Functional Path Manifesto

Functional Path Manifesto

Defining the Field of Athletic
Development – Where We Are Now

Why am I writing this? Who am I to tell you how to train or
rehab your athletes? How can I have the impudence to question some of the
hallowed concepts of training and performance, even question sports science? I have consistently questioned much of what
passes as conventional wisdom in regards to training and rehab and I have the audacity
to ask you to do the same. Think and question. Why? On whose authority do I speak?
Frankly I speak on the authority of wisdom based on experience and common
sense. I have a passionate belief in defining the field of athletic
development. I am defined by what I am not, I am not a sport scientist,
physical therapist, ATC, a doctor, or a sport psychologist, I am a coach. As a
coach I have had to travel in all those worlds, because of my experience in
those worlds I am not restrained by conventional wisdom; rather I choose to use
conventional wisdom as a starting point. I certainly have learned from all
those disciplines and have incorporated those ideas into a systematic approach
to athletic development. I have specialized in being a generalist. Being a
generalist allows me to focus on the big picture, the connections and
relationships that define athleticism. The arena of athletic competition on the
track, the fields, courts and pools of the world are the laboratories to test
these concepts. There is no hiding in this arena, it is a results driven world
where training mistakes and inadequate preparation are quickly exposed.

Athletic development is about optimizing training to enhance
performance in the competitive arena. The basic concepts are quite simple. My
experience has shown that simplicity yields complexity, you don’t have to try to
make it complicated. That is why being a generalist is so important; it allows
me to make relationships that the specialist because of their narrower vision
will not see. Sophisticated technology and computer algorithms are part of a
much bigger picture. Over reliance on tools and technology will not get the job
done. You need the coach with experience to ask the key questions and interpret
the data. Without that, high tech tools are no more than random number
generators

Much of what I stand for is not new, we already know it, it
has worked in the past in a myriad of environments but has been rejected as old
fashioned, not high tech, not scientific. We have abandoned proven methods in
the name of progress. Certainly in every field of endeavor everything old is
new again, but because of our society’s rejection of the past we have not
studied the coaches who paved the way for us. It is trite to say that we stand
on the shoulder of giants but without coaches like Bill Bowerman, Doc Councilman,
Geoff Dyson, Franz Stampfl, and Percy Cerruty where would we be today in terms
athletic performance. They were innovators who were not afraid to challenge
conventional wisdom. No one stands alone, I have been very fortunate to learn
from many people. Most importantly I have learned from the athletes that I have
coached. Who better to learn from? They were the ones who did the training;
they were the ones, who competed,

My concepts of training are based on study of past training
methods, sports science research and practical experience working with all
levels of athlete. You learn through deliberate practice, through trial and
error. You learn in the trenches, not in a book or a laboratory. You learn form
your mistakes and your successes. That is where you start, but that is just a
beginning. What I do is common sense; it works because it is simple and
natural. If we follow our survival instincts we will do the correct things concerning
movement and training. Modern society and conventional wisdom in training has
dulled our instincts to the point that they are buried. The key is to unlock
these instincts and allow the body to solve movement problems the way the body
was designed to function. This is not dangerous or extreme, it is essentially
what children do in free play when unrestrained by adult supervision and
burdened by having to do the movements correctly. Today even at the highest
levels of sport coaches are creating robots. Movement is not paint by numbers,
it is an expressionist drawing, it is not a classical music aria, it is jazz
riff.

We need to get away from reductionist thinking, stop
breaking movement and exercise into its smallest parts and the focus on those
parts in hopes of producing a moving flowing working whole, it won’t happen. It
will only happen if there is a quantum approach, an approach that focuses on
the big picture and the connections. In many respects this is where sport science
has failed us. In the rush to publish and the desire to show statistical
significance we have become so reductionist in our thinking that we now fail to
see the forest for the trees. Focusing on Max VO₂ or trying to
isolate the internal oblique and transverse abdominis, while very neat and
clean in the lab just do not transfer well to the performance area. Is it
important to understand scientific concepts? Yes it is, but we must not be restrained
by them. I remember scientists and sports medicine people publishing papers on
the Fosbury Flop after the 1968 Olympics when Fosbury won the gold medal in the
high jump. The substance was that this was an inefficient dangerous way to
jump, merely an aberration that would soon go away. Several years later when a
jumper using the Fosbury technique broke the world record, the same people were
publishing articles and papers extolling the biomechanical advantage of the
technique. Coaches and athletes knew it immediately, it was more natural, they
could see and feel it. It took advantage of body structure and function to
effectively apply force against the ground. Where would high jump performance
be if we had listened to the initial response from the scientist? Coaches and
athletes lead innovation in training and technique, not scientists.

Most scientific studies are isolated studies out of context
of the spectrum of human movement demands. Science needs to measure an isolated
component in order to conduct “valid” scientific experiments. I understand that
those are the rules of the game for the scientist, but outside the lab in the
real world of performance the rules are different. On the field or in the pool
we cannot isolate variables. Does that mean we should reject science and rely
solely on practice and experience, absolutely not. As coaches we need to travel
in both worlds. As a coach, statistical significance does not mean anything to
me, I am interested in coaching significance and how it applies to making a
particular exercise or training method more effective. The great coaches I have
known are both artists and scientists. They know what canvas to paint on, what
brushes to select, the brush strokes to use and how to blend the colors to
achieve the result they desire. We must get all the pieces working in harmony.
In performance the essence is linkage and connections, not isolation. Therefore
the training should reflect this and focus on muscle synergies and connections.

I am alarmed with the biased one sided training regimens
that I see imposed on athletes. If you are doing a lot of something then you
are probably not doing a lot of something else, a zero sum relationship. When
you do this the result is a highly adapted athlete, the athlete adapts to that one
component being trained. To thrive in the performance arena demands a highly
adaptable athlete whose training is not biased, but reflects the demands of the
sport and the needs of the individual athlete.

Certainly we are not going where no one else has gone before,
we are not sailing uncharted waters, the path is clear, and the destination is
obvious. That begs the question then, why with all we know and the supposed
progress we have made, why are results so inconsistent. Why are preventable injuries
at levels never seen before in sport? Do we need to take a different approach? We
must take a long look at what got us to this point. Look back at what worked in
the past. Look at those people who are producing consistent reproducible
results. We need direction, definition and leadership, not more marketing and
hype. We need to recognize and acknowledge the problems and address them with
concrete solutions. To achieve this we need to shift the focus back on people,
not facilities, equipment and training methods. Coaching is a people
profession, people working with people to raise performance levels. We must do
everything possible to raise the standard of coaching. I hope this stimulates
you to get on board and help me to define the field of athletic development. We
can change and we must change or we will go the way of the dinosaur. I implore
you to get out of the weight room, go out and work to build highly adaptable
athletes that can thrive in the competitive arena.