Club Coaches Attend Dublin Coaching Conference

Seven of the Club’s Coaching Team attended the Dublin Athletics Juvenile Coaching Conference held in Howth yesterday.

This was a great coach networking event with Coaches from other Clubs in Dublin.

Speakers on the day included Michael O’ Connor. Michael is Coach, and Dad, to Kate O’Connor who this year won medals in Heptathlon at World and European level. Michael gave rare insights into the journey both he and Kate have been on over the past decade. Michael this week won the World Athletics Coaching Award for 2025 so to have our coaches to be able to hear from a coach of Michael’s calibre was inspiring. Indeed Michael chose Howth over heading over to Monaco to pick up his award this weekend!

Sophie Becker and Phil Healy, spoke about their progression from teenagers to making Olympic Finals. Both Sophie and Phil emphasized how they were really late developers. Sophie spoke how she might be at the back of the field in heats and not making finals even at county or regional level. Phil mentioned how she would also not make finals and both spoke of the support of their Parents and coaches who always believed in them and supported them through thick and thin. Another inspiring story of what is possible if athletes stick with their sport for as long as possible.

Other speakers included elite, Olympic level coaches, Aideen Sinnott, Feidhlim Kelly and Gerard O’Donnell who talked about training group dynamics, how to balance the load and recovery of teenagers who do multiple sports and also how to structure training so you can ‘bullet proof’ your teens to meet the demands of sport.

Finally, Peter Doherty and Sinead McGoldrick from Ratoath AC in County Meath, talked through the journey of their Club from 15 years ago when less than 5% of members competed to now where they have over 90% participation percentage, impressive athlete retention percentages, a Fit4Youth Group for teens who want to be active but not compete and how they are not arguably Ireland’s more successful Juvenile Club in Track and Field.

Coach Education and CPD is a key part of our Club’s Strategy with the Club fully supporting Coaches in upskilling their knowledge.