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The Hong Kong Coaching Committee (HKCC) and the All-China Sports Federation successfully organised the 22^nd Elite Coaches Seminar, consisting of a pre-seminar workshop and a seminar on 13 and 14 March respectively, at the Hong Kong Sports Institute (HKSI). This year’s theme was on “Sports Psychology” which is gaining popularity in elite training and competitions around the world with regard to its immense effect on strengthening athletes’ performances.

The pre-seminar workshop, coordinated by the HKSI’s Elite Training Science & Technology Division and supported by the Hong Kong Association of Sports Medicine and Sports Science and the Hong Kong Society of Sports and Exercise Psychology, was titled “Biofeedback in Sport Psychology: Theory and Practice” with live biofeedback demonstrations and case studies being illustrated at the workshop. Audience members attending this workshop included coaches, sport science researchers and practitioners, and university students in sports science.

At the workshop, Dr Raymond So, Director of Elite Training Science & Technology of the HKSI, said in his welcoming speech, “As an important intervention approach, biofeedback is effectively used in various kinds of sport psychology practices including stress management, skill acquisition and performance enhancement.” He concluded his remarks by hoping the audience can be inspired by the latest development in biofeedback, and in return, can promote the integration of biofeedback in elite sport training in Hong Kong.

Professor Frank Fu MH JP, Chairman of the HKCC and Mr Long Shenjun, Director of Science and Education Department, Education Division, General Administration of Sport of China were the officiating guests of the opening ceremony of the Seminar titled “Sports Psychology in Elite Training”, which was coordinated by the HKSI’s Coach Education Department.

Speaking during the opening ceremony, Professor Fu expressed his heartfelt thanks to the five renowned speakers, the All-China Sports Federation and the National Sports Associations for their support to this seminar as well as other coach education programmes. He added, “I hope that all coaches here will grasp this opportunity to upskill yourselves and apply the knowledge you learned today into your athletes’ training. With your contribution, I am confident that the standard of Hong Kong’s athletes will continue to improve and achieve further breakthrough results.”

Mr Long Shenjun welcomed the experts, speakers and coaches attending the seminar during the opening ceremony, and said, “Since 1996, the scope of coaches attending the seminars has been enlarged steadily and the content of the seminars has also been more diversified. Becoming an international coach’s seminar mainly in Asia, the seminars have definitely encouraged the work for enhancing coaches’ development. In the past few years, we tried to organise seminars in mainland China and coaches from mainland China were also selected to attend the seminars in Hong Kong, with a hope that both coaches from Hong Kong and mainland China could benefit from the seminars.”

Five professional experts in the field of sports psychology, from mainland China, Israel, the United Kingdom and Hong Kong, shared their insight and expertise in sports psychology to the audience present at the seminar.

The first speaker of the seminar was Mr Gao Zhiqing, Head of Competitive Sport Research Department and Associate Researcher of Beijing Institute of Sport Science. With over 15 years of working experience with the China national teams and Beijing representative teams in different kinds of competitions, he spoke at the seminar on the topic of “Application of Sports Psychology in Individualised Coaching”. He shared his views on the significant impact of athletes or coaches’ individuality on sports training and competitions, encouraging coaches to consider traits of different individual athletes while giving instructions to them.

Professor Boris Blumenstein, Director of the Department of Behavioral Sciences at the Ribstein Centre for Sport Medicine Sciences and Research, Wingate Institute, Israel, spoke about  “Biofeedback Approaches: The Wingate Five-step Approach and Learning-Modification-Application (LMA) Approach”, introducing two biofeedback approaches to the audience. The Wingate Five-step Approach includes introduction, identification, simulation, transformation and realisation; while the LMA approach stands for learning, modification and application. He stressed that by developing athletes’ psychological as well as mental skills and gradually transforming these skills to the athletes’ training and competition routine, these two approaches can enhance athletic performances and help build up athletes’ resistance to stress.

Dr Huang Zhijian, Sports Psychologist, Sport Psychology & Monitoring Centre of the HKSI, gave a presentation on the topic of “Effective Communication in Sport Coaching”. He set forth the concept of “Empathy” and pointed out factors influencing effective communication in sports. He ended his presentation by imparting some constructive hints and useful tips for coaches to facilitate their communication with athletes by becoming a good communicator.

The forth speaker was Dr Itay Basevitch, Certified Consultant at the Association for Applied Sport Psychology and Lecturer in Sport and Exercise Sciences at Anglia Ruskin University, United Kingdom. In regard to his extensive experience in team sports by working mainly with collegiate soccer teams as a sport psychology consultant, he talked about his experience and viewpoints on the topic of “Measuring and Training Decision Making Skills in Team Sports”.

Mr Shi Zhihao, Vice-President of Shanghai University of Sport and President of Chinese Table Tennis College, was the last presenter at the seminar. Being a Head Table Tennis Coach in women’s teams from 2005 to 2012, he led the women’s Table Tennis Team to victory at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games and 2012 London Olympic Games. Hence, he shared his personal experiences in Table Tennis on the topic of “Managing Competitive Stress for Coaches”. In his presentation, he outlined the types of stress faced by athletes and coaches, and then suggested ways for both coaches and athletes to manage their stress alongside all the challenges in training and competitions.

The Elite Coaches Seminar is part of the Hong Kong Coach Education Programme aiming to provide a platform for overseas and mainland China experts as well as local coaching professionals to exchange ideas in sports coaching. This year, the pre-seminar workshop and the seminar brought together over 250 coaches and sport science experts from Hong Kong and mainland China.