Local physios embark on ground-breaking certification course

The United Kingdom Strength and Conditioning Association’s Accredited Strength and Conditioning Coach (ASCC) certification can soon be added to the repertoires of a group of local physiotherapists who are making steady progression in the course.
Two instructors from the United Kingdom namely, Martin Gallyer and Dr John Jakeman are currently in Guyana, administering a component of the UKSCA course to a batch of 14 Guyanese physiotherapists.
The physios have been engaged in practical examinations under the watchful eye of the UK duo for the past two weeks, with that stage of the certification process coming to a close on Monday.

On Monday, Guyana Times Sport spoke with one of the instructors, Gallyer, who gave an overview of the programme, its difficulty level and an update on how the Guyanese have been progressing.
“So, what the UKSCA have done in here is created a teaching pathway of the ASCC, the trainer course, to give people an understanding of what a technical model is, how to plan programmes, how to do the really foundational bit of what S&C is and then we can start to develop their coaching, so, they can work with the athletes later on. It’s really about a process of getting people who might have been physios, like these guys, and getting them to understand a different field,” Gallyer explained.
The instructor further stated, “All of these guys in the room here are at the stage where they’ve passed all the live assessments in module A, B and C, which is safety in the gym, foundation movement, and strength-based training. They’ve really progressed and done well and thrown themselves in which is a really good thing for myself and John to see.”
The course is being facilitated in Guyana by InSync Therapeutics, whose Managing Director Neil Barry, detailed the course from the learner’s perspective.
“For the last two weeks, we’ve had a really rigorous practical programme where we needed to understand some of the fundamentals of coaching and some of the technical elements of performing a lift, safety around athletes, being in the gym especially and me, personally, I learned a lot and we still have about three months more left to go,” Barry disclosed.

He went on to add, “We’ll then be doing some work remotely, we’re going to actually train a few athletes, we’ll be doing some testing, then we’ll be doing some reviews and all of that is reviewed by a panel in the UK before you actually pass. So, as I said, it’s about a five per cent pass rate. So far, it look like everyone’s going to pass. So, that’s pretty good,”
Barry went on to divulge how he believes the certification can boost the Guyanese sport fraternity since it’s an area that hasn’t been tapped into.
He said, “I think what it does, it really underlines that strength and conditioning is in itself a facet of high performance and potentially, it’s not one we’ve tapped into before. I’m not aware of Guyana having really high-level S&C’s before now. This course is what people will want to do if they want to work in the Premier League or with some of the big national teams around the world, even in the NBA.”
“So, what this allows is for Guyanese [athletes] to be trained by other Guyanese who have these high- level certifications; they have a background in science and they can sort of take the strain off coaches in preparing, in preparing strength and conditioning plans and now expose more of our athletes to high- level performance. I think it’s going to bring us into the future,” the renowned physiotherapist went on to add.
Once they are successful in completing the course, the Guyanese physiotherapists will listed on the UKSCA’s platform as accredited coaches and will be equipped to work with major sport teams across the globe.