Kacy Vig Ota
CEO / Senior Coach
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Kacy Ota is on his second year as Head Coach of Conejo SImi Swim Club. Kacy has been coaching some level of swimming since the age of 14 years old, and now is in his 19th year of coaching some level of swimming. He has taught learn to Swim, Pre-Competition swimmers, Novice Swimmers, Summer Leaguers, Age Groupers, High School, Masters, Advanced Age-Goupers, Pre-Seniors, Seniors, College, and National Level Swimmers. He has also been active in the operations of Local Swim Committees since the age of 17 years old.
He previously was the Senior Assistant and Head Age-Group Coach for Conejo Simi Swim Club from 2010 - 2015. Prior to joining the CSSC Coaching staff Kacy was Head Coach for two years for Raisin Country Aquatics (The Selma Site for the Tule Nation Tritons). Prior to be head coach at RCA, Kacy was the Head Age-Group Coach for six years, and an age-group coach for 2 years prior to that position. He coached under the supervision of the Head Coach Gary Ota (his father) before taking over the swim club. As Head Coach he continued to coach the Advanced Age-Groupers while his brother coached the Senior Swimmers. During this time Kacy attended California State University, Fresno where he earned his Bachelors Degree in Mass Communcations and Journalism with an emphasis in Electronic Media Productions.
Kacy is a member of the American Swim Coaches Association which through his achievements have earned a Level 3 status as an Age-Group Coach.
He has also served as a Head Coach for a recreational summer team, the Selma Aqua Bears for 7 years, and also served as President of the Selma Aqua Bears for 3 years. The Aqua Bears are part of the Central Valley Recreational Swim League (CVRSL) which Kacy has been a Team Representative for 7 years, Vice-President for one year, taught a coaches clinic two years, and taught Meet Admin for two years. He served as an Athlete Representative for Central California Swimming for four years, a Team Representative for four years, and Age-Group Vice Chair for one year. He has also served as Diversity and Inclusion Chair for the Coastal Section of Southern California Swimming and now as Diversity and Inclusion Chair for Southern California Swimming. Throughout his coaching career Kacy has coached 13 All-Star Teams Coaching Staffs and was Head Coach of the Central California Western Zone Team in 2010.
Kacy was Head Diving Coach for Immanuel High School for two years and then became Head Swim Coach of Selma High School where he coached for 7 high school seasons. During his time at Selma he developed the team to over 60 athletes and had Division 1 CIF qualifiers and relays almost every year. Upon moving to Simi Valley, Kacy began the Grace Brethren High School Swim Team which he coached for 3 years. He had multiple Division 4 CIF qualifers and relays including a Individual event champion. Kacy is now a Volunteer Coach for California Lutheran University Swim and Dive Team. In his first year with the program, the team broke numerous school records.
Kacy's swimming career was fairly short, as he ended his swimming after High School. He was a backstroker in high school. He chose to attend school close to home and began his coaching career at the age of 18, after 4 years of coaching the Summer League Level and one fall as a Seasonal Club Coach. He became Head Age-Group coach at 20 years old and then Head Coach at 25. He also worked with school district a lot to help get the new Selma High School Pool to be built during his time in Selma.
Kevin Lane
Head CLU Coach
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Kevin has been teaching and coaching aquatics for over 30 years. In our area he has coached Novice teams for Daland Swim School and South Coast Aquatics, and has done lessons for numerous young people in and around our area including many of our current CSSC swimmers. The last 5 years he has been the Cal Lutheran Assistant Coach for their Swim and Dive Team, and will continue this year for his 6th year in that position. Kevin has also been a coach for local Masters Teams and is a Certified US Masters Swimming Coach Level 2.
Kevin's swimming experience began at the young age of 7 years in Connecticut. During his swimming career he set and helped set Connecticut state records, as well as being a swimmer on various Connecticut All-Star Teams. He continued his career in college at Southern Connecticut State University, which was a Top Ten NCAA Division 2 Team at the time. He swam at the national level and set school records in the 200 Fly and in relays, and was elected as team captain his senior year. Kevin continued his swimming after college as a Masters Swimmer and won the US Masters National one mile Open Water Event for his age-group.
Jennifer Ota
Head Age Group Coach
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Coach Jen is the Head Age Group Coach for Conejo Simi Swim Club.
Elite Age-Group Coach
Coach Jen joined the CSSC coaching staff in 2011 and took over as Head Age Group Coach in 2015. Jen swam for CSSC (CSA at the time) and graduated from Royal High School in 2001. Jen's prior coaching experience includes 6 years of coaching at Clovis Swim Club (near Fresno) where she attended school and competed> Jen has coached Clovis Swim Club's Stroke Team, has taught at a Swim America Swim School, and has worked with Clovis Swim Club's age groupers where she helped develop a nationally ranked 8 and under athlete. Jen truly understands age-group development coaching, from learn-to-swim to advanced 12 and under training, and she absolutely loves swimming and kids.
Peter Daland
Age-Group Coach
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Peter comes from a long aquatic family. The Daland family has a long legacy of Olympic swimming, NCAA swimming – USC Trojans and teaching all levels of swimmers at the Daland Swim School for the past 30 years. Peter grew up in and around aquatics competing at the highest level in both swimming and water polo as a youth. Peter grew up swimming for his mother Ingrid Daland with Conejo Simi Aquatics (now CSSC). After his swimming and water polo playing days, Peter jumped right into the ranks of coaching. He has coached both water polo and swimming as a the head coach at Westlake High School, Thousand Oaks High School, Highland High School, Utah, Rowland-Hall St. Marks Prep, Utah and currently at Moorpark High School where he has been teaching at the school for the past 16 years. He also coached for six years in Utah where he head coach of the Salt Lake Aquatic Club at the Steiner Aquatic Center. While coaching club swimming Peter coached swimmers all the way to the Olympic Trial level. He has also spent many years heading up the swim team at the Daland Swim School in Thousand Oaks. Peter graduated from Cal Lutheran University with a Bachelors of Science degree and received his Masters in Education and Administration from National University. He has also earned a Culinary Arts Degree.
Teri Berkel
Age-Group Coach
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Teri begins her seventh year with CSSC as our Red Group Coach at Rancho Simi. Teri worked with CSSC's Green and White Group swimmers in her first year and continues to look forward to helping our swimmers progress through the Age Group program. She has a long history in the sport of swimming, starting as a child where she swam for the Torrance Dolphins and was an age group record holder in breaststroke.
She has a degree from CSUN and is currently pursuing her Masters Degree in Kinesiology (the science of movement).
Teri competed as a teenager while living in Oklahoma but switched to running upon her return to California. She spent her collegiate career as a runner for CSUN. Currently, she competes at Masters swim competitions as well as continuing to be a competitive runner. She has also competed in many triathlons in the past.
Teri has also been coaching Swimming for Conditioning classes at CSUN for nine years as well as teaching private swim lessons every summer. Her specialties include working on the
fundamentals, technique and stroke refinement in all four competitive strokes. Her goal is to help swimmers learn to love swimming while also progressing from novice to advanced Age Group swimmers.
Brian Murphy
Age-Group Coach
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Brian Murphy joins the CSSC Staff at CLU, working primarily with
our Red Group. His athletic career was in water polo, where
he played at Occidental College in the early 70s and participated
in the Water Polo Olympic Trials for the 1976 Olympics. He
coached at Occidental during the mid-seventies, and began coaching
club swimming in 1980. He owned Arroyo Seco Aquatics and
coached a number of age group top 10 athletes and took teams to
Junior and Senior Nationals from 1981 through 1992. Brian
helped student-athletes reach the 1988 and 1992 Olympic Swimming
Trials.
In 1986 he helped organize the founding not-for-profit Board
that build the Rose Bowl Aquatics Center. He currently
participates in Masters swimming and water polo.
Brian has a wealth of knowledge and experience in running
successful aquatics program and enjoys working with young athletes.
Andy H Nguyen
Age-Group Coach
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Andy began swimming at age 10 at the Simi Valley YMCA. He swam for 3 years there before his family moved to Orange County where he continued swimming with Irvine Novaquatics. Upon returning to Simi in 2009, Andy joined Conejo Simi and swam in the Blue and Senior 2 groups before graduating from Simi Valley High School in May. Andy is currently a Freshman at Cal Lutheran University where he will continue his swimming career and hopes to earn a degree in Bioengineering.
Outside of the pool, Andy enjoys vanilla ice cream and cheering>
Sara Peterson
Substitute Coach
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Sara Peterson joins CSSC's staff as CLU's Green Group coach. Sara is a 2nd year student at Cal Lutheran and is majoring in Exercise Science with hopes to be a Physical Therapist. She has been a competitive swimmer AND coach for 9 years, beginning as a swimming lessons instructor and working her way to CSSC.
Sara's enthusiasm for learning is evident in her background as a student-athlete and coach, and her focus>
When she is not at the pool she is reading, socializing, or cheering>
