USA TKD Elite Coahing Team

The Elite Sports Clinic

Today, I attended a clinic organized by Singapore Sports Council and conducted by the USA Elite Taekwondo Coaching Team. One of the speaker was USA most experience elite coach, Jean Lopez. There were two speakers in the clinic. The other speaker I could not managed to get his name.

Both of them shared their experiences with the local coaches at present. One key point they stressed on good coaching is to place the athletes at the first priority, and not the coaches; these include welfare, rewards and other relevant issues. They also mentioned that the athletes' well-being is one of the main responsibilities for the coaches. Coaches should not only look for attaining medals in championships on the expense of athlete's well-being. In the perspectives of 'Success', they agreed that athlete's success is not only confined at Medal prospect, there are other areas to look into too, such as their own fulfillment, enjoyment, etc.

Another point they strike me was: Enjoyment. If coaches could add in some training elements that would increase the degrees of enjoyment for the athlete during the training, then the drop out rate would be greatly reduced.

Finally, they also said that coaches shall keep up with the latest knowledge of Sports, these include: sports physiology, sport psychology, biomechanics, nutrition, etc.

The clinic was very fruitful and rewarding.

Elite Coach,Jean Lopez (Above)

Another Elite Coach (Which I did not manage to get his name, my apology)