Wednesday, January 24, 2024
Jeff Moxie and Lori Rose Supporting Linnea Mack through the DAPP Program
Throughout their lives, Jeff Moxie and his wife, Lori Rose, have been involved in virtually all aspects of the sport of swimming. As Rose put it – if you’re a water person, you’re a water person, and that couldn’t be truer for this couple.
For Moxie, it started at 6 years old in a pool in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Later he became a Masters swimmer, then president of U.S. Masters Swimming, to his latest post as treasurer for the USA Swimming Foundation Board of Directors.
“When I was president of Masters Swimming, that’s when we started the Masters Swimming Saves Lives, which is now in conjunction with the USA Swimming Foundation per the MOU,” Moxie said. “I can’t believe that there are people who haven’t learned how to swim. When the [current U.S. Masters Swimming CEO] Dawson Hughes came to me a couple of years ago and said we had this opportunity with the USA Swimming Foundation, it kind of rekindled my passion for not just adults learning to swim, but kids, and even supporting the ‘kids’ on the National Team in the sport. Everyone is a kid when you get to be our age!”
Rose was a competitive swimmer for 10 years, swimming at the YMCA, then in high school and college, until she eventually became an aquatics administrator, lifeguard and swim instructor. Later she became an elementary school instructor but came back to the water in 2013 when she began coaching triathlon through the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society; teaching adults how to swim so they could participate in triathlons to raise money for the organization. She participated in her first triathlon in 2015.
“I was tired of smelling like chlorine!” joked Rose about her time away from the sport. But from all the philanthropic organizations they work with to their support of the USA Swimming Foundation, the common thread has been their shared passion for helping others.
“The USA Swimming Foundation serves a need on many different levels,” Moxie said. “From the elite-swimmer level – since there’s no government support, someone needs to support them – to the learn-to-swim programs for kids and adults, everyone should know how to get from one end of the pool to the other. They don’t need to compete, but they need to be safer in the water.” Moxie added that hearing from the challenges coaches face to make sure everyone can learn how to swim – particularly from a program in Buffalo, New York – Moxie knew the Impacting Communities leg of the foundation mission was a sorely needed one.
“When you’re able to reach underserved children, it’s a really huge thing and helps shrink that gap [of ability] when they learn how to swim,” Rose said. “And plus, seeing their smiling faces – they don’t know who the Olympians are from Adam – but just the joy they exude and that they learn how to swim so quickly is amazing.”
For Moxie, it started at 6 years old in a pool in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Later he became a Masters swimmer, then president of U.S. Masters Swimming, to his latest post as treasurer for the USA Swimming Foundation Board of Directors.
“When I was president of Masters Swimming, that’s when we started the Masters Swimming Saves Lives, which is now in conjunction with the USA Swimming Foundation per the MOU,” Moxie said. “I can’t believe that there are people who haven’t learned how to swim. When the [current U.S. Masters Swimming CEO] Dawson Hughes came to me a couple of years ago and said we had this opportunity with the USA Swimming Foundation, it kind of rekindled my passion for not just adults learning to swim, but kids, and even supporting the ‘kids’ on the National Team in the sport. Everyone is a kid when you get to be our age!”
Rose was a competitive swimmer for 10 years, swimming at the YMCA, then in high school and college, until she eventually became an aquatics administrator, lifeguard and swim instructor. Later she became an elementary school instructor but came back to the water in 2013 when she began coaching triathlon through the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society; teaching adults how to swim so they could participate in triathlons to raise money for the organization. She participated in her first triathlon in 2015.
“I was tired of smelling like chlorine!” joked Rose about her time away from the sport. But from all the philanthropic organizations they work with to their support of the USA Swimming Foundation, the common thread has been their shared passion for helping others.
“The USA Swimming Foundation serves a need on many different levels,” Moxie said. “From the elite-swimmer level – since there’s no government support, someone needs to support them – to the learn-to-swim programs for kids and adults, everyone should know how to get from one end of the pool to the other. They don’t need to compete, but they need to be safer in the water.” Moxie added that hearing from the challenges coaches face to make sure everyone can learn how to swim – particularly from a program in Buffalo, New York – Moxie knew the Impacting Communities leg of the foundation mission was a sorely needed one.
“When you’re able to reach underserved children, it’s a really huge thing and helps shrink that gap [of ability] when they learn how to swim,” Rose said. “And plus, seeing their smiling faces – they don’t know who the Olympians are from Adam – but just the joy they exude and that they learn how to swim so quickly is amazing.”