Rocco Meiring: We do not do it for the nominations

The University of Pretoria-based coach will battle athletics coach Thabo Matebedi and cricket coach Conrad Shukri for the prestigious award at the ceremony at Sun City on Sunday, 23 August.

Meiring, who has won the award twice, says the nomination is simply a bonus after another successful year.

"I mean obviously I'm in good company with the other nominees, as I've said before, we don't do it for the nominations or for the trophies, it is a job for us and it's something that we choose to do. But being nominated and recognised is obviously nice and a bonus for us," Meiring said.

Despite winning the award twice, Meiring says standing on stage to collect a trophy is still not something that feels normal for a coach. 

He believes the spotlight and podium are usually reserved for athletes, who are more accustomed to collecting medals and trophies.

He admits he can hardly remember what it felt like to receive his own awards.

"No, as I said it's not a normal place . Our athletes or teams get on to the podiums or the trophy presentations and so on. So, we prefer being in the background, it is unknown territory for me but it is a big honour and it is a privilege to be recognised by the department of sport,” the coach added.

Meiring now faces another big challenge of producing the next generation of world-class swimmers. 

He helped guide Tatjana Smith to Olympic glory and has since unearthed another huge talent in Pieter Coetze.

The coach is carefully developing Coetze into a global star and believes there is still plenty of work to do before he reaches the heights achieved by Smith.