German instructor Dr Winfried Spanaus is in the country where he is training Rwandan athletics coaches during the ongoing training course on advanced skills in middle and long distance running.
Organised by Rwanda Athletics Federation (RAF), the two-week training course taking place at Bugesera Stadium from December 7-21, targets 16 Level One athletics coaches in efforts to upgrade their coaching skills to Level Two category.
Spanaus, a sports scientist and an expert in track and field. He is often assigned by the German Olympic Sports Federation to teach coaches in different countries various skills in preparing an athlete from a young age, with Rwanda his latest coaching destination.
"I got all the training packages to become a coach for middle and long distance coaches,” Spanaus said.
During his two-week course, the instructor is coaching local coaches on various training methods for athletes and nutrition that is good for athletes with ample focus on middle and long distance running.
"There are some good coaches here but they always need to improve and I think Rwanda is a country that can introduce middle and long distance runners. With the training, it is easier to train kids and prepare them into future athletes,” he said.
With the package that coaches will get from the training course, Athletics governing body (RAF) boss Lt.Col. Lemuel Kayumba is confident the trained coaches will apply the skills acquired to improve the performances of athletes from their respective clubs.
"Our coaches are supposed to always learn new skills so that they can help athletes improve their performances. That is why we are organizing these training courses are being organised...we hope to train more through the partnership existing between our federations [Rwanda and German athletics],” he said.
Police athletics club coach Joselyne Nyiraneza is one of the coaches benefiting from the training course. She told Times Sport that
"We are learning a lot of new skills and the instructor has been teaching us to adopt modern approaches while applying some skills that we used to apply manually," Nyiraneza said.
"The skills that we are getting from this course will hopefully have an impact on the athletes’ performances as long as we apply them accordingly,” she added.