My life in sport has without doubt been varied, and has taken me the length and breadth of the UK, and around the globe. I am proud to say that I have some incredible clients in my portfolio, past and present, Manchester United Football Club, England Cricket, The UK PGA, England Boxing, Premiership Club owners, celebrities, millionaires and billionaires. I’m a former Olympic and British No.1 tennis coach, travelled the WTA World Tennis Tour with my wife Elena Baltacha over a period of 8 years, supporting her playing on some of the biggest courts in the World, such The Rod Laver Arena in Melbourne, against some of the biggest names in tennis, such as Maria Sharapova who Elena competed against in Memphis USA.
Life is now pulling my career on a very different trajectory, and placing me at the centre of a concept that will change the way athletes across the UK will be supported and developed, and this is all happening from The Hub’s base here in Ipswich, with the support and collaboration from many entities across the UK, including Nationally ranked educational entities such as The University of Essex, and I am very proud to announce that The Hub has gone National!
We now have an incredible network of Hub consultants across the UK, from Glasgow all the way down to London, these consultants are being developed to offer my unique Hub concept to thousands of junior and senior athletes across the UK. Our first National promotional campaign, proved, what I believed to be the case, there are thousands of coaches out there, supporting some of the very best athletes, across many sports who are highly skilled at their craft of technical coaching, but when areas, such as strength work, nutrition and mental skills need to be implemented, the support at a high and detailed level, is very difficult to find.
The response from our National Hub launch was simply incredible, many coaches, parents and even grand parents have been in contact with our Head Office based at IWIC, seeking support for their athlete. Athletes such as female players from Premiership Football Clubs like Manchester City, Professional Speedway riders, Nationally ranked trampolinists, we have even had inquiries from professional stunt men! Working with universities across the UK will be key to the support we can offer our National portfolio of athletes, the University of Essex has already stepped forward as a university that has seen the unique potential of The Hub, and the calibre of athletes we are attracting. They have opened their Laboratory doors to the Elite athletes who sit within our portfolio of clients, these incredibly talented athletes have already started to visit the University of Essex, Human Performance Unit for World Class Sports Science support.
Life has a way of bringing people together, separating them, and then bringing their life paths together again, this is exactly what has happened to Chris McManus, Director of the Human Performance Unit at The University of Essex and myself. The phenomenal growth of the Hub, means we have very specific needs, this is what drove me to contact my old friend Chris McManus, Chris actually travelled with Elena and I, and coincidentally lived with us, as we competed at the Grand Slam that is currently running in Paris, at Roland Garros. Chris stayed with us in our apartment to support Elena’s sport science needs, in particular her sports nutritional requirements.
I asked Chris for a meeting around a month ago, during this meeting I asked him if we could access him, his talented team and the incredible facilities at The HPU in Essex, he agreed instantly, and last week a group of Hub specialists including myself, Helen Davies, GB Marathon runner and her coach Clive Sparkes carried out a first of many visits to The HPU, this visit will be followed by Amy Wilson-Hardy, England International Rugby Union player, who is also an Olympian, and Ramla Ali, fully Nike sponsored female International boxer. The Human Performance Unit is part of the School of Sport, Rehabilitation and Exercise Science at the University of Essex. It delivers a variety of sports science services including physiological testing, coaching, body composition assessments, as well as sports nutrition and sports psychology consultations. They Work with athletes of all abilities and sporting disciplines, the HPU sports scientists use information collected during fitness tests and consultations to help athletes like Helen Davies achieve their sporting goals.
Kelly Murray (HPU Manager) said “Chris McManus (HPU Director and Lecturer in Sports Nutrition) and I are excited to work with Helen towards her marathon ambitions. It is always great working with new athletes, and it is particularly exciting to work with an athlete of Helen’s calibre. Helen and Clive are an excellent partnership and we are looking forward to playing our part within Helen’s support team that includes Nino and his team from The Hub”.
I am now arranging a National tour of some of the top Universities across the UK, to hopefully develop a similar relationship between them and the Hub of consultants we now have across the UK, many of our consultants graduated from the highest performing universities in the UK, such as Loughborough and Edinburgh, renowned for their sporting excellence. The Hub is based in Ipswich, and from Ipswich we intend to shout loud and proud of what we are achieving Nationally, and hope we can play our part in the lives of some of the most promising athletes across the UK!
