Athletics
Here are a couple of historic articles. You may be interested to read and see how current efforts compare !!
DEVELOPMENT OF THROWS STRATEGY
Mike Winch VP UKA (October 2007)
Introduction
This of necessity will be short and sweet. Much has been said and written with regards to our low level of performance in the field events, and more will be, in the wake of Osaka where we had the worst field results in the history of UK’s major championship participation.
There have been major problems with support for our leading throwers, problems with selection and problems simply in the way the events are being managed. Change has been rebuffed at both UKA and individual levels, and at present despite individuals continuing isolated pockets of excellence, little overall progress has been made in ten years.
It is time therefore to assume that what has gone before has not worked, and what is to come must work. It has to if we are to hold our heads high over the next five years leading up to London 2012.
This clearly needs blue sky thinking and a quality of concept and strategy beyond what has been the norm hitherto.
The Problems
The common quote “that there are no problems, just answers”, is apposite at this time. Many, me included, have been pointing out the problems for a very long time, to little effect, despite suggesting practical and positive answers. We must conclude therefore that there has not been the will to action the solutions suggested, that we are all wrong and things are really fine (the super-tanker hasn’t sunk, it is just turning around), or that there is not the money and personnel available to implement an action plan.
It has been said that we need just to wait a bit longer and all will be well. If this were the case, then why bother doing anything at all? Clearly waiting has not worked, hence we have had ten years of decline, and also clearly it will not be an effective strategy for the near or far future. The throws are at a very low ebb, in the fact the lowest I can remember since I came into the sport, and urgent action is needed to remedy the situation.
The Will
If anything is to be done, the will to change needs to be the first port of call, both for UKA and its critics. Myself, John Hillier and many of our colleagues in coaching, and I am sure many others in the throwing events, will be happy to put the recent past behind and work to the future, as long as our views and work are respected and supported.
We have massive expertise in the throws in the UK, why not use it?
Right or Wrong
Many people have put forward ideas. The original Throws Management Group spent one year (2004-2005) asking the athletes, coaches and event experts what they thought should be done. The results were collated, published and were close to being unanimous, BUT were never implemented, due it would seem to management decisions within UKA, and a subsequent disintegration of the unanimity which had existed to that point. It is therefore impossible to say whether they would have worked or not, but the general consensus is that since virtually everyone supported the concepts, they had the best chance of any, in succeeding.
The main thrusts of the suggestions were:
Money
The money is there, but it appears that it is being spent within very narrow ranges of the sport; at the very top (WCPP) and at the very bottom (government strategy on fitness for children). The middle band is virtually unsupported except by the EMG system, which in all honesty is a shambles and has not remotely reflected the needs of the throws group.
LTAD (long term athlete development) is a theory developed by an individual (Istvan Balyi) to make money, and is based on no sound scientific research. Rather, it was developed by piecing together observations in a narrow range of sports. This has crippled UK Sport’s view of how money should be spent, and is reflected in their strategy of ‘one hat’ must fit all. Looking at the sports which have succeeded on this basis, it is clear that endurance and simple, low/medium technical content sports are clear winners. Highly technical sports are still largely in the doldrums or continuing their backward slide.
As athletics is many sports in one, we could clearly anticipate that the system would succeed to some extent in the running events, but fail almost completely in the field. This must surely tell us that a change of strategy is urgently needed to turn things around.
A ten year life span for a thrower is clearly nonsense, as was demonstrated in Osaka most of all by Franke Dietsche, who at a very venerable age, won gold. If she had been in the UK she would have been forced out of the sport years ago by UK Sport’s insistence that she was ‘past it’. Our own examples of Judy Oakes (25 years at International level) and Steve Backley, as well as many others, demonstrate the fallacy in the argument. Clearly, athletes will go up and down in performance during their career, and the skill is to recognise whether a drop is the end of a career or merely a slump. So far there has been nothing to suggest that judgements made, have been backed up by any depth of knowledge. It is completely ridiculous to discard older athletes after a single or even a few failures. Lynn Davies, Mary Peters, Sebastian Coe, Linford Christie Denise Lewis and Kelly Holmes, all Olympic Champions who failed before they succeeded, would confirm the point.
This needs to be understood and accepted by all, and it is essential that a more sophisticated level and basis of judgement be put in place, if we are to make progress.
Personnel
Personnel dealing with the throws have simply got been up to scratch. This is no reflection on them personally or their ability, it is just that specialists are needed to develop effectively specific and sophisticated concepts and strategies. Change is needed to bring the best on board.
North - South
This is an additional, but nevertheless important problem, which desperately needs resolution. Despite many of the best throwers senior and junior emanating and training in London, nothing by way of facilities has been earmarked or indeed developed in the region, particularly South of the Thames. Crystal Palace NSC is appalling, despite tinkering with the ancient and sub-standard indoor area, and noises relating to its use as a training base for the 2012 Olympics. The equipment base is running on empty, the staffing is non-existent and Greater London Leisure have sold off the in-field most evenings including training days, to a hack football team for playing on. There is only a basic strength room and no medical setup of any worth. To be honest it’s pathetic, and yet the sport has a major athlete throughput from this area.
Pickett’s Lock is at least an hour and a half away as are any other decent centres, giving the athletes little alternative but to put up with the abysmal level of facility in South London.
This needs urgently addressing, as has been suggested on numerous occasions over the last ten years, if the coaches and athletes are to continue to be able to train to International level.
The Answers
1] Employ specialist professional event group director for the throws as part of the WCP team.
2] Employ and involve ‘event expert administrative personnel’ to assist and administer (not lead; ‘too many chiefs and not enough Indians’) all aspects of the implementation of the new strategy.
3] Employ a (full or part-time) senior coach to lead each individual event and create an event group and squad structure covering all ages. Have the courage to put those persons in charge, tasked with implementing the strategy for each individual event. Move completely away from system/administration lead development, to expert people led development.
4] Re-formulate the Event Management Group (back to its original format) to bring all interested and expert parties together to develop a binding strategy, and to remove it from the internal political mire it has become entrenched in.
5] Create the ‘seamless pathway for athletes and coaches’ from bottom to top, this to be the practical focal point of the new strategy. Where talent exists both in coaching and in participants, it should gathered into the unified flow of excellence as early as possible. Use senior international coaches to mentor those not so experienced, and to assist in developing the already existent coach-athlete relationships, rather than destroying them. Focus on coaching the coaches as well as assisting to develop the athletes
6] Central contracts to reflect and support the existing coach/athlete relationship by naming both coach and athlete as key stakeholders, within the seamless pathway. It is vital to give coaches credit for knowing how far up the ladder they are capable of climbing and indeed wish to climb. This, together with an agreed code of conduct for senior coaches involved in the strategy, would reduce the bad feeling created by perceived ‘poaching’, that is the single most important deterrent to coaches allowing their athletes to attend UKA and other ‘squad’ activities.
7] Move away from LTAD and the ‘five rings’ to create the development of our own science based and event specific model for improvement, with reference to the conditions here in the UK and with the support of Sports’ Universities. Explain to UK Sport that their funding strategy does not work properly for highly technical events (sports) in the hope (vain though it may be) that they will support of shift of emphasis.
8] Resource the events, athletes and coaches properly along the lines suggested above, and with reward based strategies to bring forward incentive and competition amongst the group. (For example put in place UK Challenge awards for the coaches of the successful athletes).
9] Develop North and South (Loughborough and Crystal Palace) ‘throws’ specialist performance and development centres, where all can work with the appropriate support facilities and staff.
10] Develop an online resource centre to collate and make downloadable the vast amount of technical information available. (I started a UKThrows website but abandoned it when I withdrew my support for the new Event structure. I am still happy to set the basics up for minimal cost.
Initial timetable
December: Set up a throws conference of all leading coaches, current and recently past athletes, and persons of expertise to develop and agree the new strategy based on the above, and binding on all.
January: Set up new Event Management Group to reflect all input available, to implement the new strategy and oversee its progress.
February: Develop and agree a budget for implementation of the strategy on the basis of priorities. Set future timetable.
March: Put in place new expert staff at HQ and outside. Identify North and South Throws Training Centres and open discussions.
April: Start detailed implementation.
Conclusion
We all want the athletes to win.
We all have passion, commitment and knowledge.
We can do the job given the resources.
Why not support everyone interested and able, to achieve common aims?
NEWS
The paper below was presented to UKA in January 2004 as a first step in setting up a seamless performance development structure for athletes and coaches.
Has anything improved since then ? Feel free to comment
________________________________
The
Future of Performance Coaching within UK Athletics.
A
discussion document.
M.A.Winch January
2004
Introduction
The heart of our sport is the ‘coach - athlete
relationship’.
Since its inception UKA has divided it’s interests in
coaching into two completely separated areas, those of Development (Coach
Education) and Performance (Coaches to Teams and the partial resourcing of some
Personal Coaches to Lottery resourced athletes). The majority of active middle and high-level coaches have
been left to fend for themselves. This
has caused many problems resulting in dissatisfaction amongst that group, some
of whom have now abandoned the Sport.
The English Areas and Home Countries, the Counties and
the Clubs have attempted to maintain a structure along the lines of the former
system, which has been rudderless since the collapse of BAF.
With the expert coaching base declining, that remaining is now proving
inadequate to deal with the young athletes requiring specialist coaching to the
highest level.
The fledgling Athletic Coaches Association of the UK has
been formed to give coaches a voice within the sport, but little else has been
forthcoming to address the deepening sense of isolation felt by many of our best
coaches.
The Performance Directorate
The Performance Director and his four Group Directors,
despite being coaches have little or no influence on the development of the
sport. They have been specifically
tasked with looking after Lottery funded athletes and some of their coaches, to
the exclusion of all other athletes and coaches. This is a major structural weakness in the Performance system
despite some early attempts to involve a larger group of people.
In fact the original Performance Plan as envisaged by Malcolm Arnold
catered for the resourcing and support of a proper coaching system, but this was
removed from the equation by Sport England and has never been successfully
re-addressed.
There are currently no National Coaches, National Group
Coaches or National Event Coaches in place with a remit to create a seamless
coaching plan from Club through to Major Games. There are a group of ‘Potential’ Coaches operating in a
haphazard way with little support from the athletes or their coaches.
There are no National Squads covering all groups and
ages of athletes.
The High Performance Centres are only involved in
working with Lottery ‘Potential’ and ‘Matrix’ (elite) group athletes and
are therefore irrelevant to Clubs and other athletes and coaches who form the
next layer down and the springboard to future success.
All of this has created pockets of excellence working
within a vacuum, and Clubs desperate for coaches and resources being divorced
from that excellence.
The ‘Potential’ Scheme
This has helped some athletes who otherwise may not have
received assistance. However the
scheme has come into direct conflict with many Clubs, coaches and athletes
because of its divisive, bureaucratic and bullying structure. It is a general opinion that the scheme was ill conceived and
ineffectively operated in what is seen as a direct conflict with existing good
practice.
The sport is structured with Clubs at its heart.
The deflecting of athletes from their Clubs, from their Club Coaches and
into a system of overly assertive mechanisms, distracts and disorientates
athletes, disillusions coaches and creates a two-structure system that cannot
work efficiently.
The ‘Potential’ Scheme seems to be disassociated
from the way the sport actually functions, and appears to be an attempt to
create a situation in which UKA controls this group of athletes, with no
reference to anyone except UKA employees. This
of course will not work, as UKA cannot resource the huge number of coaches and
administrators that would be needed to support such an alternative scheme.
Such personnel are currently working voluntarily within the Clubs and
have little desire to leave.
Combine this with the ‘Talent ID’ Scheme which is
viewed by many, not to be spotting talent but rather ‘poaching’ athletes
already some way up the ladder from their coaches, and the whole lower and
middle area of the sport would seem to be in conflict.
There has been no major attempt to mentor coaches of
potential athletes who need further tuition to be able to help their athletes
further up the ladder. Rather,
athletes have been encouraged to leave their coaches to join, in the main, High
Performance Centre squads.
Development and Coach Education
The development of athletes can only be achieved if
there is a clear pathway to success, both for coaches and athletes.
The current position of Development Athletics being
divorced from Elite Performance, has created a chasm on that success pathway,
not only for the athletes but also the coaches.
The new Coach Education system is in many ways superior
to what has existed in the past, but even that, six years down the line has not
fully addressed the real nature of coach education, the teaching of people about
coaching their event. This has
recently come more sharply into focus with the development of the Level 3 and 4
event specific modules that has involved a number of high-level coaches and was
piloted at the end of 2003.
The concerns from coaches are that the scheme is much
too expensive and thus rules out those aspirants with few financial resources,
immediately reducing the number of potential high-level coaches for the future.
The other concern is that the qualifications are not to
NVQ validation standards and therefore do not have a wider application or value
beyond athletics despite the great expense in time and money needed to achieve
them.
A seamless pathway to success
Taking the above into consideration it would appear that
athletes and coaches are all being pulled in several different directions.
UKA must bring the various strands of coaching strategy
back into harmony, both within the overall UKA structure and also that of the
sport as a whole.
There are a number of models which could be chosen, but
that followed by most Countries is the event-based system.
This is the structure that produced the great results in our own past and
still remains in part in some Home Countries, England Areas and Counties.
Such a structure necessitates the creation of a
‘Performance Coaching Strategy’ based on a complete pathway for an athlete
and coach from the very earliest stage to the very top and based on the highest
level of coaching right from the beginning.
This implies that the Clubs or at least the major
training tracks must be resourced with good coaches to look after the intake of
youngsters into each event. Nine or
more (sprints and hurdles, middle distance, long distance, long and triple jump,
high jump, pole vault, hammer throw, javelin throw, and shot and discus) paid
(for the hours worked) coaches with the responsibility to coach athletes from
any club, attending at least three times per week at the centres, would make a
huge difference to the initial and most vital first step in the pathway.
They would also act as the ‘Talent Scouts’ both for potential
athletes and coaches, guiding them into the system.
They could also effectively link in with the schools’ structure, being
local and well qualified.
At ‘Hub’ level a system of coaches, again paid for
their time, covering each of the events under a ‘Hub’ Chief Coach with
organisational responsibility to select and develop local personnel and ensure
their performance, would create the next step of the ladder.
This effectively would be the ‘Potential’ level group.
At National level this system would be mirrored in the
employment of a Chief National Performance Coach and a staff of nine to twelve
National Event Performance Coaches, with responsibility to oversee the whole
performance structure in practical terms.
Within this structure would be the High Performance and
Regional Performance Centres which would act as the focal points for all levels
of athlete and coach, ‘Hub’, ‘Potential’ and National Squad gatherings,
supplementary resources (Medical, Physiotherapy etc.) and coach education, thus
defining and drawing their role into the whole continuous structure.
Administrators, not coaches, with the remit of supporting the coaches and
athletes, not controlling them, would co-ordinate the functions of these centres.
At UKA level the Performance Director would be an
administrator to oversee the complete structure, Lottery funding would be
managed by administrators and Group Directors would be replaced by coaching
staff responsible for the whole pathway of their individual events.
This complete structure would create the seamless
performance development path for the athlete and coach, utilising and enhancing
the 'best practice’ that to a large extend is currently being wasted.
Input at all levels
Such a structure can only be created if coaches have
input at all levels of the sport. It
is their role to produce the athletes and they know best how this should be
effected. Currently coaches meet at
Club, County and English Regional/Home Country level. Their input has always been high and useful in assessing the
needs of their local domains. However
with no overall broad based input at the top since the inception of UKA there
has been no cohesion between the various groups.
The creation of a seamless functional structure also
depends on a seamless input, accountability and reporting structure, with
overall policy being guided by an expert top-level group.
The present structure of PST’s (to become Commissions)
lends itself to this, in that a high level coaching group could work together in
appointing the best coaching talent to oversee and enhance the system.
Funding
The cost of such a structure will depend on the
modernisation and reorganisation of the current Lottery funding structures at
both Elite and Potential levels, the extended use and re-organisation of
National and Regional High Performance Centres, the extension of ‘Hub’ roles
into coaching provision, and the involvement of the Clubs and Local Authorities.
How much each part of the suggested plan can be funded
from currently existing sources will be dependent on this fundamental re-organisation,
but even if this can only be effected in the long-term, and central budget input
is minimal, the basic structure can be well resourced by the voluntary sector
and local funding.
It is well to be reminded that in the past, fees from
coaching courses have made a very significant input to local performance
coaching resources, and there is no reason to suggest that this cannot be
reinstated as part of the new Coach Education structure.
Summary
M.A.Winch January
2004