Coaches

Colin Bartlett

Colin has been an established freestyle coach for 5 years and has worked with athletes on the New Zealand Youth Development and Youth Olympic Team. His experience ranges from Head Coach on several Snowboard Camps including the Freestyle Snowboard Teen Sessions Camp at Squaw Valley USA, to coaching the New Zealand Youth Olympic Team during their Spring Camp in 2011.

Colin’s most valuable experience is not just limited to freestyle coaching. He also lives with a number of his team members providing 24hour support, mentoring and guidance during their off snow responsibilities and education which he believes is equally important as the on snow progression. He is known in the industry for his natural ability to build strong, influential relationships with his athletes and encourages the importance of the ‘team’ which he believes is a crucial element in his athletes success.

Sponsors: Nitro, 3CS, Raiden, Ashbury

Qualifications: AASI Certified Instructor, Intermediate First Aid – Corporate Safety Ltd, CPR Rescue and Breathing – NZ Red Cross, Advanced Driving Skills – NZ Defensive Driving, Pathways to Excellence – Rotary Club, Advanced Leadership Program – Sacred Heart College.

Elliot Catton

Elliot joined Simple Snowboarding Canada in the founding year as a Coach and has since progressed both his own personal riding and coaching skills. This allowed him to dominate a few years of regional competition before moving his focus fully toward coaching. He has had numerous Halfpipe and Slopestyle titles including a win at the 2010 You Look Good Pro Series Tour and making finals at the 2011 World Championships in La Molina, Spain. Elliot now spends his time on the snow putting all of his efforts towards helping the next generation of developing Snowboarders. Elliot’s coaching abilities have been recognised by the governing bodies of Canadian Snowboarding, which lead him to be selected to coach the first ever Youth Winter Olympics as the sole Canadian Team Coach.  Elliot’s efforts were highly successful, returning with 2 Olympic Gold Medals in Slopestyle and all of his athletes in Halfpipe and Slopestyle made the finals. Elliot was also the Halfpipe Team Coach for the province of Ontario at the 2011 Canada Winter Games in Halifax. 3 out of 4 Ontario team members were on the podium, bringing home 2 Gold Medals and 1 Bronze for Ontario under his guidance. Elliot has also coached at the following events: FIS World Championships, FIS World Cups, 1,2,3,4,5 and 6 Star TTR World Tour events in multiple countries, FIS National Championships, Ontario Winter Games, Provincial Championships, Numerous Local and International Independent Snowboard Events
Elliot is always pushing team members to find their limits, often stepping up to show them something is do-able and then assisting them with the process. Elliot’s strong solid nature serves as a great influence to the team and inspires confidence in those who ride with him.

Qualifications: Canada Snowboard Competition Development Trained, Certified NCCP A, Certified NCCP B, NCCP Psychology Of Performance, NCCP Prevention and Recovery of Injury, NCCP Leading Drug Free Sport, NCCP Conflict Management
Sponsors: Billabong Outerwear, Smith Optics, and Celsius Boots

Sam Marcotte:

Sam has been coaching in Ontario and New Zealand for more than 8 years. Originally hailing from New Zealand, he has seen snowboarding undergo enormous progression since he first stepped onto a board in 1998. A former competitive sponsored snowboarder, his career was cut short from a serious knee injury in 2001. In 2007 he founded Simple Snowboarding with the goal of taking young Ontario Snowboarders all the way to the top, while insuring they maintain a healthy snowboarding career and avoid key mistakes in their path.

Since 1998 he has racked up more than 20 back to back seasons between Canada and New Zealand. Over this time he has gained valuable insight and skills that combined, have allowed him to develop his own unique technical snowboarding theories and ideas. He has blended these into a program that has allowed young riders to turn heads everywhere and achieve an enormous amount of success in such a short period of time. He has also helped to develop his own coaches riding ability and see their progress and achievements both on and off snow translate into their continually progressing coaching ability.