Australian Institute of Sport

History

Two reports were the basis for developing the AIS: The Role, Scope and Development of Recreation in Australia (1973) by John Bloomfield and Report of the Australian Sports Institute Study Group (1975) (group chaired by Allan Coles). The need for the AIS was compounded in 1976 when the Australian Olympic team failed to win a gold medal at the Montreal Olympics, which was regarded as a national embarrassment for Australia. The institute's well-funded programs (and more generally the generous funding for elite sporting programs by Australian and State Governments) have been regarded as a major reason for Australia's recent success in international sporting competitions.

In 2011, Minister for Sport Mark Arbib announced the AIS would take responsibility for the strategic direction of high performance sport in Australia. In November 2012, the ASC released "Australia's Winning Edge 2012–2022", a high performance sport plan, which highlighted a new role for the AIS particularly in terms of developing coaches and talent identification but not directly managing national sports organisations elite athlete programs as it had done since 1981.

Timeline

A brief overview of the history of the AIS follows.

Institute

The AIS employs a number of staff who primarily work in Sports Science and Sports Medicine, which includes disciplines such as sports nutrition, performance analysis, skill acquisition, physiology, recovery, biomechanics, athlete career education, strength and conditioning, psychology, physical therapies, talent identification, and applied performance research.

There are a number of sculptures located throughout the Bruce Campus, such as 'Acrobats', 'Gymnast', 'Pole Vaulter' and 'Soccer Players' by John Robinson and the 'Swimmer' by Guy Boyd. After the Sydney 2000 Olympics, two of the three sculptures - ' Gymnast' and 'Wheelchair Basketballer' - that were located on the Sydney Tower Eye prior to the Olympics were installed at the AIS.

The AIS Arena is a 4,200 capacity indoor stadium which has been used for sports such as basketball, gymnastics and volleyball as well as music concerts. Directly adjacent to, but not strictly part of the institute is the 25,000 capacity outdoor Canberra Stadium which has hosted matches of all the major forms of football played in Australia.

In 2005, 2009, and 2010 the institute won awards at the prestigious Canberra and Capital Region Tourism Awards. These awards were given in recognition of the daily public tours that are available. Each tour, which takes in several different buildings of the institute as well as the arena and the Sportex zone, is led by an athlete currently training there.

Logo

Shortly after its inception in 1981, the AIS held a competition for a symbol that would depict the AIS aim of "achieving supremacy in sport". Over 500 designs were submitted. The winner was Rose-Marie Derrico, a design student from Bendigo, Victoria. Her design showed an athlete with hands clasped above the head in recognition of victory. The colours of the logo were red, white and blue, which are the same colours as the Australian flag.

On 3 February 2014, the AIS launched a new logo in line with its new direction as outlined in its Winning Edge program that was launched in 2012. Landor Associates designed the new brand and logo. The gold in the brand representing Australia's pursuit of gold.

National Training Centres

In November 2012, the AIS announced that, following the introduction of the Winning Edge strategy, control of its direct sports programs would be transferred to individual sporting bodies. As a result, many National Training Centres, or Centres of Excellence, were established at the AIS over the next two years, replacing the scholarship programs. These include:

Basketball Australia Centre of Excellence

Netball Australia Centre of Excellence

Football Federation of Australia Centre of Excellence

Volleyball Australia Centre of Excellence

Rowing Australia National Training Centre

Swimming Australia National Training Centre

The AIS does continue to support other athletes in other sports however they are self funded and not under the National Training Centre banner.

Former sports programs

Up until 2013, the AIS offered scholarships to athletes across 36 programs in 26 different sports:

Artistic gymnastics, athletes with disabilities - swimming, athletics and winter sports, basketball, netball, rowing, football (men & women), tennis, swimming, track and field, volleyball (men) and water polo (women) administered from Canberra

Diving, squash, softball and cricket (men & women) administered from Brisbane

Sailing and slalom canoeing administered from Sydney

Hockey administered from Perth

Sprint canoeing, triathlon and BMX administered from the Gold Coast

Road cycling, track cycling and beach volleyball administered from Adelaide

Australian rules football, rugby union and rugby league are camps based programs

Winter sports (in partnership with the Olympic Winter Institute of Australia) administered from Melbourne

Sports that previously had an AIS program but were discontinued prior to 2013 included: weightlifting, water polo (men), volleyball (women), wrestling, shooting, archery, boxing (1997 - 2010) and golf. .

The head coach for the AIS boxing program from 1997 to 2010 was Bodo Andreass.

Notable athletes

Many prominent Australian athletes have taken up AIS scholarships. In 2001, the AIS established the Best of the Best Award to recognise highly performed AIS athletes. As of 2011, the following athletes have been recognised - Alisa Camplin, Robert De Castella, John Eales, Simon Fairweather, Neil Fuller, Bridgette Gusterson, Rechelle Hawkes, Shane Kelly, Luc Longley, Michelle Martin, Glenn McGrath, Michael Klim, Michael Milton, Clint Robinson, Louise Sauvage, Kate Slatter, Zali Steggall, Mark Viduka, Vicki Wilson, Todd Woodbridge, Lauren Jackson, Chantelle Newbery, Petria Thomas, Kerry Saxby-Junna, Jamie Dwyer, Anna Meares, Malcolm Page, Ricky Ponting, Oenone Wood and Matthew Cowdrey. In August 2013, Stuart O'Grady was indefinitely suspended from the 'Best of the Best' due to his admission to doping in 1998.

The Australian Institute of Sport Alumni highlights the many prominent Australian athletes that the AIS has assisted.

Athlete of the Year

Since 1984, the AIS has named an Athlete of the Year. For the first twenty years, the award was predominately made to one athlete only. In 2004 a male and female athlete were awarded with the accolade; and the awarding has varied over the ensuing years.

Notable coaches

AIS was established to provide high level coaching to Australian athletes. Since its establishment in 1981, the AIS has employed highly credentialed Australian and international coaches. Original coaches were - Bill Sweetenham and Dennis Pursley (swimming), Wilma Shakespear in netball, Adrian Hurley and Patrick Hunt (basketball), Peter Lloyd and Kazuyu Honda (gymnastics), Jimmy Shoulder (football), Ray Ruffels and Helen Gourlay (tennis), Kelvin Giles, Gary Knoke and Merv Kemp (track and field), and Lyn Jones (weightlifting).

Other notable AIS coaches - Charlie Walsh (cycling), Barry Dancer and Richard Charlesworth(hockey), Terry Gathercole (swimming), Marty Clarke (basketball).

Sports medicine and sport science

AIS established sports medicine and sports science services and research programs when established in 1981. Dr Dick Telford was its first Co-ordinator of Sports Science and Medicine. Other notable staff have included: Dr Peter Fricker, Professor Allan Hahn, Professor Louise Burke, Dr Bruce Mason and Keith Lyons.

The AIS Sports Medicine department in 2020 released guidelines on the management of COVID-19 in athletes and a template for return to sport in Australia after the Coronavirus lockdown. These guidelines were used by the Australian government National Cabinet and the various Australian state governments to recommend stages for recommencing sport after the vast majority closed down in late March to early May 2020. Generally the doctors working at the AIS have been sports medicine specialists qualified through the Australasian College of Sport and Exercise Physicians.

Under the leadership of AIS Chief Science Officer Paolo Menaspà, in March 2022 the AIS released the National High Performance Sport Research Agenda, designed to prioritise resources in areas of critical importance to Australia's high performance sport system. In July 2022 the AIS awarded grants to six Australian research teams, aimed at optimising the performance of elite athletes, coaches and support staff. The document "Recommendations for conducting AIS-supported research in high performance sport" was also released in 2022. The "Future of Australian Sport, Megatrends shaping the sport sector over coming decades" was published in December 2022. In August 2023 the AIS, together with Australia's Chief Scientist Cathy Foley, organised the Quantum Meets Sport workshop, a world first which led to the Queensland Government committing $8.5 million to support quantum research with an impact on the Brisbane 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games. The "National Science and Research Priorities for High Performance Sport" were updated and released in March 2025, recognising matters that are important to the Australian high-performance system toward the 2028 Summer Olympics. In early 2026, the AIS released the report "Comparison of AI Solutions for Evidence Synthesis in High-Performance Sport".

Olympic Winter Institute of Australia

The AIS and the Australian Olympic Committee formed the Australian Institute of Winter Sports after the 1998 Winter Olympics. The organisation was renamed to the Olympic Winter Institute of Australia on 1 July 2001. It provides training in alpine skiing, freestyle skiing (including aerial and mogul), snowboarding, short track speed skating and figure skating. It is also a partner with the AIS in skeleton (toboganning).

Elite Athlete Education Network

The Elite Athlete Education Network (EAEN), formerly known as the Elite Athlete Friendly Universities (EAFU) network, is a network of universities and other education providers who are committed to supporting elite student athletes in partnership with the Australian Institute of Sport. The guiding principles which underpin the network include:

Appointing a dedicated staff contact to support elite student athletes during their studies. This contact is responsible for advising student athletes in regard to academic planning, as well as supporting flexible arrangements to fulfil academic requirements.

Tailoring or developing flexible study options to support the needs of elite student athletes.

Basketball program

Men's and women's representative basketball teams from the AIS have been in existence since the institute's establishment in 1981. The women's team competed in the Women's National Basketball League (WNBL) between 1981 and 2012, while the men's team competed in the South East Australian Basketball League (SEABL) between 1982 and 2010.

In 2014, the Basketball Australia Centre of Excellence was established by Basketball Australia at the AIS after they assumed responsibility of the basketball program.

Partner school

The institute's partner school is UC Senior Secondary College Lake Ginninderra, with the AIS having sent its Year 11 and 12 scholarship-holders there since the college's inception in 1987.