Training Sessions click here to view the Juniors training plan
Rug Rats and Triathlon Don’t they say “never work with children and animals” Face it, they need more work than the average adult and will probably run off to college once you have helped develop them into a top athlete! Where’s the fun in that? At Optima Racing Team (ORT), we have only had a junior squad for about a year (started in summer 2005) and the juniors do so many other sports it’s been a balancing act getting them “triathlon” orientated. Really from 9 – 14 our philosophy is fun, technique and trying to develop a positive environment for the juniors to train in.	Support  The first thing that really stands out for me, as a coach, is how much the parents support their children, a 05.00 start for swimming, 19.00 finish for turbo sessions. It is tough and they have siblings that also need picking up, dropping off, it’s not easy. I know from articles I have read on developing junior athletes, that the number one reason for children dropping out of sport is a lack of this “support structure”.	Coaching As head coach of ORT, I can only thank my luck stars that I have such an excellent group of assistant coaches around me to call on and also get advice from when it comes to the juniors. Emma and Ski both completed their L1 coaching award to be able to help out and then I have Sally and Eddy Carter (head of PE at Godolphin and Latimer school) who are both from sports science back grounds and also school sports teachers.
Bike & Run Nick and Steve who own Bike and Run in East Finchly (triathlon shop), have been supporting our senior squad for a couple of years now. It is a credit to the boys (and a lesson to other retailers) that their hearts lay not just in putting food on their own table, but in the grass routes of triathlon. It makes absolutely no business sense to help out 11 – 14 year olds. Sponsorship of Michelle Dillon or Tim Don will get your products/ brand seen but a 12 year old, I don’t think so! It is with no shame that within this article I thank/ plug the boys (Bike and Run) for all the support they have given the juniors. Please check out their shop www.bikeandrun.co.uk	But why start a junior team? I don’t know how many of you keep abreast of the junior race series, I know I hadn’t until I got involved in the London Region Committee (LRC). London region junior team came last in the inter region champs again in 2005. I got to thinking, how can this be when this is the region that brought us athletes such as Spencer Smith, Tim Don, Stuart Hayes and more recently Steven Bayliss. In fact you could almost say (without imports!) the London region has dominated the male upper ranks of triathlon for years. This was all the motivation ORT needed, so we held a couple of try a tri training days in Barnes/ Richmond and now have a consistent squad of about 10 juniors.	Development We believe we now have a firm structure in place, where we can develop our junior squad further and just like the senior squad (keeping numbers to around 20) we are looking to “create individual sporting excellence within a team environment”. We are looking for juniors who really want to learn new skills and possibly develop themselves further in triathlon…
		If you or you know any juniors interested in triathlon training and racing please contact james@optimahealth.co.uk