Coaches and Directors
Coach Brad is entering his 3rd season as head coach of Arena Club Aquatics. This will be his 7th season overall with the team. Coach Brad is a current USA registered swim coach, and ASCA level 3 educated coach.
For the first few seasons, Coach Brad mainly worked with 10&U swimmers, and novice 11-12’s. Since becoming head coach in fall of 2020, Coach Brad has begun working with all practice groups, and swimmers of all ability levels. Being involved with all the groups has helped him get a solid feel on the program as a whole, and has helped him grow as a coach.
Senior performance and senior development are the two groups in which Coach Brad is the primary/lead coach for. Meaning he writes the sets and practices each day. He is in and out with junior group, starz development, and mini starz and will occasionally write the sets for them. However, he relies mainly on his assistant coaches for the sets with these groups.
Most recently at the 2022 MD Long Course State Championships, ACA had 9 swimmers qualify and attend, and more impressively placed 10th out of 31 teams who scored.
Throughout his time at ACA, Coach Brad has coached more than 20 state qualifiers (6 individual first place finishes), 3 sectional qualifiers, and 1 futures qualifier.
In addition to coaching USA swim, Coach Brad also is the head coach of the summer swim team at The Arena Club. The Arena Club has had 4 consecutive (excluding the summer of 2020 with no summer swim) 2nd place finishes in the HSL, while being small in size, never having more than 120 swimmers.
Each year it is Coach Brad’s goal to grow more junior champ, state, and national qualifiers within the program. As a whole, the coaching staff is very excited about the direction ACA is headed towards. The entire coaching staff is aimed to help each child reach their highest potential in swimming!
Coach June has been a part of the Arena Club Aquatics swim team since 2009. She first began as a swimmer on the Arena Club's Summer Swim Team. She then began swimming year-round, and eventually was a member of Patterson Mill High School's team. Coach June had a lot of success in swimming over the years, with her best stroke being backstroke. She also qualified for High School States during her time at Patterson Mill.
She has been an assistant coach for the year round team since the fall of 2018. She originally began helping with our younger and novice swimmers. Throughout her time at ACA she has grown and become more involved with our older swimmers and their training. In 2021, Coach June became the lead coach for our junior group, and starz development group. She will continue to be the lead coach of the junior group and STARZ group while assisting with the senior development group for the 2022-2023 season. She is currently a registered USA swim coach, and ASCA level 2 coach.
She has recently graduated from Towson University with a bachelor's degree in English. Besides coaching our year-round team, Coach June is also one of our best swim instructors, and is an assistant coach with the summer swim team as well.
Coach Jennings began swimming with Arena Club Aquatics in 2013 and swam through 2020. During his time swimming, he was a 2-time state champion, Speedo Sectionals Qualifier, and had a nationwide top 25 50 freestyle for a brief period. Despite hanging up his cap and goggles in 2020, he transitioned into coaching, revitalizing his love of the sport. Currently, he is an assistant coach for Junior Group and Senior Development as well as the lead dryland coach.
Outside of the pool, Jennings graduated from Cecil College and Tiller Homeschool Academy in 2022 with an Associate’s Degree, while planning on furthering his education through University of Maryland Global Campus to obtain his Bachelor’s Degree in business. He also runs his own lawn care business named “JobsByJennings.” JobsByJennings is expanding by both purchasing another business named “SJ Elsner’s Lawn Mower Sales and Service,” as well as developing an app and website.
Introducing Arena Club’s newest Jr Coach, Mackenzie Payne! Mackenzie is a senior in high school and is looking forward to swimming in college. She has swam year-round for 7 years where she currently swims in the Senior performance group.
Mackenzie loves to swim competitively and is excited to share her passion for the water with our young swimmers. Her favorite strokes are fly and free. Mackenzie cannot wait to use her experience to teach our rising swimmers that the key to speed starts with technique!
In her free time, Mackenzie teaches private swim lessons at Arena, likes hanging out with her friends and family, and volunteers at her church. She is also a certified lifeguard. Mackenzie is excited for an awesome season!
