What are the responsibilities of a sports coach?
A good coach will always know that he/she has many responsibilities; here are a few of them:
· Know how to communicate effectively with your athletes
· Understand the learning process and training principles
· Understand and implement appropriate teaching methods
· Understand the various coaching styles
· Understand the capabilities of growing children
· Advise athletes on safety
· Understand the causes and recognize the symptoms of over training
· Understand how to reduce the risk of injury to athletes
· Prepare training programes to meet the needs of each athlete
· Assist athletes to develop new skills
· Use evaluation tests to monitor training progress and predicting performance
· Advise athletes on their nutritional needs
· Understand and know how to develop the athletes energy systems
· Advise athletes on relaxation and mental imagery skills
· Advise athletes on the use of legal supplements
· Evaluate the athletes competition performance
· Evaluate athlete/training and athlete/coach performance
Coaching Roles
A coach also has to fulfill many roles here are a few of them:
· Advisor Advising athletes on the training to be conducted and suitable kit and equipment.
· Assessor Assessing athletes performance in training and in competition.
· Chauffeur Transporting them to sporting events if parents or family are unavailable to take them.
· Counselor Resolving emotional problems on the basis that sharing anxieties can be both relieving and reassuring.
· Demonstrator Demonstrate to the athletes the skill you require them to perform. To achieve this it is important that you also keep fit.
· Friend Over the years of working with an athlete a personal relationship is built up where as well as providing coaching advice you also become someone, a friend, who they can discuss their personal problems or share their success with. It is important to keep personal information confidential because if you do not then all respect the athlete had for you as a coach and friend will be lost.
· Facilitator Identify suitable competitions for them to compete in to help them achieve their overall objectives for the year.
· Fact finder Gathering data of national and international results and to keep abreast of current training techniques.
· Fountain of knowledge This may be the part of an advisor role in that they will often asked questions on any sporting event, events that were on the television, diet, sports injuries and topics unrelated to their sport.
· Instructor Instructing athletes in the skills of their [next page]