Dr Ric Charlesworth AO CitWA

Known around the world for his excellence in coaching hockey and considered one of the Australia’s greatest coaching minds, Dr Ric Charlesworth is a former captain of the Australian Hockey Team and the Western Australian State Hockey Team and Cricket Team.

A doctor of medicine with an honorary Science degree and an Arts degree majoring in philosophy and history. He played hockey for Australia for a record 17 years and played first class cricket for nearly a decade.

He was elected a member of Federal parliament in 1983 and retired 10 years later. His plans to pursue medicine were diverted when he took on the position of National Coach of the Australian Women’s Hockey Team from 1993 to 2000. Between 2009 and 2014 he coached the Men’s team.

He is the author of 5 books on coaching and team management.

In four World Cups and three Olympic Games as coach of Australia Ric’s teams won Gold on 6 occasions and once won bronze. They won 8 of 9 Champions Trophy tournaments and 2 Commonwealth Games Gold medals… this is a record never equalled in the sport. Between 1994 and 2014 Ric was ‘Coach of the Year’ 8 times!

Given that in the last 60 years Australia has won five Hockey World Cups and four Olympic Gold Medals (nine in total), Ric’s involvement in seven of these as a coach or player is an extraordinary contribution to the sport.

Between 2022 to 2024 Ric worked in China assisting the Chinese national team to win the Asian Games in October 2023 and to secure a silver medal in Paris in August. The team ranked 14th in 2022 made a meteoric rise in the game to lose in the Olympic final in a sudden death shootout.