COPE Salthill Triathlon Training day 2

running on the water !

Sebastien Locteau Helping and Supporting Cope Galway and Croi charities

Supporting my two favorite charities through the COPE Triathlon and free training sessions and fundraising money for Croí for my channel swim is really exciting.

I have been lucky in the last two weeks to be assisted by Lilly Muldoon. She does not realise how important it is to have a assistant coach behind you and be the safety net of each session and keeping the office work up to date.

Training people each year at the Free training sessions for Cope is really enjoyable, whatever the weather or the ability we just meet and train. Last Monday I was very lucky again to have three assistant coach with me, Lilly Muldoon & Tony Daly from Predator Triathlon Club and Karl Prendergast from Galway Triathlon Club.

Week 2 session of the 16th May was Transition training with mounting / dismounting the bike, then 10km bike and Swim 500m.

It brings some new ideas, and give me a chance to look athletes in action without thinking about the session. Sometimes when you feel you know everything and have nothing else to learn in the trade it is time to open your mind and accept you need to update your skills or learn new ones.

I am one of the rare athletes having done ultra-distance in different sports. After the channel swim I will certainly go back to Ironman Triathlon and ultra-running with my friends. In 2012 I will certainly have no athletes qualifying for the London Games, and will then run a 24h with a few friends.

My goal as a coach always has been to bring an athletes under my own program, not just been a representative coach who just bring athletes with him to represent the country. My long term goal mean coaching three different sports not at 3 different Olympic games and I have all my life to achieve this and I am pretty close to achieve my goals

Ireland is moving fast at the moment, more and more events, maybe too many at the moment but new strong smart talent is coming through every day. New coaches with new skills and determination to achieve are coming through the Irish system. Every new generation of athltes and coaches brings performance to the higher standard.

Even if we don't notice, national governing bodies are working hard and are evolving with the system. We sometimes forget to mention the positives in sport.

Sebastien Locteau

First Published on runireland.com on the 15/05/2011