Jamshedpur, Jan. 7: The 66-odd coaches, who have come here from almost all the states, for the archery seminar, were initially disappointed. They were expecting to pick some latest tips on shooting techniques, on the opening day of the coaching seminar that commenced at the Centre for Excellence this afternoon.

But by the end of the day things changed fast and they were a happy lot. The coaches were told that Park Kyung-Rae, the former chief coach of Olympic and World Champions, Korea, had reserved his talk about the latest technique in archery for tomorrow, the concluding day of the seminar. The seminar is being organised by the Archery Association of India (AAI).

Kyung-Rae started the seminar talking about the basic training method. “He spent most of the time explaining the right posture while shooting. He taught the right weight to be put on the scapula while shooting and also shed light on how to shoot without straining the muscles,” a SAI coach, Souman Das said. He added, the opening day session had helped coaches who have begun their career in coaching. “Experienced coaches are waiting for Kyung-Rae to talk on dynamic spine and speed shooting, tomorrow,” said the coach of the Indian team C.K. Das. Kyung-Rae, also an ex-archer and president of the Win & Win Company, a bow manufacturing unit in Korea, explained the posture of archers with the help of slides and drawings on a board. “Through the help of slides, he tried to hammer home the point of how to draw the bow with utmost concentration. The transfer of adequate weight from the shoulder to the back was superbly explained. He taught us things which we did not know much,” said a young participant.

The Korean conducted the seminar in as many as seven sessions. “He has his own way of conducting seminars. He wants to satisfy himself that the coaches have understood him well. He has conducted several coaching seminars,” said an official of the Jharkhand Archery Association (JAA). Das said Kyung-Rae would answer queries from coaches in a questions-answer session. “We have prepared the questions and would like to ask him about the tuning aspects, arrow flight simulation and other related techniques,” he added.

A SAI coach said the knowledge acquired from the seminar would be difficult to apply during the first Junior Asian archery meet scheduled to begin here from January 9. “We have to apply the techniques in coaching camps as applying them during the championship would mean trouble,” he said.