India’s high performance athletics coach resigns ahead of Olympics

Athletics coach resigns ahead of Olympics: In a shocking move, the high performance German coach Volker Hermann of the Indian athletics team resigned from his position  and reasons his own expectations as the cause of resignation. 

The contract of the Athletics Federations of India was extended till 2024 even though sources reveal that he did not sign the contract. The federation tried their best to keep him with the team especially considering that he only few days ago chartered ways to go forward with the preparations for the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. 

He took to social media platforms to formally announce his resignation where he said that he had already resigned three weeks ago after being convinced he could “no longer meet the self-imposed expectations of his role.”

A report in the PTI said that AFI denied any rift between the federation and the high performance director and said that he had given resignation a few days ago but did not specify any specific reason for this step. 

The 34-year-old German coach was appointed in 2019 making him the second person in this role after the Olympian Derek Boosey left the position vacancy after just seven month stint. He too resigned ahead of Rio Olympics in 2016. 

In his facebook post, the coach said, “After one and a half fruitful and inspiring years in India, the day has come when I could not any longer meet the self-imposed expectations coming along with the role of AFI’s high-performance director, which is why I resigned from my position three weeks ago.”

While doing the end formalities, he appreciated the Indian athletics saying that it has a great future ahead. “ It requires a conducive and likewise sustainable infrastructure to support its countless talented athletes and coaches. It also needs players with a strong, confident, and independent mindset to succeed at the world stage,” Herrmann said.”

While appointing him for this position the top officials had said that Hermann’s main focus and involvement will be in the planning and strategizing aspect of the athletes. He will me go through the data and record of the athletes and will be preparing a module accordingly. 

One of India;s best medal contenders M Sreeshanka, a long jumper, experienced training under the coach with which he was not satisfied. The young athlete who is used to being trained under his father felt his ways were very restrictive. 

AFI president Adille Sumariwalla confirmed the news saying that we tried him to stick with us at least till the Olympics but he wanted to go home.