Time Management

Time management is very important in sports coaching as good time management skills allows a coach to focus on finishing a session effectively. It has been stated in the article of Macquet (2015) that time management has important consequences on athlete’s well-being, physical and mental recovery. Following this article, it has been stated in Johnson (2014) that good time management allows coaches to become focused which leads to success as good time management can lead to better quality of sessions. However, to achieve good time management skill, coaches have to plan, prioritise and use equipment such as a stopwatch in every session to keep track of time (Jowett, 2006). 

In my first session coaching at Burnley College Football Academy (BCFA) my role was to carry out a warm up with a group of athletes that were randomly chosen by the coach. Carrying this warm up I thought it would be best to spread out on the field as there was only 8 of us and we had half the pitch to ourselves. I then started to carry out some warm ups such as jogging across the pitch to ensure that the athlete’s blood is flowing to their muscles as it states in the article of Devlin (2010) that jogging is one of the most important warm ups in football. Following this the second warm up that was carried out was dynamic warm up stretches as this would improve their flexibility and mobility (Crockford 2015). 

Furthermore, I then told the athletes to carry out mini sprints as this improves agility and brings the athletes heart rate up (Gabbett, 2016) . At this point everything was going well however I did not keep track of time, therefore athletes could have been spending more time on a warm up that only needed a couple of minutes. I figured out I lost track of time when the coach called us all back in the circle whilst the group I was working with was still sprinting. This was due to a lack of experience and professionalism in my opinion.  Therefore, in my next coaching session I planned and prioritised it well as I knew I lost track of time in my first session, therefore I decided to bring in a time tracking device as this would help me keep on top of each warm up and manage and track the time I spend on each warm up a lot better. I then finished a little bit earlier than the other group of athletes but I knew I was managing time a lot better than my first session as I received positive feedback from one of my coaches that was spectating my sessions. 

Bibliography

Crockford, J. (2015). Improve Your Stability and Mobility with These Functional Exercises.

Devlin. (2010, Feb 5). Warm ups. Playing football better for your health ‘than going for a run or lifting weights’.

Gabbett T, et al. Effect of leg dominance on change of direction ability amongst young elite soccer players. J Sports Sci. 2016;34(6):542–548.

Johnson, U., & Podlog, L. (2014). Sport injuries. In A. G. Papaioannou & D. Hackfort (Eds.), Routledge companion to sport and exercise psychology (pp. 877–891). New York, NY: Routledge. 

Jowett, S., & Clark-Carter, D. (2006). Perception of empathic accuracy and assumed similarity in the coach-athlete relationship. British Journal of Social Psychology, 45, 617–637 

Macquet, A. (2015). Time management. Time management in elite sports: How do elite athletes manage time under fatigue and stress conditions?(88), 341-363.