Skate Canada LTAD Update Skating Program Review

Skate Canada LTAD Update/ Skating Program Review May, 2009: Section Annual General Meeting Slide 1 Personal Introduction of speaker. Some years ago, an impressive and influential group of sport scientists began discussing the questions of how could sport in Canada be a more positive and more successful experience. These sport scientists had been experts in their own specialties – and had analyzed sport all over the world, but when they came together to discuss the broader issues new and exciting ideas began to form. In the end, they developed something called the “Long Term Athlete Development Model” – or LTAD for short. These scientists presented their ideas to the leaders of Sport Canada who quickly became excited about the possibilities that could spring from their ideas. They began a national consultation program called “Canadian Sport for Life” and from the consultation process and the input of the original scientists, they launched a national LTAD program. Sport Canada developed a generic model of basic principles and philosophies that apply to all sport. They then began to partner with ALL sports in Canada to assist them in integrating these principles and philosophies throughout sport. As the national governing body for figure skating, Skate Canada is now charged with the important task of developing a figure skating specific LTAD to ensure that Sport Canada’s mandate is fulfilled – that all athletes, young and old, in Canada have the most positive sport experience possible! Slide 2: The purpose of the LTAD project was to develop models for systematic athlete development. The model had to account both for the pathway for Olympic excellence, and a pathway for achievement and participation in sports for life – This is completely in keeping with Skate Canada’s Mission Statement! The development of a systematic LTAD allows us as an organization to look at all athlete programs and address questions based on first principles – looking at the whole system of development instead of single isolated questions. This new philosophy will allow us to make real and meaningful changes for our athletes! Sport Canada has a vast amount of information available for coaches and parents on its website: www.ltad.ca Slide 3: To better understand how the LTAD is developed and integrated into Skate Canada, let us review the three development phases set out by Sport Canada: • Phase 1 was to develop a FIGURE SKATING SPECIFIC LTAD model. This phase is coming to completion now, and we will discuss the details as the presentation progresses This phase involved consultation with over 2000 coaches from across Canada. Coaches participated from all different sections, from all types of clubs – small, large, rural, urban, and from all levels of skating – from the first steps on the ice to the top of the World and Olympic podiums! 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 1 • • Phase 2 is to analyze all of Skate Canada’s programs and structures to determine where they match the ideals of LTAD and where they fall short. When this analysis is completed, phase 2 finishes by identifying changes that need to happen within the organization to try to best integrate LTAD principles. Phase 3 is then the process of making the real change in programs and structure to allow the best for our athletes every day in every rink! Slide 4: A steering group of coaching leaders took all of this feedback and the general “Sport Canada” LTAD and with the support of 7 working groups of coaches, developed our Figure Skating LTAD. This model – starting at Learn to Skate and continuing to Living to Win is centred on the philosophy of staying “Active for Life” – ensuring that there is a place for everyone who loves to skate. Each stage outlines the key skill acquisition, ideal training activities, the role of performance and competition and the important role of our skater’s coaches. The full and complete model is available for review on Members’ Only. We encourage you to review the document in full at your leisure! There have been many LTAD presentations through the last two years. 15 presentations were conducted at national events. These presentations have focused on receiving feedback on the model itself – on the basic principles and philosophies, and on the all important skill progressions. From these presentations, there has naturally been a great deal of discussion about what all of this means to you. Slide 5: Here is some of what we are hearing: “It’s Only an Elite Model” The LTAD model does chart the pathway for an elite athlete. That is one component of what the model is designed to do. The model also guides the development for all athletes in our system. We have a huge base in CanSkate and STARSkate and it is important to ensure those athletes are exposed to the best programs possible that are focused on helping them develop to reach their full potential, whatever that may be. The LTAD model will help guide a skater’s development regardless of their level, age or ability. We hope by the end of this presentation you will have an understanding of how LTAD will be important to everyone in the organization. “Athlete’s Age Doesn’t Match Model” All athletes have a place in figure skating and all athletes regardless of their ability and skill level are important to our organization! In fact, one of the most IMPORTANT principles of LTAD is to be aware of the fact that individual athletes grow, mature and learn at different rates. Athlete’s may start slow and then advance faster at later stages or vice versa. Regardless of where the athlete’s ability peaks LTAD seeks to ensure that there will be a comprehensive, well planned training and development program in place for them to skate and enjoy the sport. The age ranges listed in the document highlight the “Average” age ranges for the “Ideal” pathway from CanSkate to the Olympics. Each of our athletes is neither average nor ideal – they are each unique! “Are We Getting Rid of Tests?” No! Tests are an important element of our system which help motivate our athletes, gauge their progress and challenge their abilities. The LTAD model itself is about the ideal skill development process. What we need to do is re-evaluate our test system and see if the LTAD model gives us any insight into how to improve that system for our athletes and for the organization. There is no intention to remove tests – 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 2 there is EVERY intention to improve the testing system for the betterment of our athletes by aligning it to the principles of LTAD. “No More Free Skating Programs? Is Artistic Not Important?” Free skating programs are an integral part of our sport. What is also critical for our sport to keep athletes interested and involved is teaching them the sport in a way that helps them progress to their potential as fast as possible so they enjoy participating and stay in the sport. They will stay interested and involved if they keep learning and mastering the skills necessary to skate, spin and jump. We need to be sure that athletes spend enough time on their skill development at the proper times in their early development in order to have the best chance of mastering skills. Once they have learned some solid basic skating skills, they can then put those skills to good use in a program. The artistic side of the sport is very important and a lot of fun! If athletes do not learn how to skate and do not learn proper skill development when their bodies are most receptive to that skill development they will not improve and will become frustrated and leave the sport. What LTAD is pointing out is that we often give so much importance to the skating of a program that athletes miss out on critical time for learning skills quickly – right at the age when they are normally finishing CanSkate. LTAD is suggesting that by giving skill development a little head-start over learning a program we will help improve the chances that athletes will stay in the sport long enough to enjoy both sides of the sport equally. Slide 6: Now, in 2009 we have completed the LTAD model – the statement of the ideal athlete development in figure skating! We move to the critical phase of analyzing our programs and identifying the things that need to change for our athletes to have the benefits of all the work in the LTAD model. Slide 7: First a note about synchronized skating! Because of the focused nature of the discipline, synchronized skating has already completed Phase 2, and is beginning Phase 3 in the 2009-2010 season. The complete details have been posted to Member’s Only over the past two years, and the final technical package will be available soon. Slide 8: Those of you involved in the synchronized skating discipline will remember the consultations with the community on the programming and competition changes to be implemented as a consequence of the LTAD model and its analysis. We are now beginning that consultation for singles, pairs and dance – and this session is the first step in the consultation. In this presentation we will outline the preliminary findings of the stage-by-stage analysis relative to the experiences of our athletes and then review with you the most important questions that need to be addressed as we move to making change in our programs and competition structures. Our programs include all of • Skating Skills, Free Skating, Ice Dance and Interpretive Tests • Competitive Tests in all disciplines • Evaluation Processes And all competition structures including: 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 3 • • • • CanSkate Events STARSkate Events “Competitive” Events Adult Events Slide 9: The stage by stage analysis has been completed for all stages of the LTAD. For this presentation, we will be focusing on the first three stages: • Learn to Skate • Learn to Train, and • Learn to Compete. These three learning stages are the most important to an athlete’s future success – and they represent 83% of the Skate Canada membership – so these stages are important to all clubs and coaches in Skate Canada. Slide 10: The first stage of development for any skating sport must be: LEARN TO SKATE! The Learn to Skate stage spans the two Sport Canada stages of “Active Start” and “FUNdamentals” You will see these stages listed in Sport Canada documents. Both the Sport Canada and Skate Canada LTAD clearly indicate that the introduction to any sport needs to be focused on fun and play. The primary focus is to develop physical literacy. In skating, that means that our skaters need to be learning all the basics of skating – and these basic skating skills will then serve them in whatever ice-sport they chose to pursue – even if it is not figure skating. In very strong terms, Sport Canada is highly discouraging competition at the early parts of Learn to Skate, and emphasizing that formal competition should be minimal at the later stages of Learn to Skate. The focus should be on developing skill through play. Our principle program serving athletes in the “Learn to Skate” stage is CanSkate. We also serve athletes in this stage with our fantastic CanPowerSkate program. For today, however, we will focus on CanSkate. Slide 11: The vast majority of CanSkate participants are between the ages of 6 and 10. For the most part, this does allow a large number of skaters to enter the sport within the ideal age frame for possible high performance development. It is interesting to note that fewer than 10% of athletes participating in CanSkate are actually of preschool age (i.e., under 5) even though our LTAD model allows for entry as young as 3 years of age. Slide 12: The full details of the LTAD for each stage are in the document, available on-line. By way of a summary, we can say that the CanSkate program meets virtually all of the needs of the LTAD model. There are two key areas of physical literacy, however, that need attention in CanSkate – speed and flexibility. Research has shown that athletes in this age range are at the ideal time in their physical development to accelerate their capacity for speed and flexibility – both critical to becoming a successful figure skater. If CanSkate is to be fully in line with LTAD we will need to find ways to further emphasize these skills. 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 4 While the program is well designed to meet the demands of LTAD, we do know that many clubs struggle with the delivery of the program in their own unique situations. We will need to find ways to support clubs in their efforts to best deliver the program to ensure that all children in these programs are receiving the best learning situation possible. The one area where our CanSkate athletes do not match with LTAD is in the area of competitions. While Skate Canada does not formally endorse CanSkate competitions, they do take place in all areas of the country. These competitions have a variety of different forms, and are running a variety of different ways. As was mentioned earlier, Sport Canada does not support formal competition at this stage. If we are to retain competitions as a part of our programming at this stage, then we must consider the rationale very carefully to determine if it truly does meet a developmental purpose. But we will come back to this question later in the presentation. Slide 13: As we move from Learn to Skate to Learn to Train we entry the category of “Sport for all” Sport Canada has mandated that this level of participation in a sport should be accessible to anyone who has developed the basic physical literacy demands of the sport and who has a desire to participate. At this stage, athletes are in their peak development stage for rapid skill development. They learn quickly and consolidate physical skills quickly. Because of the rapid skill development, the focus at this stage should be primarily on training – and developing solid on and off-ice training programs. Competition should be secondary to learning new skills – and should always reinforce and suppose the skill development Slide 14: The skill requirements outlined in the LTAD identify our athletes in STARSkate, up to and including the Sr Bronze tests as being in this stage. These athletes make up 14% of Skate Canada’s membership – and are 85% of the figure skating members! (Figure skating members are those athletes who are not in CanSkate or CanPowerSkate) If we look at our membership data, we can see the age of athletes who have completed CanSkate but have not yet passed their Sr. Bronze test or a Juvenile test. The ages are displayed in this figure. 50% of the athletes meet the ideal age range for a high performance development pathway – and even more who may move into the pathway as late-starters. Slide 15: Learn to train is the introduction to figure skating – and it is at this stage that we find the most discrepancy with LTAD. We are not unique in this regard – this is the case for almost every sport! Why are we in discord? Well, almost every analysis of programs at this level highlight that we treat these children as “little adults” – everything about their programs and experiences look and feel the same as they do for our international competitors – even though they are at very different stages. How does this manifest itself? Even though we know this is the best time to be learning skills, we have made competition SO important that children are being held-back from their skill acquisition for success in competition. This is the 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 5 BIGGEST complaint that we have from coaches from across the country. Even those coaches who “hold skaters back” lament that they feel they have to do so. Further, and perhaps more damaging, the need to succeed in competition at this stage has resulted in children over-competing and under-training. The season becomes focused on learning the free-skating program, training that program, and going from weekend to weekend competing with the program. All of this means compromises are made in learning and training new skills! Imagine how much more effectively we could be using the training/ ice time for athletes at this stage if all season we were not • Asking for our music • Waiting for our music • Running through our program • Cooling down from the run-through • Discussing the program It is widely understood that to become a high performance athlete you need to have accumulated 10,000 hours or more of skill training along the road. We begin that skill training at this stage - How much time is lost with our complete focus on competing? How many more group lessons could we be teaching if less of the season were focused on competitions and more of the season focused on skating and learning? Certainly we are not saying no competitions – but competitions at this stage must support the acquisition of skills – not impede the skill development! (2) Our second major problem with this stage is that we introduce external evaluation too soon. In CanSkate, athletes are evaluated on an on-going basis by the coaches that they work with on a regular basis. As soon as they finish CanSkate they move to a system where they are evaluated on a specific day, by the “big and scary” evaluator who they have never met before. Clearly we need to develop our athletes so that they can successfully deal with the stresses of the external evaluation that is inevitable. What LTAD is saying at this stage is that we need to be gradually introducing external evaluation – and particularly introducing it in such a way as to not interfere with that rapid sill learning! We tried to address this problem when we introduced the evaluation system in 1990 – but it is still not 100% successful – and it is time to be looking at this question again. (3) Finally – on the most important skills of skating: edge, turn and balance! Skating Skills were introduced as a replacement for figures in training these critical factors. Unfortunately the program is still not widely accepted in the country and therefore is not meeting the demands of the sport. We have the best skaters in the world – but in many ways that is despite the program, not because of the program! Slide 16: Moving now to the next stage – Learn to Compete! Again, the full stage details are available in the LTAD model document. It is important to note that not all athletes from Learn to Train will move to this stage. Further, some athletes may move to this stage in some disciplines and not others. It is completely possible that athletes who are not in the high performance stream will stay in Learn to Train for a long time, and then move into programs that have an “Active for Life” focus. This transition is very important to us, and will be the topic of future discussions. The Learn to Compete stage is where “Excellence” starts to become a focus. Early in the stage it remains “Sport for All” – but the end of the stage will not be accessible to all athletes – for a variety of reasons. This is not a bad thing – it is just the natural change point for athletes. 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 6 This is, in fact, the “make or break” stage of development. More than programming factors, the role of the coach will “make or break” the athlete here. Why is this stage so important? It is exactly where MOST athletes will go through their growth and maturation – and the effective management of the changes that are experienced by athletes will make all the difference in their future success. Because of the highly technical nature of figure skating, skill development will continue to be a high focus (as it is through all stages in our sport) – but the main focus at this stage is to learn to deal with the demands of competition. On the ice, artistic development and the skating of free-skating programs is very important. Individualized teaching is important. Within the training and evaluation, speed and the development of speed is critical. Off the ice, individual attention due to growth and maturation patterns will be important. Strength programs will be adapted according to the athlete’s growth patterns. In addition, off-ice programs should be integrating mental training and planning. Slide 17: Why do we care about individual attention to growth and maturation? Well – remember what happened to all of us when we were at that age! At the same age, girls and boys can be completely different shapes and sizes… even if they all end up being the same shape and size after they’ve all grown and matured! We need to make sure our programs don’t lose athletes just because they grew at different times! Slide 18: Who is in this stage? This stage represents our athletes in Jr Silver – Gold STAR Skate and Juvenile and Pre-Novice competitive programs. If we consider our current membership in these programs, we see that 20% of these athletes match the “Ideal” high performance pathway. The reasons for this drop are not yet fully understood. It may be a natural attrition as athletes move through the system. There is concern, however, that this is a direct consequence of the “holding back” skaters in Learn to Train – and a direct consequence of athletes in Learn to train taking too long to learn and master the skills required. Slide 19: So, while this is the make or break stage for our athletes, we need to be aware that the make or break stage from a programming perspective is the previous one. Learn to Train! We need athletes to get to the Learn to Compete stage earlier – so the work we do at Learn to Train programming will have a direct impact here. Once they get here, however, we need to be very aware of the impact that different growth and maturation will have on our athletes. A review of the programs has identified that our system may actually disadvantage skaters – particularly girls – who mature early. Why do we say that? Well, as we saw in a previous slide, when our skaters grow and mature, their bodies change shape and size – this changes the biomechanics of jumping. Ideally LTAD indicates that when athletes are going through this growth spurt there is a need to be more patient with the consistency of skills. Unfortunately for the early maturing girl this happens in the age of Juvenile and Pre-Novice. This is the most competitive pool of skaters in our association, so being patient is not so easy. Things are easier on the athletes who mature later…They 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 7 often go through that growth spurt as late as Junior, where there are far fewer skaters in the pool, and they have often benefitted from being identified as “talented” before the impact of the growth. The final major concern at this stage is the level of consequence associated with competition performance. This stage is correctly identified as “LEARN” to compete – athletes are to be learning to deal with the demands of competition – but we make the consequence of poor performance so high that coaches can’t always make the best developmental decisions for their athletes. When athletes are trying to compete for the right to move to the next competition they will often “play it safe” in their program construction – skating conservatively to ensure their success today – which is often at the detriment of their success tomorrow. The athletes who succeed in the first “round” of this elimination move on to get another “Learning” opportunity – a chance to compete again. Those who do not make it to the next round are left without that opportunity of learning. To make matters worse, the reward of “making” the next competition becomes so large that skaters decide to stay back in a category just so that they can achieve that reward – even if the right developmental decision is to move on. It becomes a vicious circle. Again, skaters need to learn to deal with a qualification structure – but like we said in the Learn to Train stage, we need to develop these skills in a measured way. There will be time enough for qualification when athletes move to the “Train to Compete” stage! Slide 20 That takes us to the end of the analysis for the first three stages of the LTAD. Now – what do we do about our findings? We need to talk about whether there are things in our program structure that need to be changed to make our athletes development healthier – more in line with LTAD. As we go through the programs in each stage, we will present a series of questions. We are looking for feedback from your clubs on these questions. There will, naturally, be an opportunity to discuss the questions when we get to the Question and Answer session at the end of the presentation – but we also highly encourage you to take these questions back to your clubs and discuss them with your coaches. There will be an opportunity for you to formally contribute your thoughts through an on-line feedback questionnaire! Slide 21 Just to remember what we are talking about when we talk about our skating programs – we are talking about CanSkate and STARSkate, and the competitive test program. For the three stages we are focused on here today, we can see where these programs align with the LTAD stages. Slide 22 In CanSkate we identified three important programming questions: • Should we provide a specialized version of CanSkate to meet the unique needs of Pre-School aged athletes? • How can we increase the capacity of speed training for our athletes within the limits of the CanSkate program? • Can we add skill elements that encourage flexibility training – either on the ice or off the ice? Slide 23 Moving to STARSkate, and starting with the Skating Skills program. We need to know from you: Is this program working in your club? And if it is not, what do you think needs to be changed. 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 8 It is so vitally important that we get changes to this program right! Deficiencies in skating skills have an enormous impact on the future development of our athletes. If we are going to change the program again, we want to be sure we are addressing your concerns. Slide 24 Next – the Free Skate program! We know there is a HUGE gap from CanSkate to the Preliminary free skating test. So – do you see value in having a Pre-Preliminary free-skating test that would bridge that gap? Perhaps splitting out some of the more basic skills on the preliminary test and allowing athletes to test those skills first? Next, our skill development outlined in the LTAD document indicates that there are some inconsistencies in the order of elements in the free skating element tests. In addition, we know that some elements on the tests are of less or greater importance within the new CPC scoring system – so, is it important to you that we re-align the elements on the tests to be consistent with LTAD and CPC? Finally – we know that the well balanced program requirements for competition are in conflict with the program requirements for tests. Is it important to you that we re-align the program requirements on the tests to match those required of athletes in competition? Slide 25 Speaking now of the Ice Dance test program – our compulsory dances. Our dance test program is the one that has had the least change! I guess that speaks volumes. The program basically does the job it is meant to do. That said, we do know there are many issues involving partnering. Many athletes are limited in their ability to take tests because of a lack of availability of partners for the tests. In other cases, the costs of acquiring a partner for a test are astronomical. We continue to look at options to address these issues. Slide 26 And the Interpretive program! Test statistics indicate that this is the most under-utilized part of STARSkate. There are many varied reasons for this. But while we examine the reason for this under-utilization we need to be very aware that this program is VERY popular in the Active for Life categories! In adult competitions, the interpretive events are some of the most popular. For athletes who move to “Active for Life” stages as teens, interpretive programs are used as an opportunity to allow for creative development and expression without the limits of jumping. It appears that we cannot lose the Interpretive program. But – at the same time we need to address that its lack of adoption within the development of the high performance athlete means we may be limiting the creative development of our future champions. So, we need to ask if there are other ways to develop creative movement that are more appropriate to athletes who are continuing in high performance stream. Slide 27 Finally – tying it all together – how we evaluate the progress of athletes in our programs. In the Learn to Train analysis, we identified that there is a concern that we are imposing external evaluation too soon – with many consequences. So, we need to ask – is it time to consider the inclusion of coaches in the evaluation of skills for athletes in the Learn to Train stage? 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 9 Also, after looking at the demands of each test it seems important to ask why we have a Juvenile and PreNovice test? Do the tests in the STARSkate program meet the same purpose? Is there a principled reason for streaming the testing of athlete’s skills in the Learn to Compete stage in two different categories? Would it not be easier if they took the same tests – Maybe passing a Juvenile test and passing a Jr Silver test are the same thing? Slide 28 And, now, the last piece of Phase 2 of the LTAD: A Competition review! Slide 29 Sport Canada reviewed the competition structures in all sports across Canada. They found several common themes. These themes are as real in figure skating as they are in other sports! (1) Competition structures are expensive – and they are expensive for everyone: skaters, parents, clubs, coaches and the association! When we review the structures in some cases it is less expensive to travel to Europe than to travel across our vast country. Athletes in Europe can compete in international competitions easier and cheaper than athletes in Canada can compete in some sectional events. We want to be sure that our competition structures are not so expensive early in the athlete’s development that the financial resources are not available when they really need them! (2) “Talent gets excluded” – one only needs to look at the example of Pre-Novice ladies in Quebec. In one weekend almost 200 pre-novice ladies will begin the competitive season. At the end of the weekend, 8 of those athletes (or 4%) will be able to move on to the next competition. That’s 96% of the athletes eliminated in one weekend! As we mentioned in the Learn to Compete discussions, that is too many athletes to leave behind such that they will not have the necessary learning opportunities. (3) In the Learn to Train discussions we talked about the impact of over-competing and under-training. This is a serious issue that we must resolve when discussing the impact and implementation of LTAD. What Sport Canada heard from all sports is that “this is the way we have always done it” – implying that it works for us, why do we need to change? But – we challenge you to consider – it works, but maybe it works only for those who survive. Does it work for those who left the sport? Does it work for those who did not have the opportunity to meet their full potential? These are important questions for each of us, as leaders in figure skating, to consider. Slide 30 Before we talk about a competition review, it is important for us to distinguish competition from performance. The development of performance skills is enormously important for our sport. But we must distinguish this from the competition experience. When Sport Canada discusses competition within LTAD it refers to events where there is a lasting and external consequence to the level of performance in the competition. Within figure skating these consequences take on differing forms. We need to remember that it is possible to have performance without competition – so, when we consider the role of competition, we should consider the value of the “consequence” and ask if there is a different way we can develop performance when the consequence level is inconsistent with LTAD. Slide 31 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 10 The formal Sport Canada review of competition asks us to look at a series of questions. Of most importance is the role of competition in the development of the athlete, the balance of competing versus training, the development of skills to deal with increasing consequence to performance and the construction of the competition calendar for athletes. Slide 32 In that vein, starting at Learn to Skate, we ask the important questions: Should we standardize the CanSkate events? And should this standardization be consistent with LTAD? Should we be skating free-skating programs at CanSkate events – recognizing that the basic skating skills have still not yet been fully developed. Slide 33 At the Learn to Train stage, we need to ask: We need to begin introducing performance – but is it possible to have events where skaters skate to a standard – meaning more than one skater could achieve a Gold in any event if more than one skater met that standard of excellence. This model is used in a lot of other artistic/ technical activities – like music and dance. Second – we really need to consider the value of qualifying competitions. Should Preliminary and Jr Bronze skaters be eliminate from the “next” competition? Does this create a reward system that just encourages skaters to be “held-back” to win?? Slide 34 Finally, in Learn to compete we discussed at some length the impact of growth and maturation. Within a full competition re-structure, is it possible that we could better define the age ranges within the categories in this stage, perhaps allowing athletes the time to be “patient” regardless of whether they mature early or late. And – in our full competition review, if we have removed the “national” event in February, is it possible to re-structure the competition calendar for these athletes so that their peak event is not in November (i.e., Sectionals). Slide 35 This has been a lot of information to take in today! Like we mentioned, it is very important that we get your input. The organization is at the stage of developing ways in which to address the short-falls of our programs. Even with best efforts, a steering committee cannot possibly anticipate the realities of all clubs in the country – so it is ABSOLUTELY imperative that we have as much feedback as possible. Please take the time to take these discussions back to your clubs, with other members – and most importantly, with your coaches! A feedback questionnaire will be available on Member’s Only – as will the presentation slides, and the national speaking notes for the presentation. All of these will be available for your review. We will be moving forward in developing change recommendations. The next step will be presented at the National ACGM. Any feedback received before June 1st will be considered in this round of discussions. There will be another round of feedback following the National ACGM. Slide 36 Thank you for your participation today. We can take any questions now. If you have questions that do not get addressed today, please feel free to forward them to ltad@skatecanada.ca 2009 Section AGM LTAD Presentation 11