Conditioning Research

A few weeks ago I posted an interview with mc , talking about the seminar that she was to do here in Edinburgh today. Today's seminar was fascinating and I am really grateful to mc and to Rannoch for promoting it. What I found really interesting was the way in which the teaching pulled together a range of different threads of topics which I have been thinking about for years. I'll post some of these ideas in some additional posts. I think I've been a bit dismissive of mobility work and z health in the past - I have done it and enjoyed the feeling, but was somewhat bemused by the way in which it was often presented as the solution.... This seminar did what the books and articles I've read previously have failed to do - it put the exercises into context, it explained the reasoning and the theory that justify the moves. It makes more sense now - it is about threat modulation ...reassuring your nervous system that things are OK. We went through a lot of theory and th...

One of the things that this blog has recorded my thoughts about recently has been the idea of skill development vs strength development. Strength development is one thing, but in order to be good at your sport or activity you need to practice the specific skills involved. There has been a lot written on motor learning which is fascinating to study. Some of the interesting stuff is of how there is little transfer between similar movements. This area of skill development came up in today's seminar with mc - which I will write more of soon (it was excellent) - but I also came across this today which is relevant to the discussions: Study shows new brain connections form rapidly during motor learning New connections begin to form between brain cells almost immediately as animals learn a new task, according to a study published this week in Nature. Led by researchers at the University of California, Santa Cruz, the study involved detailed observations of the rewiring processes that t...

Normal Tuesday night fun. That is my instructor . I am still crap at this but enjoy the training.

Intermittent fasting hits the mainstream papers: Feast or famine: The diet that won't just help you lose weight, you'll live longer and be brainier! The article is referring mainly to the up Day Down Day diet that I mentioned here . As ever I recommend Brad's writing's in Eat Stop Eat on this subject

I read this today: complicated sells, simple works Interesting thought to reflect on. There is a lot of cash in this field, a lot of people trying to make a living and a lot of them are trying to sell you something: a book, a course, a workshop. There isn't much money in the simple stuff - but that is what works

This keeps coming up - for example in a comment on the last post from Dan: Also, Olympic lifters traditionally have some of the highest vertical leaps recorded and they do mostly explosive movements. It would seem that Luke has an opinion that is not supported by much of the industry when he says that cleans are actually sending the body a signal to go slower to something like that. Everything I have read about explosive movements says that they help the body recruit more motor units and increase rate coding. Some science actually says something different. For example: EXPLOSIVE EXERCISES IN SPORTS TRAINING: A CRITICAL REVIEW This paper reviews evidence relating to the effectiveness and safety of explosive exercises, such as Olympic style weight lifting, other weight training exercises performed at a fast cadence, and plyometric exercises, that are commonly used in the strength and conditioning training of athletes. Contrary to popular belief and the practices of many athletes, the ...

I interviewed Luke a few months ago.