Local Coach Going for Gold

By Sean Smith
Staff Writer
North Penn Life
May 27, 1999

With the help of North Wales resident Sean Hanley, a number of Pennsylvania powerlifters will be going for the gold this summer.

Hanley will be one of 20 coaches and 72 athletes from Pennsylvania attending the 1999 Special Olympics World Games from June 26- July 4th in Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill, N.C as part of Team USA.

A trainer at the North Penn YMCA, and an employee of Indian Creek Foundation, Hanley, 27, has been involved with the Special Olympics for 12 years and said coaching in the World Games is a definite highlight of that involvement.

Hanley’s coaching career started out innocently enough when a ninth – grade classmate and Special Olympian sitting at his lunch table suggested he help keep score at a bowling tournament.

From there, Hanley was hooked.

“ I found out there was a network of other sports that interested me, and found out I like coaching in general,” Hanley said.

Hanley said coaching Special Olympics is like coaching any high-level athlete, with the addition of being part of a “very close fraternity.”

As a Special Olympics coach, Hanley said he gets to know parents and families of athletes. He said he forms close bonds with his athletes, with whom he may hang out with after a competition, and in general, “have a blast “ with at the YMCA.

Don’t think it is all fun and games though.

When it comes to his approach to coaching, Hanley said athletes can expect, “ a guy that gives you brass. A guy that gives you the honest truth and trains you the way you need to be trained. “

Hanley said he looks at all aspects of life through the eyes of a coach and that he has learned as much coaching as he has taught.

“ I have found out an incredibly great amount about myself, who I am, and what I want to do, “ Hanley said, adding he plans to open a training center dedicated to servicing the mentally challenged.

For a coach, Hanley said there could be nothing better than making the World Games, a competitive experience on par with any other. Hanley attended the 1995 World Games in New Haven, Connecticut as an assistant powerlifting coach.

“It’s as intense, exciting and amazing as the regular Olympics. There is total similarity,” Hanley said.

Hanley counted walking in the opening ceremonies of the 1995 World Games among more than 7,000 athletes representing 150 countries, as one of the top 10 moments of his life.

“You have 1,000 emotions running through you in one electric charge,” Hanley said. “ It’s awesome, and that is an understatement.”

Hanley added, “ There is nothing comparable to it, not until another two months.”