Schubert, O’Brien Take Florida Club Job

Seldom, if ever, has a community gained worldwide recognition solely because of its sports programs the way Mission Viejo has come to be synonymous with swimming and diving excellence.

Step up to the registration counter at a Toronto hotel, list your hometown as Mission Viejo, and you’re not the least bit surprised when the clerk says, “Oh yes, that’s where all those Olympic swimmers and divers live, isn’t it?”

It appears, however, that no one will tire of the announcers repeating those two words at world-class aquatic events anymore. Monday, the two coaches who turned the Mission Viejo Nadadores swimming and diving teams into the most successful clubs in history accepted similar positions at the Mission Bay Training Center in Boca Raton, Fla.

Mark Schubert, who had been swim coach at Mission Viejo since the team’s inception in 1972, and Ron O’Brien, the Nadadores’ diving coach for seven years, were introduced at a news conference as head coaches of the new Mission Bay Maykos program by James Brady, president of Mission Bay Development Co.

Schubert served on the 1980 and ’84 Olympic coaching staff and was named national team coach four times. He was voted Coach of the Year by the American Swimming Coaches Assn. three times and his swimmers have won 19 Olympic medals. The Nadadores became the winningest club ever this year when they won their 44th national team title. Schubert’s top Nadadores assistant, Larry Liebowitz, preceded him to Boca Raton.

O’Brien is a five-time Olympic coach and six-time U.S. Diving Coach of the Year whose divers have won six Olympic medals and 77 individual national titles. The Mission Viejo diving team is undefeated since 1979 and has won 35 national team titles.

“The credentials of Mark and Ron establish Mission Bay as a facility second to none, and as the new home for Olympic contenders,” Brady said at the news conference.

The question now, of course, is how many of the world-class athletes who made Mission Viejo the Mecca of the aquatic world will migrate south to Brady’s “new home” with their mentors.

Tiffany Cohen, who has trained with Schubert for five years since she was 13, won Olympic gold medals in both the 400- and 800-meter freestyles last summer.

“It’s sad to see him leave, but I understand it was a great offer,” said Cohen, who lives with her mother in Mission Viejo and attends the University of Texas. “He set the record for most national championships here and I guess it was time for him to get a new challenge.

“Knowing Mark, he’ll probably set a new one down there.”

Cohen said she has yet to determine where she will train next summer.

“I doubt it will be here . . . well, I don’t want to say that, it’s too early,” she said. “I could stay at Texas and train with Richard (Quick) or I could go to Florida or come back home . . . I’m just not sure yet.”

Olympic silver medalist Amy White, who had not heard Schubert was leaving until contacted Monday at a relative’s home in Massachusetts, sounded on the verge of tears.

“I’m in shock,” said White, a senior at Irvine’s University High School. “I can’t believe it. Two days before nationals (last month) Mark told us we shouldn’t worry about the rumors until we saw a “for sale” sign in front of his house.

“I think it will be possible for us to remain a top team, but I’m sure a lot of people won’t be swimming for us.”

Many of Schubert’s best swimmers--including Olympic gold medalist Mike O’Brien, college competitors Tami Bruce, Channon Hermstad, Vic Riggs and Dan Burger and rising stars Kim Brown and Dan Jorgensen--are in Japan competing in either the Pan Pacific Games and/or the World University Games.

Schubert says he knows of only one swimmer, Susan Johnson, the national 200-meter breaststroke champion, who has already decided to move to Florida, but a number of the Nadadores live in Mission Viejo with host families (Johnson is one) and it would seem logical that they would follow the man they left home for in the first place.

Others, like Cohen and O’Brien, are in college and have only to decide where to spend the summer. Still others, like Brown, Jorgensen and White reside with their parents in southern Orange County.

“Sure, some kids will come,” Schubert said in a phone interview Monday. “You build up a rapport over the years and I guess it’s pretty natural they’d want to follow. A lot have shown an interest, but it wouldn’t be fair for me to name names because no one has had a chance to decide yet.

“My feeling is that the majority of the host kids will come and most of the locals will stay. I’ll do everything I can to help the ones who want to come, but some just won’t be able to and I understand that. We’ll always be friends, anyway.”

Schubert isn’t expecting a mass exodus and he believes Mission Viejo will remain a powerful swim team.

“I think the program will continue to be one of the best in the country,” he said. “There’s too much parental enthusiasm and community and corporate support to have the program whither away just because the coach leaves.”

That remains to be seen, but it appears the Nadadore diving program will be virtually decimated. O’Brien says he isn’t sure just which of his divers will be leaving Mission Viejo, but a reliable source indicated that double gold-medalist Greg Louganis, silver-medalist Michele Mitchell, bronze-medalist Wendy Wyland and national age-group champion Wendy Williams will join O’Brien in Florida.

O’Brien’s No. 1 aide, Jeff Shaffer, has already agreed to direct the Maykos’ age-group program.

“Greg is going to stay based in California,” said O’Brien, also reached by phone in Florida. “He just bought a house in Malibu, but he may train down here. And, yes, Michele and Wendy (Williams) indicated a desire to move down here.”

The Mission Viejo Co. announced Monday that Terry Stoddard, the boys and girls swimming coach at Capistrano Valley High School, would be the interim Nadadores swim coach. Dave Burgering, a member of the 1980 U.S. Olympic team who trained under O’Brien until retiring this year, was named the interim diving coach.

A spokesman for the Mission Viejo Co. said the intent was to “preserve the continuity of the swimming and diving programs.” More than 400 swimmers, 247 of whom are 12 and under, train under the tutelage of 10 full-time coaches at Mission Viejo. The diving program includes 45 divers in all age groups.

In the final analysis, it was the prospects of working in the country’s finest aquatic training center that lured both men to Boca Raton.

The $5-million training facility will be the focal point of a $200-million planned housing development which is similar to Mission Viejo. The aquatic center, which is scheduled to open in April, will be the most sophisticated and comprehensive facility of its kind in the world.

It incorporates two Olympic 50-meter pools (one with 10 lanes and the other with the standard eight), a diving well with 10 springboards and five platform levels, teaching pools, an extensive weight training area, a complete sports physiology lab and spectator seating for 4,000.

Both Schubert and O’Brien stressed the facility--not the seven-year contract that both characterized as “generous”--was the determining factor in their decisions to leave Mission Viejo.

“It was a very difficult for me to leave the greatest program in the world and Southern California, a place my family and I are very attached to,” Schubert said. “It was even harder to leave the friends and the athletes, but the physical plant here was the difference.”

Schubert originally served as a consultant for the design of the training center. He realized the developers would make a serious effort to get him to coach their new team when they decided to construct the center exactly the way he envisioned it, “without a single compromise,” he said.

O’Brien said he felt that the Mission Viejo Co. had been totally supportive and provided him with whatever it took to run a first-class program, but the new facility would allow him to double the size of his team.

“The opportunities are unlimited given the facilities at Mission Bay and the potential for a totally self-contained training environment,” O’Brien said. “It’s something that does not exist anywhere else.”

Schubert said that he and O’Brien were already close to hiring a full-time sports psychologist and that positions for a nutritionist and sports physiologist are in the budget.

“It will undoubtedly be the finest facility in the world,” Schubert said. “We’ll have a human performance laboratory similar to the one at Coto de Caza for computer stroke analysis and the physiologist will help us with blood testing.

“I’ve had many offers over the years, both from colleges and club teams, and we never made a decision strictly on financial considerations. The contract played a part, sure, but the main thing was a chance to explore some areas of sports physiology and medicine that we just couldn’t do in Mission Viejo.”

Schubert’s wife, Joke (pronounced YOKE-AH), said that despite all the reasons to go to Florida, it was still a very difficult decision.

“We’ve really enjoyed living in Mission Viejo,” she said. “Mark has been here 13 years and we’re leaving a lot of close friends. It’s going to be a growing experience for all of us.”

Especially Schubert. He spent the major portion of every day for 13 years building a dynasty in Mission Viejo. The Nadadores didn’t do it with a few superstars, either. They won as a team, loading the consolation finals with youngsters on the way up and veterans who fell just short of world-class status.

He started as a brash 23-year-old who once was tossed in the pool by an irate parent. But even those who disagreed with his dictatorial approach to coaching would grudgingly admit that he treated every swimmer on the team equally. You’d just as likely find a gold-medal winner as a 14-year-old newcomer doing pushups for not listening during a workout.

“I think I’m a lot better coach now,” Schubert said. “I got respect with discipline in those days. Like I told Joke, it’s like starting over, but it’s not like starting over. At least I’ve got a reputation now.

“If you’re asking me if I’m excited about being an age-group coach again, the answer is yes, I think it’ll be fun.”

But don’t get the idea Schubert plans to spend the rest of his career coaxing 8-year-olds through workouts.

“Given the scope of this facility,” he said, “I think this program will grow very, very rapidly.”

Undoubtedly. And don’t be surprised if the Mission Viejo program declines at the same rate.