Colleen Elgert
Who has more fun than us? Truly! Number four on our list of epic and inspiring Panda alumni is Colleen (Pistawka) Elgert. A few little diddies about her is that she was a setter for five years with the Pandas and her oldest son is currently playing his second year with the Golden Bears volleyball. And now I will allow her the privilege to tell the rest of her story:
I am born and raised in Edmonton. My older sister played Pandas and I remember as a little girl watching. My sister was my first coach. We played beach volleyball in our backyard and she was the one that encouraged me to go to Jasper Volleyball Camp. They even bussed us to the camp on a Greyhound from Edmonton at that time. I absolutely fell in love with the sport after Jasper.
I always felt that I was going to go to UofA. My siblings went, but I never felt any pressure. I just felt a “pull” to be at the UofA. Now looking back, I can see that God brought me there and He helped me grow through that experience as a student-athlete. I love to now joke with my kids that I bleed “green and gold”. I entered the Panda program at 18 years old. I was so fortunate and privileged. Suzy Smith was a new first year coach. She was very young, keen, committed and intense. I was very fortunate to be with a team that was made up of rookies. There were only a few veteran players. I was able to be a starting setter and be that kid that was thrown out there to improve and develop. I was able to play a full five years without any major injuries. The schedule was intense being a first year science student and an athlete. Originally I had 6 science courses. I remember being exhausted after having so many classes, labs alongside a heavy training load in and outside the gym. At the time Suzy was doing schooling in exercise physiology learning from cutting edge research and this brought a lot of intense activities outside of the gym.
I came from a small Edmonton high school and my social group from high school continued to meet for lunch at CAB in my first few months at University. Eventually, I started to spend more times with my teammates and they became my social group. We spent so much time together at practice, outside of practice and at retreats to Jasper. My teammates, Bear volleyball athletes and other athletes became my social group. We mixed and mingled.
I loved the travel as an athlete, especially flying out to the coast, to the “green” campuses when we had snow back in Edmonton. We had some great bus trips to Lethbridge and Saskatoon with the Bears team. Alcohol may have been involved with all the silly antics. We also had “rookie-ing” that we did to the first year players…. It was all good fun. On one particular van trip where we were crammed in three to a seat, we played “rock, paper, scissors” in a modified version called “worm, dirt and rain”. We laughed hysterically and may have played it the whole way to Saskatoon from Edmonton. Deb Dyson (who nominated Colleen to share her “Always a Panda” story) was my right side and I remember many foot and back massages, as well, on the van trips. I also can see all the old gyms in my mind. My fifth year, I ended up playing both field hockey and volleyball. I was a dual sport athlete. I was so fortunate to play five years and play a lot of volleyball.
Panda volleyball taught me a work ethic like no other. I believe that every high level athlete has that or gets it once they begin to play varsity sport. You receive a mindset of goal setting and achieving them.
I am married to Greg Elgert. He was a volleyball player with the Bears who was a few years ahead of me in the program. He is a physical therapist and I am an occupational therapist. We have three kids and we live the rural acreage life in Athabasca. Max is a second year UofA student, Sam is in grade twelve, and Abby is a grade ten student. Sam is preparing to head to Thompson Rivers University to play volleyball next year. Abby is a volleyball and soccer player. Right now, I have found a very comfortable balance in my life. I am so grateful that I learned to multi-task as a parent when I had young children. Now, I have time to have my own pursuits, even though we are still busy chauffeuring with the commute to Edmonton three times per week, which is two hours each way. I am coaching volleyball right now and I also coach skiing and work part-time as an Occupational Therapist. I receive a lot of meaning from being involved with youth female athletes. They are going through a lot of changes and volleyball gave me a lot of resilience as a young woman so I want to give back.
I coached my daughters club team for many years and I received tremendous meaning from it. I have come to appreciate all the work that my coaches have done for me. It is great to be able to help people to put their best forward and also laugh hysterically along the way.
I would love to nominate Rhonda (Neufeld) Dubois! I was lucky enough to play provincial team and Pandas volleyball with her. She lives in Ottawa and I tracked her down this last summer when my son was playing beach volleyball nationals there.