sport

MAAA employ top Welsh coach

GEOFF WARD has agreed with the Malta Amateur Athletics Association (MAAA) to become their coach as from next month. Ward, who is a decathlon champion has around 30 year’s experience of professional and voluntary work within the sport of athletics covering a diverse range of services and with a successful track record.

The MAAA can now boast of a fully professional coach, something that it had longed for, for quite some time. The association had advertised for a new coach in a leading British magazine and around nine coaches applied for the job. The choice was a difficult one for the MAAA but after taking some expert advice, they gave the job to Geoff Ward.

Ward’s involvement in the sport includes working as a senior coach in combined events. He coached several GB international athletes and he is also an Athletics Development Officer. He has got the know-how as an Athletics Stadium Manager, Coach Education Tutor, a Lecturer on Athletics Related Topics and an Administrator.

Athletics is one of Britain's most successful sports, provides the foundations of fitness, speed and skills for many other sports, appeals equally to boys and girls and yet like Malta it still struggles in schools and amongst the general public. Why?

There are many reasons, and not all unique to athletics. Poor facilities, pressure on the national curriculum, poor media coverage, a difficult sport to teach and many other reasons are given. The sport itself can also take a lot of the blame, particularly in the past 15 years or so. Internal politics, power struggles, amateur v professional arguments have all hindered the development of a superb sport.

Ward’s past experiences as an international athlete, athletics stadium manager, athletics development officer and administrator combined with his present day coaching of elite and developing athletes put him in a unique position to talk about the whole sport. This rounded view of a very diverse sport provides him with many athletics topics relating to teaching, coaching, sports development, recreational management and sports science.

In conjunction with UK Athletics and the Athletics Association of Wales and now as an MAAA employer he is in a position to deliver a range of new coach education courses and workshops.

Courses in coaching and teaching athletics can be organised for colleges/universities catering for sport and teaching related subjects. Inset training for education authorities and individual schools can also be provided.