An episode of the Industry Insight Series brought to you by our Partners

Not a member and want more content like this? Speak to our team.

“Those first few years really did fast-track my development in management,” says Matt White, who was the Head Sport Director of cycling’s Team BikeExchange Jayco for 15 years, and now holds the position of Director of High Performance & Racing.

“Those first couple of years set me in a really good position to go through some pretty tricky times later in my career.”

White is speaking to the Leaders Performance Institute and Elite Performance Partners’ [EPP] Founding Partner Dave Slemen about his transition from professional rider to management over the course of a single winter in 2007 and 2008.

He also discussed how he has adapted as a leader in the intervening period, particularly in light of cycling’s pivot towards younger riders and an ever more cutthroat development environment.

Gary Brickley, best known for coaching 17-time Paralympic gold medallist Dame Sarah Storey, believes the balance between wellbeing and performance is tricky to maintain.

By John Portch

“That balance needs to be carefully managed otherwise the person can go down a whole spiral of interventions that might not always be appropriate,” he tells the Leaders Performance Institute.

Brickley is speaking just moments after appearing onstage at November’s Leaders Sport Performance Summit at Twickenham Stadium.

He acknowledges that athletes often have traits that set them apart. “Athletes work differently,” says Brickley, who is also a Senior Lecturer at the University of Brighton and an exercise physiologist. “They might not be well in a general sense but perform absolutely brilliantly. Then you may have a situation where you reduce their training and focus on their wellbeing. You can’t do one without the other.

“It’s a tough area and I don’t know if we’ve got the people trained up to the level needed at the moment.”

How does he see the scene developing in five years’ time? “To be honest, I think we’ll still be way off,” he says with a smile. “We’ve gotten better with things such as nutrition and we’ve moved away from those old-style bullying coaches that put athletes under pressure and we’ve weeded out a lot of the rough things that affect athletes, but there will still be challenges.”

The Leaders Performance Institute sat down with Brickley to briefly run through his reflections on the run-up to Tokyo, where Storey won three Paralympic gold medals, and his thoughts on coaching in general terms.

Gary, how do you seek to combine your coaching and academic knowledge within the performance environment?

GB: It works both ways, as what I learn from the athletes I can pass back to the students. I’m interested in nutrition, environmental physiology and training theory and there’s a lot that I’ve been able to pass on to my athletes. Say, for example, Sarah Storey is getting ready for the Tokyo Games and she wants to do some heat and altitude work. I’ll work out what’s the best procedure, we’ll try it out, I’ll get her feedback, and then take it forward to the next stage and see if we get some performance improvements.

What has been your biggest performance challenge of the last 12 months?

GB: Not going to events has been hard. I couldn’t go to Tokyo, I’d been to all the Games since 2000, it’s been remote coaching from home, which has been a challenge. There was no contact with families and that was pretty tough for athletes. You couldn’t win a gold medal and go and celebrate with your family. There were also athletes who contracted long Covid and did not make it to the Games. Tokyo, success-wise, was great for us but we never knew if it was going to happen until the last minute. Then you need to prepare for things to go wrong. For example, Tokyo was about preparing for the heat and then it poured down with torrential rain during one of the road races.

How important is the feeling of control for a coach?

GB: I give control to the athlete until I feel that something might be going wrong or not in the right direction. Then I would intervene. That could be an injury or it could be a piece of equipment that requires the right innovation team. I have coached in water polo, swimming, triathlon and elite cycling and there’s a process of continual learning and educating yourself, lifting different ideas from different sports. In the past, I’ve had some pretty dodgy coaches and you learn from their errors too.

In what ways do you check the learning and understanding of your athletes?

GB: Onstage, I mentioned being a decent filter as a coach and getting rid of the rubbish, whether that’s rubbish people that are trying to intervene with the athlete or rubbish ideas about the theory of a sport or how you recover. As a coach, I find myself filtering that out so that the athlete hasn’t got to deal with issues like that. They can focus on their race, on their recovery, and have a good, settled situation at home or on the track.

How do you ensure that everyone inside the building feels empowered to speak up and explore performance questions?

GB: I think we talk a lot about collaboration and multidisciplinary work. The coach needs to pull on a lot of different people at different times. Some people you may not talk to for two years, other people you might be talking to them on a daily basis. If you find that people are backing off a little bit you have to ask why they’re not contributing to the team. That could be the nutritionist who hasn’t felt that they’re needed because the person’s nutrition is fine. We’d ask them ‘can you find out a little bit more for us in this area?’ There are always performance questions and ways you can encourage people to feel a greater sense of ownership in their work.

Download the latest Performance Special Report – Enhance Your Environment

Brought to you by our Main Partners Keiser, take a step inside the cultural reset that led Harlequins to the Premiership title with scrum-half Danny Care and Head of Rugby Performance Billy Millard, then explore how the team worked with performance coach Owen Eastwood to place wellbeing at the centre of their performance equation and why this approach is also shared by Google and the Toronto Blue Jays. Finally, discover why equality, diversity and inclusion can be a competitive advantage through the admirable work being done at English Premier League club Brentford FC.

Download Report

This Leaders Performance Podcast is brought to you by our Main Partners

“A few years ago, there was a bigger emphasis on numbers and trying to hit specific targets and outcomes, whereas now, especially with those younger athletes, we spend more time talking about trying to show specific behaviours.”

Dan McPartlan, a Strength & Conditioning Coach with British Cycling, is reflecting on how his work with athletes continues to change in this latest episode of the Leaders Performance Podcast.

Also on today’s show, we discuss:

• The human teaching tools of S&C [4:30];
• Reacting when an athlete has a bad day at the office [10:00];
• Building an athlete’s confidence in their own body [11:30];
• The elements of McPartlan’s work that continue to surprise him [16:10].

John Portch: Twitter | LinkedIn

Listen above and subscribe today on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher and Overcast, or your chosen podcast platform.