This season, BISP set out to expand Triathlon programme offerings at the school by hiring full time High Performance Head Coach Zane Castro for the Triathlon Academy.
Coach Castro was born and educated in Texas, USA and most recently makes his transition to British International School, Phuket from Marymount University, Arlington VA.
He was hired and founded the initial varsity triathlon programme established within the NCAA. He led his team to a National Championship Runner up spot in the 3rd season and earned multiple Regional podium spots, qualification for FISU World University Games and a top 10 finish, in 2016. Coach Castro has coached junior, national level athletes and elites into the international level competitions successfully. He brings a wealth of understanding of youth, junior, and collegiate level development experience and processes along with extensive movement based injury resistance knowledge, which is critical to the environment among youth, junior and senior level developmental athletes.
He laid the foundation for a comprehensive varsity collegiate triathlon programme and also worked towards official triathlon’s approval as an NCAA Emerging Sport for Women. BISP has set a goal by bringing Coach Castro in to do the same here.
As of Term 1, the BISP Triathlon academy has added 21 Triathlon-related activity opportunities beyond the previously established High Performance Programme.
· Youth Exposure Programme A for 7-8 years of age: This programme is focused at age-related movement skills, course navigation, safety, fun, and no necessary competition – a campus series will be available within the next year.
· Youth Exposure Programme B for 9-10 years of age: This programme continues the A categories while increasing attention to expanded skill sets, learning to train, communicate, and beginning of self-management beyond training. Fun remains a critical role. The campus-wide series will benefit the focus of this group as we move forward.
· Performance Programme 11-17 years of age: Competition becomes a teaching tool to progress to advancing levels of performance. Skills and physiological abilities begin to be of more focus, self-management, communication, and repetition of processes. The end focus is upon finding process, and building a love for the game.
These activities are layered over the course of each term dependent upon the age group and the relative programme to provide fundamental skills required for current and future athletic success.