primal mma

My old pal and returning guest Will Massey PhD,  Sport Psychologist, educator, coach, and practicing martial artist.

In this episode, Will offers his insight into how we can foster and cultivate independent and self-directed learning within a group setting. 

We cover, learned helplessness, implicit learning, practicing for performance vs practice for learning.  Motivation theory and considerations. And finally Will gives some practical takeaways for coaches looking to support athletes becoming more independent and in control of their own development. 

Will is able to pair an academic and theoretical perspective with a practical understanding as both a student and coach of the sport. 

This valuable discussion given retention, motivation and participation involve creating a positive and engaging psychological training environment.

Today's guest brings both a practical and theoretical perspective to skill development in marital arts.

Dr. Alan Dunton is a former Irish National TKD team competitor and now a researcher and lecturer at Cork institute of technology.  Alan received his PhD in Skill Acquisition under the guidance of  former guest, professor  Ed Coughlan. (aka. Dr SkillAcq) .

I really clicked with Alan and we went down several rabbit holes and discussed a whole lot of different aspects of training and skill development.

Alan is advocate and proponent of a more ecological approach to skill development, but also sees utility and in more traditional approach and frameworks.

This is part 2 of 2 - and we carry on from where we left in part 1. Exploring disguised and deceptive actions.

Alan was extremely receptive and enthusiastic to collaborate when I reached out and i encourage all that enjoyed his insight to follow him or reach out to him on his twitter profile. 

Today's guest brings both a practical and theoretical perspective to skill development in marital arts.

Dr. Alan Dunton is a former Irish National TKD team competitor and now a researcher and lecturer at Cork institute of technology.  Alan received his PhD in Skill Acquisition under the guidance of  former guest, professor  Ed Coughlan. (aka. Dr SkillAcq) .

I really clicked with Alan and we went down several rabbit holes and discussed a whole lot of different aspects of training and skill development. 

Alan is advocate and proponent of a more ecological approach to skill development, but also sees utility and in more traditional approach and frameworks.

This is part 1 of 2 - and we flesh out a lot of the topics discussed on the previous episode with Dr Rob Gray.

Alan was extremely receptive and enthusiastic to collaborate when I reached out and i encourage all that enjoyed his insight to follow him or reach out to him on his twitter profile. 

Part 2 should drop in next week or so!

I finally snagged him! After months of pestering, Professor Rob Gray joined me to chat and answer some of my questions on skill development in martial arts.

Rob is a giant in the skill acquisition space, and his voice has become all too familiar to me after spending much of my last few years working through his huge catalogue of podcasts of his show 'The Perception Action Podcast" .

Rob is an Associate Professor of Human Systems Engineering at Arizona State University and recently published and released his book MOVE .

While Rob's podcast is very technical and academic, he has delivered in his book a wonderfully concise and digestible summary of how we learn and acquire movement skills.

Rob's outreach and coach educational resources have profoundly shaped and influenced my perspectives and understanding of skill acquisition which spills over into all aspects of my life.

Life is movement.... Why not be better at it!

In a rush to make the most out of the opportunity I tried to squeeze a lot in this 60 min slot. So this episode moves quick and covers a lot. But he's been busy on the podcast tour these last months. So if you are hungry for more. Follow him on twitter @shakeywaits or search for him on your podcast directory.

 




 

Coach Leigh Remedios is the owner and head coach of VT Jiu-Jitsu in England UK. 

He is a life long martial artist, former professional fighter  and UFC vet, and a recipient of 4 different black belts. 

My first contact and introduction to Leigh was an exchange over a post I'd made on a BJJ FB group about shrimping and bear crawling in jiu-jitsu practice being a waste of time.

What started off as a terse back and forth led to a more substantive exchange, where Leigh was receptive to some articles and resources I sent him. 

A couple of months later we hopped on the zoom to chat about training. This chat is episode #6 and was a fun discussion, one in which we found much more similarities in our training approaches than differences. 

Leigh, as apparent is a very accomplished coach and competitor and decades later is clearly still in love with martial arts and looking to learn and improve. So a great guest and a an enjoyable chat was had.

Leigh can be found on FB, and at his gym's webpage www.vtjj.co.uk 

My discussion with Professor Nicola Hodges was all about demonstrations!  Dr Hodges researches and teaches out of the motor skill lab at the University of British Columbia.
 
 I reached out to Dr Nicola to ask for her to lend her expertise and insight into the science of demonstrations and learning in sport.  
 
 Being such a big part of our sport and coaching, I was interested in how we might make the most of the demonstration time while increasing the effectiveness of them.  
 
 Professor Nicola did not disappoint, other than reminding me I get a little overzealous about the ecological dynamics space that place less emphasis on direct instruction and demonstrations. 
 
 Nevertheless it was a great reminder that there are still so many unknowns and that there are many roads to the destination. I fun chat with immediately implementable nuggets of advice. 
 
 You can follow and connect with Dr Nicola via twitter @nicolajhodges and learn more at her website http://msl.kin.educ.ubc.ca/home

An information loaded discussion with Professor James Stafford. Dr Stafford has a PhD in experimental psycology with a keen interest in Motor Learning and Skill Acquisition and Virtual Reality. 

James and I discuss the incredibly sensitive and sophisticated calibration of the perceptual motor system as it pertains to movement in martial arts and sport more generally. 

James delivers a ton of fascinating insights into what we think is going on and why this is so crucial to the way we train and develop skills. 

Additionally James talks about the exciting world of Virtual Reality and what is coming down the pipeline in terms of training aids, skill development devices and even concussion managment tools. 


You can follow and connect with DrJames via twitter @JamesStafford94

James is also involved and works with VR developers Incisiv sport who can also be followed on twitter @incisivsport

PART 2 of my discussion with Coach, Educator and Professor of Skill Acquisition Dr. Ed Coughlan. 

Ed and I discuss the growing non-linear approach to skill acquisition in sport and how it can help us design more effective training and development environments for MMA. 

A two part episode here discusses the slow moving paradigm shift in sports coaching and skill development. Dr. Ed helps clear up some of my nagging confusion and ambivalence in my own coaching methods. 

Coach Ed has a ton of content as podcasts, publications and YouTube videos and I was honored  for him to add a couple of more hours of it on this podcast.

You can follow and connect with Dr Ed via twitter @DrSkillAcq 

I finally snagged Coach, Educator and Professor of Skill Acquisition Dr. Ed Coughlan. 

Ed and I discuss the growing non-linear approach to skill acquisition in sport and how it can help us design more effective training and development environments for MMA. 

A two part episode here discusses the slow moving paradigm shift in sports coaching and skill development. Dr. Ed helps clear up some of my nagging confusion and ambivalence in my own coaching methods. 

Coach Ed has a ton of content as podcasts, publications and YouTube videos and I was honored  for him to add a couple of more hours of it on this podcast.

You can follow and connect with Dr Ed via twitter @DrSkillAcq 

Season 2 kicks off with a talk with Coach John Kessel. 

Coach John is an US Volleyball Hall of Fame inductee with over 50 years of coaching men's and women's volley ball at the collegiate, international and Olympic level.

Coach Kessel is a strong advocate of specificity and authentic representative practice and empowering athletes through relationships and prioritizing a love for sport. 

John credits much of the success of US Volleyball to an era that embraced the science of learning and more specifically motor learning for sports. 

It was a privilege to have a coach I admire and one that influenced my thinking so much on the podcast to share his wisdom.

For more of Coach John Interviews, this link provides a collection of many of his interactions over the years. 

https://www.owltail.com/people/FcUKJ-john-kessel/appearances

Lastly, this episode had some sound quality issues due some lost connectivity during our conversation. 

What was intended as a quick test conversation for a future Primal MMA podcast, turned into a fun and broad discussion of training for MMA and Sam's recent foray into the ecological non-linear space. (So we decided to upload it)

Sam is a coach at Ronin Fitness in Eau Claire Wisconsin and has been rapidly gravitating towards the ecological and constraint led approach to martial arts training, in this three part episode we discuss the non-linear vs more traditional linear training approach. 

BE ADVISED LOTS OF BAD LANGUAGE!

In this 6th episode I talk with founder and creator of "Train Ugly'' and ''The Learner Lab'', Trevor Ragan.

Trevor, is an educator, coach and practice design consultant across several sports, working including, basketball, baseball and rugby.

For the last decade, Trevor has been at the forefront of a mission to optimize coaching, learning and training philosophies.

In this discussion we explore the principles of randomizing and adding variability to practice and how it can be used to design more effective and authentic training environments.

Trevor's body of work is accessible at https://thelearnerlab.com/trevor-ragan/ and his podcast The Learner Lab'' https://thelearnerlab.com/podcast/ is a wonderful and valuable resource for anyone who is interested in optimizing their own learning processes.

In this fourth episode, I talk with Jeff 'Jackie' Chan. Jeff is the creator of the hugely popular MMA Shredded YouTube channel.  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCt1ZR07apYANZ3MmlbipIXg and a professional fighter currently signed to ONE FC.

Jeff's training videos and tutorials differ from most typical coaching videos in that he demonstrates the skills in live and authentic situations. 

In the podcast we discuss the evolution of MMA Shredded and Jeff's training history. We also discuss the importance of sparring, authentic training methods and balancing the sparring volume with intensity to mitigate risk.

Jeff has traveled the world training at some of the best MMA gyms. He talks about his experiences and how his own training has evolved over time.

We also talk about the differences between training for skill and training for technique and finding the balance between both to optimize the practice experience.

I have written about Jeff and his training methods before and how I think they epitomize many of the effective principles of learning and development which science supports. https://www.primalmke.com/post/youtube-coaching-why-i-m-jeff-chan-s-fan-boy 
Jeff was fantastic guest to have on the Podcast so early. Enjoy.