British Olympic Team - Essay Example

Bill Sweetenham, the national swimming coach, said: "In swimming, we have the worst facilities in the top 20 countries in the world. That's not investment in sport - that's neglect and negligence. None of the 36 British Olympic swimmers trains at a London club" (Londonpoolscampaign.com 2004). Financing sport is an investment made for future. Many promising athletes may not reach the Olympic podium because of need for training facilities of world-class, which are currently in great deficit. There is a certain positive trends in this area: "Under the plans, young children aged between 10 and 16 will be able to apply for grants of up to 20,000 to help fund their training programmes" (The Evening Standard 2004, p.6). Situation described above is a significant subject to the study of the degree lack of facilities has on the overall performance of British Olympic Team.

Many of contemporary UK athletes were trained on the base of sport development level achieved in previous years. Therefore their current performance may seem contrasting. However it is extremely important to determine what impact will have the current UK policy of investments in sport on the British Olympic Team of tomorrow. In the light of Olympic bid made for London 2012 it is crucial to find out whether UK has enough facilities of world-class to contain an Olympic capital for the year 2012.

The research of the impact the lack of facilities has on the ov. class events and ethically fair and drug-free sport - aims considered by UK Sports as their mission - would help not only to determine whether it needs changes, but also could help to indicate what changes are needed.This proposal gives an insight on how the subject research should be held. Starting from questions' raising it describes methodology, which should be used when conducting the research. Interviewing and questionnaires were chosen as the main sources of data gathering.

Additionally a case study of UK swimming could prove useful for demonstrating the results of survey.ImplicationsImplications that should be considered when conducting the proposed research can be divided into two groups: research methods-related limitations and ethics-related considerations. Later on in the proposal both of these groups will be examined with more detail. It is important to stress that if not considered each of these implications could mislead researchers into false outcomes and thus inadequate recommendations on the investment policy.

Research question:The research proposed will try to determine what place in the overall success of British Olympic Team, clearly illustrated at Athens is taken by governmental support, or more generally: to what extent does lack of facilities have on the overall success of the British Olympic TeamProposed MethodsDesign of the StudyTo answer questions pointed out in previous sections I suggest using a combination of a survey and a case study design. Arguments for using these methods are as follows: survey belongs to descriptive methods of research providing a descriptive information, which enables generalization to be made; surveys gather data at a certain point in time to describe the existing conditions, therefore they are economically