Functional Path Training

Developing Athletes

Ever since I started on this journey first as an athlete and then as a coach I was fascinated with what it took to develop and nurture the athlete. As a young athlete I saw some athletes develop and thrive and others stagnate and fall by the wayside. Why was this? I noticed that certain schools were always good in selected sports. I noticed that certain coaches, regardless of talent, year in and year out always produced top athletes and teams. Why was that? At that stage of the journey I must admit it was all somewhat mysterious to me, there did not seem to be a method behind what I was observing. I wanted to know why the things that I was seeing were occurring.

Those questions started me on a quest; some would call it an odyssey to find answers. I knew that there had to be more to it than I was seeing and experiencing. When I began coaching I noticed the same things I had seen as an athlete. Some athletes thrived, some just barely survived and many fell by the wayside. Now that my perspective was broader not only did I see schools continue to develop talent but also nations. It quickly became clear that athletic excellence was something that could be systematically nurtured and developed. So, I began to look around the US and then around the world, I started looking for big things, commonalities; just like everyone I was trying to find the secret. I quickly realized there was and is no secret. I did start to see patterns and common threads though. Little did I know that I was working in a system that was doing exactly what I was searching elsewhere for. I literally could not see the forest for the trees, the answer was right in front of me.

When I started coaching and teaching in 1969 that was probably the apogee of sport development in the United States. We were the preeminent sporting nation in the world as evidenced by the dominant performances at the 1968 Olympic games. There was mandatory daily physical education taught by trained educators. Sport was centered in the schools and coached by trained coaches. Sport at all levels was part of the educational system. In the elementary and junior high schools there were afterschool sports programs that featured participation over winning. By the mid to late 1970’s all this began to unravel. Mandatory Kindergarten through twelfth grade daily physical education was dropped. Physical education as an academic discipline in colleges and universities was deemed not academic enough and physical education programs were dropped or the curriculum was changed to sport or exercise science. The mission of training physical education teachers and coaches was severely compromised.

All of this coincided with the ascendency of the GDR and the Soviet Union in the 1960’s and their dominating performances in the 1976 and 1980 Olympic games. They began to beat the US in sports where we had traditionally been strong. So we started looking at what they were doing and tried to copy it. This was somewhat of a knee jerk reaction. What we failed to take into account as we blindly copied their system was the cradle to grave control, they had over their athletes due to the communist system. Frankly the methods and ideas those countries used became an infatuation for many. Little did we know that our system, what some people derisively called a non-system as it had existed was probably superior. It would take the fall of the wall and the decline of the eastern bloc for us to understand that their system was not everything it was made out to be.

I write all of this to set the stage for the goal of this book. It is quite straight forward – to define the process of developing athletes and in parallel coaches’ development from the beginning stages to the podium and beyond because it is my contention that the two must go hand in glove. It is a journey, a process, not a clearly defined model as many would like to portray it. There are landmarks that must be achieved along the way but there are not definite time parameters; it is not a straight line. The athlete and coach are part of the socio-cultural milieu so they reflect the society they exist in. There are many realities today that face the developing athlete that were not a factor forty or fifty years ago. I will take a historical look at the various athlete development systems to see what we can learn from them. I will then outline a process of athlete development designed to meet the current reality of sport in the 21^st century and all the challenges that are entailed. It is a dynamic process that requires continual learning. Thanks for joining me in this journey as we learn together to develop the best athletes and coaches possible.

Food for Thought?

When you are planning your training program or evaluating your program, I have found it very helpful to ask the following simple and very basic questions:

Strong for What?

Fast for What?

Fit for What?

Supple for What?

Drill for What?

Ultimately, what are you training for?

Finding the Edge

It is so tempting to just do what you are good at in training and to neglect the other things that you need to do to make significant improvement. It is so easy to rationalize away and then have it come back to haunt you when you need those other things the most. If you spend all your time on what you are good at then how do you get better? Somewhere you have to find that edge, a sweet spot where you can balance strengths and weaknesses in order to make incremental progress toward a goal. It is pushing the envelope to get out of your comfort zone. It has become fashionable to advise the athlete to get comfortable with being uncomfortable all the time. That is fine as far as it will take you. For me that smells too much like grit and mental strength, two terms that I am not enamored with. It requires intent and purpose for each session, it is more than that just doing it. You have a well-articulated plan that is grounded in fundamentals. Execute the plan, constantly evaluate and revise the plan as necessary. Recognize that progress is not linear and sometimes there will be setbacks, but with a clear plan, a setback will be a marker to gauge where you are. The key is to push yourself continually to find the edge that will make a difference.

Systematic Sport Development

Sport systems have always fascinated me, even before I started coaching. When I was in college, we played the great San Diego State Football teams coached by Don Coryell. It was obvious they had a system and played to that system and recruited players for that system. My junior year in college we had a clinic at Fresno State and the defensive line coach at San Diego State, John Madden, was the featured speaker. He gave insights into the system, how he selected players for the positions and what he did to develop them. Needless to say, that confirmed what I had seen on film and on the field, it left a deep impression on me of the need to have a system if you wanted to have sustained excellence.

At the same time, I watched Bud Winter’s great San Jose State track teams. The knock on them was they had talent, so it didn’t matter what they did. Nothing could be further from the truth. Bud Winter took that talent and refined it and developed it through a well-defined system. The lesson here to me as a young coach once again that even if you have talent it is only through a system can you maximize that talent.

My next exposure to a systematic approach to athlete development was the Bowerman system at University of Oregon. I would say that this had the biggest influence on my subsequent coaching regardless of the sport.

In 1969 when I stared coaching, I was interested in developing my own system that was eclectic or if you will a hybrid of the systems that I could study and that I had seen firsthand. The more I studied and observed I could see that consistent performance was a product of some kind of a system. Sometimes very rigid and clearly defined and other times less structured. The proof was always in the pudding. Systems beat chaos. Systems with talent produced repeatable sustained excellence.

52 years later I am still enamored by systems. I have developed and refined my system over the years. It has been a process. A system lends order and structure to enable the coach and athlete to focus on the process. A viable system is not rigid and confining, instead it is organic and liberating. It provides a framework to build on. They system was always designed to fit the athlete, not the other way around. The system revolves around a well-articulated philosophy and clear core beliefs that everyone lives by. If those core beliefs are not well articulated and practiced, you have no system

I urge you to take a look at your system and other systems. What can you learn from others? What are you doing well? What can you do better?

LTAD is Becoming Cliché

Let’s look at where we have been over the past seventy years. What has changed? Society has changed immensely; youth sport has become commercialized. There is no longer mandatory physical education in the schools. Then and now child development does not follow a neat linear progression, so-called windows of opportunity for development of various physical is a myth, sport development is all over the place, youth phenoms rarely turn out to be senior champions. We need to stop following recycled eastern European so called LTAD models. They were developed for a different society in a different era. We need to put a concerted effort to get mandatory daily physical education back in the schools, not just for sport development but for general health. Physical education will provide the physical literacy and movement skills base that are foundations for specific sport skills. Let’s stop following the flock, think critically and recognize the current socio-cultural milieu in America and come up with a workable framework that fits our society and current reality. We can do it!

Sports Biometric Data – The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Last week I attended the second annual Sports Biometrics conference in San Francisco, it was a good conference with very good information and challenging ideas. I also attended in 2016. Last year my general impression from the presentations and my interaction with the attendees was that data was king, it seemed that everyone was enamored by what could be measured and how. It was as if there was to measure everything that could be measured and then some. This year I detected a slightly different tone. It seemed that some of the presenters and in talking to the delegates that there was degree of skepticism and questioning about the how the data was being used and even in some cases the value of certain biometric measures

Here is my take on the use and value of biometric data in sport after attending the conference for two years and experiencing this up close. It is very exciting to me to think that we can measure and monitor physical properties that we once dreamed about measuring, that is the good. For me the issue is being able to take the data and be able to turn it into actions the coach can use. Is the data meaningful and actionable? Just because we can measure it does not make it meaningful. What about accuracy and validation of the algorithms that are used to deliver the information? So much of the technology is not validated. There needs to be an independent body that can vet the technology and the algorithms. Another issue I see more frequently is: Where is the sport coach in this process? Ultimately it is the coach who turns the data into action, so why aren’t coaches more involved in the process.

Perhaps this will stimulate discussion and help achieve some clarity

GAIN X – Short but Spectacular

As one who is not given to hyperbole GAIN was too short but it sure was spectacular, it was easily the best we have ever had. After ten years, we don’t have it figured out but we sure are on our way. GAIN is not a conference, it is an event, an event that is meant facilitate networking and building a community of professionals who will question and challenge each other to be the best. It directed in four prongs 1) Athletic Development 2) Sport Coaching 3) Sports Medicine/Rehabilitation 4) Physical Education with the goal to foster communication and sharing between these disciplines.

So many people have gone into making GAIN what it is today. I want to recognize them with a special thank you

Melissa Gambetta (My Wife) – The brains behind the operation, the person who does all the hard stuff to make it run smoothly

Ed Ryan who graciously gives up his time each year out of his busy schedule to do the onsite operations

Tommy McHugh AKA Tommy Tech who does all the filming, manages the web page and his dad Patrick McHugh who helps him

Rice University Men’s Track & Field who are our on-campus sponsor, specifically Brek Christensen, assistant coach.

The GAIN Originals (Still Coming to GAIN) 

 

 

Tove Shere

Adam Moss

Bill Knowles

Steve Myrland

Greg Thompson

Patrick McHugh

Phil Bazzini

Joe Przytula

The Faculty

 

Wade Gilbert, professor in the Department of Kinesiology at California State University, Fresno. Dr. Gilbert's areas of expertise include coaching effectiveness, talent development, and sport psychology. Editor - International Sport Coaching Journal | Consultant - USOC Coaching Education.

Michael Joyner MD, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. He has done extensive work in Physiology of Elite Athletes. Elite athletic performances are experiments in nature on the limits of human physiology. Dr. Joyner uses data from real-world competitions to understand the limits of human physiology. 

John Pryor, Former conditioning coach Japan Rugby, now the conditioning coach for Suntory Rugby, Brumbies in Super Rugby and Fiji.

Jim Radcliffe, Head S&C Coach University of Oregon, a pioneer and a true master of the profession.

Martin Bingisser, HMMR Media, Swiss National Hammer Throw Coach

Nick Garcia, Athletic Development Coach & Assistant Track Coach, Notre Dame High School, Sherman Oaks, California

Steve Magness, Head Cross Country and Assistant Track Coach University of Houston

Bill Knowles, ATC Philadelphia Union Academy and HP Sports. Pioneer in reconditioning and return to play.

Ed Ryan, ATC Head Trainer US Women’s Olympic Basketball Team, Formerly Head of Sports Medicine at USOC

Randy Ballard, , ATC , Director of Integrated Performance, University of Illinois

Joe Przytula, ATC Supervisor of Physical Education and Health, and athletic trainer with Elizabeth Public Schools, Elizabeth New Jersey USA.

Greg Thompson, Elementary Physical Education Teacher Farmington Michigan, Currently Athletic Development and Age Group Head Coach, Livonia City Soccer Club

Steve Myrland, District Performance Coach for Athletics, District Wellness Director Middleton Wisconsin School District

Our Partners

Their generosity makes it possible to have the quality faculty we have.

1080 Motion - http://1080motion.com/ makes of 1080 Sprint and 1080 Quantum

Bridge Athletic - https://bridgeathletic.com/ makes of Bridge training management software

Lane Gainer - http://lanegainer.com/ makes of the famous Bullet Belt

GAIN Swimming - September16 to 18, 2016

Coaching Athletic Development for Swimming - Design to Implementation

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Are you interested in being challenged as coach to make your swimmers better? Would you like to learn how to systematically make your athletes stronger and keep them injury free? If so, GAIN Swimming network can help.

GAIN is an acronym for Gambetta Athletic Improvement Network; this network was formed in 2008 to connect professionals to facilitate learning and sharing of ideas. Due to the success achieved working with swim coaches and clubs we are now creating a network specifically devoted to swimming with an emphasis on preparation of the total swimming athlete.

The objective is to provide an educational experience that will significantly advance each coach’s expertise by sharing information with other professionals in a setting that encourages an open exchange of ideas. It will be a workshop format consisting of a mixture of lecture, discussions, hot topic panels, practical learn by doing participation and demonstration. If you are sincerely interested in advancing your professional development apply now.

Date & Site

September 16 - 18, 2016 Carmel Swim Club, Carmel Indiana

Benefits

Access to GAIN Swimming Forum on secure web page ($250 Yearly membership fee included in tuition)

Access to GAIN Library including videos of past GAIN Conferences

Cost of Attendance

$1200 for three coaches plus $100 for each additional coach

Register

Enrollment limited. Go to selection labeled open to new members.

https://www.teamunify.com/MemRegStart.jsp?team=incsc&event_id=673958

Deadline for registration is September 1 - Enrollment Limited

For Further Information

Please call or email Vern Gambetta at 941-378-1778 or email at [email protected]

The Faculty

Our faculty is experienced professionals who have been in the trenches working in the field of athletic development for swimming.

Vern Gambetta - Founder of GAIN Network

Chris Plumb - Chris Plumb is the Head Coach/CEO of Carmel Swim Club.

Ian Murray - Associate Head Coach of Carmel Swim Club

Chris Webb - Head coach of the Fort Collins Area Swim Team in Colorado. 

Randy Ballard - Associate Athletics Director for Sports Medicine and Integrated Performance at the University of Illinois

Steve Myrland – District Performance Coach for Athletics and Wellness Director Middleton Wisconsin School District

Topics

Concepts of Dryland Training (Vern Gambetta)

8 to 18 Age Group Progressions in Athletic Development (Ian Murray)

Assessing Physical Competency – Trainability for Swimming – Theory & Practice (Randy Ballard)

Stick Mobility (Learn By Doing) (Steve Myrland)

Strap Strength & Stability (Learn By Doing) (Steve Myrland)

Integrating Dryland Training with Swim Training (Chris Plumb)

Warm-up to Swim (Chris Webb)

Strength Training (Vern Gambetta & Chris Plumb)

Weight Room Without Walls – Getting Stronger on Pool deck (Vern Gambetta)

Equipment & Facilities (Vern Gambetta)

Schedule

Friday September 16

1:00 to 3:00 - Registration

3:00 to 5:00 - Afternoon Session

Concepts of Dryland Training (Vern Gambetta)

5:30 to 7:00 - Dinner

7:00 to 9:00 - Evening Session

         Integrating Dryland Training with Swim Training (Chris Plumb)

Saturday September 17

7:00 to 9:00 - Early Morning - Observation of Carmel Dryland Training

Senior Group Followed by Age Group

9:00 to 10:00 – Breakfast

10:00 to 10:45 - Stick Mobility (Learn By Doing) (Steve Myrland)

10:45 -11:00 - Break

11:00 to 12:30 - Assessing Physical Competency – Trainability for Swimming – Theory & Practice (Randy Ballard)

12:30 to 2:00 – Lunch

2:00 to 3:30 - Age Group Progressions in Athletic Development (Ian Murray)

3:30 to 3:45 - Break

3:45 to 4:45 - Strap Strength & Stability (Learn By Doing) (Steve Myrland)

4:45 to 5:30 - Weight Room Without Walls (Getting Stronger on Deck)

5:30 – 7:00 – Dinner

7:30 – 9:00 – Panel Discussion/Q&A

Sunday September 18

8:30 to 9:30 – Warm-up to Swim (Chris Webb)

9:30 to 9:45 - Break

9:45 to 12:45 - Strength Training (Vern Gambetta, Chris Plumb & Chris Webb)

Selecting Exercises

Coaching Points & Execution

Male Female Differences in Adaptation

Designing Workouts

Weekly (Microcycle) Structure

Yearly Plan – Short Course & Long Course

         12:45 to 1:30 – Wrap-up

Trade-offs

An effective training program demands constant trade-offs. Every component of training cannot receive equal emphases. If one component is emphasized then another must be de-emphasized. Good training is often compared to a mosaic but in my mind that is much too static, it is more like a kaleidoscope, ever changing in a state of dynamic equilibrium. It is so much more than balancing volume, intensity and density as it is often portrayed. It is actually careful consideration of the interaction of all training components while minding that all components of training should be trained at all times in different proportions. The trade-offs, the mix if you will, changes as the athlete accumulates training day to day, week to week to week, month to month and year to year and must be adjusted accordingly to insure continued adaptation. Carefully consider the trade-offs. Weigh the cost benefit analysis relative to each trade off and relative to the short and long term goals of the training program. There is a firm foundation for all this in scientific training principles but ultimately it requires a heavy dose of coach’s intuition and knowledge of the athlete. No formula or algorithm, just constant adjustment and fine tuning.

Musing on Athletic Excellence

Athletic excellence and coaching excellence have been fascinations of mine since I was a young athlete. During the course of my career I have been fortunate to train with, observe and coach some great athletes in both individual and team sports. I have also been able to work with and closely observe some great coaches. In this post I will share my thoughts on athletic excellence and in another post my thoughts on coaching excellence. There is some obvious overlap between athletic excellence and coaching excellence.

Talent and Ability – You can argue what talent and ability are but regardless of how you define them they are a must. The truly excellent athletes make the most of their ability. Sometimes they may not have the most ability but they find ways to exploit what they have to the maximum.

Mindset – Mindset is the current buzzword, 45 years ago I had no idea what it was called, but every great athlete that I have seen has had a growth mindset and the commensurate grit. They are always focused on possibilities. Never fixed in their thinking.

Focus – Athletic excellence demands a laser like focus on the task at hand. No distractions.

Dedication – This is a given and goes along with focus. They know what they have to do and are willing to make the sacrifices to achieve that.

Routine – This is the difference maker. Routine! Routine! Routine! The great ones have training and practice routines that border on ritual. I think this serves as a psychological anchor, a point of reference that gives them a sense a security

Resilience – They have the ability to bounce back from failure or setbacks, learn from it and internalize the lesson to get better.

Lifestyle – An athlete for 24 hours not just the hours of training or competition. It is not possible to be a chump off the field and a champ on the field.

Consistency - The great athlete is consistent, the lows are not too low and the highs are not too high. They operate on an even keel. In other words you know what you are going to get they show up everyday. The spectacular comes from the consistency in training and competition.

Eye on the Prize – Focus on the goal at all times. The goals guide them like a beacon in a storm. The goals keep them on course.

Know Their Strengths – They are acutely aware of their strengths and train and compete to their strength. Over time they have the ability to bring their weaknesses up to the level of their strengths.

Risk – Willing to take calculated risks and occasionally push the envelope. You be willing to risk(not wreckless) to be the best. This demands that they are comfortable with being uncomfortable all the time.

Athletic Intelligence – The great athlete possess an high athletic IQ. They know their bodies; they know when to push and when to back off. They understand their sport. They may not be able to articulate it but they show it in everything they do in training and competition.

There is no doubt more, but these are the qualities that stand out for me.