Becoming an elite athlete throws up as many challenges off the sporting ground as it does on it, so talented young athletes from regional Western Australia were recently given some tips on how to cope with the transition.
13 February 2009
About 40 athletes hailing from Perth and regions including the Wheatbelt, Peel, South West, Pilbara, Goldfields and Kimberley - attended the Gifted Athlete Program (GAP) Camp on Thursday 29-Friday 30 January at Woodman Point Recreation Camp in Munster.The annual camp is a joint effort of the Department of Sport and Recreation (DSR) and Western Australian Institute of Sport (WAIS).
Sport and Recreation Minister Terry Waldron visited the camp on Thursday to pass on some lessons from his own experiences in sport to both the Introductory (12-14 year olds) and Advanced (15-21 year olds) participant groups.
The Minister said GAP was all about helping talented young athletes to make the most of their natural skills by preparing them for the transition from junior sport to the next level up."I have seen so many highly gifted young sports men and women who at a tender age appear to have all the skills necessary to be world champions. Yet they never make it past the most basic club level," Minister Waldron said.
"We are very fortunate in Western Australia to have a sporting structure that identifies gifted young sports men and women. Through the Department of Sport and Recreation, Healthway's Smarter than Smoking program and the WA Institute of Sport, we have the funding and the expertise to put programs like GAP in place.
"As a young sports-mad kid brought up in the bush, I wish I had the opportunity to learn about the pathway to elite sport, the best nutrition to develop young athletes, leadership development, injury prevention and the like."As part of the camp, all participants got to hear elite athlete Jesse Phillips (flatwater kayaker) from WAIS talk about his own experiences, and those in the 15-21-year age group also took part in a Drugs in Sport workshop.
Other topics addressed at the camp included:
Introductory- Identifying your sporting pathway
- Introduction to nutrition for sports performance
- Practical guidelines on managing multiple commitments in life
- Basic strategies to prevent and treat injuries
- Strategies and practices of leaders in sport
- Learn how to promote yourself as an elite athlete in the media
- Principles of rest and recovery to prevent injury
Getting the most out of sport to develop as an individual- Nutrition theory and practice - learning to shop at the supermarket
- Learn how to plan for and manage transitions in sport, school, work
- Advancing your sporting pathway - lessons learned from elite athletes
- Introduction to ASADA drugs in sport messages
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