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Lange To Lead Germany As Head Coach

Nov 14, 2008  - Craig Lord

Dirk Lange, who recently quit the helm of the South African national programme, has been appointed head coach to Germany, with responsibility for leading the London 2012 campaign in the pool. Lange, personal coach to the likes of Olympic medallist Sandra Voelker in Hamburg before leaving for South Africa, where he coached the national team in Pretoria, will work alongside sports director Lutz Buschkow, who took over where Orjan Madsen left off in the wake of Beijing.

Buschkow holds a position unlike any other in DSV history: he is the first director to enjoy a seat on the board of the federation and therefore has a direct stake in the political process  that can determine the ship's course.

Madsen's parting shot to Germany was to remind Germany that the former European swim superpower was too intent on navel-gazing, had failed to focus on finding solutions and had slipped behind rivals in coach education and in terms of the amount and quality of training being undertaken the length and breadth of a nation that enjoys relatively good facilities. The result was a truly weak showing at the Olympic Games in Beijing, with Britta Steffen, double gold medallist in sprint freestyle, the only athlete able to live up to potential. 

In an interview with SwimNews, Madsen said: "There is a culture here that is focussed on the problem, the excuse, the blame, there is mistrust, jealousy, navel-gazing, too much side-stepping on key issues, too many coaches repeating almost mantra-like that they feel disadvantaged. This type of thinking burns itself into the brains of athletes, subconsciously over time. In such a culture, there’s a danger that youngsters develop into athletes who shy away from the challenge come the big occasion.

"Physically we have all the ingredients that anyone else has but they don’t stack up when it counts,” added Madsen. Psychologically, “we have to look at how young athletes are trained. Athletes turn out the same as their coaches. They take their values, their way to work and they live the culture that coaches create around them.”

The DSV, the German federation, was also criticised by swimmers this week for failing to communicate properly with athletes and coaches. 

Time to build on the things that Madsen had put in place, Lange told SwimNews on the day that the DSV announced his appointment, to a role previously occupied by Manfred Theismann, on the eve of the final round of the Arena World Cup here in Berlin. "Germany is not swimming at its capacity in international competition. It is capable of much more, so we have to find the reason but we have to focus on the solution. We have to become much more a part of the international scene. Our coaches must attend international conferences, engage with foreign athletes and coaches; our swimmers need more race exposure. We need to take away the fear factor. Orjan Madsen was absolutely right in what he was doing. Perhaps his message came too soon for German coaches but I think they now know what has to be done and we can all reap the rewards of the work Madsen put in place."

Lange, who will also oversee a smart track system of preparing youth swimmers for senior waters along similar lines to programmes operating in the US, Australia and Britain, sees his role as providing the direction for and link between the national team programme, sports science and home coaches in their club programmes. "We're not here to order the coaches around. I can't make them do things but I can support them and make sure that the conditions, the environment needed for success are in place."

He said that the London 2012 ship had already left the post-Beijing port and there were just five and a half months remaining to the German trials for Rome 2009. "We have to make sure that the ship is on a better course and that it speeds up."

Rather than "push" coaches in specific directions, he believed that the better way was to "convince them of the right way and then  trust them to do the job". Germany was not starting from "0" but it would have to work hard to catch up, he noted. "We see on the World Cup that there are lots of guys swimming very fast. We have to be more internationally minded. We have to encourage international training groups." Lange coached Cameron Van der Burgh, the South African who has set world short-course records on breaststroke this cup season. The presence of foreign swimmers of that calibre could only help Germany should any choose to base themselves in the country.

When it came to building the national team, Lange said that a "high degree of flexibility" was needed, combined with a tougher standard of selection criteria.  He wanted German swimmers to learn "race toughness", to adopt a "more aggressive race philosophy". That message would be instilled in the generation that will wear German colours at the 2012 and 2016 Olympic Games, a period in which the national team could be given a serious boost were Hamburg to be awarded the rights to host the 2013 World Championships, for which the Hanseatic port city is a tentative bidder.

Lange, who left South Africa just before an inquiry into disputes on the national team in Beijing was launched in September, advocates more individualised training, more dual meets between countries, a greater emphasis on relays at the heart of the national-team strategy, more work on "winning mentally by racing more". The domestic race competition needed overhauling to ensure that German swimmers raced more often, while between six and eight high performance centres would be established across Germany, with head coaches employed by the DSV. A couple of those ought to be brought in from abroad, Lange believes. 

The model he speaks of is not far removed from those to be found in Australia and Britain. It is also loyal to the message that Madsen left behind as a legacy of his short time at the helm of the German programme. Germany needed honesty and  that is what it got from Madsen. Lange says: "Madsen is one of the best in the business. He is among the highest experts. I will always take my hat off to him. What he said was absolutely right. We have to build a system that is more open-minded as far as knowing and understanding what other programmes are doing and what they have to offer Germany. 

Buschkow said: "The team will be in place by january 2009 and we can then get down to a period of intensive work ... It won't be easy."