BSUK’s second annual Coach Summit, held at Birmingham City University on Saturday 28 January, was a truly memorable day of learning and inspiration around baseball – that was the verdict of more than 80 people who attended the day of talks and seminars on Saturday with some of the world’s top coaches, plus the baseball athletes and players who got to work with those coaches in both gym and classroom sessions on Sunday.

All the guest coaches are based in the United States. These high-level coaches were blown away by the openness and the thirst for knowledge they found in the British coaches and players, and it made the event special for them.

Finally, the BSUK Awards on Saturday evening, presented to coaches, volunteers and umpires, was a perfect recognition of the work these people contribute, and the importance of what they do.

The overall theme of the Coach Summit was “An Athlete-Centered Approach”.

First, Dave Turgeon from the Pittsburgh Pirates and former MLB Consultant and college coach Pat Doyle opened proceedings with questions of “Why do you coach?” and “How can you build culture around the athlete?”.

Then Cindy Bristow, one of the top fastpitch coaches and authorities in the world, spoke on “Coaching the Modern-Day Athlete”, looking at the differences between how coaches and players may view the world, and the different modes of communication they use.

Later, Team USA Slowpitch Coach Steve Shortland looked at “Maintaining an Athlete-Centered Approach in Competition”, particularly when dealing with adult players.

All of this produced a series of thought-provoking sessions that were more about the psychology of athletes and coaches than the technical aspects of the game.

BSUK National Development Manager Will Lintern, the architect of the Coach Summit, said after the event: “We set out to deliver the best possible coaching event baseball have ever had, not just in the UK but in Europe. And we did just that. The speakers were world class, as was the level of discussion and engagement from our coaching community, and this now sets up British baseball to have successful 2017”.

Then, in a final plenary session, all the guest coaches gave their answers to a series of questions posed by Will Lintern. Here are some of them:

Asking what they loved most about coaching led to answers such as:

• Giving back.
• Empowerment of athletes.
• Going through everything – all the ups and downs – as a team.

Asked what they have seen in coaching that they think other coaches should emulate:

• Caring for players so they believe in you and in themselves.
• Being true to yourself and bringing this to your relationship with players.

29 players from the baseball HPA had the chance to spend time in a gym with the guest coaches and local coaches from their format. Players devoted their time in the gym to catch play and defensive work.

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