West Austin Aquatics

USA Head Coach Janet Risser
(USA National, Pre-National, Bronze)

Janet is an extremely talented and accomplished swim coach. Janet swam in Nashville, Austin, and the University of Tennessee and was an All-American in both high school and college. Janet coached several years at Longhorn (Texas) Aquatics as a developmental, head age group, pre-national coach and as an assistant for the National team. In 1988 Janet started competitive swimming at Circle C with Texas Aquatics and then with Texas Gold where she was the head coach and pool manager. Janet has over 20 years experience coaching and 28 years experience as a swim lesson instructor.  Her many accomplishments include coaching over 50 national age group titles in short course and long course, and coaching numerous swimmers at sectionals, nationals and junior nationals. Coach Janet has been a  South Texas zone coach, and South Texas Age Group chairperson (Head Zone Coach). Janet has been awarded South Texas Age Group Coach of the Year by her fellow south Texas coaches.   Coach Janet has worked with every level of developmental and competitive swimmers and understands how to keep young swimmers motivated and improving. Coach Janet is totally committed to each WFLY swimmer and develops a plan to help him/her reach their swimming goals. Coach Janet has experience training USA Swimming coaches and she is looking forward to leading West Austin Aquatics USA Swimming team into a future of fast swims, great strokes, and FUN!

Head Developmental Coach John Walsh
(Rec Team WAAC Flyers, Masters, Guppies)

John is a founder of West Austin Aquatics. John swam for the City of Midland and Dad's Club in Houston specializing in freestyle and butterfly. John has over 15 years of coaching experience, as a coach at Westwood Aquatics and then with West Austin Aquatics. Through the years John has helped hundred of swimmers improve their strokes, better their times, and achieve their goals. John has many swimmers that have excelled at JO's, STAGS,  TAGS,  Sectionals, and Junior Nationals.   When he was the WFLY Senior Coach his swimmers were regional and state champions and sectional/junior national finalists.  John has been a South Texas Zones coach. John enjoys coaching all levels of swimming, but especially enjoys working with swimmers of all ages new to the sport.  He understands that young athletes must have fun and be able to see their improvement to continue to enjoy swimming.  He has developed practices and competitions that help bridge young swimmers into proper strokes and meet experience to have success in competitive swimming. John has served on the executive committee of South Texas as Technical Chair and served as a member of the South Texas budget committee.  As technical chair he helped design South Texas championship meets.  John believes that the sport of swimming offers something for all youth, and he helps young swimmers learn to love the sport.

Swim Coach Tristen Schalyo
(USA Age Group)

Tristen comes to WAAC from Las Vegas, Nevada where she was a USAA swimmer for 8 years. After high school, she took a break from the swimming world and attended the University of Nevada, Las Vegas where she graduated with a Bachelor's of Science in Secondary Education. While teaching middle school English, Tristen received her Master's in School Counseling and went on to be the College and Scholarship Counselor at Valley High School in Las Vegas. It was at Valley where she was the Head Coach for both Men's and Women's Swimming. While there, she not only helped students receive over 6.5 million dollars in scholarships each year, but also helped build the swim program to bring a greater number of new swimmers to regionals and state. Tristen enjoys helping young people enchance their talent in the sport of swimming, as well as with their future life goals.

 

Swim Coach Jimmy Bynum
(Masters, USA Head Age Group)

Swim Coach Ginny Walsh
(Lakers Summer Swim Team)

 Ginny is a familiar face at WAAC having swam on the USA team, and worked as a lifeguard, camp counselor, summer rec coach, and USA Swimming coach under Janet.  Ginny led the Lakeway satellite program last year. While at WFLY, Ginny was a TAGS champion, Sectional and Junior National finalist.  She graduated  from Denison University with a degree in economics and is currently a graduate student in sports management at UT.  All four years she was on Denison's conference and National swim teams.  She was a conference champion in the 400 IM, an All-American and an Academic All-American.  Her senior year the Denison Girl's team finished 3rd in the Nation in NCAA Division 3.  While a senior in high school, Ginny swam over 9 miles between two Hawaiian Islands. Ginny has been involved with swimming since she was five years old and can be seen now at the occasional masters meet. She enjoys helping young swimmers attain their competitive goals by improving their technique and helping them gain race confidence.  Her passion and love of swimming is brought to everyone she coaches.
 

Swim Coach Lauren Wagh
( Lakeway, Masters)

Swim Coach Jackie Gerhardt
(RAV Summer Swim Team)

 Coach Jackie swam competitively since the age of 9. Her   first team was in Hershey, PA (Hershey Aquatic Club) and she has  been swimming year round ever since. .Jackie competed with Hershey Aquatic Club from the age of 9 until she graduated high school in 2008. She also swam with an  additional summer league team, Hershey Country Club, which was a lot of fun. In high school she not only swam with her aquatic club team year round, but also competed with the Hershey High School swim team (state champs her freshman & sophomore year).
After high school, Jackie spent her first year of college in upstate New York where she attended and swam for St. Bonaventure University (Division 1, Atlantic 10 Conference). After that her family moved  to Austin and she transferred to Texas State University. 
At Texas State, Jackie is studying Dietetics, which will prepare her to be a Registered Dietitian. She hopes to pursue a master's degree in Food Science after she graduates from Texas State in 2012 and and then fulfill her dream in working for a food corporation in product development.
As far as coaching experience, Jackie have been certified as a Water Safety Instructor. She began giving swimming lessons at the age of 15 and has coached every summer since. She worked for a summer as an assistant coach at the Hershey Country Club team where she had previously swam. And last summer (2010) she was an assistant coach at WAAC and also at Lakeway. Jackie loves swimming and coaching alike and looks forward to a great summer coaching Ridge at Alta Vista and working with some future swim stars.

Coach Kim Allen
( WAAC Flyers, Triathlete Classes, Swim Lessons)

Coach Kim’s swimming began by winning gold in her first race at age 5. Growing up in Galveston, Texas, Kim began water-skiing in the rough water behind her home. By age 13, Kim was a water-skier for Sea-Arama Marineworld. She traveled to many locations, doing ski shows throughout Texas and La. Though Kim knows how to do pyramids, slalom tricks and other kinds of special skiing, her specialty became blind-folded ramp-jumping! Kim went on to become a water-skier for The University of Texas, and went to Nationals with her team each year.
After graduating with a degree in Journalism, Kim became a triathlete and marathon runner. She began swimming Masters around 1986, and has competed at the 50 free, the 100 free, and particularly enjoys open-water distance swimming including 3-mile swims and 15 mile relay swims.
Kim has been coaching swimming for about 10 years. She has coached for Texas Gold Swimming, City of Austin Parks and Recreation, Circle C Seals, Heart of Texas Masters Swimming, Trizones Triathlon Training and other groups. In 2007, Kim was awarded the “ACE All-Star Award” by the City Manager of Austin. She was nominated by City of Austin employees for her excellence, knowledge and dedication to aquatics and wellness.
Kim also has worked in mental health, social services, and employee assistance programs for many years. She holds a Masters of Family Studies, a certification is dispute resolution, and is a licensed insurance agent.
In addition, she is a licensed chemical dependency counselor intern, and has formal study in Chemical Dependency Prevention. Her consulting clients include Southern Methodist University, Mothers Against Drunk Driving national office, Texas Christian University, San Angelo State University and many others.
Kim is past-President of the Dallas chapter of the Employee Assistance Professionals Association, and the past Vice-President of the Austin chapter, and the President-elect. The organization is comprised of mental healthcare professionals and researchers focused on mental health and chemical dependency prevention in the workplace, among other types of issues and training.  
Overall, Kim is about wellness, prevention and risk management. Her favorite words? “I love to swim, I love Coach Kim!” Her passion is keeping children and families happy and working toward health!

Swim Coach Beth Jackson
(REC Swim Team)

WAAC is thrilled to have Coach Beth back with us this spring and summer.  Coach Beth takes time out of her busy life of being a mom and cardiology physician's assistant to share her passion for swimming with young swimmers.  Beth was a swimmer at Texas A & M and has experience as a master's swimmer. She has been a summer league coach and USA Swimming coach.

Swim Coach Ginger Siler
(Guppy, Swim Lessons)

Ginger grew up in Charlottesville, Virginia where she started to swim competitively at the age of 5. She competed in Charlottesville's local summer swim league for thirteen years, and for Charlottesville High School, where she qualified for the Virginia State Championships in   Swimming all four years. After graduating from Virginia Commonwealth   University with a B.S. in Exercise Science, she moved to the Austin area and began working at the WAAC in the Spring of 2010. She has over 10 years experience coaching and teaching swim lessons to kids of all ages.

Coach Diane Welch

Diane is a founder of  West Austin Aquatics and is the  Strength and Conditioning Coach.  Muscle development, muscle strength, and overall conditioning is an integral part of the training at West Austin Aquatics for the older swimmers. Diane takes a very active role in the conditioning of the swimmers and helps build muscle strength without injury or harm to their strokes. Diane is a certified trainer specializing in strength conditioning for swimmers.