E5 | Ben Haines: Strength and Conditioning

Welcome to the team behind the teen podcast. I’m your host, Donny, mate. This is the monthly

show focused on building conversations around the team based model approach to ethic, performance.
Strength, conditioning. Sports Medicine. Sport Science. Mental Health and wellness and
sports nutrition.
Hello, everybody, and welcome back to the podcast. This is the team
behind the team podcast. And this is Donny mayb-. I’m your host and
we have got a special guest today in the studio all the way from Down Under
in Australia. Mr Ben Haines, I just a little brief history with
Ben. I first met Ben, but a little over a year and a half ago when I
was in Sydney, Australia, speaking and attending the HSCA conference.
And Ben and I had a nice chat there, a good little conversation. And we’ve just kind of kept in touch.
And Ben is in town with his lovely wife and he’s going gonna be speaking, presenting a
clinic. So excited to hear you do that in being and currently is the head of physical
performance for beach volleyball in Volleyball Australia. So without further
ado, Ben, welcome to the show. How are you doing? Tony, I’m doing great. Thank you very much for having me. It’s a pleasure
to be here. Well, glad you made the house the positive travel ban for you so far. Has it been all right if
you adjusted pretty decent so far? Yeah. Yeah. Look, I think although it’s a long way to travel,
the time difference wasn’t too bad and working in a number different sports. I’ve got
to practice my international travel quite a lot, so I’m actually feeling wide awake and ready to have a chat.
No, it was. Yeah, that. That’s good. You look like you’re awake. So we appreciate you making time
out of your schedule to come all the way over to the US and invest in our staff and the coaches
here in America. So thank you, Ben. We’re glad to have you. I thought we could just start the
show off with, you know, being in Australia and just looking at your
resume a little bit. You have not only know your a p._h._d, but you’ve done
you’ve been at some incredible places and got a broad range of experience working with
athletes. So could you just introduce yourself to everybody, maybe give us a little history of like how you got
into strength, conditioning and performance and bring us up to current day, how you got to where you had the role
you’re in now? I’d love to. Thanks, Tony. So, yeah, I’ve been doing
strength and conditioning really since nineteen ninety nine. I grew up in a fairly
small town in north Queensland and did university there, studied a bachelor of sport
next door science. And whilst I was doing my my undergrad studies I obviously was starting
to think about where I wanted my career to go and where my particular passion in sports science lay.
I did a number of different placements in different organisations and different disciplines.
I did a month of biomechanics at the Australians to do a sport. Oh man, that sounds thousand tents.
Amazing opportunity, but was enough to for me to work out that I probably want to do biomechanics for the rest
of my life. But then I was very lucky when I came back in my final year of university
to spend some hours volunteering and observing one of the
national basketball teams that was based in Townsville. Their strength and conditioning coach. And for
me, that was really where I got bitten by the SNC bug. I did that and I knew from there that
this was the direction I wanted my career to take. So after finishing my degree,
I guess it’s as similar in U.S., you know, you don’t just walk into a high level or even
necessarily entry level SNC jobs, especially back then, there wasn’t a lot around. So I had to pick up
and leave towns when I moved to Sydney, a bigger market to try and get my foot in the door
in strength and conditioning. And that was a grind, you know, a lot of years of working
just in a general fitness industry whilst volunteering at a number different organisations, but was
eventually lucky enough to get my start as a casual strengthen conditioning coach at the New South Wales Institute of Sport.
And from there, that was really, I guess, the role that kind of kickstarted my
career. Within about eight months, I’d won a full time role at the South Australian Sports Institute
and there I was responsible for a number of different programs. It was
an institute that had 16 sports that it worked with, and they range from developmental
to to elite sport. And being a new coach, I worked across a developmental
space that programs like men’s and women’s soccer. I also worked with the basketball program
and towards the end of my time, I managed to snag a role with the
rowing program, which was actually one of our premier programs. So I was there for about a year and a half
and I absolutely loved it was an excellent grounding for my my S.A.C. skills.
But then in a roundabout January of 2000, six,
I got an opportunity to move over towards the Middle East
and that actually took a while to come up. I didn’t end up moving there until April 2007,
and that was working in Qatar at a sports academy for high school aged
athletes called Aspire. And that was an amazing. FERENCE I saw
that that’s. Yeah. You know, obviously the there was the strength and conditioning experience, but the cultural
experience as well, living and working in the Middle East and living and working,
especially with sports professionals from around the world. I’ve never been so
immersed in a in different sports cultures in such a melting pot
environment. And, you know, we had strength, conditioning coach, sports scientists,
sports head coaches from all around the world. And that, for me, was an
amazing opportunity to learn from a number of different people.
You know, I think one of the things within any country is we we get really conditioned to the way we go about things.
So true. Whether that be in the field of sport performance or something else. And so to
to really be thrust into this this melting pot of sporting
preparation from from all around the world was amazing. So, yeah, I was lucky enough to
live and work there for around about four and a half years. And again, I worked with a couple of different sports,
table tennis. Strangely enough, for me, with like with quit in Australia, it was always just
kind of a back backyard game that you had after a couple of beers. But, you know, I quickly learned that it’s a serious
sport and and how to best go about preparing athletes for that. But
the second that the second half my career, which was really the last two years, I
was working with their football program or soccer program, as it’s called here, and they’re crazy
about soccer. So that was a really well
sponsored program with a lot of revenue behind it and and a fun option and got to travel to some
amazing parts of the world for competition and and training camps and really
work with what I’ve really enjoyed as an age group to
work with kind of that 12 to 18 year old age group primarily
or solely there, really. And then towards 2010 11, kind of decide
it’s probably time for the family to move on. So we started looking at opportunities back in Australia
and I was lucky enough to actually win the head of Athon SNC position back at the
South Australian Sports Institute, where I’d had my original full time position.
So I packed up the house in the Middle East to move back there. And
yeah, Roos really thrust into it was twelve months out from the London Olympics. The institute
had lost a couple of full time staff members. And so I essentially got
all our kind of Olympic or Olympic hopeful athletes kind of thrust at me in that 12 month
lead in to London, which was a lot of work and a fair amount of pressure there to try
to make sure that we didn’t undo the good work that’s been done in the three years to get these athletes to
the true point that they were anathema. Right. Exactly. Don’t don’t mess them up.
But that was great fun again and was lucky enough to work across some
a range of sports, a rowing sprint, kayak track, sprint cycling,
which was great fun, both Olympics and some Paralympic athletes as well. And then towards
once London was done and kind of the institute was was trying to work out what they
were doing going forward. As far as sport allocation based at the Sports Institute was actually also
the Australian National Beach Volleyball Program. And I knew the coaches pretty well from
from having a couple of conversations. And they were in the market for an SASE coach and
asked me if I’d be interested in the job in which I was in the institute
were happy to subcontract me out to beach volleyball. So then I was still employed by the
Sports Institute, but kind of half of my time is contracted to beach volleyball. And so for the entire
Rio cycle in twenty thirteen through to to Rio was working with the Australian
beach volleyball program whilst heading up the South Australian Sports Institute SNC and looking
after the the rowing program. And that was a very,
very busy four years looking after two major programs there because of rowing program.
We had a number of Olympic athletes as well. And whilst
ours was doing that as well, I somehow found time to do a bit of consultant work to some of
the professional sporting teams that were in Adelaide. So that was a bit work working with
the Australian Rules football, which I know is is not very big over here in the United States.
So I consulting out to them and their essence, a unit and then also more
recently to the South Australian cricket team as well that plays in
the National League. But yeah, I guess soft after Rio, it kind of
seemed like a good time for me to seek another challenge. And that’s when an option with
the state program for Australian Rules Football launched
a new position to try and help develop the athletic potential of the junior players.
So essentially, they’re under 16, under 18 talented players that are trying to get drafted into the AFL.
So I stepped into that that role as athlete development manager and really for me, it
was an amazing opportunity. You know, it’s not often you get to walk into an organization and have a clean slate
position where you can, you know, basically build and create what you you seize. Important.
And I was lucky to work with some great coaches. I had an amazing boss that gave
me a lot of scope to kind of craft that. And so, yeah, I’ve spent
two seasons, which is just over a year and a half working with the South Australian under 18, under
And then just recently, the last 12 months, viable, Australia actually found a way
to lure me back to the sport. So I’m kind of back there again working with baseball evil for the
last 12 months. And our focus is on Tokyo. It’s it’s approaching rapidly and it’s
right around the corner and that’s where it’s at. Thanks for saying that. You know, just listen to your story.
I had a couple of questions. You said something about when you first were getting
into the profession. It was a grind. I know in the U.S.
that the job market is just, you know, looking at applications
are market here is very oversaturated. We have more qualified
coaches and we actually have positions available. I know being in Australia, that was a common theme. I
heard other coaches say that it’s very hard. It’s even harder, I think, in Australia
to get in, to get your foot in the door, so to speak, and get a full time job. Would that be accurate? Yeah,
definitely. It’s you know, it’s a very rewarding industry
and it’s a great industry to work in. But with that comes a lot of people that want to work in it.
And so especially when I was starting out. But it’s it’s still quite challenging.
You’ll spot on. There’s not as many roles as raw people coming out that want to work on them.
So I’m curious, how did you. What was it about you being that
stood out that made them want to bring you on board? What do you mean looking back and what you think it was?
I think early on, you know, it was just that that attitude to really get out there and give everything
a try and make myself available for as many things as possible. You know, there seems to be a bit of
a negative connotation around volunteering your time at the moment. And I’m not saying, you know, you
need to go out there and work for free, because that’s that’s not what that’s about. But the more of that.
Well, I was really I have to get out there and network and meet people and and show my
passion and my my obvious interest for the field. And I think that really that really
helped me out. Now, what about also the other thing I was thinking about you were
when you were to Spier. That intrigues me. You said you learned a lot
there, not only culturally, but talk a little. Just maybe just take a second. What did you what
are some things you kind of learned and picked up when you were respire? Definitely. You know,
coming through the Australian system, as I’m sure it’d be the same here in the US, like I said, we really have
our way of doing things. And that can be specific to strengthen power development, that can be specific
to conditioning models, that can be specific to agility and footwork. And so
I, you know, entered a spy with my mindset of how I went about preparing athletes
because of my my education and my experience. But very quickly, I saw that that wasn’t the only way
of going about it. You know, working with Spanish coaches and how they approached movement and and integrating
apply metrics for a lack of a better word into that kind of movement based training.
Working with Brazilians who were really just about the flow when the feel of the game and
maybe doing their strength work on the field. So I really
I guess, was challenged on my beliefs of of whether the way that we did it in Australia
was the best way of doing it. And I think that’s a really good, rigorous system to put
your beliefs through, whether you get to do it in an opportunity like that or not. Because if we
only talk to people that 100 percent agree with, I think you’re not necessarily growing your
expertises as much as you potentially can. So for me, I picked up a few new things
in there, probably more around the way I approached my my field based training rather
than my my white room training per say. But it definitely also consolidated a lot
of my ideas. And yeah, I think the way that I’ve learned is it’s a really solid way. I like the way that we do it. And,
you know, I don’t add in some mighty bits and bobs, but the the core of that kind of coaching methodology,
I guess I learned was was something I’m really happy with. Yeah, that’s great. No, that a
that even sounds here. And how you talked about that experience seemed like it was pretty, pretty profound.
And I think that’s sometimes where as coaches, you know, we don’t always like to
get out of our comfort zone. Like you said, and tried new things. But I think that that’s kind
of where growth happens and where, like you said, maybe something you’ve seen
the dumbest thousand ways. So many times you see it in a fresh light
that you actually learn something new, grow and change and become a better coach. And I think that’s I
think those experiences are great. I had another question
going from your story of your kind of your timeline. The 16
year old, the young young athlete you were developing for
Australian rugby football. That that really piqued my interest because
I thought. Talk about why in the collegiate system. You know, on the Olympics side,
we’re getting a lot of athletes coming out of what we call like a club system in America where
these athletes are they have their high school sport. But then, you know, in the off
season, they’re basically training year round. What it is they’re doing the club sport and there’s no downtime.
So we’re getting athletes that are very for lack of a better term. They’ve got
a high mileage on their bodies, so to speak. They’ve been they’ve played a sport
at a higher level, like they’ve been a professional athlete, but they’re amateur athletes. But they haven’t been
trained in the physical realm as much. Talk about maybe
what did you see working with those younger athletes as far as what were some gaps that
you saw? What were some things you had to address or maybe build up in those athletes and what
were some challenges? I can really resonate with what you talked
about there as far as the disconnect between the athletes sporting ability and
the training that is done on the field versus their their athletic development. And it’s something that we see
and that I saw I saw during this time as well throughout our entire sport network
in Australia. And it makes sense. You know, athletes should get picked for their sport
predominantly on their skill ability in that sport. But quite often what that means is they’ve developed those
talents and life skills really, really well. But they haven’t necessarily been exposed to the athletic
preparation, the athletic development that we know really underpins does athletes to help with longevity
of career and performance. And so that was something that very, very
clearly was was obvious in Australian rules football in the field that I
do sport that I was working with. And that time, because like a lot of sports in Australia,
not particularly well resourced at the junior level. So they’ll have a sport head coach that
does the technical coaching and might even have, you know, two or three technical coaches, but very limited resources
on the athletic preparation side of things. So even at a state level where these players were
coming into work in a state program, which we didn’t we’d like to think is a fairly
high quality program. A lot of these athletes hadn’t even seen the inside of a gym before, let
alone, you know, been shown how to to run correctly or how to change direction and things
like that. So for me, work walking into the sport, like I said, it was a clean slate and a new opportunity.
My real mission in the first kind of year and a half or nearly two years was to
try and make sure that I made better movies. I knew I wasn’t necessarily going to have a lot of time with the athletes
in the white room to try and work on on the strength or power. So I wanted to make
sure that these these young men had a really good opportunity of at least moving as well
as possible to help themselves perform better on the field and limit that risk of injury.
How did you handle athletes who didn’t want to train Tuthill? That being look, you
know, in that particular example of Australian Rules football, I was blessed. Everyone
wanted to be there. Oh, good. It was an amazing age group and a really fun time for me. And it’s
because they all knew it could lend lead to something bigger. You know, these these players,
these boys had worked really hard to get into that state academy program. But it was not the end point.
The end point was getting a professional career in the AFL. So the job’s only half done. And,
you know, they worked really hard on me. I can hand on heart, say, however, that’s not always been my experience working
with adolescent athletes. And my time in Aspire particularly was
was quite a challenge, especially early on. There was a big culture gap between what I
was used to in Australia. wakana. You know, you work hard and you train hard, you sport, you’re gonna get better. And
that could lead to a better way of life where a lot of the athletes, they weren’t really that interested in
sport. You know, they kind of did it because I was at a sport academy, but it wasn’t something that
really was driving them towards, you know, perhaps a better opportunity down the line.
Luckily, thankfully, through our time there, there was a number of boys that kind of
came along, all the boys set for the start to believe in
that message, I guess. And even if it didn’t necessarily mean it was going to be a better way of life for them, it was
Frosties all all about maximizing what you could do as a person, maximizing your potential.
And if that meant you went on to bigger and better things, fantastic. If it didn’t, at least you’d, you know, made sure you did
the most with what you had. And they bought into that. And then they became our biggest culture drivers.
And that’s where we start to have some success with the junior athletes coming through. And I find it interesting that
sometimes when you got a lot of resources that can be taken for granted
and they don’t you know, kids today don’t realise, you know, how many, how many, whether it’s
it’s a weight room or a nutritionist, you know, especially in a college system, just how good they really have
it. And I think you sometimes you see with with whether
it’s a. An organization, they don’t have the resources. There’s a. Would you call it. There’s
a deprivation and the motivation is a little stronger because they
want it. And they don’t have as much there. And so it’s always interesting to me that sometimes you can give an athlete
too much. You know that we can see that in the US with with entitlement and no entitlements
being a hot topic here in the U.S. over the past few years with our athletes and kids and just
just trying to teach kids. I mean, you’ve got to you’ve got to earn everything that it’s given
to you. It’s not just going to be handed over. You got to work your tail off. You’ve got to sacrifice and pay the
price. And so I’m sure that was a good, good, good experience currently.
Let’s talk a little more current now with beach volleyball. You’re
the physical preparation, but you also handle sports science. So sports science
in here in the U.S. is definitely something that’s come on as of late.
And that’s kind of what this podcast is about, just interviewing and having conversations around
the different roles that you’re seeing, the new roles popping up in performance.
One of them is this sport science. A lot of universe is called applied sport science.
Talk a little bit about your role of the SNC coach, but you also you do some
sports science. You kind of do both talk about your multiple hats and kind of how do you make that work in your
role? Yeah. And look, it’s a real legacy, I guess, of what we’re talking about
earlier of not necessarily every sport is as well resourced enough to have one person
to do all these separate jobs. And so within in beach volleyball,
if we want to do kind of any sports science work or at least integrate into our program, a lot of that
falls on my shoulders. Now, with that in mind, I don’t sit here and claim to be an expert
across all of the sports science disciplines because it’s it’s really wide ranging. And I’m lucky enough to
have access to some some Low-Cost Sport scientists at the South Australian
Sports Institute who I can draw upon for specific knowledge. So where I guess my role really sits
with that is coordinating between the coaches and therefore the athletes
and the sport types, sports scientists on what kind of projects we want to run. So, for example,
that might be looking at our conditioning and working out whether we need to use
heat, external heat as something to try and maximize
our adaptations during training sessions. We’re also lucky enough to have an attitude chamber
at SASE sorry in South Australian Sports Institute. And so sometimes
we we look at using that as well, monitoring our athletes, hydration,
having our nutritionist onboard all of these different, I guess, subbranches of sport
science where I’m more acting, I guess almost as as
a head of sport science and coordinating those projects and using the specific experts
in their respective disciplines. That’s pretty I know
here in the U.S., you know, some some of your bigger schools have more individual roles they can play. But
then there’s a lot of schools out there. You’re seeing the day the SNC coach or the nutritionists or the
or the athletic trainer here, you guys call it a physio, but athletic trainer maybe is doing they’re wearing
those same hats in fulfilling a lot of roles just because the resources,
the backing is in there. And so it’s intriguing to me to hear, you know, that
you’re kind of doing that kind of similar role, even though you’ve got a great team around you thinking
about just hearing you talk just now. What has just from
your experience so far, what has been some of the key
elements of what makes sure performance team work really well together? Yeah, I think
the largest one for that is communication. It’s all well and good to have amazing
experts in different disciplines. But if you’re sitting in your silos and never really talking,
then it’s not benefiting. The one reason we all kind of exist, which is to improve performance
in the athlete in front of us or the team, the greater team. And so for
us, that’s a large driver. You know, we have what we call an athlete centered model when
the athlete is who we’re trying to improve performance in. And if they play in a greater team, then that’s
obviously going to expand to include their role within the team. But then
the coach, who is obviously the most connected to to the athletes, has that that closest
kind of input. And then the performance team sits around that. And that includes myself as
well as strengthen Haitian coaching and the head of physical preparation. But then
we also have our dietitian and our physiotherapist or athletic trainer, as you mentioned. And
those those are the kind of nation vigils. And if we want to make sure that we’re
maximizing the performance gains from any of those interventions, that needs to be in an integrated approach. And that’s
what I really see the opportunity for. Maybe lower budgeted schools or programs
where they don’t necessarily have all those individuals is if you’ve got one person
kind of delivering in a number of different areas or a variety of areas, you might lose a small
amount in the real specific technical knowledge that goes along with the
time having spent work in a specific discipline. But what you gain back from understanding
how it integrates a number of different disciplines into overall performances is priceless,
in my opinion. Yeah, I think the best
thing you know, that we ran into and we see is just.
How frequently I mean, what’s kind of the what works well for you, how frequently do you guys meet?
What’s forms of communication you use? You talk about the integrated approach. How does that
like on a day to day, week to week, month to month? Kind of what are some give a
little bit more kind of look under the hood. What does that look like for you guys? Little bit. Yeah, sure. So I guess the
the obvious starting point for that is we have our weekly performance team meeting and we meet every Wednesday
at lunchtime to sit down as a large group and discuss
any kind of relevant or pertinent question to specific athletes. And we’ll go through and discuss
each athlete on their on our squad, everything from current injuries to projects that we
might be trying to work on, our two performance goals that we’re trying to reach some athletes.
That could be a very quick conversation if things are just. Yeah, well, you know, we’re in the middle of a cycle and we’re we’re taking that
offer. Others if we’re we’re working on something heavier, we might spend a bit more time on. But
then, you know, I’ll be talking obviously with my coaches daily. You know, I
sit in the same offices as my sport coaches. So we’ve got a real clear focus on on what
we’re trying to work on each performance block and end each day within that block. Really,
I’ll meet with the physiotherapist normally a couple of times a week. And if we’ve got a specific
person that might be in a real acute stage rehab. Yeah, we might talk every
day. Yeah, not necessarily face to face. That’s where things like email or we just
even used like a WhatsApp group to quickly share information.
Hmm. Mr. No. Yeah, I think you know, just to reiterate, you’re definitely the communication
piece is key. And depending on the topic or the issue,
frequency may increase or decrease depending on what cycle you’re in or depending on the issue at hand.
So definitely, definitely something we’ve been doing that too. We’ve been having a lot of within our own
different sports and teams having more performance team meetings, which has been very helpful. So I’m
glad to hear that it’s similar approach there. So the other thing I’d
love to just touch on here in our conversation, so you have a p_h_d_ approach to call
you Dr. Behere. The doctor is in. I can only you know this from
colleagues and friends. I know that giving your piece D I’m assuming was very taxing.
And definitely and heard it almost takes the life out of your life. That’s true or not.
Yeah, I feel lucky to be here speaking to you today after surviving a peace day, that’s for sure. We’ll call
it. Well, I feel honored that we have a doctor in the studio today. So talk.
Just give us a quick little overview of the research you did and maybe some of the highlights
of the findings that you got from some of your research. Sure. So I started my p._h._d.
Towards the end of my time at Aspire. And I guess one of the good things about Aspire was
our athlete numbers weren’t too high. We had a really good coach athlete ratio. So
you had time to think about your craft and why you were doing what you’re doing. A part of the challenge
that I see in the Australian system and I don’t know what it’s like in the US system as you get so busy
delivering SNC services or whatever you want to call it. Similar to that,
you don’t actually necessarily get time to sit back and think about, you know, the why you’re delivering it and
how you might do it better or a different way of doing it. That’s very true. So, you
know, I was really lucky to have that at aspire to have that time. And a big part for me, kind
of as I was going through it was looking at these training programs that I was writing for the athletes
and really wanting to gain a better understanding of what was happening, not at, I
guess, a smaller physiology level, but at that kind of level. That really interested me as
an S and C coach, which I called the neuromuscular performance level. So, you know, if we’re riding
a strength training program, we know that has some IT fatigue that’s associated with it both acutely
and perhaps a bit longer than that. So I want to try and have a look at neuromuscular tests, common
tests that we’d use like a countermovement jump, a drop jump and isometric IT dipole 20 meter sprint
to assess what the impact of such as training session was like and then
to to track its recovery and to look at that at different times in the year, because, again, we know that
specific training stimulus is going to affect an athlete based on what they’ve done previously.
So if we’ve got an athlete walking in for the first session after they’ve had a break, they’re going to react
to that session a lot differently for six, eight weeks down the track when we’ve got some quality kind
of lifting under the belt. So that was really, I guess, the premise for
me. So I conducted a fairly large study in a spy looking at that, an adolescent
athletes, which was to the athlete group I was really interested in at the time. And that
spanned across kind of a 17 week period where I looked at their response to a fatiguing
strength training session. My goal had been to repeat that and look
at what the response was to a fatiguing power type of session.
However, that was around about the time in 2011 when I decided it was time to move back home to Australia. So I had
to kind of tweak and massaged my p_h_d_ p_h_d_ topic a little bit
with leaving those adolescent athletes and coming back to Australia and not necessarily having the same
access to equipment and athletes the way that I did. So the second
half my p_h_d_, I looked at a similar thing, kind of using a smaller, more condensed
testing battery and really focusing around the countermovement jump, which has become a large passion of mine, especially
having worked in in beach volleyball and just the things that we can tease out from
like a body weight. Can a movement jump in a loaded countermove and jump where we take some additional external
load and different things that that might tell us in assessing performance, but also assessing
your muscular readiness? What are some of the things from the kind of movie jump that you guys are looking at?
So look, I threw the net really wide when I was investigating variables. It was a
we did our testing on false plates. And I think I analysed over 35 variables
to have to try and tease out what was actually telling me something important to begin, what was a
reliable and valid measure and then what was what made sense
from an applied perspective for an S.A.C. coach to look at moving forward. And some
of the simplest things really were the best, you know, depending on how you cue your athlete and the instructions
that you’ve given before they perform their tests. See, that’s what I thought. Cueing is just so different, right. It really can’t change
it. So if you know. Q an athlete to jump as high as possible versus an athlete to to jump
as quickly or as powerful as possible in countermovement, you can greatly skew the outcome in either
height or peak power, relative peak power, depending on how you queue.
And I say that because I mean everybody cues a little differently. I think in Cannes it can have
an impact on the results in in today. You know, in the US, which is
every other day, there’s some kind of technology coming out and that’s got these broad
claims or whatnot. So that’s good to hear you say that. Did you? You’ve firmed
what I believe. So. Thank you. Cool. So not only being
a doctor, you’re also a presenter. You you you teach courses.
For the HSCA and. How did you get into that being?
So once I move back from the Middle East back to Australia and started
work back at the South Australian Sports Institute, I was acutely aware of the ISCI.
They’d been how I’d gotten into strength and conditioning. I guess it was the national
body. So I had to seek accreditation through them. But then that’s
where I did my my level one s and say my level to us and say through. And so I felt,
you know, a lot of responsibility and a lot of gratitude towards the organisation for
getting me so far along my journey. It was something that definitely felt like I I wanted to give back to.
So coming back to South Australia, I was contacted by the ISCI who
said they’re on the lookout for some presenters to help deliver their courses in Adelaide.
Asked if I’d be interested and I jumped at the opportunity. I wanted to learn very quickly about myself.
Is the similarities in the parallels between presenting or teaching
at a course like that is so similar to coaching? It’s all about, you
know, in taking knowledge that you have and instilling it into another person, whether that
be an athlete or a developing as an S.A.T. coach and essentially helping them grow in an area
that you feel you can add value in their life. So for me, it was it was almost
a no brainer. I’d love it. You know, I’ve been doing it now since 2012, I think was my first
course. And the last year and a half,
I’ve actually been the state coordinator for the ISCI. So I coordinate the courses
and and present at some of them in Adelaide when my schedule allows me. And
I absolutely love it. For me, it’s all part of giving back to the organisation
and developing, helping to mentor those up and coming in and see coaches that are coming through,
hopefully trying to help them not make the same mistakes that I made along the way. Exactly. That was the key. There’s
plenty of ice. And yet, you know, I am really keen to keep on
doing that. I love it. I get just as much out of doing that as I do coaching. I thought, no, I
definitely share your passion. As far as you know, I’ve been coaching for a while
now. And I think one of the most I feel like one of the most rewarding and significant
things for me as a coach now is just trying to help younger coaches grow
and learn. I think you nailed it on the head. Try to
take the mistakes and the failures, flops, fumbles we’ve had and maybe help them navigate
some of that. You know, today really. I mean, there’s so much education. Definitely an American, I’m
sure Australia online as well that, you know, a lot of nose coaches
a day. They’ve got a lot of book knowledge coming up, but they don’t have always that practical experience
that they need. And so I think that’s that’s a critical piece. And I’m sure sounds like your presentation.
You some of that’s got to be hands on w accurate. Definitely. You know, for me
and it’s a message I it’s still almost in the first half now when I present a level one S.A.C.
coaching course back in Australia. It’s it’s fantastic to have all the knowledge in the world. If you can’t impart
that knowledge to an athlete to help them grow and get better, then it’s almost as.
As the same as a book sitting on the shelf that hasn’t been picked up and read. And so
I really encourage challenge even might be a stronger, more appropriate word.
Those coaches that, you know, might not necessarily be lucky enough to be able to apply
their craft as an S.A.C. coach when they’re starting out. But to get out and coach something,
there’s always, you know, an unwritten soccer team that’s looking for a for a coach or whatever your sport
of interest may be. And coaching skills, in my my opinion, are transferable. So if you start
learning early, all the skills that that go along with coaching, all the soft skills which
are crucial and critical to our success as a necessary coach, then,
you know, I think you can be a much stronger SASE coach down the line. Yeah, I agree. I agree.
Let’s talk a little bit now. A little bit of, I think, our heartbeat similar. I love
volleyball. I’ll work with the volleyball team here, Texas and our head coach, Jared Elliot.
He’s our head coach and we’ll train in the sand so we’ll have a sand by ball team. But you work with
the volleyball team and I work with volleyball players.
What are you guys currently doing? Do do your your athletes
lift? Some do. I mean, what are you doing to get them ready for Tokyo?
What’s the schedule look like? A weekly schedule? What kind of current Blocher you. Maybe talk a little bit about
what do you do to develop your athletes to get them ready for the next stage? Yeah, sure. So
beach volleyball in Australia has got a fairly strong history and culture
of physical preparation, which for me was fantastic cause I didn’t have to to walk in
and try and build that and they wanted to be strong. The Australian beach volleyball
games specifically wanted to be a real strengthen and power game and we were gonna be stronger
and faster and faster than the competition until the last point. That was part of our
our goal. The challenge that we have in beach volleyball is that the international season is
so long. You know, games can international games can start in January and run all the way through
to November. So with with that in mind, we have to be very selective and
very smart about how we go about our physical preparation, because you could almost say we’re in season for 11
months of the year. Now, with that in mind, with now our national program,
we’ve got teams at a different levels. You know, we’ve got our world’s number one team who are vying for
a medal at Olympics. We’re going there to win gold at Tokyo. That’s our mission. And we don’t shy away from
that. We were lucky enough to win a bronze at the world champs last year. We’d
had a world ranking at the best in 2009 of number two in the world. So
we feel like it’s real. It’s a realistic goal. But then we’ve got some
what we call probably developing athletes who, you know, we’d like to qualify for Tokyo.
That would be great. But we’re also then looking at them for really peaking in 2024 and
in Paris. So with that in mind, like the programs can look quite different
this stage of the year for us. We’ve just come back after a couple of weeks off at Christmas.
And I really call this kind of my second bite at pre-season. So leading into Christmas,
we had depending on the team and the athlete somewhere probably between about six to eight weeks of pre-season,
which was a really strong focus on conditioning lifting,
on sand conditioning as well to work on our metabolic systems, but a really big
focus on our strength and power because we don’t get to lift as much during the season as potential. We
like we notice especially. Yeah, I think to drop off the windows shrinks.
Yeah. And Tokyo’s coming earlier in the year than
what our spitz our normal competition calendar looks like. So we have to kind of
squeeze everything in earlier in the year. So when I get back to Australia, we’ll probably finishing
off what I’d call the tail end of all our pre-season or our preparation period,
although already there’s been a large shift towards more time on the sand and less time in the gym.
And we’ll start probably from kind of mid late Fab. moving into our competitive
season where it’s really trying to juggle the demands of preparing for competition
in the sport with with maximizing any gains in athletic performance that we can get. What’s a typical
session in the weight room looked like for you guys? Is it how long? What kind of exercises? How
many days a week? Yeah. So if we’re talking preseason, I mean, I typically have them in there about 60
to 75 minutes. I guess it depends. Change a little bit depending on how fast the athletes
move. Some a little bit although there may be is slow.
Yeah. We try and aim to to get them in and out within 75 minutes. Otherwise you know the
athlete starts switching off and we just don’t get the returns on on what we’re looking for. So we’ll start off with a
pretty specific warmup, which is really just targeter around where I get in any of that in
typical injury prevention work. I want to do to look after those hot spots for beach volleyball shoulders, lower
back hips, making sure that they’re getting a little bit of love and but they
also getting fired up, ready for the bigger, bigger lifts that are coming. And then for me, it’s a real focus
and lower body strength and power. You know, we need to get a jump high. We need to be at a jump high a lot.
And we need to be at a cover. Right. Made us super fast in the sand and repeated again and again exactly
how long. I mean, ours well, you know, a match typically won’t last much
longer than 60 minutes if it’s a long match. But we might need to do three and a day
a lot. Oh, yeah, three and a day. You know, eight. If we make it all the way to the gold medal match,
which we we like to do, then we might play in a tournament which is cross
three to four days. But the challenge with that is, you know, we might be playing in
in 35 to 40 degree Celsius temps. So you know we’re talking 100 Fahrenheit. Yeah.
So not only are you running for that that many they’re long for that many matches.
It’s very hot. Exactly. And we want to make sure that we’re as close
to 100 percent on that last point to win the gold medal match as we were on the first. You don’t want
drop offs. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I know. Beach volleyball. I it’s definitely it’s taken off big here in America.
So it’s a sport that’s getting a lot of popularity and continues to indoor
as well. So you’re working with a great sport. Let’s talk a little bit
here. Let’s talk a little bit about professional development.
So I’m curious on this. When you have your doctorate, you’ve you
worked at all these great places. I mean, do you need to keep learning? I mean, what do you do
being what do you do to kind of continue to grow and develop yourself or do some things you books, you read courses.
Is it what are you up to with some of that? Yeah. Well, for me, you know, it’s it might
be a bit of a cliché, but I figured the time I I stopped learning or wanting to learn in this profession, it’s time
for me to hang up the coaching boots. Because you’re probably just about done.
But I think, you know, any time I sit down and get the chance to talk shop or watch
another coach, coach, there’s always something that you can learn. You know, there’s no two people in the world that go
about this exactly the same way. And that’s what I love about our profession. You know, every time
I see even a new S.A.C. coach, you might be learning their craft.
I still try and take the opportunity to to watch how they’re going about it. And there might be something that I can pick up that they’re
doing that could affect my coaching. Obviously, option is, you
know, the longer that you’ve been working in the field in the industry, probably become less to pick
up new things. But like I talked about earlier in the podcast, even something that reinforces
the way that you go about something is still a good learning opportunity. In my opinion, and
if you’re getting a lot of those and maybe, you know, one or two things that start to challenge you on why you’re
doing things the way that you do. If it causes you to do nothing more than go back and review
your practices and go, yeah, I think I’m still spot on. Actually, maybe I need to
to take a deeper look at that then that’s a growth and a learning opportunity and that can happen anyway.
I’m thankful and glad to hear you say that, that that’s the one thing I think about
this profession that this is coming up on my 25th year is a strength coach
and sometimes times being I feel like I’m just getting started because it’s changing so rapidly
and there’s so much out there and so many great individuals that are great at what they do. Like yourself that you
get to meet and learn from. And I think I enjoy not just the journey,
but I think the whole process of just mastery. I think that’s something that
I know is a passion of mine. Just continue to learn and grow and just find a new ways
to get better, even if it’s incremental. I think that’s that’s something that kind of like gets me excited.
There’s a saying I heard years ago, but it goes like this. It’s you’re there green
and growing or you’re ripe and rotten. And I know it’s a little maybe cliche
a little bit, but I think that, you know, that you want to be green, keep, grow and keep
finding ways to stretch yourself and open your mind and learn new new methodologies, meet new people.
And I think that’s something that keeps the passion alive. It keeps the flame burning for me, and it sounds like it
does for you. We’re kind of getting close to the end of the show today. And it’s it’s been a great conversation
as we go out. What would be some advice that you would give
some younger coaches out there, whether it’s overseas or here
in America, just getting started? What would be some what would be some key advice is they’re going to
get started, maybe they’re discouraged or is that is that what they thought would be or it’s harder than they thought? What
would you say to him being. Look, I think that’s really apt. And my biggest piece of advice
for coaches that I speak to that is struggling with that is to remember why you got
into it. Remember the passion for what you feel for what you’re doing. And if that passion still there
and still burning, then then keep plugging away because your chance will come.
You know, we talk that there’s not always a lot of opportunities out there. But for those people that
that keep showing up and really keep working at it, like getting in good in life, I think those good things
come to those people that work at it. So I really encourage any kind of SNC coach that’s
now perhaps battling with with feeling like it’s not quite happening for them or it hasn’t happened
yet. To stick with it. But coupled with that, I’d say
is really try and attach yourself or reach out to someone that you think
would be a good mentor because you need some support in doing that. You know, I can’t. It’s not always easy
to pick yourself up and dust yourself off and, you know, apply for that that next job that that
might be out there and and have your name on it. So that’s where I think the importance of having a good mentor
that can really help you work on the areas that you need to try and develop into to win those positions. And just
just give you that pat on the back, occasionally let you know that you’re doing a good job. So
that would be one large area that I’d I’d look at. And then the second area, I’d I’d try and really challenge
any kind of up and coming on us and say, coach, is to not think in black
and white in our industry. You know, I think it’s probably one of the the larger
things that’s probably had a bit of a negative effect on the SASE industry over the
last 10 years is that we’ve really had this kind of influx of information and opportunity
that you’ve talked about, which is an a marvelous thing. But I’ve see a lot of judgment attached to those things
in a black and white. It can only be right or it can only be wrong. And we know in working with the human body that
that’s not always the way. There’s a large scale of gray in between. And it’s almost something I think that we need to embrace
as S.A.C. coaches and go, you know, this is gonna work. 90 percent of the time. And this is my philosophy
that underpins how I’m gonna go about my business, but I need to better adapt and massage that to
the person. The living organism in front of me to make sure that I maximize it and get the most
out of it. Yeah. So you made me think there was a movie. Kind of
a big movie called Star Wars. I’m sure you’ve heard of that one. Laughs I’m a little bit of a junkie
on Star Wars. And there’s a saying that about the Sith Lords, which are the dark
evil lords in the movie, like Darth Vader was a Sith. And there’s a saying
that the jet I have about Sith Lords, I don’t know if you’ve heard it, but they say only Sith
think in absolutes. And it kind of goes back to what you say is if you
only think black or white. There’s only one way to do things, then kind of missing the mark.
And I think that’s so true today. The more I do this, the more I realize, because as a young coach,
I always thought there was only this is the right way to do it. But I just didn’t know. I didn’t know. I had no idea
that I was off a little bit. And so I think as I get older and the more I learn,
the more I realize, man, there’s so many different ways to approach this profession
and athletes and to be successful. So, yeah, I appreciate you sharing that with the with the younger coaches.
I mean, if anybody wants to connect, we chat after they hear this episode, where can they find
more information and connect with you would be the best way to do that. Show her the best way to reach me
would be through Twitter, which is just at Ben Underscore. Hines underscore.
Unfortunately, Google will probably find other ways of contacting me as well. You know,
the world kind of is connected. It’s all like that. But Twitter is the best place to reach out to me. Awesome. Well,
Ben, it’s been a pleasure. And as we go from the show, you being from down under, you’ve got to give us a little
gives a little sign off in Australia. I don’t know. How would you say goodbye in Australia? What would you say? Oh,
you know, I’d try to say a big cheerio to all that is out there. Thanks for having me on diary.
We really appreciate it. And we hope to see you down on dissent. I know. I loved it over there. It’s been an absolute
pleasure. Just have you in the studio today on the show. So thank you for your time, expertise, knowledge
and most importantly, your passion for what you do. I hope that everybody can hear that through the through the mike.
So it’s been a pleasure. Thank you. You’re welcome. And this is Daddy made the team behind the team
podcast. We’re signing off. We’ll catch on the next episode. See you then.
Thanks so much for tuning in and listening to this episode. The Teen Behind the Teen Podcast
for future episodes go to i-Tunes Spotify, Google Podcast or
Stitcher. We definitely want to keep having great guests on the show and great content.
So if you have a moment, please go to i-Tunes, leave a rating and review and let us know how we’re
doing. I’m Donny, mate, and thanks so much for tuning in.