Reply to: Horizons Keep fit with only 3 minutes of intensive interval training per week

[Doggy Styles]

Luke Pike, nephew of Mark Falco. I don't remember Pike but I remember Rock Me Amadeus.

[pacharan]

No, fill me in.

Sonny Pike

I remember him being a guest on Fantasy Football League in the 90s. There was a documentary too.

ISTR that he made a conscious decision to go abroad as he felt the standard of the EPL wasn't high enough at the time.

[doodab]

No, fill me in.

While you cogitate that, I remember Michelle Wie, a young girl so good at golf they allowed her onto the men's tour in the USA as soon as she reached 16 (maybe earlier, I can't remember).

But now at 22 years old she is back with the women and missing cuts. She was fined last week for abusing a shaft. At the time she was 20 over par so one can hardly blame her.

She can abuse my shaft if she likes

Actually I don't think that was my original point at all, it was the use of the word genius to describe skills that were relatively commonplace.

Genius is relatively commonplace. High acheivement less so, perhaps because so much genius is wasted on pointless drudge of little note like banking and traffic planning and politiciking.

[Doggy Styles]

Your point is well illustrated by child prodigies who appear to have the skills but don't make the grade as adults.

Remember Sonny Pike?

No, fill me in.

While you cogitate that, I remember Michelle Wie, a young girl so good at golf they allowed her onto the men's tour in the USA as soon as she reached 16 (maybe earlier, I can't remember).

But now at 22 years old she is back with the women and missing cuts. She was fined last week for abusing a shaft. At the time she was 20 over par so one can hardly blame her.

Actually I don't think that was my original point at all, it was the use of the word genius to describe skills that were relatively commonplace.

[pacharan]

I'm not sure how rare an ability has to be before it is called genius, but my point is that millions of players in the world do this, and Beckham was just one of thousands who can do it well enough to be a professional footballer.

Your point is well illustrated by child prodigies who appear to have the skills but don't make the grade as adults.

Remember Sonny Pike?

[Notascooby]

MTT - both. Although only one is straight!

[Mich the Tester]

This is worth a read from a pro triathlete on what it takes as a child to be top of their game...
Toil and Trouble « Jodie Swallow's Blog

There's now a real danger of this thread turning into a 'would you/wouldn't you'.





I would.

[doodab]

This is worth a read from a pro triathlete on what it takes as a child to be top of their game...
Toil and Trouble « Jodie Swallow's Blog

porn followers who think my name is a stage name

[Notascooby]

You are forgetting one other thing about prof sportspeople - absolute determination and single mindedness. Read Rob Fowlers autobiog - not great but interesting on this point. Names loads of players you have never heard of who he came across over the years, who he says were clearly better than him but who just couldn't keep going at the pace required, got distracted etc. Says he was always at training which was 2 bus rides away but you could see the numbers thinning as the weather got worse and the distractions got better. Says the clubs are deliberately hard on trainees to squeeze out the ones not desperate to succeed.

This is worth a read from a pro triathlete on what it takes as a child to be top of their game...
Toil and Trouble « Jodie Swallow's Blog

[Zoiderman]

You are forgetting one other thing about prof sportspeople - absolute determination and single mindedness. Read Rob Fowlers autobiog - not great but interesting on this point. Names loads of players you have never heard of who he came across over the years, who he says were clearly better than him but who just couldn't keep going at the pace required, got distracted etc. Says he was always at training which was 2 bus rides away but you could see the numbers thinning as the weather got worse and the distractions got better. Says the clubs are deliberately hard on trainees to squeeze out the ones not desperate to succeed.

Lee Sharpe comes to mind, reckoned by Ferguson to be better than Giggs. Wasted talent. Mind you, there's a litany of them.

Practice also sharpens the skills of any professional. I remember Beckham could put a corner on Scholes shoe laces each time he wanted to, and the best goal I ever saw, for speed etc, was at West Ham; Utd were defending, the ball spilled to Beckham at right back, who swivelled and hit a first time 70 yard bross field pass to find Giggs who raced into the penalty area to find Cantona I think, who scored. Under the cosh, 11 seconds later 1 up.

all professional sports people, the greats, still had to practice. Warne, the greatest bowler I have ever seen, would spend hours, on hours, upon hours practising. He once bowled 5 overs of googlies on the trot, which would ruin any other bowler (due to the rotation in the shoulder/wrist needed). Wilkinson? They all stayed after normal training to train some more.

[lukemg]

You are forgetting one other thing about prof sportspeople - absolute determination and single mindedness. Read Rob Fowlers autobiog - not great but interesting on this point. Names loads of players you have never heard of who he came across over the years, who he says were clearly better than him but who just couldn't keep going at the pace required, got distracted etc. Says he was always at training which was 2 bus rides away but you could see the numbers thinning as the weather got worse and the distractions got better. Says the clubs are deliberately hard on trainees to squeeze out the ones not desperate to succeed.

[d000hg]

It's not entirely a different subject but difficult to exclude as a variable in the research; you'd need to find people with those medical conditions who are passed fit by a doctor to do this kind of training and I think most doctors (and most competent fitness trainers) would be very reluctant to put somebody on high intensity training if they have some underlying medical condition, even if that condition isn't thought to affect their heart. I think the one thing that scares fitness trainers more than anything else is a client who starts an exercise regime and then goes home and has a heart attack, and high intensity training looks risky in that sense so you'd want to exclude the risk when it comes to medical conditions.

Hmm, conditions such as polycystic ovarian syndrome don't have those kind of risks (unless you're already very fat and at risk in the normal way) but do have associated issues with losing/gaining weight. Actually, I think PCOS is related to insulin anyway so we're back where we started!

[Robinho]

I do interval training.

8 * 30 second sprints 3 times a week. It awesome and saves lots of time.

If you walk down Farringdon road at night you might see me zoom past. nneeeoooowwwnn.

[Mich the Tester]

I'm not sure how rare an ability has to be before it is called genius, but my point is that millions of players in the world do this, and Beckham was just one of thousands who can do it well enough to be a professional footballer.

I don't think Beckham's inate ability is particularly rare, but slightly better than the rest of the bunch who play football. Lots of people are good at spatial awareness and coordination; dancers, crane operatives, pilots and so on need this too, and obviously some are better than others in the coordination business. What's a bit more rare is the combination of spatial ability, coordination and other physical attributes like speed, agility and endurance. Then even more rare are people use those attributes as footballers; some choose other sports or activities, sometimes due to cultural reasons. Then of course somebody somewhere has to recognise the talent of the individual, and however hard scouts try the process of spotting talent in the young is flawed and full of traps. You could probably find many millions or maybe tens of millions of people with his neurological attributes, but only a few of them are footballers.

[Doggy Styles]

I know a few of the guys at FC Zwolle, which is a Dutch first division side, so not the absolute top level but one below; they all seem to be able to aim and kick a ball within about 20cm of a spot on a wall 20 metres further up. Quite impressive to watch. I don't think that explains the difference between the best and the rest though; perhaps the combination of kicking the ball in the right direction, at the right speed, at the right height, in the right parabola to fall at the feet or on the forehead of a team mate in the right position, and do it time and time again even when you're tired is a better indicator, but more difficult to research.

The point they were trying to make is that the brain of a footballer has to make several spacial calculations at once and then control muscles accurately. They call this genius.

I'm not sure how rare an ability has to be before it is called genius, but my point is that millions of players in the world do this, and Beckham was just one of thousands who can do it well enough to be a professional footballer.