After a long period of training, camps and competition finishing with the Europeans in Antwerp, the GB squad and staff are taking a well deserved break before getting back into an intensive testing and evaluation phase. Work will resume soon at the Peter Harrison Centre in Loughborough where the squad will be working with our dedicated Physiologist and Strength and Conditioning lead – all part of the exciting new partnership we have which has been funded through the Peter Harrison Foundation who supported the business case we presented earlier in the year. Alongside this our talent and development programme is about to kick off with the first Talent ID day on 15 September at Loughborough where we will bring together a completely new group of athletes who have either come through our work with the English Institute of Sport or who we have spotted as part of our focus on youth. The second Talent ID day will be on 29 September in Sheffield and this will in the main be for those individuals currently in clubs who club coaches or the performance staff have spotted as having potential. Following a rigorous testing and evaluation process we are looking to select a Development squad from these sessions who will then undertake a training and competition programme over the coming year. Assistant GB Coach Justin Frishberg will head up this programme and be the head coach of the Development Squad. All of this work is vital if we are to up our game and start to bang on the door of the top teams in the world. This work is about laying foundations not just for the immediate future but looking ahead to 2020 and 2024. It is exciting stuff and it is what we have needed for a long time. At the same time the development staff – Kirsty, Jo, Amanda, Lee and Paul, supported by many of you, especially Steve Brown, Ross Morrison, Mike Spence. Kylie Grimes and Gavin continue to push into new areas with some incredible successes. This week has seen a further session at Headley Court who are really pleased with what is being delivered there – see the separate piece and photograph of the presentation made to Mike Spence. The Spinal Injury Programme has also been in full swing this week with session 2 being delivered at Sheffield SIU and as I write, session 2 at Salisbury is taking place. This weekend will see us supporting the development work at Gloucester University which is really beginning to take off. So lots of activity and lots to be excited and positive about. This week I met with the senior management team of the Copper Box in the Queen Elizabeth Park – home of the Paralympics, to evaluate the centre as the possible venue for the 2015 Wheelchair Rugby World Cup which I am leading on behalf of the IWRF. This is a really exciting prospect – bringing together the top 8 teams in the world to play in a high quality tournament. The idea is to have a festival of rugby with the wheelchair teams matched by their able bodied rugby teams who will be over here to play in the 2015 IRB Rugby World Cup. I will keep you up to date with how this project develops but it will be an exciting one and hopefully will really recapture the public’s support for our game as we showcase it in an extraordinary festival week. That’s probably a good note to end this blog on – enjoy the last of the summer weeks.
David Pond
