We speak to the Swede who led Christian Olsson to world triple jump success and guides British high jump record holder Morgan Lake.
Yannick Tregaro was inspired to become a high jumper by watching Sweden’s Patrik Sjoberg break the world record (2.42m) in 1987. He took up athletics at the age of 11 and at the age of 18, after jumping a personal best of 2.17m, represented Sweden at the 1996 World Junior Championships in Sydney, Australia.
Tregaro left school with the goal of “making it to the world or European elite as a senior athlete”. instead, he made his name as a successful and respected coach, guiding Sweden’s national triple jump record holder Kristian Olsson to Olympic, world and European titles.
He currently coaches a group of athletes based in Gothenburg, including former World and European U20 triple jump champion and Swedish junior record holder Gabriel Wallmark, former European U20 100m hurdles champion and long jump silver medalist Tilda Johansson (Sweden) and former Great Britain World and European U20 national high jump record holder. in 2025
What was one of your most memorable moments as a young athlete?
My boyfriend and I both wanted to try athletics and I still remember the first time we called the club. The coach told us to come to the arena. there was a fence around it and we were looking in, a little nervous, then we saw patrick… it was just so cool to see my idol for real for the first time.
When we entered the arena, we saw Patrick doing his thing up close, so it was hard for us to focus on the meeting with the trainer. That was my first love of athletics, that you could easily walk into an environment that was so inspiring. I’m still breaking out now, and that’s something that’s stayed with me, that inspiration and that feeling inside.
A year later I had the same coach as Patrick, Viljo Nusiainen*, and Patrick almost became a big brother to me.
How did you get into coaching?
Villo died in June 1999. It was a shock, but by then I was already really interested in training and why we were doing it. I always asked. “Why are we doing this?” and looking at Patrick and the other good athletes in Villo and trying to understand the reasons for doing certain things. I loved watching old high jump and triple jump movies and when I was 17 I took a course to coach young athletes at the club’s summer holiday camps.
I think in a way I was really lucky because my best friend was Christian Olsson. He is two years younger than me and we used to train together. I was better than him at that time, but he was developing fast. When Villo died, I didn’t see that there was another coach who could give me what I wanted, so I felt that I wanted to coach myself. Then Christian asked me if he could train with me, so that was the beginning of my coaching career.
I beat him earlier that summer, but he just kept getting better and better and improved so much. He qualified for the European juniors, won two medals and suddenly I was this really young high jumper coaching his friend who was now the European high jump champion and silver medalist in the triple jump.
At first, Christian was still asking. “Yannik is the right coach for me”, and I remember that there were discussions with the Swedish Olympic Committee and the Athletics Federation. they thought that since Christian was such a good talent, he might need more experience or a better coach. They were skeptical, and so was Christian, always asking a lot of questions about why we were doing what we were doing. But it was so important to me because he was trying to test me, see if I knew what I was doing, and I think that was a really good thing.
I have so many memories when I think about this, but of course having an athlete like Christian as my first athlete was so beneficial for me. He was super talented. he was so organized and technically good (that was Villo’s forte, working with coordination, technique and rhythm) – and he continued to develop very quickly.
Who has been your biggest coaching influence?
My success with Christian was a mixture of skill and what I’ve seen Villo do with Patrick over the years. Because I spent a lot of time with them at training camps and championships, I had an incredible insight into how you train a world-class athlete. Even though I was inexperienced as a coach, I was not new to the big championship environment and to see how Patrick prepared for those events I think was really unique.
Villo was really good at making diaries. I had my own training diaries for the last six or seven years, but also what Patrick was doing, so of course I copied a lot from that and looked back to see when I was really fit, what I was doing in the weeks before. Or what led to that performance? It was a gold mine. I also had a lot of answers just because I had been around those athletes and learned what some coaches can take a lifetime to learn.
I still think one of the things that was important to me was that I was so curious when I was young. Villo was a really creative coach and I wanted to experience and try new things and be open to different ideas.
When I lecture, I talk about an “art” coach and an “excellent” coach. Although he wrote the diaries and did the planning, Villot was very much the “art” coach. He did not specifically plan each exercise. he looked after us and what we needed. That was one of his coaching strengths, and it’s mine, too.
Then, of course, I wanted to know more and was selected for a super-coaching program created by the then head coach of Swedish athletics, together with a behaviorist and the Swedish Olympic Committee, where they gathered about 20 of Sweden’s best coaches. I think we met six times a year and it was about getting to know each other, opening up, talking about our personal stories and then of course educating ourselves. Those coaches, which included Agne Bergvall (Carolina Kluft coach) and Benke Blomkvist (famous sprint coach), became my best friends, to whom I could ask anything. I think that program is the answer to why Swedish athletics was so good in the early 2000s.
How has your coaching staff evolved?
That first summer, 1999, I only coached Christian, but when the summer was over, I decided to take on all the athletes that Villo was coaching who were younger than me.
Then I had a group, and I always think that a strong group is an important tool for developing athletes. There’s so much energy in the band and if everyone’s giving off energy, you’re automatically energized. I really love the environment you can create.
There will always be extroverts and introverts, but it’s so important to see everyone for who they are and take their time in the spotlight. When someone is quiet for a while, it’s so easy to say. “Come join us” and you become more extroverted and he just becomes more introverted and shuts down. To see shy, introverted people grow, not that they have to be extroverted, but just participate and contribute, and for extroverted people to listen more and be more understanding, that’s been great.
When people in a group trust each other and can be themselves, that’s when they perform. That’s really important to me in coaching. To get people to perform, it’s not just what you do technically and physically, it’s how you make them feel as a person. I think maybe it’s even more important than what you do, but sometimes it can be hard to get everyone to buy into that philosophy.
Morgan obviously wants to improve and I always say. “Either you develop or you die,” and that’s how it is. It’s so important that he develops, but a high-flying PB doesn’t always have to improve. You may find yourself developing in other areas, physically, mentally and technically, and if that happens, the results will eventually come.
What is the best piece of advice you would give to a new or aspiring coach?
Some coaches create a training system that they believe in and put the athlete in that system, but I wanted to be a little bit the opposite and build the system around the athlete. So you need to find out what the athlete’s strengths and weaknesses are, how do you develop that athlete, and what does that athlete need to reach their potential? That is always my goal. to make every athlete I coach reach 100 percent of their potential.
Athletics can be really unfair sometimes. Athletes can train perfectly and be so motivated and determined and do everything right and they still don’t perform that well, while some other athletes can be stupid like they show up sometimes and can perform really well. I think you should be able to create a person who understands that.
Having balance is also important. never stop playing! As I learned more about technique, strength and development, I became more and more specific. I felt like I was going from being this open, playful coach to becoming more and more withdrawn. All the education I’ve done has pointed to being more specific, but it’s important that you still “play” and use the nervous system in different ways.
Finally, if you want to reach 100 percent of your potential, you don’t need to become the world’s best triple jumper, high jumper, or anything else, you have to have a plan and you have to execute the plan. Period: I don’t take no for an answer if I can help my athletes. If it is not possible to do what we have planned, then we have to do the best thing and figure it out. Having an elite mindset as a coach and athlete means finding solutions to get the job done.
