Cool idea! I'm just sharing some thoughts based on your points that hopefully you find helpful or interesting.
I have also read Breath and agree it takes a weird direction sometimes. Nasal breathing is 100% legitimate though. It should be our default for better quality of air, keeping us more in the parasympathetic system and developing a good dental arch (especially for children/teens). The Buteyko method is well practiced and researched with good results. Body by Breath is another good breathing book you might be interested in.
Keith Barr is a big tendon guy who would advocate gelatin supplements for helping with tendinopathies. Ligaments also benefit. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27852613/
Knees over toes - I don't really follow or look at the knees over toes guy's stuff but I think if you can bend your knees pain free while lifting, do. Cal Dietz (American S&C Coach) is a big proponent of it too. If you don't use it, you lose it, and I think this is what happens with a lot of adults. A lot of them can get away with not bending their knees even when doing squatting actions which is not going to stimulate the soft tissues to stay strong and supple.
Cold - I've never been interested in this stuff. Just seems so impractical to try to use it and from the little I've heard you need to be consistent with it because you only get very short term benefits each time.
I would definitely be in favour of external over internal cues. You can really freeze joints and create stiffness unnecessarily with an internal, body-centred focus (bad unintended consequences). For example, there was a while where there was a heavy emphasis on teaching forehands as just a wrist flick in Ireland and some people adapted using this cue by tucking their elbow close to their sides to limit movement from their elbows up. You have to really know what you're talking about to use internal focuses in my opinion and we don't have that kind of biomechanical understanding of throwing yet.
To the extent I'm interested in Cold, there's two things that make me think there might be something to it. First, there's the general idea of it being beneficial to get our body (and brain) "stronger" at resisting negative stimuli that aren't actually threatening to us — see the book Endure for example, which I've mentioned in a few previous posts.
And second, research showing that cold exposure leads our body to generate a type of fat tissue that burns (relatively speaking) more calories. See, for example, this old post of mine (just search for the word "cold"):
> The Buteyko method is well practiced and researched with good results.
I looked it up on Wikipedia and their intro section says "The medical community questions these claims, given limited and inadequate evidence supporting the theory and efficacy of the method." So now I don't know what to think!
I do like the idea of doing things that are difficult sometimes to simply build mental and physical resilience. I think my issue with cold exposure is how you would have to set it up. My interests usually lead to reading things that are practical for my clients to use and creating ice baths or going out in shorts on a snow day meant I never really went down that avenue! But I must look into your articles since you've probably done a lot of the hard work for me. ;)
Haha sorry I should have been more careful with my wording. 'Well practiced' is OK, the same sort of concepts are used by Patrick McKeown and Oxygen Advantage certified people (https://oxygenadvantage.com/patrick-mckeown-m-a-tcd/) but the research is not extensive on Buteyko specifically. There is evidence for it helping asthma: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/14752538/
Part of the problem is how many claims the Buteyko method makes - it sort of claims to cure everything. It blames CO2 intolerance for causing a whole host of conditions and this can be fixed with breathing less and doing so nasally.
Thanks LT for another great article. I have idea lists, am tempted to copy this format!
Timeouts do seem to increase the chance of a turnover more than it's worth - better to learn how to keep the disc alive when multiple players are tired.
"Where's our revolution?" - clue is in the name! A team from a small isolated ultimate community became World Champions, and contain several of the top 10 female players in the world - how did they beat the best teams the huge community in America had without any clear offensive structure? Why are so many superstars originating from this tiny community?
I think one of the advantages of training and playing a flow and principle based offence is that you get many touches of the disc, and learn to adapt to any on-field situation.
"teach newer players the important frisbee concepts (vert stack, ho stack" - don't teach beginners stack! Learning to stand in a stack and wait for your turn to cut is not a good way to learn how to play frisbee - better for players to thrive in the chaos and focus on simpler things like spacing, movement, technique. When they face a team that surrounds the stack they will have to learn how to play spread anyway, so it's best not to mention anything to do with structure beyond "spread out" and "stay connected" for at least the first few months. Revolution learned and played that way for many years!
Re: revolution ... I think you make a fair point that their playstyle is a revolution. But I feel there's a sense in which it's not an example of what I was trying to get at. For two reasons. First, because it's a little more undefinable—"shoot more threes" and "go for it on fourth down" are very clear, specific strategic tips. I'm not sure anything Revo does differently is that easy to explain.
And second, because it's hard to separate their overall frisbee skill from their revolution — like you say, they have arguably 3 of the top ten players in the world, and that's not even counting that they have probably the best puller in the world. Manu, Vale, and Cartagena are amazing throwers in any system. Would their revolution be as noticeable if it wasn't for their skill? For example, the "Moneyball" A's had unexpected success even without any notable players.
Re: vert stack/ho stack ... also a fair point. I'm maybe not a full-out Hive-ist but I'm at least Hive-adjacent. I agree with all the common arguments for why vert stack stinks. I think the greater point still stands (that it's important to think about providing the best possible introductory materials). Just imagine that I used parenthetical examples that we both agree are important to teach to new players!
Cool idea! I'm just sharing some thoughts based on your points that hopefully you find helpful or interesting.
I have also read Breath and agree it takes a weird direction sometimes. Nasal breathing is 100% legitimate though. It should be our default for better quality of air, keeping us more in the parasympathetic system and developing a good dental arch (especially for children/teens). The Buteyko method is well practiced and researched with good results. Body by Breath is another good breathing book you might be interested in.
Keith Barr is a big tendon guy who would advocate gelatin supplements for helping with tendinopathies. Ligaments also benefit. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27852613/
Knees over toes - I don't really follow or look at the knees over toes guy's stuff but I think if you can bend your knees pain free while lifting, do. Cal Dietz (American S&C Coach) is a big proponent of it too. If you don't use it, you lose it, and I think this is what happens with a lot of adults. A lot of them can get away with not bending their knees even when doing squatting actions which is not going to stimulate the soft tissues to stay strong and supple.
Cold - I've never been interested in this stuff. Just seems so impractical to try to use it and from the little I've heard you need to be consistent with it because you only get very short term benefits each time.
I would definitely be in favour of external over internal cues. You can really freeze joints and create stiffness unnecessarily with an internal, body-centred focus (bad unintended consequences). For example, there was a while where there was a heavy emphasis on teaching forehands as just a wrist flick in Ireland and some people adapted using this cue by tucking their elbow close to their sides to limit movement from their elbows up. You have to really know what you're talking about to use internal focuses in my opinion and we don't have that kind of biomechanical understanding of throwing yet.
To the extent I'm interested in Cold, there's two things that make me think there might be something to it. First, there's the general idea of it being beneficial to get our body (and brain) "stronger" at resisting negative stimuli that aren't actually threatening to us — see the book Endure for example, which I've mentioned in a few previous posts.
And second, research showing that cold exposure leads our body to generate a type of fat tissue that burns (relatively speaking) more calories. See, for example, this old post of mine (just search for the word "cold"):
https://someflow.substack.com/p/criticisms-of-a-chemical-hunger
> The Buteyko method is well practiced and researched with good results.
I looked it up on Wikipedia and their intro section says "The medical community questions these claims, given limited and inadequate evidence supporting the theory and efficacy of the method." So now I don't know what to think!
I do like the idea of doing things that are difficult sometimes to simply build mental and physical resilience. I think my issue with cold exposure is how you would have to set it up. My interests usually lead to reading things that are practical for my clients to use and creating ice baths or going out in shorts on a snow day meant I never really went down that avenue! But I must look into your articles since you've probably done a lot of the hard work for me. ;)
Haha sorry I should have been more careful with my wording. 'Well practiced' is OK, the same sort of concepts are used by Patrick McKeown and Oxygen Advantage certified people (https://oxygenadvantage.com/patrick-mckeown-m-a-tcd/) but the research is not extensive on Buteyko specifically. There is evidence for it helping asthma: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/14752538/
Part of the problem is how many claims the Buteyko method makes - it sort of claims to cure everything. It blames CO2 intolerance for causing a whole host of conditions and this can be fixed with breathing less and doing so nasally.
Thanks LT for another great article. I have idea lists, am tempted to copy this format!
Timeouts do seem to increase the chance of a turnover more than it's worth - better to learn how to keep the disc alive when multiple players are tired.
"Where's our revolution?" - clue is in the name! A team from a small isolated ultimate community became World Champions, and contain several of the top 10 female players in the world - how did they beat the best teams the huge community in America had without any clear offensive structure? Why are so many superstars originating from this tiny community?
I think one of the advantages of training and playing a flow and principle based offence is that you get many touches of the disc, and learn to adapt to any on-field situation.
"teach newer players the important frisbee concepts (vert stack, ho stack" - don't teach beginners stack! Learning to stand in a stack and wait for your turn to cut is not a good way to learn how to play frisbee - better for players to thrive in the chaos and focus on simpler things like spacing, movement, technique. When they face a team that surrounds the stack they will have to learn how to play spread anyway, so it's best not to mention anything to do with structure beyond "spread out" and "stay connected" for at least the first few months. Revolution learned and played that way for many years!
Re: revolution ... I think you make a fair point that their playstyle is a revolution. But I feel there's a sense in which it's not an example of what I was trying to get at. For two reasons. First, because it's a little more undefinable—"shoot more threes" and "go for it on fourth down" are very clear, specific strategic tips. I'm not sure anything Revo does differently is that easy to explain.
And second, because it's hard to separate their overall frisbee skill from their revolution — like you say, they have arguably 3 of the top ten players in the world, and that's not even counting that they have probably the best puller in the world. Manu, Vale, and Cartagena are amazing throwers in any system. Would their revolution be as noticeable if it wasn't for their skill? For example, the "Moneyball" A's had unexpected success even without any notable players.
Re: vert stack/ho stack ... also a fair point. I'm maybe not a full-out Hive-ist but I'm at least Hive-adjacent. I agree with all the common arguments for why vert stack stinks. I think the greater point still stands (that it's important to think about providing the best possible introductory materials). Just imagine that I used parenthetical examples that we both agree are important to teach to new players!