"Throughout much of urban history, streets were often highly diverse, multi-functional places. Children were active users of streets: not only for play. But for socialising, running errands, calling on friends or family, going to and from school (or work) or watching the world go by. ...

In a sense, the ultimate goal of child-friendly urban planning is to turn the playground inside-out. Rather than building play reservations, the job of the child-friendly planner/designer is to remove the fences and gates, and invite children into the public realm beyond, so they can enjoy rich, engaging experiences and encounters with the people and places around them."

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🚶‍♂️🧑‍🦽🚴‍♂️🏃‍♂️🤸‍♀️

options opportunities places . movement

This week, I'm submitting my last couple of assignments of the first year of my Master's. A periodisation essay being one of them. What's one of the biggest takeaways from the module and its applied practice? Less is more. It's something I've communicated on for some time, yet I've at times found it challenging to actually get people to 'buy-in' to. Which means that I need to do a better job with how I communicate and how I integrate sports science into decision-making.

There's one of two ways that this relates to people in my experience. A couple of scenarios where this concept is really relevant.

One, a recreational exerciser who, instead of doing a little, often, is drawn towards an almost all or nothing approach. Instead of going for a walk or breaking up sitting time or lifting the nearby weights for just a few reps at a time (microdosing/exercise snacking/greasing the groove/incidental movement), they are drawn to physically and emotionally taxing activities that are unsustainable. Forcing mileage/intensities/exercises that haven't been built on a solid foundation is another example of this.

Two, a high performance athlete or coaching team supporting an athlete who, in the pursuit of success, is consistently trying to squeeze everything out of a training session. In turn, the consistent accumulation of hard sessions back-to-back doesn't give enough time for recovery and adaptation to occur. This can potentially lead to overreaching/overtraining. Performance will actually dip as opposed to improve. Injury risk goes up.

In both cases, a practical step to take would be to ensure you do one easy session a week. Have I earned the right to go hard? Have I done an easy session in the last week? Do the benefits of today's session outweigh the costs? In the high performance setting, what was the point of today's session as a part of the bigger picture?

Less is more.

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'A number of research studies ... have all reported that approximately one-third of young athletes had experienced non-functional overreaching, overtraining or staleness.'

📖 S&C for young athletes, p.57.

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📷 screenshot from the Gaelic games athletic development action statement.

Another gem of an episode, @mike_quirke podcast.

Here's one of the passages that really stood out for me –

' This current group, born in the last 20 years, their movement capacity at a childhood level isn't as proficient as it would have been previous to that. Why? They're not moving as much. Even though we all know the cases, "my young fella, he's doing hurling, football, basketball, soccer, tennis ... and shur I'm just a taxi." But it's all organised sport. Where's the exploration time? "Ah, shur, he's wrecked. He's at home, and then he just goes straight on the PlayStation, or he's on the couch." So, there's actually no time where he's a kid, doing kids stuff. Which is falling over, figuring out that branch doesn't hold me, and figuring out that wall is too high ... they're not doing that anymore. When it's overly organised, we're robbing the kids of really important exploration ... ' Dr. Ed Coughlan.

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#PhysicalLiteracy #MovementExploration #MovementVariety #Play

Just my occasional reminder to runners new and old. An ultramarathon isn't better than a marathon, which isn't better than a half marathon, which isn't better than a 10-miler, which isn't better than a 10k, which isn't better than a 5-miler, which isn't better than a 5k, which isn't better than the mile. Which isn't better than the 800, 400, 200, or 100m!

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Yes, you can easily get training programmes online and in-person for runs of any distance, but if you've never run regularly before, why are you now targeting a marathon or half marathon? And should you really be given a training programme for a half marathon straight away without any consideration for your running form, and exercise and training history? Maybe your why (and the positives of running a long-distance event) outweighs any cons, or maybe not. I come from the school of all movement is good movement, so I don't ask these questions lightly.

I do think a lot of people are signing up to longer distance events prematurely. With bigger and longer being put on a pedestal, and mistakenly associated with 'better'. This can be seen in other sports and with fitness industry trends too.

' ... "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure." Measurement is only useful when it guides you and adds context to a larger picture, not when it consumes you. Each number is simply one piece of feedback in the overall system.

In our data-driven world, we tend to overvalue numbers and undervalue anything ephemeral, soft, and difficult to quantify. We mistakenly think the factors we can measure are the only factors that exist. But just because you can measure something doesn’t mean it’s the most important thing. And just because you can’t measure something doesn’t mean it’s not important at all. '

I'm currently reading about athletic development and different models within it. One, the Developmental Model of Sport Participation, has seven 'postulates' associated with it. In 2014, five of the statements (of the model's seven) were considered to have 'strong' evidence to be able to recommend them as best practice to help guide policy. Separately, the last two quotes are from Wayne Goldsmith. His first quote is an excerpt from a video you'll easily find online – no such thing as an elite 8-year-old.

'For strength and conditioning coaches working with young athletes, the goal is clear: to foster a supportive learning environment that provides an appropriate balance between challenge and fun, which helps young athletes develop robust levels of athleticism, reduce injury risk, and enhance health and wellbeing. It is likely that, by achieving this goal, coaches will be able to support young athletes to participate and perform more safely and more effectively in sports. In addition, coaches will be able to help those individuals acquire the knowledge, confidence, skills, and physical attributes that facilitate a lifetime commitment to physical activity.' 

Ch. 5. Coaching young athletes.

These HSE publications are great!

I think a lot of the guidance could be applied to us as adults too.

- practice a range of movement skills
- mix of everyday tasks, unstructured and structured activities, active travel
- we need daily opportunities to move, to play, outdoors and in
- rhythm and actions improve with practice
- check that equipment/load is suitable
- let them discover their own limitations

Anything resonate with you?

Enjoyed this – How We Learn to Move.

Brings me back to those games of basketball and soccer in the school and back yard in Kilcummin. Where we learnt how to move. 2 on 2, 4 v 4. Our variation of movement developed adaptable skills that could be applied to different situations and environments. It wasn't through repetition of the same one 'perfect' technique over and over again but through exploration and play and a pinch of guidance that we developed our athleticism and robustness. Yards, roads, fields, trees – this was our playground.

Soreness on a regular basis isn't an indicator of making progress in our training. Making progress is making progress in our training.

Showing up consistently, focusing on good technique and form, moving fluidly, working with a 'sweet spot' of resistance – not too heavy, not too light – and applying progressive overload is what will serve you well over time.

Push yourself to get the most out of the training, sure. But know that that doesn't equate to soreness, though occasionally it comes with it.

From my perspective, the magic is more so found in being mindful, intentional and explorative with how we move our bodies. Do we feel our muscles in the movement? What kind of alignment do we have? Can we develop our body and spatial awareness as we move through the exercises? Can I re/learn a movement skill?

These are more interesting questions to consider than chasing a feeling of soreness and fatigue on a daily basis – while we get stronger and more mobile in the process.

We have so many strengths in our local place-based communities. Untapped assets right on our doorstep.

Consumer culture would have us believe that to live a good life, a decent life, we need to look beyond our neighbourhood. A subtle devaluing of what's local, handmade and homemade.

But maybe the solution isn't what's out there, it's what's here and now. In what and who are rooted in our communities. Not in a distant marketplace.

There's value in what's local. In and with our neighbours, associations and organisations, built and natural environment, local economy, stories and local heritage.

The connected community is a beautiful thing.

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Adapted from The Connected Community : Discovering the Health, Wealth, and Power of Neighbourhoods. By Cormac Russell and John McKnight. @wormbooksschull

Building on our last post, here we cover how we currently approach programming. Which is informed by the idea of fundamental movement patterns. To give some background, we learn fundamental movement skills as children. Within the first two years of life, children start many gross motor activities such as pushing, pulling, carrying large objects and climbing. And skills such as kicking, throwing and catching a ball increase too. These skills are developed through play. Play, in its many forms – including walking, running, jumping, dodging, crawling, climbing, bending, rolling, rotating – enables children to do everyday tasks and sets them up to participate in activities in the long-term.

Fast forward to adulthood, we practice these skills incidentally through the day. But often the conditions may be such that we don’t engage in them a whole lot. Walking may be the main activity, but beyond that there may not be much variety in our movements. (Many of us would benefit from just walking more.)

What we use as a guide to our resistance training builds on these fundamental movement skills or patterns that are developed in childhood. Push, pull, hinge, squat, and loaded carry are just some of the ‘fundamental movement patterns’ that we ensure to plan around. Of course, there are many other forms of play - rolling, climbing, crawling - that we can benefit from exploring too. Like in childhood, we train movements, not muscles (generally speaking). This type of training can also be described as ‘functional’.

Hope that helps. Just to say that like with everything I share, I aim to have it underpinned by evidence. All of the above information on childhood development is from the HSE, including from the My Child: 2 to 5 years book which has been developed for parents and is available online free to download. The book is full of valuable advice and interestingly the section on play and learning I feel resonates with what we as adults can do too (page 100). Any questions or comments just drop us a line.

More isn’t better. Better is better.

The focus isn’t to make you tired and sore. The focus is to support you to move well. Quality over quantity.

Can you do the simple things really well? Can you jump or hop or push-up the best jump, hop, push-up you can possibly do today?here

oop movement |

Options are the things we could do – the choices before us. Opportunities are the circumstances that make it possible to do something. And places are the spaces we inhabit and their availability for us to move around in. 

Options are good. But it's opportunities that bring them to life. These opportunities are influenced by lots of factors, including the places and spaces we move in; some people have circumstances stacked heavily in their favour, and others less so. I think it's important to acknowledge this. The places where we live, learn, work, and play shape our health in many ways, collectively and uniquely.

I see my training first as an option for our community locally. A quality service available for people to consider. And then when people avail of my training or consult, it's an opportunity. An opportunity to move well. An opportunity to explore your relationship with movement and physical activity.

oop movement

options opportunities places. movement

We benefit from variety of movement. In our gardens, fields, courts, woods, parks, lanes and shared spaces. Different settings, different sports. Different stimuli, different tasks.

There are plenty of outside play options locally. @ballydehob_community_tennis and @ballydehobfrisbee are just two of the great welcoming social options that I've come across recently. Both provide opportunities for developing athleticism – coordination, balance, spacial awareness, speed, agility – while having fun in the process!

We're in this together. We're all connected — a person is a person through other people.

Our training is a partnership. And through this partnership, of mutual caring, there's a space for us to both grow and learn from each other.

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Your relationship with movement is unique to you. It's complex and can change over time. The people we interact with, the communities we're part of, the culture we experience, the places we move in, all influence our relationship with movement.

It's my job to support you to have a positive experience. To meet you where you're at. To support you to move competently and confidently going forward.

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With health and wellbeing as a central tenet, training should be established on a strong foundation of movement skills and structured appropriate to your movement quality and history.

Long-term athletic development doesn't just apply to youth athletes and their development. As adults, we can benefit from thinking long-term and from tailored training with athletic development in mind. It's never too late.

Is it just me or is dawdling not only important for our health but also, maybe counterintuitively, for us to move? Specifically for unplanned and unstructured movement. We're so stimulated all of the time, especially with technology. We're full to the brim with consumption. Maybe we need to leave time to allow for idleness; to invite in creativity and movement. To slow down. To invite in play. Because exercise is now so synonymous with movement, do we tend to box up and overly structure our activities?

Big up to pottering about, idleness, boredom, putting the technology away, taking a stroll with no destination in mind, and not predetermining everything.

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Image of The Idler by @lillyhedleyprint in Our Isles: Poems Celebrating the Art of Rural Trades and Traditions. @liznojan_books

We ran, we climbed, we jumped, we crouched. We used jumpers as goal posts. We got a ball and played against the wall. We explored movement in different forms.

We developed coordination, agility, and all-around athleticism and movement skills. We developed an awareness of our bodies in space.

All through movement and play.

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I believe it’s important to incorporate play and variation into our movement as adults, benefiting our bodies and minds, and I try to do that in my classes and coaching.

We can take a lot of inspiration from children's movements and unstructured play.

Lane walks, sea dips.

The simple things are a tonic for the soul.

Life, movement. It's OK to rest a while, to feel the ebb and flow.

📖 Wintering, Katherine May. @wormbooksschull

The fitness-industrial complex is the concept wherein individuals and institutions in the industry profit for their own self-interest, not necessarily for the long-term benefit of society. It's the upholding and reproducing of ways of doing things even though these approaches are causing more harm than good. A kind of bastardisation, or consumerist construct, of what it means to be 'healthy.'

The tactics used can include preying on people's insecurities as some bodies – thin, 'able-bodied' – are presented as desirable or worthy, and others not. Diversity of movement is meanwhile reduced to a commercial package.

People are nudged to conform to the idea of a particular ideal body, there's an obsession with weight-loss and change. You're not enough as you are.

Of course, this is a social and commercial construct. A construct that feeds on body shaming and self-loathing. That conflates a particular body type and commodified exercise with somehow being a better person.

Sadly, this is pervasive in the health and fitness industry.

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As I work more and more in the health and fitness space, I'm trying to do so while maintaining an open mind and continuing to view the industry with a critical lens. I suppose it can be easy to consume ways of doing things (including current trends) and marketing, and unintentionally start to mimic what others do. So for me, I have to be intentional with my learning and complement my experiential learning with learning through reading and different sources.

In the image is some of what I've been reading and rereading lately. From Functional Training for Sports' straight talking and proven programming to Up to Speed's spotlight on the legacy of a male-centric model of sports and physical activity. From Quiet's exploration of our culture of personality (over character) to Deconstructing the Fitness-Industrial Complex which helped shape the beginning of this text. They capture messages and points of view that I'm either a fan of or that I need to increase my awareness of, and I try to incorporate them into my coaching.

Movement is diverse. Movement is about so much more than a physical aesthetic.