PGA of Germany Teacher of the Year, Peter Wolfenstetter, has worked alongside Thailand’s Thongchai Jaidee for over 12 years and is travelling to Rio as the Thai Team Coach.
Explain a bit about how you began working with your athlete and when that was.
PW: 12 years ago there was a friend of mine whointroduced me to Thongchai when he was playing the BMW tournament in Munich and then we started working together a little bit and after that we started our partnership.
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What are the key things you are going to work on to prepare your athlete for the Olympic Games?
PW: What we want to do is to play every week the best we can and I think we will not do anything special. But the week before I will fly to Asia and we will be practicing together.
When he is good and in form there is no need to change a lot but we will make sure he’s playing his best form when he’s in the Olympics.
I think it’s definitely a special event – 100 years I think since it was in the Olympics and it’s special and we have been talking a lot about what we are doing, what’s going on, how we are working and now we have made a plan and I think we’re on a good path.
How will you stay in touch with your athlete during the Olympic Games?
PW: I am very happy that the Thai Olympic Committee have involved me so I will be going with my player and I am very happy about this.
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What does it mean to you to be working with a potential Olympic qualifier?
PW: I think it’s very special and there’s not too many players and not too many coaches that can go to the Olympics…for me it’s bigger than a Masters or a major.
You meet a lot of different sports and athletes and you can talk with all the coaches and I think it is a totally different atmosphere than when we go to the Open Championship or something like that.
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What do you think the impact of Olympic Golf will be?
PW: Most of the time I see him between the end of Novemeber and then at Abu Dhabi again. But during the year I think I am in contact with him most of the time and he sends me videos.
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The Confederation of Professional Golf Olympic PGA Professional Coach Hub is a first-of-its-kind Olympics page (http://eur.pe/OlympicPGAPros) that aims to and celebrate coaching and shine a light on the PGA Professionals from around the world that are supporting, or have supported, the 120 male and female potential qualifiers for the 2016 Rio Olympic Games
Each Player-PGA Professional section contains details about their relationship, key links to find out more about both the potential Olympic qualifier and their associated PGA Professional, along with interviews and features with many of them.
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