BRITISH SWIMMING CONSULTANT SCOTT IN POST
Australian Michael Scott has taken up his post as British
Swimming High Performance Consultant this week and hopes to
play an important role in country's preparations for Beijing.
Scott, who officially took up the position just three days
ago, is keen to build on the momentum gained by outgoing Performance
Director Bill Sweetenham and ensure coaches and swimmers have
the right support to help them achieve success in Beijing.
"With Beijing so close my role is to build on the foundations
already in place and ensure the coaches and swimmers have
the support they need to perform in the lead-up to the Olympic
Trials then at the Games themselves.
"I'm not here as a caretaker, that would be unfair to
both the coaches and their swimmers. I don't expect things
to stand still. I see things as a process of continuous improvement.
The swimmers are expected to be at their peak in just 10 months
and we know the times in Beijing will be faster than in Athens,
so their support system must improve too.
"My task is to keep the ship moving and make sure any
fine-tuning required between now and Beijing is carried out
as well as looking at longer-term opportunities for the sport."
Scott has been involved in swimming for a large part of his
life and has a wealth of experience in high performance sport.
His career history is impressive and includes stints working
in management at the Australian Institute of Sport and the
New South Wales Institute of Sport. Most recently he was Chief
Executive of the FINA World Championships in Melbourne.
His appointment marks a change of emphasis for British Swimming,
but Scott is keen to continue the progress already achieved
by Sweetenham.
"I'm not Bill Sweetenham. We have different skills but
we share the same passion for the sport," said Scott.
"I'm an ex swimmer and an ex swimming coach and I've
worked in recent years in high performance sport managing
high performance systems. A combination of my passion for
the sport and understanding of high performance will allow
me to build on Bill's great work.
"Bill left a wonderful legacy in terms of how he developed
British Swimming and a fantastic foundation to build on. The
prospect of a home Olympics brings a real sense of excitement
and opportunity and thanks to the progress made since 2001
it's not a case of starting at square one."
As well as ensuring Britain's swimmers and their coaches
don't get left behind their international rivals, Scott is
charged with developing a network of high performance centres
across the country and his strong management background will
be an asset to the project.
"To be successful globally we need a critical mass of
both coaches and swimmers on podium and development programmes
and a world class service underpinning that," he explained.
"The growth of performance centres in Britain is critical
for British Swimming's long-term strategy. It's important
to put the right coaches in the right positions at centres
with strong clubs and to make sure we develop this critical
mass of centres so we don't put all our eggs in one basket.
"The challenge for us now is the number of 50m pools,
but there are very positive signs in terms of the number of
50m facilities currently under construction and at a development
phase.
"These positives need to be harnessed and we need to
increase opportunities by improving the athletes' daily training
environment and identifying appropriate competitive opportunities
to enable them to compete successfully at international level.
I'll be working closely with key stakeholders to make sure
we can achieve this."
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