Team Hoyt

After watching this video about Dick and Rick Hoyt (AKA Team Hoyt) and mentioning it in my previous post, I wanted to quickly write about some things which I think coaches and athletes could take away from the story.

For starters lets look at Rick. Rick shows us that even the seemingly impossible can be possible. If Rick was given no external support, then sure it would have been impossible for him to compete in marathons and ironmans, but as the saying goes 'no man is an island'.

If you ask any of the worlds top athletes, I'm sure not one of them would say "I did it all by myself". All athletes require some form of external support to reach their goals, whether it be in the form of moral support, coaching, physiotherapy, fellow competitors, team mates, psychologists, nutritionists and the list could go on forever. I think it's important that athletes appreciate the support system around them and the lengths that many of these service providers and individuals will go to in order to ensure that they can perform at their best. Athletes should make the most of this external support network in order to have the best chance at reaching their goals, whatever they may be.

Dick and Rick Hoyt
http://www.teamhoyt.com/about/index.html

The same goes for coaches. No coach is going to have the expertise required across all aspects of athlete performance in order to act alone. It is important that as coaches we continually source external resources and ideas and where available, utilise the skills of specialised service providers. That is if we want to get the most from our athletes.

Now let's look at Dick. A photo of Dick Hoyt should be right there in the dictionary next to the word "Commitment". In what began as a decision to raise his child with a disability, to partaking in and completing in over 1000 races, Dick has showed unbelievable commitment to his cause.

It is this sort of commitment that athletes require, to get through the early morning training sessions, the physical hurt and everything else that goes with it in order to reach their goals. This is especially relevant to those in team sports - when your effort can affect the success of your whole team, it's important to commit 100%. I'm sure that many successful athletes could tell you about the high level of commitment that it took them to succeed. I hope that they could also tell you about the high level of commitment that many others may have had along the way to help them succeed. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to take away from the individual efforts of athletes. I think however that one of the major things I think an athlete can take from the efforts of Dick is the idea of being a part of something bigger, and an appreciation of the commitments and efforts of those around them. For example the parents who would drive them to training and competitions, pay money to provide the things they need etc, or the coaches along the way who would put the time in to plan and run training sessions - once again the list could go on.

Again I think the same goes for coaches. I don't believe (and I'm sure most coaches would agree) that the role of a coach should be limited to the training field and the Saturday matches. I think that as part of a wider support network, the coach needs to be going that extra mile for the athletes wherever they can. Whether it be being available for their athletes to talk to, or sourcing new and improved methods, not simply sticking to what we know.

Once again, I just wanted to write this in order to support my previous post and add a few things to it. Please feel free to share your thoughts.