FIFTH COHORT BEGINS FAST-TRACK INTO SPORT

by Jessica Whitehorn, UK Sport

A fifth cohort began UK Sport’s Fast-track Practitioner Programme (FPP) last week with the first of six workshops that they will complete over the next year.

The FPP is a partnership approach between UK Sport, the Home Country Sports Institutes, National Governing Bodies, the British Olympic Association and British Paralympic Association, designed to accelerate the professional development of young practitioners who demonstrate the potential for excellence within the high performance system supporting Britain’s elite athletes to world class success.

The 25 participants will complete the programme within one of the Home Country Sports Institutes, the Olympic Medical Institute or, for the research interns, Bath and Southampton Universities. Over the year they will take part in a challenging and innovative professional development programme consisting of a series of workshops held at various venues throughout the UK as well as receiving close on-the-job support from their suitably qualified mentor.  

The programme includes 16 interns, who are new to the high performance system, with the aim being to equip them with the skills and experiences required to forge a successful career within elite sport, and nine support staff, who are already employed within the system, where the aim is to accelerate the development of skills that they are already demonstrating.

A number of common themes are progressively developed over the workshop series designed to develop the essential “high performance competencies” needed for independent practice. Via the mentoring process, the key messages and learning experiences from the workshops are reinforced within the working environment where technical and non-technical competencies can be honed.

The first workshop, held at the National Sports Centre in Lilleshall, provided participants with an introduction to the programme. The focus of the workshop was, “what does excellence really look like?” both for the high performance system and individual practitioners within it, and also, “how are you going to get there?”

The group were given an insight into what will be expected of them with presentations from Peter Keen, Head of Performance at UK Sport, and Scott Gardner, physiologist to the all conquering British Cycling team.  This workshop will provide the foundation for the rest of their year on the programme, where they will acquire the skills needed for their pursuit of excellence.

Sarah Craven, UK Sport’s FPP Coordinator, said: “We know that our athletes need the best preparation if they are going to succeed at the highest level and this means having the best people around them.

“With over 700 applications for the intern positions this year, these candidates have done extremely well to secure their place. They are all very capable practitioners with huge potential and, with the support of the FPP, they have a very bright future ahead of them within high performance sport.”

Photograph courtesy of UK Sport