Cycling Legend Dubnicoff Steps Down
Tanya Dubnicoff (Winnipeg, MB), one of the faces of cycling in Canada, has stepped down from her post as a national team head coach after a successful two-year stint.
Under Dubnicoff the Women’s Team Pursuit was responsible for Canada’s only cycling medal, a bronze, at the 2012 Olympic Games in London after Gillian Carleton (Victoria, BC), Tara Whitten (Edmonton, AB) and Jasmin Glaesser (Coquitlam, BC) pedaled to the podium.
Tanya Dubnicoff coached (from left to right) Jasmin Glaesser, Tara Whitten and Gillian Carleton to an Olympic bronze medal in the team pursuit in London. Photo: Jason Ransom
A three-time Olympian herself (1992, 1996, 2000), Dubnicoff’s goal was to channel all her experience to help guide her athletes down the right path in London.
“The biggest thing I learned was to be there for the athlete,” said Dubnicoff. “I wanted to be the buffer between them and everything else. It calms them down and they feel like they’re not missing anything. I wanted to reassure them that they were doing everything they need to do.”
Dubnicoff entered the coaching ranks after a long and success career as a cyclist. Besides her three appearances at Summer Games in Barcelona, Atlanta and Sydney, Dubnicoff won four gold medals at the Pan American Games, nine Canadian championships (1992-2000) as well as the 1993 world Sprint title.
Coaching was a natural transition after she decided to retire from competitive racing.
Tanya Dubnicoff had a storied cycling career that included a world title and four Pan American Games gold medals. The Canadian Press/Kevin Frayer
“It’s a challenge,” Dunicoff said about juggling different personalities on a team. “You give a lot of the reins to the athletes to guide the team. The team is its own nucleus so(the athletes) contribute to that dynamic and it’s taken care of within the group.”
Dubnicoff believes that the sport is in good hands and has a ton of potential to grow in Canada with the 2015 Pan American Games in Toronto providing new infrastructure for elite athletes to eventually train in.
“With the building of the Pan Am velodrome in Milton, Canada has the opportunity to be a gold medal country in cycling.”
– George Fadel
