Athletics: Aspire Development Academy

 For the past few days the girls and I have been at Mt Smart Stadium doing athletics.

We'd signed Mulan and Miya up for the Aspire Development Academy, a training camp for 10- to 17-year-olds.

(Mulan has decided that athletics is now her number two activity, behind ballet, and this season we're planning on doing a lot more athletics competitions and training.  For the past few years we've been focusing on music on Saturdays, so not attending athletics competitions, but from now on athletics will be Mulan's Saturday priority.)

The camp was excellent, and I highly recommend it.  Miya, in the 10-to-11 years group, had two days, while Mulan, in the 12-to-17 years group had three days.  We were there from 9:30 to 3pm each day.

What I especially liked about it was that we had a bunch of 50 or so kids all extremely motivated and just loving getting outside and having a serious run around.  They were all pushing themselves hard (and sometimes it was pretty hard work!), and happy to be pushing themselves hard.  There is a huge satisfaction to be able to control the body with strength and speed in that way, and the kids were getting it.  It was an inspiring environment to be in.

The coaches were also all excellent.  For me, coming back into it after 20+ years, it's interesting to see the big-name athletes from my day now there as senior coaches.  Amazingly, my old PE teacher from secondary school was coaching there, too -- Mulan and Miya had a few super-beneficial sessions with him.

As far as I could see, the only downside to the camp was that there were too many kids for the coaches to do a lot of fine-tuning with individuals.  For the most part it was group sessions rather than precise one-to-one technique adjustments.  While this was perfect for both Mulan and Miya, given the level they are currently at, I can see how some more experienced teen athletes may outgrow this type of camp and not get as much out of it.