Will Bayley winning Paralympic gold in 2016
Monday to Friday, with a minimum of 20 hours at a table – but they also then get expertise in other areas, like a psychologist and physiotherapy.
‘ That’ s where the individual athlete plans are very useful, so if Billy for example decides he needs to work on something specific, he’ s got the time and contact with the coach to do it.
‘ We’ ve also got video analysis here, which most players coming through the pathway programme haven’ t had much access to before, so they can see themselves playing, which is a really useful aid for both athlete and coach.’
The‘ here’ in all this is the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield, an international standard, multi-sports training centre and the base for, among others, England Athletics, England and GB Boxing and England Basketball.
British Para TT have also called it home for the best part of a decade, but having a singular base poses the coaching staff some tricky questions, as Marples warns.
‘ Some players can commute here if they live close enough, but others will potentially move their entire lives to be near this training centre. We will do an extensive amount of work with the athlete before inviting people here. We want players that will buy into an elite performance culture. We will only bring players here once we believe they are ready to be here.
‘ That’ s because we have worked hard and embedded a high-performance culture and we want future players to aspire to this.’
Finding those players whose aspirations he’ s keen to attract is what takes up a sizeable portion of Marples’ time.
‘ My role as the Pathway Manager is to build strong links with the current pathway players and their personal coaches- to ensure that they are in an environment where they can excel and become better athletes. I then organise camps throughout the year where these athletes are invited to take part.
‘ We’ ve also started linking up more closely with the Talent Development Centres( TDC), to try and grow a new initiative called the Futures Programme, through which players could be working and improving without needing to be directly seen by us. Instead, we’ d work with those players’ coaches and clubs to develop training diaries and offer some insights around things like psychology.
‘ At the development level, I observe the athletes at training camps roughly every six months to monitor their progress. There will be some focus on specific exercises based around their classification, but at development level it’ s more of a broader improvement we look for.
‘ It’ s important to continue to build links between the player and their club and coach. We encourage all the pathway programme athletes to attend their club training sessions, and to work closely with their personal coaches. We are then just a phone call away if the coach would like to discuss any aspects of thir athlete’ s game.’
Think you might be coaching the next Rob Davies or Will Bayley?
Contact Shaun Marples at: smarples. bttad @ gmail. com or on 07944776751.
WE