Athletics Australia Board of Directors
Robin ‘Rob’ Fildes OAM (President) has a wealth of business experience and a history in Athletics dating back over 30 years to his days as a club athlete at Sandringham. In 1964-71 Rob was an international standard decathlon champion and ranked in the world’s top 15. He also played for Collingwood from 1961-63.
Rob’s sporting administration experience includes a Trustee of Melbourne Olympic Parks Trust (1995-2001), Chairman of Australian Masters Games (1995) and Director of AFL Publications Board (1982-95). In 1998, Rob received an OAM for sports administration.
Bill Bailey is the Oceania Area Representative on the International Association of Athletic Federations (IAAF) Council. He was the foundation Executive Director of the Oceania Athletic Association (OAA) and was the Athletics Competition Manager for the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games. Bill is currently Chairman of the IAAF Regional Development Centre in Brisbane and of the IAAF High Performance Training Centre in Auckland. He was an IAAF Technical Delegate for the Athens Olympic Games in 2004, the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne and the World Junior Championships in Beijing both in 2006.
David Grace Q.C. is a lawyer in private practice with a specialty in a number of areas of law including sports law. He has had extensive involvement with sporting organisations as a competitive athlete, as a consultant and in administration. He has also acted as an advocate for many sportspersons appearing before sporting tribunals. He has been an Arbitrator on the Court of Arbitration for Sport since 2000 and was a member of that Court’s Division established for the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne. Between 2001-2006 he was President of the Athletics Australia Tribunals. In 2004 he was Team Advocate for the Australian Olympic Team at the Athens Olympic Games.
Jane Hansen’s professional experience includes working in investment banking in London, New York and Australia, was previously on the board of MCC and the State Sport Centres Trust (which covers MSAC and Royal Park, Hockey and Netball centre). Jane's educational background includes an undergraduate degree in economics and a master’s degree in business administration from Columbia University, New York.
Matthew Mahon is General Manager of Melbourne-based consulting firm Royce. Royce is a communications advisory firm that provides advice to a wide variety of clients, ranging from some of Australia's largest corporations, to governments at State and Federal level, to smaller companies and not for profit organisations.
Matthew's experience lies in providing general business, marketing and communications advice to major corporates, government and a range of sporting organisations. Matthew also previously worked for IMG as Director of Marketing and Communications (Australia). He is also a member of Old Xaverians Athletics Club.
Eddie McGuire AM is one of Australia's leading sport and television personalities who has hosted numerous shows including the six-time Logie winner - The Footy Show, plus Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, the World Cricket Tsunami Appeal Match, the 45th, 46th and 47th Annual TV Week Logie Awards, co-hosted Australia Unites - Reach Out to Asia Telecast, and co-presented the 1998 Commonwealth Games from Kuala Lumpur.
Eddie is the CEO of the Nine Network, has written two best selling books, is head of his own production company, McGuire Media, has been a sports journalist for Eyewitness News, written a column for Australia's largest selling newspaper - The Herald Sun, has had huge success in radio shows such as the top rating D Generation, The Richard Stubbs Breakfast show and The Grill Team and was responsible for bringing AFL coverage to FM radio. Eddie is President of the Collingwood Football Club (AFL) and has a long history of working with many charities. Eddie and his wife, Carla, have two sons, Joseph and Alexander.
Nicholas Moore has 21 years experience in business and information technology. He has extensive management, consulting and project expertise, achieved through engagements with major companies, particularly in the finance sector.
Nicholas is currently engaged by National Australia Bank as a consulting Project Director managing retail banking projects and has previously held senior management positions with IBM, Westpac Banking Corporation and global software company SPL where he was the Director of Professional Services in Sydney.
Nicholas has performed consulting engagements for organisations such as American Express, AGL, NSW Police, Optus, NRMA, HCF, Capital Finance, Suncorp, State Bank of NSW and Australian National Rail.
Nicholas also has 36 years experience and involvement in athletics at all levels. He started his athletics career with Randwick Botany Little Athletics in 1970 and went on to compete at school, club, university and open level. Nicholas is a current masters athlete, and has competed at the World Masters Athletics Championships.
He was president of Sydney University Athletics Club from 1991 – 2000 and is still closely involved with the club. In 1996 he was appointed Venue Manager for the World Junior Athletics Championships in Sydney and was a technical official during the Sydney 2000 Olympics in conjunction with his employment with IBM.
Michael Smellie has more than 25 years experience in senior management roles in the music and media industry based in New York, London, Tokyo and Hong Kong. He is currently consulting with the German media group Bertelsmann AG on their Asian strategy.
Bronwyn Thompson is Australia’s leading female long jumper and the chairperson of the Athletes Commission. Her commitment to the sport includes being an athlete ambassador for Queensland Little Athletics, a committee member of her local club and writing articles for Inside Queensland Track and Field News. Bronwyn’s professional background is physiotherapy.
