My 6-day long R-Phase course is now over and it is time to start digesting the information. My brain and body is a little bit saturated from all the information I received this past week through lecture and movement.
One of the things that came up early in the course was the plasticity of the human nervous system, which is one of the important concepts to understand with Z-Health. Plasticity simple means that the nervous system can be molded and remodeled through training, but basically what ever you do.
Below is a video demonstrating how plastic the nervous system really is.
In a previous post I mentioned the KISS Principle and strength coach Dan John. I have never actually known the origin of the principle until now.
The principle has nothing to do with this KISS but in many ways the band uses the "KISS principle" to influence their music. I remember once hearing an interview with Gene Simmons, the bass player, and he talked about the importance of him playing extremely simple in order to make the music work. There are many other examples like this from the music world and please do not confuse simple with easy.
Many musicians if not all will tell you that sometimes the most difficult pieces of music to play are actually theoretically very simple. One example would be 12 bar blues; theoretically very simple to play and easily understood and is usually something a beginner learns in the first few months of picking up an instrument but ...
... there is a big difference between a well seasoned pro and a beginner, even if they are playing the same music. Most people, including non-musicians will be able to tell the difference between the two even though they may not be able to explain why.
While popular usage translates is as 'Keep it simple, stupid', Mr.
Johnson translated it as 'Keep it simple and stupid'. There was no
implicit meaning that an engineer was stupid; just the opposite.
The principle is best exemplified by the story of Mr. Johnson
handing a team of design engineers a handful of tools, with the
challenge that the jet aircraft they were designing must be repairable
by an average mechanic in the field under combat conditions with only
these tools. Hence, the 'stupid' refers to the relationship between the
way things break and the sophistication available to fix them.
The principle most likely finds its origins in similar concepts, such as Occam's razor, and Albert Einstein's maxim that "everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler".[3]Leonardo Da Vinci's "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication", or Antoine de Saint Exupéry's "It seems that perfection is reached not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away".
I am off to R-Phase this week which is a 6 day long course offered by Z-Health. I am expecting it to be a very intense learning experience.
What is R-Phase? The short and simple explanation of R-Phase is that it is a series of fairly isolated joint mobility exercises to improve your health and performance.
It is actually much more then this and I will write about my experience with this course another time.
This is from the Z-Health website describing R-Phase.
"With R-Phase, we focus on the basics: precise, dynamic joint mobility
training through a neurologic lens. Additionally, we introduce and
study functional anatomy, kinesiology, and fundamental neuroscience —
to lay the foundation for the "whys" of the system. R-Phase, as the
foundational Z-Health certification, often brings dramatic changes in
people, and provides trainers with a set of assessment tools and
protocols to bring immediate results to their clients."
This is a quick recap of what I did with the team for the 45 minutes I had with them.
But first, please let me try to explain the a bit of the thought process that I go through when doing something like this. What I mean by "this" is that I am only going out for one 45 minute session; I am the guest coach for the day.
Now, "this" may turn into a regular training session with this team but for now it is only a one time thing.
One of the things I have learned as a coach is to keep it simple. I have seen to many high level professional athletes fail miserably at what many would call basic or simple exercises.
Strength Coach Dan John from Utah, USA calls this the KISS principle (keep it simple stupid).
I have learned this lesson the hard way many times, but maybe just maybe I have it figured out now. The KISS principle ends up being the driving force behind this session. It is also important to keep it simple when not knowing anything about these players other then they play Basketball in the highest division in Denmark.
Here is a summary of the training session I did with the Hørsholm 79ers with some other bits of my thought process about coaching this kind of training session.
- I start by giving the girls a bit of a shocker as I tell them "no shoes, no socks". They all kind of give me a weird look but comply with my instructions. If you are wondering why no shoes, then you can read some of my earlier posts:
- Brief introduction of myself and some of the things we will be doing. After talking to the coach a few days before, we decided that I should focus on body weight exercises with a focus on the trunk and lower body. Considering these are basketball players, where the knee is one of the most injured joints this is certainly not a bad idea. Learning some proper movement mechanics of the lower body is always good and is usually lacking in many athletes.
- During the introduction I give them my 1st rule; "if hurts you must stop and let me know". I have no idea what the current medical history is of any of these players. The last thing I want to do is hurt someone by pushing them into a drill or exercise that is not appropriate for that individual at this time.
- With introduction over we get down on the floor on our stomachs, resting on our forearms for a minute or so then go directly into side-lying rotations which is thoracic spine mobility drill.
- Z-Health drills from R-Phase; lateral & medial ankle tilts, closed chain knee circles and hip pendulums.
- Split Squats (2 x 5 reps/side) & Body Weight Squats (3 x 5 reps) emphasizing movement quality.
- Now since I have had a chance to observe them move a bit we go into what I believe may very well be one of the best exercises, when performed properly, for knee health ... the single leg squat.
- I decided to teach them the Single Leg Box Squat, which is going up and down from a chair, box or bench.
- This is a much harder exercises then you think but these girls really pulled it off quite nicely.
- Next I coached them through 2 exercises that really focus on the back side, mainly Hamstrings & Glutes.
- Research has shown that in people with knee pain, the Hamstrings are relatively much weaker then the quadriceps (muscles on the front of the thigh). So, to prevent knee pain and also aid in performance doing lots of work on the back side is very important.
- The 2 exercises I taught were the Single Leg Deadlift and Sliding Leg Curls on the floor.
- At this point I was out of time and we had to stop. I didn't get a chance to really talk about programming so I will include a sample program in my next post.
My family actually doesn't have one of these bikes but it is something that is very unique to Denmark and maybe even just Copenhagen (or at least that is what I think is the case, I could be wrong). I certainly did not see them in Sweden where I lived for the past 3 years.
It is not unusual to see a whole family on (or in) one of these bikes. It appears that many families have these style of bikes instead of owning a car.
Nothing really, other then it is a good song and they are also from my home town of Winnipeg, Manitoba among other great musicians like Neil Young ...
Or maybe there is a connection, here is a little story ...
This past summer (2009) I attended a Z-Health seminar in the USA. One thing I took away from the course was the importance of the eyes in sporting excellence. Eye sight as measured by how well you read an eye chart is only one aspect of using your eyes and doesn't take into effect the other functions (e.g. convergence or peripheral vision).
By the way, my eyes were not to good which may explain some of my athletic incompetence.
Then, this past week I was meeting with an international Water Polo coach who was in Copenhagen (my current place of residence) for the LEN Conference. We were talking training for Water Polo since he has heard I am fairly on top of the research in this field (see www.waterpolotraining.net).
One of the things he wanted to know was how do you train athletes to react quicker. As an example, you see something happen, process it, make a decision and act. How can you make this whole process quicker?
My great answer to him was "... Uhhh ...Uhhh ... good question"
But after a few more seconds of thought, I told him about the eyes and just this past few days I also came across this article.
First, there is a basic reaction, also known as optometric reaction (in other words, see it and get out of the way).
Next, there is a perceptual reaction, meaning
you actually can identify the object coming at you and can put it in
some context (for example: That is a tennis ball coming at you and not
a bird swooping out of the sky).
Finally, there is a cognitive reaction, meaning
you know what is coming at you and you have a plan of what to do with
it (return the ball with top-spin down the right line).
This is very interesting information and could be the missing link in athletic development.
How many athletes have you coached or played with who just did not seem to meet their potential?
Maybe one of the road blocks were their eyes.
I will talk about more of this in future post and even show some simple eye exercises you can do.
I just watched this video of Evelyn Glennie talking about communication.
If you have never heard of her before she is a world renowned percussionist who just happens to be deaf (note: she is not deaf from playing the drums!).
One of my teachers, Paul Chek, says very often regarding communication "you have 2 ears and 1 mouth for a reason!" (i.e. you should listen twice as much as you talk, now there is a challenge for some people).
In the video below, Evelyn Glennie talks about how you listen with your whole body and not just the ears.
Maybe it should be you should listen 100+ times as much as you talk.
She is a very intelligent lady and great musician and demonstrates in this video an uncanny ability of explaining the art of listening and communication through drums and other percussive instruments.
She teaches even more than this ... like never giving up, perseverance, having no limitations and just the power of music which is really sound which is really vibrations which you do not need the ability of hearing to sense.
In the book "Essentials of Exercise Physiology, 3rd edition" by McArdle et al. on page 438 they state that it was back in the 1960's when a Swedish physiologist named Dr. Astrand said "to be an Olympic-caliber performer, you must choose your parents wisely."
It is a very common saying with coaches and exercise physiologists. It basically means that you cannot change your genetics and that your parents genetic pool will determine your athletic success.
So, if your parents are very nonathletic, then the chance of you becoming a good or great athlete is essentially ZERO.
My thoughts on this ... it's completely a bunch of BULL SH*t!!!!!!!
It is true that you cannot change your genes BUT we all have the ability to change how our genes are expressed.
As an example, most of us will get fat and die young if we eat crap food and sit on the couch all day. But if we all ate healthy food and exercised properly the opposite would happen (gene expression at work?).
If you want to be strong you need to lift heavy weights but if you all you do is run 30-60 minutes a few times/week you cannot say "oh, I just have bad genes, that is why I am not getting stronger".
I know this example is kind of ridiculous. I use it to make the point that what you do day in, day out matters. You may not get as strong as the world's strongest man but then again he who holds that title didn't get there from just having "good" parents.
We are all athletes, just some of us have never been exposed to proper training, nutrition and healthy lifestyle practices.
You could be Michael Jordan but if you never run, jump, climb, throw/kick a ball, ect ... then you will never realize your potential as an athlete. Michael Jordan's success as an athlete was not just because he had good genetics. He did the things necessary to express the genes he had to there full potential.
I end my little rant with these two quotes:
"It's not where you start - it's where you finish that counts."
-- Zig Ziglar
"Hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard."
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