The busy BEC Development calendar is packed with events these months and what a better way to kick off June than with the BWF/BEC Coach Education Level 3 Course. 

From 1 to 6 June, 15 participants representing Scotland, Poland, Lithuania, Italy, Czech Republic, Switzerland, Norway, France, Hungary, Latvia, Estonia, the Netherlands, and Sweden, will be taking part in the course.

The last Coach Education Level 3 Course organised in Europe took place before the COVID-19 outbreak. The pilot course was also hosted in the city of Holbæk, Denmark, where Badminton Europe’s Centre of Excellence is located.

The 15 participants will be guided by an experienced BWF team. Kenneth Larsen, Fran Dacal, Martin Andrew, and Sharon Springer will be the ones in charge of delivering the course. It has been an intense start to the course, with a short in-class introductory session to then head to the courts. There, participants got to do some icebreaker activities through which to know each other.

In this warm-up session, participants got to learn about each other’s backgrounds as coaches, as well as their motivations behind their careers. Despite it just being the first day, Andrew is positive about the course’s group.

- We have participants with different experiences as far as the countries are concerned, and with various stages of development as players are concerned. It is going to be interesting to see how they are able to formulate some of the information they have received and how they will take it back to their countries afterward, to look on how they will develop their systems, Andrew said.

From talent development and detection of talent for badminton to distinguishing the difference in coaching styles and points of view, participants have already got to present their own ideas to the rest and discuss different perspectives.

- We have a group of coaches who are thoughtful and who are taking the information on board, who are considering how they can implement it into their thinking. It is not about working out what is right, but working out what is right for them and their systems, Andrew concluded.