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Hugh Fisher – Winning as a way of life

“There are no stars on a dragon boat team.
1530alta
Hugh Fisher Photo by Randylincks.com

“There are no stars on a dragon boat team. But then there are no passengers either…”

– Hugh Fisher

With the Summer Olympics in Beijing just over the horizon, I couldn’t help but reflect on the Sea to Sky corridor and those individuals living here who have been successful in past Games. Alas, the list is quite short. Whistler resident Shannon Smith won a bronze medal in swimming at the 1976 Olympics in Montreal and Steve Podborski followed with another bronze in Lake Placid four years later. In 1992, current Squamish resident Hillary Lindh won the silver medal in downhill as a member of the US Ski Team. But beyond these three, the pickings get mighty slim…

Fortunately, there is Pemberton resident Dr. Hugh Fisher. A double-medal winner in Los Angeles in flatwater kayaking (gold and bronze), the blond-headed Fisher and his Mohawk partner Alwyn Morris provided Canada with one of the most powerful images of the 1984 Games. Indeed, few who witnessed the medal ceremony in LA will ever forget Morris proudly lifting an eagle feather high in the air as the two teammates were awarded their gold medal for the K-2 1000m sprint.

While Fisher is better known locally for having coached the Laoyam Eagles to their 10 th victory in a row in the junior division at Vancouver’s International Dragon Boat Festival — an outstanding feat given Pemberton Secondary’s 200 students — the understated physician has a remarkable athletic resume. He was a member of four Olympic Teams (from 1976 to 1988), a double medallist at the ’83 World Championships and still today at 52, is one of the fastest Master’s paddlers on the planet.

Given all the talk about the “stuff” Whistler will get in return for being an Olympic host, it’s interesting to note that Fisher credits much of his international success to a Games legacy. But in his case, it didn’t come from the Olympics. “The Canada Summer Games held in Burnaby in 1973 was hugely important,” he explains. “The event itself was sort of forgettable for me, tipping as I did on the start line... but the construction of a world class flatwater racing and training venue on Burnaby Lake, about a mile from my house, was like an unbelievable $1.2 million personal gift to me. I trained there for the next decade with many world-class paddlers — including my future partner, Alwyn Morris.”

Interesting too, that he is putting the finishing touches to a legacy of his own back in Pemberton. And yet I would have never known had his colleague Dr. Cathryn Zeglinski not told me about it. “The local paddling club,” she wrote me, “has a new home now at One Mile Lake in Pemberton with the recent building of a clubhouse on volunteer donations of time and labour.” And that, she explained, would have never come about without Hugh’s involvement.

Fisher, however, refuses to take all the credit for getting such a promising community legacy off the ground. “I just got tired of hauling the boats around,” he says with his signature self-conscious chuckle. “So I went to the village, told them the concept, and they stepped up and got involved.” He pauses for just a moment. “Pemberton really supports its athletes, you know. It hasn’t been all that hard to go out and ask people for help. In a way, it’s a lot like dragon boat racing — many hands make light work…”

What fascinates me most about Fisher, though, is how such a watersports athlete (he’s participated and competed in just about every paddling activity known to man) ever ended up living and working in a landlocked community like Pemberton. Another gust of laughter. “Good question,” he says. “I’ve been asking myself that a lot recently. You know, I’ve been living here now for the better part of two decades. Even raised a family here. I love this place. Really like the people in Pemberton.” He stops. Takes a deep breath. “Still, at this point in my life, the idea of living closer to the sea holds a lot of appeal…”

But back to his path to Pemberton.

Born in New Zealand — but raised primarily in Burnaby — Fisher put off his medical residency training until after the 1988 Olympics in Seoul. Too late to enroll in a B.C.-based program, he decided to go back to his country of birth to complete his education. “I worked in a very rural setting on the North Island,” he says. “It was full-scope medicine in a small community. And I loved it.” He smiles. “So when I returned to Canada, I decided to take two years to travel though B.C. and find the right place for me.”

His first stop was in Pemberton. “The local doctor desperately needed a break,” he says. “So I was persuaded to sign on for one year.” He never left…

Given his first 24 hours in the valley, it’s amazing Fisher even stayed another day. “It was September of 1991,” he remembers. “On my first night in Pemberton, a call for help came over the radio. The Lillooet River was flooding and they needed volunteers to help fill sandbags. So that’s what I did for most of my first night there.” Exhausted from the work, the young doctor dragged himself to his B&B the next morning only to be awakened a few minutes later by the unmistakable sound of gunshots outside his window. “Turns out that the police had been forced to shoot a bear because everybody else was busy fighting the flood.” He laughs. “It was quite a welcome…”

The next week, Hugh brought his wife, Hillary Downing, to Pemberton. “She’s from a small B.C. town herself,” he says with almost a straight face. “And her intention at the time was not to live in a small B.C. town again…”

Undeterred, Fisher embarked on his new medical adventure with the same energy he’d applied to his paddling. “Pemberton was quite a different place back then,” he explains. “I was treating primarily farmers and loggers and members of the local First Nations community. Unfortunately, I was the only doc around and my practice was huge — one of the 10 biggest in the province,” He sighs. “During those early years, I was on-call 100 per cent of the time. There were overwhelming moments, for sure!”

But somehow he managed. “I was raised to think you have something to give back to your community,” he explains. “So I just did what I had to do.” Still, folks in Pemberton had never seen the likes of a doctor like Hugh Fisher before. He laughs. “People around here think it’s totally normal now for me to walk into the hardware store in board shorts and flip flops.” Another round of self-deprecating laughter. “But at first, I’m not sure they really knew what to think...”

Even the launch of his coaching career in the village came at him sideways. “The parents of some of the kids at the high school thought I was a rower, so they asked me if I would start a local rowing club.” He smiles again. “I told them I didn’t know much about rowing. But if they were interested in paddling, I might be able to do something for them there.”

Fisher seems to be the kind of person who sees obstacles merely as challenges to overcome. He approached paddling aficionado (and friend) Tim Malone at Whistler’s Outdoor Experience with the idea, convinced him to “lend” him two Voyageur canoes for the program and then he invited local kids to come out and try out for the new team. “We spent the first few years just learning the ropes,” he says. “But right from the beginning, I decided I would take the kids to Vancouver to compete in what was then the biggest dragon boat festival around.” To everyone’s surprise, the unknown team from this tiny Coast Mountain village knew what it was doing. In their third appearance, the Eagles won the very competitive junior division title. They’ve never relinquished it since…

“You know, I look around this place and I see all these 8,000-foot mountains surrounding the village,” he says. “It’s like living in a big bowl. And as beautiful as this valley is, I believe you have to get out of the bowl every now and then in order to see the rest of the world.” He pauses. “For me, that was a big motivation in getting these kids to race. When we go down for an event in Vancouver now, it’s not just 40 kids and their coach. It’s parents and family and friends and… you know what I mean. It’s a community thing…”

And then he adds: “There’s nothing like taking 25 kids from Pemberton to downtown Toronto and seeing the reaction on their faces. That’s when I realize that I get way more out of this program than I put in.” Still, it’s not like these kids are tourists. Competing at the World Crew Championships there two years ago, they won seven out of a possible nine gold medals...

A quietly intense man, Fisher admits he’s not a yelling, screaming, rah-rah kind of coach. “That’s just not my style,” he says. “My focus is on teaching good technique and good movement.” He pauses. “I know there are a lot of coaches out there who would disagree with me, but if the kids aren’t laughing and splashing each other at the end of one of my workouts, I figure I’ve done something wrong…”

Clearly Hugh Fisher is one of those uniquely talented individuals whose positive attitude and personal work ethic easily rub off on people. And I could go on and on about his accomplishments. But it would only embarrass him. Let me just finish off then with Hugh’s reflection on that day 24 years ago in LA when he was crowned the best his sport. “For me, winning an Olympic gold medal was a very important thing,” he says. “But I realize now that during all those years of training, I also got to experience things that today I value much more than my gold medal…”