Why balance
is so important?
Obviously,
you need to have good balance to be able to perform well at any sport. Balance is one of those things that most
people just take for granted. But, when balance goes on you it becomes a big problem fast!
Have you ever seen and elderly person who needs to hold on to everything
around then and watch their feet just to walk in a straight line? In fact, falling is one of the biggest safety
hazards for the elderly because their balance starts to go on them.
Just like
the elderly, falling is a safety hazard for athletes. Balance helps to stay upright and navigate
your body around obstacles in your way (ie., other players). Training yourself to have good balance helps
to immunize your from body checks and other parts of the game that might push
you off your feet. Strong balance
equates to strong performance. Doing specific drills can improve your balance quickly.
Your
cerebellum is the “little brain” at the back of your brain at the top of
your spinal cord. Athletes should learn
to pay a lot of respect to their cerebellums, because this little brain gives
you a great advantage in your game. The
cerebellum does a lot of really important things, but we’ll focus on just 3 of
those things here. They are the ABC;s of
movement.
First, A
stands for accuracy. The cerebellum
helps you to be accurate when shooting pucks, passing to your teammates, and skating in a straight line.
Second, B
stands for balance. The cerebellum helps
you to stay upright in your skates, do your edges, and stay on your feet when
you get rocked by the opposing team.
Third, C
stands for coordination. The cerebellum
helps you to have the fluid and effortless looking movement that is the most obvious in best
athletes in the world.
As you can
see, the ABCs of movement can are key to high performance as an athlete. Just like the other parts of your brain, your
cerebellum can be trained to perform better and better…with the right kind of
drills and practice.
Proprioception
is a fancy word for how well your brain knows where your body is in space. The joints in the body have a high number of
receptors that send signals to the brain to help the brain know where each
joint is at any given time.
The joints
are like satelites and the brain is like the GPS unit. The better the connection between the
satellite (joint) and the GPS unit (the brain), the better the brain will be
able to predict and control movement.
The better your brain is able to control your movement, the better you
will perform.
The best way to do "proprioceptive work" is to know how you test individually on proprioceptive assessments, and to do drills that are specific to your individual strengths and weaknesses. These drills then help the brain have better connection with the parts of your body that are slowing you down...so you can speed up!
A well-trained brain is the "secret weapon" of every great athlete. When your brain works well, your body works well and your mind works well. The brain is the command centre for all things...including athletic performance.
It was once believed that the brain didn't change much during one's lifetime. That the brain you were born with is the brain you are stuck with. That is no longer supported by current research.
It is now common knowledge that the brain is like
plastic in that it can actually change very quickly.
This concept is known as "neuroplasticity." The brain not only can
change, but it does change constantly. Everything
you do, every thought you have, every emotion you entertain, the food your eat,
the exercise you do, every movement you make...changes your brain.
Neuroplasticity is your friend, if you want to make your athletic performance better. The more you do the right things in the right ways, the more your brain will change to support high level athletic performance.
The brain can change for the better or the worse. The athlete's focus is to drive plasticity in the
direction he wants it to go. That is, in
the direction of high level sports performance.
What is the most important thing you can do to improve your
athletic performance? We believe the answer is "build a better brain". When we find a deficiency in the brain, that
is a brain that is not functioning well in some area...we look for ways to
stimulate and challenge that specific area to make it work better. That's the reason why assessment and reassessment are so important in this work.
Brains are like fingerprints.
They are completely unique to every one of us. Our brains are the result of function, habit,
and injury. We need to focus on the
individuality of people in order to properly train their brain.
When you learn more about the way your brain works, specifically about the things that are less than optimal, you have a target for athletic training. By focusing on the areas in which your brain isn't doing well and improving them, you will find that your athletic performance improves too.
Think of the brain as a neural GPS unit and the receptors in
your body as satellites that send signals back to your brain. These satellites send millions of signals to
your brain every second. If the signals
are incomplete or mixed up, the brain will not be able to do its job very well,
which could result in frustration, movement difficulty, poor coordination,
pain, injury, and underperformance.
These satellites come in three primary forms: visual
signals, balance signals, and movement signals. The brain takes these signals and filters
them through a complicated process and then creates a constantly updating 3D
map of your body in relation to your environment. The more complex the movement demands of your
sport, the greater will be the demands on the neural GPS to keep up. The better the map, the better the
performance. Athletes need a high level of integration of these systems to reach
excellence in sports performance.
The good news is that these systems can be trained and the
brain has an infinite capacity to change with the right training. You need to shake off outdated thinking that
the only athletes to reach the top levels are those that have natural talent.
Great athletes are created, not born. The truth is that few athletes are taught to
move well. To be great you must focus on
foundational skills that many athletes were never taught. Your body can only create as much power and
strength as its mobility and stability will allow. Lifting more weights or practicing harder
won’t help you if your mobility and stability are off, even slightly. Mobility and stability are created in the body
by proper body movement patterns, strong visual skills, and strong balance.
Excellence as an athlete is in the ability to move fluently,
which is rooted in joint mobility, vision, and balance. Athletes
must be able to see well, balance well, move well, think well, and integrate
well. Integration involves everything
from motor, vision, and balance to thoughts and emotion. This creates the foundation for strong fluid
effortless movement like you see the pros doing.
We teach you to speak the language of the nervous system by
using specific movements and drills that enhance the body’s signals to the
brain and that integrate the information in a way that makes the brain
supercharged. We focus on the high speed
network of the nervous system to get your body performing at the level you want
it to.