386: Sam Wuest on Elasticity, Tension-Relaxation and Keys to Athletic Longevity

More show notes at https://www.just-fly-sports.com/podcast-386/

Today’s podcast is with Sam Wuest.  Sam is a licensed acupuncturist, jumps coach and teacher of internal martial arts residing in San Jose, Costa Rica.  Sam combines modern strength & conditioning with Traditional Chinese Medicine/movement arts in his movement practice, and is the creator of the “Meridians Move” system.  He is a former Division I athlete and coach of NCAA national champions and national medalists in track & field.  I first met Sam at a “Be Activated” seminar, and he has been a two time guest on the podcast in the time afterwards.

In the world of movement and athletic performance, we spend a lot of time learning about muscle tension, force production and how to maximize outputs.  At the same time, we spend very little time learning about the opposite end of the spectrum, how to relax muscles, optimize resting tension, breathe and recover.  Even if we spend a smaller portion of our training time on the recovery aspect, it still is critical to understand the “soft side” of movement.  If we don’t spend time on it, we will move more poorly, take longer to recover, and impede our movement longevity.

We occasionally see those athletes who are able to compete at a high level of movement skill, and even power output into their late 30’s and early 40’s, but we don’t spend much time considering the factors behind their performance.  On today’s podcast, Sam goes into the ideas of movement quality, elasticity, stress, breathing, therapy, and more that can help us achieve better movement capabilities, later into life.  This podcast is also a lens by which to observe the entire process of training, but seeing both ends of the tensioning and relaxation spectrum.

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