2020 Grand Slam Coaches' Conference Speakers

GSCC2020 - Scott Draper
Scott Draper
Scott is a well credentialed leadership and organisational development consultant with a high-performance sport background as a professional athlete in two sports, coach and administrator. With broad experience in designing and leading strategic transformational change initiatives at the senior executive level across multiple sectors including Financial Services, Federal and State Government and Series B Start-ups. Previously Scott worked as the Head National Coach at Tennis Australia and has coached both Ash Barty and Lleyton Hewitt. His other sporting highlights include representing Australia in the Davis Cup whilst culminating as a Mixed Doubles Grand Slam Winner.
GSCC2020 - Nicole Pratt Cropped
Nicole Pratt
Nicole played professionally for 19 years reaching a career high singles ranking of 36 and 18 in doubles. She was a member of the Fed Cup team for 10 years and competed in the Sydney 2000 and Athens 2004 Olympic Games. Nicole began working for Tennis Australia in 2008 coaching Casey Dellacqua to a career high singles ranking of 39 and 11 in doubles. Appointed the Head Coach of the AIS Women’s program in 2011-2014. In 2015 she was appointed the Head of Women’s Tennis for TA, during this year Nicole coached Daria Gavrilova to a career high ranking of 36. Nicole is a Tennis Australia High Performance Coach as well as serving on the WTA coaches’ committee.
GSCC2020 - Cahill Headshot
Darren Cahill
'Following a successful sporting career where Darren won numerous international tennis tournaments, secured a ranking within the world’s top 25 players, and represented Australia on multiple occasions, Darren’s attention quickly shifted towards coaching. Most notable was Darren’s coaching relationships with Andre Agassi, Lleyton Hewitt, and Simon Halep who all reached the world No. 1 ranking and claimed Grand Slam title success under his leadership. Impressively Darren led Hewitt to be the youngest ever world No. 1 player, and Agassi to become the oldest player to achieve the same feat. Coaching provided the opportunity for Darren to positively influence individuals and teams towards maximising their potential, and this desire remains at his core today. Darren remains a key-note speaker, lead commentator for ESPN, and has recently been appointed to the Board of Directors for the Port Adelaide Football Club.'
GSCC2020 - Patrick Hunt Cropped
Patrick Hunt
Patrick Hunt has been at the forefront of international coach and player development leadership for more than four decades and is considered one of the pre-eminent experts in the field globally. Patrick is currently President of the FIBA (Federation of International Basketball Associations), World Association of Basketball Coaches (WABC). He has served on the FIBA Technical Commission since 2011 and in September 2014, was appointed to the most prestigious position of Chairman of the FIBA Technical Commission.Hunt has coached over 350 games representing Australia and was Head Coach of the Canberra Cannons in the Australian National Basketball League in 1981. He was one of the initial Coaches of the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) Basketball program and has been with the AIS from its inception in 1981 being Head Coach of the Men’s program from 1982 to 1992.
GSCC2020 - Dr Margaret Osborne
Dr Margaret Osborne
Dr Margaret Osborne is a Lecturer in Music (Performance Science) in the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, and Teaching Specialist in the Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences at The University of Melbourne. Margaret’s academic and clinical practice specialises in performance science and psychology, assisting people to manage anxiety, build confidence, enhance performance, and develop emotional resilience. She is a registered psychologist who has worked in a variety of settings including federal government, education, anxiety and drug and alcohol treatment clinics, employee assistance and occupational rehabilitation. Before holding her current interdisciplinary position in music and psychology at the University of Melbourne, she conducted two postdoctoral research fellowships to understand how learning instrumental music can inspire educational motivation and engagement; and how music performance can be improved using self-regulated learning and emotion regulation skills. Her research investigates optimal performance and wellbeing in musicians, performing artists and athletes, combined with the development and teaching of new subjects in musician’s health and performance psychology. Her approach draws from sports, positive, clinical and educational psychology disciplines.
GSCC2020 - Sarah Stone
Sarah Stone
Sarah Stone was born in Melbourne, Australia, and is the founder and chief executive officer of the Women's Tennis Coaching Association. A dynamic industry leader, Sarah resides in America and has been coaching on the WTA tour for over ten years. A former professional player, Stone has a vast amount of experience at the very top of women's tennis. Currently, she is the coach of American Fed Cup player Alexa Glatch. Formerly, Sarah was the coach of Samantha Stosur for three years, Stosur was a three-time grand slam champion while under Stone's tutelage. In total, Sarah has worked with six top 100 WTA tour players. As a professional player, she competed in the main draw at both Wimbledon and the Australian Open and twice represented Australia on the junior Fed Cup team. Additionally, Stone won 11 professional doubles titles alongside several Australian players, including Stosur, Sekulovski, and Kriz. Sarah's previous speaking engagements included presentations at the ITF World Conference Bulgaria, USPTA World Conference Las Vegas, and The Grand Slam Coaches Conference in 2018. Sarah is highly committed to using tennis to promote social change. Away from tennis, Sarah is an avid painter and gardener, as well as a passionate Hawthorn supporter.
GSCC2020 - Harry Moffitt Cropped
Harry Moffitt
Former SAS Team Commander and registered Psychologist, Anthony “Harry” Moffitt, recently retired after almost 30 years with the Australian Defence Force, most of which was spent with Australia’s elite Special Air Service (SAS) Regiment as a Team Commander and specialist. He completed 11 active service deployments amassing nearly 1000 days on Special Operations globally, including being wounded in action in 2008 and repatriated to Australia due to his wounds. Harry completed his time with the SAS as its Director of High-Performance.
GSCC2020 - Cliff Mallett Cropped
Dr Cliff Mallett
Dr Cliff Mallett is a former medal-winning Olympic and World Championships coach in athletics. He is Professor of Sport Psychology and Coaching at The University of Queensland and the Technical University of Munich in Germany and has published more than 130 peer-reviewed papers and advised 30+ doctoral students in the last 15 years. Cliff has won an Australian university teaching award and presented 25 invited Keynotes in 11 countries. His passion is to create knowledge to answer important questions and to translate rigorous applied research to inform policy and practice in sport. So, he is heavily engaged as a consultant to international and national sports organisations and with several professional sport franchises in Australia. Cliff was the Chair of Research for the International Council for Coaching Excellence (2013-2019) and led a major international project examining Serial Winning Coaches, many of the world’s most successful coaches.
GSCC2020 - Brenton Sanderson cropped
Brenton Sanderson
Brenton Sanderson's football career began with SANFL club Sturt before joining Adelaide in 1992. He debuted as a teenager, playing six games across two seasons before transferring to Victoria Park. At the conclusion of a 13-year player career, having played 209 games for three clubs, Sanderson moved to Port Adelaide as a development coach before moving back to Geelong, where he served as an assistant between 2007 and 2011. During that time, he played a key role in the '07 and '09 premiership triumphs, and contributed greatly to Geelong's charge to the '11 decider before being selected by Adelaide as its senior coach for 2012. In his first season in the top job, Sanderson led the Crows from 14th to third, finishing just six points shy of Hawthorn in the Preliminary Final. In 2016 Sanderson became Collingwood's forward line coach. He has served as coach of the AFL-AIS Academy, where was tasked with guiding the best young footballers in the country on their journeys to the elite level. In his 4th Season at Collingwood, Sanderson oversees Collingwood's forward line and ball movement.
GSCC2020 - Adam D'Sylvia Head Shot Cropped
Adam D'Sylva
Adam D’Sylva has become one of the most talked-about chefs in town and has built an enviable culinary reputation. As part owner and head chef of Coda in Melbourne, Adam draws inspiration from across the globe to blend Asian and European tastes and techniques. Adam's roots take him back to an apprenticeship at Hilton on the Park before working at popular celebrity restaurant Cosi. His experience extends beyond Australia having worked in the Marche region of Italy, Hong Kong and one of America's best restaurants - Per Se (New York). Adam has also twice been the Victorian winner in the Lexus Young Chef of the Year award. With many novice cooks under his wing, Adam believes success does not come overnight, you need to work at it and make sure your decisions are calculated with goals and objectives.
GSCC2020 - Adam Carey Crop
Adam Carey
Adam has been an employee within the performance department at Tennis Australia since 2011. His current assignment is working with QLD’s 12-15 girls having formally spent time as a been a National Head Coach in Western Australia and a National Women’s Coach in the National Academy in Brisbane. Prior to returning to Australia, Adam spent 12 years working in the United States as a private coach and business owner, a USTA employee, Collegiate Division 1 Head Coach and Director of the Andre Agassi Foundation. He is currently working on his Doctorate in Philosophy at the University of Queensland having completed his Bachelors and Masters in the USA. His area of focus for his PhD is “How daily training environments grow expertise in coaches” and is fascinated by the way coaches interact, frame beliefs and develop their “personal story” through the athletes, coaches and environments they develop.
GSCC2020 - Chris Kachel
Chris Kachel
Chris has a 50 year tennis legacy of playing, coaching and educating at the highest level. He spent 8 years on the professional circuit with a career high ATP singles ranking of 73 and doubles 19. Chris was Head Coach of the Australian Institute of Sport for 12 years 1990 -2002. In 2000 he was awarded the Australian Sports Medal for service to the sport through coaching and the development of young talented tennis players. He coached for two years on the WTA tour before taking up a 2year position with the Chinese Tennis Association coaching female athletes in the National team. In 2009 he was the TCAV Coach of the year. Chris is the current Tennis Australia Manager of Development & Environment and is heavily involved in the education of coaches through the High Performance Coaching Course, High Performance Next Gen Program, Talent Development Program – liaising with Platinum coaches and mentoring.
GSCC2020 - Machar Reid Cropped
Dr Machar Reid
Machar Reid is the Head of Innovation at Tennis Australia. Prior to this appointment, Machar served as Tennis Australia’s inaugural High Performance Manager and Sport Science & Medicine Manager from 2008 to 2014. During this time, his expertise and leadership established a much-envied performance pathway which reasserted Australian tennis onto the international stage. In his current role, Machar leads the company’s mission to challenge the sport’s conventional wisdom and status quo. This involves combining a digital ideation and delivery focus within the Tennis Australia’s data-science and equipment incubators as well as an active investment focus in early stage sports technology companies. Machar holds an MBA (Deakin University), a PhD (UWA) and is an Adjunct Professor at Victoria University.
GSCC2020 - Julia Lawrence Head Shot 1
Julia Lawrence
Julia’s involvement within the sports industry spans 25 years. A former secondary PE teacher, Julia took up the Coaching Director role at Netball Victoria in 1995 where she worked for 15 years in various technical, development and corporate roles. Moving to Singapore in 2011 with her family, Julia worked with Netball Singapore for 5 years as Technical Manager overseeing both Coach and Umpire Development. Julia returned home in 2016 and was appointed to the position of General Manager – Coach & International Development at Netball Australia. She has also been a member of the International Netball Federation’s Coaching Advisory Panel since 2014. Julia’s legacy in netball included the review and development of Netball Singapore’s Coach and Umpire Accreditation Frameworks and the development of a digital blended learning strategy and content creation for Netball Australia’s Coach Accreditation programs. In September 2018, Julia took a leap of faith to leave the Netball industry and take on the role as Coaching Development Manager with the AFL. Together with the AFL Coaching Team, Julia has contributed to the evolution and rollout of CoachAFL, a digital membership and e-learning platform, and the transformation of the AFL Coach Accreditation framework to align with contemporary learning practices. Julia was promoted to the position of National Coaching Development and Education Manager in October 2019 and is the first female appointed to the head of coaching role at the AFL!
GSCC2020 - David Rath Head Shot 1
David Rath
David Rath is the newly appointed Head of Football Program at St Kilda Football Club in the Australian Football League. The broad brief of this role is to shape the football program alongside Coach Brett Ratten and identify areas for improvement across the coaching and football analysis team. Rath will manage St Kilda's assistant coaches, development coaches and football analysts. He will also oversee the game plan, coach education and development, training, player skill acquisition, training analytics, game analysis and IT, leadership and player development. Rath comes to St Kilda from his role as Coaching Innovation and Education Manager of the Australian Football League (AFL) and was responsible for the roll-out of a new national coaching strategy – headlined by the digital platform - CoachAFL. David has also been heavily involved in profiling the direction the game is heading on-field, to inform rule change and game style conversations working with Football Operations staff. David previously spent 13 years in a variety of coaching and management roles at Hawthorn Football Club, including assistant coach, performance analyst and most recently as Head of Football Strategy and Innovation. Before these football roles, he spent 9 years working as a Biomechanist and Performance Analyst in the Sports Science Department of the Australian Institute of Sport, across a range of Olympic sports, analysing athletic techniques in order to optimise performance and minimise injury risk.
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - MAY 11:  on May 11, 2016 in Melbourne, Australia.  (Photo by Robert Cianflone - CA/Cricket Australia/Getty Images)
Darren Holder
Darren is an experienced facilitator, coach developer and systems convener with a demonstrated history of working in the sports industry, particularly with coaches and performance leaders to develop strategy, design systems, implement processes and support learning and the growth of individuals. Darren has spent the past two decades as a respected cricket professional working with international cricket organisations around the globe to achieve their goals and objectives, particularly in Australia, India, the USA and Caribbean. Darren is a visionary in the field of coach learning, who is always prepared to challenge traditional thinking in the search for better, and is a key architect in the growth of Australian Cricket’s Elite Coaches. Having recently founded his own consulting business, Coaching Better, Darren connects theory with practice in the pursuit of sustainable success. Learning is key to coaching better and everything he offers is underpinned by evidence-based research. Creating value through connecting a vast network across domestic and international sport from pathway to elite, and the sport coaching academia, Darren has developed an ecosystem of coach expertise and support to facilitate a variety of experiential learning opportunities in secure social learning spaces.

GSCC2020 - David Hunter Smith Headshot
David Hunter Smith
David is a Plastic Surgeon with a special interest in reconstructive breast and abdominal surgery, hand surgery (particularly Dupuytren’s disease), surgical research, and medical education. He holds the academic position of Professor of Surgery, Monash University and supervises PhD and other higher degree students. As the Director of surgical research, he is the lead physician for the melanoma and complex skin cancer service and senior surgeon for the Peninsula Health Network in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. He examined in Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery for the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and mentors and trains advanced Plastic surgery trainees.David is also a member of many Australian and International surgical societies and he is a Fellow of The Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and the American College of Surgeons. David has a Masters degree in Public Health, which has broadened his outlook on surgery as a public health priority. His research interests focus around Dupuytren’s disease, augmented reality, basal thumb arthritis, and quality of life outcomes.
Kathryn Mitchell
Kathryn Mitchell
Australian Track and Field Athlete - Javelin. A career spanning two decades, Kathryn is one of the world’s top ranked javelin throwers. Growing up in south west country Victoria, she was a promising junior all-round athlete. She started training seriously for the javelin at the age of 17, moving away from home to access coaching and facilities. Kathryn only became competitive at an international level, at the later age of 28, after meeting and training with coach and now partner, East German javelin world record holder Uwe Hohn; the only man in history to throw the javelin further than 100 meters. Hohn completely overhauled Kathryn’s technical and physical training which has so far resulted in more than 10 meters improvement of her personal best distance. Prior to meeting Hohn, Kathryn almost quit the sport due to a six year period without improvement with her previous coach. Her journey has taken her to two Olympic Games finals, three World Championship and four Commonwealth Games teams. She is the current Australian record holder with a personal best of 68.92 meters achieved at the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games in 2018, where she won the gold medal and broke the Games record. Her throw still the biggest in the world since 2013.
GSCC2020 - Veronique Richard
Veronique Richard
Veronique Richard earned her doctoral degree in sport science from the University of Montreal then went on to complete a postdoctoral fellowship in sport psychology at Florida State University. Her research focuses on the effects of creativity enhancement on motor performance and psychological adaptation. She is currently leading a rich and varied performance psychology practice primarily working as a mental performance consultant with numerous Canadian national teams (e.g. water polo, artistic swimming) and individual elite athletes (e.g. gymnastics, figure skating, trampoline, etc.). As a Mental Performance Advisor for Cirque du Soleil, Veronique Richard supports artists to optimize their performance and ensure their well-being. Additionally, she is an associate researcher at the Montreal National Circus School working on several creativity projects. Finally, building on her research and applied experiences, she has designed a program to stimulate and foster creativity which combines movement improvisation, creative problem solving and collective ideation. With this program, she has helped organizations around the world such as Cricket Australia, Coaching Better, PAISAC, NXT WWE, and PGA coaches to create their next practice.