A rare opportunity.

Over the past few months I've been seeing Adam weekly for physio/ Pilates and with that I have been lucky enough to get added bonus of his experiences coaching the elite athletes in Australia. It didn't take me long to realize how professional he is when it comes to getting the most out of athletes and it's this reason that I thoroughly enjoy the conversations we have while he treats me.
Its taken me quite some time to build this relationship with Adam were he sees me as a professional athlete and not someone who is going to waste his time and skills and because of that a rare opportunity has presented itself. People can easily see his enthusiasm gets results hence he gets around 20 requests a week to coach, most of which I believe he kindly rejects. But on Saturday I was lucky enough to be offered a chance to run with him and by all reports I've impressed him.
Adam wanted to teach me how to run. Sounds easy enough right, just put one foot after the other as fast as you can. Well for Adam, who has a degree in physio and bio science it's all about technique (as it is with Carlo). The two critical things he wanted to teach me was to use hip extension with my legs and to drive my arm back behind my body.
To clarify running with hip extension, he told me that rather focus on raising my legs when running (something I unconsciously was doing), to focus on driving my foot down into the ground. It was a strange technique and took a little concentration to get it right but it did seem to feel quicker.
We started the session practicing knee lifts though the focus was on this hip extension. Adam was insistent on making sure I was relaxed while doing the exercises, something I find difficult especially with Taekwondo. When it comes to sparring I find it hard to relax and still be switched on, so I tend to fatigue pretty quickly. It's definitely something I need to work on.
Later in the session we switched to running drills over a distance of about 50 meters. This was what I initially thought we would be doing for the entire session as my focus is to improve my cardio fitness. Running this distance while focusing on breathing, relaxing and technique made the session seem quite easy. After each drill I would completely relax while jogging back, (that is active recovery were you regain your breathe while still, moving which is similar to sparring).
Overall I found the afternoon a good experience and I think I can definitely improve my fitness, which in turn will make sparring that little bit easier. From past experiences I've noticed that maybe if I had a little more to give in the last round it may have changed the outcome of my fight. Time will tell.