Themes covered in this episode include:
How our personal philosophies can be constrained by external metrics such as what we judged on (medals for example).
Staying open to being surprised by what others can do.
Replacing expectations and 'supposed to' with attentive responsiveness.
Challenging our assumptions.
Finding spaces to have time and the environment to explore thinking.
How we might find out what others think our philosophy is.
A guide to ontology, epistemology, and philosophical perspectives for interdisciplinary researchers. This is an excellent short article to explore philosophy in research a little deeper.
My fabulous guests on parts 1 and 2 are:
Dr Alex Lascu is a skill acquisition specialist by trade and currently lectures at the University of Canberra. Her passion for talent development and community sport is contagious, and she enjoys existing in the gap between research and practice in the hopes of bringing these two worlds together.
Find Alex on Twitter at @skillacqlascu

At her website https://skillacqlascu.com/
Or LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/alascule/?originalSubdomain=au
Dr Carl Woods is a Senior Research Fellow within the Institute for Health and Sport at Victoria University. His research interests reside at the intersection of ecological psychology, social anthropology, and sport science, where he explores concepts of knowing, skill, learning and education. He has an extensive background in both academia and the industry, having held various positions within multiple Australian Universities and the Australian Football League.

Contacting Carl -
Carl is on Twitter - @CarlWoods25
ResearchGate
Here are a few of Carl's recent papers -
Thinking through making and doing: sports science as an art of inquiry.

Craig Morris is an Olympic Canoe Slalom Coach and High Performance Coach consultant with over 17 years of experience in performance coaching.

Personal coach to 1 individual senior Olympic, World and European podiums and over 30 World Cup podiums, across multiple athletes and 4 Olympic disciplines, Craig is regarded as one of the World’s leading Canoe Slalom coaches and skill acquisition specialists.

More recently Craig has become a Director and Performance Coach for Cultured Coaching Ltd, offering high performance bespoke development and executive coaching and mentoring to individuals and teams across a myriad of domains.

Wherever Craig goes he aims to be innovative in his coaching practice and is increasingly engaged worldwide in fields including leadership, coach development, skill acquisition, mentoring and ecological approaches to performance coaching.

Craig and Carls paper 'On the Wisdom of Not Knowing: reflections of an Olympic Canoe Slalom coach
Craig can be contacted via
email at [email protected]

On Twitter @MorrisCraig_

LinkedIn Craig Morris
David Farrokh is a PhD candidate at Sheffield Hallam University (with Prof Keith Davids, Dr Joe Stone, and Dr James Rumbold) researching flow from an ecological dynamics perspective.
Find David on FaceBook and Twitter @bigpicsoccer

Welcome to the third episode of the River Tiger Podcast. In this conversation I am co-hosting with Stuart Armstrong (The Talent Equation Podcast) and welcoming our fabulous guest Mia Palles-Clark. Mia is a British showjumping BSCC Level 3 Coach, Coach Developer, British Army team coach, England Home Pony Chef d'Equipe and UKCC Coach of the Year 2017. For many of you, Stu needs no introduction, but if you have not checked out his podcast yet you are in for a treat. There is a link to Stu's podcast at the end.
In this episode we start to explore some of the implications of agency (or lack of) for horses and children within our sporting communities. Not surprisingly, this ended up as a long conversation and covered many fascinating areas and ideas. The focus was always on how we move forward and what all of us can do to help shape a great future for both equestrian and youth sports.
The themes we covered included:
- why agency is important
- aspects of our language and culture that shape our interactions and behaviours
- what can we do to change the landscape of our sporting and coaching eco-systems
- listening to our horses and children
- why agency is just as important in youth sports and how we can learn from other sports and disciplines
- why and how ecological dynamics and a constraints-led approach could have an impact on competence and also support agency
- a bit of a wish list of what we would love the future could look like.
Links to my guests/co-hosts
Mia Palles-Clarke can be found on Instagram @miapallesclark. She is a coach educator with British Showjumping and runs her own coaching business Mia Palles-Clark Showjumping (find her on FaceBook).
Stuart Armstrong is the host of the wonderful The Talent Equation Podcast which can be found on most podcast platforms. He is also active on Twitter @stu_arm.

"If we could start again and design sport around the needs of children, would the sports still look the same as they do now?" Mark O'Sullivan asked this question at a conference a few years ago, and I keep revisiting it, thinking about it from the perspective of the needs of horses.
With the continuing issues of abuse in sports, this episode explores what the issues are and whether there are cultural aspects to the way sports have emerged that may make abuse easier to perpetrate and harder to eradicate. Does a historical focus of developing obedience and compliance undermine agency and consent. And if so, how can we move forward and have youth and equestrian sports that are safe, ethical, and meet the needs of those partaking?
Thank you to this weeks guests, authors Dr Jennifer Fraser and Julie Taylor, for joining me for a conversation about abuse and bullying, the impact that it has on individuals and how sports are perceived by those outside of the current systems. This was a difficult but important conversation for me. I am passionate about not losing equestrian sports, but equally passionate that much needs to change moving forward or we will lose them and with good reason.
My guests on this episode are:
Julie Taylor is a journalist and author of 'I Can't Watch Anymore': The Case for Dropping Equestrian from the Olympic Games.' 'Catalogues what happens to sport horses in plain sight ... should be compulsory reading for all of us who care about horses.' - Professor Paul McGreevy BVSc, PhD, FRCVS; author, Equine Behaviour

Passionate, yet rigorous and meticulously researched, this eye-opening book holds equestrian sport up to Olympic standards and finds it sadly wanting.'
Find Julie on Twitter @eponatv Facebook https://www.facebook.com/eponatv and YouTube https://www.youtube.com/user/eponatv
Dr Jennifer Fraser is the author of 'The Bullied Brain: Heal Your Scars and Restore Your Health.' 'Bullying and abuse are at the source of much misery in our lives. Because we are not taught about our brains, let alone how much they are impacted by bullying and abuse, we do not have a way to avoid this misery, heal our scars, or restore our health.'

Find Jenniferon Twitter @bulliedbrain

I met Martina when I attended the Athletic Skills Model (ASM) Advanced Instructor course earlier this year. The course was excellent and I have used the practical elements regularly in all of my coaching and own practice since.
I am exploring how to develop it for using with horses to help diminish the movement poverty that many horses suffer and to support healthy, happy and skilful movement in horses as well as humans.
For open courses in the UK in 2023 (London and Sheffield) or for bespoke courses with a focus on your own sport contact Dr Martina Navarro.
The Athletic Skills Model website (English overview). https://www.athleticskillsmodel.nl/en/about-asm/
An open access academic paper about the ASM theoretical underpinnings .
https://www.athleticskillsmodel.nl/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Creating-adaptive-athletes-the-athletic-skills-model-for-enhancing-physical-literacy-as-a-foundation-for-expertise.pdf
Dynamics Coaching blog articles link https://dynamics-coaching.com/our-blog/
Martina Navarro
'I joined the Department in August 2017 from the University of Bern, Switzerland, where I was working as a post-doctoral research fellow. I hold a BSc degree in Sport Science from the School of Physical Education and Sport Science, University of Sao Paulo (EEFE-USP), Brazil. At the same institution (USP), I did my PhD in Human Physiology (Neuropsychology) focusing on the effects of training strategies and high levels of stress and anxiety in human cognition (eg. attention and decision making) and motor control. During my PhD I joined a Sandwich program and did part of my PhD research at the MOVE Research Institute Amsterdam at the VU University Amsterdam. In 2013 I worked at the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Science, at the School of Medicine of the Federal University of Sao Paulo, Brazil, as Post-Doctoral Fellow. In 2016, I was awarded an excellence post-doctoral research fellowship by the Swiss Government, and subsequently joined the Institute of Sport Science at the University of Bern. During my Fellowship, my research focused on testing Bayesian Decision Making Theory in sports and human performance. In addition, I have worked with sports consultancy companies and professional sports teams and international sport organisations, most notably, in Brazil and the Netherlands.

My research interests are focused on understanding the intricacies of the key elements (perception, action, cognition and emotion) in human performance psychology. Specifically, my work investigates how high levels of anxiety and stress and different skill acquisition strategies may affect attentional resources and consequently decision-making process.'
Academic contact [email protected]

In this conversation we explore the performance demands of sports where each competition course is unique and is viewed from a position other than by practicing. By walking the course in Showjumping or walking along the banks to view the course in Canoe Slalom.
Other than identifying the best route through the course, what other information could be attended to that would support a successful performance? Craig and Richard discuss and compare the performance demands of the two sports.
These include:

• The need to have a plan to reduce the number possible actions and identify the best routes or lines though a course. This is an education of 'intention.'
• Having a plan that helps to constrain the focus of attention of the performer. Guiding their attention toward the information that will support them to realise their performance goals. This could be described as an education of 'attention.'
• Flexible enough to allow them to remain open to what is happening in the performance and be adaptive. Ongoing calibration of perception and action.

I hope you enjoy listening to this conversation as much as I did!
About my guests:
Richard Seals is a Professional Show Jumper and like many others in this sport he continues to compete as well as coach and bring on horses. Richard is a British Show Jumping UKCC level 3 coach and has just started his Level 4 at Gloucester University. He has also completed National development program for coaching excellence and a Pony Club Accredited Coach.
Richard has also been active as a representative on many committees including British Show Jumping Area 21 (Derbyshire), the Rider representative on the British Show Jumping National Sport committee, and a representative/ consultant on the Sport Horse Research Foundation.
Richard can be contacted via facebook or his website.
Craig Morris is an Olympic Canoe Slalom Coach and High Performance Coach consultant with over 17 years of experience in performance coaching.

A person-centred, inspirational leader, Craig has gained recognition both nationally and internationally for his ability to develop individual athletes and teams through a trans-disciplinary approach to development transcending pathway to podium.

Personal coach to 1 individual senior Olympic, World and European podiums and over 30 World Cup podiums, across multiple athletes and 4 Olympic disciplines, Craig is regarded as one of the World’s leading Canoe Slalom coaches and skill acquisition specialists.

More recently Craig has become a Director and Performance Coach for Cultured Coaching Ltd, offering high performance bespoke development and executive coaching and mentoring to individuals and teams across a myriad of domains.

Wherever Craig goes he aims to be innovative in his coaching practice and is increasingly engaged worldwide in fields including leadership, coach development, skill acquisition, mentoring and ecological approaches to performance coaching.

Committed to facilitating others to shine, he is well known for being highly skilled in building and evolving relationships across performance teams.

Recognised for committing significant time to building a coaching chain, both within Canoeing and across other sports, Craig’s passion and skill to support other coaches and engage on a mutual learning journey through dyadic mentoring is growing rapidly.

Craig can be contacted via
email at [email protected]

On Twitter @MorrisCraig_

LinkedIn Craig Morris