Nick Ruddock on Physical Prep, Olympics, and Cultural Change

It's just kind of a joke Now he's constantly on the podcast . I love talking with him , love getting his ideas and sharing a lot of our feedback to each other , kind of what's on our mind , and this one was prompted because the Olympics have just wrapped up .

When this episode was being filmed and I actually had a lot on my mind for just taking a step back and looking at you know how far we've come in gymnastics on the men's and the women's side at the elite level , from you know all the way back to you know , 2012 and eight . I think we're in a very , very different sport then than we are now .

Many things for the better , and I wanted to kind of jump on with Nick and just chat about you know what his thoughts are in the Olympics and he has obviously a lot of experience working with athletes at the Olympic level consulting work , different countries , different teamwork .

So I wanted to kind of pick his brain on what was going on with what he saw , what he thinks has changed , what the great things that he enjoyed watching , and also kind of what he thinks it means for the entire sport . Because obviously many people watch the Olympics and it trickles down .

There's not a huge percentage of people in the sport that are going to the Olympics competing .

There's not a huge percentage of people in the sport that are going to the Olympics competing , but a large amount of what happens at the elite and the Olympic level trickles down into certainly colleges and certainly the club level and many people's thoughts on the sports .

And so , yeah , really a great episode , talking about , maybe , the culture and how it has changed , talking about the positive halo effect that many things have happened from the Olympics as well , and also dive into how the natural change of a , a four year cycle or a yearly cycle is kind of upon us and kind of offering people some thoughts on what Nick is

doing when he's consulting , when he's working with clubs , when he's working with teams and athletes , on how to you know what to change , what to look at and how to go about that process and at the time that this comes out , nick is actually hosting an incredible gymnastics leaders conference which I highly recommend that anybody involved in kind of gymnastics from a

leadership position or someone who's wanting to learn more about how Nick goes , approaches , you know , his gym club level consulting and what he's doing to try to really help the next generation of leaders in the sport kind of move forward . Nick has an insane amount of experience to offer on the consulting side and kind of problem solving side .

So chances are if there is something that is going on in your gym , your club , that you would like to change or want some advice on , I'm pretty sure Nick has , you know , dealt with those issues before . So in the show notes below we will have a link to sign up . I would definitely jump on .

I cannot wait personally to listen to Nick's content and kind of what he has going on . So make sure you jump down there and check that out and then also make sure you enjoy the episode . Thanks , all right , good to go , nicholas . We meet again .

I didn't um pull them up on it , but they said dirty dozen to me instead of a daily dozen and I kind of chuckled inside and it was a bit like I don't know where you've got that from , but I'm really intrigued well , the good thing was it's a quick pivot to dirty dancing .

We're spending when I say we , I mean me and my team investing a fair amount of resources and energy into recruiting new , new members , clubs that we are kind of engaging with . Um , we got a lot going on .

I mean , we're spread a lot across a few different services now , which is amazing , but , um , yeah , loving it , we're getting good feedback and yeah people with with great results and um post games . Now there's always a lot of interesting conversations going on , of course . What does the next quad look like ?

from the game's ending . So I wanted to have you on , obviously giving your experience in a chat and kind of . There's some really good discussions happening , I think , in the olympics in general , but gymnastics for sure .

I think , like you know , we're saying off air that this olympics versus consider what tokyo kind of was , is was not around covid , that one compared to then what was 16 , particularly here in the states . Like I feel like we're in a different stratosphere of culture . Gymnastics , uh , what is normal , what is not normal and that kind of stuff .

So I wanted to have you on . I actually did want to ask as law of script , but with the projects that you have and stuff going on , cause I find myself on the uh former category , I'll say is are you more a depth or width person ? Do you find yourself right now ?

I found myself at width level like I was doing a lot in a different amount of places , but now that I kind of am taking a step back . I've gone for depth over like really good podcast , like we're doing a mentorship behind the scene with physios , like I have a whole bunch of really big research projects behind the scenes .

So I'm like finding myself leaning more into depth over width . But where do you fall in that category now ?

I think that , um , we've certainly narrowed down our offering and what we're trying to focus our attention on , but , but ultimately , um , there's a lot of opportunities in different places . One of our big missions is really just to impact gymnastics .

So we don't want to go too narrow a field , because then we're actually going to be maybe reducing the amount of people that we impact .

And you know , we've , um , we've re-established and re-clarified our , our mission recently , which is about leaving a a positive footprint on the world of gymnastics long term , and then we identified eight behaviors that are going to help us to kind of get close to that .

Now , of course , when you say something like , um , you know , make a positive and lasting difference in the world of gymnastics , like there's no end , there's no end point in that , there's no mountain top , like you just got to keep on going . But , um , we're looking for , like , what are the indications that help us to understand that we're on the right track ?

Uh , you know , we believe there's a kind of eight behaviors that we're embodying , we're sharing , we're all about and we want to be held accountable to um , and and they are . You know , if we're doing that , if we're embodying those , then we know that we're on the right , right pathway .

So I think some of that works , really helped us to clarify exactly what's important to us as an organization , and me and my team and , yeah , it kind of makes the journey a bit easier when you've got that clarity in place . And we talked , obviously , pre-recording about . You know , it's quite , quite difficult saying no to things , but ultimately we have to .

Now we , we get . There's a lot of demand for our time and our resources , which is amazing , but at the same time , if we go too wide , we're now actually doing a poor job at all of that . So , um , yeah , it's getting a balance right , dave , but I think in the future I'd like to say we're going to have both .

We'll have good depth across a wide range of activities and services as well , and I think that's kind of where the yeah , that's where the long-term vision is definitely yeah

, no , no .

consulting , right Like the six weeks after college nationals . I probably had like 11 consulting calls with teams or organizations or whatever , just because everyone's looking for , hey , this didn't go well , can we change ?

But then , conversely , I see the most patients in the clinic after season typically and so a lot of that conversation with their coaches and stuff , and so for may and june it was literally nothing but college and club level consulting and trying to help , and then then obviously trials , passes , and then you know the the backend work with the Olympics and stuff ,

and now I feel as though I'm transitioning into the DMS or call starting to come about like hey , like you know , maybe this didn't work as well as you wanted , or this person wants some help with this next year and squad and I , I don't know , I find with you know , they feel as though they're so overwhelmed with 13 things they want to fix .

They want to overhaul their strength program . They got to get their flexibility up , they want to make their difficulties start to go up . Um , and I feel as though a lot of people get paralyzed by the 300 things they'd like to do .

And I'm just curious how you juggle , maybe , some of that challenge with your consulting work or yourself , like , do you pick one thing and go deep for a month and then you move to the next thing ? Do you pick the top three things and go a little wider , like what's your advice there ?

Yeah , in all seriousness , I I do my work in like I'll have probably like a three , four month period where it's just like pedal to the floor and then I'll drop off , probably for a month , six weeks , when I actually I feel really lazy .

I really struggle in that period , but it's what my body needs , probably my mind as well , um , but it gives me a recharge , um in that period for me to go again with whatever that next phase might be . Um , I'm in that push phase at the minute . We've just released or launched um gymnastics leaders . Of course , we've just we're in master class mode .

We've got a lot of work happening with immersion . I'm back on the road again next week and I've got kind of six international trips in pretty quick succession , speaking gigs , like you name it , and so , um , for me it comes in in in peaks . There is probably at least two of those peaks throughout the year . Um , so that's that's me .

But what helps me is my team , like that , allows me to do it . Um , and over the last 18 months I've just just recruited more people and I just wouldn't be able to do what I now do and reach the number of people that I do , and all that without having a really great team behind me .

So there's there's things that I used to do that I no longer have to because I've got someone else doing it .

Um , and I think that every kind of six , six months , I'm looking to recruit a new member in the team that can tackle some of that for me , and it just frees up my attention to be able to serve my community better , because ultimately , that's what I'm trying to do , um , serve the community to the best of my ability .

Um , and that's advice that I also give to clubs as well . It's like what are you doing now ? Often the conversations are with the head coaches , because those are often who my clients are but like , what are you actually doing ? That you don't need to do , but you do do , and you probably do it because you've got all the answers .

Like , most head coaches can do everything they can talk to parents , they can run the payroll , they can coach in the gym , they can deal with administration problems , like they've got their fingers in all these different pies . So they know absolutely everything that's going on and how things work , which is amazing .

But then everyone goes to that individual for the firefighting and when things need doing , and so part of my advice is always about how can we decrease your workload , delegate some of this activity and train your team so that they can take on some of this , and it frees you up to do what it is that you , um would be better doing , and I'm not going to say

that you'd want to do , because a lot of head coaches they just want to coach . Yeah , um , and unfortunately , when you step into a head coach role or coaching director role , there is more to it than that , um , but there's often a lot of things that the head coach is just they just they don't need to do . Someone else could do it .

Um , maybe they can do it at 90 as effective to start with , but that's fine . Maybe they can do it at 60 of the effectiveness of the head coach to begin with . That's fine as well . Um , it's just about releasing that and having a process there for delegation . So so that's certainly one of the things that I I would would advise .

Coming back to your original question , the second thing here , I guess , would be to understand what the low hanging fruit is Like . Where are the obvious opportunities for development ? And , like you and I both know , if we talk about technically , like the gymnastic stuff here , it's physical prep .

Like most , a lot of the technical challenges and poor technique and injuries , of course , and all that stuff that slows down is as a result of the kids not being physically prepared enough .

So usually when I'm looking at a program I'll look at the schedule and the physical prep and I go like , where's the low hanging fruit , where's the obvious opportunities for you to improve performance ?

I did this last week with a client and they sent me the programs , which is something they're able to do and , um , I noticed that there was one aspect of their physical preparation which was only on the program once throughout the week , but it was actually something that I would suggest having every single training day and like just that one change and it might

be like a 10 minute difference to each training day or 15 minutes max Like that one change could completely transform the way that those those athletes will

perform . Now , yeah , it needs a bit of time to get into the program and for the athletes to adapt to it , but you know , if you could do this for 12 weeks , your entire season afterwards might look different . I mean , in this case it was core training . Um , you need to do core every day . I'm a real firm believer of that .

Uh , if you can't do a handstand , you need to train hands , and every day until you can . You know those are the non-negotiables . So start with those , start with the low hanging fruit and the obvious gaps in your program , um , and work from there , because once you sort that out , everything else kind of moves around a bit .

Anyway , you know , you might think that skill level was a problem , but actually when you resolve the physical prep , all of a sudden the skill level increases . Now that right , that's not an issue . And so you move on to the next higher priority and where the low hanging fruit is there .

And when it comes to time , when I'm talking to head coaches , there's always the objection of like I don't have time . And my answer to that is if it's a big enough problem , it a big enough solution , and so you can't tackle big problems with small solutions and expect it to work .

So you need to really confront it and go like this is really actually slowing us down here . If we don't resolve this , there's massive consequences . So let's chuck all that . We've got at this for 12 weeks and that big investment of energy and resources hopefully will give us like a change in outcome . Um and turn .

An investment , I guess , is what everyone wants when they're , when they're making changes from a strategic perspective .

You know , I think a lot of what maybe not the only the head coach , a lot of people are in there but in general , like a lot of your time is required on thinking and really thinking through a problem and understanding like what are we doing that maybe is not serving us ? That we used to do , what do we need to do differently ?

But also I mean as we'll talk about a little later like the sport has changed significantly in the last 10 years . Right , it is like the way that I used to train athletes and the way that I used to work on the medical side is substantially different than it was 10 years ago in a good way , because new things have come out .

But like I find that you know I follow that I think it's like a George Washington quote or Abraham Lincoln . It's like , you know , if I had five hours of chopper tree down , I'd spend four and a half thinking about how is not in more rope climbs and more drills . It's about thinking about like to your point , like is there a structural scheduling issue ?

Do I need to learn something new ? Do I need to learn about proper weight training ? Do I need to learn about proper technical analysis for your chain code ? Do I need to understand these fundamentals at a better level ?

Because when you actually do go apply those things in the gym and you can maybe find yourself doing you know , uh , what would be three hours of work in 15 minutes , because you know exactly what drills to do , you know exactly how to set a strength program up , you know exactly what your stretch is going to be , and you've taken the time to not only learn for

yourself but teach your staff . And , of course , when that information sifts down to everyone in your organization , you're extremely efficient and you're much more efficient .

So I don't know , I find myself these days I still do a lot , but I find myself on the thinking , contemplating , researching , you know , really making sure that I have the act sharpened , so to speak , before I go in and do the things with programs and do things with patients , even in the clinic .

And I'm not sure if that resonates with you , if you feel that way too , but I find myself needing more uninterrupted two , three hour blocks of reading papers and researching and really understanding problems first .

You need to be in the role that you play , of course , as well , and your experience and the services that you provide is probably other people here that won't connect with that . They'd really struggle to digest it that way .

Some people need to go for a run and they get all their best ideas , and thinking time is when they're , you know , in the gym or doing yoga or whatever that might be .

Um , and so I think you're absolutely right . It's it's key for everyone to have reflective time and thinking time and not just to be on the hamster wheel just doing the same thing over and over again .

Now , um , like 99 of the audience here , the olympic cycle has no relevance to them whatsoever , like they're not involved with that level of performance , and so , um , whether the olympics is taking place or not , it's probably not going to impact their day-to-day , but they do still need to factor in .

Okay , there is a cycle that I go through which is like on season , off season , all right , and and when that season ends , before going into the next one , and and jumping back on that hamster wheel like , what changes are we going to make ? Like , um , what have we actually learned from the last two , three , four seasons ? What's the trend ?

Um , you know , history repeats itself . Unless something is going to change , you know right now , that's what's going to transform the results moving forward .

So , unless , as a , as a team , you're allocating time , I think , to have those conversations , you're probably just going to get the same results , um , and maybe even worse results , because if you're not thinking about it and strategizing and innovating and your competition is , they're going to do better , which means you'll end up doing worse .

So I think one of the competitive advantages you can have is just lots of reflection time , um , and in the simplest form , we probably learn this uh , on some of our courses and things that we might do you plan , do review . It's as simple as that plan , do review . You know what are you going to do ?

Like , let's do it , let's review whether it worked , and then you replan again and like . It doesn't need to be more complicated than that , but it could be if that's your jam , if that's what you're into .

And you know , there the parallel to this is that in the four year cycle as much as the one year cycle , I personally find that when you're talking to people and you're trying to I'm trying to get people to have consulting work or do their questions as soon as the season is ending , like literally the week after they have their little break , they take time Like

let's at least have a zoom meeting and jump on a call to get the first one going , because you really only have , I would say in the in the yearly cycle , maybe a month or six weeks to make a dramatic change and something you're going to do differently if you do really want to overhaul .

And then on the elite side , you know , when we talk with people I tell them like out of a quad , maybe you have six to eight months , like if you really want to dramatically change the way you're training , you want to start weight training , you want to do a workload thing .

You want to , uh , change difficulty substantially right For , like someone's uh , all of the team's bar scores , or whatever . Like you , you cannot do that . The third year going into a four-year , like in 2027 , it can be really hard , or 26 and really hard to make dramatic sweeping changes to what you're doing .

And so I think people don't realize how fast the season comes in the yearly cycle or the second year of a quad comes in the four-year cycle , and I'm trying to encourage people like , listen , you , you need to start like yesterday and if not , like you got to , like almost all hands on deck .

You know , take a Saturday , pay people for their time , get them coffee and food and have them come in and say , okay , what are we going to do to change this ? And , to your point , how do we delegate this ? How do we all take a piece of ?

You know you need to qualify for an olympics first . If that's what you're you're trying to do and you can't , that process starts halfway through the cycle . Um , and if you're looking at the time between tokyo and paris , of course you know that wasn't a full quad anyway . Uh , there was only three years technically , because the olympics was delayed by a year .

So , um , yeah , like , thinking about this from a broader perspective to try and appeal to all the audience , like , you're absolutely right , the earlier you can be strategizing and thinking , the better . But equally , like that that might work in your favor in the sense of just because you plan something doesn't mean it's going to work .

So , if you , if you start implementing changes and then , six months down the line you work , you find out that wasn't what you needed . You've still got time to go right . What's the what's the next option ? What can we learn from that ? You don't want to be experimenting too far into a competition season , for example .

I can give you my top three first , but maybe top three highlights or wonderful moments of let's go just gymnastics first . Maybe we can go to other sports later .

But that was the most nervous I've ever been for a meet in my entire life was men's team final on Monday , maybe just having some involvement , knowing some of those people and just like it's such a historic event to have them be , you know , not even competitive , but just .

And then , of course , steven , can you imagine sitting three and a half hours and having to go last on pommel horse when your team is almost clinched and you're the last person ? Bro Ice in his veins , right . So that was , you know .

I dovetailed the women with that too as well , because they're incredible and seeing them have a redemption tour was really dope , but that was probably highlight for me . Second , hopefully not stealing your thunder , but Reese and Luke .

Seeing Reese win pommel horse gold and just knowing how much Reese has been through and how much Luke just grinds on the back end and from the last experience he's had . That was an emotional moment for me too as well , to see them go super well .

And the third for me was at a holistic level , was just looking across the field and seeing how many people were on their second , third , fourth Olympic cycle , right . So , becky Downey , ellie , obviously , simone , there was , you know , people who are in the States here . It was a huge issue to be in college and then go to elite and then have to go back .

But now you're seeing people go two years of college , then go to an Olympic cycle , then go back to college , then possibly do an Olympic cycle . Like that is just so incredibly healthy for the sport , for the athletes , for the coaches .

Like I really was taken aback at like how awesome it was to see know grown women doing gymnastics at a high level and not like just showing up but like being super competitive and vying for olympic medals and finals .

And so , yeah , that was those three , the men's and the men's team , the women's team , uh , reese and luke , and then I would say the um , the just the overall state of the age and aging up . So did I steal any of yours or was that close ?

Obviously , I'm really fortunate in my position to have supported many athletes that get to go to competitions like this and I think that , um , seeing a whole bunch of them , like knowing their stories and knowing how hard they've worked , and and then just seeing them kind of live that experience and knowing that they would have dreamt about it and pictured it in

their head so many times , and um , that's really quite special

, I think . When you when it's not as sterile I'm just watching someone through a screen , it it's like you know their story , you know who they are , you know they deserve it . And that's not just the athletes , it's the coaches as well .

I mean , obviously Ellen is a good friend of mine and she's on the podcast before , but I remember I was looking up and seeing her on the floor with them at team finals and I like damn , like I know how hard ellen has worked to help that program get to where they need to be medically yeah , yeah , no , I think it's really special to see that , which is

amazing um , I think , just the positive coverage in general on gymnastics .

Gymnastics has been through a rough ride , you know , so , um to see that that's that switch in terms of the way that it's now discussed and talked about and and that is the byproduct of of , yeah , a lot of changes which have taken place , but also a lot of role models like simone , people within gymnastics , you know , people that are willing to talk about

important topics and and use their platforms to kind of help the sport um be resurrected , if you like , and I kind of feel like this was quite pivotal . This games in doing that , and there's so much positivity which is being spread , which is amazing . Now , that's not to say that it isn't without some um challenges , of course there's .

There's something very topical , of course , with regards to , like , the bronze medal on floor and and so that's .

That's not great um , that situation , of course , but I think , largely , there has been a lot of great coverage about the sport and you can see that like people really care about gymnastics as a sport still , um , and I think it's going to really inspire people to to take up gymnastics and , um , so many of the gymnasts you know they're fantastic role models that

they're so good , they're so good at representing um , you know , in our case of , on the woman's side of things , you know being a a strong , powerful , inspiring woman , um , and I think it's just amazing for for so many young girls to look up to that and see that , um , that you're coming from different backgrounds and different body types , different countries ,

different um you ethnicities , of course , and and and the whole range . It's just like I felt quite proud of the sport again . Yep , yeah , and and that's like that's . That's probably quite different to how a lot of people have felt about gymnastics and so that's given me a boost and I think a lot of people are boost really .

You know the superman meme came out in the whole nine . But yeah , I don't know steven personally , but I was extremely proud as a male gymnast that he used this platform to say like , hey , this is why we need college programs and more men's , you know boys in gymnastics , because the sport is dying on that side .

And so that was incredible to see and I think you know I was watching um , kevin Hart and Kenan Thompson have like a peacock coverage for like a uh , like a comedy segment .

And then and Jordan was on there , fred was on there there was a lot of insanely positive Steven went on the Jimmy Fallon show , so to see it kind of crack that fourth wall into mainstream coverage to your point in a place you think about 10 years ago in 2016 , which we're at the Olympics , man , it was a dark , dark , deservingly hard time for gymnastics and

to see that leaf turn over a bit of positive coverage and people talking about it . Getting young boys in gymnastics yeah , I agree with you . Body getting young boys in gymnastics like yeah , I , I agree .

We know that that's a bit that's been happening for several years now , that trend , which is great , and , um , seeing so many of those athletes kind of in their prime still , like , performing at their very best on the competition floor Amazing example , seeing how important or how well people are taking care of their mental health in terms of the decisions that

they're making as well , and things so like just all really good things for coaches , parents and athletes to be able to recognize and learn from . And hopefully , as a byproduct of that , we'll start seeing , you know , better decision making taking place .

Um , you know , if , if people are leveraging what they're , what they're seeing , um , you could you can't be what you can't see , like you can tell people something over and over again , but , like , if these athletes and parents , like they can see , they can see the effectiveness of decisions , they can see people make decisions , they can , um , like understand the

value in mental health , for example , or having coping mechanisms , all that kind of stuff . Um , it will trickle down , and it already is for sure , so it's that's great to see and something else .

recruiting or stuff . And I find myself I have a very different mental framework now of the ages of 10 to 14 , when someone comes to me , you know , in the in the U S side hopes or tops or junior elite or whatever , like yeah , you know , I'm going to be on junior national team and blah , blah , blah , and it's like okay , this person .

I used to think that , like , okay , this person's going to go to college and maybe , like 22 is when that person might be moving on . But now , you know , through puberty , this person could have 10 more , 20 more years in gymnastics . Like that's insane to me , like I can't wrap my head around .

When I was younger , you know , my my brain didn't think about the fact that when someone was 12 , they could have 20 plus more years in gymnastics and like , in particular , I was like Jesus man . That's insane and to your point .

I can now point to many , many examples , not just one outlier of Oksana right or someone who made it , but like there are like multiple 24 , 26 , 28 year old elites . And even in college it's like you know . There's girls that I've worked with that had a really hard injury senior year .

They just took a gap year and went to college a year late and they're going to be 24 when they finished their career and totally okay Now , like that used to not be normal , they used to not be okay and now it is .

And I really love that because it's completely different how you approach 10 , 13 , 14 years old when somebody might have that much longevity left them , and I'm really happy to see that .

, absolutely .

It's what we need to make sure that we do is translate the lessons from that when we're making decisions for the younger kids , because it's all well and good recognizing that we've got 25 years ahead of us , but ultimately , if the decisions aren't made at a young age , you're still placing the same ceiling above them , because they'll burn out really early or

they'll lose their love from the sport , and so I think we need to take the lesson that is presented in front of us , which is that this is no longer a sprint , it is a marathon and ultimately I've just released a video on this on my YouTube channel but , like , your ultimate competitive advantage is whether you're even just still competing or not , because over

time , gymnasts will retire from the sport . So if you can be the last person standing , you're , you're already at an advantage , if you like . Um , just from longevity , just from being experienced , maybe the most experienced , uh , being fit and healthy and developing your program . I mean , look at an Ellie Black , for example , just a prime example of that .

You know , she's just , she gets better and better as she ages Doesn't mean that it's not challenging for her in different ways or that her body might be pushing against her in other ways , but like she's always improving , someone with that rich experience of competing at four quads , I mean it's just yeah incredible yeah , and to that as well , I find myself , um ,

I understand , as someone who works with these athletes .

impacts are , I think , what , what caused a lot of the issues is it's all the hard landings when they're going through puberty , it's all of the it's . The density of competition is a big factor here in the States too , of how many meets we do per year when someone's actively growing .

And I find that my pendulum has swung personally that when I first got out of school , when I was maybe a little bit too cautious I really would advise pulling people back too much and I felt as though they were just taking a lot of time off and I was trying to bubble wrap them .

But then , of course , I met Tim Gabbard and learned workload science and many other injury type stuff came out like OK , well , we do have to train hard , but we have to train intelligently and smart when we do this .

And so I think the misnomer sometimes is that when they're going through puberty 10 to 14 , we're just going to back off a lot , we're not going to do a lot of training hours , we're just going to kind of wait it out , and I find myself kind of going back on my not on my word , I would say as well .

But just , I've learned a lot more and I've changed my approach , which is like okay , well , there's cross training , there's a lot of technical drill development and stuff that you can get a lot of volume and reps in without adding a lot of intensity .

And then if you can get through that period for some athletes it's 14 , for some it's a little different but when you come on the other side of that , you have developed so much and then you can handle a lot more intensity . You can handle a lot more when you've fully gone through some of that growth and you have strength to support that .

And then you think about how much better somebody is on the other side , because I would say half the injuries I treat that people end up being career ending , develop and start in puberty . That's really , you know , an OCD , an ACL tear , a back fracture like in those things , hot athletes for their career .

So I learned that from you , and maybe it's a hat tip to you , that there is so much that can be done in a solid 20 to 25 hours without burying somebody completely .

Um , because you can definitely go too quick , for sure , but you definitely can go too slow , and you do have to strike that balance of , like , we still need decent training volume here and we need high reps . It's just that's the way the nature of the sport is .

We want early skill acquisition there's loads of benefits to that as well but we also want to be planting seeds for , like , long-term future skills . Um , and maybe maybe we train some of that volume in such a way that it doesn't have the same impact on the body .

So , use of trampolines and long tramps and floor bars and strap bars and , uh , spotting , you know there's all sorts of different ways of offsetting some of that volume . Um , I think what we most need to be careful of is , like when skills have been acquired in the gym and then we say , oh , let's put this into a routine now .

So sure , a kid might be able to do a double double when she's 14 on the floor , but is it really necessary ? You've acquired that Like , why don't you just stick to doing it on the rod floor or doing them off the trampoline and keep that in the locker so that you know that you've got that later on ?

But , like for now , maybe that's not as necessary as you once thought it was . Um , I actually think we're probably losing most kids to pressure of some of some shape , way or form and and that's pressure from parents as well as coaches .

So I'm not like I'm not , I'm not saying one greater than the other , but I would say there's a balance of both there , of pressure to perform , um , but like slowing down , it's all well and good , slowing down , right , but if you don't have the trust from the parents , then actually they end up relocating because you and you've got to be able to effectively

communicate

. So this is our strategy . We fully recognize , we fully recognize your daughter's ability . We are really excited about the future . Rest assured , we have a strategy in place for that talent to come to fruition .

But it might not look as obvious to you because we're going slowly and that is intentional and we've made that decision because of our experience and we know that if we push too quickly now which which , by the way , she might be able to cope with and perform really well in the short term that might actually impact her ability to be here in sort of two , three

years time , which we believe is going to be a poor decision . So you know , it's whether or not you can build that trust so that you can go slowly not too slow , but slowly , um and have the full support of everyone that's involved . I think that's quite a tricky balance for clubs to get right .

works yeah , no , you're totally right and I think it's definitely resonating with me as I think about this is that one thing , along with the changing younger years aspect , I think we have to all , as a sport , reflect and this is not us or wherever , but um , I can't say who or where , but I was consulting with an athlete who is in the running for a pretty

high level in the future and she told me that she felt as though she was being put on a hamster wheel of success , that as soon as I checked this thing off the box , I made this team . Okay , now it's this team . Okay , now you got to make this team when this me . Okay , now , make this team now . Now train with this upper level team .

Okay , now , be top physicals on this team .

Like she felt as though there was always a moving goal line , and that really resonated with me , because somebody else that I worked with , who was on the medical staff , said , as though as soon as we checked a box , there was no time to pause and think about , like okay , do we have to run at this next goal right now , or can we kind of give us a six ,

six month ? Um , and I think about um , asher , uh Hong and Tom . Tom Meadows is a friend and he said on his podcast famously that , like just because somebody could do an iron cross or could do a planter , could do a Maltese , he's like no , we're going to wait , we're going to wait because you haven't grown yet , you're not through your frame yet .

Like we're going to hurt your elbows If we try to do a lot of volume and strength when they stuff . But Tom was like , nope , let's just wait . Nope , let's just wait . And of course that takes experience and wisdom .

But I think that the thing I see coaches and parents and even Jim struggle with is they can't like , they can't see progress right , they can't see the new skill being competed on hard , they can't see the all around score that's going up year by year by year by level .

And I think sometimes that lack of tangible metrics of success by women , what the sport puts on with you won this meet , you made this score , you made this team , you're on this invitational I think that's where people struggle a bit with the fear of like oh , my God , I'm , I'm not going enough , I'm not pushing hard enough because we haven't hit these checklists

of like you know this , this team , then that team , then that team , then junior , then senior , then I get an assignment yeah , yeah , and .

So you don't know how much the physical preparation is helping , necessarily , until it comes to later on down the line , perhaps , um , you know , you might not see it translate directly into a skill straight away when you're doing it .

Now we know that physical prep is a great investment and you're always going to get a return on that , whether that is , you know , creating new skill opportunities or adding an extra six , seven , eight years to a gmas career .

But in that moment when you're doing it , you don't see the outcome , whereas if you ask a kid to do a skill , you can see yes or no , did they achieve it or not ? So they've done a double back and they've landed on their feet . Hooray , we've got something tangible here that we can look at .

But doing a squat with an extra 20 kilos or doing an extra five single leg dips , you don't necessarily see how , um , like you , don't necessarily translate the success of the double back into that single leg dip , for example , or or whatever that might be . Now we might know that as coaches , but not everyone's going to recognize that .

So , again , it comes down to trust . Like how , how much trust is there in um , in yourselves as coaches , from the people around you that support that athlete ? Like , the athlete needs to trust you as a coach .

The parents for sure need to trust you as a coach and without that , I think it's just , it's really challenging to do this with a , with a slow and steady process , because , let's be right , a lot of parents , they want , they want results , um , and it's not my place to say whether that's right or wrong , and there's lots of context , of course but like there

is um , like that is an insurmountable amount of pressure for a lot of people . And I think if we actually understood what the attrition rate is here in gymnastics in terms of , like , the number of kids that that drop out or move or whatever , I think it would be staggering .

I mean , we're never going to know that statistic , but I think it's staggeringly high because of how competitive the landscape is . So , yeah , I just keep coming back to trust and longevity .

That could , like I said , haunt them for a while , and they want specific advice and younger me , when I was really stuck inside the fast , fast , go go , we got to make this whatever and the culture had not changed . Um , you know , I was unfortunately trying to help them get back as quickly as possible but as safe as possible always .

But now I find myself much more conversation with people about , like , if they , they do , you know , you can do everything right . You can do everything right , do all the physical prep and listen to every course that Nick has and I have whatever injuries are still going to happen Right .

And I think in many places , consulting wise , it was always about how fast can we get back , cause we have to compete this in the middle of the year or make this by the end of the year .

And now , you know , unless somebody is , I can only think about two someone's competing for a scholarship and they have to go to a national level meet to get a university recruitment thing . And , to be fair , even on that , I know many of the college coaches and they don't want to see that , they don't want to see you rush back and do it .

But I realized there's a bit of a . You have to be available and show your talent level to be on the radar of coaches . I get that . Or in this situation that's happened , a couple of quads and stuff like that .

It's like someone's literally trying to make Olympic trials and it's like I'm pretty good to go , but I'm kind of getting back to all my skills and we're planning that outside of those two things almost every other time .

Now I'm like we need to fully get you back safely , like that requires six to nine months sometimes and I don't want to be the bearer of bad news , but this is not a one month ankle sprain where you can train bars and you're going to be fine to go .

I find myself having a lot more of those like okay , like do we need to be getting back for nationals this year ? Do you need to get this team ? Do you need to do all your meets Like I know you want to . That's not the issue . I want you to too but like , you are 13 or 14 or 15 or 16 .

And if you rush back with this thing , you're going to have back pain for on and off for the rest of your career . Like , do we want that , or can we take six months and truly heal this the right way ? And I find that I may . Again , maybe it's experience that I can stand on my own two feet now as a provider .

But now I feel as though the culture supports that , whereas maybe 10 years ago there was an undertone of like , yeah , yeah , yeah , cool Six months , but like we have four , like we have three . And I was like , okay , we have three or four , you know , like .

And so I find myself doing what I feel is medically right , even if someone's not happy with it , cause the culture eventually will support it .

Dave , just something that I've been thinking about a lot recently um is how important it is to be thinking about the , the day-to-day enjoyment of what we're doing and the athletes are doing and I know that sounds really fluffy and woo-woo , okay , but like , let's just think about let's take an olympics , because just passed um , probably more dreams were shattered at

the olympics than they were achieved . Like that's , that's the reality of how many people went there with , with aspirations .

I mean , there's very few people that can win medals at the olympics , um , very few people that actually get to the olympics in the first place , let alone some of these other major competitions or championships , or even making a national team .

And I think that if our pursuit of of that um compromises the , just the general enjoyment of the sport , we've got to take a back seat and go like what's the chances of us ? Like looking back on this and thinking that we made the right decisions ? Or like is this journey going to be worth it ?

Like , even if I made that event , if I'm not enjoying the day-to-day , will I look back and go like this was really worth it ? I mean , the olymp Olympics came and went for us in a couple of weeks , you know , and that was it . There's a 15 year or 10 year investment into that , that two-week period .

You know you want to be able to look back and go like every step of this journey was worth it , like I know , whether I won a medal or not , or whether , um , or whether I even made the Olympics or or made the national team or regional or states , whatever it might be like it's got to be worth it .

And at every level at regional level , state level , club level , olympic level we've got to be thinking about , um , the destination .

I know this is very cliche , I'm just not sure enough people are recognizing it and I think when you work in it , um , when you work with those people and and you see the heartache , you see the trauma , you see shattered dreams and um , like it just reminds you how important it is to to keep some perspective on this .

And if the sole focus about our measure of success and everything that we're striving for is purely about that , that one accomplishment or a series of medal winning events , you know , like the chances are , you're never going to look back and go like this was a real worthwhile journey . I love the result .

Jeez , that journey was tough and so I just think it's important that we're because we're talking about success a lot here . We're talking about striving and dreaming and achieving , and I love all of that and I'm really into high performance , as you know otherwise I wouldn't do the work that I do .

But , like 99 of people listening probably more won't reach that level . They never will . They never will just based on numbers and statistics and how few people do , particularly in a country like yours , dave , where you've got like a staggering number of coaches and gymnasts that are trying to do that .

So let's not ruin this experience for 99.9 , because they're all trying not all of them , but most of many of them trying to get to the top 0.01 . Um , just an important thing for us to all recognize .

I've spoken to a lot of coaches that are like you know what I'm finally here and it's not everything that was , yeah , it's not what I wanted it to be , and I'm like , hey , you know , like , enjoy what you're doing . If you love coaching kids at club level , they're having a blast , they're making progress , you've got great relationships .

You're like you're a big impact on their life . Just be careful what you wish for , about , like , I'm not saying don't dream . I'm not saying don't strive , but it's not greener grass , it's different grass .

I was struck this year also about how maybe it's a us thing because us media is a bear of its own , but like when somebody wins in gold medal and the expectations are laid that somebody you know wins by a dominant fashion moves on , it's just , it's so mind boggling to me how quick it is , like you know , like oh , good job , go America , and they move on

to the archery or they move on to the , the , the , the shooting or whatever . Right . But you know , last Olympics not to go into more depth , but there was definitely some things that didn't go as planned and it was an absolute witch hunt , almost like a massacre in the media , of how bad it was . I can't believe you got this metal , you didn't win gold .

And like I was struck again empathetically towards the athletes that maybe I have a connection to is like nobody sees the whiplash effect of what happens when it doesn't go well and they're already horrifically upset and , like you said , shattered dreams because they're so frustrated , they're so bummed . It's been 10 , 15 , 20 years to get to this point .

It didn't work out how they wanted it to . It's just such a contrast . And when someone is really taken to the board , so to speak , for not doing well , but then they win their gold medal , they move on and I don't know . I think it's so important it . It highlighted for me how the coaches and the athletes have to be at a human level .

First of , we're doing this for enjoyment . We enjoy the sport , we fall in love with the sport , we like coaching , we like doing , we like the grind of the process . That's all well and good and , of course , we want to win .

But like the dust fades man , the lights turn off , people go down and whether you had the meat of your life and you won gold or you absolutely imploded , you did not have anything work out the way you wanted to . Your coach is still going to be there on the other side of the camera , and your parents and your friends and your teammates .

And so , yeah , I find myself more not detaching is the right word , but like I find myself getting more and more to the human level interaction with athletes , no matter of who they are .

From the highest level athlete I work with literally someone who's recreational , it's just human level involvement in sports and involvement in what we're doing , and I think it's really important to to remember that those things when we start a new quad and it all shakes over and we start our new dreams again , you know yeah , and that's it .

Um , and so , yeah , the message here , I guess and I I do think this is important one just enjoy what you're doing . And , by the way , like you're not always going to enjoy it , because it doesn't matter what level you're coaching at , there's these peaks and troughs , right , there's problems , there's challenges , there's upset , there's adversity .

So I'm not painting a picture here that you're going to be in the gym having an amazing time always .

I'm just saying , like , just get the perspective about what , what it is that you're striving for , and and , yeah , just be careful what you wish for sometimes yeah , yeah , for sure , and kind of to wrap up on this note is on this , uh , method of or approach of learning education , new kind of stuff .

So that could be like a head coach , a club operations manager , someone who's a decision maker .

Essentially , we want to make a difference to those people in communities , that people that might not be our clients , they might not work with us in the Circle program , for example , but we want to make a difference and we really understand me and and my team some of the pain points that people in these leadership positions are facing , and there's many of them ,

but one of them is is time , um , overwhelm , um , you know , being amazing at so many things , but also struggling to get around those tasks .

And we've , you know , just chosen this event and the topic of the event because we know that it can make a big difference to the way these clubs operate and that is in line with our mission of making a positive and lasting footprint on the world of gymnastics . So we're focusing on on how to put together what we believe is a very important resource .

It's a world-class members handbook . It's something that we think that all clubs should have . It's something that most clubs have a version of , but , um , like from many of the ones that I've seen as I travel around the world and working with you know , clients and non-clients is that it's um sub-optimal .

It doesn't do exactly what it should do , and I think most handbooks collecting dust sitting in a drawer they're not referenced . Um , and we believe that we've got a great example of of a world-class handbook with the right resources , the right tools , which will actually make lives a lot better .

And what I mean by that is a handbook is a central hub for your philosophies , your values , your mission , all your policies , and without the clarity on that stuff , it becomes quite messy and , as a result of that , head coaches are firefighting lots .

There's conflict with coaches , lots of conflict with parents , lack of transparency , lack of trust , uh , certain decisions which are being made emotionally , decisions for this person , not for that person , like it all comes down to how well do clubs have a really robust set of policies and standards and expectations that are not just in place but but communicated in a

really effective , engaging way also , and so this initial inaugural conference of gymnastics leaders will be walking through and sharing the tools and content on how to put one of these world-class handbooks together . We're really excited about it because we know how powerful it is and we've listened to the community .

We know this is something that people need , so yeah , looking forward to it .

I personally will be watching too as well , so I can't wait to kind of dive in there more . But we will include the show , uh the link to the show notes below , and when this one comes out , there's a bit of a discount which you guys should a hundred percent take advantage of .

So , of course , just pass it along and I think together it will really help a lot of clubs .

So that's what our podcast I've come to is our facetimes , just put on audio yeah , true , yeah , no , I love it , man .