Most TTV members and fans already know a fair bit about our Events and Clubs Officer but his week we are reintroducing everyone to Claire Montgomery with the next TTV Fast Five!

1 - Can you tell us a bit about yourself?

"As most people know, I am a table tennis person who grew up on a farm and my father Jim Montgomery is involved with the sport.

"What you don't know, is that we are from a sporting family. My grandfather (Dad’s dad) was a top road cyclist in the ’20s & ’30s, my father has played table tennis for 60 years and my brother was one of the top 100m sprinters in Australia.

"I started playing when I was 10 and always played at least one other sport in conjunction with table tennis up until I went overseas to play professionally in Belgium. I was the first Aussie-born female to get a professional contract in a European club. I was selected for my first Nationals at age 12, I got very excited about that, thinking “WOW which exotic place in Australia do I get to go to?!” …….. As you can imagine, I was very disappointed when I found out it was Geelong, 25min from my house!

"I was much more excited years later when I got selected for the Australian team for the World University Championships which was in Beijing – a much more exotic destination! Then again when playing for Australia in the International Youth Cup in Belgium where I had better results, coming out at the end with Bronze and Silver medals.

(2001 World University Games Australian Women's Team
L-R Peri Campbell-Innes, Claire Montgomery, May Cho, and Peng Quach (Coach)

"On my way through Juniors, I played a lot of pennants and tournaments. Pennant mainly in Geelong, but also in Ballarat, Coburg, Croydon, old Albert Park, and then MSAC. I spent a lot of time on the road.

"Since that Geelong Nationals, I have only missed a couple of other Nationals, as after I aged out of playing in Juniors, I got involved as a Junior NPC (17 times). I played for Victoria in 5 Junior teams, 4 Youth, and 6 Senior Women’s teams. I missed out on my last year in U/18s with an ACL reco also missed the Sydney Olympic trials while on crutches.

"I was honoured to represent Australia on two occasions – Table Tennis took me all around Australia and part of the world! I competed in the trials for the Athens Olympics when I returned from playing in Belgium. A bad elbow injury put a stop to my playing career at that time.

"I got into coaching at 17, doing my first level 1 course with Glenn Tepper (yes Glenn, I’m still bending my knees!) and have coached countless juniors (and a few Vets) over the years. I was lucky to be able to do the ITTF Coaching courses as well, level 1 in MSAC in Jan 2018, and went off to New Zealand for the level 2 in Nov 2019 – good old COVID has thrown a spanner in those works as I can’t complete the remaining 15 out of 50 coaching hours for accreditation until the venues open again!

(2016 U/18 Victorian State Girls Team - Alice Springs)

"I got involved in the Admin side after being the ‘slave labour force’ for my dad when he was the Junior Team Manager and then honorary CEO of TTA around the time of the Sydney Olympics. I then got to learn from Phil Davis, logistics extraordinaire, on managing teams and running events, including Nationals, efficiently. This has led to being a State Team Manager 23 times and running countless tournaments and numerous Nationals. I also started out as a TTV selector back then, learning the ropes from people such as Phil, Dad, Mary Legassick & Graeme Ireland, a role I still hold with pride today."

2 - What brought you to TTV?

"My first Committee appointment was at TTV, and that was an interesting experience! I learned how to stand up and be heard as a young female in an older male-dominated room. I went on to be on the Table Tennis Geelong committee for 10 years, I even had the honour of being on the Table Tennis Australia Board for a term. More recently I was elected back onto the TTV Board, which I resigned from when I got the job in the office.

"I love the sport! Table Tennis took me all around Australia and parts of the world and as a kid from Country Victoria, that was an awesome experience. I have been involved as a player since I was 10, a coach since I was 17, and an administrator since 23, I just want to give back to the sport that has had such a major impact on my life.

"What brought me into the job at TTV specifically was that I have seen this sport from so many angles that I felt that with not only my background in the sport but coupled with my education and work experience, I could help bring the sport into the digital age and lessen the workload of all the hard-working volunteers who keep our sport alive and thriving."

3 - What goals do you have for table tennis in Victoria?

"Most would say “increase number of juniors” etc, but my goal is how to lighten the workload of our wonderful volunteers so that they can concentrate their time and energy on increasing participation rather than endless mountains of paperwork.

"I am going to quote myself here: back in 2018, TTA had a series of open meetings in each State to get input on their new Strategic Plan. At the Victorian meeting, I stood up and said, “we need to drag this sport kicking and screaming into the 21^st century”. There have been so many technological advances in the last 25 years in computers and the internet if embraced, can make everyone’s life so much easier.

"For example, the first week I started in the office at the end of Feb 2018, there was a 6-inch high pile of membership forms from Affiliates sitting on my desk waiting to be entered into the TTV database. Each Affiliate would have to collect the paper forms, put them in their own database, then post them all to the TTV office for me to do the same thing. For me, with my IT background, it seemed a serious waste of everyone’s time, double or triple handling the information.

"So, I changed the process. Now, each Affiliate has their own login to the database and they either enter the membership data directly into the system or they get their members to go onto the website and sign up themselves. Affiliates use the State database as their own, drastically reducing the handling of the membership forms and the time it takes for the players to become a registered members of TTV and TTA and vastly improving the integrity of the data collected because in all honestly, I had a lot of trouble reading everyone’s writing!

"Now that the Affiliates are used to using the TTV RevSport website, my next goal is to provide each Affiliate with their own RevSport website so they can do so much more through that platform – from memberships to running pennants to table bookings and so much more. My extra goal is for the whole of TT in Australia to get on the same technology boat – I am working slowly on that one …. Shhhhh don’t tell the other States yet"

4 - What are your outside interests?

"Right now, the only outside I get is a walk around the dog park across the road from where I live! I love reading, anything from sci-fi, fantasy, history, and tech manuals. I will admit to being a gamer in the past, something that COVID-19 has had me take up again to pass the time when not working and trying to avoid spending too much time on social media! Plus, the usual, TV shows, movies, and family, I love and miss my 8 nieces and nephews."

5 - Can you tell us a few things that might surprise us about you?

"Firstly, that I have had a life outside of table tennis! I know, shocking to most people but it is actually true.

"I started out my university studies in Computer Engineering at RMIT. I did part of that on exchange while living in Belgium, where I was put in the only English-taught department in the University: Commerce! That is where I discovered that I was shocking at French, could do Maths in Flemish, that beer actually can taste nice and I was more interested in programming websites than machine coding.

"I was the webmaster at NMIT (now Melbourne Polytechnic) for a couple of years and have had my own little side business for many years as a freelance website programmer helping small businesses get affordable and easy-to-use websites up and running.

"I loved studying. I went from studying Computer Engineering at RMIT to Remedial Massage Therapy (Sports Injury Management), IT Systems, Sports Law & Management, and finally Event Management. And I then got lucky enough to land the job at TTV which I have found I can put to good use a lot of the different areas I have studied over the years …. well, all except for the medieval history subjects I picked up as extra credit!

"I have competed in Netball, Basketball, Equestrian, Swimming, Soccer, and Tae Kwon Do at varying levels from school teams to competing in Nationals. I also spent years as a Sports Coach in high schools, coaching students in Table Tennis, Softball, Basketball & Volleyball.

"Finally, a fun fact, my great uncle was the 9^th Prime Minister of Australia from 1929 to 1932."