BASKETBALL SCHOOL "TORNADO" Team of „Tornado“ BS intership in Spain (Barcelona)
April 20 – 22, 2018 team of “Tornado” BS intership in Sapin, Barcelona. During this trip coaches and director of our school communicated with Pere Capdevila – director of FCB Barcelona youth sports, got acquainted with the youth sports education system, visited sport base, that was created for various kind of sports. Delegation of “Tornado” BS met former player of our school – Filip Siewruk. Filip came to Lithuania when he was 13 years old and helped Tornado KM – “Fudo” to win silver medals im the championship of Lithuania. After good season in our country he moved to Barcelona. Filip told our delegation about living conditions, education, process of practices. Polish guy practicing twice a day - after scholl he has individual practice and in evening – team practice. As Filip said, only elder guys have practices in the morning. Our visitors watched practices and games of various age teams, also went to Badalona “Juventut” kids game. “We’re glad having opportunity to get acquainted with Spanish basketball school more closely and directly, not just from stories, - told coach Tomas Kentra. – Of course, youth sportbase left the greatest impression. Mostly infrastructure is friendly football, but also created great conditions for other kind of sports. Near the main basketball gym, that can split into three smaller, there are fittness gym, massage or physiotherapy cabinets, video preview room. However the proccess of practices were most interesting for us. 3 – 4 coaches are working 
with one group. In Lithuania only one coach is working all this job alone, rarely – two. Spanish prefer fast team basketball, based on individual skills. There are no quite difficult combinations, both in young and elder age. Differently from Lithuania, there are no technical protocol. Coaches assistants mark statistics themselves and use it only inside the teams. In the kids age, 8 quarters of 5 minutes are plyed. We visited Badalona “Juventut” kids game. Fast basketball based on individual skills were played there. Ball on one player’s hands spend less than 5 secunds. The way of Spanish basketball is clear. But I should note that in the elder age teams of Barcelona, most of players were foreigners! Apparently, no matter how good mentioned the Spanish system, every system needs a talented child. Our Lithuanian basketball system also has it’s own face – our youth teams take high places in the championships and Lithuanian men's teams have highest skill players. There is a very high merit of children's coaches. Also, compared to Spain, children have a lot of equal games, where they can accumulate great experience in Lithuania. To sum up, I can say that the trip was very helpful, we could apply some aspects to our workout process. We also had time to look after Barcelona. It's great that such traineeships are becoming a tradition".
Director of “Tornado” BS Dainius Čiuprinskas organize such a trip second year in a row. D. Čiuprinskas is happy created opportunity to show coaches “basketball kitchens” of other countries: “Such a trips are great opportunity for our coaches to gain some experience, to expand their minds. Sports base of Barcelona was stunning! Of course, we understand that it’s merit of football. Looking to this trip from sports side, we were surprised by such a fast basketball of kids, great passing. It was very unusual for us, organization of game: only one referee, playing with a rubber ball. Parents were quite calm during the game – they didn’t react to mistakes of referees or kids, just support their teams. The same I can say about coaches. They didn’t highlight a mistakes of kids and didn’t interfer with the work of judges. During this trip, we made sure, that because of small country and good work we have great championship – Lithuanian Pupil’s basketball league. Championships are held every year, thats why we are able to play a lot of equal games, that let both for players and coaches to improve. There are championships every two years in the most of European countries. And till the final games teams play in regions. So, such a teams as Barcelona or Juventut don’t have equal opponents. Such a situation we saw in the U18 game, where Mataro played against Barcelona. Talented players of Barca play only 50 – 60 proc. of their skills... Summing up, as I talked to Pere Capdevila – director of youth sports of Barcelona – basket is the same everywhere – 3,05 m, and success depends on hard work of coaches and players!“
