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VICTIM PROFILE Reprinted
from B.C. Masters Swimmers Newsletter.
Author: Barry
Davis
Colonel John J. McManus,
AKA Rocky, was given the very important jobs of looking after
the Northview High School Swim Team mascot and holding the
championship trophies during annual photographs. Being a full
two years younger than his classmates and quite small for his age,
he was allowed to swim in meet warm-ups, but never made the dual
meet squad until well into Grade 11 as a 14-year old. His main
task was to ensure that no opponents ever made off with Norton - the
fat blue gorilla. With this level of trust and responsibility,
his teammates knew that John was bound for greatness. For most
of the first three years, Norton was well cared for and watched
every race. One fateful day in 1971, Northview ventured to
Downsview High for a dual meet. Unbeknownst to the Northview
swimmers, Downsview had
gangs of hoodlums that roamed the school. Norton had been
placed on the diving board, as that was a good location to watch the
meet. After warm-up, the Northview Boys Team went back into
the girls’ change room (at dual meets, the visiting team always went
to the ‘opposite’ room) for a quick pep talk from the coaches.
Upon returning to the pool deck, all that could be seen was a pile
consisting of small stuffing chunks and shredded pieces of blue
fur. Witnesses described a group of “greaseballs with big
knives” who cut poor Norton from stem to stern. Norton was
replaced by a stuffed moose and John was carefully supervised by
other teammates like Roy Smith. The Moose was never left to
graze on his own lest it be made into flank
steaks.
John enrolled in the
Canadian Forces in 1972 attending Royal Military College in
Kingston, Ontario where he played Water Polo and swam in the
OUAA. RMC had a small swim team, so they had to struggle to
even put a relay together. In 1975, an RMC Medley Relay
qualified for the OUAA Finals. In that race were many
ex-Northview swimmers swimming for various universities. One
swimmer (Richard Bramwell from Guelph) came up to John and asked him
if he had a little brother about four feet tall that went to
Northview. John replied that he had no brother, and it was
him. Bramwell walked away saying that it could not possibly be
the same person that he was thinking about.
John’s most exciting
moment in the pool happened when he was the Captain of the Water
Polo team during his 4th year. As one of the only
RMC teams that had a winning record, they were getting prepared for
a game against the best University team in Canada – McMaster.
Mac’s starting lineup had 2 Olympians from the 72 Munich Games and 3
that would later play in the 76 Montreal Games. John gave the
team a motivational chat before the game, but knew deep down that
Mac had not been beaten in the OUAA for 15 years and RMC did not
stand a chance! The RMC team came out fired up, but was down
3-0 before the first quarter was 2 minutes old. Then, a Mac
player (more than likely one of the hoodlums that cut poor Norton)
viciously kicked one of the RMC players in the head and was kicked
out for brutality. Mac was forced to play the rest of the game
a man short, and RMC ended up winning 9-7.
John graduated from RMC
in 1976 from Mechanical Engineering and then completed Air Navigator
Training in Winnipeg. After getting his wings, he was posted
to 443 Squadron in Shearwater Nova Scotia for the first of his Sea
King flying tours. After his operational tour flying from Navy
ships, he became an instructor on the Sea King training
squadron. During this period, he played on the Nova Scotia
Provincial Water Polo team and competed in a series of Canadian
Championships.
In 1985, John attended
the US Navy Postgraduate School in Monterey, California to study
Oceanography. The only organized Water Polo in the Monterey
Peninsula was at the local Junior College called MPC. Upon
arrival in Monterey, he went over to see the coach, and was told
that the only way he could participate with the team was to be a
student at MPC. The coach added that he only needed to sign up
for one course and could take Water Polo from the Phys Ed
department………..so in keeping with creative and sound recruitment
procedures, John became a member. Water Polo ‘class’ was run
concurrently with the team practice! He competed in weekly
tournaments with other college teams in Central California like
Chico, UOP, Fresno and Davis and attending cross-dressing Halloween
parties. We do not have time to discuss such items here so you
will have to ask John.
After Monterey, John
flew two more Sea King tours and then set his sights on space.
In 1992, John applied to be part of future Space Shuttle and Space
Station missions along with 5300 other applicants. He made it
into the ‘Final 20’ and participated in the final selection process
that was conducted by the Canadian Space Agency.
John was selected as the
1997 Canadian Exchange Officer to attend Royal Australian Air Force
Staff College in Canberra, Australia. Soon after arriving in
Oz on a hot summer December day, he took his kids for a swim in the
Tuggeranong Pool complex. While his kids were splashing in the
kiddy pool, John saw a group of ‘old guys’ putting on hats and
getting nets ready for a game. John wandered over and asked
“how a guy would go about joining their group”. The guy, who
seemed to be the leader, asked John if he had every played the game
before. John started to give a quick Water Polo resume when
the guy stopped him and said “Mate, you are # 9, you are the newest
‘Over-40’ member of the Tuggeranong Vikings and by the look of you,
you better get ready to swim for the ball”
After Australia, John
was posted to the Air Force Operational Headquarters in
Winnipeg. There, he took up Masters Swimming with MMAC.
He was fortunate to arrive at the right time when the 160-199 relay
teams that needed someone at least 46 years old and able to do a
sub-29 50 Free. At the 2000 Nationals, the 3 fish and John
lost a Judges Decision (from a former Downsview high school dropout)
in the 200 Free Relay (even though they had a lower time), but then
won the Medley Relay in a time that was the 8th fastest
in the world during that year.
In July of 2000, John
moved to Victoria to take command of 443 Maritime Helicopter
Squadron – still flying Sea Kings after all these years. Since
arriving in BC, he has been a member of the Navy Masters Swim Team
and is also active with BC Summer Swimming looking after the
coaching committee for the Sidney Piranhas. It was recently
announced that he has been selected as the 2004 Navy Male Athlete of
the year based on his performance in the 50-54 Age Group in Masters
Swimming. We are proud of John for sure, but the author
suggests you not let him near any mascots.
John McManus with high school
team
How does an Air Force Colonel, Air Navigator, go from being
“Keeper of the Gorilla Mascot” for his high school swim team to -
Canadian Forces Navy Athlete of the Year at the age of
50?
With a whole lot of
focus, training, dedication, and skill, just to name a few
things.
10973
Colonel JJ McManus (RMC ’76) (aka Rocky in his RMC days) is not your
every day 50-year Canadian Forces officer. When we were
checking around trying to fill in a few blanks for our RMC Flashback
article, it was not difficult to receive feedback. The
following were just some of the typical comments we
received:
-
John is arguably the
most dedicated swimmer on the CFB Swim Team. He swims
every morning for an hour and a half, between 0600-0730
hrs.
-
He's a team player and
is always very helpful and encouraging to new Club
swimmers.
-
John maintains an
extremely high fitness level and leads by example 24/7 - whether
it's Unit sports; EXPRES; on the job; and / or in his personal
life.
John
McManus and Navy teammate Michael Basanta discuss strategy before
the 50 Free.
He never hesitates to
volunteer his services for the good of the team. The “Colonel”
for example takes on the responsibility of maintaining the team's
website. Check it out. http://www.navymasters.com/
John asked the coaching
staff to post workouts as a link for the benefit of all military
personnel that were deployed which has been greatly appreciated, in
particular, by the “sailors at sea” which is confirmed by the many
e-mails of thanks received by the coaches.
Classmates, friends who
have known “Rocky” over the years knew he is a pretty special guy
and very professional about every thing he does and is very
passionate about aquatic sports. This passion has earned him a
great deal of personal satisfaction over the past few years:
He has broken numerous
BC Masters Swimming Records (both individual and
relay);
In 2004, John had by far
his best season. About 50% of his swimming events were
personal best times. At the age of 50, this is remarkable
especially that he has used swimming for fitness training and
competed in swim meets for almost his whole life;
The most recent
highlight and most rewarding had to be when John broke his first
ever Canadian Masters swimming record (+50 males) in the 1,500m swim
during the 2004 Canadian Masters Swimming Championships in
Edmonton. He topped this off by also playing a vital role in a
new Canadian record in a Navy relay record in the 4x200m freestyle
event.
At the end of 2004, all
Masters Swimmers that compete throughout Canada are recorded and
ranked based on their swim times. The results are then posted
on the Masters Swimming Canada website (under results and
records).
http://www3.sympatico.ca/chberger/ca04/cmc04m2g.htm
http://www3.sympatico.ca/pascale.piaczinski/rec/rmc04m7g.htm
John ranked # 1 in
Canada and this top ranking has never been matched by and other
CISM Swimmer.
Colonel
JJ (Rocky) McManus has proven that a person can perform at their
best at the age of 50 and still be considered an "elite"
swimmer. No wonder the Navy had no trouble in recognizing the
COMMANDER OF THE MARITIME AIR COMPONENT PACIFIC as their Athlete of
the Year.
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Colonel JJ (“Rocky”)
McManus (RMC’76) Recalls His Swimming Days….And Coach Captain Ken
MacDonald
From 1972 to 1976,
Captain Ken ‘Coach’ MacDonald was the RMC Water Polo and Swimming
Coach. He was an experienced age group swimming coach and in
addition to coaching at RMC, he looked after the Base Kingston
Aquatic Club. In mid-August 72, he made a presentation to the
newly-arrived recruits about the RMC Water Polo team. He
mentioned that the practices would take place every afternoon and
that cadets trying out for
the team would go to the pool instead of participating in the daily
recruit sports. As the days were very hot in August, the
thought of spending time in the pool was very attractive to some of us.
About a dozen recruits were trying out for the team, and along with
the returning RMC players and the 3rd years transferring
from CMR and RRMC, we were told that there were probably going to be
about four positions available for the new
recruits.
Being a competitive
swimmer, I enjoyed swimming lengths, but when the yellow balls got
thrown into the pool, I found it extremely humbling trying to pick
them up. Most of the other recruits had played Water Polo in
High School or for a Club, and knew how to handle the ball and
shoot. I had never picked up a Water Polo ball in my life, and
had no idea how to catch and pass it with one hand! We
recruits worked out for about two weeks, and when all the other
cadets returned after Labour Day, we had about 20 players competing
for the 13 positions. I recall thinking that things did not
look good for me, especially after I saw the many 3rd
years that had played at the other colleges. But, I figured
that at least I would be in much better swimming shape for the Swim
Team just by getting to swim every day for a month.
In about mid-September,
‘Coach’ made his decisions. Some of those players with
previous collegiate experience were not selected, and four recruits
made the 13-man team. One of them on the list was me, and I
remember talking to Ken about this. I expressed my thanks, as
well as my surprise about getting selected. He told me that he
was building for the future, and he wanted a solid base of
1st Years on the team. He told me that he knew that
I had no experience handling the ball, but that I was a solid
swimmer. He figured that it was easier to teach a swimmer how
to handle the ball than to teach a good shooter and ball handler how
to swim.
One of the best things
about being on an Intercollegiate Team during Recruit Camp was
getting to personally know the 2nd, 3rd, and
4th years, and realize that they were friendly, human,
and not out to make all recruits lives difficult. Also, Ken
was there every day to listen to our military problems and guide
us. In my 1st year, we played in the QUAA.
That meant that we were off to Montreal or Quebec City almost every
weekend during the fall. We got to wear 6s, drink Molson
Brador beer, and play multiple Water Polo games. In the close
games, the novice players were relegated to the bench but were good
cheerleaders! I recall the first game that I got in was
against CMR at their tournament. We were ahead about 9-0, and
the coach wanted to rest the starters. He looked down the
bench and called for ‘Ernie’ Chance, Gabor Vajay and me. In we
went, and we all scored a couple of goals. The final score was
RMC 18 CMR 0. We learned later that night that humiliating CMR
like that when you were staying in quarters there was not a good
idea.
In the three years that
followed, all of us on the Water Polo Team had a wonderful time and
we were fortunate to have continuity in coaching from Ken. In
1973, RMC switched to the OUAA, and we ended up experiencing a much
higher level of competition. There were five teams in the OUAA
East and five in the West. In 1974, we ended up 2nd
in the East. I’m not sure, but I think that we were the first
RMC Team to make it to the OUAA playoffs after RMC switched from the
QUAA to the OUAA. We met McMaster, who was 1st in
the East, in a sudden death playoff. They showed no mercy to
us, and I think that they beat us 17-1. We knew how CMR felt
two years before.
Editor’s
Note: Following
graduation in 1976, Coach Captain Ken MacDonald with a few of his
contacts in the PERO world made arrangements for young Lt “Rocky”
McManus to be seconded to C.O.J.O (the Canadian Olympic
Organization) during the entire ’76 Montreal games. Quite a coup,
for Rocky! Especially, knowing that the majority of his
“anglo” classmates were posted to St Jean for French language
training.
Coach Ken Macdonald
during his Canadian Championship gymnastic days and prior to his
arrival at RMC.
SWIMMING AND
WATERPOLO AT RMC 1971-75
By Coach Ken
MacDonald
74 WATER POLO TEAM
Back L-R: Cliff
Watt; Eric Thomas; Gabor Vajay; Andy German; BGen Turner; Pete
Prediger; John McManus; Graham Rodgman; Ken MacDonald
Water
L-R: Rick Charland; John Cutbill; Chris Chance; John Linscott; Mike
Hache; Dave Read; Bruce Lazenby.
Coaching any
sport is a challenging endeavour at the best of times, but it is
made even more so when one has never played the sport. That was my
situation when tasked (notice I said tasked not asked) to coach the
RMC Water Polo Team. I did have a good background as a competitor
and coach in competitive swimming and diving, so the "powers that
be" felt that was close enough. Thus, I became the swimming and
water polo coach over the period 1971-75. During this period we had
more disappointments than successes, but the successes were
sweet ones and the cadets were superb people and a joy to be with.
They were like sponges and tried to sop all the information and skills I could give them. In swimming we were all fortunate in
that many of the cadets had some age group swimming background and I
had coached the sport for several years. Competitive swimming is
an individual sport where only in relays does the team concept
arise, so the experiences are very different than in water polo.
During my tenure, we had several excellent swimmers who excelled and
progressed to Provincial and National Championships. Rick Douglas
and Dave Read immediately come to mind. As a swimming team we
did well in the regional and QUAA events, but did better as a water
polo team.
The water polo team was essentially the same
cadets, but with a different outlook, because we were a bonefide
TEAM and always did very well in invitational and QUAA events. While
some of the cadets had some high school exposure in the sport, we
were short on experience and comparative skill level compared to our
adversaries and their larger base of students; but we were never
embarrassed and always tried to improve. For example, after being
easily handled once by the very highly ranked McMaster squad, we
invited them to RMC one weekend to show us some of the tricks of
the sport, legal and otherwise. As I said earlier "sponges," pillbox
adorned "sponges!!" Not too long after that mini clinic, we went to
a tournament in Hamilton and much to everyone's surprise (including
ours); we defeated the vaunted McMaster team. Yahoo! They were
livid, while we were very humble in our "once in a lifetime"
victory. We had a similar experience with another large university
with a great water polo team - the Toronto Blues. I must take full
credit for this major victory, because I was rushed to hospital with
an allergy attack just prior to the game and while I was away,
the team laid a licking on Toronto. I take credit for the victory
because I felt the team was better off without me and so they dug
REAL deep to prove that point. Thereafter we tried to find some
reason for me to be absent during each game, but the Athletic
Director, Dudley Hill would not allow this to happen. We used to
have a lot fun at the Queens vs. RMC night each year because water
polo was one of the several events contested. Our win/loss ratio was
pretty even over the years, but one particular time, the Queen's
coach and team members had been scouting our team and were
planning to zero in on Dave Read because he was our speedster and a
great player. They planned to put their best player on him in an
attempt to neutralize his effectiveness. We had other plans. Since
they only knew Dave by his hat number and the fact he had a
moustache, we changed Dave's hat and number with Graham Rodgeman's
because Graham also had a similar moustache and a similar swim stroke
to Dave. Now Graham was a good player, but it was really
hilarious as he led the poor Queen's player everywhere in the pool
except where the ball was, leaving Dave and the remainder of the
team to swim with relative ease anywhere they wanted. We won the
game and Simon Beitler, their coach, didn't catch on until we told
him after the game. We feel Graham won that game for us and we
were very proud of his great performance.
We were not one of
the glory teams, but we worked and trained as hard or harder and
were a credit to the College. At the end of each game the players
looked like they had been in a catfight. The players all had to wear
two bathing suits because one would invariably get torn off. In
fact, Rick Douglas had his bathing suit completely torn off and on
the bottom of the Queens pool during one of our "friendly" games
mentioned above. The game had to be stopped so we could get him
another suit. We had many notables on the team over the years; Chris
Peachment was by far the best goalie in the conference and his
replacement Gabor Vajay was a fine goalie as well, his only problem
was that he loved to score goals and would take off down the pool
with the ball and leave our net empty. He kept us all on our toes.
Rick Charland had one of the hardest shots in the conference and was
always on the net.... but, at least one or two feet over the
top, his nickname was "convert." John Cutbill was a terror in the
pivot position with his backhand shot and Rick Douglas, Dave Read
and Andy German were very strong swimmers and goal scorers. I can't
remember all of the players, but Graham Rodgman, Bruce Lazenby, Pete
Prediger and John McManus stood out as stalwarts who always worked
hard and put excellent effort into each game. And who could forget
our Faculty Representative Cliff "splendid" Watt? Unfortunately we never had all of these guys on the same team! I won't get into
the big Mac eating contests or some of the other escapades we had,
but will end with the fact that several of the cadets including
Dave Read and John McManus kept swimming and have been very
successful in the local, regional and national masters swimming
programmes. I may or may not have contributed to their carry-over
successes, but I do know that coaching and being with all of those
fine people was one of the most rewarding times in my career.
What is Coach Ken
MacDonald doing these days?
Click below to find
out.
http://theperiscope.ca/MacDonaldKenGio.htm |
