Anton Kurcz

Sport w życiu Antona

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Z góry dziękuję Jakub Kurcz

* From the Book: “The Ultimate Run – Canoe Slalom At The Highest Level”  – by William T. Endycott

Toni Kurcz and the Value of General Athletic Training After the 1977 Worlds, the Austrians hired Anton Kurcz, who had formerly been the coach of the Polish team. While in that capacity, he had coached boats that had medalled in K1W (Cwiertniewicz — World Champion in 1975; K1 (Gawronski — Bronze Medalist in 1973); and C2 (Jez-Kudlik — Silver Medalists in 1975). He is a firm believer in the value of general athletic training: “On the course, you can never know what you’ll run into and many-sided training will help you out of surprises.

Anton is still a Polish citizen and commutes in and out of Austria to train the Austrian team. His primary responsibility is to attend training camps for the national team members. Secondly, he is supposed to travel from club to club to help bring on intermediates and beginners. In between these jobs, he goes back to Poland to see his family.

New Blood

Following the 1977 World Championships, there was a famous half hour television interview in Austria during which the Austrian paddlers openly criticized their coaches. Since the matter was given such widespread publicity, visible action was taken and Toni Kurcz was hired as a direct result.

Sattler says that Kurcz was very good in preparing for the 1979 Worlds.

Every trainer brings new things. Before Jonquiere,
we Austrians trained together once in a while, but on
the whole we weren’t on the same schedule, not
working together, competing against each other in
practice sessions.

Another important point: “Kurcz was not Austrian and that helped him. He was a novelty because of it.“

Kurczs forte is conditioning. He doesn’t see the paddlers much from August through February. Instead, he writes out training plans for them to follow. However, from time to time he will show up at little races during this period, or at marathon races the slalom paddlers have entered just for fun. After February, however, he begins to see them more in training camps.

Kurcz doesn’t have a place to live in Austria, he’s always on the move. There is no one central canoe center for him to live at. The Austrians prefer to train at home so Kurcz has to come to them.

Kurcz’s Background

Anton Kurcz was born on June 13, 1937. As a youth his only interest was sports, particularly ski jumping. It was only after a ski jumping accident terminated his competitive career that he entered the Higher School of Physical Education in Warsaw, which “opened my eyes to the need for general training.”

The academy taught the theory that before one specialized in event-specific training, it was physiologically better to engage in general all-around training. The human body, it was taught, would make faster progress later during the event-specific training if it were first subjected to a program of all-around fitness.

It was at the Academy that Kurcz learned of the concept of general athletic tests which had norms for world class athletes, a concept he transferred to tests for his paddlers.

” Give me good athletes, and I’ll give you good ski jumpers,”

is a line from French ski-jump coach Honore Bonet that Kurcz likes to quote.

Another one: “One-sided training does not interest me; man was not made to do only one thing.”

It is never too late to start the process of general all-around training before moving into event-specific training, Kurcz says, although the earlier the general training starts, the better.

Kurcz warns, however, that a large volume of general training, such as the Austrians engaged in in 1979, “works only for people who already have good technique.”

Since Kurcz has had the unique experience of heading elite training programs in two different countries, his comparisons of the Austrian and Polish systems is interesting. On the whole, he thinks the situation in Poland was better than in Austria, although ironically, there were fewer resources in Poland. The key differences:

• Centralized group training. In Poland the whole team trained together all year round. Not so in Austria where people were off by themselves most of the time.
• Contact with nature. In Poland, the weight circuits and athletic training facilities were located outdoors because this was cheaper than building a gymnasium. But this created a great environment because of being close to nature: “Our sport is close to nature.”
• Mixed training. In Poland all classes trained together. Kurcz felt this was important because they all learned from each other. In Austria, there are very few canoeists.

Group Training for Jonquiere

In preparation for the Jonquiere World Championships, the Austrians trained together as a team more than they ever had in the past. This, according to members of the team, was the prime benefit of having Kurcz as a coach. There were more training camps together and the boaters inspired each other to better performances.

” Peter Fauster and Edi Wolffhardt (who finished first and second at Jonquiere), benefited the most from Anton,”

Norbert believes.

“Fauster loved to go hard in training, but he wouldn’t stay very long. He’d show up, take a few runs, see that they were fast, and then go home”

He was very fast in short courses, but he was also very lazy. Anton made him train much more seriously and much harder.  Edi Wolffhardt had total confidence in Anton. Edi needs
someone to reassure him and to give him direction. I need a fight to get me excited before a race, to get me going. But Edi is just the opposite. He needs someone to calm him down.

Anton did all of this at Jonquiere.

During the winter of 1978-79, Norbert was in Australia and when he came back in mid-March, he trained with the Dutch team, coaching them. It wasn’t until April that he started training with Edi and
Peter. Anton did, however, give him a training plan to follow in Australia.

Periodizing
Toni Kurcz divides the year up into three phases…