The Turkish Olympic Committee (TOC) and Turkish Triathlon Federation held a technical course for triathlon coaches from 25-29 October in Ankara, Turkey.
The five-day course, which was supported by the International Olympic Committee’s Olympic Solidarity, was led by International Triathlon Union (ITU) appointed coaches Alexander Kochetkov and Vicent Beltran Alcala.
Participants took part in theoretical and practical sessions and learnings which were then reinforced through evaluation meetings where individual feedback was provided.
Explaining the goals of the development course, former national athlete and Vice-President of the Lithuanian Triathlon Federation, Alexander Kochetkov said:
"With this programme, the ITU is trying to provide a better training system and improved coaching knowledge for developing countries. One of the important goals of the course is to raise the trainers – who play a key role in the development of the athlete – to a world standard. I can say that the coaches here have made very good progress so far. It’s nice to see that everyone is open to learning and new ideas."
Having observed the development of Turkish triathlon since 2011, Spanish and ITU coach Vicent Beltrán Alcalá said:
"We have made huge progress at the end compared to our level on the first day of the course. Here, we provide the coaches with a different perspective of coaching. They have made very good progress. Triathlon is becoming more and more popular in Turkey. To improve, it is necessary to increase the number of people who start practicing this sport, especially at a young age. You can think of it like a pyramid. The wider the base, the higher you can reach. Better results can be achieved by bringing more children into this sport and helping them to improve their abilities."
Turkish national athlete Esra Gökçek stated that attending a coaching course as an athlete provided her with many benefits:
"We learned a lot from the valuable trainers of the ITU. By participating in this course as an athlete, I increased my knowledge which I can integrate into my training plan and my own social life. I believe that if we learn what we need to do not only as an athlete but also from a trainer’s perspective, this will improve our performance. I am very happy to be here."
Turkish Triathlon Federation Foreign Relations Coordinator Hüseyin Onur Aydemir said:
"So far, we only had two or three coaches with an international coaching certificate. We very much want to increase the number of internationally educated people in our triathlon community and to have our country represented in triathlon at the Olympic Games. This course made an important contribution to this path. On this occasion I would like to thank Olympic Solidarity and TOC for their support."
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