In an exciting new initiative for youth sailors, the Irish Sailing Association has announced provisional details on a series of Performance Pathway Seminars.
The seminars are replacing the ISA Optimist Squads and ISA Topper Squad which have traditionally run from October to March. The change of tack does not affect summer activities which start after the ISA Pathway Nationals.
The seminars are primarily targeted at junior sailors from the Topper and Optimist classes and their coaches. There will also be sessions available to parents of sailors. Other applications may be considered.
There will be a minimum of three seminars over the winter and the topics will include but not be limited to Fitness, Psychology, Programme Design, Nutrition, Boat Transition, Olympic pathways.
The very clear switch to focussing on the education of young athletes means ISA Performance can widen the scope of how many athletes and coaches it can engage with over the course of the year. The ISA says 'the Pathway has often been criticised for not being inclusive enough so this initiative will tackle that concern head on'.
The ISA say 'Given our limited resources we feel this approach will give a better return on investment while at the same time giving the pathway much more visibility across a wider base. ISA Performance will NOT be running the ISA Optimist Squad or the ISA Topper squad this winter'.
There is additional investment going into the ISA coaching programme and it is hoped this programme will help facilitate the clubs and classes take on the role of training over the winter period.
As always the ISA Pathway Nationals will be the key event in the domestic programme. The ISA plan to invest more into the event and ISA Performance will continue to use this event to determine squads for the summer events.
Provisional Dates
OCT 29th & 30th
DEC TBC
JAN TBC
More Details and Application Process will be posted October 7th. In the meantime save the dates. It is envisaged we would have between 20 and 30 places per class association
