26. Januar 2006  
Havanna / Cuba  
Artistic Gymnastics

F.I.G.- coaching seminar Olympic solidarity in Havanna

Erik Lopez (CUB),
Dieter Hofmann (SUI)

FIG-coaching seminar in the new Cuban center

Already since many years the FIG organises - with financial support by the IOC - coaching seminars all over the World.
One of these seminars now took place with 36 gymnastics coaches from Cuba, Mexico, Bolivia and Venezuela in a new Cuban gymnastics center. The seminar was led by Dieter Hofmann.

IOC / F.I.G. - International Seminar for Coaches in Havanna/ Cuba 2006
'OLYMPIC SOLIDARITY'

Coaching seminar "'OLYMPIC SOLIDARITY'"
Dieter Hofmann, the former head coach of the men's national team of the GDR who now lives in Switzerland where he was a coach at the club NKL Liestal, has been working for FIG-events already since the 70ies.

Hofmann with interpreter and a gymnast in action...



This latest seminar which ended on Saturday, Jan. 21st took place in the new Cuban gymnastics center which hasn't even been officially opened. Nonetheless training already takes place there. The gym is equiped with apparatus by the well-known Dutch company "J&F" and consists of 3 rooms (c. 40 x 40 meters). The rooms are for women's and men's artistic gymnastics and for RG. In addition to the gyms there is a hotel, a boarding school and facilities for sports medicine.

"36 coaches as well as 10 students and 2 professors took place in the seminar and all of them were very eager to learn" - mentioned Dieter Hofmann.

The new, equiped with Janssen-Fritsen (NED) apparatus, gym in Havanna

Erik Lopez (CUB), Dieter Hofmann (SUI)

The most eager student by the way was the Cuban gymnastics star Erik Lopez who wants to end his own gymnastics career soon and already makes plans for a future job in the Cuban gymnastics federation.

In fall 2006 another coaching seminar is scheduled in the same gym in Havanna/ Cuba, this time for women's gymnastics coaches from Latin America. Following that, Dieter Hofmann has planned together with the Cuban gymnastics federation a 2-week training camp for the Cuban men's national team.
E. Herholz, gymmedia