The second in a series of Paris Wave: High Performance Seminars has taken place in Munster’s Mitchelstown Boxing Club this evening, and was attended by 24 people from 6 boxing clubs in the province.

Paris Wave is designed to support boxers, coaches and clubs, and capitalise on the post-Games renewed interest in boxing created by the 10 strong Team Ireland Boxing and Kellie Harrington’s historic second Olympic gold. Paris Wave has five pillars, encompassing participation growth, safeguarding, women in sport, coach education, and boxer wellbeing.

Led by High Performance Director Tricia Heberle, Head Coach Zauri Antia and Coach Damian Kennedy, the coaching seminar included three key elements:

1. Road to Paris 2024 and Lessons Learned: presentation and Q&A 2. Practical coaching session: led by Head Coach Zauri Antia and the HPU coaches
3. Session/weekly planning workshop: fundamentals of designing a daily programme, building a training week and competition campaign.

The High Performance Unit would extends its heartfelt thanks to Mitchelstown Boxing Club for hosting this evening’s seminar.

On Monday, 34 people from 16 clubs attended the inaugural seminar, hosted by Castlerea BC, in Co. Roscommon – and 10 youth and senior boxers from Connacht clubs participated in the practical session.

Participating Clubs

Mayfield Boxing Club

Mitchelstown Boxing Club

Sliabh Luchra Boxing Club

St. Francis Boxing Club

St. Paul’s Boxing Club

Riverstown Boxing Club

Forthcoming Seminars

Please note that dates and locations for each seminar are in collaboration with the respective provincial unit. Dates and locations for seminars in Leinster and Ulster will be published in due course.

Dublin: The National Stadium, September 23rd, 6pm to 9pm – register here: https://shout.com/s/VtO4MiKu

Paris Wave also includes:

Paris Wave – NextGen  This programme will support clubs, financially, in responding to growth in member numbers. IABA will provide support for the provision of 4 training sessions for new members over a 6-week period, beginning in September. All clubs offer training to multiple age groups and clubs are welcome to make Paris Wave – NextGen applications for several training groups. IABA will also be supplying programme-specific materials to each participating club.

Paris Wave – Women in Sport – WIS Conference, August 31^st, encompassing workshops on Coaching Teenage Girls, S&C for Female Combat Athletes, and Safeguarding Essentials – a practical session on managing and reporting concerns. This also marks the beginning of a 6-month long arc of WIS learning at in-person events in every province. Paris Wave – Women in Sport will culminate with a conference on International Women’s Day, 2025.

Paris Wave – Coaching: IABA is making 8 additional coaching courses available in this pillar. Four Fundamentals: Assistant Coach courses will enable 80 people to begin their coaching careers in Q4, and Four Level One: Club Coach courses will enable 80 coaches to take the next step in their coaching journeys.

Paris Wave – Safeguarding augments IABA’s existing 2024 Safeguarding learning programme. IABA is providing 20 Safeguarding 1 workshops throughout 2024, and under Paris Wave, has added Safeguarding 2 learning in Q4. These are online events, and open to all Ulster clubs and their members.

A Celebration Event for Paris 2024 Olympians and Paralympians from Northern Ireland, including Team Ireland Boxing’s Jude Gallagher, Michaela Walsh and Aidan Walsh, has been announced

The event is taking place in the SSE arena on Thursday 3^rd of October and is set to be a night to remember with interviews with our athletes, music and entertainment. SportNI says this is a “ a unique opportunity for the sporting community and wider public to come together and celebrate the incredible success of our Olympic and Paralympic athletes.”

Hosted by BBC’s Stephen Watson and Olympian – now broadcaster and author – Aimee Fuller, the event will also feature music from DJ Pete Snodden and singer Ryan McMullan.

Tickets for the event cost £1, and will be available via www.ticketmaster.ie and www.ssearenabelfast.com from 12 noon today, Wednesday 18 September. Read more: https://www.communities-ni.gov.uk/…/minister-announces…

Dyslexia Ireland is making available to boxing clubs a webinar to explore how best to include and support dyslexic children and young people in sports activities. The webinar will be held on Tuesday 8th October 2024 at 7.00pm. Please register in advance at https://www.tickettailor.com/events/dyslexiaireland/1399194   

The intended audience is coaches, teachers or volunteers who work with young people in either informal sports activities, or in more competitive contexts. The webinar will be recorded and shared with those who have signed up to the webinar.

As part of the webinar, Dyslexia Ireland will be signposting the work has undertaken as a partner in the SASLED European Erasmus+ project. The SASLED project partners have developed a free online training course and new guidance for sports coaches and trainers on how they can be more inclusive of dyslexia and other specific learning difficulties within their sports coaching. More information on the  SASLED project is available here: https://dyslexia.ie/new-training-on-sld-sport/

As part of the European Week of Sport, Sport Ireland Coaching, in partnership with the LSP (Local Sports Partnerships) Network and the Sport Ireland Participation Unit is hosting a series of ICOACHKIDS Regional Coaching Conferences for coaches of children and teenagers. The aim of the ICOACHKIDS Regional Coaching Conferences is to bring current best practice and specific information to coaches at local level that will support them when coaching children and teenagers. Coaches who attend will be provided with specific directed learning on the day of the conference, as well as being signposted to self-directed learning opportunities through Sport Ireland and the ICOACHKIDS website.

Date:                  Monday 23^rd September

Time:                  18:30 to 22:00

Venue:               Radisson Blu St Helens Hotel, Stillorgan, Dublin

Register here: ICOACHKIDS Regional Coaching Conference 2024 Tickets, Mon, Sep 23, 2024 at 6:30 PM | Eventbrite

Date:                  Friday 27^th September

Time:                  18:30 to 22:00

Venue                Carlton Hotel, Old Airport Road, Cloghran, Dublin

Register here: ICOACHKIDS Regional Coaching Conference 2024 Tickets, Fri, Sep 27, 2024 at 6:00 PM | Eventbrite

Date:                  Saturday 28^th September

Time:                  10:00 am – 13:00

Venue:               Bridge House Hotel, Tullamore

Register here: ICOACHKIDS Midlands Conference 2024 Tickets, Sat, Sep 28, 2024 at 9:30 AM | Eventbrite

The aim of the ICOACHKIDS Regional Coaching Conferences is to bring current best practice and specific information to coaches at local level that will support them when coaching children and teenagers. Coaches who attend will be provided with specific directed learning on the day of the conference, as well as being signposted to self-directed learning opportunities through Sport Ireland and the ICOACHKIDS website. 

Name of Conference: ICOACH KIDS Regional Coaching Conference 2024

Who should attend: Coaches of Children and Teenagers 

If you answer YES to any of these questions the ICOACHKIDS Regional Coaching Conference is for YOU! 

1. Are you a coach of children U12? 
2. Do you coach teenage girls? 
3. Do you coach teenage boys? 
4. Would you like to know more about being child/teen centred in your coaching? 
5. What coaching skills do you need to improve/develop to put the needs of children/teenagers first? 
6. Would you like to develop an inclusive culture and environment where you coach? 
7. Are you concerned with dropout from your sport? 

This ICOACHKIDS Regional Coaching Conference 2024 will provide a clear set of practical tips and tools to create positive meaningful movement experiences for each and every child/teenager in your session. The conference presenters will provide supports to create child centred sessions, tips on how to manage fun and skills development while empowering the children participating in your sport.  

Keynote Speakers

Sheelagh Quinn – Biography 

Coaching Children and Physical Literacy Lead Officer at Sport Ireland  

Sheelagh has worked with Sport Ireland for 25 years, and currently leads the development of the Coaching Children and Coaching Teenagers Programmes in Ireland and Physical Literacy within Sport Ireland. As part of her role Sheelagh leads on the iCoadhKids Projects- a multi-agency global movement aiming to support the development of a Specialist Children and Youth Coaching Workforce (including ICoachKids, ICoachKids+ and iCoachGirls). Sheelagh is currently the Chair of the iCoachKids Global committee, and a member of the steering group of Sport Coaching Europe (The International Council for Coaching Excellence (ICCE) continental body for Europe) 

Declan O’Leary – Biography 

Coaching Development Manager for Sport Ireland 

After spending much of his career in supporting NGBs (National Governing Bodies of Sport) in the development of their coach development systems, Declan has worked more recently on the support of coaches in their practice. This has included coaching people with disabilities, coaching children and coaching young people.  As well as investigating the needs for coaches in their practice, Declan has contributed to the development of the Sport Ireland coaching and the ICOACHKIDS resources. He is a founding member of ICOACHKIDS. 

Phil Kearney – Biography 

Course Leader for the MSc Applied Sports Coaching at the University of Limerick. A Fellow of the Higher Education Authority, his teaching, and research centres on the domain of skill acquisition, particularly as it relates to youth sport. A regular contributor to RTÉ Brainstorm, Phil chairs the Skill Acquisition and Biomechanics subgroup of the Gaelic Athletic Association’s Sport Science Working Group, is a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Motor Learning and Development, and is the Irish representative on the Teaching Games for Understanding Special Interest Group of the International Association for Physical Education in Higher Education. Phil is a co-founder of Movement and Skill Acquisition Ireland

The first in a series of Paris Wave: High Performance Seminars has taken place in Connacht’s Castlerea Boxing Club this evening.

Paris Wave is designed to support boxers, coaches and clubs, and capitalise on the post-Games renewed interest in boxing created by the 10 strong Team Ireland Boxing and Kellie Harrington’s historic second Olympic gold. Paris Wave has five pillars, encompassing participation growth, safeguarding, women in sport, coach education, and boxer wellbeing.

Led by High Performance Director Tricia Heberle, Head Coach Zauri Antia and Coach Damian Kennedy, tonight’s Paris Wave High Performance seminar was attended by 34 people from 16 clubs – and 10 youth and senior boxers from Connacht clubs participated in the practical session.

These coaching seminars include three key elements:

1. Road to Paris 2024 and Lessons Learned: presentation and Q&A 2. Practical coaching session: led by Head Coach Zauri Antia and the HPU coaches
3. Session/weekly planning workshop: fundamentals of designing a daily programme, building a training week and competition campaign.

The High Performance Unit would extends its heartfelt thanks to Paddy Sharkey and Castlerea Boxing Club for hosting this evening’s seminar.

Participating Clubs

Ballinacarrow Boxing Club

Ballyhaunis Boxing Club

Ballymote Boxing Club

Castlebar Boxing Club

Castlerea Boxing Club

Celtic Eagles Boxing Club 

Galway Boxing Club

Gateway Boxing Club

Gurteen Boxing Club

Knockmore/Foxford Boxing Club

Loughrea Boxing Club

Monivea Boxing Club

St. Anne’s Boxing Club

Sean McDermott Boxing Club

Swinford Boxing Club

Tredagh Boxing Academy

Forthcoming Seminars

Please note that dates and locations for each seminar are in collaboration with the respective provincial unit. Dates and locations for seminars in Leinster and Ulster will be published in due course.

Cork, Mitchelstown Leisure Centre, Wednesday September 18th, 6pm to 9pm – register here: https://shout.com/s/RSEntXIq

Dublin: The National Stadium, September 23rd, 6pm to 9pm – register here: https://shout.com/s/VtO4MiKu

Paris Wave also includes:

Paris Wave – NextGen  This programme will support clubs, financially, in responding to growth in member numbers. IABA will provide support for the provision of 4 training sessions for new members over a 6-week period, beginning in September. All clubs offer training to multiple age groups and clubs are welcome to make Paris Wave – NextGen applications for several training groups. IABA will also be supplying programme-specific materials to each participating club.

Paris Wave – Women in Sport – WIS Conference, August 31^st, encompassing workshops on Coaching Teenage Girls, S&C for Female Combat Athletes, and Safeguarding Essentials – a practical session on managing and reporting concerns. This also marks the beginning of a 6-month long arc of WIS learning at in-person events in every province. Paris Wave – Women in Sport will culminate with a conference on International Women’s Day, 2025.

Paris Wave – Coaching: IABA is making 8 additional coaching courses available in this pillar. Four Fundamentals: Assistant Coach courses will enable 80 people to begin their coaching careers in Q4, and Four Level One: Club Coach courses will enable 80 coaches to take the next step in their coaching journeys.

Paris Wave – Safeguarding augments IABA’s existing 2024 Safeguarding learning programme. IABA is providing 20 Safeguarding 1 workshops throughout 2024, and under Paris Wave, has added Safeguarding 2 learning in Q4. These are online events, and open to all Ulster clubs and their members.