WHAT KIND OF TRAINING DO YOUR COACHES HAVE?

We operate an apprenticeship model which starts with people coming along to our sessions. When they demonstrate they use the brain the way science says is the best way we ask if they are interested in becoming a coach. Jon Thorne, our founder, runs workshops to explain how the scientist think the brain works best. Trainee coaches go to as many events as possible and learn by doing. All coaches are experienced at doing whatever activity or sport they are using to help players livewire the brain.

WHY DO I NEED TO BE KIND?

Yes, I am asked this question. Science says it is impossible to fully hardwire a brain because there are always new parts that can be rewired. But, if we assumed we could observe a fully hardwired brain in operation, that brain would think it knows all it needs to know. If someone doesn’t make sense to a fully hardwired brain … the hardwired brain will think they must be wrong and be of no value. A fully hardwired brain will help others correctly do what it knows. If they fail the fully hardwired brain will reject them. A fully hardwired brain will see any questioning of its correct ways as an act of disrespect and selfishness because there are no other ways. A fully hardwired brain is harsh and unkind. And has limited performance because no brain can ever know all it needs to know in our complex dynamic ever-changing world.

Luckily the science says it is impossible to fully hardwire a brain. We can maintain the brain's ability to rewire itself throughout our life. When we livewire the brain we see those who don’t make sense to us, who we struggle to understand as people who can help rewire our brain to learn more and do more than we thought we could do. This is why we say we play for fun, fitness, and kindness to maintain the brain's ability to rewire itself.

WHY CAN'T I USE MY SUPERIOR ATHLETIC ABILITIES?

You can but at other clubs. Not ours. We help players use the brain the way science says is the best way. If you solely rely on being bigger, faster, stronger, and better than opponents you will lose every time you come against someone who is bigger, faster, stronger, and better than yourself. Our coaches help you to develop the "Think Power" to beat players who are better than yourself by learning how to think your way past, not power your way past all players of all abilities. If Michael Jordon and the Chicago Bulls had to maintain “Think Power” we are pretty sure we all do.

WHY ARE YOU STOPPING ME FROM COMPETING?

We are not stopping you from competing. We are helping you to be a good competitor. The convention is to compete by making fewer mistakes which is why many coaches and players practice what they know. This can hardwire too much of the mechanics of play into the brain and this reduces the ability of the brain to rewire itself. We know this from science. If we hardwire too much into our brain we are less able to adapt when things are not going our way. A desire to win with an inability to adapt can lead coaches and players to be poor competitors. They often get upset with others, give up or resort to fouling and aggression or only compete when they know they have athletic superiority. Keeping the brain livewired means we treat winning and losing as the same because both help us to find new ways to improve beyond what we know we can do. Especially if we can rewire during a game. The late Kobe Bryant called this his Mamba Mentality. I am pretty sure he knew how to compete.

HOW DO I JOIN?

You pick a session and turn up and play. We don’t run trials, squads, or teams because we want to create an ever-changing environment that encourages everyone to modify and reconfigure the circuitry of the brain. Having different players each week helps with this. We are not trying to correctly do what we know how to do. We are stepping beyond what we know how to do to find ways to keep rewiring the brain.

CAN YOU HELP MY CLUB PERFORM TO A HIGHER LEVEL?

We are less sports-specific coaches and more brain-specific coaches because we know higher levels of performance always lie beyond what we know. Michael Jordan called it “think power”. The late Kobe Bryant called it his mamba mentality. Their pursuit for greatness meant they always looked beyond what they knew they could do. ​

It is my experience that many basketball, swimming, and netball performance programmes could well have too much emphasis on avoiding mistakes. They are too well planned. To hardwired. The more hardwired coaches and players become the more they lose the brains ability to adapt when things go wrong. Hardwired coaches and players win when they have athletic superiority and lose as soon as the opposition is good enough to disrupt the hardwired way of playing.​

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It is my opinion that many performance programmes need a bit less hardwiring of the brain and a bit more livewiring of the brain to find new levels of performance that lie beyond what club coaches and players know they can do.

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Yes, we can improve your performance programme by reducing the levels of hardwired and lifting the levels of livewiring. Players get sports-specific coaching and brain-specific coaching.

WHAT IS YOUR INCLUSION POLICY?