Every two years Ontario selects athletes from each region of its six regions to participate in the AAA program, with the goal of being in the Ontario Winter Games.
Is it keeping pace with modern sport development?
Alberta brings its top 75 players together to form its Canada Games team and along the way it offers standard and rigorous on-ice and off-ice training and education to all those participating.
Sound more like a training camp than a tryout?
Quebec, while critized for taking two years to picks its team, also offers the same comprehensive training and engages other training experts outside of Ringette to develop the athletes.
The Ontario Government, through its Sport Priority Funding, offers financial assistance to Ontario sport organizations for training camps for its elite teams such as the AAA program.
For the 2011 Canada Winter Games, Ringette Canada hosted a four day ringette event called La Releve at which it brought all the Provincial teams together for a shared training event in Ottawa to build strong players and coaches.
Everyone we spoke with loved the event.
Bring it on – again and again.
Core content presented at La Releve included fitness and sport specific training, managing stress in competition, sports psychology, mental preparation, coping with a full training schedule, hydration and nutrition, media training, in addition to team building and leadership skills.
Training events like this build key partnerships between sport scientists, coaching development builders and ringette associations.
The Elite Committee of Ontario Ringette is currently looking at its AAA program.
See the proposal that started the discussion.
Is your ringette association ready to answer the key question:
- What does athlete development mean in your ringette association?
- Is there more that you could do at each age group? (Gather the “movers and shakers” in your association and start the discussion).