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Squash Coach Profile – Steve Barlow

Steve Barlow has been with us since the early days of Club Towers and is at the heart of our Squash coaching programme.  Here’s a bit more about him and his amazing career.

Coaching Qualification:

Level 4 England Squash Coach

Playing Career Highlights:

  • England O40 & O45’s player
  • 8 times Bedfordshire Squash County Champion
  • 100% win record representing England.

If you had to pick out a couple of highlights from either your coaching or playing career what would they be?

Representing England at Masters level where there is still fierce competition to qualify and to then go unbeaten as a Masters player.

Coaching a huge variety of different ages at all levels and hopefully helping them enjoy the sport more, improve and have fun along the way.

You were a professional golfer before turning to squash. Very different sports on the surface but did the golf background help your transition to squash at all?

All sports require an array of different attributes but also share many of these. Concentration, visualisation, discipline, mental strength, agility, etc are so important in both. Definitely the mental side of the game and discipline in training helped.

Generally, in golf you are not affected by an opponent as much and the main opponent is quite often yourself. The ability to deal with this certainly transfers to squash. Many a squash player has beaten themselves!

If you had to give one tip to our junior players at the Club what would it be?

Hmm, condensed into one sentence… Listen, observe, respect all, have fun and stop juggling that blooming racket!

We have lots of members in the box leagues looking to improve and climb the leagues. What are the most common mistakes you see?

Poor footwork, racket preparation and posture resulting in poor technique. Incorrect or non-use of bigger muscle groups to generate power. Poor shot selection would be another common theme but then we all know how easy squash is from the viewing gallery!

To see Steve’s video on technique and home practice click here

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