strength and conditioning edit
Sun, Sep 10, 2023 6:04PM • 24:59
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
coaches, coaching, rugby, sport, athletes, professional sport, day, great, learn, role, work, suppose, sports, good, melbourne, wondering, experience, team, rugby league, staff
SPEAKERS
Paul Barnett, Dean Benton
Paul Barnett 00:00
Dean Benton Good afternoon and welcome to the Great coach's podcast.
Dean Benton 00:04
Good afternoon. How are you?
Paul Barnett 00:06
I'm doing pretty well. Bit of a rainy day here in Sydney. What's it like down there where you are?
Dean Benton 00:11
Sunny day actually, ironically in Melbourne, so no complaints whatsoever?
Paul Barnett 00:17
Well, why don't we actually start their day? Why don't you tell us where you are in the world and what you've been doing so far today?
Dean Benton 00:24
Yes, certainly. In Melbourne by choice of the families elected to stay in Melbourne now the kids are all at all settled at school. So I've obviously I've travelled around the world a fair bit. Probably got to the point where I was doing too much. So yeah, so certainly elected to stay in Melbourne. Got my business running these days, and also doing a little bit of consultancy with Argentinian rugby.
Paul Barnett 00:54
Argentinian rugby, well, we can add that to the list of the world's great rugby nations you've worked for? Because if I've got it, right, there's England, Australia and Japan. That's, that's
01:04
correct. Yes.
Paul Barnett 01:06
Well, actually, you've worked all over the world, Dean, and I'm sure you've met some great coaches along the way. In fact, you've worked with a couple of really big names. There's Vern Gambetta, Eddie Jones, and of course, Wayne Bennett, the great rugby league coach, but there's many, many others that you've crossed paths with. And I'm just, I'm just wondering, Dean, from your perspective, up close. What do you think the Great Ones do differently? That sets them apart?
Dean Benton 01:33
Good question. They're all different. They're all unique. And they all bring different things. So, but they do say she has some commonalities. The great coaches, they know how to win the league laser like focus, they don't get distracted, nor allow staff to get distracted, either. Great knowledge and experiences are given. That's just expected. But for me, it's the ability to communicate. And the good ones, really, they have a innate sense and ability to teach and to sell. I think that's one thing that sets them apart. It's, it's funny, you can always tell a respected coach, when they walk in the room, the room goes quiet. And that's when you know you're here amongst greatness. What I think another thing that sets them apart too, is charisma. They're great coaches. They all have charisma, suddenly, that's very hard to define, possible to measure. Most coaches are good motivators. But it's the charisma that separates great coaches from the good coaches.
Paul Barnett 02:44
And think we've had that I had said before, Dean, it's fascinating what how does, how does charisma? How is it experienced in an elite coaching environment, like the ones you've been involved with?
Dean Benton 02:57
I think this really comes down to selling they give a great sense of why I could you know, all the good coaches do that. They give a great sense of direction as to why they're there. So they, as I said, motivation is usually quite short lived, but inspiration is much longer law. And as I said, sellings about the emotion. The good coaches are very good at doing that. They're very charismatic at doing that as well. The great coaches are always good teachers, which is the mental side of things, of course. But I think that's probably the best way to explain it. I
Paul Barnett 03:34
want to talk to you a little bit about teaching versus coaching later on. But perhaps, let's just start with strength and conditioning because on an elite coaching setup in a staff associated with one of these high performing groups, national team or even a team in international competition, what's the role of the good s&c coach
Dean Benton 04:01
I think it's probably function think, and treated like senior assistant coaches, rather than just a silo sometimes. It's not a criticism, I suppose. It's more observation, it'll Olympic sports, you'll see certain silos but in the best professional sport programs that definitely seen and treated like assistant coaches. And a very good at conceptualizing how athletic performance is applied. They don't think in Orthodox terms. So I'd say sometimes a strength conditioning coach will think in terms of well, I've got them fast, I've got them strong, etc, etc. I've got them fit up done my job, but the job's not done until until it until it's contextualized until it's applied to the game model. Another way to think about it, whether it's AFL rugby league, or or or rugby itself, this way to think about fitness, the definition for fitness is it is a team's ability to carry out the game model for entire 80 minutes or an AFL could be 100 minutes, of course and beyond. But that's probably the best way to think about it. In addition to the good ones are very good at helping out the head coach in terms of synthesizing and coordinating the Sports Science, Sports Medicine, sometimes, information that is put to head coaches is quite overwhelming that these guys are caught very, very busy. So they can actually synthesize and play a role there for the head coaches. In many ways, coach, as coaches, it's about the ability to take the complex and make it well complicated and make it simple for the head coach, in their role.
Paul Barnett 05:45
Doing does that role change on game day? Versus the training track?
Dean Benton 05:55
Absolutely. By game day, your work done and sometimes find ways to get bored on game day because there wasn't a lot to be done. So yeah, I suppose my work was was certainly in terms of preparation. That's not to say the game is not important. As translation coach does does have a significant role to play, but it's different. Most your work is that is is, is certainly helping the players but less so before. But that's not to be, you know, you can't diminish your role there on game day, but certainly, yes, in the preparation of the players, or athletes for that matter of just not just talking about the football and rugby case, of course,
Paul Barnett 06:38
your first job in professional sport, was with the Australian Rugby team, and you had very little actual knowledge of the sport at that time. Then I'm wondering what that experience in that role taught you that has stayed with you, as you've gone on, to experience other sports are the codes of the countries.
Dean Benton 06:59
In many ways, I've taken advantage of coming from rugby background. Here, I wasn't stifled by tradition, and those sorts of things. So I looked at the sport from first principles. So it was a massive advantage in many ways. There's an old saying that principles, a few methods, and many there's more similarities between sports and differences. Obviously, between league and rugby and AFL AFL actually has its roots in in rugby, a lot of people don't know that. Yet, as you move between the sports, as I said, there's more commonalities, all the sports require training principles, training variables, athletic quality, it's just molding those qualities in the context of the sport in terms of what's applicable to that, to that sport. And, and to be and to how much I should say. But say you're coming back to your first point. Yeah, I've learned more from from coaching and performance from outside of rugby and rugby league than I've worked within it. And I've actively gone out but outside the outside the rugby codes, in particular rugby to learn learn about those. And that's given me a huge advantage of I've certainly learned a lot from swimming, athletics and my backgrounds from athletics, soccer, and even recently, ice hockey. So yeah, I think I think it's an advantage sometimes to come from the that side of the sport.
Paul Barnett 08:22
Actually, to that, to that point, I have this fascinating quote from you. You say I'm not really interested in how much they lift in the gym exclusively. It's about how well it transfers to the field. It's really that idea of transference that caught my eye and I'm I'm wondering, what are the best coaches do to ensure the transfer to the field is really maximized?
Dean Benton 08:46
Certainly, you have to work closely with the sport coaches. So if you take rugby or rugby league, you're working closely with those guys and, and assessing it transfer rather than looking at how much lift in the gym. It's how much strength and power they can use on the field and those things that discernible these days by I. Look, it's very hard. It's very, it's very easy, I should say, to discern in a gym environment, how strong someone is, but can I apply it on the field? That's you can't always assume that. So you're certainly working closely with, with coaches on that, and looking to where the manifestations of athletic qualities are appearing, actually, within that player's game. And if they're not, you've got to ask, you know, what's the missing link? And that could be numerous things. So but as I said, but not looking at the sport unorthodox terms, in terms of just numbers, it's looking at how manifests or appears on the field.[PB1]
Paul Barnett 09:45
Then is there an example you could share where you've worked on that missing link that you just referenced and have been able to unlock it?
Dean Benton 09:55
Yeah, certainly, you could have say for instance, you take the scrum, sometimes you hurt someone it is it is Very strong, but it's not, it's not transparent. And examples of that could be a lack of flexibility, or they can't get an adopted position. So that can come with all aspects of, of contact. You can sometimes you can see guys with some significant leg power, but it's not transferring. And that could be, could be, again, could be flexibility, it could be technique. But if you just looked at the numbers, then you wouldn't you wouldn't know as to why that's not transferring. So I think it's important to it's important to do to to be assessed in terms of the application to the sport, not just that's not just by numbers, testing reports.
Paul Barnett 10:46
I guess that whole idea of looking beyond the data is a key part of your role, in fact, any coach's role, but when I was preparing for today, I was looking at some documents that you shared with me actually. And you, you break down the pillars of how you define a world class strength and conditioning coach, and I was wondering if you could just take us through those
Dean Benton 11:10
many ways, coaching is like any profession. The three pillars i i place weighed on courses is knowledge. You know, what does a person know? What does a coach know? Experience? What have they done? And their capabilities? What skills and characteristics do they have demonstrate their three main pillars? I think that's a good place to start. A background within the sport, as an athlete is helpful, not certainly not a prerequisite to being a good coach. But, but it certainly offers credit, credibility. And also a big one is empathy. That if you actually haven't done it, or done it in elite sport before, it's very hard to have empathy for what athletes are going through. So I think that's, that's certainly certainly important. The other one I was alluding to before is the ability to teach, train, and assess all athletic qualities like that that's important, rather than just be the jock of the gym, to be able to work across all all qualities speed, power, strength, endurance, etc, etc. And, of course, as I was alluding to before, the ability to teach it well, aside from just coaching it of course, or training it, and the ability to communicate it to sell to give the athletes a reason why it is critical.
Paul Barnett 12:38
To that point did Dean, could you take us through the way that you differentiate teaching from coaching?
Dean Benton 12:46
Certainly, teaching is about the acquisition of new new new knowledge and new skills. Casey, on the other hand, is more focused on refining, developing knowledge and skills over time. Teaching tends to be a one way process, where the teacher transfers the knowledge to the athlete. Whereas coaching is a two way process. And as as that two way process grows over time, it actually flips around the other way. And I'll explain what I mean by that the minute but the coach provides in the coaching process. As I said, it's feedback. Good coaches. I got this one from Bill Slater. Good coaches see what athletes do. Right. A good good athletes feel, but coaches don't. So as I said, Certainly coaching is a two way process and and over time, it certainly it your role, then changes, whereas the athletes have a much, much more significant role in terms of what they're doing that makes sense over time, as opposed to when it's starting off to the young athletes[PB2] . And
Paul Barnett 13:59
so what about this experience when you see teams having a flurry of soft tissue injuries, and it's often the s&c coach who is pointed out as being the one if not to blame, or the one who's got a significant hand in that scenario, when when that occurs when there's a high pressure moment, and the focus comes under one element of a coaching staff. What do you see the best groups of coaches do?
Dean Benton 14:31
Well, they don't panic. When Ben it was very good that his visibility absorbed pressure was incredible. And I think to remain rational, not be overly emotive, about Speights of injuries, sometimes injuries can come down to errors. Sometimes it's just bad luck. But you know, I suppose, looking at each each injury case by case so to speak, and not becoming, as I said to emotive about it, particularly professional sport, those pressures can certainly be magnified by the media a lot of again, of course, it's the whole game is dependent on results. And if those injuries are linked to poor results for you that can result in significant pressure on staff within programs, which is not pleasant.
Paul Barnett 15:30
Emotional, you mentioned emotional control. They're twice easy to say, I guess, but difficult to do in the world of high pressure sport, have you seen routines that people may have that are better than others when it comes to controlling their emotions?
Dean Benton 15:47
So I suppose it's always a state of, as I say, trait and state, some people are less inclined to be emotive than others, some people get better over time at controlling their emotions. Some of it comes from experience. Yeah, as I said, professional sport can be a hard period, you go for that at times.
Paul Barnett 16:13
Do you, Dean? How is your approach to experimenting to learn, changed as your career has progressed? I say this because you've you've authored many, many scientific papers, and I'm wondering how you've evolved, as you've become, have this thinking of yours has evolved? Have you moved up become involved with ever more sophisticated and highly performing or elite level teams?
Dean Benton 16:40
Yeah, I probably I see myself as a sports science educated coach, rather than sports scientist. So most of those of my articles are written as I suppose, around coaching applications. Unlike science coaching, I have no rules. So experimentation is where a lot of new things are born. And I think that that's where breakthroughs happen in sport. And I think another way to, really, to experiment within staff is none of us as smart as, as all of us. And I think sometimes getting staff together, and debriefing, which in itself is experimentation yet, and you're learning as you go. I think, studying facts, and then reflection, either by yourself or among staff, and allows you then, through experimentation to see the results of those things.[PB3]
Paul Barnett 17:36
thing, what debriefing routines do you use?
Dean Benton 17:41
I've got I've got I've been given some good ones out of the Extra Deck is is been very generous to these, these performers. That is, it's simple. Once you know, what was done, well, what could be done better? What can be done next time? It's usually about five or six critical questions that you would that you would ask yourself upon reflection, or as a staff, or even know, where appropriate, asking athletes of course. And I think lots of learning comes comes from that organically. And through that, of course, you learn and which is, you know, in a, in a funny sort of way, experimentation.
Paul Barnett 18:23
Then I've got another interesting quote from you, you say, coaching an athlete and teaching them in the language that you use. It's not easy, and they're all different. And so you have to know how to communicate. And I guess this court is amplified by the international experience you've had, but from traveling to all these places, what have you learnt about communication, particularly in high pressure situations?
Dean Benton 18:50
As you pointed out, they're all different. So and you have to be discerning, particularly in different countries in different cultures have had to get better at that and get better at that fast but but I think the good coaches, they have a good understanding of people, how they feel, what makes them tick, and the best way to influence them. It's not it's not what you say, it's what they hear, perceive and more particularly feel. I think that's very important. So certainly in high pressure situations, accuracy, sincerity, and brevity of communication is very, very important.
Paul Barnett 19:30
He talked about hearing precision feeling. You talked about what makes the athlete tick and precision and remedy. And I'm interested if you could share an example with us of how you've read these things, and looked beyond the data to help an individual or a team perform.
Dean Benton 19:51
Yes, just trying to think of handle a certain situation, but I think when I first started our coaching I was like a lot of young coaches quite transactional, as I've got towards my latter years. So it's plateaued. But I'm only 54 You're much more transformational than you sit down, you'll have discussion with an athlete about where they want to go, where they think they need to go, rather than you telling them where they need to go. So it rather than planning for them, you're playing with them. And you get much, much better results by taking that approach. So that's probably Yeah, I think by doing that, you get a sense of what what makes them tick. And the best way to influence them. And then, in many ways, they're actually helping you design their programs. And once you do that you have by, and we don't like none of us like to have decisions made for them for us, I should say. So yeah, consulting, is something that I've got better over the years, I think.
Paul Barnett 21:01
Well, I want to pick up on this theme, actually, because he started coaching track and field in the Springs area way back in 1996. And I'm curious, the knowing what you know, now, what advice would you give your younger self?
Dean Benton 21:19
certainly be more patient. So if I was talking to myself here, being more patient patients is is also how you act, of course, when you have to wait longer than what you think you should think that's very important. And also to knowing your blind spots as well. Knowing what you know, know what you don't know, but need to know. Know, find out from others what you don't know that you don't know. Because we all have blind spots. Kruger Dunning effect, as they say, and find out who does know and invest in them. That would be probably some of the main things. But the other things I would have to suggest is is, is I would have told myself many years ago, to listen a lot more to a lot less. Ask more informed questions that was suppose considered questions uninformed, that are informed statements. Coaching gives you many opportunities to say nothing, I think you should take advantage of all of them. Otherwise, of course, is being present. I think sometimes particularly at home, I think there's it's very important that being present, and not being in the past or the future, and actually listening to a lot better. Other ones, coaching, coaching can't be taught, it can only be learned. And you certainly can't learn to coach on the internet. It's a craft that must be practiced and experience over time. So there's certainly no shortcuts to experience and you can't buy experiences we always say.
Paul Barnett 23:03
And now that you're very passionate about learning through experience, and you also have a very strong vision for where you would like the role of the strength and conditioning coach to go in Australia. And I guess so my final question is, in the distant future, if you do ever hang up the whistle, what's the legacy that you hope you have left, when it comes to the role? Perhaps I'll even go deeper the art and the science of strength and conditioning coaching.
Dean Benton 23:34
We're not sure how influential I am here, but but probably, I think it's gone away for the art, it's probably gone a little bit to be a little bit too data driven. So I suppose I swing back to being more balanced between the art and the science. As I said, I'm not quite sure how much influence I have in that. But yeah, I You talked a lot of the more the older guys, and that's their observations, and I agree with them. But yeah, I think these days, were completely over endowed with information and and devoid on how to use it these days. And I think it's easy to get seduced into data and, and technology. But as I said, it's the wisdom of how to apply it in a coaching environment, which I think is is not always present these days.
Paul Barnett 24:27
Then I think that's not only true of s&c coaching, I think it's true of all facets of life, whether it's parenting or in the boardroom to so thank you very much for your time today. I've enjoyed learning a little bit more about strength and conditioning coaching. It comes up so often in these interviews and prior to meeting you I didn't know as much about it as I liked. So thank you very much for your time today and I hope but Well, I wouldn't say good luck to the Argentinian team, but good luck for you in your role with them. Anyway. Thanks, Paul.