Just Fly Performance Podcast

Guest James Baker, expert in long-term athletic development, discusses topics such as early specialization vs. early engagement, integrating movement and play into training, transitioning young athletes, implementing strength training, optimal windows for strength training, peak height and weight velocity, and progression of depth jumps and landing mechanics.

Today’s show is with athletic performance coach, Erik Huddleston.  Erik is currently the Director of Performance at Indianapolis Fitness & Sports Training (IFAST) and a performance consultant for a number of professional baseball & basketball teams. Erik previously spent time at Indiana University & Texas Tech University with the men’s basketball teams. So often in the course of using barbell methods for athletic performance, there are often movements that are considered sacred cows of training.  There also tends to be common thoughts as to how these lifts should be performed, such as all athletes needing to squat heavy “ass to grass”.  In reality, athletes come in all shapes, sizes and structures.  Athletes of varying shapes may respond to various types of barbell lifts differently, and there are ways to optimize training for performance, and robustness when considering structural differences of athletes. Advanced and elite athletes will tend to utilize the feet, and stance in different ways as well.  Knowing how an athlete is leveraging the gait cycle, and what points they are particularly biasing to achieve their performances, is important when thinking about which lift variations we might want to utilize with them over time. For today’s episode, Erik takes us on a deep dive into squatting and how it relates to the “reversal ability” of athletes, given their individual shapes and structures.  He also relates the phases of gait (early,mid,late stance) to squatting and jumping concepts, to help us better understand how to give athletes what they need at particular points in their career.  Erik cover important elements of single leg squatting as well, in this highly detailed chat on performance training. Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster and Lost Empire Herbs.  For 15% off your Lost Empire Herbs order, head to www.lostempireherbs.com/justfly View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage. Timestamps and Main Points 4:00 – Some of the things Erik has learned from spending time in both the collegiate and private sectors of training 9:00 – Things that Erik looks at in training video that he may be addressing in the gym setting 15:00 – Managing squatting and squat training in light of the various phases of stance 25:20 – How to “bucket” athletes based on need in squatting, in terms of depth and heel-elevation, particularly those with wider hips and narrower shoulders 35:00 – How an athlete’s body shape and structure will tend to determine their functional ability and biomechanics 49:00 – Self-selection principles when it comes to strength and power exercises and coaching 52:00 – Shin angle principles in light of squatting and reversal power 55:00 – How single leg differs from double leg training in terms of pelvic-sacrum action and pressurization 1:00.30 – What Erik is looking for in the stances of the foot when an athlete is jumping or dunking 1:05.30 – Why banded work can cause athletes to “over-push” in jumping, and the impulse related nature of “point zero” in a jump 1:11.30 – More talk on jumping in regards to single leg jumping and accessing late-stance, and why advanced athletes tend to be more late-stance dominant 1:22:00 – Erik’s take on athletes who are early-stance dominant, and how to help them overcome resistance, create compression, and ideally get to mid and late stance more easily “An ability to translate through the phases of gait is something that I look at (when assessing video)” “Some kids are naturally not going to be able to get lower in that athletic stance” “Gait is a constant falling and catching yourself as you go forward” “If the tibia moves forward and your heel is on the ground, you are moving towards the middle phase of propulsion…. as soon as the calcaneus breaks the ground you are in a later phase of propulsion” “(Internal rotation) doesn’t allow for a lot of general movement qualities… or a fluid variation in movement.  IR is compression, IR is force production, it is not necessarily fluidity of movement, it is meant to block things from happening; to compress and produce force” “If someone is at that (max IR) point, and you ask them to change levels, then there is going to be a compensation” “A lot of the higher end athletes I work with are biased towards this middle or late propulsion, so for them to squat, I need to bring the ground up to them (through a slant board)” “Having only half of your foot, or just your heel on the slant, doesn’t put you in an early position (with heels on plates, the bias is still towards IR)” “If they are spending too much time, and they are too shoved forward into middle and late stance, access to early (stance) is key” “3rd world squatting, sitting on your heels is very early stance biased” “Compensation is not a poor choice, you just need to have resources outside of that compensation” “From a strategic standpoint it is difficult to get (narrow shoulder/wide hip individuals) to come out of the bottom of the squat with quality…. Putting them in a position that doesn’t allow much descent will allow them more ascent… I have 3 or 4 girls who do hack squats really really well; I don’t allow them all the descent of their pelvic floor that they would generally have” “The rebound is a completely different position than the going down portion is (of a squat)” “I’m looking for those first couple of inches (of the squat reversal) as it can be out of the bottom; I think that giving them that constraint, that raises the floor up a little for (narrow shoulder/wide hip), so they are not pre-disposed to over-dropping into a jump” “The unique thing about the tibia and the sacrum is that they actually move together” “The goal is to have smooth, fluid transitions between (all movements in the gym)” “If you look at the typical basketball athlete, they are very output driven, not very input driven… they are springy people” “That early (heel) position is really important for athletes to get into in jumping, because it gives them enough yield and expansion quality to get that energy capture before they are going to turn that around” “(The bottom of a jump) is max internal rotation, maximal force production… at that point heel breaks the ground, and every transition from that point until their toe comes off the ground is going to be ER” “If I need to bring an athlete back on their heel at all, how far back is that, and how do I manage that? “Muscle itself is biased towards IR because there is a compressive nature about it” Show Notes Michael Jordan guarding Allen Iverson https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4O04iA1Pack About Erik Huddleston Erik Huddleston is currently the Director of Performance at Indianapolis Fitness & Sports Training (IFAST) and a performance consultant for a number of professional baseball & basketball teams. He previously spent time at Indiana University & Texas Tech University with the men’s basketball teams.

Ben Askren, former MMA fighter and wrestling coach, discusses his transition from multi-sport athlete to wrestling specialist. He emphasizes the importance of creativity and mental process in training athletes. The podcast covers topics such as studying elites, teaching individual style, unconventional methods for strength and power, and the evolution of wrestling. Askren also delves into the mental element of sports, including dealing with anxiety and strategies for consistent performance.

Today’s show is a Q&A with Joel Smith.  We are back again for a series of your questions and my best answers.  Today’s show is by theme “The Speed Show” with a ton of questions on speed, acceleration, max velocity, muscle-relaxation speed, and even working with distance runners.  Sprinting is always going to be a synthesis of so many elements of human performance, and is one of the highest-reaching challenges for any coach in athletic coaching (which is why it’s also such a rewarding puzzle to solve). Outside of the common speed questions; I also had an interesting question on how to assess “swings in the pendulum” of training methods.  The awareness by which we get to our own coaching biases is important, so I’ll dig into some ideas there as well. Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster and Lost Empire Herbs.  For 15% off your Lost Empire Herbs order, head to www.lostempireherbs.com/justfly View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage. Timestamps and Main Points 1:59 – How to fix heel-striking in athletes 12:56 – A step by step process on helping athletes improve hip extension and delay knee extension 19:50 – Thoughts on flat feet being an advantage since you enter mid stance more quickly? 22:16 – The top 2-3 faults, issues I commonly coach as it pertains to start out of blocks, acceleration in those first 2-3 steps, and common drills I utilize for correcting said issues. 33:57 – How to periodize maximal velocity work. Once intensity is at the max and assisted/overspeed is touched upon sporadically, where do we go from there? 43:18 – Thoughts on setting up a weight room/jumping/sprinting program for high school XC runners. Training age with me 1-3 years. 50:44 – How do you balance your stance/beliefs when training philosophy and paradigm swings like a pendulum? 56:54 – In regards to the Soviet research on muscle relaxation times being the differentiating factor between their elite and non-elite athletes, what are some methods to train relaxation times? Show Notes Dave O’Sullivan Slouches https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYD4Jx_IXSw Usain Bolt Warming Up https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW9GxrrSDFg&t=163s About Joel Smith Joel Smith is the founder of Just Fly Sports and is a sports performance coach in Cincinnati, Ohio.  Joel hosts the Just Fly Performance Podcast, has authored several books on athletic performance, and trains numerous clients in the in-person and online space.  Joel was formerly a strength coach for 8 years at UC Berkeley, working with the Swim teams and post-graduate professional swimmers, as well as tennis, water polo, and track and field.  A track coach of 11 years, Joel coached for the Diablo Valley Track and Field Club for 7 years, and also has 6 years of experience coaching sprints, jumps, hurdles, pole vault and multi-events on the collegiate level, working at Wilmington College, and the University of Wisconsin, LaCrosse. Joel has coached 2 national champions, multiple All-Americans and school record holders in his time as a track coach. In the realm of strength and conditioning, his programs have assisted 5 athletes to Olympic berths that produced 9 medals and a world record performance at Rio in 2016. In 2011, Joel began Just Fly Sports with Jake Clark as a central platform to promote information for athletes and coaches to reach their highest potential.  In 2016 the first episode of the “Just Fly Performance Podcast” was released, now a leading source of education in the sports performance field.  The evolving mission of Just Fly Sports is focused on teaching athletes to realize their true, innate power, and achieve the highest joy in their training, competition, and in the community.

Today’s show is with Jake Tuura.  Jake currently works at Velocity Training Center as a strength and conditioning coach. Prior to Velocity, Jake was a collegiate S&C coach for 7 years.  Jake is the owner of jackedathlete.com where he teaches athletes and coaches principles on muscle gain, jumping higher, and rehab from jumper’s knee. Training for things like vertical jump and sprinting are enjoyable to discuss, but we need to always be zooming out into more global concepts of performance.  For example, you may tweak every ounce of your training to help an athlete jump 4” (10cm) higher, but what if that athlete just got into a really good community where athletes were doing various dunks, and found that simply being in that environment unlocked 4” of jumping gain, that was eventually able to filter over into their permanent results?  Or perhaps look at the formation of jumpers who are obsessed with jumping as youths, doing dozens, if not hundreds, of jumps each day? Also, understanding how to be consistent as per staying healthy is not often considered as it should be, particularly for jump-related sports. Jake Tuura has been on a journey of sport performance exploration for years, and offers grounded solutions for those seeking muscle gain, performance increase and pain reduction.  On the show today, Jake talks about what he has been learning since leaving the university sector in strength and conditioning, as well as updated knowledge in the vertical jump training space.  Jake also talks about how to use games as the ultimate warmup (and workout, when combined with sprints and jumps) for athletes, and finished with some great points on knee pain and rehab, and points where isometric exercises might not be the panacea that it is so often offered as. Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster and Lost Empire Herbs.  For 15% off your Lost Empire Herbs order, head to www.lostempireherbs.com/justfly View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage. Timestamps and Main Points 4:56 – Some of the last things Jake learned as a college strength and conditioning coach 16:31 – What Jake has learned working in the private sector of sports performance since moving beyond his university coaching job 18:44 – Thoughts on using games with pro-level players versus younger athletes 25:29 – Things that Jake has been compiling in the last few years in regards to vertical jump training 38:21 – What Jake has noticed in elite dunking athletes in regards to their training history and jumping volumes 46:22 – The importance of using sport play as either an advanced warmup or potentiation for jumps or even sprints 51:59 – Thoughts on penultimate length in a running two leg jump” 58:13 – Looking at isometric training, versus kinetic chain training and general strength conditioning when it comes to knee rehabilitation and injury prevention “When you are a college strength coach, you think that everyone really wants to be in (the weightroom)” “You are warming up their bodies, but are you thinking of how you are impacting their brains?... they are like zombies” “If you are a college strength coach, there are 1000’s of kids who will do your job for free… and you have to impress the head coach” “I think we need to start vertical jump training with the objective starting point of physics, and then you can create a good plan” “Can you get stronger by just jumping? Yes you can; but… some people are just not built for that, and they need extra training… sometimes freak athletes, they may not need the extra training, they were just born for it” “(In regards to knee pain) Jumping as high as possible for a decently high volume… would a caveman do that?” “The pro-dunkers, would jump every day (growing up) and as they get older and increase outputs, they do not jump every single day; and they always get into strength training” “Having the people to do dunk sessions with is huge; we had like 10 guys at an LA Fitness out here one Friday night, and everyone’s vertical jump was up, like 4 inches” “If you can start playing pickup basketball for 30-60-90 minutes, that is the best warmup to dunk” “If you can stimulate the system with gatorball, you will feel a lot better going into your sprints” “You just do not know the story to be giving these canned technique tips to people; they shouldn’t exist” “Isometrics, heavy isometrics like a leg extension, are going to be huge for the patellar tendon, and the quad tendon, and Osgood Schlatter, is will be great for that, but that heavy isometric will not be good for patella-femoral pain; someone who has general knee pain” “Iso lunges, Spanish squats, all those are going to give you immediate (tendon) relief.  If you do those exercises, and you don’t have immediate relief, then you probably don’t have a tendon issue” “There is correlation from having lack of dorsiflexion and having jumper’s knee” About Jake Tuura Jake Tuura, MS, CSCS currently works at Velocity Training Center as a strength and conditioning coach. Prior to Velocity, Jake was a collegiate S&C coach for 7 years. He earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin-Superior (2014) and his Masters from The College of St. Scholastica (2015). His website: jackedathlete.com helps athletes gain copious amounts of muscle, jump higher, and rehab from jumper’s knee.

Today’s show is with Angus Ross.  Angus is a senior strength and conditioning specialist with High Performance Sport New Zealand, with a particular interest in track and field athletes.  He has worked with a number of sports at an elite level within the NZ system, including sprint cycling and skeleton in recent years. Angus has a PhD in exercise physiology from the University of Queensland, and is also a Winter Olympian in his own right having competed at the 1998 and 2002 Winter Games. Angus has been a two time previous guest within the first hundred episodes of the podcast.  In the time since we last talked, Angus has traveled the world and has spent time with some leading edge strength coaches, such as Jerome Simian.  His curiosity and angles of looking at performance training has made him a truly enjoyable guest to have on this show time and again. One topic I’ve heard in the world of training is “the spinal engine”.  I have been working extensively in the last year in the realms of getting the ribs and spine to work alongside the hips more effectively in sprinting, throwing, jumping and overall athletic movement.  When Angus told me he had been doing a lot of research into spinal engine work over the last few years, I was excited, and when Angus actually went into the details of it all, I was truly inspired.  Angus’s work connects so many dots in regards to concepts I’ve been thinking of on my own end. On the show today, Angus speaks about his take on spinal engine theory, rhythmic movement, sprint (and iso hold) asymmetry and how some athletes may need to take advantage of the movement of the spine more than others.  He also talks about long and short hold isometrics, and proprioception training.  This was a phenomenal chat with lots of immediate ideas for any athlete or coach. Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster and Lost Empire Herbs.  For 15% off your Lost Empire Herbs order, head to www.lostempireherbs.com/justfly View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage. Timestamps and Main Points 5:15 – Spinal engine theory vs. a leg spring model 11:26 – How the mobility of spine and ribs can benefit you as an athlete 15:42 – Resources and inspiration for exercises and drills to improve spinal mobility and range 19:09 – A discussion on asymmetry in sprinting 21:43 – Benefits of looking at data & the role of intuition and feelings in martial arts 24:58 – Rhythm in Athletes: What you can learn from trying martial arts and other rhythmic sports 32:17 – Who can benefit from spinal engine theory? 34:21 – Asymmetrical training & What Angus learned from training with Jerome Simian 48:38 – How and why to use long duration isometrics in training 54:03 – Static stretching before sprinting & Pros and cons of extreme iso holds 57:11 – Insights on short isometric holds 1:01:07 – Thoughts on proprioceptive training: Weight lifting, joint proprioception, and utilization of balance and stability “The concept (of spinal engine theory) is that if you laterally flex a lordotic spine, is that it induces an axial torque and a rotation of the pelvis” “When you look at things through the spinal engine lens, it’s really very different to the leg spring model.” “It begs the question: Should we be training lateral flexion per say and is range of motion a critical factor?” “Most of our elite runners are short trunk, long legs and that’s what we say is the normal, but if you don’t have that, can you compensate by becoming a different style of runner and using what you do have to facilitate your ability to try and relate?” “You need the hardware to be able to run that software and if you can’t get them in those positions…you’re gonna give them coaching cues all day long and it won’t do them any bloody good because they can’t get in those positions anyway.” “I’ve found the lateral drills to be fantastic with helping people eliminate crossover running.” “I have this feeling like, the people who really generate that asymmetry and really work the spinal engine, you can’t help but think that they have an innate sense of rhythm… and I don’t think you can generate that whip of momentum change in asymmetry without some rhythm, without some ability to sense your body.” “My working model currently is: Probably everybody can benefit from [spinal engine] to some level. Some might find it more advantageous than others.” “There’s some recent papers… that have shown there really isn’t any objective effect or positive effect in people that are more front-sided or more rear-sided. You run with what you’ve got, I guess, and it doesn’t seem to be this dramatic effect that maybe we’ve been told to expect from these sprint training models.” Show Notes Kevin Mayer 100m Dash https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wip9pNj6Fi4 Quadratus Lumborum Training Methods https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDgUP2k_TKI About Angus Ross Angus is currently employed by High Performance Sport New Zealand in a power physiology and strength and conditioning role, primarily working with track and field. He has worked with a number of sports at an elite level within the NZ system including sprint cycling and skeleton in recent years. Angus has a PhD in exercise physiology from the University of Queensland and has also worked within the Australian institute system with stints at both the Queensland Academy of Sport and the Australian Institute of Sport. He is also a Winter Olympian in his own right having competed at the 1998 and 2002 Winter Games.

Today’s show is with Conor Harris.  Conor is a strength & conditioning coach specializing in biomechanics and movement quality. He is the founder of Pinnacle Performance in Portland, Oregon where he trains all levels of athletes and general population clientele. He has worked in a wide variety of environments such as D1 Collegiate Baseball, EXOS, High School, and private performance training facilities. If there is one big element that is infiltrating modern training and performance right now (at least I hope it is), it is the attention to the quality of movement, and the particular impacts that doing one type of lift (say rear foot elevated vs. front foot elevated split squat) will have on an athlete.  So often, we just move through a variety of movements in a training program, without really thinking about the experience that those training methods are actually giving to that athlete’s body. Conor Harris is a young coach who has really zeroed in on the impacts of various movements on an athlete, and how those movements fit in with what an athlete is missing (or on the flip-side, is already strong in) in their gait pattern.  At the end of the day, every training movement we utilize should come back to how an athlete moves, or intends to move, in their sport.  The training we use should have the capacity to fill in any needed “gaps” in a movement profile that may be pre-disposing an athlete to pain, or injury. On today’s show, Conor will take us through concepts of late vs. early stance dominance in athletes, and how split squat variations will preferentially engage those stance dynamics for the purposes of injury prevention, or enhanced performance.  We’ll get into how squatting with heels elevated, or hinging with the toes elevated, can benefit the athlete through rotation of the leg bones, and finish with some great ideas on how to help restore internal rotation to athletes, as well as some big rocks of athletic glute activation. Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster and Lost Empire Herbs.  For 15% off your Lost Empire Herbs order, head to www.lostempireherbs.com/justfly View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage. Timestamps and Main Points 5:20 – Elements that help athletes pronate in the gym with more “common” exercises 12:40 – How to differentiate between a “late stance” and “early stance” dominant individual 19:20 – Why the sport of basketball emphasizes “late” stance more than many other sports 23:00 – Ideas on when to actually intervene with an athlete if you suspect an imbalance or movement inefficiency 38:00 – How foot position in a split stance exercise impacts rotation and joint dynamics 45:30 – Thoughts on split squatting with a (hard) balance disc in the front foot 49:15 – Conor’s big rocks in helping to restore an internal rotation deficit in athletes 56:00 – How to squat for maximal glute activation, via stretch-loading the glutes “Your joint positions, your tests all reflect that you spend a lot of time in late stance; a basketball player is a perfect example, someone who is constantly on their toes to be athletic.  These people often present with a certain foot presentation where their toes are pointing away from the midline of their body” “If you strike the ground and you don’t have that nice heel reference then it is going to be more difficult to get your heel forward, if you are starting in the position where you can’t get the pronation to resupination” “Anything that drives the knee over the toe a lot is going to allow for that internal rotation of the tibia to occur, as well as pronation of the foot.  That heel elevated split squat can be a really good way to do that” “When I think of a contralateral load, I think of that as a reference to find your heel or midfoot.  An ipsilateral load is better to find mid-foot to toe-off.  If I wanted to find that earlier phase of pronation I’m a fan of using that contralateral load (it will pull them in towards the midline of their foot)” “A lot of times, these narrows (narrow ISA) will be biased towards heel strike, originally” “Think of how often a basketball player needs to be on their heels, it’s not very often” “When we run, it’s more of a mid to late stance transition” “Let’s say this person does need to find more of that heel strike mechanics, that will help restore more of the variability in their body as a whole” “Let’s say they can’t hinge very well; take that heel wedge, and flip it around, so now their mid-foot and fore-foot is slanted upward, that can help them hinge backwards, and now you are providing more internal rotation to that hip” “Let’s say you have someone who is bilaterally extended on both sides, what that person is really trying to do is create an internal rotation, force producing strategy” “Getting them back on their heels can give them something to (internally) rotate to” “As you get deeper in the squat, you need some level of internal rotation and pronation of the foot (to reverse and push upwards)” “True opening of the hips is being able to get in your hip through internal rotation” “If you know what kind of joint positions we need to have, and how we get there, then muscles are easy” “Simply by being in a split stance position you are going to be biasing more external rotation and “supination” of the front hip and front foot” “Vertical tibia = mid-stance” “I love to restore internal rotation through positions like hinges” “Hold a ball that keeps your knees in line with your toes, squat to 90 degrees, and come out of it; that ball is providing a reference for your pelvic outlet; your pelvic floor is going to open up and your pelvic inlet is going to become more closed, your pelvic outlet is going to become more open” “Wide stance squats use less glutes than narrow stance, toes straight ahead” Show Notes Internal Rotation Exercises https://youtu.be/ZIiONQEAtqo https://youtu.be/qSlOus-fPc8 https://youtu.be/w-DmasVjuac   https://youtu.be/ZVg4Ox4gQV0 https://youtu.be/NNzR4_YaIuQ https://youtu.be/qVkmuRzk8ow https://youtu.be/CGmMgtqIImk About Conor Harris Conor Harris is a strength & conditioning coach that specializes in biomechanics and movement quality. He is the founder of Pinnacle Performance in Portland, Oregon where he trains all levels of athletes and general population clientele. He has worked in a wide variety of environments such as D1 Collegiate Baseball, EXOS, High School, and private performance training facilities.

Today’s show is with athletic performance coach, Dan Back.  Dan Back is the founder of “Jump Science” and is also a coach at Xceleration sports performance in Austin, Texas.  Dan reached an elite level in his own vertical jump and dunking ability, and has been helping athletes run faster, jump higher and improve overall physical performance for over a decade.  I first met Dan in my own time at Wisconsin, LaCrosse, where I was working on my master’s degree in applied sport sciences. When it comes to sports performance training, the two “KPI”s we are routinely searching for, are undoubtedly sprint speed and jumping ability.  Improvements here are harder to come by than simply improving a barbell strength exercise that is brand new to an individual.  On top of this, the higher velocity the movement, generally, the more difficult it is to improve. This is where there is a big difference in simply knowing information about training, and spending time talking to coaches who have been working hard on this skill themselves for years, and then have transmitted that knowledge into working with others.  Dan is a coach who really embodies what he is teaching on a regular basis. On today’s show, Dan talks about how his plyometric programs have changed over the years, where his plyometrics volume has shifted, volume in performing variations of various sport jumps, as well as in submaximal plyometrics, where big rocks like depth jumps fit in now. Key elements Dan looks at when coaching speed that fit with reactive abilities RSI, Strength/speed alternation, and knowing that you aren’t losing too much “explosive or maximal strength in the pursuit of speed Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster and Lost Empire Herbs.  For 15% off your Lost Empire Herbs order, head to www.lostempireherbs.com/justfly View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage. Timestamps and Main Points 4:41 – Dan’s evolution as an athlete and coach & how he became interested in sports performance 9:52 – Making jump training a sport: Is low rim dunk training the most effective for young athletes? 14:10 – Sport jumps vs. “Fun” jumps & How have your views on plyometrics evolved over time? 17:24 – Filling in the gaps in athletic history 20:01 – What staple plyometrics do you use in your training besides jumping? 25:34 – Building up from small, quick, easy movements 31:05 – Are there plyometrics Dan don’t use anymore? 32:38 – How Dan utilizes sprinting, warmups, and other exercises in athletic training 39:51 – Measuring RSI in sprinting and how to “reverse engineer” RSI from a “sprint first” perspective 46:33 – Dan’s approach to elimination and reintroduction of strength training and how to ensure one is not losing their maximal or explosive strength abilities when working on speed “I love [low rim dunk training] and I do think there’s a superiority there compared to just trying to touch the rim or touch the back board. One, because it’s just more fun. Two, to have success in the training, but then also there’s just this component of it’s not like a workout.” “Having that fun and even that creative, ideas-based, like oh I’m gonna try this dunk or I’m gonna try to dunk off one leg or whatever… having that fun, creative environment definitely makes a difference for the motor learning side of things and the motivation side of things.” “Hurdle hops are good but this is like a complimentary, forced development exercise. We want to have the base be not plyometrics, but the base be fun jumping and hopefully even diverse fun jumping.” “I believe in jump technique, I don’t overdo it… Sometimes if they don’t have those key skills, it’s like you’re kinda getting strong and not realizing any of it.” “Nowadays, really I would say sprinting is the plyometric that I have gravitated the most toward trying to make sure that is included in an athlete’s overall workload.” “I’m basically trying to get people to move with less effort and just kind of bounce off the ground.” “I want to just get them to a point where I like how it looks; where we have decent posture, decent relaxation, which is subjective obviously but… if we have an athlete do a 60-meter sprint with 90% effort, we’re hoping we can be not gassed after that. We want this to be pretty easy, pretty repeatable, like you could go do it again two minutes later.” “You don’t want to chase the RSI by doing two foot plyos and getting your squat up, you want to chase speed, sprint a lot, and because of that you have this lightness on your feet, and then you do the RSI test without having to even train it and now you’re just better at it.” “I don’t want to have to alternate between strength training and non-strength training, it’s more of something that just comes out of necessity.” About Dan Back Dan Back is the founder of “Jump Science” and is a coach at Xceleration sports performance in Austin, Texas.  Dan reached an elite level in his own vertical jump and dunking ability, and has been helping athletes run faster, jump higher and improve overall physical performance for over a decade.  Dan has been a constant source of coach and athlete education in the last decade through his website and social media channels.

Today’s show is with strength coach, Graeme Morris.  Graeme is a performance coach that consults for a variety of team sport and combat athletes including world and Australian champions in Muay Thai. He is also the head strength and conditioning coach for the AFL umpires and has previously worked in rugby league for 6 seasons. Graeme has experience learning from many leading coaches, and has integrated it into a balance that he sees fit for his own training populations. There are so many topics in the world of sports performance in regards to speed and strength.  I often get a lot of questions on how I end up integrating much of it into a practical training session.  At the end of the day, seeing the art of how coaches take information, and use it practically with athletes helps tie the content in the many conversations I have together. On today’s show, Graeme takes us into his own integration of the two most common interests of performance coaches: Game-speed and strength/power development.  Graeme speaks on his usage of closed versus open agility work, and lateral speed development, linear speed, and “robust running” ideas for team sport players.  He also goes into his strength methods for athletes, how “specific” to get in the weight room, and particularly how he gets into various oscillatory strength methods to help his athletes maximize their power outputs, and finally, some ideas from training combat athletes. Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster and Lost Empire Herbs.  For 15% off your Lost Empire Herbs order, head to www.lostempireherbs.com/justfly View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage. Timestamps and Main Points 4:15 – Graeme’s mentors and influences on his sports performance philosophy 5:45 – Graeme’s take on closed vs. open agility training for his athlete populations 19:00 – Talking about linear speed drills, “switching”, mini-hurdles, and more in the development of speed for team sport athletes 27:45 – A discussion on working in small vs. open spaces and its impact on how an athlete’s muscle groups and energy systems are impacted 30:45 – How Graeme’s role as a strength coach fits into game speed, in respect to the coach’s technical/tactical plans for the team 35:15 – The story of “never go full Bosch” and Graeme’s approach to more “specific lifts” in the weightroom 40:30 – Where Graeme stands on the 1x20 lifting spectrum 43:00 – Graeme’s experience with oscillating lifting reps for a variety of athlete populations 58:00 – Working with Cal Dietz’s “reflexive trimetric” training method 1:04:00 – Core foot training movements that Graeme utilizes in his programming “If an athlete doesn’t have multiple tools to begin with; it’s hard to select the right tool… I look at shuffle positions, crossover step, basic backpedaling.  We are starting in a closed scenario, maybe resisted to slow it down a little more” “When you look on social media, you always see the best athletes…. It’s always great to see what people are doing online but they are always putting the most talented athlete; people are afraid to show the least talented” “When players reach where I am trying to get them to (from a linear speed perspective) then I will sprinkle in robust running methods… I find people will skip that initial step and go right into (robust running)” “I think you can get a lot of game speed in your technical/tactical drills” “In defense we are trying to take away space from the competition, in attack, we are trying to create space… you know these guys, you know they are not quick, but they always seem to have time on the field” “We need to have these drills that are executed at game speed, or above” “When you are working in a short space, that is going to put more stress on the calf, groin and glute area.  When you work in a more open space, that is going to put more stress on the hamstrings, and it’s often more aerobic” “It doesn’t take long to develop the strength that you are after; but developing speed with young athletes (is critical)” “Every day I was working on the farm, or playing sports, that was my original training mate” “85-90% of my training is proven methods, but I always like to experiment with the other 10%” “When my fighters are going into training camp, those eccentric loads are so high, I use oscillating training methods to freshen them up” “I use oscillating movements more for accessory movements at the end (of a workout) (i.e. start with banded hex bar deadlift, then go down to split squats for speed)” “I’ve used that on team sport scenarios where you have timed sets one day, you have oscillating movements on another day” “If you don’t have to run into brick walls, then you can use more of these oscillating movements (and less maximal strength)” “A lot of foot stuff will depend on how your hips move… I’ll probably address the hips first” Show Notes Cal Dietz’s Reflexive Tri-metrics https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aw6epBVpRYM   View this post on Instagram   A post shared by Graeme Morris (@graeme_morris) Graeme demonstrating a basic oscillating hop drill used as a warm up   View this post on Instagram   A post shared by Graeme Morris (@graeme_morris) About Graeme Morris Graeme Morris is a performance coach that consults for a variety of field based and combat athletes including world and Australian champions in Muay Thai. He is also the head strength and conditioning coach for the AFL umpires and has previously worked in rugby league for 6 seasons. He has a experience designing and implementing strength and power in the gym, as well as speed, agility and conditioning on the field.  Graeme holds a degree in Human Movement with Honours in Exercise Physiology, a Master’s degree in Strength and Conditioning and is a level 2 qualified Australian Strength and Conditioning Coach (ASCA).

Today’s show is with biomechanist Gary Ward.  Gary is the author of “What the Foot” and founder of “Anatomy in Motion” (as well as the “Wake Your Feet Up” and “Wake Your Body Up” courses).   Gary is known for solving unsolvable pain in minutes, not months, and his passion for the foot hugely influenced his interpretation of human movement. Gary’s foot wedges and training system have had a massive impact on my approach to training athletes in a single leg setting, and between Gary’s influence, and that of running coach Helen Hall (a student of Gary’s), my approach to gait, running and the foot is forever changed for the better.  Gary has been a previous 2x guest on this podcast, speaking on the topics of human movement principles, pronation, “duck feet” and much more. In my ever-running interest in the foot and lower leg, and its role in human movement, I have been very interested in the role of the rear-foot in the past few years.  Initially, I found that I was able to rid myself of plaguing Achilles tendon issues by mobilizing my calcaneus bone, which tuned me into the importance of looking beyond “foot stiffness” as a cover-all in lower leg performance.  From there, I’ve become increasingly more interested in the role of the rearfoot in not only injury prevention, but also athletic performance situations. On the show today, Gary Ward is back to take us on a deep dive into concepts of forefoot-rearfoot opposition and the role of the heel bone in pronation, supination and gait mechanics.  He’ll go into how a well-functioning rear-foot plays into the gait cycle, and how this also works with the ability to get into the ball of the foot well in athletic movements.  Gary will give some practical examples on how to check one’s rearfoot function, and we conclude the show getting into some nuts and bolts of squatting mechanics in light of 3D human movement. Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster and Lost Empire Herbs.  For 15% off your Lost Empire Herbs order, head to www.lostempireherbs.com/justfly View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage. Timestamps and Main Points 6:37 – A recap on foot opposition, and how the twisting and spiraling of the foot works into human movement 22:03 – Gary’s take on how rearfoot mobility and foot opposition plays into the ability to get to the ball of the foot well in athletic movement 37:39 – How pronation and supination changes as ground speeds increase from walking to sprinting 49:10 – How to check for limited range in the rear foot, and how to get the rearfoot moving 58:52 – How the body will compensate upstream if it is getting too much or too little movement in the foot 1:04:12 – How arch height in barbell squatting impacts the athletic result of a barbell lift, and if the arches should flatten in a barbell squat 1:10.09 – Squatting and effortlessness in human movement “The rearfoot is the calcaneus and the talus” “When the calcaneus moves down, the navicular moves up” “If there was a midfoot bone, I would say the cuboid is a midfoot bone… out of the 26 bones, we’ve got one midfoot bone.  Otherwise, what we are really looking at is the forefoot opposing the rearfoot, and it does it in all three planes” “The lowering of the arch is an opening of the joints at the base of the foot” “If you roll pressure towards the inside edge of the foot, then you will initiate an eversion in your rear foot, but if I take the 5th metatarsal head off the ground, then what you lose is the opposition” “There’s only one way to get the shin forward, and keep the heel on the ground for too long, and that’s to maintain a pronated foot position” “If your foot does not pronate at the time it is supposed to, then the body will continue to pronate the foot until it reaches the amount of pronation it needs” “You do need to get that (calcaneus) eversion to get into that toe rocker of the push-off phase” “The eversion you are looking for in the rearfoot, should happen the moment where you get the tripod on the ground” “The focus in the industry is always towards the stiffening side” “95% of the muscles in the foot are actually supinators, so we have to pronate in order to stimulate 95% of the muscles” “What interests me is not how much pronation, but the quality of the pronation… the quality of pronation will always be most optimal when the foot has a resting position of neutral, so everyone who does not have that resting position of neutral will always be compromised to some extent” “The pressure change when you pronate, will move anterior, and medial (forward and towards the big toe)” “Placing a finger, in front of the calcaneus in the back of the arch, you should feel pressure on that finger when someone bends the knee” “I get it nearly every week at least, people are in context with Achilles issues, Sever’s disease, bumps on the back of the heel and they are always on the level of the TCJ, and it’s simply too much talo-crural movement and not enough rear-foot accompaniment” “More length in the plantar fascia through better rearfoot movement is likely to take pressure off excess lengthening in the Achilles” “(With getting calcaneus movement) You can roll a sock up and place it in the back of the arch to see if they can compress it a little bit, it’s not about flattening it to the floor, it’s about “can I get more contact on it”” “What you’ll find is that the heavier the weight, the less pronation there is, the more there is a rapid, knees-in movement at the very bottom…. so you have this whole extensor chain is able to light up; the heavier you get, the more and more of a requirement that is” “Teach you to pronate, teach you to supinate, teach you to flex and extend your knees, teach you to anterior and posterior tilt your pelvis, make sure you can have a pronating leg and supinating leg, and go and experience that, and then go squat…. You need to continuously remind your body of how it should move” “Don’t you think the idea of a squat feeling effortless is overlooked”? “The 5th rule of movement is that the brain is hard-wired for perfection” Show Notes Calcaneus Tilt https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yulwH_9e21k High Jumper pronation video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7qIo_xOLqA Olympic lifter with inwards knee travel in squatting (see 3:00) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdY78tvKlxA Helen Hall COG video https://vimeo.com/244973290 About Gary Ward Gary Ward is the author of “What the Foot” and founder of “Anatomy in Motion” (as well as the “Wake Your Feet Up” and “Wake Your Body Up” courses).  He is known for bringing individuals out of pain when all other options had failed.  A former ski-boot fitter, Gary is known for solving unsolvable pain in minutes, not months.  His passion for the foot hugely influenced his interpretation of human movement. Increasingly sought after by all types of practitioners in the fitness and therapy industry, he teaches an evolution that start with the foot and results in whole body integrated movement solutions.