Day 1 Movement Compensation Screen

So I found myself back at Brunel University just a couple of weeks after passing my BWL L1 Coach qualification. This time I was there for a 4 day S&amp;C course with Elite Performance Institute.

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Having been warmly greeted by both ..

Shane Cahill - From a professional rugby back ground and had booked me onto the course.

and

Karl Gilligan - Had been involved with IRFU, Leinster Rugby and has worked with elite athletes and players was our course tutor.

.. I went into the classroom to find a mass of testosterone - 21 guys, myself and my new girl buddy, Emma.

Hey I am NOT complaining!!

Karl took us through the back ground of his company and his experience.

With all these people I wondered how diluted the information might get to be honest but Shane and Ross we also available to answer questions as we went into the athletics centre.

We observed Karl’s methodology of body fat screening then one by one we all had a go at the vertical jump test. This was when the competitive nature of people started to come out but it was friendly and fun.

I scored a measly 26.3 but was not the lowest

Next he demonstrated functional movement screens and movement compensation screens one by one which we then practiced using a score sheet. This was the section I was concerned about to be honest.

However Karl mentioned research where appropriate and was open about subjectivity too which was refreshing and a comfort about his integrity.

For an S&amp;C coach working with teams or larger groups of people I feel this is great way to identify those at high risk or with limitations. As a Biomechanics Coach™ I would then want to assess those at higher risk to have more objectivity in WHY they failed those tests.

We scored each other and practiced then started looking at range of movement tests that Karl correlated to the movement screens. Thus giving the group an insight into one method of assessing a group of athletes for risk of injury and reduced performance.

Obviously with my experience I have a method of screening clients that differs but I can see these methods working in different settings like this.

For example I cannot perform 27 screens on a football team of 25 players in the space of less than 3hrs, which might be the MOST time I have with them in a session.

BUT

With both of these skill sets available to me I can

a). Assess a large group initially to identify the big risk guys

b). Refer these high risk guys for the fuller screen

c). Utilise different methodologies for the different circumstances or for a fuller understanding of limitations.

Finally he took us through the ‘corrective’ exercise section which had some similarity to certain sections of iMoveFreely® type exercises. But again iMoveFreely® is a more specific system that is more in depth because we deliver it one to one therefore have more time.

Considered doing a gym session at the end of the day but was aware we had speed and agility training tomorrow so decided against it.

So at the end of day 1;

The REALLY cool part was all of the people around me are all a ‘type’ of person. We all;

Enjoy training

Enjoy learning

Have a certain level of confidence

Are happy to interact and share

Are supportive

Are motivational

Inspired each other

It reminds me what it might be like for MY learners and so feels a great to be able to empathise.

However it also reminded me how bad my school education was, or at least that the timing was not right for me, because it was no where near as much fun as this!

So ready for tomorrows speed and agility training!!

Better eat and rest …….

Day 2 Linear Speed &amp; Agility

Ok so by mid morning I was REALLY glad I hadn’t done a gym session last night.

The gang arrived and settled for a lecture on acceleration biomechanics. Looking at sprinters start position, tibia angles and back angles, arm drive, the height of foot.

This was really interesting for me as a specialist in intrinsic biomechanics considering what I would do with nerve tension to improve speed.

Would LOVE to do some sessions with sprinters and utilise timer gates and nerve mobilisations on random sessions to see how this influenced the athletes speed.

We were all asked to get into groups and for one of us to deliver a warm up specific to some linear speed training. So I worked with my new buddies Nathan, Cameron and Gift.

Next up was;

Mike McGurn (world class S&amp;C coach for 15yrs, also consulted with Man Utd)

WOW!

This guys was an amazing coach.

He took us through a fantastic R.A.M.P warm up - you have to do the course to find out what that looks like but I LOVED moving, raising my heart rate and feeling those endorphins at last!

Soon we were filming each others speed mechanics drills, agility training, sled pulling and viper band work, all stuff I have NEVER EVER done

I don’t think I have a single fast twitch fibre in my body!

But it did begin to feel better and everyone LOOKED better by the end of the session.

Lunch time was a welcome break from what we had done for most of the morning. I found myself sharing a lunch table with;

Davy McGregor from Era-Fit who had also played rugby for London Irish.

He had donated all of the equipment we had been using.

Was tough being surrounded by all of these rugby players ! ;)

The afternoon was all about multi directional speed work.

People started dropping out during the afternoon due to fatigue. My concern was my missing ACL but I kept having ago at the less ‘twisty’ one.

By 5pm there were just 8 of the 23 taking part in the super physical games.

LOVED it though!

The designing of games to play for sports conditioning was so much fun

Those of you who saw the video of me on the trampoline somersaulting into a sponge pool know what a big kid I am!

As a group we were attentive, cheering, encouraging and generally buzzing all day. It felt a bit like an adults sports day!

Oh boy I was ready for food and bed!!

Day 3 Clean &amp; Jerk

So I woke feeling ok consider what we were put through yesterday. I was just a tiny little bit tender but nothing debilitating.

I was super excited about today as it was clean and jerk day with technical application and starting to look at skills work.

Going through the break down of the clean positions was extremely helpful yet again - I am learning you cannot go over this TOO much because there is always something to work on.

Lecture first, then practical and in my little group (4 guys Johnny, James, Lawrence, John and me) we discussed the technicality of the skills we were practicing, observed each other and coached each other into positions. We were a really mixed group of levels from completely novice, with no mobility and wearing trainers to qualified weight lifting coaches in lifting shoes, getting full range A2G and yet we were all critiqued positively and were super helpful to each other with no egos and ALOT of fun and banter.

Lunchtime was upon us surprisingly quickly but we all needed FOOD.

Back to a short lecture and more practical work all afternoon.

What a great day that was over far too quickly!

We just

lifted

coached

lifted

coached

lifted

coached

the clean and jerk

SUDDENELY it was 5pm BOOOOOOOOOOOO!!

Guess…..?

YUP Food and bed!

Day 4 Plyometrics, Energy Systems and Periodisation

The gang piled in walking slowly with various limp patterns due to the DOMS they were suffering. Mine wasn't too bad but I hadn't got the testosterone pouring round my body making me compete with everyone else like some of these guys - you know who you are (Boris &amp; Tom) !

The first lecture was all about identifying energy systems and how they contribute to our needs analysis. We looked at programming for strength and speed etc using this information and how to consider programming for adaption.

After lunch we had our antioxidants measured by a company with a BioPhotonic Scanner just as a little bonus. This was fascinatingly presented by a physio who explained it tests you to a cellular level of roughly the last 6 weeks and how many carotenoids you have. The usual blood test would be influenced by you last meal which is why they are not as accurate and require you to be fasted.

So this scanner is basically telling you your risk is of disease and whether you need to consume better food and eat more fruit and veggies for example.

Now while this is only a baseline scanner measuring you to the nearest thousand carotenoids it does identify if you, your clients or athletes are below what the expected level of carotenoids should be and therefore at risk of;

Heart disease

Degenerative disease

Reduced performance

Injury

and so on…

Apparently you can hire this machine for a month to test all of your clients <a href="http://www.whybioscan.com"target="_blank">www.whybioscan.com</a>

Anyway this is how we SHOULD measure

Average person 40,000

Elite level 50,000

BUT

When they tested over 18 million people (think it was more than that actually) they found most of the population are around 28,000!!

One guy on the course was only 17,000!!

As we each got tested it was funny how we all started to make excuses about our diets recently, me included! Having had xmas in the last 6 weeks AND surviving on hotel and pub food for the last 4 days I didn’t hold out much hope for my result.

I stepped up placed the other edge of my palm on the little light and rested the flat of my palm around the scanner. The dial started to climb……

My score?

80,000 carotenoids!

C’MON - Happy with that - being a massive fan of raw veggie and having a sushi addiction clearly help my carotenoids!

Next we were back on the track doing plyometrics - tucks, high jumps, long jumps, long jumps throwing a medicine ball, hurdles and then with all this information we were writing programmes for golfers, periodising considerations over 12 months using a linear model.

Fascinating but I was simply so shattered my brain started to shut down during the last lecture. My attention span is so short anyway and after such a mass of information going in over the last 4 days I had to be lead by the guys in my group (Thanks you Gift, Lee, Tom &amp; Joe) when it come to the final tasks.

Then we were done!

We had a group photo, collected our certificates and hugged each other goodbye having bonded so much over the 4 days of learning, moving, being challenged, discussing, coaching, helping, supporting and having fun together. We are of course now all Facebook buddies!

Overall this was a fantastic experience, a lot of information over a short space of time and delivered by an extremely experienced and knowledgable professional who answered every single question really well.

Thanks also to Shane, Ross, Lee and Mikey all of whom couldn't have been more helpful.