‘Take home’ after IFAC 2020

It is a fact of life that even when we listen to the same presentation in the same conference, we each hear something different. So there will have been as many lessons learned from IFAC 2020 as there were participants!

So please read these lessons I learned in that context. Those who attended hopefully on reading these will be reminded of the excellent input from speakers and their own lessons learned will be reviewed and refreshed. Those who did not might reflect on the following and create their own.

As we move forward with IFAC and EACA, I think it would be a good idea after each IFAC to share our lessons learned and ideas they generate on dedicated pages of the EACA website. This would become our “learning locker room!”

So these for me were key take-aways as lessons learned.

  1. A winning culture is founded on a learning culture. Learning is a never ending story and we must bring structure to it if we are to be consistent winners:
    • Build a robust foundation of basics and keep refreshing them
    • Be meticulous in preparation and briefing
    • Learn on the move from life experience
    • De-brief forensically – hot and cold de-briefs
    • Revisit and relearn from cumulative experience
  2. Coaches must adopt a new way of thinking in learning how to adapt to a hybrid approach of teaching and learning. What can be taught sits well with virtual communication. This embraces the science of coaching and the technical skills that are the tools of our trade. What can be learned sits best with practical experience. This embraces the art of coaching and the people skills in our work.
  3. Female and male coaches bring unique skill sets to coaching and it is clear we must be more committed to and engaged with understanding how to harmonize those skills not only to achieve athlete and coach development and performance excellence, but to bring coaching itself to a new level.
  4. The dreadful days we have been going through in the face of the COVID19 Pandemic has tested out ability to be creative, adaptable and versatile in applying our skills in a climate of restriction and uncertainty. But we have risen well to the challenge, even to learning on the move how to address mental and emotional health issues. Critically, such issues will not disappear when the Pandemic ends. Going forward we must sharpen our observation skills to be ahead of the game in recognising stress signatures to coach both athletes and coaches in being better prepared to protect against such issues.
  5. Related to this was an effective policy applied in the Netherlands of coaches holding training at a level of 6 week readiness to compete.
  6. Traditionally Coach Education Programmes do not teach coaches how to learn and as a consequence coaches do not normally teach athletes how to learn. Greater input to coach education programmes from Cognitive Psychology is essential to correcting this.
  7. As technology has greater and greater impact as a means of informing coaches decision making, Artificial Intelligence will become a valuable contributor in synthesising the tsunami of data now available. It is not more data that we need but digestible and usable information.
  8. Coaches have responsed to World Athletics President, Lord Coe’s “vision and interest that a body be formed from amongst the coaching community dedicated to Athletics Coaching related matters and to facilitate bringing necessary change.” That response is the creation of the Global Athletics Coaching Academy (GACA) embracing Education, Regulation, Support and Representation. Area and National Athletics Coaches Associations are part of GACA’s strategy in building a World Athletics Coaches Community. This is an important moment in Athletics History for coaches to be responsible and accountable for the future of Athletics Coaches and Coaching.

These were the bigger general take away lessons. There were many more at the specific level and I’m sure you’ll pick up on these by listening to the excellent presentations and panel discussions.

Sincerly,

Frank Dick OBE

IFAC 2020: last days to sign up

Less than one week before the first session of the 2020 International Festival of Athletics Coaching means that anyone interested to attend has to hurry up and book to gain access to the live stream page.

Don’t miss the opportunity to listen from great coaches like Ans Botha, Helena Duplantis, Malcolm Arnold and Vern Gambetta but also from experts coming from different areas like brain specialist prof. Vin Walsh and Jonathan Boase, who is working on an Artificial Intelligence solution to analyze team sports’ playing and support coaches in talent identification.

Register today for only €99,00 and live the magic of the Festival!

Ans Botha: what a line-up at IFAC!

Did you not sleep the last 5 nights waiting for the coach who will speak in the same session of Helena Duplantis? Well, it was worth it: Ans Botha, the coach of 400 World Record holder  Wayde van Niekerk is that name. 

Ans will talk about how to “hold athlete competition readiness throughout Covid-19”, sharing her experience in managing Wayde’s positivity at the virus right before his first race of the season and still getting a huge result after a few weeks he returned healthy.

Ans’ slot is scheduled at 2:05PM GMT in the Session 2 of the conference, next Novembre 7th. She will also speak in the panel at the end of the session together with Helena Duplantis and Maria Chiara Milardi, the italian coach of Davide Re, one of the best European quarter milers in 2020.

This will probably be the last time Ans Botha will speak in public to share her great experience with other coaches so don’t miss the opportunity and sign up to IFAC 2020!

Charles van Commenee at IFAC!

Another big shot for the 2020 International Festival of Athletics Coaching: Charles van Commenée enters in the conference’s line-up!

Charles is one of the world”s leading experts in managing performance, initially as personal coach to a number of elite athletes who won medals at Olympic Games and World Championships, then as Technical Director for Dutch and British Athletics and finally as Performance Director for the Dutch Olympic Committee and later for British Athletics.

He will talk about how to “Lead the team through Covid-19” in the third session of the conference, scheduled November 7th at 6:55PM GMT. 

If this announcement helps your last doubts to fade away, subscribe to the 2020  International Festival of Athletics Coaching for only €99,00

Ladies & Gentlemen…. Dawn Scott will talk at IFAC 2020!

England Women have been boosted by the appointment of Dawn Scott as senior women’s physical performance manager.

Scott, who hails from the north-east, has been working with US Soccer since 2010 and played a key part in USA’s FIFA World Cup wins in 2015 and 2019.

She previously spent nine years with The FA as head of sports science and supported England’s run to the 2009 UEFA EURO final.

Her role will be to support the Lionesses as they work towards UEFA Women’s EURO 2021, which will be played on home soil.

That preparation will start with the SheBelieves Cup to be played in the US from February, with Scott starting work at St. George’s Park in December.

Scott will also be charged with building the interaction between the senior team and Barclays FA WSL clubs in terms of physical performance as well as working closely with staff along the whole talent pathway.

She will benefit from working alongside the outstanding physical performance and nutrition team already working at St. George’s Park.

If you want to hear from such a successful woman in football subscribe to the 2020 International Festival of Athletics  Coaching for only €99,00!

Helena Duplantis in the IFAC line-up!

Great news for the upcoming International Festival of Athletics Coaching, scheduled for next 6-8 November: Helena Duplantis will speak about how phenomenal ‘Mondo’ Duplantis and his entourage dealt with Covid-19 restrictions to achieve the incredible set of new World Record in pole vault.

Helena will be interviewed by Wolfgang Ritzdorf in the IFAC session entitled “Remaining competition ready in a climate of uncertainty”, scheduled at 2:55PM GMT on Saturday, December 7th. 

She’ll be also one of the hosts in the final panel of the session, with two other female coaches. Want to know who they are? Stay tuned: they will be announced soon here!

In the meantime, don’t lose time and subscribe to the 2020 International Festival of Athletics Coaching for only €99,00!

EACA, NACACTFCA and ASEA together for a conferences’ cycle

With an agreement that could be defined as historic, the Associations of Athletics Coaches active in three major Areas in the world have decided to collaborate in the organization of their annual conferences.
The European Association (EACA), the North American, Central American and Caribbean Association (NACACTFCA) and the South American Association (ASEA) will organize their respective annual conferences in a completely virtual form due to the still very severe pandemic conditions at the level. global.

The three conferences will therefore have a similar format and will all be broadcast in live streaming on this site, through which in the coming weeks it will also be possible to purchase. virtual tickets for the conferences.

Finally: IFAC 2020 !

We were hanging on for as long as we could to be able to have a conference in person but we had to give up, the Covid-19 pandemic has changed everyone’s lives and the end seems to be still far in the future.

In these last few months we had many doubts about the fate of the 2020 edition of our International Festival of Athletics Coaching. Initially scheduled for January, then postponed until the end of March at Loughborough University, it was only a few weeks before the event that we had to cancel to avoid any issues with this new pandemic.

We finally decided to have a completely virtual IFAC 2020 in November, from Friday 6th to Sunday 8th. Compared with the original program of last March 2019, we amended some topics to make room for conversations related to how successful coaches were dealing with the constraints of access to training facilities, travelling and attending competition sites during the 2020 season.

We had an incredible coach who shared their experience of one of their top athletes who tested positive with Covid-19 right before the opening of the season. You must listen to this one!

The Festival’s line-up includes great speakers like Dawn Scott, Vern Gambetta, Donna Fraser and Malcolm Arnold.

As always, the European Athletics Coaches Association believes that coaches can learn from an array of different related areas. For this reason, at IFAC 2020 we will hear from Bryony Dunne and Gareth Grier who are leading London’s Air Ambulance in these challenging times.

Many more great names for the IFAC 2020 line-up will be announced in the coming weeks so stay tuned!

The event will be streamed live on the new EACA website. The standard price for the all seven sessions of the conference is €99,00. However, if you decide to become a member of the European Athletics Coaches Association by registering on our website, you’ll get a discount. If you apply for the Free Membership you’ll get a 10% discount, while if you choose to sign up for the yearly Premium Membership the discount will be a big 30%!

Applications are already open! All you need to do is register yourself for the conference!

Only a few days before NACACTFCA 2020 Conference

If you are not registered to the NACACTFCA 2020 Conference yet, don’t wait any longer: coaches and experts like Roberta Anding, Harry Marra, Donna Harris, Dan O’Brien, Wendy Truvillion and Nikos Apostolopoulos are waiting for you!

Register today for only $50,00 to watch the live stream. 

If you are an EACA member the discounted price is € 35,00!