The man who coached Dame Jess Ennis-Hill to Olympic and world titles, Toni Minichiello joined us to talk about growing up an immigrant, the changes in the sport, tells stories of some dark times, how he develop Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill to become an Olympic champion and his faults as a coach.
Speaking from the EIS in Sheffield on NLTV’s podcast ‘Hidden Greatness’ Minichiello expresses how the track and field funding system in the UK is broken and discusses ways in which it can be improved to aid better performances.
The 2012, UK Coach of the year spoke about why he chose to be a track & field coach, discusses the highs and lows in the sport and blamed himself for the injury which led Ennis-Hill to miss out on the 2008 Olympic Games.
Minichiello said “I really felt I’d broke the athlete. I’ve got an athlete on the verge of doing what they wanted to do, and you made a mess of it. You broke them.”
“It’s a coaches fault. Coaches causes 99% of the injuries, cause I decided what you do, where you compete, volume of training, how its structured and the rest of it”
After help guide Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill to Olympic Gold in 2012, Minichiello was made redundant from his job, this ultimately left him unemployed with a family to feed.
Minichiello said “It was kind of bitter sweet because you achieved what you set out to do”
“You either wait or choose to go in a different direction and I chose to wait really, and just work out a way of being”
Prior to being made redundant Minichiello discusses his multiple battles with the governing body of the sport and how he best dealt with the situations he was facing.
Hidden Greatness Podcast feat. Toni Minichiello
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