Andy Young (ex coach of Laura Muir) guilty of "serious misconduct"

Mods please feel free to fix typo in title.

Also adds colour to presumably why DeBues-Stafford left in 2020. I know she said she was carrying an injury through indoors 2020 and one athlete said they were made to race against physio advice. She then left after the indoor season.

Béla Károlyi once called a 90 pound gymnast under his tutelage a "fat, overstuffed turkey."

Seems like an extreme overreaction from UKA. How are any of these truly serious concerns?

Disagreeing with a physio therapist? Who cares? It’s not a disagreement with a medical doctor. A physios opinion should always be taken with a grain of salt. They shouldn’t be giving medical advice at all quite frankly. Now if a doctor says don’t run, but the coach forces the athlete to run, well that’s a problem.

Providing a food advice without having some type of formal training? Give me a break. Coaches cannot tell an athlete to eat better unless they get some certificate from Devry University? This argument always infuriates me. As if we all can’t dispense good eating habit advice to friends, families or athletes. It’s not that hard. “Hey, quit eating McDonalds and try putting some healthy options on your plate.” Again, if an actual MD has some concerns regarding an athletes caloric or nutritional intake, and the coach tries to move an athlete in another direction for performance gains, yes that’s a problem. But that doesn’t sound like the case at all.

Young does seems like a jerk, especially for allegedly leaving an athlete on the road, but here’s a solution: If your coach is an a-hole, find a new coach. Good grief, especially at the pro level.

I swear, athletes need to get a grip and take some personal accountability for themselves. The softest generation of all time.

The panel is woke

1) Seems like they all did go an get new coaches 3-5 years ago, try keep up mate.

2) many GPs have opinions worth nothing in sports performance terms. I've had "medical doctors" tell me a ferritin of 20 isn't a worry. A spprts physio involved in the sport is going to be better equipped (and more accessible) to assess ability to run than many average docs. Given the athletes involved, good chance they were working with some of the more top end physios in the country. If a UKA or Scottish Athletics appointed physio is saying "you shouldn't be easy running right now" (as was the case before the panel) and a coach says quote "nah it's fine just race" then yeah that's a problem.

3) if you bothered to go read the case rather than just start complaining about your previously held generational gripes you would see one of the charges was indeed related to a situation where a sports nutritionist had been specifically brought it to help an athlete where there were potential risks to health and eating disorders and Young continued to put pressure on said athlete.

Well, to be fair, she was 2.5 feet tall.....so.....

Young is a raging alcoholic and his behaviour was seriously damaging his athletes.

Know the facts before you post such crap.

At times one or two things could be something that just needs correction, but you have left out a few things.

1) Not allowing them to train or race if they did not meet his demands?

2) Emotionally undermining potentially injured athletes?

3) Driving an athlete at what sounds like driving crazy and then just leaving them on the side of the road?

This person has no place in coaching.

My two cents:

Running/ training is NOT that complicated, especially for the super talents.

There is no wonder coach out there, for the athletes out there move around and find what works for you. If you think your coach is a raging psycho, go work with someone else!!!

Yeah there are some bad coaches but pretty sure everyone would want to work with Muir.

Think this is important. Coaching matters up to a point. End of the day Muir did 3:54 with Young, then 3:52 with Vernon and now 3:57 injury interrupted with Cram. Reekie 1:56 with Young 1:55 with JB. GDS has broken 4min with four different coaches now I think. World class talent will shine through most situations.

Look, the fact that Young, in your words, is "a raging alcoholic" is one thing, and not why he was banned. To be banned for five years because 1) a massage therapist (that's what a physio is in the UK) thinks one of the athletes should not run, and Young allegedly disagreed with that, and 2) that he allegedly disagreed with someone certified in talking about food - is hardly a reason for a five-year ban. Why not just put him on a one-year probation? Help him figure his crap out, even. Get him some help, maybe.

I detest the phrase "woke," but this is exactly what the UKA is demonstrating. This sounds like typical petty, British stand-em-up-and-knock-em-down subterfuge. They are world-class at that. Not so much on the track anymore.

It's an overreach by UKA, and it goes beyond their scope. Young may be a jerk, but it doesn't sound like he participated in any actual crime, unless the crime is just being a drunk a-hole and a bad coach who didn't take well to advice from others. If there is an avenue for such a challenge, Young would likely be successful in overturning this ban in a court of law.

Bans (and jail time) should be reserved for the drug cheats, pedophiles, and sexual assaulters IMO.

What's with all these middle aged overweight British mid-d coaches?

To clear up some confusion on your part - this is not a sporting "ban" but a suspension of his UKA coaching license. You do not need a license to coach someone in the UK and if any athlete wanted to continue to work with Young there was absolutely nothing stopping them from doing so (it is telling perhaps that it seems even his amateur athletes all left him too).

Having a license helps you to receive certain benefits from UKA including access to UKAs coaching insurance scheme. There are different types of license and the goal of the program is that someone who has their license is held to and meets a higher standard of professionalism and can therefore advertise themselves accordingly.

UKA is totally within their remit to suspend someone from the privileges of that licensing program if they don't meet that threshold. If UKA is "out of scope" in upholding the standards of their own licensing program then I don't know what is within their scope. It seems fair to me that if you want to advertise yourself as a UKA licensed coach it would be fair for UKA to have a say as to who can do that. If I were them I wouldn't want "a holes who are bad coaches" in your words being able to trade off my name recognition.

'Seems like an extreme overreaction from UKA. How are any of these truly serious concerns?
Disagreeing with a physio therapist? Who cares? It’s not a disagreement with a medical doctor. A physios opinion should always be taken with a grain of salt. They shouldn’t be giving medical advice at all quite frankly. Now if a doctor says don’t run, but the coach forces the athlete to run, well that’s a problem.'

Doctors in UK are not trained to deal with sports injuries. The doctor is actually much more likely to say don't run as they don't really understand what athletes are like. The key part is forcing them to race

Treating adult internationals the way he did is ludicrous and is is the fact it has been retro applied. He can re-do his coaching exams etc next year

I have seen bullies like that myself and their best athletes tend to be introspective quiet personalities. The guy I knew has a fight with a few people who stood up to him. That at least was 35 years ago. You cannot behave like that anymore

Most good athletes esp. elite need holding back not pushing. Look at Kerr In WC

For the most part no different in the U.S., Loser sociopaths who get off on bullying people.

Athletes need to realize they are the ones with the power. Being a pro runner is about the most selfish lifestyle you can have. Don’t waste good years with bad coaches.

I said the same thing about Mary Cain and Salazar! Go work with someone else. At the end of the day the athlete should worry about themselves first, the brand and “group coach” a distant second.

I know contract stuff gets weird but hey you have a few good years to run fast, why be miserable

Thank you for noting this. It is not as if Young is being locked up. It is perfectly reasonable, and proper, for an athletics body to not direct its limited resources to a coach that treats athletes like that. Especially since there are heaps of coaches that don't do this to athletes.

It's ironic that he may have been a coach with an attitude problem but Laura hasn't really been as good since they went their seperate ways.

Can't be sure that's the reason, but if it is, it's a pity.

Watched a lot of tele on the sofa over the years honing their craft.