sports-skills

Message to the Sporting World – Do it your own way!

After the CLOSING ceremony of every Olympic Games, someone should yell out, “let the (real) Games begin”.

The real “GAMES”…………the junkets and fact finding missions the Sporting leaders from most countries embark on to find out what the USA, Germany, Great Britain, South Korea, China and Australia are doing to be successful in the Olympics.

The logic seems simple enough.

“Our country didn’t win any medals at the Olympics” says the Minister for Sport.

“Country XYZ won lots of medals at the Olympics”, says the CEO of the Sports Commission.

“Therefore if we want medals and we copy them we will win medals”, thinks everyone in the room.

“Hooray!!!! Problem solved – let’s buy some air tickets”. (more…)

By Wayne Goldsmith, ago

To a Coach with a Hammer, Every Athlete is a Nail: Creativity in Sports Coaching.

Coaching is creativity.

To the successful coaches of the future, creativity will be a core coaching skill: right up there with communication, passion, empathy, commitment, the ability to engage athletes and sports specific technical skill.

But what does it mean to be creative and to coach creatively. And to coaches who are not naturally creative, can they learn to be?

Or to the coach with a hammer, is every athlete a nail? (more…)

By Wayne Goldsmith, ago

High Performance on a Budget – can you create a high performance environment without spending any money?

As soon as someone mentions the words “high-performance” in sport, people start running for their cheque books and credit cards. The most commonly held view about high-performance sport is that you need significant investment and resources to run a successful high performance sports program. However, money alone does not guarantee success in high performance sport and almost any coach or Club can create a sustainable high performance environment by targeting and prioritising their resources on the right things at the right time. This article discusses how to prioritise in high performance sport and how to target the things that matter: the things that will make a difference where it really matters….the performance of your athletes

By Wayne Goldsmith, ago

The High Performance Sport Checklist – Part Two of the List of 50 Things you Must be doing to Succeed in High Performance Sport.

Score Key: 0-10: High performance sport is not for you. Maybe try your hand at pavement painting or hole digging or grass mowing or something else which does not require the consistent application of excellence. 11-20: You might dream about being high performance and talk about being high performance, but Read more…

By Wayne Goldsmith, ago

Top Ten Talent I.D. Tips for High Performance Sport – The T.O.P. Approach

 

So much of the world’s high performance sports dollars (or Yens or Yuans or Euros or Pounds or Pesos or Rands depending on where you come from), time, energy, focus and attention is spent on three things:

  1. Talent identification;
  2. Talent recruitment;
  3. Talent development.

Or if you like, find them, sign them, refine them.

And most of the world has still got it wrong. There is a better way. (more…)

By Wayne Goldsmith, ago

The Performance Clock and Coaching

The aim is to create a sustainably successful high performance environment and to always be competitive. Winning once can be a matter of luck. Sustainable competitiveness comes from good planning, good management, vision, creativity, innovation and hard work.
The Performance Clock explains why athletes, coaches and teams fail to sustain competitiveness and how you can avoid the traps and pitfalls inherent in the cycle of sports performance.

By Wayne Goldsmith, ago