Public Spark

Much preparation is needed on the athletes and coaches as well. These are three areas that Olympic coaches have found to be important:

1. Believing in the athletes

   Coaches must help prepare athletes physically and mentally for competition. However, they must also trust and believe in their athletes. Ryan Davenport (coach of the US skeleton sledding team) once said, ” An idealistic coach might like to think that people are working out of a sense of purpose or duty, but I’m sure that most athletes are putting in the effort in order to get the reward.”

2. Managing people effectively

   Coach Mike Candrea led the 2004 US Softball team to win gold in 2004 Olympics. He said “Well to lead, I think it’s two-fold. One, it’s managing the game; obviously we are still playing a game, but more importantly, managing people. And I think a big part of that I’ve found out dealing with young women, because I’ve coached men and I’ve coached women. Men have to play good to feel good and women have to feel good to play good. I spent a lot of my time trying to get young women to feel good about themselves and I think a part of that is understanding life. And what life’s going to bring. And how do you cope with some of the quote, ‘curve balls,’ that you’re going to get in life.”

3. Encouraging team work

   Coach Kryzyzewski (Coach K) will lead the US Men’s Basketball Team this year. He is known for his phenomenal coaching of the Duke Basketball team. He strives for unity as he will have many talented NBA players on the team. He feels that he has to prepare the team to coordinate in unity and find a balance so that there are no selfless or selfish players.