Nigel Kemp’s name is synonymous with swimming successes. In 18 years at Dalhousie University, he has guided the men’s and women’s swim teams to numerous Atlantic Universities Athletic Association championships. In the process, he has made swimming one of the most successful sports on the Dal campus. Winning Dalhousie coach of the year honours, as well as similar awards from the Canadian Interuniversity Athletic Union and the Canadian Amateur Swimming Association, underlines the superb job he has done since arriving in Halifax.

His achievements, though, go far beyond the boundaries of the Dalhousie campus. As a Canadian national coach, he has travelled with this country’s swim teams to places such as Sweden, England, Australia and German Democratic Republic, and to events such as the Second World Aquatic Championships in Columbia, the Summer Olympics in Montreal, the Commonwealth Games in Edmonton, the Third World Aquatic Championships in West Berlin, and the World University Games in Mexico City. As well, he has served in such capacities as advisor with the CASA and a member of that organization’s coaching development committee. His expertise has been sought by swimmers and swimming officials world-wide.

He fell in love with the sport in his childhood years as he developed into an international swimmer for Great Britain. That love for the sport has never wavered through almost two decades of teaching young athletes.

Throughout his coaching career, Nigel has carried a good philosophy with him. His approach was summed up in an article a few years ago in which he said: “I feel each athlete is an individual and has to be treated that way, I have learned over the years not to write off anyone who wants to come out and give the effort and time. Any person with talent has to be nurtured, whether they’re Olympians or the average varsity athlete. I have seen athletes improve tremendously. Success is improving, not necessarily winning.”

Though he has been surrounded by winners through the years, he has never lost sight of the other swimmers who may have been a little further back in the pack. That, too, has been a valued coaching asset in his career.

How big an impact has Nigel Kemp had on the many young swimmers who have come under his wing? When Halifax’s Nancy Garapick was right at the height of her achievements at the Montreal Olympics in 1976, I asked her: “How much has Nigel meant to your career?” There was a quick smile and a quick response: “Everything.”

When Nancy won her medals, Kemp was a man bursting with pride in the shadows of the star. Only then did he drop the protective screen he had built around the young swimmer. The spotlight, understandably, shone brightly on Nancy and her medals. She had worked extremely hard for a long, long time and she had earned her rewards. But Nigel Kemp, slipping away from the limelight to allow Nancy her day in the sun, deserved a lot of credit, too. He had prepared her well.

Nigel’s ability to bring out the very best in a youngster like Nancy Garapick has been one of his prime strengths in coaching hundreds of young people in the sport, both at Dalhousie and with the Halifax Trojans Swim Club. That ability, along with his teaching expertise, has, indeed, turned a lot of swimmers into winners and achievers. It’s for that, and his many other assets as a swim coach, that has earned Nigel Kemp a deserving pew in the Nova Scotia Sports Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1989.

Bio Courtesy of Hugh Townsend