Winter Squad Camp Update

We are well into our second winter camp now, currently on day 40. We have a outstanding group here in Florida, with Canadians Kyle Jones, and Paula Findlay, Americans Jarrod Shoemaker, Alicia Kaye, Sarah Groff and Tommy Zafares, Dane Helle Frederiksen, Vendula Frintova from the Czech Republic, Spaniards Mario Mola, and Carol Routier, and finally Richard Murray from South Africa, and Mirinda Carfrae to arrive next week and into March.

I've been posting photos on my facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/JoelFilliolCoaching

and the same photos also on flickr at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jfilliol/sets/72157632546609868/

The bulk of the squad is focused on the ITU World Series, while Helle, Alicia, racing non-draft Rev3, 5150, and 70.3, and Rinny focused on Kona of course. 

Camp so far has been excellent, a great coaching challenge with so much talent in one squad, and a great pleasure being surrounded by likeminded inviduals. We are simply focused on moving forward each day, and each week, both individually on specific areas, and working together, lifting each other towards what we want to achieve this season.

Follow me on twitter for more @joelfilliol

They aren't just going to give it to you.

"Galen won a few races last year, but he lost most of them. He still feels he has unfinished business. He can get better. He's very, very hungry. He's even more motivated than last year. At this level you can't rest on your laurels. Too many other people are working hard. They aren't just going to give it to you."

"I think Galen realizes how close he is right now. Every little thing matters. Every little bit of rest. Galen always has been disciplined, but right now he is leading a very Spartan life. Well, he's living in a nice house. But all he does is run, rest and spend time with his wife. He's either training or recovering 24 hours a day. In everything he does I've noticed an increased intensity and discipline."

From OregonLive.com via Letsrun.com Quote of the Day.

Wisdom from Jasper Blake

Jasper Blake has a fantastic story to tell about his sporting life  - his 'retirement blog' is great read, and the closing paragraph contains this timeless wisdom:

If I could pass on anything to the next generation it’s this:

No matter how good you get or how good you think you are, remember that you are never entitled to anything and the sport owes you nothing.  You need to approach it as if you owe the sport everything.  Never underestimate how much work you will do and how much you will have to give of yourself to get good.  If you want to win you have to earn that rite every single year, every single month, every single week, every single day, every single workout.  But don’t look at it as a sacrifice; consider it a gift that you have the opportunity to go down that road.

Win or lose, it’s an awesome road to be on!

Jasper is now coaching at B78

comment on twitter @joelfilliol 

Charles van Commenee to quit as UK Athletics head coach

Van Commenee said: “If I hold athletes and coaches accountable every day, how could I work over the next four years if I am not held accountable myself? It’s a no-brainer. I never understand when people who have failed stay in jobs, as in politics and football.”

From an article in the Telegraph.

Athletics Weekly contacted me for comment, and I wrote the following:

My view, as a former foreign Head Coach of British Triathlon -

While it's admirable and rare for a performance leader to hold himself accountable to the failure to meet the UKA performance target, his resignation will not help UKA move forward, and creates a discontinuity in leadership and uncertainty for all involved, from athletes to coaches. Medal targets are somewhat arbitrary in the first instance, and a non-coaching Head Coach can only have so much impact, particularly over only one quadrennial.

In my role with British Triathlon as Head Coach, the limitation was the quality of the personal coaches working directly with the athletes, and this is the same for UKA. As long as athletes like Mo have to head overseas to find the level of personal coaches and training groups they need, UKA's impact will be limited, no matter what other resources they have access to. Furthermore, the opportunity of young developing athletes to train alongside the current champions will be limited, when those athletes are primarily outside the UKA system.

Whomever is the next UKA head coach is less important than implementing the strategy of further investment in world leading event coaches that British athletes want to train with, and that are fully supported by UKA, and

that get results. If the rumours of Dan Pfaff leaving UKA are true, then that is a bigger loss to UKA than CVC leaving, however neither bodes well for the future of UKA.

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

Olympic long jump gold medallist Greg Rutherford on coach Dan Pfaff

But he admits that Pfaff is likely to move back to his home in Austin, Texas, after his contract expires in December, so he will follow him to the United States.

The 26 year-old said: “He’s had a bit of a hard time in the UK.

"I don’t think people were prepared to listen to what he had to say and it was down to some of the athletes to approach him rather than coaches and staff, which has been tough for Dan.

“He’s had a fantastic career so far and he’s coached some great athletes and he’s been doing so well with us.

“But when he came over to Britain people just didn’t want to take it on board. I think because of that, he’s missing being at home in America

From an article in the Telegraph on American coach Dan Pfaff, who has been working for UK Athletics since 2009.

The Disciplined Pursuit of Less

Why don't successful people and organizations automatically become very successful? One important explanation is due to what I call "the clarity paradox," which can be summed up in four predictable phases:

Phase 1: When we really have clarity of purpose, it leads to success.
Phase 2: When we have success, it leads to more options and opportunities.
Phase 3: When we have increased options and opportunities, it leads to diffused efforts.
Phase 4: Diffused efforts undermine the very clarity that led to our success in the first place.

Curiously, and overstating the point in order to make it, success is a catalyst for failure.

From the Harvard Business Review:

This illustrates a challenge within Olympic sports. When they achieve some success, and therefore gain access to more resources, this doesn't necessarily lead to further success. With careful management, more resources and more opportunities won't lead to a loss of focus, however that's not often the case. Instead we see diffussed and confused efforts. In sports this often takes shape as an expanded multidisiplnary model with sports science and sports medicine staff growing at great cost, beyond the capacity to make use of these resources, and comparitively little investment in the fundamentals of success - world class coaches, and access to preparation and competition opportunities for athletes.

ask "What is essential?" and eliminate the rest.

Be careful what you wish for. Lean, mean and hungry wins. 

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

Kenya Athletics coach wants foreigners to be banned

“Some of the foreign athletes are now catching up with us  that they were now beating Kenyans in their own specialities,” said Kirwa.     

He said Kenya was at a threat of losing ground as athletes from other countries were giving the country in some of the event’s it was dominating a run for its money because of their accessibility to Kenya’s training skills. 

 “We should protect our own by restricting others from invading our territory by being strict on entry rules,” he said. 

From this article. Perhaps some further consideration required...

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

“It’s a good life if you don’t break too many guitar strings. And it’s a pretty good life if you do.”

“It’s a good life if you don’t break too many guitar strings. And it’s a pretty good life if you do.”

Canova 101

Running Times has an article on running coach Renato Canova 

"What we do is to increase the volume and the duration and the single length of every type of interval at this type of speed. We need to extend the ability to run at the speed you want and you can produce."

This gives way to the main philosophic tenet, which I've dubbed Canova's Golden Rule. Simply put, to fulfill your potential as a marathoner, you need to progressively extend the distance you can run your goal pace, over a period of months and years."

A nice summary of some Canova principles that I use in my coaching practise. Some creativity is required to implement in triathlon preparation, alongside swim and bike training, however the main principles such as specific pace, pace extension, high volume intervals, and faster long runs can all be applied into ironman training. 

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

Triathlon tested spirit of future pro athletes and community

Two decades ago, three future Olympians, a future Canadian Olympic coach and a future national-level cyclist all took part in a Bracebridge sporting event that pushed both athletes and the community to their limit.
Canadian national cycling team coach Nathaniel Faulkner, Paralympian Graeme Murray, Olympic coach Joel Filliol and Olympians Simon Whitfield and Dan Roycroft were among the 345 young athletes who took part in the Kids of Steel triathlon of 1992. 

Google alerts hit me with this article. 

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

Alberto Salazar a few days after London Olympics

A video with Coach Alberto Salazar post Olympics. They are up in St Mortiz at the time of the interview - some nice footage during the interview of the athletes training on the track there. We saw Alberto, Mo Farah and Galen up in Font Romeu France before London as well. (both popular European altitude locations). 

Some great insight in this short video. 

There are a few other interviews from St Moritz from the same interviewers. 

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

TEDx CapeTownED - Prof Tim Noakes - The Mindset to Succeed

"the future will never remember what was in your bank account, or what kind of car you drove. The future will remember that wild ride of life where you believed in others and left a gift behind for someone else to dream the impossibe." 

A great video shared by Jordan Rapp. Prof Noakes new book is also a great read. 

A few selected quotes from the video:

"what we really need in life is a coach who will give us the self belief to do the extraordinary"

"faster, it's only pain"

"the art of sport - you have to have both the arrogance and the humility" 

"my job was to convince him he was beyond extraordinary" 

"hopefully you have a mentor like Bowerman who pushes you at a critical time. A time when someone has a belief in your future more than you do"

"your legacy is the belief you generate in the students you teach, it is your ultimate responsibility" 

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

It’s More than the medals: making sense of athlete’s performances at the Olympic Games.

Wayne Goldsmith at the Sports Coaching Brain blog has a good article on reviewing athletes performances at the Olympic games. He lists five questions to ask, however the key question for triathletes is did the athlete improve relative to their own performance to their previous major international competition?

That’s got nothing to do with money or population or systems: these are coaching issues - about preparation and planning, and all the money in the world will not make any difference to Olympic performance unless these issues are addressed with honesty and with a commitment to learning and improvement.

That's the key take home there - again back to the basics - just reproducing what has been done before is the first step - consistency of performance. 

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

Float On: Reid Coolsaet blog

I’ve thought about the race a lot in the past seven days and each time I try not to think of what could have been, but it’s pretty hard not to.  One of the positives which I keep thinking about is the great training I had building up to the race.  I feel as though I’ve reached a new level of marathon training even though I wasn’t able to show that in my final result.  Knowing that I’ve stepped up my game is really motivating for the next season and my next marathon.

A good post London blog from Canadian Olympic marathoner Reid Coosaet. Similar place to where Kyle Jones and I got to with Olympic prep, and not quite the result we were expecting, but also knowing the level of preparation we achieved is never wasted and always building forward.

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

Team GB can surpass record medal haul in Brazil Olympics in 2016

UK Sport will channel more than £500 million into Olympic sports over the next four years to try to replicate the success of the London Games, and its chief executive said the 65 medals won here should not be the limit of British ambition

From an article in the Telegraph. In my view, more money doesn't necessarily win more medals. But this is a lot of money again into the next quad, and with that you can get and keep good people involved, and good people DO help athlete win more medals.

“First you identify the athletes with the talent and the motivation to win. Then it is working tirelessly and in a giving way to support those people to be the best they can be."

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

Vaughters Reveals More About His Doping and The New York Times Op-Ed

“You have guys who train the same and are very disciplined athletes, and are even physiologically the same, but one has a quirk that’s very adaptable to the drug du jour,” Vaughters says. “Then all of a sudden your race winner is determined not by some kind of Darwinian selection of who is the strongest and fittest, but whose physiology happened to be most compatible with the drug, or to having 50 different things in him.” 

Bicycling has an excellent follow-up interview with Garmin-Sharp cycling boss Jonathan Vaughters on his piece in the NYT on doping in cycling

Both articles are well worth the read to gain some insight on the world inside of cycling, and wider sports, as to how so many athletes turn to doping. David Millar's excellent book is also worth a read along these lines.

Almost every athlete I’ve met who has doped will say they did it only because they wanted a level playing field. That says something: everyone wants a fair chance, not more. So, let’s give our young athletes a level playing field, without doping. Let’s put our effort and resources into making sport fair, so that no athlete faces this decision ever again. We put so much emotion into marketing and idolizing athletes, let’s put that same zeal into giving them what they really want: the ability to live their dreams without compromising their morals.

Fortunately athletes can still win clean in triathlon. There is no doubt that there are drugs within the sport, but as long as athletes can and do win clean, there will be fewer athletes turning to drugs.

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

How Team Sky and British Cycling Became the Best in the World

"With six stage wins and number 1 and 2 on the podium at the 2012 Tour de France, Team Sky grabbed the attention of all other cycling teams, and the world. Then, just over a week later Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome thrust British Cycling into that spotlight as well when they took gold and bronze at the Olympics in the men's time trial."

The trainingpeaks blog has an article about the success of Team Sky and British Cycling. The article includes some of the elements such as recruitment to and from the track, the incredible resources that the teams have access to with the Sky sponsorship and government funding. While the much publicised approach of "marginal gains" is lauded in this article and others as a contributor to this success, these methods are by no means unique in the world of sports. However cycling has often been practised in traditional ways, and one of the elements that has come through with Britsh Cycling and Team Sky is a move towards a coached environment for the riders. Programmes in cycling are traditionally race led, e.g. racing into form, vs training led, and have Sky have taken this preparation-focused approach with Wiggans, for example racing fewer races than in the past, and more focus on specific preparation such as altitude training and weight manipulation. Rider coaches are actually something relatively new in cycling, vs team manager led, and is an important, albeit basic change of approach on the invidiualising preparation. 

While it's interesting and sells well to focus on the technologic approach, good coaching and leadership is really at the heart of Team Sky's success and a reminder to do the basics well and success will follow. 

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol

Craig Mottram set to return to triathlon

"So how would be likely go in a triathlon? Chances are he will be successful. It will be fascinating watching his progress and development into this new sport…maybe he should have made the decision 4 years ago!"

First off the Bike has an article with an unconfirmed rumour that Australian runner Craig Mottram may switch over to triathlon from athletics. Mottram ran the 5000m in both the London and Beijing Games. The last couple years Mottram has suffered from some injuries and for a time was doing some training with the VIS triathlon squad and coach Jono Hall. He was at the WTS London race in 2010, and there were some rumours he may swtich then, however he kept running through to London. 

As the originator of the British Triathlon "TriGold" talent transfer programme I'm a supporter of runners coming across to triathlon, and with the multisport background that Mottram has, if he commits to the sport for 2 years he has the potential to make a real impact. 

---

comment on twitter @joelfilliol