Principle of Individualisation –The Individual’s Response to TrainingEach individual is unique. Each individual brings to athletics his own capabilities, capacities and responses to training. Different athletes will respond to the same training in different ways. There is no such thing as an ideal training programme that will produce optimal results for everyone. You, as the coach, need to understand the principles of training and apply them with your knowledge of the individual athlete. This knowledge should be of the many factors that affect the planning of the individual athlete’s training programme. These factors include heredity, developmental age and training age.Athletes inherit physical, mental and emotional characteristics from their parents. This is heredity. These inherited characteristics should be recognised by the coach. Many of these characteristics can be modified by systematic training but the extent to which they can be changed and modified will be limited by the inherited potential. Not every athlete has the inherited potential to be an Olympic champion. All athletes have the ability to make the most of what inherited potential they do have.Our knowledge of growth and development tells us that young athletes of the same chronological age can be at very different levels of physical maturity. Individuals of the same chronological age can often be up to four years apart in their developmental or biological ages.