About Didier

            He remained there for 30 years !

 That was indeed a glorious period for the New Caledonia athletics. With support of the teachers and the local paper ‘’Les Nouvelles’’ , he started a talent detection operation called ‘’Opération Javelot’’ which was to reveal dozens of champions during the years 1978 to 2006 , who will practically beat all the existing French records, monopolize the national championships podiums (over 200 medals in 30 years !) , but also emerge at the highest international level of Olympic Games and World championships.

            During the same period , he wrote and published with a little team of friends a monthly bulletin ‘’Trajectoire’’ , which was a collection of sport news , technical articles but also short humoristic stories , poems , pastiches : 208 issues were published for a total of 5000 pages !

            In view of this activity and these results , he was maintained in his post even during the period of political troubles which agitated the country in the 80ies and had even his responsibilities extended to the whole French Pacific as detached National coach.

            From 1994 , he also started to get involved with the international Athletics Federation and was asked to build the content of the throwing events part of the coaches training courses organised by IAAF all around the world. The documents that he produced have been translated in many languages and are still in use nowadays.

            That was a period of nearly non stop travelling the world between the athletes tours to France, the missions in the Pacific area and the international training courses from Sénégal to Indonésia , by way of Oslo or Puerto Rico !

            Since 2008 , most of these documents can be found on his U tube web site ‘’DPTHROWSCOACHING’’ which amount to 250 videos , 13 000 followers and over 5 millions connections.

          In 2003, came the official retirement time at 60 years of age. He retired from the French Federation, but went on with his international coaching career to become consultant coach at the IAAF high performance training centre in Auckland (NZL) . Then was recruited as national throws coach by the New Zealand athletics federation.

            That was another prosperous period with world titles and records and participation at Olympics, world championships , Commonwealth games , under the colours of New Zealand or of Tonga. Also a period of international courses , conferences and technical publications…

Pict : DL Poppé with top NZL Olympic and World champion Dame Valerie ADAMS)

BEST ATHLETES AND TEAM COACHED

ADAMS Valérie, Dame, Shot put (20,85m) – Commonwealth and multiple world and Olympic champion

AL LA FERTE MACE Hand ball : Orne champion – FSCF France cup finalist

BELL Connor (NZL). Discus. NZL Champion and record holder – World leader

BLOXHAM Matthew (NZL) Hammer (79,74m) NZL U20-U18 Champion and record holder – World U18 finalist

BRADLEY Nicole (NZL) Hammer. NZL champion

CASSIER Erwan (France) Discus – Hammer France and NZL champion

CHAPMAN Madeleine (NZL) Javelin (50,98m) NZL Champion

FAKATE Malia (France) Discus – Shot Multiple South Pacific champion

FIAFIALOTO Monika. (France- WF) Javelin (57,10m) French champion

FRANCE Equipe de France – Multiple international championships and matches as team coach

GILL Jacko (NZL) Shot put- Multiple World U20 (23,00m) and U18 Champion/record holder (24,45m) -NZL Champion/record holder

HOATAU Akusitono (France – WF) – Shot (19,19m) – Discus. France champion

KITEAU Joachim (France) Javelin (79,65m) World U18 champion

LAKAFIA Jean Paul (France) Javelin (86,60m) Olympic Top 12 finalist (Los Angeles) France Champion/record holder

NEW CALEDONIA Equipe d’athlétisme . South Pacific games 1979 to 2003

NEW ZEALAND athletics team – Multiple international and world championships

POILAGI Rosemay (France) Javelin (58,28m) European U23 cup winner

POLELEI Linda (France) Javelin (57,32m) Multiple South Pacific champion

PO UHILA Anna (Tonga) Shot put (18,03m)– Multiple Olympic representative – Oceania-Australia and NZL champion

RAMESH Bina (France) Javelin (61,66m) World U20 champs medallist – France champion -Australia champion

SIAKINUU SCHMIDT Gaétan (France) Javelin (82,39m) – France champion

TAUHAVILI Peta (France). Javelin (80,76m)– France champion

TEANYOUEN Marie Daniele (France) Javelin (56,84m) -France champion

TIPOTIO Vitoli (France – WF) Javelin (80,34m). France champion

TONGA Athletic team – Olympics 2008 and 2012 – world champs

US Monastir Hand Ball

VAITANAKI Rocky (France) Shot (18,59m) – France champion

VILI Bertrand (France) Shot (20,12m) – Discus – World U20 champs finalist – France record holder

WRATHALL Stephanie (NZL) Javelin (54,18m). NZL Champion

….And , of course , many many more ! (a few hundreds !)

It is only in 2017 that, slowing down his high performance coaching investment , he got into semi-retirement and came back to the old writing demon. He published in May 2018 his first novel ‘’Three men (and a dog) on the Rock’’ (Jets d’Encre) . An humoristic novel which could easily be seen as a suite of the famous classical ‘’Three men (not forgetting the dog) in a boat’’ by Jerome K JEROME . It is a successful mixture of the English and the Gallic humour which relates the ‘’goofy’’ adventures of three friends (and their dog) trying to initiate themselves to different sporting activities in New Caledonia.

            The original drawings illustrating this book have been made by Joël DUFOUR, a French painter, sculptor and artist from Cherbourg.

            In the aftermath , he kept writing and published in 2018 two anthologies of ‘’bar room quotes’’ : ‘’Préavis de brèves’’ (Warning: quotes !) and ‘’En brèves et contre tout !’’  (In short and against all !) . Putting the finger and the words where it hurts with a biting irony and a sense of the formula which hits the spot.

            In 2019 , the social unrests in France and the ‘’Yellow jerseys’’ crisis inspired him a theatre piece ‘’The head of Cupido’’. A comedy of manners where the humour of the situations is only matched by the sharpness of the words.

            In the same time ,with help of editor Matthew FULTON,  he self-translated his first book in English into ‘’ Three men (and a dog) on a Rock’’ which was published by XLibris USA

            In 2020 . He published in French a 3rd anthology of ‘’bar room quotes’’ : ‘’ Brèves sans trève !’’ (‘’Quotes without stop’’) and a short humoristic stories book : ‘’Et pourtant il tourne !’’ (‘’And yet it moves !’’) (both published by Jets d’Encre) and a new ‘’coaching philosophy’’ book ‘’ Heat to heart from the coach !’’ with 200 quotes and pictures about sport and coaching , published by X Libris.

            Also published by X libris in 2021 the English translation of ‘’Et pourtant il tourne !’’  under the title ‘’And yet it moves ….short stories from our absurd world !’’ with illustrations from accomplice Joël DUFOUR.

 Awards :  GOLD medal from the French Athletics coaches association –BRONZE medal from the New Zealand Athletics Federation.- PIN of the International Athletics Federation

Pict : Author signing in Tourlaville (France)

 BIBLIOGRAPHY Published

1961 : Chief redactor ‘’Normalia’’ (Bulletin) teacher training college Caen (France)

1981-2003 : Editor and publisher ‘’Trajectoire’’ (Bulletin) Nouméa (New Calédonia)

1981 – – –  : Multiple athletics technical publications

2018 : ‘’Trois hommes et un chien sur un Caillou’’ (Novel) (Jets d’Encre).

2018 : ‘’Préavis de brèves’’ (Aphorisms)  (Jets d’Encre). 

2019 : ‘’En brèves et contre tout !’’  (Aphorisms)  (Jets d’Encre)

2019 : ‘’La tête de Cupidon’’ (Theatre) (Jets d’Encre)

2019 : ‘’Three men and a dog on a Rock’’ (Novel) (Xlibris)

2020 : ‘’Heart to heart from the coach’’  (Aphorisms). (Xlibris)

2020 ‘’Et pourtant elle tourne! Histoires de notre monde absurde. (Short stories) (Jets d’Encre)

2020 : ‘’Brèves sans trève !’’ (Aphorisms) (Jets d’Encre)

2020 : ‘’And yet it moves ! Short stories from our absurd world (X Libris)

Projects

‘’Can I have a word with you ? ‘’ (Aphorisms)

 ‘’Scouille’’ (Historical humoristic stories)

“The man alone in the stand’’ (Novel)

A word to finish :

I understand that this does not fit necessarily with the usual profile of the writers . But as all the ways lead to Rome …Several can lead to the people !

We are what we are and you cannot change what you have been . To gravitate around the sporting world , a fortiori international , does not prevent to observe , think and express yourself.

In the opposite !

And if you want to succeed in getting the most and the best out of humankind when it is our raw material, you better start sharing other things than technical advices !!!

Picture : DLP with young NZL school athletes champions (Mat Bloxham,Ella Pilkington,Richard Callister

An humoristic novel which could easily be seen as a suite of the famous classical ‘’Three men (not forgetting the dog) in a boat’’ by Jero?me K JEROME . It is a successful mixture of the English and the Gallic humour which relates the ‘’goofy’’ adventures of three friends (and their dog) trying to initiate themselves to different sporting activities in New Caledonia.In the aftermath , he kept writing and publishes in 2018 two anthologies of ‘’bar room quotes’’ : ‘’Pre?avis de bre?ves’’ (Warning: quotes !) and ‘’En bre?ves et contre tout !’’ (In short and against all !) . Putting the finger and the word where it hurts with a biting irony and the sense of the formula which hits the spot.In 2019 , the social unrests in France and the ‘’Yellow jerseys’’ crisis inspired him a theatre piece ‘’The head of Cupido’’. A comedy of manners where the humour of the situations is only matched by the sharpness of the words.At the same time , he self-translated his first book in English into ‘’ Three men (and a dog) on a Rock’’ which has been recently published by XLibris USA.