Coaching Stories: Navigating Storms, Triumphs, and Transformations in Sport

This inspiring text unveils the storms and triumphs of coaching in the form of case studies. It explores coaches’ stories from across the globe through a scientific lens and translates them back into coaching practice, offering essential guidance on how to support both new and experienced coaches in their work and professional development.

These stories represent coaches of various ages, genders, ethnic and cultural backgrounds, sexual orientations, religions, and experience levels, presenting readers with a comprehensive and diverse overview of coaching and its varied and complex demands. Each powerful case study helps readers see coaching through a different lens, prompting reflection, thoughtful discussion, and creative problem-solving. Designed to instruct, reveal, and inform, the authors provide key takeaways, highlighting successes and challenges, as they consider what makes (and breaks) a coach as a person and performer, and what contributes to sustainable coaching performance. The cases are organized thematically into six parts, with each chapter including a story, guiding questions, relevant research literature, and practical considerations.

This book is essential reading for coaches and those working with them, including educators, coach developers, applied sport psychology practitioners, sport managers, medical staff, embedded sports scientists, and other professionals surrounding the coach. Students in sport psychology, sport coaching, sport management and other sport sciences will also benefit from these inspiring stories, and the lessons that can be taken from them.

Stiliani “Ani” Chroni, is Professor in Sport Psychology and Sport Coaching at Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences in Elverum, Norway.

Peter Olusoga is Senior Lecturer in Psychology at Sheffield Hallam University, UK.

Kristen Dieffenbach is Professor in the School of Sport Sciences and Director of the Center for Applied Coaching and Sport Sciences at West Virginia University, USA.

Göran Kenttä is Senior Lecturer at the Swedish School of Sport and Health Sciences and Head of the Sport Psychology Discipline at the Swedish Sport Confederation in Stockholm, Sweden.