Which one is you?

One of the most commonly asked questions in my daily  business , and which I do face on daily basis is

"What Exactly is High Performance?"

I love to talk about, write about, think about sports science, sports medicine, exercise physiology, talent identification, performance psychology, biomechanics, skill acquisition, elite coach development, recovery, sports physiotherapy, sports massage, performance analysis and all the elements and components of high performance sport, but what is it?

 What is this thing called *High Performance?

I can summarize it all in one word.........Change.

People around me, mostly those sales rep I do educate make High Performance seem a lot more complex, tricky and mysterious than it really needs to be. Sure there is some really cool technology and terminology involved - as there is in all industries - but the essence of High Performance and how I define it  is Change - or rather, accelerating the rate of it.*

Here's my example.

Two people pick up a book about exercise and read that jogging 30 minutes a day for six weeks will improve fitness - specifically endurance.

*Person A* - reads the book and gets up the next morning and jogs 30 minutes.

*Person B* - reads the book and gets up the next morning and jogs 30 minutes. Along the way, they start thinking, if I increased speed and covered more distance in the 30 minutes, I would improve faster. And maybe if I included a few hills, I would get stronger and that will help

me to go faster. And I wonder if I increased the time to 40 minutes, how

much more benefit would I get. And if went faster, added some hills and a few sprints, maybe I can get the same benefit from running for 25 minutes, etc etc etc.

And that's the core philosophy behind High Performance. Not so much the latest technology or the most up to date sports drinks or the greatest facilities - it is much simpler than that.

It is the attitude that things exist in sport only to be improved and enhanced. That what we know, is only the starting point for what we can know. That there are no absolutes, no "onlys", no "always" and no "nevers" in high performance sport - there are only limits to be ignored, boundaries to break and obstacles to overcome. Nothing is static - nothing is permanent - nothing is fixed.

No record is unbreakable. No title unwinnable. No contest impossible. No

opposition unbeatable.

High Performance at its core is a belief that anything is possible and that nothing is impossible.

Money helps create world class high performance environments. There is no doubt that funding helps build the best facilities, buy the best equipment, support innovative research programs and so on.

*But money alone does not make high performance programs successful. *

It is the attitude and beliefs of the people who drive the environments that makes the difference.

You are either someone who is passionate about change - or someone who is equally passionate about keeping things the way they are.

Around workplace there are hundreds of colleagues involved in business and started to think about their jobs.

A few thought, "I wonder what is least amount of effort I can put in today and still get paid?"

Most thought, "I wonder what's for dinner tonight when I get home from work?"

A few - the real High Performance people thought, "I wonder how far I can push the limits of what I do and how fast I can accelerate the rate of change in my sport?"

Which one was you?

Let me wrap up these briefly:

   1. The essence of High Performance is Change. If you are a person who

      loves the challenge of change, who looks at things in terms of how

      much they can be improved, then High Performance is for you.

   2. Decide if you are a "make the car go faster" type of person or a

      "how can we make the car safer" type of person. High performance

      people are risk takers who know no limits, no boundaries and see

      "what is" only as the starting point for "what can be".

   3. High Performance is not so much secrets and mysteries and big

      words about muscle energy and applied physics. It is a mindset - a

      mindset that actively seeks and embraces change - accelerating the

      rate of change faster than the competition.

Thanks for reading, thanks for the opportunity to share

Robert