Gert Van De Broek

Professor by day, Coach by Night

When you mention Gert Van De Broek, you immediately think about him as the National Team coach for the Belgian Yellow Tigers, and that for already more than 10 years. In academics his name also rings a bell.

What for many would already be an accomplished career in coaching, with more than 10 years with the Belgian Women’s National Team and 25 years at club team Asterix (with 13 Championships and bunch of other accolades), Gert Van De Broek was also the Head of Sport for the Ministry of Sport in Flanders for the last 10 years and a professor/researcher at the University of Leuven. However, he’s saying goodbye to his work for the Ministry of Sport and as a head coach for Asterix (where he’ll still be the Sporting Director), in order to free up some time in his jam-packed schedule - something which he looks forward to.

Next to his many accomplishments with club and national teams, he also put a lot of work into scientific publications as a researcher at the University of Leuven. The topics studied focused on the perception and behaviors of coaches across different group dynamics. A lot of that time was spent on scientific research processes, very time-consuming and disadvantageous because it only used a small academic target group. That’s why he’s looking to put the theory into practice, in order to validate his research and perform a reality check.

We at CEV are pleased to have Gert join the Euro-Asia Coaches Cooperation project as a nominated expert to share his knowledge, and provide the coaches with a new, diverse skillset.

(Read the original interview with TopVolley Belgium here)