Blog
Happy Birthday Sir Ernest Shackleton
This week, Sir Ernest Shackleton would have celebrated his 138th birthday. Happy birthday Sir Ernest! I’m sure you’re very familiar with Sir Ernest’s adventure to the Antarctic. He was a very special leader. He inspired twenty eight men on the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, he kept them together as a team and they all came through it to tell the story. Their expedition was tough, really tough. Tough times require strong leadership. Shackleton was a very strong leader and is now widely regarded as one of the greatest leaders of all time. So how did he do it? What qualities did he have? How did he manage to keep all his men alive and return home...
Read MoreTeam England
Team England, as Gary Neville reported this week, was and still is in an awful mess. ‘Terrygate’ has not so much split the camp as isolated him and Capello. Thank goodness someone somewhere showed some leadership and manoeuvred Capello to go where he needed to go. At no level in any organisation can the leaders allow subversion and insubordination. The only time I have ever ‘done a Capello’ was when I had already decided to go and wanted to make it difficult for the guys in charge, which I did. They had take over at our division of SocGen, I had tried all the proper channels to explain that these guys had a nasty, hidden, personal agenda and no clue what they...
Read MoreThe Psychology Of Injury Rehabilitation
In April 2011, two days before a trip abroad, I stood on the side of a football pitch before a match and ominously said to a team-mate “I just hope none of us get injured before Friday!” Have you ever heard the quote by Christopher Marlowe, “Be careful what you wish for, you are likely to get it”? Well, on that day I ruptured the Anterior Cruciate Ligament in my left knee. The repercussions of a serious injury can go far beyond the physical impact and stress to the body. An injury can affect an athlete’s confidence, self-esteem and their sense of identity; making them feel vulnerable and isolated. Now, I am not a professional footballer (although I should...
Read MoreGood January Great February
What a year this is going to be! 2012 is going to be awesome! I’m certain it’s going to be everything you want it to be, in fact, I know you are going to get everything you want, because YOU’RE IN CHARGE. If you’ve started your i2i journey, then you’ll know what’s needed to make this year and every year one you want. However, how much you want it is a different question altogether. Remember to make it habit. Whatever the dream, make sure you’re doing something towards it everyday. The more you think about the dream, the greater chance of it coming true. The i2i course explains why this is such a natural process, if you’ve...
Read MorePreparation for 2012
Hello everyone My preparations for the 2012 season are in full swing. I have been lucky enough to be a part of the UKA / London Marathon altitude programme for the past 12 months. I really feel that having the opportunity to spent so much time training at altitude has been career changing for me. I spent 4 weeks in Kenya pre Christmas where we train and live at 2400m above sea level, the benefits of training at altitude are massive for distance runners as it helps to increase the oxygen carrying capacity of the red blood cells. We also have miles of hilly trails to train on, a gym on site, physiotherapy, massage and good healthy food provided. We had some challenges to...
Read MoreFive Gold Things
Back in January, the i2i Newsletter talked about the right attitude for 2011. We had 1 year ahead, 365 days, 8760 hours, 525600 minutes which is simply 31,536,000 seconds! Plenty of time hey? Plenty of time to achieve that dream, plenty of time to change the direction of your life, plenty of time to make things happen. So how did you get on? As it’s nearly Christmas, I thought I’d give you an early present for next year. It’s the same deal for 2012, you’ll get the same amount of time and a little bit more (It’s a leap year!) Rather than ’5 Gold Rings’ at Christmas, my gift to you is ’5 Gold Things’ to achieve those...
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