Functional Path Training

Tokyo Olympics in the Rear View Mirror

Well, the 2021 Olympics are in the books. It was an Olympics like no other. Great performances, disappointing performances, surprising performances, great upsets, in short just about everything you want to see in an athletic contest. But something was missing for me, and it wasn’t spectators. The magic, the passion that has been ignited in me by the Olympics just wasn’t there. I think the added year dragging it out was part of the malaise that I felt. I had skin in the game, our swimmer from the Sarasota Sharks won a silver medal, an outstanding accomplishment in one of the toughest events in swimming. The extra year was to her benefit, but for many others it was too much mentally and physically.

I do think we need to rethink the Olympic games. For sure to downsize it would be a good place to start. Now we are looking at three years preparation rather than four. This presents interesting challenges. Over the next months I will be posting more on lessons learned from the games. Questions that have been raised. We can’t let this unique learning opportunity pass.

Reflection and Thank You

In the coaching profession it is said that the measure of a coach is the ability to have their athlete or team ready on the day. I can’t say enough about the job coach Brent Arckey did getting Emma Wyant ready for the 400 IM at Olympic Trials. Not only did she win but also swam a lifetime best – that is being ready on the day! I am thankful to Brent to having me work with Emma and being able to make my small contribution. As an old guy I could not help but reflect on how fortunate I have been able to work with coaches like Brent and athletes like Emma throughout my career. A special thanks to Emma for bring so much joy to this old man, you are special and will go far in life.

After the race I was thinking about Nort Thornton, who passed away this spring and how much he would have enjoyed Emma’s race. Nort had a huge influence on what I do with swimming dry land and my ideas about training in general. I miss our phone conversations. I am sure Jack Simon was watching from his retirement home in México, but Jack was the one who got me interested in swimming close to fifty years ago.

Another great coach that I was thinking about was as I watched USC perform at the NCAA track meet was the late Tony Wells. USC’s performance had Tony Wells written all over it. Carol Smith Gilbert was coached by Tony and mentored by him. What a tribute to a great man and coach. I sure miss picking Tony’s brain about sprints and hurdles. We had some great times teaching at development camps in the 1980’s.

Coaching is special. It has never been a job for me. I just am so thankful to be able to still keep at it. ONWARD AND UPWARD!

Brave Enough by Jesse Diggins

I have always been an an avid reader of coaches and athletes’ biographies. Each biography gave me insights into what that athlete tick. How they approached training. How they got into their sport. How they were coached. There is so much to learn  from the experiences of others on the journey to achieve the pinnacle of sport performance. Brave Enough by Jesse Diggins in one of the best I have read in a long time. Her candor is refreshing. She shares her battle with bulimia which makes the book invaluable in itself. Great insights into training and team dynamics with female athletes. Regardless of what sport you coach this is a must read.

My Learning Milestones

I have been thinking lately on who and what shaped and influenced my ideas over the years. It has been a process of searching for knowledge to get better at getting better. These reflections make me realize how fortunate I have been in my life to be in the right place at the right time. The foundations for this journey was laid by my parents and the education I received in parochial elementary and high school where we were taught to think. It goes without saying that the athletes and colleagues I have been able to work with were also a constant source of learning for me.

Theory of Track & Field class at Fresno State senior year spring of 1968 taught by Red Estes, who was assistant track coach at Fresno State. We had to show proficiency in each event and develop a training program for each event. The textbook was Modern Track & Field by Ken Doherty. Red lent me all the back issues Track Technique and Run/Run/Run by Fred Wilt which set me on the right path.

Fresno State Track & Field Clinic, January 1968 with Bill Bowerman, University of Oregon and Ken Shannon, assistant coach at UCLA. What a way to start a career. After hearing these two coaches for two days there was no doubt in my mind that I would be a track coach. Fifty plus year later I can close my eyes and hear Bowerman’s words and see Shannon film of pole vault training.

Theory of Basketball class at Fresno State senior year spring of 1968 taught by head coach, Ed Gregory. Coach Gregory went on the scout for many years with the Warriors. We had to scout and prepare a scouting report on a high school game and college game. I chose Fresno city college versus Pasadena City College coached by Jerry Tarkanian. After that game my head was spinning watching the speed that Pasadena played and their tenacious 1:2:2 zone defense. A preview of thing to come at UNLV years later. We also had to develop our own training system and playbook.

Foundations of Conditioning fall 1968 at UCSB. The class was taught by Sherm Button. Our class project was a year long training program for your sport. It really forced me analyze and think why I was doing what I was doing. I still have it.  Sherm was a great teacher and a mentor for me.

MTSAC Track & Field Clinic February 1970. This was an annual clinic attended by over 300 coaches. This was the first time I heard Tom Tellez speak; I became a disciple. He recommended two books that really opened my eyes – Mechanics of Athletics by Geoff Dyson and Science of Swimming by Doc Councilman. Arne Nytro, from Norway coach of Terje Pedersen, first man to throw 300’ in Javelin, he also spoke on distance training also presented. He was a generalist, which left a huge impression on me and forged my philosophy of specializing in being generalist.

1972 Olympic Trials and Clinic. During the Olympic Trials each morning there was a clinic on all the events presented by top coaches. A chance to network and meet other coaches and share ideas.

July 1972 AAU Learn by Doing Clinic in Sacramento. Organized by Fred Wilt. It lasted six days beginning at 8:00 in the morning going until 9:00 at night. The days were devoted to learning by doing at stations taught by top coaches. Evenings consisted of lectures, the first two nights were by Tom Ecker on biomechanics and last three nights by Tadeusz Starzynski, coach of Joseph Schmidt two-time gold medal winner in triple jump. His lectures were two hours with simultaneous translation from polish. They were amazing, extensive use of 16mm film of training exercises. No heavy weights, a lot of what a we today call coordination. Really opened my eyes. In addition, the interaction with the coaches who attended was tremendous. It was a who’s who of anybody and everybody who did anything in coaching for the next forty years.

Track & Field Omnibook by Ken Doherty – First Edition. This was an update on his previous books all assembled under one cover. I still go back through this book once a year. It is so rich in information that is timeless.

Grad School at Stanford 1973-74 was in many ways a dream come true. Just to be at Stanford and the people that was able to access was amazing. There was also a dance master’s program and having classes with them opened my eyes to new vistas in movement, all of sudden rhythm and tempo became part of my coaching repertoire. In addition, I coached the jumps and decathlon. I don’t know if it was an aha ha or aha shit moment before the first meet when I realized that a year before I was coaching La Cumbre Junior high school and now I was coaching in the Pac Eight.

UC Berkeley Exercise Physiology seminar in January 1974. The speakers were a who’s who of anybody who had done anything of significance in exercise physiology to the that time. The headline presenter was Per Olaf Astrand, a true iconic figure in the field. Needless to say, it was eye opening, educational and challenging. There were over three hundred people there, only a handful of whom were coaches. I felt it gave me an edge in training my athletes because I had learned cutting edge information from the best.

1976 Olympic Games – I was able to attend the Montreal games. I got there a few days before the start of track and field. I would go to the practice/warm-up track, arrive at 7:30 am and leave at 7:00 pm. I did not want to miss anything. It was an education. Seeing Juantorena go through a session. Seeing the East Germans for the first time. Trying to hear what the coaches were saying. It was an unforgettable and formative experience for me. You can learn so much by watching.

1978 Commonwealth Games Scientific Congress in Edmonton. First time hearing Frank Dick present. There were many good opportunities to interact with speakers and delegates. Certainly, another good learning experience.

1978 I became editor of Track Technique, at the time the premier technical journal in track and field. This gave me access to a worldwide network of coaches, athletes and scientists. The information that I received was priceless. Some was published in Track Technique, but much was material I used in my coaching and is still in my library. I was able to get TAC to make Track Technique the National Governing body technical journal. I was removed for the editorship because of my outspoken stance of the drug abuse in track & field.

Shriners Hospital in San Francisco biomechanics lab with John Hagy. From 1977 to 81 I got exposed to film analysis, EMG and use of force platform. Was able to do research on my athletes as they were used as “normal” subjects in some landmark gait studies.

Visit with Tom Tellez at University of Houston in January 1982. After a conversation at a convention in December Tom invited to spend three days in Houston. During those three days he took me through his technical model for every event. We studied film of each event. He went through cues for each event. We probably spent twelve hours a day going over every detail. I watched workouts with Carl Lewis and Tom talked me through what they were doing. It was an education. It got me back on a simpler path, I was making things too complicated and confusing my athletes. My athletes saw immediate progress from the lessons I learned. As a team we finished second at nationals and had two individual national champions. I still apply the lessons I learned then.

Project Gold leading into 1984 Olympic Games. Worked with Anne “Betty” Attwater and Ralph Mann on biomechanical analysis of sprints and hurdles. During this project getting to know Mel Rosen, Coach at Auburn and Ed Temple coach of the famous Tigerbelles and listen them talk about sprinting and training was a priceless experience. They weren’t the loudest voices in the room, but when they spoke you listened. They may not have been scientific, but they were oh so wise.

Meeting Dr. Lois Klatt head of performance lab Concordia University in River Forest Illinois. A lady way ahead of here time. Lois made me understand three planes of motion and importance of training movements not muscles and multi joint actions. The work with her was a seminal moment in my career. I now looked at movement, training and rehab with new eyes.

ASMI Pitching research with Dr Chuck Dillman and later with Glen Fleisig. I had known Chuck from when he was with USOC. It was very special experience to be on the ground floor of this research. Chuck came and met with our pitching coaches (White Sox) and asked them what they needed to know. That was why he was such a special sport scientist, His approach spoiled me. We are able to have the majority of our pitchers from 1987 to 1996 filmed and analyzed during my time with the White Sox. It helped me to clearly define what we needed to do in training. We had significant reduction in injuries as a result.

Starting Building & Rebuilding the Athlete seminar in 1992. Putting everything together in a systematic manner that I could teach in a sixteen-hour seminar. I taught this periodically until spring of 2005

First visit to Australia 1996 and the AIS in its heyday and John Pryor and Mark Andrews at Sydney academy of sport. Subsequently I have been to Australia thirteen more times and each trip has been an amazing learning experience working with great coaches and applied sport scientists.

Starting GAIN in 2007. GAIN is a community of professionals for professional development. At this stage of my career this now become my focus. It is an incredible learning community that inspires me every day and challenges me to keep learning and leading. If you have a passion for leaning, please join us https://thegainnetwork.com/

These represent the highlights. Every day for me the process of learning continues.

Herb Elliott – Some Quotes & Thoughts

I don’t have many heroes in sport, but from the time I first saw this picture in Life magazine of Herb Elliott and his coach running the sand dunes at Portsea he became my hero. Here are some thoughts and quotes from a presentation he recently did in Australia. He is 82 years and sharp as a tack. He retired from running at age 22 and has never looked back. I think there are many lesson todays coaches and athletes can learn from Herb Elliott.

“Turn yourself into a better human being through sport”

He related that he ran to exhaustion 4 days a week, the other two days he just ran for the pure joy of running. As a note most of this time he was working an eight-hour day!

He related a workout on a very windy day when his main competition in Australia, Merv Lincoln was also doing a workout at the same track, as it turned out it was almost the same workout. He observed that Lincoln chose to run with the wind while he ran into the wind. Herb said he knew could beat Lincoln after that day because he was ok with being uncomfortable.

For all you complexifiers out there this is a gem:” Running is so bloody simple – you are born, you walk, then you run. Don’t make it complicated!”

Planning/Periodization – Several Random Thoughts

Recognize that periodization is concept not a model.

Why do we still teach antiquated models in our coaching education programs? They don’t work as advertised and never did. In addition the Eastern European models that are still portrayed as gold standard are based on drug cycles.

Recognize that Periodization is not about time, it is about timing of the application of each training stimulus.

Conduct a Thorough Gap Analysis - The difference between training and competition to develop a viable dynamic plan.

Ask yourself: Are you planning for continual adaptation?

How do you deal with and plan for extended seasons that are common in sports at all levels of competition?

Herb Elliot and Ralph Doubell – Some Lessons for Today

Sadly, I doubt that unless you are a diehard track fan you do not know these names. I am surprised at how many of the current generation of track coaches and athletes do not know these names. Herb Elliot won the Gold Medal in the 1500 meters at the 1960 Rome Olympic games in a world record time of 3:35.6. Ralph Doubell won the Gold medal in the 800 Meters at the 1968 Mexico City Olympic games in the world record time of 1:44.40.

The last two books I read in 2018 were Ralph Doubell – Don’t Worry, It Is Only Pain and The Golden Mile by Herb Elliot. The Doubell book is new, the Elliot book was first published in 1961, I had read it first in 1969. I did not realize how much it had influenced me until rereading it again last week. My original copy had gone missing.

Elliot and Doubell were both Aussies. They were coached by two giants in coaching – Elliot by Percy Cerutty and Doubell by Frans Stampfl who had also coached Roger Bannister to the first sub four-minute mile in 1954. The two coaches could not have more different in personality and approach to coaching

Frans Stampfl was a professional coach, paid by University of Melbourne, a rarity at the time.  He was a generalist who coached all events. As an athlete he had been a javelin thrower. His training methods were biased toward classical interval training as developed by Woldemar  Gerschler in Germany in the 1930’s. There were more structured workouts ion the track working at varying prescribed paces. Stampfl was an early advocate of weight training. Doubell lifted up to three times a week at certain times of the year.

Percy Cerutty was a self-made man. After nearly dying from ill health in mid-forties he started running and lifting weights, adopting a lifestyle defined by his approach to physical culture. He espoused a Stotan philosophy, Stotan was a contraction stoic and spartan. He was an outspoken critic of the track & field establishment. Their training was spartan to say the least. The training was based on effort and feel rather than being driven by the watch. In the year leading up to Rome they ran 3 minutes and thirty seconds all out often once a week to get used to the pain and effort necessary to win the gold. Cerutty was also a big advocate of weight training, it was integral part of their preparation. A big part of their preparation was sand running at Portsea, their primitive training camp.

It is interesting to note that both Elliot and Doubell had not started specializing early. Doubell was a late developer that played a variety of sports until specializing as a University student. Elliot did everything, he rowed, played cricket, Aussie Rules Football. He was a prodigy in many respects breaking world junior record in the mile and 880 as an 18-year-old. Doubell did not do much formal training as teenager by todays standards. Elliot did more but nothing approaching what some high school boys are doing today. Both were very active as youth, playing outside walking and riding their bikes everywhere.

At the same time, I was reading a doctoral dissertation “Applications of Anaerobic Speed Reserve to Elite 800m running” by Gareth Neil Sandford. It was a tremendous piece of work, full of actionable information about the 800 meters both in terms of training and racing. This was written in 2018, but I could not help but think how Cerutty and Stampfl had it figured out sixty years ago. I t is amazing that in the intervening sixty years how muddled and confusing training has become.

These two books should be mandatory reading for every track and field coach, for that matter for every swim coach, triathlon, cycling and cross-country ski coach. It will make you think about getting back to basics and focusing on the need to do to get your athletes faster.

Training Talk: Conversations with a Dozen Master Coaches

The following post is taken from the Foreword I contributed to Martin Bingisser's new book Training Talk: Conversations with a Dozen Master Coaches. 

Back in 1987, I took a leap of faith. After 20 years of experience as a track and field coach, I moved to a new town for a new job in a new sport as director of conditioning for the Chicago White Sox. I was confident I could handle the challenge, but in the back of my mind there was still some doubt. I had never worked in baseball before, and the profession I had entered, athletic development, hadn’t even existed a few years prior.

After arriving, the doubt quickly faded as I took a look at baseball through the eyes of a track coach. Why didn’t my javelin throwers have the shoulder problems that pitchers did? It was simple: I started looking at the pitchers as javelin throwers in long pants. I took what I knew about preparing the whole kinetic chain to throw the javelin far and adapted that to the demands of pitching. To the surprise of many, we stopped having shoulder problems, and the pitchers became more durable. This was a lesson I was then able to apply many times over in other sports. Don’t look at the sport as a unique activity, instead look at the movements, and connect that to what is being done in other sports. This is a lesson you will learn from the coaches in this book. If they have one commonality, it is the ability to see movement with different eyes and make adjustments accordingly.

No matter the sport, a good coaching philosophy must stay true to the same fundamental truths of coaching. In this book, Martin has sought to discover these truths through interviews with some of the best minds in coaching today. This book is a reflection of Martin’s intellectual curiosity and passion to learn. His probing questions allow you, the reader, to get to the essence of the concepts and training methods.

I am honored and humbled to write this Foreword and to be included as one of the coaches interviewed for this collection. These coaches are an eclectic mix of experts from athletics and field sports, but the one thing they have in common is that they are the best of the best. Together, the interviews provide a comprehensive overview of the process of developing the athlete from many points of view. Most importantly, as I did 30 years ago, each of these coaches has gone outside their specialty and, in many instances outside their sport, to learn and challenge themselves to improve. This sends a powerful message about what it takes to be on the cutting edge.

By selecting coaches that transcend sports and disciplines, Martin underscores the unity of training ideas and concepts. The need to communicate across sports to share knowledge and learn. This collection of interviews features coaches who are thought leaders that have produced results at the highest levels of sport using this approach. None of them is narrow in their areas of interest or specialization. They all go where they need to go to find answers. They all use lateral thinking to connect dots in seemingly unrelated manners. They did this, not by being followers, but by questioning and building connections outside their fields of expertise.

All of these coaches share:

• deep knowledge;
• passion that fuels their drive to learn;
• coaching the athlete, not the sport or event;
• achievement at the highest levels;
• continued learning; and
• strength in getting better at getting better.

Reflect on the ideas expressed here and each of these approaches. Think critically about the responses. Do not take any of the answers as gospel. Use the collective wisdom of these coaches to learn and grow. It may change your ideas, or it may confirm them. Regardless, the benefit will be improved coaching. Keep learning!

Coaching Classics

Every year I post this because there are many new readers to the blog and followers on Twitter @coachgambetta and friends on Facebook http://tinyurl.com/lezv8tr and Google Plus who have not seen it. These are classic works that I think every coach should read. They span a range of areas from scientific and technical to sport sociology. Just as with any classic they are timeless. They are rich with knowledge. There are many works in this list that I go back and review each year, they never get old. Challenge yourself and see how many of these you can read in the year if you do you be a more knowledgeable coach for doing it.

The Inner Athlete by Bob Nidefer

Problem Athletes and How to Handle Them by Tom Tutko and Bruce Ogilvie

Psychology and the Superior Athlete by Miroslav Vanek and Bryant J. Cratty

Scientific Principles of Coaching by John Bunn

What Research Tells The Coach About Sprinting by George Dintiman

Track & Field Omnibook by Ken Doherty

Modern Track & Field by Ken Doherty

Modern Training for Running by Ken Doherty

The Science of Swimming by James E. Counsilman

The Mechanics of Athletics by Geoffrey Dyson

Better Athletes Trough Weight Training by Bob Hoffman

Hidden causes of injury, prevention, and correction for running athletes by John Jesse

Wrestling Physical Conditioning Encyclopedia by John Jesse

Proprioceptive Neuromuscular Facilitation: Patterns and Techniques by Dorothy Knotts and Margaret Voss

Scientific Principles and Methods of Strength Fitness.  By Patrick O’Shea

Total Body Training by Richard H. Dominguez and Robert Gajda

Kinesiology by Gene Logan and Wayne C. McKinney

Skill In Sport by Barbara Knapp

Acquiring Ball Skill – A Psychological Interpretation by H.T.A. Whiting

The Thinking Body by Mabel Todd

Run Run Run by Fred Wilt

How They Train by Fred Wilt

Mechanics Without Tears by Fred Wilt

No Bugles, No Drums by Peter Snell

The Unforgiving Minute by Ron Clarke with Alan Trengove

Run to the Top by Arthur Lydiard

Franz Stampfl on Running by Franz Stampfl

The Jim Ryun Story by Cordner Nelson

Another Hurdle by Dave Hemry

Run To Daylight by Vince Lombardi and W.C. Heinz

Track and Field Dynamics by Tom Ecker

Championship Track and Filed by Tom Ecker

Biomechanics of Athletic Movement by Gerhard Hochmuth

Sports Physiology by Edward L. Fox

Interval Training – Conditioning for Sports and General Fitness by Edward L. Fox and Donald K. Mathews

Biomechanics and Energetics of Muscular Exercise by Rodolfo Margaria

Biomechanics of Sports Techniques by Jim Hay

Introduction to Biomechanic analysis of sport by John W. Northrip, Gene A. Logan and Wayne C. McKinney

Principles of Sports Training – Introduction to the Theory and methods of Training by Dietrich Harre

Fundamental of Sports Training by L. Matveyev

Sports Training Principles by Frank Dick

Training Theory by Frank Dick

Track Speed – Hurdles, Sprints and relays by John Le Masurier

Track and Field – Textbook for Coaches and Sports Teachers Edited by Gerhardt Schmolinsky

Olympic Track And Field Techniques by Tom Ecker, Fred Wilt, and Jim Hay

International Track and field Coaching Encyclopedia by Feed Wilt and Tom Ecker

Track in Theory and Technique Edited by Thomas P. Rosandich

The Hurdlers Bible by Wilbur Ross

Mechanics of the Pole Vault by R.V. Ganslen

The Triple Jump Encyclopedia by Ernie Bullard and Larry Knuth

Tendinitis: it’s Etiology and Treatment by Sandra Curwin and William D. Stanish

The Sweet Spot in Time by John Jerome

Weight Training In Athletics by Jim Murray and Peter V. Karpovich

Weight Training in Athletics and Physical Education by Gene Hooks

Circuit Training by Manfred Scholich

Circuit Training by R. E. Adamson and G.T. Morgan

The Miracle Machine by Doug Gilbert

The System of Physical Education in the USSR Edited by G. I Kukushkin

The Soviet Road To Olympus – Theory And Practice Of Soviet Physical Culture And Sport by N. Norman Shneidman

1000 Exercises d’ Athletisme by Kurt Murer and Walter Bucher

Winning Volleyball – Fundamentals, Tactics and Strategy by Allen E. Scates

The Pursuit of Sporting Excellence – A Study of Sport’s Highest Achievers by David Henry

The Athletic Revolution by Jack Scott 

Meat on the Hoof – The Hidden World of Texas Football by Gary Shaw

Out of Their League by Dave Meggyesy

What's Behind the Medals

The bottom line is that for a long time our “non-system” has served us quite well. What has happened? The first thing that changed was the erosion of mandatory physical education to the point where today there is only one state that has mandatory physical education K – 12. The most obvious impact is that youngsters are no longer exposed to systematic physical activity. They are no longer taught basic movement or sport skills as part of an organized curriculum. What we failed to notice is that because physical education was no longer mandatory that less physical education teachers were being hired. The physical education teacher made up the pool of trained coaches. Then there came an increased emphasis on academic achievement to the exclusion of physical education. In addition, there were budget cuts due to declining enrollment and tax cuts. Therefore less qualified coaches were hired in the schools. Club sports began to take the place of school sports. These coaches had no educational requirement. Teacher training colleges changed their mission from teaching to research. Title IX put an increased burden on the schools because in many sports it was now necessary to field two teams instead of one. This served to further deplete the pool of trained coaches creating an obvious staffing problem. These problems are a reality in the United States in 2018.