Ian King

Be part of the solution

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On a Saturday morning I watched a group of girls aged approximately 6-8 years old performing walking lunges in their warm-up for club sport. It was early morning on a winters day, and every single one of them was using both hands on their lead knee as they struggled to come out of each rep. Heart breaking. Tragically I can see this in all sports of all age groups in the fields and playing arenas in any city in the western world. At least anywhere with internet connection, where dominant trends spread more rapidly.  A predominance of misguided, non-effective, career killing and quality of life damaging training methods.

I’m sure the coach, a middle aged and enthusiastic man, was well-meaning.  In the same way the misguided physical coaches globally are for the most part well meaning – for some reason they don’t ask the question and dig deep enough to understand there is a better way.

In the case of walking lunges in the warm up its potentially life-changing knee degeneration being created in group of unsuspecting and trusting minors.

If you share my vision that the direction of training in this world is heading in an inappropriate direction you can be part of the solution, rather than being part of the problem.  Because as KSI coaches we are very clear in our vision – there is a better way, athletes and clients training to be better deserve that better way.  We are committed to giving them the best so they can be their best. This is measured by zero injury and superior outcomes in training and competitive. Podium performances.

However if you, like the coach that winter Saturday morning with his group of 6-8 year old girls, leave your training decision inquires at the level of ‘well EVERYBODY is doing this’, then I’m confident you shouldn’t bother reading any further. On the flip side, if you share my beliefs that what is being done is simply not good enough, then read on.

I appreciate that possibly the vast majority of sports and physical preparation coaches care more for conformity than about the results. That’s normal. That’s average.  It’s not going to change. 90% of every group is committed to conformity and being ordinary. 5% are drive to be good. 5% won’t rest before greatness is achieved.  You choose your group, your tribe. You can be ordinary and average. Or you can be good. Or you can be great. At KSI we are driven to be great. You can share that vision, not just in lip service but in the same metrics we use to objectively confirm the superiority of the KSI way.

I appreciate that possibly the vast majority of physical preparation coaches care more for the perception of popularity, how many hits on their website, how many social media followers, than their ability to positively impact the lives of the end user.  Or how low their body fat is, or how big their biceps are. How much ‘knowledge’ they have, or how many certificates they have. However there will also be some of you that are drawn to the impact you have on the end user, more than the perception you create with your peers.

Throughout my professional career I have solved problems the world faces in training through disruptive innovations that ultimately path through the ‘three stages of truth’ – first they are rejected, then ridiculed and then adopted and claimed by a trend-spotting marketer from the north-east or the south-west!

KSI Coaches are taught these innovations at a level of excellence not imaginable to the rest of the world. And they are taught innovations that have not been released into public domain, as they rise through the levels and become trusted teachers of the KSI way.

We put the athlete/client first. We let impact determine our results. We let our results do the talking. We under promise and over deliver.  We prefer the marketing that comes from the way we change peoples lives over the marketing most use on social media to create a perception of themselves.  We are humble and solution focused.  We make a difference in the lives of others, and in doing so make a difference in the lives of our coaches. Our coaches live a lifestyle most can only dream off, as  a result of giving athletes and clients training results more can only dream off.

It’s your choice. You could be part of the solution, the KSI way.

Note:

In July 2017 we are offering selected physical preparation coaches the opportunity to spend 21 days with my top coaches and myself; through webinar and forum interaction.  It’s not for everyone. Here are some of our pre-qualifications criteria:

  1. You need to have been coaching for at least 5 years.
  2. You need to have come to the conclusion that there is a better way (for both you and your clients).
  3. You need to have taken some action to date to study KSI material (not including free online articles).

21 days with us during which you will get an inside look at who we are, what we do, and why we are totally confident we lead the world in athlete preparation.  Free.

Email info@kingsports.net to learn more.

Ian King

To think or conform?

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I received an email from a young man on the subject of stretching, a classic case of humans choosing conformity over thinking. The email went like this:

“Recently I purchased your Legacy book. The book is full of training gold, especially important information is about stretching. You should spread the truth about stretching. I can`t believe how everybody is wrong with this dynamic stretching B.S. Static stretching rules. I´m more flexible than ever, feel great, and it does transfer to dynamic motions.” [i]

I was really impressed that this young man sought to gain a personal experience about stretching prior to reaching a conclusion. He thought for himself, in the face of dogma to the contrary, and reached a conclusion contrary to the dogmatic teaching.

As for spreading the ‘truth’ about stretching, that’s what I have been doing for nearly 40 years now. The challenge is most people don’t want to think independently. The famous Dr. Albert Swcheitzer when asked in about 1952 reached the same conclusion.  Earl Nightingale tells this story in his 1956 audio ‘The Strangest Secret’. (A must listen to!)

Here is the transcript:

“Some years ago, the late Nobel prize-winning Dr. Albert Schweitzer was asked by a reporter, “Doctor, what’s wrong with men today?” The great doctor was silent a moment, and then he said, “Men simply don’t think!” [ii]

Now as far as the truth or wrong, I tend to avoid these words where possible. To ignore the value of static stretching and replace it with dynamic stretching – or to leave your static stretching till after the workouts. These are mistakes.

However I understand how static stretching is promoted, and I understand most people are more committed to conformity than fulfilling their potential.

I have watched many of those who have achieved marketed position of influence in this industry promote their values on stretching. I know personally that the minority of these influencers who actually train don’t stretch, and never have.  To acknowledge they have missed the point in training as regards stretching is not going to happen in their lifetimes. And the influencers who don’t train have no chance of knowing personally the best alternatives or combinations.

As for conformity, I again refer to the best selling (in the true sense of the word, not in the way current industry marketers use it) for one of the best comments on conformity:

“Rollo May, the distinguished psychiatrist, wrote a wonderful book called Man’s Search for Himself, and in this book he says: “The opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice … it is conformity.” And there you have the reason for so many failures. Conformity and people acting like everyone else, without knowing why or where they are going.” [iii]

[Imagine if referencing and crediting were the norm in this industry? wouldn’t that be amazing! instead of this encouragement to lie, cheat, steal and plagiarize…]

Now concepts are promoted with great dogma, which is why I have historically encouraged people to challenge and ignore the dogma:

“Not only are you taught with a degree of dogma in formal education, you are often taught not to think – rather to accept ‘this is the way’.  Certain informal education teaches you to think for yourself (as we do at KSI) or teaches you a different perspective to the one you were taught to dogmatically adopt in your formal education. Exposure to this can cause some initial unease.” [iv]

I don’t suggest knowing the truth, however I have reached conclusions and encourage others to do the same, even if they are contrary to the dominant paradigms:

“I don’t know about truth, but I can say that blind and dogmatic teaching of this by personal trainers and others has contributed to some serious misconceptions…” [v]

My strong recommend has been to:

“Resist the temptation in program design to conform to mainstream paradigms simply for the sake of conforming, no matter how dogmatically they are presented, or how much you may be ridiculed or ostracized for trusting your intuition over conformity.” [vi]

Not to be confused of course with a thinly paraphrased paragraph that followed a year later in an article at t-nation.com from another ‘author’….

“When designing training programs, resist the pressure to conform to any tradition or system of beliefs, no matter how dogmatically that tradition or those beliefs are presented, or how much you get “slammed” for not conforming.” [vii]

My message to the young man who wrote to me, and to you to, is have the courage to think for yourself! And if you need help, I wrote the book ‘Barbells & Bullshit’ to help you. If nothing it will shock you into realizing that your own conclusions will be far more accurate and ethical and better for your than the self-serving dogma dished up by many who seek to exert their influence for reasons other than a pure intention to serve you. You can get this book in hard copy or e-book.  If you email me at question@kingsports.net sharing your commitment to think for yourself, I would love to give you a free copy of the e-book.

So the choice is yours – to think or to conform. Just don’t expect the masses to be so brave!

[i] Personal communication, name available on request, 26 April 2017

[ii] http://www.nightingale.com/articles/the-strangest-secret/

[iii] http://www.nightingale.com/articles/the-strangest-secret/

[iv] King, I., 1999, So You Want to Become a Strength and Conditioning Coach

[v] King, I., 2001 (?), Q & A, T-mag.com, Issue #10

[vi] King, I., 2005, The Way of the Physical Preparation Coach, p. 17

[vii] xxxx 2006, xxxxx, T-mag.com, Feb

Ian King

Hoping to catch up to the other schools in strength & conditioning  

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At the end of a coaching session where I was giving back, along with a number of other of former elite athletes in a specific sport, the coordinator introduced me to a young man who he explained was a teacher at a private school who had been entrusted with the task of introducing ‘strength and conditioning’ to his school, with the specific intent of ‘catching up to the other schools in their association as far as strength and conditioning’.

I didn’t want to say anything to the young man, to spoil his eagerness, so I kept a straight face. But inside I cringed – ‘catch up to the other schools in strength and conditioning?’ Why would you want to do that? It should more accurately described as ‘catching down’.

Let me explain.

In the 1970s not many high schools had gyms and in the ones that did have, there was no formal programming and no ‘strength and conditioning’ service provision. Firstly because there was no such thing as a ‘strength and conditioning coach’, as the term ‘strength and conditioning’ was an afterthought by a professional organization with a strength focus that belated wanted to expand their focus without changing their acronym (you can read more about that in my original writings on this subject in ‘So You Want to Become…’). And secondly because organized physical preparation (as I prefer to call it) was not even provided to the majority of western world elite adult teams at that time.

In the early 1980s in Australia the majority of 18 year and older elite athlete that I worked with (and there were thousands) were what I called clean skins. They had never done formal physical preparation. I only had to undo the imbalances that their sport had created in their body. I summarized at that time it usually took three years of solid supervised and individualized training to clean them p to the level of being injury free for the most part for the rest of their career.

Fast forward to the second decade of the 21st century and what’s changed? I inherit broken athletes from the age of 12 upwards. ACL reconstruction, stress fractures of the lower back, shoulder and hip surgery – you name it. So what’s changed?

Many in the respective sports would tell you it’s just the sport – it’s inevitable. I don’t agree, and my experience doesn’t support this. Some will say the athletes are bigger and stronger and the impacts are greater. Really? Aside from non-specific strength tests, my experiences and observations don’t support this. A more recent trendy explanation is that the athletes specialize too early. Sounds good, and it may be a contributor, but for me this also fails to explain the difference. So what is my conclusion?

In the 1970s and 1980s athletes gaining exposure to formal physical preparation as they entered elite ranks around 20 years of age typically retired at about 30 years or age. So that’s about 10 years. What if that retirement was forced more by physical preparation inducted injury than age or their sport? Now holding that thought for a moment, what if take those same flawed training concepts and applied them to a 20 year old? They would be out of the sport by about 20 years of age!

And that’s my theory. In fact I go as far as to say if a young athlete is talent identified around 8-12 yeas of age, and has the (mis)fortune of being exposed to ‘elite strength and conditioning’ – they will be injured by 16 years of age, undergone significant sports-injury related surgery by 18 years of age, and unable to play their sport by about 20 years of age as a general rule.

So in summary when I see the same flawed training methods applied to adults being applied to young athletes, I fear for their future.

So what makes me conclude that most training is flawed? During my last four decades of seeking answers and excellence in how to train, I have reached certain conclusions and theories on what it takes to create or avoid an injury.

Are my conclusions the same as the masses? No. Should this be a concern? Only if you are a conformist. If your dominant need is to be liked, and to achieve this you need to be like others, then you would be concerned by the fact that I have reached certain theories that differ from the mainstream. On the other hand if you realize that to get a different and ideally better result than the masses, you need to train differently – then you would be excited.

In my opinion the only improvements we have seen in training is in the ability to measure it, the technology of equipment, and the technology of the surgery to repaid the injuries.

Could it be possible that what the majority – and that probably means you – are doing more damage to good in their training? That is my suggestion. Is it popular? No. Is it easy to discredit? Yes. Does this what ever else is doing approach to training result in the best possible sporting out comes? No.

So if I am on track, why do most continue on this path? The answers lies there. Because most do it. And the majority are so insecure about their actions they seek comfort in the masses. Will the get away with it? Legally yes, because the interpretation will be that is what is accepted practice. Should they be able to sleep at night? I suggest not, if they have a conscience.

Why I am I so firm about this? I speak for the athlete. My heart goes out to the legally minor young athlete who has an adult guide them to life-long, career threatening, quality of life threatening injuries. There is a better way – I teach it openly and have done for decades. I believe that perhaps in the next generation, after my time on this earth, what I teach will be accepted as the final stage of truth as described by 19th century German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer – ‘accepted as being self-evident’.

But what about the one or two generations of young athletes who paid the price in their ‘strength and conditioning’ training between 1980 and whenever a better way is accepted?

So did I get excited for the young man empowered to bring his school ‘Strength and conditioning’ program up speed with other schools in their association? Not al all. I felt sad for the by-products of this intent. The young, innocent and trusting athletes. They are not, in my opinion, going to ‘catch up’. They are going to ‘do down’ in their athletic development.

Ian King

A KSI coach in every town! Wouldn’t that be nice!  

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I was sitting enjoying lunch today in Melbourne, Vic AUST with a friend of KSI. They shared a challenge, seeking my assistance. A New York colleague of theirs had approached them to service a client of theirs who was visiting Australian from the US for a few weeks in association with the first tennis Grand Slam event of the year, the Australian Open, played in Melbourne.

So did I have any coaches I could refer to in Melbourne was the question,, and the challenges. I didn’t. Tragically we don’t have a KSI coach in every town!

Reminded me of a situation a few months ago where a US based friend of KSI was looking for us to refer a KSI coach in Spain for their client, a person associated with the band U2. Now we were able to find a coach however they were only a L1 KSI coach. We would have preferred a higher-level KSI coach.

I put out a call on our KSI Coaches private Facebook Page, and no surprise, no response. looks like we are going to have to throw our net out wider, something we’re reluctant to do – because with a coach that has a bit of this and a bit of that in their tool box (even if one of those ‘bit off’s is attempts to apply their interpretation of the KSI way), the training approach cannot be guaranteed, and nor can the outcomes. You can appreciate our reluctance to refer to the unknown…

So…. it’s our challenge – more KSI coaches, ideally one in every town! And the benefit belongs to the client getting a better and predictable training service, and to the coach getting the referral!

Ian King

Want to put your hand up for this? Respond in the next 48 hrs to info@kingsport.net

Ian King

Trump or Clinton?  

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How the 2016 USA Presidential elections will affect you – no matter where in the world you live

There are few key things that I feel many may be missing the point on about the current 2016 USA Presidential elections. Firstly there is too much focus on the messenger and not the message. Secondly there may be an assumption that is just about America, not about non-Americans living elsewhere in the world. And thirdly, a lack of forward thinking about the implications of the outcome.

Firstly – the message vs. the messenger. Granted it’s been a campaign that may have taken gutter politics to a new high (or low). And I can understand how anyone could be distracted by that. But let me bring you back on focus. It’s not about the messenger. Take Donald Trump. I see a lot of commentary on his personality, or on the allegations of his treatment of women, or on his own word selection about treatment of women, and so on. Or take Clinton, with focus on her email management or Benghazi or her husbands track record with women.

Firstly, let me be politically correct – what I am about to say is not endorsing the values or behaviours that either person has been criticises for. What I believe is however that the point is being missed. Go beyond the individuals – consider the bigger picture. This is the first time, to my knowledge, and in my lifetime, a complete political novice has been a front-runner for Presidency of the United States.

This is the message – that enough Americans are fed up with or frustrated by or disillusioned with the solutions offered in their adult lifetime by career politicians that enough of them are supporting an alternative. I suggest this is more about people power and one of the greatest shifts in political and social patterns in my lifetime that it is about Trump or Clinton.

And why? I suggest that a growing number of people in the US (and potentially other countries around the world) are concerned enough about their future that they are willing to endorse change. And that means they must be really disillusioned and questioning main-stream to-date accepted ways of governance. And that, for me is massive. There is a message in this, a ‘huge’ (no to paraphrase Donald!) message. We are possibly witnessing one on the most significant shifts in social and political thinking of the masses, based on I suggest financial realities. The system is just not working for a growing number of people.

In summary on this point, I suggest take your gaze off the personalities involved (the messengers) and look at the message – a proposal be the people, even it is only the Republicans to date in this pre-election (11 days away) moment – that there is a viable alternative that they are willing to support other than a career politician.

Now for the second point. Perhaps too many of us – myself included at times – have considered this an ‘American’ thing, that it doesn’t really matter to or affect those who are not US residents or citizens. Perhaps this is not so. What if the outcome of this election affected every country in the world and every citizen of every country in the word? And how might this occur?

In the first instance, considering the size of an impact of the US on other countries globally, it would be naïve and short-sighted to assume that there would not be a flow on affect to every other country. Now just how much impact may depend on many variables including the extent to which your country trades with the US. However there is a second potential impact. What is the same social wave of unrest, as I have called it, sweeps your country and impacts major decisions such as national elections? This is a very strong possibility, that the world may be moving into a different phase.

Thirdly lets talk about the post election impact. No, I am not talking about whether Donald jails Hilary if he is elected. Or if Hilary has retribution for Donald if she is elected; or whether Donald’s accusers will prevail; or whether the FBI will bring criminal charges against Hillary. I am talking about how our lives may or may not be impacted post election. Have you considered that?

I have, and I believe it’s something you should consider, and form your own opinions on before I share my thoughts on this with you – which I plan to do.

So there you have it. I trust I have stimulated you to give serious reflection to this moment in time, and perhaps have given you a new perspective on what may be happening – to us all, currently, in the US.

Ian King

Knowing But Not Doing

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Is That Really Knowing?

I often hear and read comments about how a person ‘know’ the works of others. This is often based on a person reading a few (typically free) internet articles writing by the person, or even meeting them.

You don’t have to look to far for examples of this, however here is a great example. I read how a young man boasted of a day spent with the late Charlie Francis, a speed coach who was so far ahead of his peers. A few years later I watched that same young man implement a pre-season training program for a provincial team whose playing arena was approximately 100 meters in length. It began with 10 repeats of 1,500 meters and grew weekly to 20 repeats of 1,500 meters. That was not all, just part of training.

Now that approach was about as far away on the continuum from what Charlie espoused as you could go.

So what does it mean to ‘know’? A great saying, attributed to perhaps Zen philosophy, is that:

To know and not do is to not know.

So why claim one ‘knows’? I assume it gives a degree of perceived credibility to have had some exposure to a respected teacher and to be able to say ‘I know’.

But what does it take to ‘know’ in the Zen philosophy way? To be able to execute a certain training philosophy or method with unconscious competence takes so much more than simply reading the works of a person, or simply spending time with them.

The ultimate test of your ‘knowing’ is to coach live and write spontaneous training programs under the supervision and watchful eye of your teacher. Ideally you then receive feedback from them – in the now. You refine, adjust and do it again. You receive feedback, refine and adjust. And this cycle is repeated. For how long? Probably years.

Imagine proudly enacting a 15 kilometer to 30 kilometer total volume interval program with mixed energy system athletes competing on a 100×50 meter arena under the guidance of Charlie Francis? What do you think Charlie would have said? I can assure you he would not have said ‘Wow! What a great understanding of my training approach you have!’

What I suggest Charlie may have reacted with would be more along the lines ‘Okay, you may have missed the point. Have you ever read the chapter in my book about coaches ploughing fields with Ferraris? What about the chapter on building of very wide pyramids with very little peak?’

There’s a few messages here.

Firstly the loose boast of ‘I know coach x’s works’ is typically issued falsely be individuals wishing to create a perception beyond reality.

Secondly if you want to truly ‘know’ a particular coaches training approach you will need to find an opportunity to test your interpretation under supervision, receive feedback and refine on the basis of this feedback – many times over, typically years.

‘Knowing’ involves a lot more than lip service or short term exposure. True knowing means letting go of your desire to be perceived as a guru and putting on the white belt. I suggest that people who truly ‘know’ make no such inference, in respect of their realization they even with a long history of studying with a coach for the purpose of mastery, they are only scratching the surface.

At KSI we give the coaches in our program the opportunity to experience this ‘knowing’ opportunity – to coach under supervision and receive feedback. The entry to this opportunity is our annual KSI August Camp in Park City each year. If and when a coach rises higher up in the KSI Coaching program you will have other opportunities each year in varying locations.

If you truly want to master the KSI way we make it possible!

Ian King

Ian King

Knee injuries – How can you hope to solve the problem using the stimulus that caused the problem?

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As a student of sports training and competition I took up the opportunity to watch the exercise selection from the waiting room at the physical therapists. I was surprised at the amount of quad exercises used over the weeks of my observing.

Later as I lay on a table in the therapy clinic I listened to a young male client answer the question from this physical therapist.

Therapist: Okay what have we done so far?
Patient: Squats.
My mind: That’s one.
Patient: Wall squats.
My mind: That’s two
Patient: Lunges.
My mind: That’s three.
Patient: Walking lunges.
My mind: That’s four.
Patient: Step ups.
My mind: That’s five.

So far, the workout was 100% quad. I shook my head and said a prayer for the patient. Now to be fair I did see one non-quad exercise being done later. But the first five and the overwhelming majority of exercises being used in the rehab program for what I believe was an ACL surgery patient were quad exercises.

I found this ironic, because it was this very profession some 30 years ago that brought me attention to the risks of ‘quad dominance’ in muscle balance and its relationship with gait and joint integrity. And here I was, some three decades later, and they were creating that exact same condition.

I took this quad dominant concern, along with my own observations, quite seriously and spend a decade or so developing and refining before publishing a concept I called ‘Lines of Movement’ in 1998. You might not recognize the concept title I gave it but you will recognize the terminology by virtue of the prolific unreferenced and uncredited publishing by people who knew better.

In relation to the lower body, I developed the concept to ‘hip dominant’ exercises to counter the concern I learnt from my therapist colleagues about ‘quad dominance’. Now, nearly 20 years after I first published this concept, my theories about the risks of quad dominance have become greater and clearer. I rank the muscle imbalance presented by quad dominant training as one of the highest correlates with ACL ruptures and similar.

If I am track, then the question can be asked:

How can you hope to solve the problem (ACL rupture risk) using the same stimulus that contributed to the problem?

Now I understand that there are many reasons why most will disregard this message. Firstly, and most importantly, because the majority of ‘performance’, ‘injury prevention’ and ‘injury rehab’ strength training does just this – create quad dominance. And to accept this and change would take the emotional intelligence to conclude one is off track and needs to redirection one’s training programs. That’s the biggest reason the message will be ignored.

I understand this. I understand others are waiting for ‘evidence’. I say look at the changing injury landscape. This injury was extremely rare in the 1980s, and even after the surgery became available there was not an instant increase in ACL incidence – so the low incidence was not because the surgery was not available. It was just a rare injury. It is not any more. So what changed? Why are so many athletes suffering from this injury now? But this would take again a degree of commitment to excellence and a detachment from ego that few are committed to.

Evidence is, I suggest, another way of saying I will only do it when I see most others doing it, and when I am doing what most others are doing, I feel ‘right’ and ‘safe’.

What I do say is this – not withstanding the frequent medical claims I here quoted by patients all too often about how their graft will be stronger than the one their Maker gave them – 50% of all ACL patients will have repeat knee surgery, and 100% will have premature degenerative changes such as osteoarthritis. I would not wish this on anyone. If it was your child would you want this?

So while the masses wait the quarter to full century it may take for the ‘evidence’ to ‘allow’ them to take note of my conclusions, another generation or more will suffer from life changing injury and surgery such as the ACL.

It does not have to be this way for you and those in your care, however that is up to you.

Ian King

Ian King

Throwing the players under the bus – a strategy for failing as a coach  

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The first game of the season showed promise with the team winning the first half easily, and then holding on for the second half to win the game. By the second game this pattern of decline in dominance as the game went on became worse, and the team lost the second half.

I had fears of what was to follow, and my fears were amplified when the field announcer stated the final score and congratulated the visiting team for winning the second half. It was just the announcer looking to give a positive to the losing team, but he had inadvertently drove the nail further into the coffin of his own team.

As I feared, the coach told the team in the post-game talk that they were not fit enough. This code for something’s not working, I’ve got no idea what, but it must be your fault and the easiest blame strategy is ‘you are not fit enough’.

Predictably they trained the team harder in non-specific conditioning work as well as rugby drills during the following week. During the next game the team were the flattest they had been, with limited on-field talk. They almost lost the first half, and ended up drawing the game. This outcome was exacerbated by the fact that the opponent on this day had not won a game in the season to date. Of course, it’s unlikely that anyone took into account that they had played and lost to the competitions top teams.

So what do you do next after blaming fitness? The post-game coach’s speech focused on the lack of intensity, telling the players they needed to play and train with more intensity. I am not sure how you naturally bring more intensity when you are more tired than you needed to be, but that’s the way this scenario played out.

During the week, as you can expect, the team were trained in a way that resulted in the coach happily stating that they had brought more ‘intensity’ to training, inferring this would serve them well in the upcoming game.

In the upcoming game the team lost for the first time, failing to score a single try, and conceding nearly half a century of points.

So what do you do now that you have gone down the path of throwing the players under the bus? You start dropping players. So about 55% of the way through the season players are relegated, with the ensuing drop in personal confidence you can expect from players dropped without knowing why.

How did this work? The next game resulted in a score against that exceeded half a century. Now it was against the second strongest team in the competition, but the fact this team scored as many points as they did against a lowest rank team (a team that the losing team had easily beaten) suggested that the outcome was unnecessarily out of context to the losing teams potential.

So where do you go now? Shuffle players around, playing them out of the position you had them in for most of the season? Basically you run out of options.

Few would disagree that athletes benefit positively from people believing in them, especially their significant others. And who more significant than their coach? On the flip side, again few would disagree that negative impacts potentially result when a coach directly or indirectly tells the athlete they are lazy, don’t try hard enough, are not intense or focused enough, or are not good enough to play at that level.

The challenge with any coach who fails to interpret the cause of their outcomes is further failure. However this failure is magnified in it’s consequence in the team culture where the coach takes the path of throwing the players under the bus.

Whenever I hear a coach who by words or actions blames his players, I see a lesser future for the coach. To put it bluntly it’s a path to failure. This applies no matter what level it is occurring at, bet it the national team or a local kids team.

I have had the fortune of working with coaches who have the strength to deflect the pressure on their team. The long serving Queensland rugby union coach John Connolly was one of these. I was impressed with his choice to absorb the pressure and not throw the players under the bus. However these coaches are the overwhelmingly minority. From my experience, I have observed the majority of coaches blame the players, failing to understand that firstly what goes on is a product of their leadership, and that the act of blaming the players is in the short term the kiss of death to their team’s culture and in the long term the kiss of death to their coaching career success.

Few coaches develop their coaching abilities to the level of being able to consistently and successfully interpret the cause of their wining or losing, and I accept this. However my suggestion that even in the absence of this high level ability, coaches could benefit from avoiding the popular habit of throwing the players under the bus.

NB. The above is fictional story to illustrate the message.

Ian King

Stop injuring the athletes – ACL reconstructions

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I was stretching beside the oval whilst debriefing my son following his high school rugby game and I looked. Three teenage boys from the opposition school were standing nearby, and two of them were in knee braces.

I have been saying for decades now that the rate of injuries to athletes is unacceptable and unnecessary. If fact those familiar with my writings would be appear of my zero tolerance attitude – we can prevent them all.

It has been tragic watching the advent then the rise of the ACL surgery since its introduction around about 1980. A positive sign is the discussions that are now occurring. In two different countries two separate article were published recently, one by a former elite US athlete who never fulfilled his career due to injury and the other by sports medicine advocates in Australia.

One of the many limiting factors in the effectiveness of any intervention that is stimulated by this growing awareness of injury incidence is what I call interpretation. Image ten coaches watching the same game where their team say lost the game. How many different interpretations will come from these ten coaches if they are independently arrived at? Could be ten. And how many of these coaches are high achieving in terms of their association with championships or whatever is the measure of success at their respective levels? At best one of them. And chances are that the coach with the most accurate interpretation.

Understanding why athletes get injured is no different – it is subject to interpretation. And listening to the interpretation provided by this sports medicine expert as to why the incidence of ACL ruptures in the young athlete is so high let me with little comfort that anything will change.

You see these experts cited the reduction in childhood play as the primary cause. I have heard the dominant interpretation amongst my North American colleagues – that the increased injury rate in young athletes is due to the lack of diversification in sports played in formative years and that the athletes are specializing too early.

Both lovely theories, and both have validity in the bigger picture of long term athlete development. But both, in my humble opinion, miss the target. And this is where you come in. You are going to either adopt one of the theories presented here (including my theory) of form your own. Whatever path you choose, I ask two things.

Firstly understand the seriousness of your interpretative decisions. You have the live, the quality of life and the livelihood (the US athlete only dropped 5 million dollars…..) of the athlete in your hands. I know you didn’t sign the Hippocratic Oath but for the sake of athletes all over the world I hope you would adopt this attitude:

First, do no harm.

Now based on a number of factors I am not optimistic that you will take the most effective path. Why am I so negative? Firstly that most of you will do what most do. And from my perspective, this conforming path gives you social comfort but leaves you under-performing on your potential, and the athletes will path the price. Secondly, most of you will lack the experience or competence to make optimal decisions. And thirdly few of you will be in a position to monitor the cause-effect relationship of training and injuries through multi-year controlled environments.

So if you are have not been too offended and are still reading, leaves me to the second request. I respect whatever path you take, and I accept that most of you will miss the target. But what you can do is every few years take stock, reflect, and change your mind. Get better at avoiding injuries in the athletes who trust you. Now this will require taking responsibility for your decisions rather than avoiding responsibility, which in sport is easy to do. It will also take humility and the willingness to let go of any dogma. So I understand this request is a large one, but I make it with optimism.

I want you to act before the duty of care concept from the legal perspective is your driving force. You are getting away with doing things today that are causes serious injury because ‘everyone’ is doing the same thing and ‘science’ has not yet ‘confirmed’ that what you are doing is causing the injuries. But one day, science will catch up and you will be held responsible for doing the things you take for granted now, like endless walking lunges, failing to stretch the athlete, and for developing the quad dominance that your current training programs are – just to name a few. One day these debilitating practices will be frowned upon. But you don’t have to wait till everyone has caught up. You can work these things out now and, for the sake of the athletes, make the changes and STOP INJURYING the athletes!

So what, in my humble opinion, has brought on the rise of incidence in ACL surgery? There are many factors, and in every case the hierarchy will be different, and this level of individual interpretation is nigh impossible in a world that struggles with accurate generalized interpretation. However, for the sake of starting your journey to serving the athletes better, I raise three of what I consider up the top end of contributing causes in most cases. I list them alphabetically to avoid any further message of which is more important or correlative.

I will also give examples in each case to demonstrate some of the influences in my conclusions.

1. The introduction of strength training and the inherent quad dominance in the program design.

Using the young athlete as a time line, based on my experience dealing with post high school elite athletes in Australia, there were few if any formal strength training programs in high schools in Australia prior to the early to mid-1990s. I suggest, and this is a hypothesis, that you could track the rise of ACL injuries in young athletes (12-24 years) along beside the rise of strength training programs in high schools and find a strong correlation.

Am I saying that strength training is bad for young athletes and should not be done? Not at all. What I am saying is that if strength training with the same imbalances as exist traditionally in adult or elite programs is applied to kids, they will suffer injuries early. And that is what is happening, I suggest.

I propose a second hypothesis – if you could track the rate at which strength training has been offered to younger and younger athletes in the high school programs, with the rise in incidence of ACL ruptures in younger and younger athletes, I suggest you would see a correlative pattern.

Now these same imbalances have been inherent in adult elite programs since I have been studying strength training for sport, since its inception around 1970 in the US.

During the 1980s I began forming a conceptual theory that I called ‘Lines of Movement’, to understand how inherent imbalances in traditional program design could quantified. I published this concept for the first time in 1998 Here is the fundamental message:

After many years I have decided that there is two family trees in lower body exercises – one where the quad dominates, and one where the hip dominates. When I say hip I mean the posterior chain muscle groups – the hip extensors; which are gluteal, hamstrings, lower back – they’re your hip extensors. And I believe this – the head of the family in the quad dominant exercises is the squat. That’s the head of the family. And there are 101 lead-up exercises to it and there’s a few on after it as well. But the core exercise for the quad dominant group is the squat. It’s the most likely used exercise in that group for the majority of people.

The hip dominant exercises – the father of the hip dominant tree is the deadlift – which when done correctly would be the most common exercise of that group. There are lead-in exercises, and there are advanced exercises from it.

So I build my family tree around the squat and I build my family tree around the deadlift. And I balance them up. In general, for every squat exercise or every quad dominant exercise I show in that week a hip dominant exercise in that week. And what do most people do in their program designs – they would do two quad dominant exercises for every hip dominant exercise. What is the most common imbalance that occurs in the lower body?

….To balance the athlete I work on a ratio of 1 to 1 of hip and quad dominant – in general. And I can assure you – most programs you’ll see are 2 to 1 – quad and hip.

That’s a concept I’m sure you’ll have never heard before because this is the first time I have spoken about it.(4)

The following is a sample list, not in any order, of the major muscle groups of the body that I published:

A sample list of muscle groups, not in any order.(5) _______________________________________________
Hip dominant (e.g. deadlift and its variations)
Quad dominant (e.g. squats and its variations)
Vertical pulling (i.e. scapula depressors e.g. chin ups)
Vertical pushing (i.e. arm abduction e.g. shoulder press)
Horizontal pulling (i.e. scapula retractors e.g. rows)
Horizontal pushing (i.e. horizontal flexion e.g. bench press)

The subsequent dilution of the origin of this concept has gone hand in hand with its failure to impact the athlete’s outcome to the extent it could have. I can only recommend you go to the source, to my original writings, summarized in the ‘Legacy’ book or more extensively in my ‘Legacy Course’ (Level1 KSI Coaching Program). I understand that those looking for opportunities to discredit my message may call ‘marketing!’ at this point in time, however those that know me better understand it’s not about the money, it’s about the athlete. And if that’s the best way at the moment to help the athlete, and I suggest it is – so be it.

I identified the imbalances of the lower body musculature and found a way to teach the risk and solution in the 1980s and taught it in the 1990s. I have since advanced my theories but the historic content would serve you really well as a base point.

2. The failure to address length and tension of the connective tissue

As a student of training trends and optimal training it has been extremely interesting to say the least to watch the trends in this area of training during the last four decades. The rise of connective tissues is undeniable, and the effort to find solutions pitiful. I suggest that the only thing my colleagues are concerned about is whether they are being trend conforming, dressed up in the behavioral term ‘cutting edge’.

Let me put it this way – more and more and younger and younger athletes are being exposed to strength training, and experiencing tissue shortening and tension increases. And the best that is bring offered is dynamic ‘stretching’ and foam rolling?

Again let me be clear – I am not saying that either is bad or of no value. What I am saying is this.

Dynamic stretching is barely stretching and does not replace the role of static stretching. And as for the dominant discouragements to the masses of the post 2000 era – that pre-training static stretching will make you weak and or increases your injures – injuries could not get much higher and the dominant value is stretching is minimized, what is done is predominantly dynamic. It’s not working! It never did! All I have to offer is four decades of professional application with an intensity and desire for optimal outcomes that few can match. Who cares about my experience? I can assure, the thousands of athletes who I have given injury free high performance careers to have.

Now foam rollers – the only reason you have heard about this option was because small equipment distributors in the US realized the profit in re-selling a piece of foam and instructed their seminar speakers to project expert (and I suggest overnight expertise) opinions on the value of rolling, to the extent that it was placed in the sequence of training sessions as a mandatory must do – and the non-trendy static stretching was left out!

Now anyone who has truly been involved in athlete preparation has been having their athletes roll on tennis balls and similar forever. But not instead of stretching and not as a replacement for massage. Rolling is great, but if you fail to keep it in context you under-perform for the athlete.

3. Fatigue

There is a point in time for even the well-conditioned athlete that the incidence of injury, especially what some mistakenly assume to be ‘impact’ injuries, increase rapidly. Here’s a third proposal or hypothesis – if you could track the level of fatigue of the athlete with those that suffer ACL rupture I suggest you would find a strong correlation. Now this hypothesis is probably the hardest one to test, I appreciate that.

I have witnessed the highest incidence of ‘impact’ injuries including ACL in the sporting teams with the highest volume training. I could name example coaches whose careers I have been monitoring for years and in some cases decades to understand the correlation between training volume, fatigue and injury incidence.

This is a risk that all coaches face at all times, requiring them to monitor their training volumes. The interpretation is made more difficult by realities such as the fatigued athlete could injure early in the game and we could say it can’t have been fatigue because it happened early in the game. Remember the residual nature of fatigue.

Conclusion

There is a growing albeit belated awareness of the high incidence of injuries such as ACL injuries in athletes, and in particular the younger athlete. Whist this is nice, and supports the strong concerns I have expressed for decades, my concern is also whether it will lead to any real intervention of this trend. My concerns are based on whether the interpretation of the cause of these injuries is accurately identified and isolated.

I provide three factors that I believe are highly correlated with the risks of ACL injuries, and provide three hypoesthesia that perhaps my more learned academic colleagues may one day investigate, to aid the thinking of the masses who wait for social proof such as this:

1. That you could track the rise of ACL injuries in young athletes (12-24 years) along beside the rise of strength training programs in high schools and find a strong correlation. 2. If you could track the rate at which strength training has been offered to younger and younger athletes in the high school programs, with the rise in incidence of ACL ruptures in younger and younger athletes, I suggest you would see a correlative pattern. 3. If you could track the level of fatigue of the athlete with those that suffer ACL rupture I suggest you would find a strong correlation.

However rather than waiting for the lagging indicators of science, for the sake of the athlete I hope that at least one coach might change their mind about how they train as the result of this article. I know the power of what is offered here, I also understand the power of conformity and dogma, and the over-riding desire of the majority to be like the majority, resulting is slow change. Thousands if not millions of athletes will get injured during this slow change, as has occurred during the last few decades.

What I would like to do is this – if you are a high school coach (physical or specific sport) and what I have said has resonated with you – and if you school would like to receive a 10 part video program I created last year titled ‘The Zero Tolerance to Injuries Video Series’, provided the school is making the purchase and it will be made accessible to all in the sports department, I would live to arrange this for you at no cost. Email my office at info@kingsports.net and ask us how you can receive this.

References
1) http://mweb.cbssports.com/ncaaf/writer/jon-solomon/25584164?utm_content=buffer0f307&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
2) http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/breakfast/orthopaedic-surgeons-call-for-sports-injury-prevention/7382198
3) http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/2016/05/bst_20160504_0836.mp3
4) King, I., 1998, Strength Specialization Series (DVD), Disc 3, approx. 1hr 06m 00sec in.
5) King, I., 2000, How to Teach Strength Training Exercises

Ian King

You don’t want to be the best you can be  

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You want to be just like everyone else

I am sure if a survey was taken of physical preparation coaches the majority would say there goal was to be the best they can be. From my perspective, I suggest that is not the dominant focus. I suggest that the desire to be like everyone else is far greater than the desire to be the best one can be. And I suggest that the price paid for this default is lost opportunities for both the professional and the client.

During the 1970s very few people participated in the exercise know as the squat, or double knee bend. The belief was squats were bad for your knees. Did the majority come to that conclusion based on their personal experiences, or did they simply accept the dominant beliefs and habits?

During the 1980s the majority of mixed energy sports athletes participated in a higher volume aerobic training block in their General Preparatory Phase. The belief was that it was neither safe or optimal to expose the athlete to other training modalities without first gaining a level of aerobic fitness. Did the majority come to that conclusion based on their personal experiences, or did they simply accept the dominant beliefs and habits?

During the 1990s the majority of physical preparation coaches included Swiss ball exercise in their program design. The belief was that performing an exercise, any – actually vertically all – exercises. This was based on the dogma that the additional balance challenges produced a superior training effect, and that this was definitely going to transfer to all sport and life activities. Did the majority come to that conclusion based on their personal experiences, or did they simply accept the dominant beliefs and habits?

During the 2000s the majority of physical preparation coaches selected almost exclusively from the so-called ‘functional exercises’ (although I am not really sure what that is) in their program design. To do any exercise sitting on a bench or lying down was heretical. This was based on the belief that standing and multi-planar movements were superior in their training effect for all people at all times, and would definitely provide a superior transfer to sport and life. Did the majority come to that conclusion based on their personal experiences, or did they simply accept the dominant beliefs and habits?

During the 2010s the majority of sports coaches and physical preparation coaches refuse to use static stretching, replacing what little stretching time is dedicated to stretching with ‘dynamic’ stretches. This is based on the belief that static stretching makes you weak and leads to injury and dynamic stretching is safer, more functional and effective. Did the majority come to that conclusion based on their personal experiences, or did they simply accept the dominant beliefs and habits?

The one question I asked throughout the above is – Did the majority come to that conclusion based on their personal experiences, or did they simply accept the dominant beliefs and habits? I suggest they did not come to these conclusions based on any form of personal experience. I also suggest that they didn’t even think. They just accepted and did.

So what would I need to see to believe that a physical preparation coach was making an attempt to be the best they can be? The most important criteria I am looking for is evidence of thinking. That the key questions have been asked, including but not limited to;

• What is the best way to train?
• What can I do to fulfill my potential as a coach?
• What can I do to fulfill the potential of my client/athlete?

Now call me simplistic, but I am skeptical as to whether the majority has applied this approach. Here are a few considerations.

Let’s take squats for examples. Prior to about 1990, when a slew of ‘research’ was published extolling the benefits of stretching, did the did the majority of physical preparation coaches have collective personal experiences that squatting was bad and then collectively and coincidentally post 1990 have personal experiences to the contrary?

Let’s take the Swiss ball for example. Prior to about 1990 few knew the word Swiss ball and exercises upon it. Up until this time did the did the majority of physical preparation coaches have collective personal experiences that Swiss balls and exercises on Swiss balls were useless and then collectively and coincidentally post 1990 have personal experiences to the contrary?

Let’s take stretching for example. Prior to about 1995 it was okay to statically stretch, and commonly done. Post 1995 it wasn’t. Now did the majority of physical preparation coaches have collective experiences prior to 1995 that static stretching was the most effective way to stretch, and then post 1995 all reach personal conclusions to the contrary? I suggest not. Now I respect that for many of you my proposition is flawed as I place a premium on thinking, at a time in the world and in our industry where the dominant belief that what you think is irrelevant – just read the research and see if ‘research supports it’. This is essentially not only the antithesis of thinking, I also suggest that this don’t think just believe in the research mentality is actually contrary to the intent of the origin of science.

For me objectivity is the key.

Scientific objectivity is a characteristic of scientific claims, methods and results. It expresses the idea that the claims, methods and results of science are not, or should not be influenced by particular perspectives, value commitments, community bias or personal interests, to name a few relevant factors.

And even though science claims this I don’t believe it is always the case.

Science in theory is intended to provide objective analysis. I believe this way has been lost in many cases, where the research conclusions are influenced by the researcher, who in turn may be influenced by the provider of the funding.

For all the lip service we pay to science, everyone knows that it is commerce that runs the show. As the Spanish proverb goes, ‘He who gives the bread lays down the law’. Science today typically serves the large corporate interests that fund it. In a world conceived by the financial and corporate leadership who effectively rule it, the purpose of the human being is to contribute to the economy as an increasingly efficient unit of production and as an increasingly efficient unit of consumption. The financial and corporate elite establish effective social policy, and commercially funded science gives them the technological wherewithal to execute it. –Laurence G. Boldt, 1999

I believe you can be more objective than certain modern ‘scientific’ conclusions:

Now I admit it’s not easy being an objective thinker. Throughout history thinkers have been subject to a variety of suppressions and restrictions by authorities.

Take Roger Bacon (c. 1219/20 – c. 1292) for example, the 13th Century English philosopher. He is sometimes credited (mainly since the 19th century) as one of the earliest European advocates of the modern scientific method inspired by Aristotle

• After 1260, Bacon’s activities were restricted by a statute prohibiting the friars of his order from publishing books or pamphlets without prior approval. • The Condemnations of 1277 banned the teaching of certain philosophical doctrines, including deterministic astrology. Some time within the next two years, Bacon was apparently imprisoned or placed under house arrest. –https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Bacon

Here are some of the thinking that Bacon and others were ‘not allowed to engage in’ at various times in the 13th Century:

The banned propositions included:

• “That there is numerically one and the same intellect for all humans”.
• “That the soul separated [from the body] by death cannot suffer from bodily fire”.
• “That God cannot grant immortality and incorruption to a mortal and corruptible thing”.
• “That God does not know singulars” (i.e., individual objects or creatures).
• “That God does not know things other than Himself”.
• “That human acts are not ruled by the providence of God”.
• “That the world is eternal”.
• “That there was never a first human”.
–https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condemnations_of_1210–1277

History is littered with examples of suppression of freedom of thinking. Now if you are still reading this article, and if you resonate with the belief that you should reach your own, objective conclusions, then here is one phenomenal role model to guide and inspire you. Buckminster-Fuller, considered one of the greatest thinkers of the 20th Century, wrote:

I jettisoned all I had ever been taught to believe and proceeded thereafter to reason and act only on the basis of direct personal experience … Exploring, experiencing, feeling, and – to the best of my ability – acting strictly and only on my individual intuition, I became impelled to write this book… –Buckminster-Fuller, referring to his book ‘Critical Path’, 1981.

I am not alone in my encouragement to you to temper your compliance with the dominant ‘scientific’ theories:

I think that in modern Western society, there seems to be a powerful cultural conditioning that is based on science. But in some instances, the basic premises and parameters set up by Western science can limit your ability to deal with certain realities. For instance, you have the constraints of the idea that everything can be explained within the framework of a single lifetime, and you combine this with the notion that everything can and must be explained and accounted for. But when you encounter phenomena that you cannot account for, then there’s kind of a tension created; it’s almost a feeling of agony. –Howard C. Culter and the Dalai Lama, 1998

Again I share I am not seeking to be disrespectful of science as it currently is.

Research is nice and I’m definitely not critical at all of the contribution of academics. But my decision to train a certain way is not based on the latest research. It’s based on the conclusions I’ve reached on cause and effect relationships in the real world. People can become too infatuated with the concept of science.

For me, success in sport is about winning. Athletes aren’t going to get offended if I don’t comply with the latest research. They just want to win. So the research is nice, but it’s always going to be limited. We’re not dealing with a college age volunteer in a six week program; we’re dealing with a human being that’s been working for fifteen to twenty years to take his body beyond where it’s gone before. –Shugart, C., 2000, Meet the press: Coach of Coaches – An interview with Ian King, t-mag.com 29 Friday 2000

I also acknowledge that the easiest thing to do is to conform. However I encourage you to reflect on this perspective on conformity:

The opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice, it is conformity. –Rollo May

I have been encouraging you to resist the pressures of conformity for:

Resist the temptation in program design to conform to mainstream paradigms simply for the sake of conforming, no matter how dogmatically they are presented, or how much you may be ridiculed or ostracized for trusting your intuition over conformity. Make our own minds up based on a combination of respect for your intuition, the athlete/client’s intuition, the results, and in respect of the body of knowledge available. –King, I.., 2005, The way of the physical preparation coach (book), p. 17

It is rewarding to see individuals chose to be objective, to trial training methods and reach their own conclusions, even if they are contrary to the dominant beliefs:

“…from young, I was led to believe that an individual’s level of flexibility is determined by genetics. As I grew older I got stiffer and when I started my formal education, I was educated that flexibility is not a vital determining factor in sports and that dynamic stretches were more than sufficient to both warm-up the joint and muscles, as well as to improve flexibility.

To be honest, with all the research papers and articles being put through my mind at that time, it did seem logical for a naive mind that was easily convinced. However, I am glad that I was shown the art of stretching…I have never experienced such levels of flexibilities in my life and I’m thankful that I chose to open my mind to a concept that was challenged by the origins of my knowledge in this field. I spend close to half or on some days, more than half of my time stretching my frontal muscle groups & performing tension releasing work with my ‘poor man’s masseur’ as it has significantly improved my overall health. Stretching will also and always be a main training tool/stapler in the programs that I design, due to it’s massive benefits that I have attained and am still experiencing.” -Tze, KSI L1 Student Coach

In essence I am suggesting that if you do what everyone else is doing, you are not only failing to fulfill your potential, you are failing to fulfill the potential of your client:

Look at it this way. If you do it the way everyone else is doing it – all things being equal, how are you going to be better than everyone else? Realistically changes do occur (albeit slowly) in sport training – because someone dared to do it differently. These people gain the advantage, are at the cutting edge. The sheep follow. Which do you want to be? –King, I., 1997, Winning and Losing, p. 30

Give you a hint – if what I teach is what the majority do, I would be very concerned. I want to do what few do, to get a competitive advantage. –King, I., 2003, Ask the Master, (book) p. 32

Conclusion

I am going to be straight – if you find yourself doing what the majority are doing, and your goal is to be the best you can be – you should be very concerned. I see this as evidence that you are not thinking for yourself, rather that you are conforming.

Now this is not bad or good from one perspective – even Master Sifu in the movie Kung Fu Panda will tell you there is not such thing as good or bad! If you have no desire to fulfill your potential, if your personality is such that you would prefer to conform, then keep going. The world needs all kinds, and the statistical reality has a pattern of talking about the 90-95% that just want to be average, the same as everyone else.

But if you are seeking to be the best you can be, to give you clients the best opportunity to be the best they can be – to be in the 5 to 10% of high achievers – then you need to stop seeking to be like everyone else and think for yourself!