The Talent Equation Podcast

Richard Shorter (AKA Non Perfect Dad) is back to help me celebrate 'Parents In Sport Week' and also because we have a special announcement to make about a new free course that we have created called 'Conversations 4 Growth' that is designed to support sports parents and coach parents to navigate the complexity of supporting and guiding young people through their sporting journey. The course compri...

Rob Gray is Associate Professor of Human Systems Engineering at Arizona State University and host of the highly regarded Perception - Action Podcast. This is Rob's third appearance on the show and once again, he brings his 'A-Game' by providing a depth of insight and knowledge and also being very patient in answering my questions and helping me think out loud. In this conversation we cover the fol...

Marianne Davies' coaching experience includes more than 20 years of working in sports, academic and corporate environments. She is a coach educator, assessor and national trainer. Marianne spent eight years in the role of Coaching Manager for Canoe Wales and before that was responsible for participation development. Marianne worked for many years as a full-time senior adventure sports coach during...

Ross Tucker is Professor of Exercise Physiology with the School of Medicine of the University of the Free State. He is the scientific and research consultant to World Rugby, ambassador and scientific advisor to Virgin Active and Adidas, and a published author, opinion leader and consultant to numerous elite sports teams and organisations. In this conversation we explore Talent ID and the 3 big mis...

Ben Galloway is back from his sabbatical running a football academy in Uganda and came to stay with me ahead of a trip north to join Keith Davids and colleagues for a conference on changing lives, community sport and skill acquisition research. Ben came to coach with me and we then sat down to reflect on the session and to discuss his recent experiences in Africa and some of his latest thinking ar...

Ian Renshaw is back and he has a new book out that he wrote with Danny Newcombe, Keith Davids and Will Roberts. The book (link below) is designed to introduce coaches to the concepts, principles and language of the Constraints Led Approach and offers practical examples of how the approach can be used to support athlete development. In this conversation we delve into some of these principles includ...

Matt Young is an entrepreneur, coach, film maker and advocate for youth sport. He has been working with the United States Olympic Commission to develop a new framework for children's sport in North America which led to him making a documentary about the challenges facing young people in sport called 'The Cost of Winning' https://vimeo.com/potentialpictures/costofwinning In this episode we cover a...

Jonathan Harding is a freelance sports journalist who specialises in German football. He writes predominantly for Germany's international broadcaster Deutsche Welle, but has also contributed to the likes of FourFourTwo, Rabona Magazine and 11 Freunde. Germany has a reputation for being the place where young footballers get the chance to develop, but what about coaches? Speaking to different coache...

Jonny McMurtry runs a brilliant blog called www.coachingthecoaches.net . His articles cover some fascinating subjects that really challenge thinking and stimulate debate. He is currently researching coaching at the University of Queensland exploring athlete motivations and what this means for coaches looking to ensure that players remain engaged and reduce drop out. In the conversation we cover th...

JP Nerbun is a coach and coach mentor that specialises in transformational leadership. He is the host of the 'Thrive on challenge' podcast and the author of a great new book called 'Calling Up - Discovering your journey to transformational leadership'. In this conversation we cover A LOT of ground but some of the highlights include... - Why we can't just be the 'accountability police' - How JP adv...

Alex Lascu is a researcher and Cricket Coach from Australia. She has dual Bachelor's degrees (Exercise Science & Psychology) from the Queensland University of Technology and is now studying a PhD at the University of Canberra. Alex is passionate in the pursuit of research in sport, focusing on talent development of female cricketers. In this conversation we explore some of Alex's thoughts about co...

This week I managed to navigate timezones and scheduling and technology challenges to 'facilitate' a conversation with Ted Kroeten from Joy of the People, Joey Peters from Game-Play-Learn and Debbie Sayers from Salisbury Rovers to discuss everything about Free Play and the sports experience for children. It is a fantastic conversation full of useful insights and reminders of why we do what we do....

Will Roberts is a senior lecturer in sport and exercise at the University of Gloucestershire. His teaching and research interests revolve around two key areas; the sociology of sport, and coaching pedagogy. His PhD examines the role coaching has in providing social and personal change. In this conversation we explore the challenges that coaches face when adopting a constraints led approach to coac...

Tyler Yearby is a movement skill coach who is part of a growing community of movement specialists that are challenging orthodoxy within coaching in the U.S. Tyler has been heavily involved in supporting Shawn Myzska in creating the Sport Movement Skill Conference. Tyler has worked in a range of sports but his main focus is American Football and he has a range of clients that are playing profession...

Sam Jarman is back and this time he is really challenging some of my conceptions of what we understand to be the reality of the youth sport experience. In this episode we delve into philosophical psychology as we explore whether what we value in sport is actually a product of social and cultural constructs which restrict us from genuinely exploring the nature of our experiences and limiting our ab...

Gunny is back with his unique brand of coaching conversation. As always, Gunny is on point exploring all things engagement and coach development. In this conversation we explore why Gunny feels that coaches should embrace 'Maslow before Bloom' in a reference to meeting an athlete's needs before learning can occur. We also discuss how indigenous games can be used to develop skills and how tradition...

It was fantastic to welcome Coach Reed Maltbie back to the show. Coach Reed has been really busy since his last visit. He has just been part of a team that coordinated a massive global youth sports Think Tank called GO! Chase Excellence and he is now engaged in providing mentoring and coach development support for a range of sports organisations including U.S Sailing, Ontario Volleyball and Soccer...

Ben Franks is a researcher in skill acquisition at the University Campus in Football Business (UCFB) based at Wembley in London and he is also a goalkeeper coach. His research studied visual search behaviour in elite goalkeepers and sought to explore how they use their eyes to help them with anticipatory decision making. This episode is made of 2 halves. The first half delves into the research and...

Olly Logan is 'Analysis Lead' at British Swimming. This is a rather misleading title as it doesn't really do justice to the role that Olly plays in supporting the development of elite British swimmers. As you will see from this conversation Olly's role is about using analysis, data, research and skill acquisition knowledge to devise interventions that will help the best get better. In this fascina...

Lucy Moore is a coach, coach developer and coach development professional. The is the Coach Development Manager at Sport England working to support coaches and members of the professional workforce in the England Talent Pathway. In this conversation we explore her career journey and why she loves working in sport and helping others to coach. We discuss approaches to coach development and explore w...

Sion Kitson is an international Futsal Coach and Coach Developer working with the England Futsal Teams. Sion has been working in the Futsal for many years having stumbled across the sport at University and falling in love with the sport after representing GB as a player and getting beaten by Portugal 20-0!! In this fascinating conversation we explore how Futsal has developed and how the game deman...

Gregor Wood was one half of the intrepid duo that worked with me to organise the live learning event that we hosted at Stewart Melville's College in Edinburgh recently. We got together to record a podcast to discuss our reflections on the event and to share our key takeaway messages from the speakers and practical sessions. Hope you enjoy. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.c...

The podcast panel is back. This week I am joined by Loren Anderson, David Hinchliffe and Ed Coughlan. In this great conversation we start by discussing a challenge that Loren faces with getting children to attune to the visual cues that will help them perform more effectively and then begin to explore a range of topics including a fabulous 10 minute rant from Ed on his views on a new sporting deve...

Calvin Betton is back. As always, Calvin isn't short of an opinion or 2 about the word of tennis. Calvin came on to the show because he had listened to the recent podcast panel and wanted to explore some of the areas that were discussed around the use of instructions to get some clarification based on some recent experiences. He also shares his love of music and we discuss the development of music...

Jamie Edwards is a performance coach...he helps people to become the best versions of themselves. He has worked with some of the most famous sports stars that the UK has produced but that is only half of the story. The real work is the work he does with young people to help to equip them for the journey ahead... Jamie has had a profound impact on my life in so many ways and some of his teachings h...