If you thought triple Olympic gold medallist Jodie Henry was a once in a lifetime Logan swimming talent, think again. Australian swimming supremo, Leigh Nugent believes future generations of potential "superfish" are in the fast lane to success through Logan City Council's 'aqualogan' program.
The Swimming Australia National Youth Coach recently toured 'aqualogan' Springwood and was highly impressed by the facility, where internationally accredited high performance coaches Dean Pugh and Tim Mulvihill have been employed to run training programs for the past five months.
"What Logan City Council has decided to do here is to support high performance swimming and that's a really unique thing in this day and age of management companies taking over council facilities and running them," Mr Nugent said.
"People come for coaching, they want to invest in a good program and try to get the most out of themselves and achieve their potential, and we're seeing that here at this centre at Logan and in a few years I think this ('aqualogan' Springwood) will be one of the high performing centres in the country.
"Swimming Australia is going to be very interested in supporting a program like this and we're more than grateful that Logan City Council is going to support its community in this way."
'aqualogan' Springwood high performance coaching director, Dean Pugh, is a Level 4 international senior coach who has coached numerous Australian teams. There are currently 60 swimmers involved in the high performance training squads, including 12 nationally qualified athletes.
Mr Nugent said the 'aqualogan' Springwood facility, which also boasts an adjoining gymnasium, was on track to become an Australian Swimming centre of excellence.
"I'll be working closely with Dean Pugh here to help him develop his program and down the track we have a national program on the drawing board where we're looking at centres of excellence," he said.
"So if we can get the support of the Australian Sports Commission for that program, this facility could achieve centre of excellence status."
Health, Sport and Community Services Chairman, Councillor Phil Pidgeon (Division 9), said the success of the swimming program was encouraging.
"Logan City Council is investing $345,734 into 'aqualogan' Springwood and what we have established there shows that we are serious about providing promising local athletes with the best possible facilities and mentoring they require," he said.
"It is a major coup for Council to have the services of Dean Pugh and his coaching team and it's a great thing for aspiring swimmers in Logan to have this fantastic pathway to the top level of swimming, right in their local area.
"Who knows, we may see more world champions like Jodie Henry emerge from Logan in the very near future."