Weird but exciting: Van Asch excited for role at World Championships
Former Right at Home Jackaroo and three-time World Champion Rebecca Van Asch is supremely excited for the upcoming World Bowls Championships on the Gold Coast, despite being on the other side of the high performance setup.
Having joined the Bowls Australia (BA) ranks as High Performance Manager in 2021, the Tasmanian will attend her first major international event since retirement in this capacity.
Speaking on BA’s ‘The Right Line’ podcast, Van Asch says that while it will be a weird feeling, she is ready for the task at hand being rinkside for the Australian squad despite being supremely nervous watching from off the green.
“It is strange and a few people have mentioned to me that it’s my first World Champs since retirement and it was a bit weird around the announcement,” she said.
“But I have my days when I regret my decision and really miss playing and others not so much, but I think that’s part and parcel of retirement, I think it’s been ten months now.
“When I’m out there watching the guys and doing some rinkside coaching, I’m never watching and thinking that I want to be out there, so I guess that’s probably a good sign that it was the right decision.
“Each team member knows that I’ve got their back one hundred per cent but it is so nerve wracking from the sidelines I can tell you now as you have a lot more control when you’re playing.”
Van Asch has enjoyed a few events in her role since hanging up her bowls, including the Ireland series last November and the Multi Nations in March, which she has labelled as magnificent learning opportunities for her position.
“I’ve been to a few events with them now, they had a series against Ireland and we had the Multi Nations earlier this year and I suppose the latter was a great test because it’s a pretty major event for us.
“One thing I have learned about being on what a few of my former teammates refer to as ‘the dark side’ now is that my days are a lot longer than they were as a player I can tell you,” she added.
“When you’re playing you can just worry about yourself and being ready and a lot of people that know me are aware that I had a bit of a tendency to roll out of bed just in time to get ready for the bus and things like that, whereas now 14 and 15 hour days with my fellow staff members on tour.”
Having clinched gold medals in three different disciplines across her campaigns in 2012 and 2016, there are an abundance of highlights for the Invermay product to reflect on at the World Bowls Championships.
However, if she was to select just one, her maiden title with Kelsey Cottrell in Adelaide will go down as her most memorable for a plethora of reasons.
“I don’t think anything will beat 2012 for a couple of reasons,” Van Asch said.
“It was my first one so that’s always very special and to win pairs with Kelsey, who to this day is still one of my very best friends, was amazing. Not to mention the fact that was on home soil and our families were there.
“Every time you talk to one of the ten players that competed at that tournament, the thing that they will all say is the most special experience is the fact that all ten of us walked away as World Champions.
“Being able to bask in that and enjoy the success of everyone else just multiplied our own, as amazing as it was to win it for yourself, seeing every one of your teammates do it was just amazing.”
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