Marcel Da Ponte

Head Coach

Email

Born in South Africa, Coach Marcel is an ASCA Level 4 certified coach who brings 27 years of relevant experience to CMA. He has enjoyed a distinguished swimming and coaching career, both in the United States and Internationally.

As an athlete, he was selected as a team captain for the South African National High School's Team, his club team and his local high school team. Most of his career was spent competing for the Pretoria Aquatic Club swim team in South Africa, where he swam under South African Olympic Coach Gerhard van der Walt. Coach Gerhard was ranked 2nd in the world in the 100m butterfly in 1987 and competed for Arizona State in the late 1980’s. Marcel placed 2nd in the 100m breaststroke and 3rd in the 200m breaststroke at the South African Junior National Championships and was the first athlete in his high school's 100 year history to receive an honors award for swimming. He is a two-time Olympic Trials qualifier (1992 and 1996) in the breaststroke events, placing 5th in the 200m breaststroke at the 1992 trials. Marcel competed at the NCAA Division I level for the Ball State Cardinals in Indiana, graduating with a degree in Business Administration in 2000. During his swimming days, he also trained in the U.S. under famed Canadian National Coach, Nick Baker at the International Swimming Hall of Fame pool in Ft. Lauderdale and attended the prestigious Pine Crest School in Florida for a summer swim season.

As a coach, he spent the early part of his career back in South Africa, before moving to the U.S. Here, he has been head coach of U.S.A. Swimming clubs in both Arizona and Arkansas before moving to Maine.  He brings to the team a fantastic combination of coaching expertise, wonderful enthusiasm for the sport of swimming and excellent communication skills. Coach Marcel has produced swimmers who have qualified for National and International teams and at all other levels including, Speedo Far Westerns, Sectionals, Futures, NCSA Junior Nationals, Speedo Junior Nationals, TYR Pro Series, U.S. Open, U.S. Nationals. He has also placed numerous athletes onto NCAA Division I, II and III college teams. He is a coach member of the South African Olympic Committee, Swimming South Africa, African Swim Coaches Association, American Swim Coaches Association (ASCA) and World Swim Coaches Association (WSCA). Coach Marcel's coaching philosophy encompases the statement of, "doing the little things exceptionally well", having fantastic underwaters and streamlines, great technique and having fun working hard.

Marcel and his wife Tamaryn are very dedicated parents to their three children, Isabell, Landon and Adrienne.

Todd Larlee

Assistant Coach

Email

Todd has been in the sport of open water swimming and triathlon for over ten years. Prior to moving back to Maine in the beginning of 2015, Todd was coaching and swimming with Gerry Rodrigues and Tower 26 in Los Angeles as well as coaching youth and junior swimmers & triathletes. Todd brings knowledge and an ability to challenge athletes to be the best athlete possible. His goal is to make each and every workout challenging and fun.  Originally from the Auburn area, Todd is enjoying being part of the Maine community again with his wife Heather and two dogs Ciana & Maverick.

Lillian Langeveld

Assistant Coach

Email

Jeff H Ward

Assistant Coach

Email

Coach Jeff comes to us with over 40 years of experience in athletics.  His college swim coaching career started at West Point, as an assistant to the men's program.  He then went on to be the head coach of the women’s team at Columbia.  At the club level, he was head coach of the Hanover Swim Team and the West Point Swim Club.  He has worked extensively with swimmers at all levels from beginners to national champions.  

His administrative experience includes 14 years as the athletic director at Bowdoin after serving as the assistant AD at Brown.  He was also Chief Program Officer at Asphalt Green where he supervised the AGUA swim program and helped develop it into a USA Swimming Gold Medal program, the top distinction in USA Swimming.  As an administrator and consultant, he has developed and led programing in a wide variety of areas including leadership, college recruiting, and inclusion.

Now settled back in Maine, he is excited to work with developing swimmers at CMA.

Meg Alberts

Assistant Coach

Email

Meg brings a career in physical therapy and a love of all things swimming to CMA.  

My career as a physical therapist included time spent in teaching and clinical work. I worked as clinical faculty at Indiana University School of Medicine and guest lecturer at University of Illinois at Chicago and University of Indianapolis.  I worked in clinical private practice and served the American Physical Therapy Association as the Indiana State Representative for the Section on Women’s Health.  

Over the past 20 years my life has come to revolve aroundswimming, aquatic facilities, and athletics.  Our family’s commitment and involvement at our local aquatics and tennis club, The Riviera Club in Indy, lead to my service as an elected board member.  Chairing programming, our committee looked closely at member commitment and long term participation in programming.  I’ve been actively involved in Indy Aquatic Masters and USMS.   

Most importantly, my husband, Mark, and I are in the bleachers supporting our daughters’ swimming pursuits.   

I couldn’t be more excited to work with CMA’s swimmers, committed families, and extraordinary coaching staff.