The Royal Dutch Swimming Federation (KNZB) has revealed that former elite swimmer Marcel Wouda has rejoined its national team staff as national coach for long distances.
Effective January 1st, 52-year-old Wouda is pausing his recent work on the ‘Wisselslag 2032’ project, an initiative aimed at promoting the medley events, to work full-time in the KNZB.
Sjors Lommerts, technical director KNZB, said of Wouda’s return, “We are extremely happy that Marcel Wouda is back on board with us full-time. With his knowledge and experience, he is a huge reinforcement for the coaching staff of our elite swimmers, both in the pool and in open water.”
After illustrious swimming career, which included winning 200m IM gold at the 1998 World Championships and 4x200m free relay gold at the 2000 Olympic Games, Wouda moved into the coaching realm.
In 2003, he was appointed as a youth national coach at the KNZB and was responsible for retired Olympic champion Ranomi Kromowidjojo, among others. Wouda’s various other roles included trainer at the High Performance Center (HPC) in Eindhoven and also as national coach of TeamNL Wedstrijdzwemmen. He has also worked with Olympic medal-winning open water swimmers, Maarten van der Weijden (Beijing 2008), Sharon van Rouwendaal and Ferry Weertman (both in Rio 2026).
As a refresher, Australian swim coach Peter Bishop, most famous as the coach of Olympic champion Kyle Chalmers up until a few months before the 2024 Olympic Games, left his role as the the South Australian Sports Institute to become the head coach of the Royal Dutch Swimming Federation late last year. Bishop replaced Mark Faber who took over the role as head of the Royal Belgian Swimming Federation (RBSF).
Quote courtesy of KNZB.
