Will Roberts

We are all familiar with the Greek heroes, Achilles, and Hercules, but according to Homer's epic story, The Iliad, set during the Trojan War, Diomedes played a far more significant role in the war for Troy than did Achilles, who was, in fact, absent for a substantial part of the fighting after his falling out with Agamemnon over Briseis. Apart from being a ferocious warrior, Diomedes was also a great orator, although often depicted as a reluctant debater, a special athlete, evident in his success in the games to celebrate Patroclus's death, and also a spy: with the help of Odysseus, he slipped into Troy to steal the palladium shortly before the fall of the city. Even before the battle for Troy, however, at the tender age of sixteen, Diomedes had avenged his father's death by taking Thebes, together with the 'Epigoni', the sons of the Seven against Thebes.

Diomedes

Keith Davids

Ian Renshaw

Daniel Newcombe

For the last 25 years, a constraints-based framework has helped to inform the way that many sport scientists seek to understand performance, learning design and the development of expertise and talent in sport. The Constraints-Led Approach: Principles for Sports Coaching and Practice Design provides students and practitioners with the theoretical knowledge required to implement constraints-led approaches in their work. Seeking to bridge the divide between theory and practice, the book sets out an ‘environment design framework’, including practical tools and guidance for the application of the framework in coaching and skill acquisition settings. It includes chapters on constraints-led approaches in golf, athletics and hockey, and provides applied reading for undergraduate and postgraduate students of motor learning, skill acquisition and developing sport expertise. Providing a thorough grounding in the theory behind constraints-led approaches to skill acquisition, and a foundational cornerstone in the Routledge Studies in Constraints-Based Methodologies in Sport series, this is a vital pedagogical resource for students and practising sports coaches, physical education teachers and sport scientists alike.

Principles for Sports Coaching and Practice Design

The Constraints-Led Approach

AtalantaAbandoned on a mountainside as a baby by her father, Atalanta was reared by a bear and later by two hunters, before becoming the best tracker in Greece as well as an excellent archer, a wrestler, and athlete. She also participated in The Calydonian Boar Hunt, and according to some accounts sailed with Jason in the Quest for the Golden Fleece.Daedalus and IcarusThe classic story of Daedalus, the engineer and inventor, who built The Labyrinth to house The Minotaur, assisted Theseus in his escape from Knossos after he killed the Minotaur, and then escaped the island by making wings of wax and feathers for himself and his son, Icarus.DiomedesDiomedes was one of ancient Greece's fiercest warriors and played a significant part if the fall of Troy, probably more so than Achilles, who was absent for most of the time after falling out with Agamemnon over Briseis. Before the battle for Troy, he had avenged this father, who had with the Seven Against Thebes, failed to take the city. Diomedes, along with the Epigoni, the sons of the seven, succeeded where their fathers had failed.'He fights with rage and fills men's souls with dread. I hold him greatest of them all; we did not fear even their great champion Achilles, son of an immortal though he be, as we do this man: his rage is beyond all bounds, and there is none can vie with him in prowess."(Hector's brother Helenus describing Diomedes. The Iliad Book VI)

From The Ancient Greece Series

Atalanta, Daedalus and Icarus and Diomedes

The classic story of Daedalus the brilliant engineer who built The Labyrinth to house the Minotaur, for King Minos, but who fell out of favour and was imprisoned in a tower. He made wings of wax and feathers for his son Icarus and himself, and flew away from the island and their captors. Unfortunately, despite warnings from his father, Icarus flew too close to the sun, the wax holding his wings together melted and he plunged into the sea.

Daedalus and Icarus

TheseusTheseus is most celebrated for killing the Minotaur, but his heroic deeds number much more than this. The six labours of Theseus, where he slew bandits, brigands and wild animals, en route from Troizen to Athens, are another. There are many other adventures to be told about Theseus, not to mention his trip to the Underworld with his friend Pirithous.Bellerophon and the PegasusBellerophon and the Pegasus defeated the Chimera. The fire-breathing beast, with two heads, one of a lion and the other a goat, a serpent for a tail and the body of a goat.Hydra bore Chimera, who breathes fire not to be resisted, a dreadful, great thing, swift of foot and powerful. She has three heads. One is that of a fierce lion, another of a goat, and the last of a mighty serpent snake.In front a lion, behind a serpent and, in the middle, a goat, breathing out the dreadful power of gleaming fire.The Chimera, brilliantly described by Hesiod in The Theogony.The Sacred band of Thebes.The fall of Sparta was down to several reasons, not least the decline in active Spartan hoplite soldiers. The battle that saw them defeated for the first time in centuries and was the beginning of the end of Sparta's dominance in Greece was by an army of Athenians and Thebans, led by the Sacred Band of Thebes. A select group of one hundred and fifty pairs of male lovers, which formed the backbone of the Theban army.

Will Roberts

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