Coaches and Directors
Coach Jim swam growing up and always wanted to teach or coach. After swimming for and graduating from UNC-Chapel Hill, he started coaching swimming and took up running. He has coached in North Carolina and in the Cincinnati and Houston areas prior to moving to D.C.
Coach Jim Coach is a life-long advocate of the sport and thoroughly enjoys getting to help swimmers improve as people through swimming. In addition to coaching, Coach Jim enjoys books, movies, travel, history and UNC Basketball - Go Heels!. He occasionally swims or runs and often spends time with his 6 year-old nice & 1 year-old nephew who live here in D.C. Coach Jim is taken care of by Penny, a 5 year-old black lab.
Coach Rob is in his 16th year coaching with the DC Wave Swim Team. He swam three years Varsity at St. Albans School for Boys, and three years in the Prince-Mont Summer League for Takoma Park-DC All Stars. In addition to swimming, Coach Rob also lettered in Football, Basketball, and Track & Field while at St. Albans. After graduating high school in 2003, Coach Rob went on to attend the University of Maryland at College Park, where he received his Bachelor of Science degree in Kinesiology in 2008.
Coach Rob has gone on to coach hundreds of young swimmers through DC Parks & Recreation’s competitive swimming programs as well as the Takoma Park-DC Swim Team. Coach Rob also serves as the Meet Director for the Annual Black History Invitational, DC Wave Distance Meet, and Winter Invitational. Rob has also served on the Potomac Valley Swimming Board of Directors as the Chair of the Diversity, Equitiy, and Inclusion Committee from 2015-2021. He currently also serves as a member of the USA Swimming Diversity Council. Coach Rob has experience coaching on the Potomac Valley Zone Team, Eastern Zone and National Diversity Select Camps, and has coached numerous Sectional and Futures level athletes.
Coach Rob is a lifetime resident of the Washington, DC Metropolitan area and a current member of the American Swim Coaches Association (ASCA) and USA Swimming. Rob and his wife Jennifer have two children (Miles and Ellis), and enjoy bike rides and the going to the beach. His favorite color is Orange, and he loves peanut butter. His favorite stroke is Breaststroke, and his favorite event is the 200 IM. Coach Rob loves coaching because it gives him a chance to share his passion for swimming with younger generations of swimmers, and help them develop life skills through sports and physical activity.
SWIM: JH & HS in the Republic of Panama
FAVORITE STROKE: Breaststroke and Backstroke….I have a love hate relationship with butterfly.
LANGUAGES: Fluent Korean
MARRIED: over 19 years to truly the kindest human that tolerates a lot of me
CHILDREN: 2 amazing teenagers, Logan 18 & Kayla 16, who help me grow everyday. I learn A LOT from not only my children everyday, but from all the swimmers I coach as well. They help me grow. My son will be swimming in colllege this fall 2024 for Shippensburg University…Go Raiders!
AIR FORCE VETERAN
PETS: Wheaten Terrier named Ollie and 2 cats named Trooper and Cody. I love animals, they are the only ones getting it right in the world.
FAVORITE FOOD: Korean, all Asian food really
WORK BACKGROUND: Life Guard / WSInstructor Air Force Flight Medic Air Force Public Health Technician Yu Ying Physical Education teacher assistant
GW graduate: Exercise Science & Public Health American Swim Coaches Association (ASCA) Level 3
COACHING: 10th year coaching with DC Wave and I don’t think I’ll ever leave. I love coaching with this team. I love seeing all our swimmers grow not only as swimmers, but as people.
PHILOSOPHY: Practice what you preach. I continue to train my swimming skills and compete as a US Masters Swimmer. This way I have the ability to demonstrate for my swimmers when necessary because most youth are visual learners. My goal is to build their confidence in the water & on the block, this way they know they are capable of doing hard things outside practices as well. Give them a safe space to know they have a voice and they are not just to be seen, but to be heard as well.
James Washington is an Age Group and Developmental coach at Takoma Aquatic Center. Coach James is in his 4th year of coaching. In the summer Coach James also coaches with the DC Summer Swim League at Takoma Aquatic Center home of the Sea Lions, 3 time league champions. He currently holds memberships with USA Swimming and the American Swim Coaches Association.
Originally a Michigan native he swam four years as a member of the Detroit Recreational Swim team (DRST) based in Detroit, Michigan. Coach James also swam four years at Martin Luther King Jr. High School in Detroit. After graduating high school in 2006, Coach James went on to attend the Howard University, as well competing with the Bison for four years. Coach James received his Bachelor of Science degree in Health Sciences in 2011.
Sharing the knowledge and passion of the sport received during his high school and college career are a few aspects that motivate Coach James to challenge kids to succeed in and out of the pool.
Fitness, nutrition, and health are a few of Coach James’ favorite subjects. Coach James enjoys stand-up comedy by one of the greatest comedians of the 20th century, David Adkins, better known by his stage name, Sinbad.
Tiffany Monique Quash, PhD swam for Randolph-Macon Woman’s College (Lynchburg, Virginia ). She is originally from Chesapeake, Virginia and has coached swimming in: Massachusetts, California, Indiana, and Washington, DC. Tiffany earned her B.A. in Political Science (Randolph-Macon Woman’s College), M.Ed. in Physical Education (Springfield College), and Ph.D. in Leisure Behavior (Indiana University). Her favorite strokes are backstroke, breaststroke, and freestyle. Outside of pool Tiffany, works at American University as a Qualitative Survey Research Methodologist and spends time with her wife, Tasha.
Coach Marques Ross is a DC native who swam with the DC WAVE from 2006 to 2014, and RMSC from 2010 to 2013. He also swam competitively at Jackson-Reed High School (formerly Woodrow Wilson Senior High School) and was team captain in his junior and senior years. During the summers, Coach Ross competed with the TPDC Allstar Swim Team and was a junior coach for 2 years.
Coach Ross attended Indiana University of Pennsylvania (IUP) where he completed his bachelor's and master's degrees in Communications Media and Strategic Communications respectively. While attending IUP, he participated in the IUP Masters Swim Team and fulfilled the roles of Secretary and Meet Coordinator.
This past summer, he head coached TPDC in their first year back to competition since 2019; along with being the assistant coach at School Without Walls High School during the high school season, and competing with the DC Water Wizards.
