{"id":2997,"date":"2020-05-17T13:49:29","date_gmt":"2020-05-17T18:49:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/?p=2997"},"modified":"2020-05-17T13:58:46","modified_gmt":"2020-05-17T18:58:46","slug":"coach-mike-barber-to-present-on-the-world-championship-technique-of-kelsey-lee-barber","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/?p=2997","title":{"rendered":"Coach Mike Barber to Present on “The World Championship Technique of Kelsey-Lee Barber”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Outstanding Australian javelin coach Mike Barber will break down the technique of 2019 World Champion Kelsey-Lee Barber in a free webinar on Thursday, May 21, at 3:00pm CST. In advance of that appearance, Mike graciously provided some details about Kelsey-Lee’s career and their big night in Doha. You can register for Mike’s presentation here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was one of those moments that throws coaches long for and dread. In the fifth round of the women\u2019s javelin final at the 2019 World Athletics Championships, Kelsey-Lee Barber sat in fourth place with a best throw of 62.95m. Occupying the top three spots were China\u2019s Liu Shiying and Lyu Huihui, along with Germany\u2019s Christin Hussong. Having set a PB of 67.70m two months before, Kelsey arrived in Doha as one of the favorites, and she still had an excellent chance to medal if she could find a groove on one of her two remaining attempts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the stands of Khalifa International Stadium, Mike Barber, Kelsey\u2019s husband and coach, sat peering into the screen of an ipad. He normally did not watch video of Kelsey\u2019s attempts during competitions but, as he said later, \u201cSomething wasn\u2019t right,\u201d and he needed to figure out what that was.  After her solid opener, Kelsey had planted her next three throws just on either side of the sixty-meter line (61.40m, 58.34m, 60.90m) a full five meters below what she\u2019d need to get on the podium. She seemed stuck, he needed to help her get unstuck, and they were running out of time.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

To Mike, the video confirmed what he had suspected. Kelsey appeared a bit tentative. She seemed to be holding something back. As officials summoned her for her fifth attempt, Mike considered telling her to add half a meter to the length of her approach.\u201cIt looked like she needed more space to feel like she could run through the crossover,\u201d he recalls. A longer run up might remove any worries she harbored about fouling and unleash her aggressiveness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Or, it might not. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s what\u2019s so great and so treacherous about these moments. The right adjustment at the right time can help an athlete unleash a big throw when they need it the most. The wrong advice, however–no matter how well intentioned–can cause them to overthink and lose their rhythm at the worst possible time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019ve all been there. Maybe not at a World Championships, but sometimes in the heat of a Conference or State championship we notice a flaw in our athlete\u2019s technique and think \u201cThat\u2019s it<\/em>! Fix that, and we\u2019re set!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In our excitement, we begin shouting adjustments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cKeep your eyes back!\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cFinish the throw!\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cStay long! Be aggressive! But, relax!\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sometimes it works, but sometimes advice delivered in the heat of battle can make an athlete self-conscious and muck up their rhythm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One year at our State Meet, I had two shot putters competing simultaneously in separate flights in different spots within the oval. It took a lot of effort–I had to bolt back and forth from one side of the stadium to the other–but I managed to shout enough suggestions to make it impossible for either of them to get comfortable. Both threw poorly, and I realized afterwards that they\u2019d have been much better off if I\u2019d kept my mouth shut. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That night in Doha, Mike had to decide, as Kelsey stepped to the runway for her fifth throw, if the moment was right to suggest a change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Luckily, he and Kelsey had survived plenty of high pressure moments during the five years they\u2019d worked together. The entire 2016 season, for example. After taking bronze at the 2014 Commonwealth Games and surpassing the sixty-three meter mark two years running, Kelsey hoped to make some noise at the Olympics, but instead spent the entire 2016 season trying to manage a stress fracture in her lower back. The focus of that year evolved into holding things together long enough to qualify for Rio and sample the Olympic experience–often an important step in a thrower\u2019s development. Kelsey accomplished that goal–she finished 28th in Rio with a best of 55.25m–but the pain and uncertainty she faced made for a long and difficult summer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She came back to set PBs in both 2017 (64.53m) and 2018 (64.57m) and picked up some additional big meet experience along the way. She made the final at the London World Championships in 2017, then won silver at the 2018 Commonwealth Games. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The 2019 season began in promising fashion as Kelsy won the Australian Nationals with a toss of 63.33m in April, displaying in Mike\u2019s words \u201ca lot of horsepower.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cShe just couldn’t quite get it through the jav, but we walked away thinking \u2018there’s a big throw in there, we just have to find it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They found it in Lucerne in July, when Kelsey smashed a 67.70m PB that announced her as a major contender in Doha.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unfortunately, ten days later at the London Diamond League Meeting, she suffered a flareup of a shoulder injury she’d originally sustained in 2014. I asked Mike if an injury history like Kelsey\u2019s (she also ruptured an elbow tendon in 2012) was simply a byproduct of making a living tossing the spear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou want to believe that you can make your athletes resilient enough to stay healthy,\u201d he said. \u201cBut the stress that throwing a javelin puts on your joints is immense. And going from being a sixty-four-meter thrower to a sixty-seven-meter thrower creates an exponential increase in the force on the shoulder.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They had to adjust Kelsey\u2019s training, and between the London meeting and Doha she never threw with anything longer than a seven-step run up, aside from at the Diamond League Final in late August where she tossed 64.74m and finished second to China\u2019s Lyu Huihui. After that competition, Kelsey informed Brian that in spite of her shoulder issues, \u201cI can beat Lyu. I can win the World Championships.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kelsey\u2019s confidence was encouraging, but the shoulder remained touchy right up to their final throwing session before the qualification round in Doha when Kelsey took a few tosses using a seven-step run up and experienced \u201ca hell of a lot of pain.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kelsey was assigned to the first flight during qualification, and the best she could manage was 61.08m in round one. That was well short of the 63.50m automatic mark, and afterwards she and Mike retired to the indoor warmup facility to watch the live feed of the second flight and await their fate. In order to advance to the next night\u2019s final, Kelsey would have to finish in the top twelve. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat was the worst!\u201d recalled Mike. \u201cShe was sitting fifth in her pool, and looking at the list of throwers in the second flight and their PBs and what we knew of them, there were definitely eight girls that could knock her out, and there was nothing we could do except prepare as if Kelsey was in the final. She started to go through her routine, and when we eventually saw that she had made it, she said, \u2018I know what I did wrong. Let\u2019s go out there and win tomorrow!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, they\u2019d been through a lot together by the time Kelsey stepped to the runway to line up for fifth attempt in the Doha final, and that gave Mike the confidence that she could handle a last-minute adjustment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cKelsey!\u201d he called out. \u201cMove back!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She did, and it almost worked. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kelsey\u2019s throw measured 63.65m, to that point her best effort of the night, but when the fifth round ended she was still well behind Hussong (65.05m), Huihui (65.49m), and Shiying (65.88m). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mike says that Kelsey \u201ccarried her momentum better\u201d on that fifth attempt but \u201cfell off it\u201d a bit at the end. That did not, however, diminish her confidence. \u201cI can do this,\u201d she assured him as they conferred before her final attempt. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

She used the lengthened run up again on her sixth throw, and this time there was no falling off at the finish. She smashed a 66.56m and vaulted into first. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

She was now in for another wait, shorter than the qualification vigil but just as agonizing. Throwing behind Kelsey in the order, Hussong, Lyu each had another shot to overtake her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hussong\u2019s 65.21m, Lyu\u2019s 62.61m, and Liu\u2019s 65.75m must have seemed to hang in the air forever, but they did not change the final order and Kelsey became the first Australian to win a World Championship gold in the throws since Dani Samuels took discus gold in Berlin in 2009. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019d like to learn more about Kelsey\u2019s career and the technique that made her World Champion, join us this Thursday. Mike will break down Kelsey\u2019s form using videos of some of her best throws. Attendees will be able to submit questions throughout. If you\u2019d like to be part of this very special event, register here<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Outstanding Australian javelin coach Mike Barber will break down the technique of 2019 World Champion Kelsey-Lee Barber in a free webinar on Thursday, May 21, at 3:00pm CST. In advance of that appearance, Mike graciously provided some details about Kelsey-Lee’s career and their big night in Doha. You can register for Mike’s presentation here. It … Continue reading Coach Mike Barber to Present on “The World Championship Technique of Kelsey-Lee Barber”<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[17,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2997","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-javelin","category-webinar"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8knIb-Ml","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2997"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2997\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}