Dr Wayne Lombard and Robin Arkell are both former Uplands College learners who will once again be heading to the Olympics as strength and conditioning coaches.
Lombard and Arkell have both been to the Olympics before, going to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics with the India women’s and men’s hockey teams respectively. Now, in 2024, they’ll be going once again as strength and conditioning specialists, albeit with different countries and teams.
Arkell is going as part of the Germany men’s hockey team, with whom he has already achieved glory. In 2023 he was part of the junior Germany men’s team that won the men’s FIH Hockey Junior World Cup, as well as part of the senior Germany men’s team that won the senior world cup. He’ll be hoping for his second Olympic medal, having previously won bronze with Team India in Tokyo.
The Uplands old boy has been part of a few more memorable teams over the years. Arkell was the strength and conditioning coach for the UCT Ikey Tigers when they won the 2014 Varsity Cup with arguably the greatest Varsity Cup comeback of all time. He was part of the Pumas’ setup between July 2015 and April 2017, winning the Vodacom Cup in 2015.
Lombard will be heading to the Olympics as the strength and conditioning specialist for the South African women’s hockey team, as well as two individual Indian athletes – Vinesh Phogat (wrestling) and PV Sindhu (badminton). When he was with the Indian women’s hockey team in Tokyo, they finished fourth, narrowly losing out to Great Britain in the bronze final.
He has also worked with the Japan women’s sevens rugby team, the University of Western Cape’s rugby team, IPL franchise Delhi Capitals (men and women), as well as with the Pretoria Capitals in the SA20 competition. Perhaps most significantly, Lombard has completed his PhD in exercise science through the University of Cape Town, completing his doctorate in 2021.
Lombard and Arkell will be joined at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris by seven other current or former Lowvelders. Benjamin Richardson (athletics), Ashley Erasmus (athletics), Josh Bruyns and Mel Janse van Rensburg (sport climbing), Nicole Shuttleworth (soigneur, cycling), Emile van Veenhuyzen (official, swimming) and Rosko Specman (rugby sevens).
