Settling in at the Academy

A freshly brushed and ironed
table at Hollins Grove

I had planned to post this much sooner, but either side of a fantastic holiday in Northumberland, where the weather was amazing, I've been extremely busy progressing several ideas for the Junior Snooker Academy I've recently joined.

First of all, I've set up a new website for the Academy, https://www.hollinsgrovejuniorsnooker.club, using, as you can see, a bespoke domain.  This will hopefully act as the focal point for us online.

In addition to building the site, I've set up the analytical tools to monitor how many hits we get, and what sorts of interactions they have with us.  As a data analyst, this stuff is really interesting for me of course!  I've deliberately kept the site quite simple and in the couple of weeks or so that it's been live, it's already generating some enquiries, which is great news.

Along similar lines, the Academy previously relied on a Facebook group to publicise its activities, but although the guys running the Academy were doing their best, it wasn't regularly updated.  The big drawback though was the regular spam posts, always from America and never about cue sports.  Some of them were not really appropriate at all for a group aimed at youngsters, so I felt that something had to be done.

So, the Academy now has a new Facebook page where we alone control content, and we're now much more in control.  I've also added an Instagram page which works the same way - Instagram being used much more widely by younger users.  Both accounts are managed from the same Meta screen, so once we're properly in the swing of it, it should be easier to post content to both sites.

Me with fellow Hollins Grove Academy coach, Annette

On to the coaching then: I've now been back at the Academy for three weeks - firstly with the support of volunteer George, and most recently this weekend with George and my other WPBSA-accredited coach, Annette.  More about this latest one shortly.

In between, I ran a session on my own, and with seven youngsters in attendance, two of them new, it was quite an experience!  Thankfully I'd prepared well, and I also had my own son, Matthew with me for support.  I just had time to brush and iron all the tables before everyone started turning up.

We had a morning filled with a quirky little competition, plenty of fun and some serious coaching too.  I focused on the new starters, and with a GoPro set up over the table, and Matthew doing some video shooting too, we had enough footage for a nice little reel to send out a positive vibe.  You can see the output on our social media pages.

Some of our excellent young players with their Red level accreditations

Fast forward to this weekend, and with two accredited coaches available, I was sure we could focus our efforts on getting some of our young players through at least one level in the WPBSA's White to Black coaching framework.  Everyone was up for the challenge, and I'm pleased to report that four of our players successfully reached Red level.  Two of them are now close to getting Yellow level too, so there's a real incentive to keep up the momentum next Saturday.  With this in mind, I've enlisted some additional support next week from another WPBSA coach, Curtis Daher, who is also a team-mate of mine in our local leagues.

With all this going on, Cueology has taken a bit of a back seat, but I have also been busy developing my different coaching level scoresheets.  These will form the backbone of how I operate as a coach, and they are equally applicable to the work I do for the Academy as well as my solo work under the Cueology brand.  It's taken some time to properly nail down a format that works, but they are now looking really good, and more importantly, they've passed the test of being put to use!

The scoresheets mean I am capturing rich data whenever I'm working with a client, so we can track performance and dig into the data to get deeper insights about their game.  Together with the video footage I'm capturing, the entire workflow I'd envisaged when I started this project really feels like it's coming together.

In working at the Academy, I can really develop my coaching style and build up some experience, and hopefully some concrete examples of how my coaching delivers results.  I am of course available in the evenings, and sometimes at weekends too, so if you want to find out more then give me a call or send a message.

Thanks for reading, and catch up soon.

Iain