LTAD - Lyndon Johns

 

 

  
 
 

LTAD

 

 

LTAD - Long Term Athlete Development

Long-Term Athlete Development

This is a phrase that has become important in coaching circles over the last few years.  I remember booking my place on a seminar set to cover this topic in the mid 90’s.  I believe it was the first time the subject was to be aired in this country and would set the trend for the next decade.  Unfortunately I missed it as I had an unscheduled date with a hospital!

The seminar was organised and administered by sports coach UK and they brought in a man by the name of Istvan Balyi – one-time Hungarian Athletics coach who migrated to Canada and is now with the University of Victoria in Canada.

The main point he was putting across was that coaches should adopt a patient, thoughtful, long-term approach to bring their protégés to elite levels rather than adopt a blinkered approach whereby they chose a ‘winning as soon as possible’, headlong dash that put the athletes on the scrap heap too early or they did not realise their true potential.  He uses a phrase – “Peaking by Friday”.

Literature on the topic regularly quotes the 10-year rule that was first enunciated by Dr Herbert Simon (Nobel Laureate for Computer Science in 1961):

‘It takes 10 years of extensive practice to excel in anything’

 

When I saw this statement, I thought – ‘I knew that’.  I bet I am not alone either.  There are quite a few of you reading this article who will be able to think of a lifter or two taking about that time to attain their peak in the weightlifting world.  One of my lifters, Mark Groombridge, started with me when he was 16 years of age and hit his peak about 10 years later.  Matt Vine was late when he came to lifting, about 20 years of age, but he hit his peak in his late 20’s – but Matt had done an awful lot of athletics training prior to his emergence into the lifting game.

This 10-year rule also amounts to about 10 000 hours of training, i.e. 3 hours of training per day.  Now, that is a huge commitment for people in our sport.  If you are good at one of the sports that pay well, e.g. tennis or golf, then maybe you could stick it out because you can earn a living from it.  You could of course train for medal positions at the international championships in which we are able to indulge.

But, what ever you do the training must be optimal.  A foundation must be laid down in the early years by working at high volume and you cannot do this if the intensity is high.  LTAD tells us that frequent competition in the early years is questionable.

LTAD is not a training programme; it is a philosophy that encompasses periodisation – not just periodisation on an annual basis, though that must be part of the overall plan, but periodisation over the 10 years and maybe more.  Moreover, the type of training must also be periodic.  The idea is to adopt a progressive and systematic approach to training so that optimum development will occur.  This means well-planned training, competition and recovery phases.

At the beginning, an LTAD model was put forward by Balyi showing three phases – Training to Train, Training to Compete and Training to Win.  In the last few years this has been extended to five phases, namely – FUNdamentals, Learning to Train, Training to Train, Training to Compete, Training to Win.  A sixth phase – Retaining – has been added recently.
Loosely, the meaning of these phases is as follows:

Fundamentals                     Build overall motor skills.

Learning to Train                Learning all fundamental sports skills.

Training to Train                 Build the engine and consolidate sport-specific skills.

Training to Compete         Fine-tune the engine, skills and performance.

Training to Win                   Maximise performance, skills and engine.

Retaining                              Adjustment, retain athletes for coaching and administration.

The following table shows just the first three phases and is taken from Coaching for Long-Term Athlete Development, written by Ian Stafford and can be obtained from sportscoachUK.  It is well worth a read.

Summary of the first three LTAD stages

 

Stage

Approximate
Age Range
(Years)

Key Points

FUNdamentals

6-8 (girls)
6-9 (boys)

Need to sample a wide range of movement activities in fun, playful and creative environments.
No sport-specific specialisation - a multi-skills approach to be adopted.
Emphasis on development of basic movement skills, not formal competitive events.
Parents involved and supportive, encouraging participation in as many different activities as possible.
Speed, power and endurance developed using fun games and challenges.
Opportunity for optimum development of speed.
No periodisation and lots of FUN!

Learning to Train

8-11 (girls)
9-12 (boys)

Begin to introduce basic skills and fitness to preferred activities.
Start to reduce number of sports/activities but recommend at least three.
Focus on mastery of basic sport skills through regular practice in fun-based environments, using discovery learning.
Emphasis on learning to train and practice, not on performance outcome, but elements of appropriate competition introduced (e.g. 25% of training programme).

Training to Train

11-15 (girls)
12-16 (boys)

Individualised programmes based on individual development.
Progressive development of technical, tactical and mental capacities.
Squads split into groups of early, average and late maturers for physical conditioning and fitness work.
Girls and boys may or may not train together depending on the nature of the activity.
Regular height checks to identify key periods for appropriate training and optimum benefit.
Regular, but appropriate and sensitive, medical monitoring and musculo-skeletal screening (care must be taken here as bodies are changing and young people may be very sensitive).
Excessive, repetitive weight-bearing aerobic activities should be avoided.

 

To a certain extent we are involved with FUNdamentals with our U11/U13 Development work.  We need to sort out how best we can fit Weightlifting into the remaining five phases and BWLA is aiming to hold another conference in the near future at which LTAD will be on the agenda.

Generally, sports can be categorised as having early- or late-specialisation.  For example, Gymnastics, Diving, Ice Skating and Table Tennis are classified as early-specialisation sports.  This means such sports require an early start to sport specific training.  However, most sports have late-specialisation.

Currently, in this country, 6 sports have set up plans for the long-term development of the athletes; they are: Badminton, Gymnastics, Netball, Paddlesport, Judo and Diving.  Other sports are in the process of developing their policy.

Late last year, the BWLA held a coaching conference that looked at our approach to 2012.  Since then, and in harmony with many other sports, we have taken this a stage further and now we are beginning to look beyond 2012.  In other words, the aim for 2012 also must be a legacy for the future.  In July we were awarded just over £1.4M over the next 3 years for the development of our sport.  We must grasp this chance and use it to the best of our ability – and we do have the ability.  We have people who are quite capable of planning for the future.  Do we have the people who can expedite the plan?

Coupled to LTAD but running parallel to it is Long Term Coach Development (LTCD).  Clearly, this is as important as LTAD.  Coaching throughout the UK has changed markedly over the past 10 years.  The change was lead by the National Coaching Foundation (NCF) in the early 80’s and they are still leading the change.  Over recent years a UK Coaching Certificate (UKCC) has emerged with 31 sports able to participate in the process of aligning their coach education system to the UKCC.  Unfortunately, due to what I believe was a political decision, Weightlifting was not on the list.

Be that as it may, we have commenced the process by which our coach education system is moving into phase with the UKCC.  It will take another year yet but we will get there – with or without backing from some obscure government department.


Lyndon Johns