If you’re trying to learn a skill that is simply a step by step process with each step doable without a great deal of practice and not in need of a great deal of time, you could learn how to do that skill in a one day or a weekend course. Of course you’d still have to go home or an appropriate facility and practice to really master that skill. I remember doing things like when I was a Cub Scout. We’d spend an afternoon learning how to tie a lanyard, or carve a neckerchief slide or whittle a wooden figure, and then go home and practice and show off our handicrafts at the next meeting. We weren’t masters by any means, but we had gotten to the point where we could practice and produce beginner level projects.
Other skills, however, are not so easily acquired. Not only do you have to be shown the processes involved, but they require a tremendous amount of practice simply because that is the nature of the medium. Whereas you can bend and braid and weave lanyard strands the way you want, it is quite a different matter to change the functional capacity of human tissue which is governed by a biochemical clock as well as multiple other factors including the motor learning capacity of the subject.
Weightlifting is just such an activity. A weekend course or seminar might show you the processes you need to master, but there is a great deal of guided practice that must take place before true mastery is achieved. Your completion certificate is just proof that you attended the event and that you were exposed to proper practices. USAW, like many other organizations, uses weekend courses because they are the easiest and most convenient to implement. The courses satisfy certain legal requirements involved in the organization of a weightlifting club or program, but no one is claiming that they inclusively provide sufficient coaching knowledge for someone truly interested in becoming a coach.
You Need Guided Practice
To bridge the gap between a weekend course and becoming a practicing coach, you need guided and supervised practice at coaching the lifts in a dedicated weightlifting facility. The Internship we provide at Takano Weightlifting will offer you, the aspiring coach, many hours of practical experience working with both novices and experienced lifters. You will be able to implement a coaching approach while learning the problem solving capacities of a wide variety of specific movements essential to the learning process.
All of this practice will have oversight by me and/or my assistant Toby Skinner, a graduate of the program and now an excellent, experienced weightlifting coach.
The problems and situations that arise in a dedicated weightlifting gym will provide you with opportunities to use your coaching knowledge and to learn teaching strategies that have proven their value over a 50 year period.
Step up your coaching education today!
If this sounds like a path you’d like to follow you can check out our program at www.takanoweightlifting.com. Just click on the internship menu and take your big step into becoming a weightlifting coach.