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Training for the winter Firsts sporting teams has been taken up a notch after the recruitment of specialist coaches Tim Knight and Layne Fletcher from Alta Athletic to help players track their fitness and improve on field performance.

PDHPE teacher, Emma Davies said this new approach stemmed from player feedback.

“Feelings of fatigue and a lack of stamina towards the end of games was affecting player confidence and the outcome of some of our matches, where we were missing out on a win by the smallest margin.

“Our players are busy and time poor so it was important for us to create opportunities to get them motivated and goal-orientated to improve their fitness, which in turn improves their individual and team performance,” Ms Davies said.

The training schedule

Students wanting to try out for the Firsts football, netball, hockey and rugby teams were given the opportunity to attend a training session at the end of 2017 where they were given individualised fitness programs to work on during the school holidays.

Fitness levels were gauged during sport trials in Term 1, which formed part of team selection for each sport. Once each team was formed, Alta Athletic put together a series of seven sport-specific training sessions to help develop the teams and work on individual fitness goals.

Netball players Emelia Corlett and Zoe Mitchell reported significant fitness improvements and increased camaraderie between the team as just some of the benefits.

“The biggest change has been focusing on training activities specific to our sport. This has encouraged us to adopt a ‘game mentality’ and think more strategically when we’re on the court,” Zoe said. 

“Training together in this way brings us closer as a team and motivates us to support one another to build on our strengths and work on areas we need to improve,” Emelia added.

Specialised sporting coaches

We spoke with Alta Athletic coach and director Tim Knight about working with �������� players.

Who is Alta Althetic?

Alta Athletic is made up of Layne Fletcher and myself (Tim Knight). We’re both passionate about sport and have backgrounds coaching in elite sport both locally, nationally and internationally.

How is the work you’re doing with �������� players different to traditional training?

We were approached by �������� to deliver a high performance program to the winter Firsts football, netball, hockey and rugby teams.

The programs have so far been focused on developing an aerobic base - meaning athletes can perform at a higher intensity for longer periods. From here forward, the program focus will start to shift towards repeated sprint ability and speed and power work.

A good training program does the simple things well. In saying that we aim to not only coach but educate the �������� athletes so that they can start to think and care about their own body. 

How will the training help improve the players’ sporting performance?

The programs aim to enhance critical performance criteria required for each sport. Blended with sport and skill-specific coaching, we will start to see the benefits manifest themselves in the team performances.

Our aim is to improve the mean physical output of each and every athlete. While some may progress at a rate faster than others, we will be in constant consultation with coaches about how best to address these possible differences so that we maintain steady improvement. Overall, this will improve both physical and sporting prowess and give �������� athletes an advantage over their competition!