Athletics in Scotland is in a far better place than two years ago, as the governing body seek a new Director of Coaching.
That’s the view of scottishathletics chief executive, Nigel Holl, with the search already having started to replace Stephen Maguire.
British Athletics have lured the Northern Irishman south for a key post in the run-up to Rio 2016 – but Maguire will remain in situ until the end of August and will take charge of Scotland’s track and field team for the Commonwealth Games at Hampden.
The medal target for that remains at ‘more than two’ – the tally of medals landed at the last two Games in Delhi and Melbourne.
Recent portents have been good, however, with big representations on Team GB and NI at the World Champs in Moscow and the World Indoors in Poland, where Eilidh Child and Jamie Bowie won relay medals.
That followed on from six Scottish golds at the British Champs in Birmingham last July when the overall total of 14medals was the best haul by Scots for more than 25 years. And four young athletes also won European Age Group medals last summer – Jake Wightman, Nick Percy, Allan Smith and Laura Muir.
‘When you go out to recruit, you never know who you are going to get,’ insisted Holl.
‘That is the first challenge. When we went to recruit Stephen, people would have said the same things were facing us. I actually think we are in a better place now than we were early in 2012.
‘Our athletes as we have seen recently – we’d four at the ‘World Indoors and that is a record representation – are competing on the world stage. We have some very talented young athletes coming through.
‘We have some good coaches and some strong development programmes – both for coaches and for clubs.
‘I think it is now a very attractive post for the right individual to look at and say: ‘’You know what, there is a basis of work that has been done there to set things up and I can really go in there and make good things happen and make a difference for athletics in Scotland’’.’
‘We need good expertise and good leadership in that role but I know the right person will be out there. And I am confident we will find that person.’
In the short-term, Hampden looms large on the horizon with a Diamond League fixture adding further gloss to an already hugely exciting summer.
‘Stephen has done a very good job and one of the most important messages is that he will continue to do a good job over the next few months,’ added Holl.
‘He will be here right through until after the Commonwealth Games. Our immediate focus, and that of the athletes, will be on Glasgow 2014 later this summer and Stephen will be totally focussed on that.
‘We’ve a team in place, some athletes looking for qualifying standards and that door closes in early June. He will be head coach for track and field at Hampden.
‘Then, further down the line, there is an opportunity to maintain a strong link with him after September. We have had some positive discussions with our partners at UK Athletics.
‘By the time he leaves, Stephen will have two years of knowledge of the scene in Scotland – the athletes, the coaches, the clubs – and he will stay quite closely in touch. I see him becoming our main direct point of contact with UK Athletics and there are benefits in that for us.
‘We will see him back up in Scotland at coaching courses and so on and that will be helpful, too.
‘As part of his role with UK Athletics, he will also obviously have an influence with those athletes at that level in terms of Team GB and NI or receiving funding.
‘We’re disappointed to lose him, of course we are. But we do think his influence can still affect athletics in Scotland.
Maguire placed particular emphasis on coach education and stood by his initial promise not to get involved in coaching individual athletes.
This weekend he convenes a National Coach Development Weekend at the Emirates Arena with Toni Minichiello, who guided Jessica Ennis-Hill from the age of 13 to Olympic gold, among those giving more than 100 Scottish coaches the benefit of his expertise. The event is free to scottishathletics coaches.
Ennis-Hill, on Glasgow 2014 duty last week, told scottishathletics.org.uk: ‘Toni has been such an amazing coach for me and I think he is a great guy for others to learn from,
‘He has always been willing to draw from the knowledge and experience of others during all the years he has coached me. So, as I progressed as an athlete, he was developing as a coach.
‘When I improved, he would go to conferences and things and made sure he learned along the way.’That was great for me because we never reached the point where I was thinking ‘I don’t think he can teach me anything more and can’t take me to another level’.
‘Toni’s knowledge was always evolving and he is still the same now. I think that’s a major reason why we have had success as an athlete-coach relationship and I think it would be great for Scottish coaches to learn from him.
‘He is even learning more now because he’s working with a pregnant athlete! That wasn’t the case before and we are looking a lot into what I can do, what I can’t do and what’s right for my body at various stages of the pregnancy.’
Details on Coach Weekend on www.scottishathletics.org.uk
