Three times Olympian and past Chairman of the FEI Eventing Committee, Wayne Roycroft has resigned as the Head Coach of the Australian Eventing Team.
In the Equestrian Australia Press Release, Wayne says, “Now is the time for change and I am looking forward to new challenges and pursuing other interests,”
Paul Cargill, President of Equestrian Australia acknowledges Roycroft’s enormous contribution to Equestrian Sport “Wayne is the single greatest contributor to Australia’s extraordinary Eventing success over the past twenty years that he has been coach,” he said "It is with great regret that we accepted Wayne’s resignation today. He is a legend of the sport with a wealth of experience and it will be difficult to fill his shoes. The international Equestrian Community, as well as our own members, will be saddened by this news. We will remember Wayne for his great achievement at Sydney 2000 and at Atlanta and Barcelona. He has been an inspiration for young Eventing riders at home and abroad.”
Whilst there is not an immediate replacement for Roycroft, Cargill explains that the team will continue to look forward. “We will now go through a process of assessing our options and our coaching structure leading into London 2012. Our London campaign is on track,” he said. Well, won't that be interesting!
Wayne very kindly did an amazing job of helping to launch An Eventful Life at the Melbourne 3Day Event in June (including a recital from memory of some Banjo Paterson and some of the Rudyard Kipling poem "If" at the front of An Eventful Life) and finished his speech with the admonition that "If you don't buy this book you need a bash around the head!". Maybe that's why it is selling so well!
Indeed An Eventful Life is full of references to Wayne by the riders - after all, "Patch" ( as he is known) has shaped their careers in many ways over the years. Stuart Tinney started his professional riding career working for Wayne and he credits Wayne with making him the rider he is today (and some rider!). Sonja and Wayne had a few run-ins (which Sonja describes in An Eventful Life as 'interesting'and 'sometimes stormy'!) but by the time of the Hong Kong Olympics, they had developed a very good relationship. Megan learned about team ways from the dynamic duo of Wayne and Bear (team vet Denis Goulding) when she was a groom for Wendy Schaeffer at the WEG in 1994 so that by the time she made the Australian team herself she was "ready to play the game and make my debut". She also remembers Wayne giving up his seat in business class on the way to Hong Kong so that she and Sonja could take turns to sleep during the flight!
Wendy has also had her fair share of frustrations with the Australian team selectors over her many years at the top of the sport and says in An Eventful Life that "Wayne definitely believes in keeping us on our toes to the last minute by not announcing a team but I actually believe that just creates a whole more stress" but she also adds "Wayne and all that he stands for is just huge. He is someone that I have always looked up to. The mere mention of the name Roycroft is synonymous with Australian equestrian sport and I am continually impressed by how much he commits himself to our sport" There is much discussion in the book of the role of selectors and coaches but I think that, on the whole, these elite riders have huge respect for the man who took Australian eventing to a new level on the international stage. After the launch of An Eventful Life Wayne told me that he had "many stories to tell which can't be told until after my retirement". Maybe that's my next book!
