GIMME 5 Coaching Conference Report Saturday 16th January 
This event was well organised by, who else, but Lorraine and Dave Scanlon, Eamon O’Reilly, Liam Lynch, Adrienne McLoughlin, Mary McQuinn, Elma Nix and Gene O’Donnell. On the day the staff at the Hotel could not have done more and our assistants, the four D’s, Dylan, David, Dean and IT expert Dara – did great work behind the scenes.
After a healthy breakfast at 8.00 a.m. in the Meadowlands Hotel, Austin Stacks Ladies, Mens and Hurling coaches were given the opportunity to learn from a wide variety of coaches and as the underage programme was due to start the following day, it afforded club coaches to get some practical tips before they embarked on the 2016 coaching season. The morning was themed “Gimme 5” and all of the speakers gave at least five insights or ideas that Austin Stacks coaches could take on board and apply them to their own approach to coaching in general and also in specific sessions. All in all it was a very positive and interesting event, which Club Chairman, Liam Lynch explained to everyone was part of a long term strategy to build on all of the excellent work to date and push things even more. Feedback from the day was summed in the comment cards with the following quotes “Excellent informative session, Speakers were superb and gave loads of insight”, “Educational, entertaining, engaging, encouraging, fantastic” , and “..enjoyed it, the diversity of the speakers’ personalities, perspectives, topics, gimme 5’s, rarely would I remember so much from a long session….” .
Hurling afficiando Andrew Morrissey did a brilliant job as MC for the morning and his stewarding meant that everything went off seamlessly and finished at 12.59 p.m. a new record- finishing with one minute to spare.
JOE O’CONNOR
Since 1998, joe has worked in the fitness industry and in 2006 began lecturing in exercise physiology and performance training in it IT Tralee, Joe continues to work as a fitness consultant with his own company, NISUS, to a number of individual athletes, teams and organisations across a variety of sports at both amateur and professional level as well as featuring on RTE’s Ireland’s fittest family as the fitness & performance expert. Joe gave an excellent overview of the need to monitor our players. Joe took us through the journey of a player and his/her training workload and how a scientific approach can bring about benefits to players at all levels. Joe’s talk included the need for proper sleep, nutrition and a striking a balance for the long term welfare of the player, so it set the tone for what turned out to be a great morning for everyone who intended. For the record, one of the organisers, Gene O’Donnell refutes the “allegation” that he has cheese in his croissant! #youhadtobethere
EOIN BURNS
Next up was a Galway man married to a Kerry woman! As a breathing coach Eoin has worked with Galway hurlers and Kerry Ladies footballers, Eoin presented a fascinating workshop demonstrating how breathing can bring long lasting benefits to players at all levels. Through video, pictures, slides, flipcharts and storytelling Eoin had everyone enthralled and sold on the idea that better breathing will produce winners. At one stage, one of the hotel staff entered the room to see everyone vigorously nodding their heads while holding their noses and while it seemed odd from his perspective, everyone in the room could attest to the benefits of this and other exercises. #youhadtobethere
ROY GUERIN
Born, bred and buttered in the Rock, Roy was unlucky with a shoulder injury which forced out of Rio later this year, Roy won 1985 Dublin City Marathon and reached the final of 100 metres in Beijing, his third Olympics. he stays involved with paralympic sport as coach, and also as assistant Irish para powerlifting coach. He also retains his role on the international paralympic committee, athlete representative for paralympic powerlifting and continues his role as educator in the paralympic programme for the international paralympic committee. A busy man, in his inspirational talk Roy questioned the coaches in attendance about whether or not the athlete was a product of the coach and his passion and drive for success and pushing yourself to the limits, was summed up by his “Tá me go maith” story #youhadtobethere
Dr James Ryan, who is a consultant specialising in endocrinology with Bons Secours Health Services Tralee, and team doctor for the Limerick hurling team gave a highy topical talk on injury prevention and how best to deal with preventing the most common ones as well as what to do when injuries happened. As a lot of the coaches were also parents, this part of the morning struck a an extra chord with the participants in the conference. His sense of humour, interaction, humility and deep concern left a lasting impression on all of the people the organisers spoke with at the end of the morning. A proud Bruff GAA man, he expressed his admiration for the club and played down Bruff’s chances of winning the All-ireland Hurling title next year!
#youhadtobethere
PAT FLANAGAN
Formerly an international sprinter and national sprint champion, Pat has more than 30 years’ experience in getting people fit and active and in training elite teams. His passion about the benefits of physical activity and training for all from those with low fitness levels to the elite sports performer shoen through his interactive presentation. Thanks Ciarán and Graham. As a strength and conditioning coach with the Kerry senior football team he has won 3 all Irelands, 3 national league titles and 4 munster titles. He has also worked with many senior county GAA teams including Waterford, Cavan, Laois, Dublin, Roscommon and Longford, and Cork. Pat’s talk was themed around C.O.A.C.H. for his gimme 5’s and his caring attitude, his attention to detail, expertise and experience and professionalism hallmarked his talk and was not lost on the coaches there. Pat was asked to deliver 5 practical tips and some people took down multiples of that on their notepads. A synopsis of Pat’s session could not be complete without mention of a Leprachan golf club head cover! #youhadtobethere
KIERAN DONAGHY
With 4 All Irelands, 2006 player of the year, etc., etc., etc., the heartbeat of the rock, role model etc delivered the keynote talk and his five pieces of advice were very practical, and also relevant to developing young players, his inspiring talk was another piece of evidence that we live amongst legends who continue to do everything they can for the betterment of the club, on and off the field. His contribution to the morning was a fitting finale to a conference which was put together in the past 6 weeks so once again, to Kieran a big thank you for taking time out from the first day on the new job and a busy training schedule etc. to lend a hand.
Thanks to Kieran, we all know that scenarios mean different things to different people! #youhadtobethere
LIAM LYNCH
Chairman of the club from a proud Rock and sports mad family has big ambitions for the street of champions as we approach centenary year in 2017. At the end of a highly enjoyable morning, Liam made presentations to the speakers.