Articles on sports coaching and developments in performance science for athletes and coaches.
As the new decade starts, it is time to face the realities of the sports experience around the world.
The last decade, saw the most significant changes in society, in learning, in education, in technology and in social change that the world has experienced.
And, in general, sport has not kept pace with the extent or speed of the changes.
New Sport: Old Sport. The Decade of Client Focused Sport is Here. (more…)
There is a tribe in the highlands of Papua New Guinea who have never seen modern technology, who could not even imagine using the latest electronic tools, who can not comprehend western society concepts of computing, social media, high speed Internet links, laser technology or satellite navigation.
This tribe, believes that the best way – the only way – the way everyone must adopt to cut down a tree is to make an axe by lashing a sharp rock to a piece of wood. This knowledge has been passed down from generation to generation for centuries….this tribe knows for certain that the only way to cut down a tree is to use a hand made stone ax.
And then, one day, through the forest, comes a man from the USA carrying a chain saw……. (more…)
One of the greatest challenges many traditional Olympic sports face is how to achieve the same or better results in less time. Kids and parents have very little spare time and for sports like swimming, track and field, rowing, diving, gymnastics, tennis and cycling, finding ways to optimise athletic development and enhance sports performance efficiently: i.e. achieving better performances in less time has become an increasingly important aspect of coaching around the world.
The concept of Talent Identification – TID for short – makes sense.
Do some standardised testing and screening of lots of kids, find the ones who can run faster, run further, jump longer, stretch better than the rest and bingo- you found talent!
It all grew out of the now “mythical” talent identification systems of the old Eastern Block (and more recently China) – and the countless stories we have all heard for the past 30 years about how the centralised government systems put every child in the nation through a series of TID testing protocols and then funnelled them in to the specific sports where their talent was most likely to be developed to its full potential.
But in the western world, in spite of the hundreds of millions of dollars thrown at TID in Australia, the US, Canada, New Zealand, the UK and Western Europe, with the exception of a few minor and specialised sports – it has failed and failed badly. (more…)
This “10000 hours to build a champion athlete” stuff seems to have popped up in a lot of places recently.
Just goes to show how many people in the world can write stuff about sport without knowing anything about it. (more…)
Hi there. In response to the overwhelming support from the sporting community all over the world, the all new Sports Coaching Brain is about to get even better. The new SCB will include some really cool, innovative and creative learning options including pod-casting and video – it will be Read more…