From the outside to the inside of Boccia

How can a assistant principal of a college be involved in para sports? Well, let us tell you!

Sarah Nolan is a name that many of you won't know about, but she helped and supported the most decorated British Boccia player in history, David Smith OBE to the top.

However, before Boccia came along, she started off as a social worker.

After 14 years of child protection, [I] moved into education, now assistant principal at a college and amongst all of that in my spare time, I've also been involved in Boccia [and have been] for a significant number of years.

Sarah mentioned that her first job was community-based social work-based stuff, firstly being involved with short breaks.

Working in respite places and short breaks units initially for those that just got learning disability, and then they realized in that town that there were young people who didn't have a learning disability, had a physical disability and still wanted to be able to get out and do stuff. So, they set up a service, a befriending service that meant that you know that those guys were given the opportunity to do stuff. And actually, it was during that time that I first met Ian [Omnes].

Ian, who is now known as Jeb, was the person who introduced Sarah to the Boccia world.

He'd gone to a competition with his mum [and] fallen out with her big style; I think at the england nationals on his way home said, 'I want you to ask Sarah'. Now, all I'd done with him [to that point] was take him to see Gloucester rugby every other weekend when they were home, and that was kind of what we did. So, I think he knew that I had a thirst for sport and that's kind of how I said yes.

But there was only one problem...

Didn't have a clue what it was, Peter. Didn't have a clue what Boccia was when I went, yeah, all right, I'll do that.

She didn't just hop into sport, she was well used to the world of athletic journeys as she says;

Well, I mean, I was actually a hockey player for Gloucester City for a lot of my time. Before that, I was going to be a swimmer. But, even though I lived in Gloucester, I went to school in Cheltenham and it was at the Cheltenham schools gala or something that Cheltenham City said they wanted me to be a part of their swimming club. My dad was like, no, you're a Gloucester person. You're not going to Cheltenham and then it never materialized. So, the swimming never happened. I'd like to blame that and that's why I got my chunkiness, I'd say and then hockey which of course your chunkiness is needed anyway, isn't it? So, yeah. Part of that, played a couple of the Premier League games, but mainly I was the captain for the third 11. I've never shied away from anything you know like someone said to me, do you want to have a go at skiing? It's like, yeah, I'll do that. Did that quite nice and easily. So yeah, that was positive so yeah, I think, you know, I've always always had something of sport in me.

With Ian as her first Boccia athlete to had worked with, she started off as his assistant as a BC3 assistant.

We went to the British nationals, he'd done well in the English nationals, went to the British nationals and Ian won and the next thing we knew at that there, they then said, we'd like to select you to come to the worlds. Well‚ I mean, I didn't know this was what this was about and believe it or not; that was in Rio de Janeiro and on the Copacabana Beach. I started off quite nicely, on my international travels etc, but Ian is actually non-verbal, will spell with his eyes and would drive his wheelchair with his head and in transit to our very first competition, his head switches got broken off his wheelchair. I ended up having to push an electric wheelchair around and then, there I am at seven o'clock in the morning, trundling up the road from the hotel to the to the venue and it's saying 32 degrees and that was at seven o'clock in the morning. You can imagine how entertaining that was and it was. I think it's safe to say that I learned a lot. I definitely matched up to what was needed Ian and I had an awful lot of laughs and giggles at it at the time.

When Ian made the decision to step away from UK Boccia at that time [now named Boccia UK]. They approached me and said, we actually like what you do. We like your approach. We'd like to keep you on and stay with us if you wouldn't mind so, that's what I did. Because, you get hooked, don't you? I stayed on and in that process of staying on, I took on a few different things, different camps in the lead up to Beijing. At one competition Jacqueline [a coach] was unwell and was unable to travel and this was in the Netherlands when I was there, they said, right, we need someone to step in to be the coach for the BC4s.

So, this was Stephen and Peter [McGuire, BC4 players] and they said, Jacqueline says, you can do it, Sarah. Did she let you know? And so there it was. That was me and they, they came away with gold.

She continued with them, and took them into the Europeans where they got gold and became European champions and mentioned that;

[I] think that I showed my metal there, stepping in at the last minute and was able to still enable people to feel and realize because as a coach, all you're doing is enabling people to understand and realize their full potential and just helping them to achieve that at the right time.

I asked her of her method, as she explains she is not a 'coach' coach, so, was it more just letting Steph and Peter get on with it?

Yeah, telling them what they needed to hear, you know, that was, I think, the key thing, you know, telling them what they needed to hear to realize and understand that they could do they could do it. And, you know, Peter in particular has always said to me we were the first you know i was the first person that ever kind of showed them that they could do it and help them to achieve that. Well, I think it's just someone different, isn't it? Someone looking at it differently because it's just a, I think it's just the nature of all the jobs I've ever done. I'm about people and that was just about people and helping them to realize as a person that what they could [do].

She gave me one such example on this, and it was when a BC3 pair Scott and Ce got their gold.

Belgium had done all sorts, it was a serious violation and when we had the you know the break in between the ends, I was able to just say, right, you need to shut up and park it to his dad more than anything, to Gary, just got to forget it. You've got to move on, just park it and just focus on where you're going and [afterwards] Scott said that was absolutely the best thing to do for them. And it meant that they could. And they went on, got gold as well. So, yeah. It's good.

Sarah was since moved around with certain classification groups and when London 2012 came in, the organisation turned more into a company, with more paid jobs coming in.

When we headed into into around 2012, [this was] where things then became a little bit more became more professional. It was less about people giving up their voluntary time and people being paid to do the job and you know at the end of the day I was earning good money even back then, let alone now. And I would never be able to be paid that by Boccia so the practicality was it was never going to be my career It was only ever something that I was going to be doing in my spare time. And of course, you know, then people were bought in and paid to be coaches um and I think it was better for everyone concerned for me to just butt out.

She said throughout her time around the sport, she worked closely with a few influential people and how she came to thinking of stepping back.

I worked very closely with Glynn Tromans, who was at the time the person who was identifying talent and so I worked with him on the talent ID along with Barry Bowden. The three of us kind of worked closely and with Chris, who is the sports science person who'd just come along so there were some new people, new ideas it still needed to use the people who kind of understood it from before to kind of then develop it and take it further etc so that's kind of how how things kind of just moved on and i needed to kind of take that step back just to to let coaches be coaches and just kind of butt out really.

However, as the time went on towards London 2012, she had been doing quite a significant amount of work with the team and before Beijing, she was doing quite a bit of work with Ali Lalani with David Smith, who were both down in the Southampton area. She reflected;

I was going down and doing training with the two of them, helping them both to train for Beijing. And so um it's it's important that, it's important that they kind of knew that they had someone there to kind of support them. So I was doing quite a bit of stuff with them and then um I think it was the worlds when we were in Belfast and they realized that David needed someone with him that was a solid rather than his carers came in and swapped about every couple of weeks. So that he had that consistent and so it was at that point that I was then kind of put with David.

And the one thing that David always said is I was the first person that just showed an interest in him. Not in his medals, not in his success, not in all of that stuff. In him and he said that's the first time and the only you know that he that and then he realized that it that I was a stayer because I was just about him getting to know him and understanding who he was as opposed to the medals he was winning and the success that he was having. And I think that shows more so when we were we were in Belfast because he didn't win and he didn't, you know, he didn't get the medals that he wanted so And so, you know, we kind of started on a rough time. But I think he realized that I wasn't going to kind of go anywhere. I was just there to help him continue and to to go forward. And so that's kind of where that came from. So that would have been 2011, I think, because it was the year before 2012 or maybe it might have been earlier in 2012.

Going into Rio in 2016 was proved to be difficult for Sarah, as;

Chris had taken over as the the coach for the team then. Again, very much I was just, you know, David's assistant, Sylvia was still the assistant on court because Nigel was on court and so that's kind of where we were with Rio. Now, Rio obviously was when David was when he did manage to get his his gold medal, but it wasn't an easy task. Rio, Rio was bl**dy hard. Not easy at all. And believe it or not, I actually sold my house whilst I was out in Rio and we had Ofsted call at the college [all at the same time] so that, while that was going on in my life back home whilst I was also out there with David. And actually it was during, so obviously they didn't do as well in the team as we would have liked.

So then when we were going into the individual [competition], David's coach at the time was Claire {Morrison, coach] and as he came out of the pool games you know David lost confidence I think really in, in Claire and himself in in everything that he did, knowing that he was going to have to play his arch nemesis at the time in the quarterfinals. So, you know, that could have been him out and that's it. So on the way back from the venue to the village, I was saying to him, because I wasn't allowed to be a part of any of the debrief or anything like that at that point. I said to him so you know what's, what's next? And he went, don't you realize? I went, no, I'm not part of that stuff. You tell me. And he was really angry, really angry. And so I just took him off to a really quiet part of the village and I just said, we're not going anywhere. I turned off his chair, unplugged him. And we just sat and chatted and chatted and there was a lot of screaming and shouting and tears a lot of frustration, both of us talking about home and here and why were we there and what what you know just so much was pulled apart at that point.

Having unpacked it, we then had to pack it all back together again ready for the next day to work out what we were going to do and it meant that I had to make some difficult calls for him to the management of the squad to say that this is the only way Dave is going to feel like he can go into tomorrow. This has got to go and that was a lot of changes. And I said to David, I'll take that one on the chin if you don't want to take responsibility, I'll say it was me if that's what you need me to do. He eventually confessed to it a few years later. But, you know that's because because i was having that conversation with him as a person as opposed to a Boccia player [so] it meant that we could then go out on that court the next day and we completely changed everything. But it meant that he was that completely different fresh person that was just out there. And I just told him you just need to put your whole heart and soul on that court and it doesn't matter what happens you will have done absolutely everything and thrown it on her. And that's all you need to do and know that you have done the best that you can and that's all we need to do. F***ing hell, did he? Because he beat [the opponent], took him to a tiebreak, beat him and it meant that then you know we were, we were on to the to the next level mind, knackering. Tears were flooding out of both of us on that quarter, you know, at the end of it [and when we got into physio after the game], he went 'Sarah?' I went 'Yes David?' Can you do that again for me for the semi-final? Yes, David. Yes, I can. But‚ we have to do too much. It was just enough to kind of get him there and the final was the easiest final I've ever seen in my life. Because he was just a completely different person.

The next Paralympic cycle was of course Tokyo, which was delayed due to the COVID pandemic and as Sarah's full time job was in the schooling role alongside her side job as a Boccia UK assistant, I asked her of the impact it all had on her.

[I was part of the] frontline workers, so I was still, oh God, that was horrible. Hated that. But yeah, I was still working, still delivering, still doing my job. Via a blo*dy screen. But actually, it was just before that that I'd become the coach for the team. So it was actually back in around 2018/19, somewhere around there, it wasn't working. The team wasn't working. They weren't performing. They were back down in 13th [in the world rankings], I think. The coach at the time, Chris, who was actually the sports scientist for the squad - it was decided that actually over roles and it wasn't right So they kind of said to they had a chat with David and me and said kind of, you know, we came out and we qualified for Tokyo and then as you say COVID hit. And, you know, I was trying to come up with all I could to kind of support the guys in doing something. But actually that time, because of where we were and all that was kind of going on. I took advantage of that being a real good opportunity for us to do a quite significant amount of work with a psychologist. We achieved so much more for them as a team with the psychologist then I think any others in the squad because we we had a focus on that because I knew I couldn't do anything more, [I mean] I tried. F***ing hell, one time we tried to play a game like we were imagining where we were and everyone was trying to play the game and put the ball in where the other. Honest to God, Peter, if you'd have seen it, it was an absolute bl**dy disaster. But we were laughing so much. Where we were trying so hard to kind of do stuff, but actually just we really had some honest frank conversations which aren't easy [and] when we came out of that, we were in a really good place because we'd done all of that. It meant they went in as a different team and and uh And that kind of came to fruition kind of out of tokyo into you know going into the worlds and coming away with that silver. We were so close to that gold. But that i think is because of the work that I was doing with the um the psych and i think then because I was pulling in and i don't know whether I think I'm, I'm lucky, Peter, in that I'm not someone who's qualified in sports. I'm not someone who's got a coaching qualification. I've got the Boccia thing because that's kind of it.

And regarding mixing her high up school role with sport;

I knew that when I took the job. There's a significant amount more pressure and all of that kind of stuff I was going to so, [originally] David was going to retire in Tokyo. And so that's when I was going to retire as well, because I'm like, that's great you know and then, life changed around him. And so, you know, he decided to carry on, didn't necessarily actually have the conversation with me about that he just told me he was doing that and it's like at the time, I just kind of thought, I said, you know, said to my husband, look, you know, it's only three years because we've already gone one year into the cycle. Maybe I can do it and then we can work towards the retirement for me because I've had to use all of my annual leave [from school]. All of my spare time, all of my weekends, all of my, do you know what i mean doing boccia and with David and and actually, my husband and I are celebrating our 15th wedding anniversary this year [2025]. We actually just need to have some time for us, you know, and with the job I just haven't got the capacity I haven't got the emotional and mental capacity to do the two jobs, the coaching and my actual job. But I also need that time for me and my husband. And that's important to get that balanced. Do you know what I mean? And you know now the the squad has got new people that are leading it and taking it in a different direction.

You know, even though I'd spoken to Greg [Baker, Performance Director of Boccia UK] about retiring a couple of years ago. It was actually after Rio. Because I said to him that, look, you know, the team need more than than I've got to offer in order to be successful. And I can't commit to that and he wouldn't let me go at that point. So that's when we agreed because he didn't want to change anything. So we agreed I'd keep going until Paris and then retire after. Lauren had just come on. Lauren [Kianchehr, Performance coach of Boccia UK] had just come on the scene. And so I was kind of preparing her without her really knowing that I was preparing her for taking over. Because we, you know, we didn't want because David before has got quite emotional about people leaving, particularly around when Nigel was leaving and I didn't want him to feel emotionally that he needed to succeed or that he needed to, do you know what I mean?

Because I was his best man at his wedding! Well, best person, wherever you want to kind of put it, so you know, I've always kind of had that with him but um yeah, I felt that was probably the best thing. And, you know, that's what my husband and I, we had a good chat about it and worked out that that was probably the best thing to do was to just give that give that last bit to make sure but then you know the job transpired against me and actually everything that I'd pointed out to greg that I didn't have the time to commit to it came to fruition because I didn't. But at least my husband and I were able to travel out to Paris at the weekend. To at least see him and see some of the Boccia in Paris. So at least I was able to do that.

I mean, it was hard because it was trying to help him to work out who was the right person to have with him and all of that kind of stuff. You know, he was going through some difficulties with carers at the time anyway so it was trying to work out who was the best person but Michael is fantastic. Misal. He's got a very dry sense of humour and he's good working with David. He's able to kind of put him in his place but not as much as I had the privilege of doing Because, of course, he was still employed by him. Whereas I was, yeah, okay, you know, he paid me for my time but you weren't my f***ing boss. So I'm able to say, don't be a tw*t, pull your head out your ass. You know, um it was easier for me to do that. And that's kind of the relationship that I built up with him that I could do that um that not everyone can get away with doing that, David.

I asked her about wether it was always going to be leaving Boccia and not the school enviroment.

Yeah. Absolutely. You know, like I alluded to financially it's it's the the right place to be but also I get so much more out of what I do in education than Boccia. You know, there's stability in education there's do you know what i mean I really love my job, Peter. I f***ing love my job. I'm knackered at the end of every day. But the success that I've seen, the difference and the impact that I can see that I've had. On some young people's lives. You can't take that away. Education is me. That's what I'm about. Absolutely.

And with the Paralympic cycle is around school terms, I asked how she managed it all.

So a lot of this was every time I'd negotiate with my managers and the principals, I'd make a point of saying that, you know, to use my image, to use David. David always agreed to come and do stuff at colleges in order to kind of get that payback for the time that they agreed and gave to me. I think it was more so in the last few years that there were more competitions, whereas kind of in the initial lead up, there weren't as many. But it did start to, I suppose, take the p*ss and that's kind of why it was it was kind of you know less so. And because, of course, we were heading to, Ofsted is the Paralympic Games type of thing, so you're always kind of working up and working towards that so, but yeah, that was always the agreement with my managers and the principals at the time is that we'd work really closely with marketing, David would always come and do at least one or two sessions in a cycle; [when I was at another school beforehand and when we] merged and became the Bedford college group, he came and did the student awards - did the speech at the Student Awards. He did a couple of those for me. So, you know, he, that's always where David and I had that understanding for me to be able to continue with him he had to give that little bit back to me and where I work. Absolutely.

She gave me a story to explain one of her big issues of doing two jobs that clashed.

We did get the Ofsted call two days before we were due to travel to the Czech Republic with David and the team. So that was a quick emergency change of names and all that kind of stuff at that point so It's not a new thing that the squad know that they have to do that suddenly, you know, turn around and response so um as as things got closer to Ofsted in this new role And like I said, after Rio, I realized I couldn't do it. I couldn't do the two [together]. I knew that. And so that's why I started to have those conversations. And it wasn't the boss that was telling me that was me. I knew for myself. That I couldn't continue, that I couldn't give the team what they needed and so, yeah, that's kind of why I started those conversations and knew I was always going to retire after Paris anyway But as it happens, I couldn't kind of go there anyway.

When reflecting back on it, she carried on to say,

But it was important, I think, for a lot of people to realise actually that that was huge to become double Paralympic champions you know two years in a row it's huge. It's not easily achievable for most people to be at that high level to achieve that you know and and so yeah, it was. You know, it is an emotional thing. And I can be the hardest b*tch out [there] but, you know, I'm a big softy underneath and so, yeah, it was it was very emotional for the two of us at that time, you know, and I know he talked about, you know, his grandfather. He saw his grandfather before he you know he thought about him just before he went on but you know it is an emotional time. You put absolutely everything out on that court when you go into that kind of game. And so the only way it's ever going to be dealt with is to is to let it all come out at the end. But I think it was good for the squad to see that David is that emotionally engaged with it? It's not just, you know, it's um, I think it's important for everyone to see that you know, Yeah. Yeah. And it's hard work. You have to put in so much to get to that point to feel like you can actually do it. And yeah. It's an amazing feeling.

When transitioning over for Sarah to leave, she recalled that she didn't see David as much, as;

We kind of worked out in that last year, we planned kind of what was going to happen when which I think helped Claire as well because Claire liked to have kind of logic and process and understand what was going to be happening when So, you know, I made sure that everything was solid in place as to when we were going to meet, when we were going to debrief, when we got, you know, it had to be that kind of methodical but it was then, in that was then that you know I couldn't go to um Korea because I was going to go with the team to Korea to do that initial bit I couldn't do that. So, yeah, I mean‚ I- I suppose the big thing really about Tokyo into Paris was that that one year that we missed [due to the pandemic] is when you do a lot of the kind of technical stuff. Where you might change something or you might change a chair might change a throw might change and you use that year to do that. But we didn't really kind of have that time. And it was quite tight then into particularly then once we did Rio which happened in December. You'd normally have November, December, January into February to do quite a bit and again that was lost again that year as well so where you might make some more significant changes, the time wasn't there in order to enable that. So we were a little restricted. And we decided that Kayleigh [Brown (nee Haggo), BC2 player] was coming along and she was doing well and we actually selected Kayleigh for Paris. We then had to do quite a bit to help her to feel thought she knew what she was doing with the team, so there was quite a lot of work and building that up and we you know set up achievable small steps and targets along the way to achieve that ultimate goal of her feeling able To be a part of the team in Paris.

When talking about support over the years, she cited her husband.

I met my husband in 2008. We married 2010. And actually in the lead up to London and beyond when I was traveling over to Swansea to coach David and Jacob [Thomas] at the time. Yeah. So he was a BC3 player, phenomenal player, phenomenal player. Became world champion, beat Grigori you know he was um he was phenomenal unfortunately passed away a couple of years ago. But yeah, so I was going there. So when I went to train there I- he's, so my husband comes from Wales and actually the family live in Kidwelly which is between Camarthon and Ethley. So I'd stay with them. So many weekends I would be more with my husband's parents than with him because I was staying with them. Do you know what I mean? But it meant then that when we got invited to the Buckingham Palace garden party, I actually took his mum with me. So she, yeah, because she's a serious royal. So yeah, she came with me to that and that was that was a big tick in the box for me as the daughter-in-law, I tell you - I wanted that!

And finally, I asked her with her now having left the Boccia assistance role, what the future with her full time job holds for her.

Would you be a principal itself? Would you go up?

I've missed [the boat] it. Yeah, I mean, you know, I'm never one for not allowing for that to be the next step. Vice principal is the next step really for me. So, you know, I'm obviously looking to that, you know, I'm uh I've got myself on some senior leadership training so I'm always on that learning curve and trying to develop those skills a bit further and understand that a little bit better. We've got a new principal and deputy principal at the college at the moment and um I'm thriving in their company. So, you know, I'm looking forward to bright times ahead for sure.