The second edition of the youth athletics coaching conference, organised by Aspire Academy in cooperation with the Qatar Athletics Federation and the Olympic Council of Asia, featured productive panel discussions with speakers from among the world’s athletics champions
In their opening remarks, Major General Dahlan Al Hamad, president of the Qatar and Asian athletics federations and IAAF vice-president, along with Ivan Bravo, Aspire Academy’s director-general, and Vahid Kardani of the Olympic Council of Asia, welcomed the conference’s participants, wishing them productive discussions that would contribute positively to raising the level of athletics in the region.
Major General Dahlan Al Hamad said, during his opening of the conference’s ceremony: sport has developed from a hobby into a taught science, and we must adapt to this new concept of sport, and to achieve that we need qualified coaches, as this is one of the most important factors in athletes’ success — if a coach can build up and guide athletes properly, then we will have champions
A panel discussion titled “A Journey Towards Excellence” was also held, featuring South African runner Elana Meyer, and Qatar’s stars Mutaz Essa Barshim in the high jump and Abubaker Haydar Abdalla, endurance champion, both graduates of Aspire Academy, alongside Musaab Abdelrahman Balla, middle-distance champion. The participants spoke about the importance of a coach’s role in their careers and the challenges they faced and overcame to reach the level of sporting excellence they now enjoy.
The conference’s panels on its second day focused on a number of issues of interest to athletes, with a session presented by Dr Michael Johnson, who currently works as a consultant with the British athletics team, addressing “enhancing running-related training to build the foundations needed to achieve the best possible performance”, while Chris Gavaghan of the Queensland Academy of Sport gave a session titled “The Triple Strength: Developing Training Standards in Athletics”, shedding light during it on the key elements for raising the level of athletics training in order to improve athletes’ competitive performance
Elsewhere, breakout sessions covering coaching theory saw wide participation from various local clubs, federations and Aspire Academy coaches, and these sessions covered training related to running, hurdling, discus throw, endurance events and jumping, as well as other sports such as high jump and long jump
Practical lectures were also held on the academy’s indoor track on reducing sports injuries, delivered by specialist experts in the field, alongside lectures on nutrition and its related challenges, delivered by Aspire Academy’s nutrition specialists
It is worth noting that Aspire Academy launched the youth athletics coaching conference in 2014 in cooperation with the Qatar Athletics Federation, with its first edition seeing the participation of around 270 representatives from local clubs and federations, in addition to participants from around the world
