Hey everyone, Coach Harry here! Yes,Coach Harry, writing a blog post, miracles can happen! This is my first one soplease bear with me! And if you have any questions, please forward them on toCoach Mlait, he loves answering all of them, and promises to get back to youwithin 30 minutes, 24 hours, 7 days a week! ;) Anyway, why am I writing this?  Well it's a crazy world out there right now, so I wanted to write one for the youth/adolescent soccer players, parents of players, and soccer coaches. I think we all agree it has been stressful in some way or another for everyone, and it is probably harder than ever for the players to progress and get better at football. I love the game, and I love coachingyouth players, especially. As an S&C coach, my goals for each player areto: Keep it fun, engaging, and educate themHelp and guide them with their goalsMake sure they can play the game wellinto their 60’s (Injury risk reduction, for my fellow S&C coaches outthere) I’m telling you this because I want you to know that I have a purpose behind everything that I do for the player, which is so important when it comes to coaching an athlete. I’m constantly asking myself why? Why am I making them do this lift? Why am I testing? etc. Hold up… just so you know I’m English(big shock right), and refuse to call football, soccer! So, from now on you’llsee football in this post, no more soccer nonsense! Anyway, back to the blog… So, I want to ask you, the player, thekid with the big dreams of one day making it as a pro , a couple ofquestions…  You all have goals, and you all havethings that you can control. So, what are you doing off...

So we got a dog. And it wasn't a decision we took lightly or came to quickly. We've been considering this for a number of years, even before we had kids. In fact, when Olivia was 3 she was asked if she thought she'd be getting a dog. She's 7 now by the way. Sorry to all other dog owners out therebut Poppy is the cutest puppy in the world. Anyways, she thought about this for a second and then gave a great answer. She said "she'd have to get a new family first". That comment has haunted me ever since. Nobody wants to be the bad dad. But we do enjoy to travel. And we head up to the hill in the winter. And I couldn't see how we could continue our current lifestyle with a dog in the mix. And to be honest I'll still don't. To give you an example of how 'on the fence' I was about getting a dog, we told the girls we were going to babysit the dog for a few nights. And so the dog would have a few nights sleepover with us. This would allow Alexandra and I the chance to evaluate how everyone was adapting to this new member of our family. And how this little puppy was adapting to us. Because let's be honest, a new puppy can be a lot of work. And if we realized we weren't up for the challenge or we'd bitten off more than we could chew than we still had the option to take the dog and the girls would still be over the moon about having a dog stay with us for a few nights. Win-win, right? Plus, since we decided to keep the puppy you should have seen the girls faces and...

Have you read the Da Vinci Code? Or any of Dan Brown's books? They're kind of fun if you're looking for a good fictional escape.Recently I read The Lost Symbol by the same author and featured Robert Langdon as the protagonist. In the movies this character is portrayed by Tom Hanks. Anyways, one of the other characters in this book is a scientist and their area of research is noetic science. This looks at the power of the mind and the effect it has on the physical world.Anyways after finishing this book a number of stories in the gym demonstrated the power of the mind. And they both involve golf. The first story involves Mike Lee.Do you know Mike? He's the English sommelier and comes in early mornings during the week. While he trains for health and to feel good a major part of his training is related to golf.[caption id="attachment_5783" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Mental strength and visualization is huge in golf.Last week Mike messaged me to share that he had one of his best rounds ever at the Harvest golf course. I asked what he attributed to this success? And here's what he hold me.He said he had played with a couple of tourists that had never played the course before. And so on each hole he was giving them clear notes on how to successfully manage each shot to achieve the best score. I wasn't there but I would guess it went something like this. 'This is hole 8 which although is a par 5 plays more like a long par 4. From the tee you want to aim for the tallest of the 3 trees on the left. When you clear those trees that will put you right in the middle of the fairway just past the 150 yard marker...

Recently I was making my way through the interior of BC giving presentations at conferences and corporate functions. And there was a message that came through with all the presentations which  only seemed appropriate to include here as well. And this message had nothing to do nutrition. Or training. Or supplements. Or any of the obvious things that have to do with fitness or performance training. Instead the message had to do with mindset. And I used a couple of stories to make the point of how to set the proper mindset for training. Because often times we'll hear of people who get started on a fitness program and don't see results. Or they make a nutritional change but the pounds aren't coming off. They make a number of lifestyle changes which should help them achieve their goal yet they don't realize the success they had hoped for. And sometimes this is due to not having the proper mindset for success. What we normally ask people is if they believe they can achieve their goal and if they are motivated to do whatever it takes. Because it's not uncommon to find out people that don't achieve success didn't believe in themselves from the get-go. And further they weren't too excited to do whatever it takes. You can imagine if someone doesn't have their mindset oriented properly they may struggle to get to the gym for their early morning workouts. And they may find it difficult to adapt to a new nutritional plan. And getting to sleep on time may be less of a priority. But once they have the proper mindset great things can happen. And success inevitably follows. During the presentations I shared a couple of stories related to mindset. The first has to do with believing if someone else...

Whenever we add a new member to our team we use a fairly standard evaluation process. And this includes asking what they think is the most important element lending to the success of the client.And their answers vary from:'Nutrition is the most important. You can't out-train a poor diet. And society in general is eating poorer quality food and more of it.'Can't argue with that.Others will say:'Getting enough varied and intense exercise is the key. With some many modern conveniences we can work, shop and be entertained without getting off the couch. Plus fewer schools, in the US, offer physical education and kids are more into social media and gaming.'Good points for sure.Really confident young coaches will say:'The coaching is the most important. Showing people the proper and safe way to train allows them to lift more intensely than otherwise. Plus they the individual is accountable to another person ensuring better compliance to the process.'Ok, yeah that makes sense.And still others will argue that:'The program is the most important. As long as you have a solid plan for what is supposed to be done, how much and when, anyone can implement the instructions and get the same results.'I wouldn't disagree with that one either.But guess what? They'd all be wrong. Because the first and most important consideration for achieving a rehab, weight loss or performance goal is mindset.If you believe you will fail, you already have. If you don't trust in the process you are just going through the motions. And if you don't believe that you can achieve great results you won't.When I look back after all the years of working in the fitness and performance industry there is one common feature of those who achieved the best results. And that was their positive mindset. It was the belief that they could do...

When you go to the gym, do you need to change your fitness mindset to be more successful? How badly do you want to achieve your goal? What are you willing to do? For some, a strong fitness mindset is more geared towards performance and an athlete's perspective. But what about the rest of us? [caption id="attachment_3106" align="aligncenter" width="275"] The proper fitness mindset leads to great results. Do our goals matter any less? Is our health any less important?   Don’t Let Yourself Off the Hook Sometimes we let ourselves off the hook by approaching our fitness mindset with a casual attitude. We compare ourselves to the general population and know that we are doing more than our co-workers, a particular relative, or a friend. Unfortunately these people aren't the epitome of health and fitness. So when we use this as the measuring stick we feel good about ourselves and satisfied that our efforts our adequate.   Approach Your Fitness Mindset Differently I'd like you to suspend reality and imagine you could achieve great things with your health, fitness and performance training. You could deadlift 500+ lbs. You could run a sub 3:45 kilometer. You could lose 45 lbs. You could rid yourselves of your nagging joint pain. If these could all be true, would you approach your training differently? Would you approach your nutrition differently? Who you approach your rest and recovery differently? Of course you would! Any high level athlete has to have a certain level of confidence that they can win, achieve great things, and are capable of being the best in their sport. Once they have this level of confidence then we see the extra attention to their training, nutrition, rest, recovery and overall focus. There will always be some exceptions to this rule, but for the...