Dr Sarah Chantler is a registered dietician and performance nutritionist. Originally from South Africa, Sarah is now based at Leeds Beckett University in the UK where she is a senior lecturer and applied practitioner. Sarah's fascinating work highlights why we should prioritise teaching food skills over food knowledge to the adolescent athlete. We dig into this idea during the episode and Sarah gives some great examples to use with your athletes.

We also discuss the role of the coach in nutrition, how age should impact what we focus on and the value of snacking as a starting point for younger kids, how the sporting system can influence poor nutrition, appetite and the challenges that come with higher training loads, the power of role modelling in nutrition, social media, and why we should all be having more conversations about food.

Enjoy!

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"Grass was a luxury, if you saw grass, you'd go and roll in it."

My conversation today is with Royston Dsouza. Hailing from India, where he spend much of his childhood playing football on the streets of Mumbai, Royston is now based in Auckland, Aotearoa, where he works as a movement skill coach and as a football coach.  Royston played top level club football in India for five years before quitting and making the move to New Zealand to study.

In this conversation, I chat with Royston about his joyful childhood, including his wide range of movement experiences and playing sport based on the season. Roy describes the difference between football in New Zealand compared to India and what led to his decision to quit the game he loved. We also chat about Roy's approach to developing movement skill and how he aims to keep kids in sport.

You can check out Roy and his awesome work @Roystondsouza on instagram.

Enjoy!

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This conversation is with Austin Einhorn and Dr Jeff Moreno, recorded live in Santa Cruz, California.

Enjoy!

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On the show this week, I'm speaking with Pathways Manager and A-League Women's Assistant Coach at Melbourne Victory Football Club, Gareth Turnbull.

Gareth has been full time in football since 2008, beginning his career as a Football Development Manager for Coastal Spirit Football Club in Christchurch, and moving on to New Zealand Football where he served as the High Performance Athlete Development Manager, Head Coach of the National U17 and U20 Woman's programmes, and the Football Ferns Assistant Coach.
 
I love Gareth's perspective not only on football development, but on life. And in this conversation, we dig into all of it. If you see sport as a way to develop joyful, intrinsically driven, all-round young people who just so happen to also be great at sport, you're going to love this conversation.

Big thanks to Garth for taking some time out on his holiday back home in New Zealand to sit down with me for a yarn.

Enjoy!

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It's an absolute pleasure to bring Golf New Zealand's National Coach, Jay Carter, on the show. Jay and I met not long ago when he reached out to ask me on his fantastic podcast, Talking Performance. We had a great conversation and barely scratched the surface on some topics I wanted to talk more about.

So, here we are. While Jay and I spend our days in different sports and with athletes at different stages of development, we share a lot in common. Most significantly, the common goal to help young athletes lead themselves.

Jay and I cover a lot in this conversation, including solving problems over learning techniques, identifying potential rather than performance, creating talent systems, play versus practice, what happened when Jay literally froze on the tee back in his playing days, thinking out loud to build awareness, slowing down to speed up, and much more.

Enjoy!

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Head of coaching at Birkenhead United FC in Auckland, New Zealand and Co-founder of Player Development Project, Dave Wright (@davewright07), rejoins me for another episode of The Curious Mind.

We discuss our experiences in youth sport over the past couple of months, including a recent trip Dave took to Tonga and what he learnt from it, the importance of joy and how to find it, and the continued rise in negative parent behaviour. 

Enjoy!

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"Fun is a fleeting moment. Joy is something that's enduring, something that brings you back."

Mike Hester works for New Zealand Rugby and is responsible for leading their approach to the evolution of the game at participation level. Prior to this role, Mike spent 28 years at the New Zealand Defence Force where he worked as a Career and Talent Manager.

Mike is also a former FIFA referee and has officiated at the highest level at pinnacles events across the world, including the Beijing Olympic Games in 2008 and the FIFA World Cup in South Africa in 2010.

On the show today, Mike shares some of the skills required for a referee to be at their best in emotionally volatile sporting environments and why investing into early stage referees is so important for the game of rugby. We also talk about the shift NZ Rugby is making from a game-centred approach to one that is more participant-centred.

The work Mike is doing is challenging not only the foundations of New Zealand's national game but also the fabric of the culture it sits within.

Enjoy!

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Dane Baker is a Performance Dietitian who has worked extensively with New Zealand's elite athletes and organisations over the past 15 years, including the Chiefs, Blues, Black Ferns 7s, NZ Hockey and NZ Swimming.  He was also the NZ team dietitian for the Rio Olympics and Gold Coast Commonwealth Games.

Dane is an active researcher in the field of RED-s, a lecturer at the University of Otago and has a leadership role as part of WHISPA, a specialist group dedicated to optimising female health and performance at High performance Sport New Zealand.  He also leads the nutrition provision for the HPSNZ core knowledge coach education program.

In this wide ranging conversation, Dane and I discuss how to properly fuel a developing athlete's performance, fad diets and the influence they are having on our kids, Dane's love of fishing, and the dangers of low energy availability in sport. We start the show hearing about Dane's formative years growing up playing golf in West Auckland.

Enjoy!

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We all have times in our lives that change us. Watershed moments that force us into thinking differently. Kylie Cox had one of these very moments a few years ago while training for an Ironman World 70.3 Age Group Championship. Despite continuing to perform in training, a number a life stressors coincided with a heavy training load. She became concerned about how her health might impact her menstrual cycle and sought help.

Now, after exercising her own curiosity and earning a Master's degree focusing on energetic injuries, Kylie is passionate about helping young athletes and their families understand what it really means to stay healthy.

Kylie also works a the physiotherapist for Netball New Zealand's secondary school programme and recently developed the first national resource on female athletic health for NetballSmart.

We start the show hearing more about Kylie's story.

Enjoy!

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My conversation this week is with Mark Upton and Ken Willner.

Mark is passionate about supporting people's WayFinding endeavours by facilitating the emergence of new connections, new capacities, and meaningful stories and refections as we journey together. He has a particular interest in helping people find their way in sport. You can find Mark's work @ myfastestmile.com

Ken Willner is a sports photographer passionate about keeping children in sport. Through collaboration with international and local professionals, Ken provides a fresh approach to helping young people flourish in sports. You can find Ken's work @ yellowforyelling.com

On the show today, Mark and Ken share their Game Hubs idea. Game Hubs are local community spaces that promote freedom, creativity, collaboration and competition through games. They embrace the voices and choices of young people, are low cost, and rather than coaching, call for adults to just facilitate play. 

We start our conversation hearing from Ken and his thoughts on the intensity of emotion parents bring to sport.

Enjoy!

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