Rowing Canada can only hope the transition to the Martin McElroy era goes smoother than the abrupt and controversial exit from the Mike Spracklen era.
McElroy was named Tuesday as the new high performance director for the Elk Lake-based national men's program and will be based in Victoria as the team builds to the 2016 Rio Summer Olympics.
Spracklen was recently fired as coach of the men's eight despite having guided the crew to gold medals at the 1992 Barcelona and 2008 Beijing Olympics and silver at the 2012 London Games. Spracklen also coached the Canadian four to silver at the 2004 Athens Olympics and Silken Lau-mann to her famous comeback medal at Barcelona 1992.
The move to get rid of Spracklen was vehemently criticized by numerous Canadian rowers - many of them Olympic medallists under Spracklen's tutelage. But his style did not suit all rowers and a small group of Spracklen detractors supported the move.
McElroy coached Great Britain to men's eight gold at the 2000 Sydney Summer Olympics and most recently was high performance rowing director for Ireland.
"Canada has a great tradition on the world stage, which together with the more recent support of Own The Podium and other partners, creates exciting possibilities for the future," said McElroy in a statement.
"I've always been impressed by the toughness and commitment of Canada's rowing athletes."
McElroy takes over responsibility for the entire national senior men's program as well as the men's Under-23 program, all based at Elk Lake.
He will be assisted with the U-23s by coach Terry Paul, who coxed the Canadian gold-medallist Olympic eight at Barcelona in 1992 under Spracklen.
Meanwhile, 29 Canadian rowers - who between them have 78 Olympic and world championship medals - have sent a letter to the president and board of Rowing Canada asking for an independent, third-party review of the "failures of the high performance executive team."
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