KUALA LUMPUR: Newly-appointed swimming coach, Chris Martin is looking forward to raising the standard of the national swimmers.
The American who has over 30 years of experience coaching in the United States, Scotland, England and China, said that the ongoing Malaysia Open Swimming Championships would be his platform to observe the level the national swimmers are at during the competition as well as to identify new talents.
“I'm definitely looking forward to their (national swimmers) performance, my eyes are wide open. So far they have been working hard, so I want to see where we are and where we can get to.
“This championship is good for me to see the swimmers in action and to look and see as to what can be improved,” he told Bernama when met at the National Aquatic Centre in Kuala Lumpur Sports City (KLSC) in Bukit Jalil.
Martin, who trained American breast stroke ace Nelson Diebel to win two gold medals at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, noted that he would try to prepare new and young swimmers for the Sea Games in the Philippines in November.
“We need to replace some of the old with new blood, from the last time to present time. So I am now looking and seeing which of the kids will be the next generation,” he added.
Meanwhile, Martin acknowledged that the national swimmers have a good attitude in order to improve themselves and were willing to learn new techniques.
“I’ve brought in new things like new breathing patterns, how to approach training differently, how to race from behind, not just ahead and lots of different strategies, and they seem interested in learning.
“It definitely makes lots of improvements in their training and now we need to make improvements in performance,” said the coach, who started coaching the national swimmers only three weeks ago.
For the record, Martin’s swimmers have set national records and competed in the Olympics for their respective countries.
Prior to his foray on the international scene, Martin’s swimmers won a plethora of national championships and broke four American records when he served as head coach for the University of Florida and the Peddie School (a college preparatory school in Hightstown, Mercer County, New Jersey, United States) respectively.
He also has had athletes compete in five Olympics and has served on two Olympic coaching staff including Team USA in 1992. Bernama