Definition of a Coach

This week my post is coming from the couch, seeing as I have Bronchitis and was not able to attend the lecture or tutorial this week.

In this post I would like to reflect on my personal definition of a coach and how it has changed over the years.

Coach 1
My first definition of a coach was developed as an athlete at age 10 through to 17 and he was qualified as a Bronze Swimming Coach and had 5 years of state coaching experience. He was a swimming coach in a small costal town with only one swimming club, one pool and was the only coach. He was expected to train swimmers from 8 years through to 18, of different abilities and most importantly different swimming oriented goals in only 4 25m lanes. From this coach I learnt that his role involved being adaptive, flexible and the importance of a 'one size fits all approach'. He needed to cater for those who attended 1 session a week through to those that attended 10.

Reflecting now on what I know about coaching, I believe he did the best he could for the knowledge he had. He did not have the education on how to properly develop a training plan according to the different season phases and physiological mechanisms. However, his relationships with his athletes and implementation of discipline were of a very high and personal standard.

Coach 2
The second definition comes from a coach I met at age 19, again as an athlete. He is an accredited Silver Swimming Coach and has over 30 years experience. He is a swimming coach for a well established coach in Canberra and has 7 lane pool to train up to 25 athletes of state to national level (ages 12-20) with swimming achievement orientated goals, however during the winter season he was limited to only 6 sessions per week due to limited afternoon pool availability.

Admittedly I only trained with this coach for a short 7-8 month, however there were several changes in my perception of a good coach. As he had more experience, his training plan was based specially for each phase of training and aimed correctly at different physiological systems. However I found when it came to an athlete-coach relationship with both myself and some other swimmers, he seemed to struggle to make a connection. With some of these athletes, this was reflected in both their training discipline and response to criticism.

Coach 3
I met this coach at age 18 however this time as a colleague. He is an accredited Bronze Swimming Coach and has met all criteria to move to the Silver level. He has 7 years coaching experience and has recently become head coach of a competitive swimming club in Canberra. There are 3 50m lanes available for his 40 swimmers who are country to national achievers of ages 11-36 with the large majority having goals aimed at improving their competitive swimming.

I have worked along side this coach for a little over 3 years, who himself is competing at this years 2012 Olympic Trails. I find this coach to be a blend of the previous two coaches mentioned. He has the knowledge to develop effective training programs, while he can still relate to his athletes and discipline them appropriately. I believe this ability not only comes from his strong knowledge and involvement within the sport over his childhood and adolescence but also from his tertiary studies in Sports Coaching and Exercise Science and Psychology.

Conclusion
I believe there is no correct definition for a coach, their role is entirely based on their performance within their environment. Therefore their success may need to be assessed differently, for example if you compare a medal count between coach 1 and coach 2 - coach 2 is obviously going to have a much higher success rate, however coach 1 has provided a wider athlete range to achieve their goals.

Please feel free to leave any comments or thoughts you have about this post!