Coach
Mark Tierney is ORCA's Head Swim Coach and CEO. He started
coaching for ORCA in 1999 and took over as Head Coach and CEO in
2001.
Mark has been selected to
coach the Southern California Swimming all-stars at their season ending meets
every year since 2006; coaching the 15/16 girls for the 2006 Zone team,
and the 17/18 girls for the North American Challenge Cup against Canada
and Mexico every year since 2007. As well as being the
CEO and Head Coach of ORCA, Mark also coaches the most advanced group at ORCA.
Mark is a graduate of Fort
Louis
College in Durango, Colorado
where he attended on swimming scholarship and graduated with a BA degree
in
in Business Administration.
In 1985 Mark met his wife in
Portofino, Italy while he was working in the
fashion industry. They were married on Valentines Day in 1987. He and his wife, Anna, have a son, Kristopher (born in
1992) and a daughter, Kaitlin (born in 2001), both ORCA swimmers.
Coach
Jess Withey came to ORCA in March of 2009 as ORCA's Head Age-Group Swim
Coach, overseeing the 12 and under program. Jess currently
directly coaches the Silver groups.
Jess'
previous coaching experience includes coaching as an assistant for NCAA
Division I, Syracuse University, where he also helped recruit
and coach NCAA
qualifiers in 2004, 2005, and NCAA All-Americans in 2006. He was
also an age-group assistant coach for the
Syracuse Chargers, part of
USA Swimming and Niagara Swimming. Jess also has
Southern California club coaching experience
with the San Pedro
Peninsula YMCA (SPPY) where he worked as an age-group coach, as well as
with Rose Bowl Aquatics.
Jess swam at Syracuse University where he graduated in 1997 with
a Bachelor of Science in Health and Exercise. While swimming at
Syracuse, Jess went on to set university records in multiple events, and
in 1997 helped Syracuse win the Big East Swimming Championships.
His other swimming experience includes swimming at
the Senior National level for
USA
Swimming from 1993-1997 and Junior National level from 1992-1993.
Jess was the YMCA National Champion in 1993 in the 50
Yard freestyle.
Growing up in
Los Angeles,
Jess was a two-time high school swimming All-American where he broke and
still
holds the C.I.F. La County record in the 50 and 100
yard freestyle events, which he set back in 1993.
Coach
Stephanie Wood is ORCA's Bronze swim coach. She began working with our
swimmers in the summer of 2002. Prior to joining our coaching staff,
Stephanie taught swimming privately.
Although she started coaching for ORCA in 2002, she started swimming
with ORCA when she was 5 years old!
In addition to club swimming Stephanie was a varsity swimmer and water
polo player for Villa Park High School.
She was named "Girl's Swimmer of
the Year" in both her Junior and Senior Years. She was also acknowledged
as being the "Hardest Worker" during her Senior Year for water polo.
Stephanie was also a member of
the Orange Coast College Women's Swim Team in the 2001/2002 and
2002/2003 academic years. During
her second season she won 1st place in the 50 Breast Stroke and 5th
place in the 100 Breast Stroke in the Conference Finals. During that
same year in the State competition, Stephanie finished 8th in the 100
meter Breast Stroke and 10th in the 50 meter Breast Stroke.
Her team took first at the State
Championships for the first time since 1997!
Stephanie is currently continuing her studies at Cal State
Fullerton.
Stephanie is a fine example of the long-term benefits ORCA's outstanding
stroke technique instruction and club competition opportunities bring to
our athletes. Additionally, she
is truly a wonderful role model for our swimmers as she now returns to
share her coaching skills!
Coach Desi Turcios
began working for ORCA in the summer of 2006 as a swim lesson
instructor, and she started coaching for ORCA in the fall of 2008, where
she currently coaches the Gold 1 and 2 swim groups. Desi swam on
the ORCA swim team from 2002 to 2005. She graduated from El Modena
High in 2009, where she also competed on the varsity water polo and swim
teams. Along with coaching at ORCA, Desi is one of the El Modena
High School swim team coaches.
Coach
Ashley Yotter joined ORCA's coaching staff in June 2011. Her
extensive background includes swimming competitively since she was 5,
competing for Team Santa Monica. She moved to Redlands Swim Team in
1990 and trained with them through a majority of her Age Group years.
In 1996 she moved to Irvine to work with NOVA Aquatics through High
School. She served four years on Varsity for Irvine
High School and spent her senior year
as Team Captain as well as the JV/Frosh Soph Coach. Ashley went on to
earn an athletic scholarship to Northern Arizona University. She came back to Orange
County in the spring of 2003 to coach
at her alma mater for another season. Shortly after her Daughter was
born in the summer of 2007 she began working as the Head Coach for
Saddleback El Toro (SET) Aquatics. She was the founding Head Coach for
the program and oversaw the development/training of the coaching staff,
the group configurations and expectations as well as designed an
education component for the program to cover topics such as nutrition,
goal setting, prioritizing, visualizing, accountability and leadership.
Before coming to ORCA, Coach Ashley also spent a short term coaching the
Gators Swim Team here locally in Southern California.
