Positioning action research as a critical means of understanding coaching: considerations from the field

This paper shines light upon the methodological value of action research as a critical means of studying coaching practice. Described as an opportunity for bridging the gap between practice and research, the application of action research to sports coaching aims to explicitly and intentionally advance practice. However, far from the enduring depictions of action research as a linear cyclical process, contemporary action research has begun to appreciate its ambiguity; much like the problematic nature of sports coaching itself. Despite this ambiguity, we contend that action research can better harness the messy realities and complexities that coaches encounter within their everyday practice. Through the provision of critical reflections the overarching aim of the paper was not only to make the case for action research as a means of cultivating critical scholarship in sports coaching but to go further, problematising some complex realities of life as an action researcher.