Gavin Pratt is currently the Director of Strength & Conditioning for the UFC Performance Institute in Las Vegas. He is an accredited ASCA Elite L3 coach and holds a Masters in Exercise Science (Strength & Conditioning) from Edith Cowan University. Prior to this role, he was the Performance Manager at EXOS in Shanghai, China. This involved working with multiple Olympic sports in preparation for the 2018 National Games, after which he then focused on assisting in the development of the country’s surfing program in preparation for the Asian and Olympic games. Gavin was also awarded the ASCA “Mentor Coach of the Year” in 2021 for his work with ASCA L1 & L2 coaches around the world.

QUOTES

“If we miss training the neck, we miss training a whole part of trunk-neck-head coupling”

“We are not just giving any random neck exercises, it is actually in the force vector they are deficient in”

"In MMA, strikes happen in around 300ms and as fast as 100ms with forces up to 10-40g”

“We have something called an MMA warm up: movement, mobilisation, activation”

“Another reason we use static neck exercises to start is to reinforce good posture”

“If we have them twice a week, we need to accumulate at least that average force in a fight absorbed across the week”

SHOWNOTES

1) Gavin’s journey from TV to strength and conditioning at the UFC

2) The benefits of neck strength for injury prevention in grappling and the trunk-neck-head couple

3) Different force vectors coaches should be concerned with neck strength and the neck strength matrix

4) How to test neck strength with a fixed frame dynamometer, and benefits and drawbacks of different body positions when testing

5) Practical examples of applying the neck strength matrix with a flexion deficiency

6) Reverse engineering neck strength from force absorption in MMA fights and differences in typical wrestler and striker neck strength profiles

7) Other assessments used by the UFC Performance Institute to determine athlete needs

8) The benefits of athlete feedback to improve your performance as a strength & conditioning coach

PEOPLE MENTIONED

Bo Sandoval

Brett Grelle