Coaching and Care of Athletes

COACHING AND CARE OF ATHLETES A year later the English Amateur Athletic Association decided that it was time that something was done for the improvement of the performances of British field-events men. In due course I received an invitation to become a eo-opted member of a Field– events Sub-committee of the Amateur Athletic Association, which proposed to institute a Summer School for Athletes. To that meeting I went armed at every point, for in the mean– time I had seen Dr Schofield (Plate XII, Fig. 38), the Principal of Loughborough College, and Mr Bridgeman (Plate XII, Fig. 38), Head of the Summer School held there annually. Between us we had drawn up a plan for the accommodation of the English Summer School for Athletes in connection with the Summer School, with every detail thought out, down to the feeding of those who would attend the A.A.A. course. The plan I put forward was ac– cepted in its entirety by the sub-committee of the Amateur Athletic Association, and I was chargedwith the task oforganizing the School. Luck was with me from the first in that I was able to persuade Armas Valste, the famous Finnish Decathlon athlete, who had put the shot nearly 50 ft. and cleared 6 ft. 5 ins., in the high jump, to become chief foreign coach at the first English Summer School for Athletes. I had also the help of J. H. Viljoen, of South Africa, a famous hurdler who had competed in the I 928 Olympic Decathlon championship, in which he achieved the best two per– formances of I I secs. for the roo metres and 15·6 secs. for the I ro metres hurdh;s. D. G. A. Lowe was instrumental in securing the help of Pierre Lewden, the French high jump record-holder. A number of well-known English athletes also gave their services as amateur coaches. The first School, instituted at Loughborough College in. I 934, was open to those who wished to learn how to coach, and also to active athletes. It remained in session for fourteen days. One notable feature of the School was the making of a slow-motion film, Teaching the Teachers, which enabled all of us to learn a good deal more than we had known previously of athletic technique. We had in vogue also a system whereby films were made daily of the performances of individual students. These .g·5-mm. films were sent by train each evening to Messrs Pathe's studios, and were returned on the following morning, so that within twenty– four hours athletes could see themselves in action, and thus appreciate the good points of their own technique and also the faults they were committing.