 5 seasons at
Woodmont, he was a triple-winner in all but one meet where he
placed second in a relay. He earned many JRAC Championship medals
and broke almost all of the pool records. While with
Poseidon, he earned a national top-16 time that placed
3rd in the nation. During his 6
years coaching Woodmont, he led the team to 3 division
titles and two sportsmanship awards. He also coached the
Country Club of Virginia to a 2nd place finish in the
2006 JRAC Championship meet.
He will be working with our NOVICE Silver and Gold swimmers. He is
also the lead coach for Age group Prep.
 Lisa BrownNovice Silver and Lessons CoordinatorEmail
 Lisa first
joined NOVA in 2001, beginning as a lessons instructor. Her
enthusiasm and skill resulted in her being named head of the
SwimNOVA lessons program in 2002. She assumed full
responsibility for the administration of the lessons program,
handling both the registration and processing of all lessons pupils
and supervising of the instructional staff. The rapid growth
of the program resulted in the splitting of this role into two
separate jobs. Today, Lisa continues to direct the
instructional staff while Lori Hopewell has assumed the
administrative details.
Lisa is also the primary Novice Silver
coach and is responsible for knitting the lessons program together
to the competitive team. If you are a dot connector, go back
to Head Coach Geoff's bio blurb for additional family
details.
 Kelly BrinsonClinics and Novice Silver CoachEmail
Kelly works with our afternoon Novice Silver
groups and brings the same enthusiasm she offers to her classes at
Nuckols Farm Elementary. In the summer, Kelly coaches at the
Avalon Recreation Association. She has been with NOVA several
years. Kelly also lends her expertise to some of our Sunday
Clinics.
 Yelena ReshchikovaNovice Bronze & Silver, Pre-Team LessonsEmail
 Yelena has been a mainstay
of the SwimNOVA program, teaching the Advanced beginner, pre-team
and Novice Bronze sections of our program. She may also be
seen on deck assisting various other groups throughout the season.
A native of St. Petersburg, Russia she skated swiftly across a
frozen Lake Ladoga, building momentum for her leap to the United
States. We at NOVA have benefited greatly from her innovative and
enthusiastic teaching.
 MC Catherine ThomasAGD Gold, AGS coachEmail
 It is our
pleasure to announce the exciting hire of a new full-time
coach for your children and NOVA. Her name is MC Thomas and
she will be joining us in the fall. I speak for the coaching
staff when I say that we are very excited to add MC to our staff.
She brings experience, enthusiasm and youth to our already superb
coaching staff. As all NOVA coaches do, MC will be working with a
variety of groups throughout the program.
Coach MC Thomas has strong roots in Virginia Swimming so she
is familiar with NOVA and even quite familiar with some of your
children through her work with the VirginiaZones teams. Most
recently, MC served as the Head Age Group Coach at SMAC Swimming in
Waynesboro, VA. During her tenure there, MC qualified
multiple athletes for the Virginia Swimming Zone Team, and led the
way in rebuilding and restructuring the age group program.
She was also instrumental in the development and planning of the
senior group which turned out 8 Virginia Swimming championships, 8
short-course YMCA National qualifiers, and multiple National Age
Group Top 16 rankings.
Prior to her stint at SMAC, MC was the head coach at
Central Virginia Aquatics (CVA) in Charlottesville. While
there, her men's team was named Virginia Swimming's Short Course
small team champions twice, and the Long Course Short Course small
team champions once. MC coached multiple Junior National
and US Open Qualifiers, as well as placing athletes in the National
Age Group Top 16. Her graduating swimmers went on
to swim at Purdue, Ohio State, Army, Radford, and
George Mason.
In 2007, MC was selected to represent Virginia Swimming
as the 9-10 girls zone team coach (where she coached 4 girls who
are now 13-14 NOVA swimmers!). Prior to her time in Charlottesville,
Coach Thomas was the Head Age Group coach at SWAT in Blacksburg, VA for 3 years. She also
has extensive summer league coaching experience in both the
Charlottesville and Blacksburg areas, and in her hometown of
Baltimore, MD.
MC is a graduate of Virginia Tech, where she played varsity
lacrosse, and interned as a
strength and conditioning coach.
You'll have to ask her yourself what MC is short for. I
know you will join me in making warm MC's welcome to NOVA
this September.
Jim O'BrienPresidentEmail Dwight HopewellSecretaryEmail David MartinBoard memberEmail Anne MaddenBoard memberEmail Bridget CuthbertBoard memberEmail
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