The Uneducated PT Podcast - 🎙️ Episode 102 – Tom Morgan: Falling Back in Love with Training, Navigating Injuries & Staying Strong After 30

Episode Date: July 25, 2025

This week, we’re joined by Tom Morgan, founder of Tom Project Performance — a voice many of you will recognize from Fitness XPO in Bolton, where his no-nonsense approach to training struck a chord with thousands. In this episode, we dig into:The mission behind Tom Project Performance — and why Tom’s so passionate about helping people reconnect with trainingWhy many former athletes and active 20-somethings struggle to stay motivated in their 30sWhat happens after 30 – and why performance doesn’t have to nosediveHow to train around recurring injuries instead of giving upThe psychology of pain and why fearing movement can actually make things worseTom’s transition into fatherhood — how becoming a dad changed his training and his mindsetTraining advice for busy professionals, new dads, and people constantly battling nigglesWhy bodyweight and plyometric training might be what your program’s missingCommon warm-up mistakes (and how to fix them)The 3 biggest lessons Tom would give his younger selfWhether you're a personal trainer, a weekend warrior, or a dad trying to stay in shape, this is one of the most practical and grounded training conversations we’ve had. 🎧 Tune in now – Episode 102 of The Uneducated PT Podcast💬 Share, subscribe, and follow for more real conversations with coaches who’ve walked the walk.

Tom, welcome to the podcast. I first heard of you, well, the first time I heard you talk was obviously at Expo and Bolton, which we were about, that we both attended. And I absolutely loved your insights in the training. I thought you were fantastic. So, honored to have you here today and to pick your brain on all things training. And I suppose I wanted to just start by kind of asking you a little bit about the idea of Tom Project Performance, what it's all about, where the idea it came from and essentially why you're so passionate about it okay well firstly thank you very much for for having me this first podcast i've done in quite a long time so yeah very excited to to be here and like i say just share share some insights and i guess my take on on training and my kind of passion for it

um so i think um the so i'll start with project performance then maybe just give you a lot bit of context in terms of sort of my background and sort of like everything that i've kind of been through who has got me to that point. So the idea behind it was like, your body is a project. And I wanted people to see this as like, training is a long-term thing. Obviously, like six-week programs and stuff like that arrive.

And there's a time and a place for them. But if you really want to get the most out of your training, it's about finding a way to make it consistent. and enjoyable for the long term. And that's part of the reason that I kind of take the approach to training that I do is, yeah, I'm just, I'm basically trying to kind of promote that, that long term enjoyment of training. Whilst also getting great results in certain areas,

and it's not just a case of like, throw it like, oh, like we're just going to change stuff for the sake of changing it. Just like exposing yourself to lots of different modalities. And, yeah, basically just like making it as enjoyable as possible. and then the performance element was, from my perspective, I came from a background from sports. There was obviously sports performance and sort of performance in the gym and that element.

But also just bringing in sort of, I guess the overarching performance of like now I'm a dad, a business owner and everything else. Like I want to be performing as best as possible day to day. I want my energy to be as good as possible day to day. So it's like the very acute benefits you'll get from training in terms of that day to day performance. the kind of middle to long term, middle sort of medium term like progressions that you'll make,

get stronger, get fitter, that sort of thing. And then also like that longevity, that long term performance of just being able to do the stuff that you like to do now for as long as possible. And a lot of the clients that I work with, they're sort of mid-thirties and onwards and just start and see sort of things drop off a little bit. And it's, like for some people, it's having a bit of a wake up call of a health scare or an injury or something like that that's just like makes them think actually if I don't do something about this and make my get my training consistent now it's an uphill battle and actually like I think it's really cool seeing like most of my clients are in that sort of 35 to 55 age group category but there's quite a few guys

that I coach who are sort of into their 60s and doing stuff that they would never see like never imagine themselves doing at that age. And also then when you compare it to other people of their age and the decline that they've seen, it's, and like, I think they're always kind of harb themselves of like, oh, I'm not progressing that much and that sort of thing. But then if you see the level they're at compared to where most people who are 60 are at, it's amazing seeing like how training once or twice a week

at that age can have such a profound effect on your health. And just your physical freedom, what you're able to do day to day. Yeah, I think most people, they don't really think about the long term, like, where am I going to be in 20 years? Am I going to be able to have the independence to be able to get up off a seat or not?

And like, like you said, the difference between seeing someone who does train at 60 and someone who doesn't. And then obviously, you know, that gets harder and harder and harder and harder to, like even to get people, I'd imagine even to get people into a gym at 60 who might not have trained.

Like, it's difficult. It's scary for people if they haven't done it their whole lives. And especially like for people who even stop for a couple of years or maybe like they trained in the gym when they were playing sport and then they retired and then they didn't really do anything. And then like it's difficult for them to kind of get up and go again then like 10 years later.

Absolutely. Yeah, no, definitely. And yeah, I completely agree sort of. I think there's two issues for those people who have been fit. It's like they always refer back to sort of the stuff that they were doing and they've still got that kind of identity. So then it's just trying to meet them where they're at when they do come in. But also, like you say, like gyms can be an intimidating place.

Like sometimes where, like even if I'm traveling and I go into a gym, I've not been to before, I still feel a bit intimidated sometimes. And I'm someone that loves training and spends a lot of time in the gym. So I think there's those two elements of kind of overcoming that sort of hurdle of just accepting where you're at right now. And that's something that obviously when people have injuries and that sort of thing is something that you have to do. And then also like that kind of intimidation factor and just, I think one of the biggest issues that I see with guys of that sort of age is they know how they used to train when they were in their 20s, maybe like early 30s when they don't have commitments. It's like it's very much a big part, like a big part of what they do.

And then they're now trying to fit that five or six day a week training like plan into. their current schedule with family, with busier jobs, with more like general life commitments. And it's, there's just a disconnect. It's just that it doesn't work. Do you have to do? I imagine there's a lot of,

with the type of clientele that you have, I imagine there's a lot of kind of magic, managing expectations involved because, yeah, you're right. Like if, like if you trained hard throughout your 20s, you know, and, you know,

you were able to do so kind of pain free. You just put your body through the, the through the windmill and it was it was you just kind of were able to get on one and you're able to get up and go again and then they tried to do that again when they're in their 30s or their 40s when they've you know a full-time job a family to look after then trying to pull themselves out of the bed to do that it must be very difficult yeah absolutely hey um i wanted to go through a couple of your quotes i called them tom's training quotes which i really really like that right so you also talked about reoccur and niggle so i just wanted to

wanted to read out something you said so you said contrary to what you might think stopping training completely often isn't necessary but adapting what you are doing and how you are doing it is so can you go into that a little bit in terms of someone who might be getting reoccurring niggles and might be making the mistake of of stopping completely yeah so this come from both both sort of some personal experience because i think we've all we've all been there like made those mistakes um but also just it's like seeing a lot of clients kind of go through this. Like say you just like you overreach a little bit and something like you tweak something and you've got a little bit pain, a little bit like maybe a little bit weakness,

that sort of thing, which is like very normally happens, both like sometimes from training, sometimes from stuff outside of training. What a lot of people tend to do is just stop doing everything they were doing. And then when that, when that niggle has become pain. free, which over time it probably will, they just go back to doing exactly the same stuff that they were doing before and just expecting a different result, essentially. And I think one of the key things that we need to consider is like pain free, pain free is great and should be part like part of where we're aiming for, but pain free does not necessarily mean we've rebuilt our

performance and we've rebuilt our tolerance. And that's essentially what, what has. happens when we when we get an injury is like the tissue tolerance has probably dropped a little bit and obviously depending on what the injury is is going to depend on how much that is and the like how much you need to adapt what you're doing but I think it's really important like when something like that happens like yeah I'm not saying like you go back in the gym the very next day but like maybe give it a few days and then start like and then start to get it moving and start loading it again but at the level that it's at now, not where you were previously.

And if you take like, I don't know, someone gets a shoulder needle when they're doing a bench press, for example. Like, most people would obviously just stop doing bench press and then go back to it and then obviously it would happen again. But if you just reduce the load, reduce the range of motion slightly,

and probably just control the tempo, you're probably going to be able to find a range and a load that you can use and do pain-free. And then that's essentially, your starting point and then from there all we'd look to do is um add like add more range until we're going through like adequate range start to regress the load and then start to progress the the speed and or complexity of how we're loading um and and this is something i i went through with um like with my knee i i've i've had so i've had five surgeries over over the past couple of years um accel is

so um all all all were rugby related I fit first off I had I had labelled tears in both my shoulders which I had operated on three weeks apart so that was phone going from like my operator's arm then being my good arm three weeks later then I then I saw my hamstring tens and LCL off my left knee which I think overall was the was the worst was the worst surgery then I did meniscus in my right knee and then I did acr meniscus in my left knee so they they were all that like the they were all surgeries and then I stupidly possibly

went skiing a little bit later a few years later and like in obviously hindsight hindsight is a great thing and I was like I'm fit I train in the gym whatever I'll be alright but what I hadn't really like what I hadn't really sort of factored in at that point was just like more sort of reactive like plier based stuff

things like that I was strong but I like I didn't have enough sort of like variability to like adapt to different positions and be strong in different positions. And also like I'm not a great skier and I'm quite heavy. So is this where is this where the kind of the the passion for because I know you incorporate a lot of plyometrics into your own program and probably your client's program as well. Is that where is that where that came from? Yeah.

It was a combination of that and also missing feeling athletic. I'd stop playing rugby for a couple of years. I was training consistently and like I think probably like from the outside person in to look at I would look athletic like I could run I could like lift in the gym I can like do like all this body weight stuff

but I haven't really trained anything explosive or anything like reactive based and I think it's something that I always include a little bit of it now both for myself and for clients even if it's not a major goal because I think there's so many positive benefits to sort of like

being good at those landings and being able to kind of react to the floor just that like the variability in terms of landing getting strong like loading and controlling into like deep positions and again just going back to like a couple of clients that I've had come through is like they've got to the point where they're like

I'm overthinking it if I need to like I need to jump off a knee height step or jump over a gate, which is stuff I'd never would have done before. But because even if you are doing like some heavy squats and stuff like that, it wouldn't necessarily build that confidence to be able to land and know that you're, you're not going to like tweak your knee or that sort of thing. So yeah, it was it was off the back of that, that I started doing it.

And it was like when I started, I sort of noticed quite a big deficit from. my left to my right, even though like it was like years ago now that I did like that I, that I, um, that I injured the ACL. Um, there was still like a little bit lingering there. And like there might still be a little bit now, but it's, it's much, much closer to what it was. Even though like, from a strength perspective, everything, everything was like, like, I would say everything was completely even left versus right. It's just that like, that last sort of element of just being able to like react on that side that it, yeah, it's it that, that, that, and once started doing a little bit of it, I was like, actually, I'm really noticing, noticing this

difference and noticing this deficit. So it kind of, it motivated me to want to do more. And then like when you've been doing it for sort of a couple of months, you then really notice the difference in terms of just like how kind of springy and generally athletic that you feel or like just the, like, being confident to just go into a sprint at like at any point or that sort of thing which I think a lot of people like as you get sort of mid thirties and onwards like unless you do still play a sport it's probably like it become like years since you've like you've actually pushed that that speed yeah the idea i would imagine there's probably a misconception from a lot of people that like might have done plyometrics during their years of playing sport because it was

incorporated into it into their training and then the minute they stopped playing sport they probably think that oh well there's no need to do uh pliometrics and more but as you're saying now it's like it really is from a like general standpoint of kind of independence and quality of life and and you know like everyday little simple things that you wouldn't think of yeah absolutely yeah yeah um another one that i wanted to go through which as well is most people think athletic performance takes a massive dive as soon as you hit the big tree zero it's just not the case but training is likely going to be a lot harder uh what are someone the reasons that you know training seems to kind of take a nose dive after 30 for a lot of people

and how can they avoid this so i think going back to sort of what what i said earlier about um just like just all those other kind of commitments coming in um and yeah you're you're you're not going to be able to train as like as much as what you previously previously did probably recovery's not going to be quite as good it's not not necessarily because you're you're older but if you like, particularly if you've got young kids, like, your sleep's going to get, like, thrown off a little bit. You're just not going to be able to kind of manage those elements probably quite as well. And that's not to say that you can't manage them as well as possible,

but there is going to be those sort of external elements that come in, plus also like the time pressure. But I think the reason that most people do, like, think that is because they do end up having, like, quite protracted periods of time where they don't, like essentially train um and then they come back and they probably get like maybe get injured if they push a bit too like push a bit too hard a bit too soon yeah um i i think it's yes it's a combination of those two of those two things and i think it is that um sort of consistency element particularly from like um with like regards to sort of plyometrics and that sort of thing of

like if you've not been it like rapidly loading your tenders in that way they are going to take a little bit of time to adapt to that. So you just have to be slow and steady in terms of, in terms of the progression that you use with that. And that's not to say that you can't, like you can't maintain it. But I think like most people either have, like they are not managing the recovery side of things and adapting the training to suit where they're at at that point or end up having like protractive periods of time where they're not training. Whereas even if they were just doing sort of like, minimum at the minimum amount just to keep things ticking over they would maintain those things for

like for a very long time do you have any advice for let's say you know people who are in their 30s and you know they might have been training hard and then they stopped to kind of maybe hit a little bit of a burnout and like you said life started to happen to them they ended up getting a couple of kids and maybe they were kind of constantly getting injured like i know from a physical standpoint we talked we talked about in terms of the amount of load that you take on, it's obviously gonna be really important. But even from like a psychological standpoint, because I'd imagine you will be more experienced

than anyone on this, and constantly getting these serious injuries that like take your back stem 10 steps. It's difficult to get up and go again and go and also pull yourself back a little bit and say, oh, I can't do a lot, which I'm probably used to doing a lot as someone who is athletic, is someone who has, you know,

being in high level competition. It's like you always probably want to do more. You probably have to do a little bit less. And it's probably difficult to, like a lot of people are probably like, oh, you know what, maybe just this, I'm just going to stop training.

This isn't for me. Yeah. Yeah, no, absolutely. I think there's like multiple things that come into that. Firstly, like you're alluding to, like if you've been used to being able to train really regularly

and really consistently and then you're, you're not able to do that. I think that like that's really hard because I think like everyone to a certain extent will have a bit of an all or nothing mindset and if you're not able to do like what you feel like you should do then that or you try to and you end up failing it makes training feel a lot harder

and a lot less motivating because you feel like you're not really getting the most out of it so like in terms of that something that I've spoken about before is almost having like a weekly minimum checklist of if everything else, like if nothing else happens, this is the stuff I want to do on a weekly basis. And so like what if I'm looking at doing that, something that I think like,

I maybe want to, it depends on the focus and you can have it as like complex or as simple as you like, but maybe like three or four hard sets of a push or pull, something quad dominant something like hip dominant which you could do in like one or two sessions in the gym quite easily and that's like going to be like enough to like at very least maintain your muscle mass and and your strength for like a period of time and then the other one that I quite like and this is something I notice when like so I've got two young boys when my first was born I stopped running for a period and then I found it just an uphill battle to kind

I get like get back into it like it felt really hard for like quite a while. Yeah. My second I just committed to doing like at my minimum was like 20 minutes a week. It's like if if nothing else, I'll just go out the door, run for 10 minutes, run 10 minutes back. And that's like like it's not optimal, but it helped me to just maintain like aerobically where I was at. And then just trying to fit in as as as much as possible outside of that like whether it's like as a running with a dog or cycling like for a mute or like those little bits people kind of I think um they think they they don't matter but yeah they they snubbed their nose at them and I can understand why they would as well especially

if you're someone who was like a beast at running or whatever it is yeah I mean I don't think I would ever ever clap myself as that but um yeah no it's it's it I think you just you just have to have that like slight shifting mindset and I think having like okay this is what I'm setting out to do this is like my kind of optimal for the week, but this is like this is my level that I don't want to drop below and having that as your kind of minimum standard for the week, I think is, particularly if it's like a checklist, because then you can have like ultimate flexibility. And yeah, most of the time, it's, it's really useful for people to have a routine and a schedule that they stick to. But it's, it's not feasible for some people and like stuff changes on a daily

basis for some people. So having like just a checklist of stuff that you can, you can fall back to. even if it ends up being you just like front load it or back load it into the week just to kind of tick the box for that week that's going to put you in a much better position than you're just kind of sacking it off completely. So I think there's that there's that like getting over that all or nothing mindset is massive. And then from a from an injury perspective, yeah, that's the like I think that's that's really, really hard from a mindset perspective because particularly it's like I found the knee injury is like probably worse just because even day to day you're in pain walking you're in pain

doing just like just everything that you do and it it's a much bigger limited to sort of like i i call the physical freedom like the stuff that you physically want to do like even if it's just like go for a walk with a dog or like run around with the kids or that that sort of thing so i think that's that's like it having that constant pain and that sort of thing does make it very very hard and And it also, like, it limits you a lot in terms of what you do in the gym or from a training perspective. But I think probably the best thing that you can do in that situation is find something else that you can make your focus while you're not able to load the other stuff as much. Because, like, you are going to, obviously, if you got a knee injury, you are going to have to manage a load. And there is going to be some stuff that you can't do for a little, little while.

Or you have to scale right back. but having other goals that you can still work hard on and make your training purposeful, I think is really important because I think again, a lot of people when they do get an injury, it's like they revolve their training

purely around the rehab, which it makes it really unenjoyable and really demotivating because if that's all you're doing so having other elements that you can focus on and even if like it could be as simple as like some upper body hypertrophy

if you've got a low body injury and just putting more emphasis on that but it's part of the reason that I ended up sort of falling into like body weight and calisthenics was it was after I had one of my knee injuries I wasn't able to do the stuff that I had been doing from a resistance perspective and like

kind of your big compounds you squats, your dead lifts, that sort of thing had always been sort of my bread and butter of training and still that. But I wasn't able to do them like as much or as as as what I had been and training was just getting a bit stale and a bit dull and I was like I was looking for something else to kind of explore and I so and then that's how I found like calisthenics and just like having that as a focus then made training more enjoyable and I think as a result of that it means that you're more likely to be in the gym and training and

probably recover from the injury like quicker because a you've got a positive mindset and be you're you're there doing other stuff and it's easy to fit like rehabby based exercises in between like something else that's maybe a little bit harder or a little bit more engaging or a little bit more kind of purposeful and again from a longevity perspective I think being able to kind of fall back on different elements of training or even just like seasonally like obviously in the summer

it's much nice as like spending more time outside so I like either being able to do like a load of body rate stuff outside or like falling back on some like cycling in running that sort of thing and having that as a bit more focus, I think makes training a lot more enjoyable. And then obviously in the winter, you're probably not going to want to be outside as much. And you might actually get like, obviously for most people, like, food is a bit more abundant. You're probably eating a little bit more because there's just a lot more food around. So like, it's quite nice to then have a focus on, like, building a bit more strength,

a bit more muscle masters in the gym and that becoming a bit more of a focus. And I think, from a training perspective, that's where like keeping in elements of everything. So like, I'd always keep like some like ply metric and power stuff in some strength stuff some hypertrophy stuff some endurance stuff but like depending on what's going on and what's the goal at a given time you might scale something up and something something down to kind of fit where you're out at that point or what you what you're focusing on yeah because I think a lot of people will listen to that now and they'll be like oh right well Tom where am I going to get the time to do my ply metrics and my endurance stuff and my hyper trophy stuff and also also practice my sport as well

yeah i mean like obviously you've got to fit it into like your um like your given constraints but that that's where sort of understanding a little bit more about sort of like what the what the minimum effective dose of those things is um and obviously it's it's one of those things the more the higher level you are in any given thing um a the more you're going to have to put into it to progress it but also like the more you'll have to put into it to like to maintain that but in comparison to what you need to put into actually progress something, the maintenance level is actually quite a bit lower.

So that's where as a very basic program, you could have the minimum effective dose for everything, which is what I try and recommend, it's like that kind of minimum checklist if you can. And there might still be some stuff that you don't do or don't prioritize on a weekly basis. But

if that's your kind of base program, you can then plug and play with I want to focus a bit more on like power and Olympic lifting here, so I'm going to put more time on emphasis into that or like, yeah, I'm like, I just want to

focus on building a bit more muscle mass, so I'm going to keep a little bit of the other stuff in, but we're going to cut, like, I don't know, maybe have one heavy set per movement per week just to kind of keep that ticking over while we focus on pushing hypertrophy a bit more, or that sort of thing. Yeah, I think an important thing you said there as well is about maintenance. I think a lot of people forget that like the goal can and should be

maintenance it's like they'll think oh if I'm not going to progress in something then you know I'm not going to do it at all whereas you know maintaining your the strength that you have or maintaining the muscle mass that you have um should should be a priority for people yeah absolutely man absolutely and it's it's kind of similar to like sort of fat loss in it like in that respect as well I think a lot of people like think like maintenance from a fat loss perspective is like it's like they kind of discount it as like as a phase of fat loss but actually for most people particularly we've got like a decent bit of weight that you need to lose like having a kind of step down approach of like going to focus on dropping a bit and then when energy drops when like training drops off

that sort of thing like having a period at maintenance is really really beneficial for a lot of people and changing like your goal to something a bit more performance based now you're kind of fueling a little bit better with the view of like at some point when those things kind of level out then focusing on maybe dropping again but obviously like for most people most people are great at fat loss um with like fat diets crash diets that sort of thing and they can they can work okay but what most people are terrible at is maintaining that off the back of it so actually having a block where the goal is the goal is maintenance is like beneficial from that perspective as well as as well as a training perspective.

And that's where I think, like, just from the training side of things, like when life is busier, when work is busy, when family life is busier, that like having the goal of maintenance, I think it feels a bit uninspiring sometimes, but actually, like, you know it's only going to be for a short period, and actually that's really beneficial because then you know, when you do potentially have a bit more time or want to prioritize it a little bit more, you've not dropped off mass, like, dropped off massively.

You've still, like, you've maintained all that stuff with, like, a minimal input. So then it's so much easier to then get back into it rather than having to like start again essentially. Yeah, you're you're more likely to see strength gains if you've been maintaining versus if you've decided that. Actually, I'm not going to do the thing that I was currently doing that was giving me progress or maintaining progress. Yeah. Yeah. Another one you said was someone has told you that doing certain movements will injure you, bending your spine, for example. Fear of movements is going to keep you feeling fragile and more than likely end up being a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Can you explain that one for the listeners? Yeah, so this all comes from the sort of movement optimism philosophy where we're just looking at like I think people are sometimes told I don't like don't bend your spine to pick something at when in actual fact like it's not going to be the movement. the movement as such that's going to cause an issue. It's going to be external factors that may potentially be injurious, whether that's like the load that you're lifting, the speed that you're lifting at. Plus also, like, we know that like pain science and injury is like much, much more complex than that.

And there can be a multitude of different factors that do like do come into, do come into injury. So by telling someone don't do that, you'll get injured, means that they're less likely to do that thing. therefore their tolerance to that thing will most likely drop so then if they do end up having to do that thing they're more likely to get injured when they do that and and that's where sort of like the whole kind of bend in your spine stuff comes from it's like if you look at what people do day to day it's like people bend down to pick their children up or like bend down to pick up a washing basket or like that they're doing those things on like a daily basis um and obviously they're like they're absolutely fine but like so building some level of of tolerance by doing some like some training around like in those ranges, to me, just make, to make, it just makes sense.

Because if you're saying like this movement is inherently bad, you're basically saying that you're like, there's going to be no training adaptation from loading something, which means that you kind of don't believe in resistance training as it is because essentially that's what you're looking for is you're looking for to get a stimulus, to load something, to get some adaptation to get a little bit stronger through that range of motion. So yeah, I think it's, yeah, I think it's important

that we don't completely discount technique when it comes to lifting. And obviously, for most people, probably keeping a quote unquote, like relatively neutral spine is going to be the strongest position for them for a deadlift and an RDL for example. But

that's also saying, like not to say that lifting with a rounder spine is inherently bad, but we probably just need to be mindful of like the other factors and like the load that we're using and that sort of thing. But those things can be trained. There's loads and loads of guys out there like Mark Rosenberg and Atlas Power Shrugged and all those guys doing like huge numbers on like Zurcher Deadlift and Zercher Jeffton Kills and that sort of thing.

so yeah it's it like i think thinking that those things will will hurt you will probably be the most likely thing to end up hurting you yeah because you because you'll never build up strength i remember i remember i i remember a physio actually told me a couple of years ago when i was younger um not to do deadlifts because deadlifts will will uh will hurt your back and like thinking about that now like that's absolutely insane advice from from from a physiotherapist um do you think that um do you think that like that's the scare mongering of certain exercises because people don't understand maybe load management and they're solely focusing on form and technique. Do you think that's something that is contributed by maybe like, you know, personal trainers when they first come out of their personal training

and of course, like, I don't, I don't remember ever being taught about load management when I did my personal training course. I do remember being like taught about technique to a small degree, but it was very much about form and technique and having to have that kind of, you know, stiff flapback versus anyone having any sort of a conversation on load management. Yeah, absolutely. I think load management is something that is spoken about a lot more now.

I don't know if a lot, I've not seen what sort of included in like PT qualifications like these days. You're saying that now, that's going back a while for me. Yeah, no, I've got no idea. hopefully there is an element of that and I think that I don't know if it's just the like the bubble that I'm in and the stuff that I see on social media I see a lot more like people talking about load management and kind of moving away from like this technique is that could be your echo chamber talk yeah exactly so yeah I don't know if that's like it is more prevalent or it's just it's just what I'm seeing but yeah I I don't think they're like but like like like particularly when I did my PC qualification, I don't, I probably only heard the term load management like four or five years ago, I think. So yeah, hopefully it's kind of bleeding through and like people are becoming a lot more, a lot more aware of it.

And I think it's, I think it's hard particularly when when you're starting because it's like it just adds more kind of complexity to things. So I think it's important to, yeah, to sort of like to make people aware of it, but also not like, paralyze them with with too much information and I think in terms of that a lot of it is a massive massive part of this for for coaches is thinking about the way that you communicate it like communicate techniques to clients and making sure that you're not scam angering them by saying don't don't lift that way because you'll get injured maybe we can lift this way because it'll be a more efficient lift or it's going to hit this muscle a little bit more effectively or that sort of thing.

Because it's like I said, there's so many factors alongside load management that will determine whether someone gets injured from doing something. And in reality, like, yeah, if someone like dumps 200 kilos worth of, like, load into their lower back when they're not ready for it, yeah, they might get injured.

But I think it's, if you're being sensible in terms of kind of progression and that sort of thing in the gym, I think it's like, lifting is a very, very safe thing to do. Yeah. What are some other ways that people can kind of prevent getting injured in the gym? That's not just about load management. Like, what are some sensible advice you could give to people?

I guess it depends a little bit on what they're doing. I think the biggest things are, like, obviously, like we've spoken about sort of load management, but like not just looking at the load on the bar. looking at the speed in which we're going into like going into ranges yeah um because obviously like that's like forces mass times acceleration as my physics teacher told me um so it's it's not just that mass on the bar it's like how how quickly we're accelerating and if say for example like an rdl if you've got like a doable way that you're like just flying down into that bottom division you're going to get a big spiking force in in the bottom position for example so i think like particularly when people are

starting, making sure we're thinking about, like, controlling our lifts and then just building tolerance to doing things quickly. And that's where I think, like, deep range pliers can be, like, really useful because you can basically do sort of, you can use them to build a decent amount of volume without, like, massive, massive kind of importers in force in those deep ranges. So they can be a really nice way to kind of bridge that. between let's say with Olympic lifting you're having to drop into like say doing a clean your hands drop into that deep very deep position with a lot of load doing a bit more kind of prep

work to make sure you're good like controlling into those positions quite like quite quickly in building volume in those positions is going to is going to be helpful because that was one thing after after my knee injuries that I um I I kind of reflect on this when I started doing a bit more a bit more with the plier stuff was like I didn't feel comfortable doing or like pushing my cleans even though I had that like I had the strength to be able to lift more but it was the thought of dropping quickly into like those bottom positions with a lot of load on me that I was never I was never comfortable with so like finding more ways to kind of bridge the gap run and just be like I know that's I can't I can't do that thing I think is quite useful and then the other thing is just like range of motion um I think the control element comes into that because and being specific with technique when you are trying to load a certain muscle is important because at the end of the end of the day,

if your goal is hypertrophy, you want to keep the tension on the muscle you're trying to load. So if you drop into like bottom of bench press and you end up taking the tension off the pecks because like you've rolled your shoulders forwards, like you're essentially not loading the pecs in the most stretch position which is obviously going to be like, really beneficial from a hypertropical perspective. So I think just having periods where you go back

to like potentially using tempo a little bit more, like focusing on control, make sure you're feeling good with that. And it's something like that. I just generally feel quite good a lot of the time. If I have like some some fast stuff, some heavy stuff and then like most of my hypotry stuff is that I'm focusing on like pauses in those deep ranges or like slow eccentrics and that sort of thing because it helps me to like keep tension on the tissue on trying to work. And by slowing it down, it normally means I'm able to get deeper into those positions than what I would have done had I gone a little bit quicker. And I think really that's the main benefit of using tempo when it comes to training.

Not necessarily it is like quote unquote better for hypertrophy. But it allows you to keep the tension on the muscle you're trying to work and probably go through bigger ranges. and whilst doing that. Yeah, so like there's really a kind of psychological standpoint to that because it kind of builds you confidence in them bottom positions that you might, let's say you are rehabbing an injury or something like that. It's like, oh, you know, you can get into that deep position pain free and that builds confidence then to be able to go back to doing them things

that you probably are a little bit terrified to do because you got an injury doing a certain movement or dropping in a certain way. Yeah, definitely. And I think that's like a really sort of valid point from it, like that kind of psychological perspective. And like, I don't know if it was David Gray that said this initially, but I think I heard it from him was like essentially what you're trying to do with like with training generally, whether it's rehab or whether it's like pushing your performance and getting new PB or that

sort of thing. It's like you're basically trying to just build a bank of evidence to tell you that you're able to, so that you're confident to do that lift. And like if it's from a rehab perspective, it's like you're building the bank of evidence to know that if you go back to playing sport or if you go back to like lifting what you're lifting before that you've you've done the work before that to feel confident doing it and then like so it's the same when you're looking at like training from a performance perspective and trying to like hit a new pb or all that sort of thing yeah yeah that's very good and i remember i was talking to a

good physio before and he was saying about um even when you're talking about tempo he was like if you're if you're rehabbing an injury or anything like that, like your muscles or anything else, they don't like aggression and they don't like speed. So, you know, slowing down and getting into that deep, deep range of motion pain free is obviously going to be really, really important. Talk to me a little bit more about body weight training.

Like, give me, why should I start doing a little bit of body weight training? Because I'm digging here in my head now. I says, you know what, I should really add some more ployos in. I've because I saw I retired from football there last year I just it wasn't I didn't get injured or anything like that it just started to become too much of a commitment in terms of I was getting older and like you know traveling to different places you know on a Friday night when I try to get home and then get to work and stuff like that and I was like and I kind of just kind of fell out of out of love and I know I play sport now and again like I'm a I'm a bang average at every sport I could

I could play a little bit of everything really poorly. You know, so I'll enjoy down a little bit of Mai Tai. I'll play a bit of tennis. I did a little bit of rugby when I was younger, a little bit of basketball when I was younger. The shortest basketballer, you'll meet in Ireland. Football was probably the sport. And obviously doing things like high rocks and stuff like that now

and anything to kind of be a little bit competitive without having to actually, you know, get injured or get hit on a pitch or something like that. But, like, is there, do you think that for people like me who have, you know, are in their early 30s who have kind of retired from sport, like, is there a, is there an argument to do a bit of bodyweight training and is there an argument to incorporate some playoffs? Absolutely, yes. I think from a five perspective, like you say, you just kind of stop playing sport. I think doing, doing a little bit of that just to kind of keep your tendons healthy,

keep that sort of that spring and that sort of like athleticism, I think is, like really, really beneficial. And it's it's going to be one of those, like, obviously as you get as you get older, like, tenors do, like, do degrade. And like, they're probably going to be one of the quickest things that do, um, do degrade as you get older. So yeah, keeping some of that in, uh, definitely. Um, and then from a, from a body perspective, um, personally, yeah, I think so. I think it's, it's a new skill. And, um, like I've mentioned before, like the physical freedom, it's, I think just being able to kind of control your body weight through space is a very different, you'll get a very different stimulus to what you'll get from,

like, just like doing sort of just like normal resistance training. And that from the perspective of, I think you are more likely to kind of load through range of motion that you probably don't normally hit. So again, like if you're not moving into those ranges often, it's like you're going to kind of lose the ability to so like strength through sort of some some deeper ranges building strength in areas that you also like are probably neglected from sort of normal strength training in terms of like being like strong protractors in the shoulder and you like compression strength through the abs and that sort of thing which obviously it's like

it's an it's an end rein strength that you don't train that very often with like normal normal strength training so it incorporates in a little bit of bodyweight skill stuff can can kind of tick a couple of those boxes without whilst making it kind of fun and not feeling that I need to hit this this mode like this range or this motion with like with with your kind of your normal training if you like and then I like said I I enjoy it just from

perspective of I think it's big just because it is because it is so different it's and that this It's so varied in terms of the amount of different ways you can go. Like, hands dance for one thing. Like, are a whole different kettle of fish to, like, using gymnastic rings and learning some different skills on there. And it's one of those things I think. It's very progressive in terms of, like,

if you can understand a few of the basic movements, then, like, you open up a whole new range of different skills and elements that you can kind of look at doing it. If you can do a, if you can do a, if you can do a, second handstand for example you can then potentially look at doing a handstand press or install the press or like start on like junior like that or handstand press ups or um that's like that sort thing and i think it's just um like loading the wrist in that way for example something again that you don't do very often so it's yeah i think there's there's a there's a lot of like minor benefits

alongside probably the overall enjoyment that you would get from from doing it yeah and i think as well like it's a really good point that like having an open mind to all different types of training and modalities and stuff like that because if you're training in a long time like things got i know there's some people that will like are i'm going to do hypertrophic training for the rest of my life and like happy to do that that's fair but like for me personally i i think you know having in an open mind to be able to try new things all the time it does create that kind of enjoyment that it's like it's like you're you're starting training it again for the first time and you know that excitement of of learning new skills i think that can't be underestimated for your your training journey

over time as as a as a person yeah absolutely no i think that's that's really important and like when you kind of go into it having that kind of beginning like beginner's mind of like knowing that you're not going to be not going to be good and that is something that does like hold people back sometimes like it might be like really strong like generally but then you put like try and get into like learn this like learn this new skill or something like that and it's like it's one of the it's one of the like funniest things like it's like everyone's stupid when they're upside down because like you upside down the handstand or like on the rings or something like that you're like point your toes towards the ceiling and they're like thinking like they they they can't appreciate being upside

down so it's like actually learning to control your body and when you're inverted I find gives people a better appreciation of movement when they're the right. way up as well yeah and it's also a great point it's like someone you might be intimidated from like maybe they're very sophisticated they're or they're they're very uh capable in some area so just get them to do some upside down as on the rings you won't be intimidated by them anymore as they as they make a mockery of themselves um can you give a little bit of advice in terms of okay for let's say people who are starting training for the first time uh talk a little bit about warm ups and uh you know warm-ups when you're trying and in your experience what are the mistakes that people make because

I know you've spoken about this as well um yeah so I think I've I've been on sort of a bit like a bit of a journey with this I think when like when I first started coaching um I was going to going through sort of like the process of like everyone had to do like 20 minutes of joint prep before they get into like that before they started lifting essentially um and it's it's one of those things as I as I went on I was like actually, it feels quite nice, but actually like there's, there's not that much benefit to doing like that much of it just because like it's generally like low stimulus. So you're not getting enough stimulus to actually like make a long term like long term change. And yeah, you might find that you're like you feel a little bit better when you go into,

go into a squat. But I think there's personally, there's much better ways that you can get prepped for your main lifts. and if you are really short on time you can just do like lighter sets of your main lift to kind of get into it and I think it's one of this it's obviously it depends on the amount of time that you've got if you've got loads and those times train

like yeah I'd like get a bit more complex with it focus on like open up ranges a little bit more on that sort of thing because like it does feel quite nice and you might get like some marginal benefit to hitting certain ranges or positions with like a little bit more frequently but I think if not you can probably spend like like a couple of minutes on a piece of like CV kit and then go into like your first like an

empty barbell for your first warm up set and then just like just build from there and I think it's yeah it I think for some people it can just become a barrier to um to train and if if you feel like you've got to do 15 or 20 minutes of prep to actually go and lift um I think that's but like that's very counter-rejective and like so it's probably like there's going to be a sweet swap maybe five maybe 10 minutes to actually make sure you're prepped but for the most part we want to get to our stimulating lift as quickly as possible and I personally think like adding in some like deep plios and things like that can be a really really good way to like warm up into your session but also get like a good stimulus from doing that stuff as well or just like stuff that just like um stuff that just

improves your movement variability in general. So just moving through slightly different ranges, spending five minutes doing that, but then if you are very short in time, like just going straight into your warm up sets. Because I think it's like, you see all those things of like, I did like all this phone roll and I did this,

and then my range improved by this much. It's like, but they're not comparing to like, if you just grabbed a barbell and done like a couple of sets of empty barbell like RDLs to warm up your hamstrings. Like you'd see like probably the better like the same if not better improvement from just doing that.

And you'll actually get like, going to be ready to see your work sets a lot quicker than spending 10 or 15 minutes like rolling around on the floor and doing like a load of like phone rolling and sort of mobilisation and joint prep stuff. Yeah, I think it looks good on like Instagram and stuff like that and you'll see like athletes

down and bub, I think people don't understand that. All right, and they say, oh yeah, this person like spends three hours in the gym. But that person gets paid, like they get paid and they're not doing three hours of heavy sets. They have the time to do like an hour of, you know, pre-imposed warm-ups and cool downs and, you know what I mean? It's completely different to someone who's, who's time poor, who, you know, has kids at home or has a job or whatever it is. And that actually goes on to something that you said as well. So one last quote from you. All right. When I first became a dad in 2021, I very quickly realized my old approach to training wasn't going

to work. to six days a week was never going to happen. So can you give some advice to like dads and business owners who are time poor and but still want to continue to make progress with their training and maybe talk a little bit about your own experience and your own findings from that? So yeah, in terms of this, like we've touched on a few of these, these bits before, but I think being realistic with what like what's doable is obviously going to be massive. And that's not to say that you have to be like, I'm not going to be able to like, still.

maintain and like get good results but just being realistic with like the time that you're actually able to able to put into it and um i i still do a bit of in-person PT now so i'm in the gym like uh one and a half days a week so i i i train the gym twice a week and then i do one session a week at home and i've got like a chin up bar and a dip bar and that's that like that's basically what my trainings look like for the past three four years now of like every so often i get an extra like an extra session in the gym but it's like it's very rare like I've only trained in the gym that much and yes like three like it's still three like solid sessions because I'm able to load like my upper body like really well at home but um I think yeah being realistic with with what's doable and then just

looking at ways to make the most of your like of what you've got whether that's like if it is training at home um even if it's like short sessions and pushing those like just doing a few hard sets that you push close to failure or that sort of thing. And that like I said before, that for when it is particularly hectic, that minimum effective dose training and like your minimum standards for the week. And then the other thing on this that kind of springs to mind

is like when I've been through periods of like really bad sleep with my, when my boys were, like, Olly's really bad right now, but like when they've been really bad, performance does drop off in the gym. but I think it's generally, like recovery is definitely harder. But the biggest thing that drops off is your desire to train, more so than those other things. So I think finding a way that you can, like, you can enjoy your training, that you can make it consistent. And that doesn't mean like you're going to love it all the time.

And there are going to be times where you do have to kind of drag, like, drag yourself to like to get a session in. But when that's the case, just like start with something you really enjoy. and then like the like the like the discipline side of things like it's like similar to what you do like elsewhere like put the sessions in the diary make sure it's like you know where like when you're going to do it and it's it's kind of scheduled in because then it's like yeah you it's scheduled so it's like it's not you're not kind of leaving it's chance but you were also just trying to make it as enjoyable as possible when you

like when you're not feeling it yeah that makes sense that makes sense okay well then I'm going to leave you with three questions and then and then then I'll let you go. So first one is if you were, if you were to talk to younger Tom, right? What are three pieces of training wisdom that you would give them for the next 10 years? That's a good question.

I think the first one would probably be started to apply us sooner. Yeah. Go with the team of the podcast. Yeah. Yeah, they're definitely that. I think probably the other one that we've not really spoken about, but like back when like in my 20s, like everything had to be really hard all the time and actually like obviously when you're short on time, like intensity from a lifting perspective is like is really important.

But like yeah, respect when you need to when you need to push intensity and then respect when actually doing easier stuff is going to be beneficial, particularly from a CVS. perspective, accumulating like easy like CV volume is going to be like is going to be really, really helpful and get a really good stimulus. So that like don't you don't need to make everything everything super hard. Because I think that like yeah, I definitely kind of put myself on a bit of a hole and like it hard CV was like is always the thing that when I am like not recovering well or like sleeps bad or that sort of thing. That's always the thing that makes me ill. like my immune system always takes a massive

hit from from doing hard CV so like if if you're like on the edge of like feeling a bit like you know what's like when you don't feel great um or like you're feeling a little bit run down like just don't like don't do hard CV stuff then do you think that's a mistake that 20 year olds make all the time

it's like they just beat their bodies up they just take every every session needs to be that yeah yeah absolutely I think it's like probably the overall like last point I would say it's just like make it like make your training purposeful. Because I think there's that there's always that temptation to just like say push it hard all the time. And actually like when you like having been through phases of like training a lot less and seeing the results that I've got from doing less and actually like how good I've been feeling

like maybe kind of reflect on that and be like actually yeah, if I've been a bit more purposeful here and actually been a bit smarter in terms of how I put things together, I think like I would have got probably better results with like less niggles coming in and also probably felt a bit better like on a day to day basis as well so I think that is like yeah probably probably my final point and one for the dads as well any advice for someone who has just become a new dad doesn't have to be about training but just in life in general uh oh what did I advise um I think I think probably just like enjoy it as much as possible and that like I fully appreciate like there are times when it is it is really really

hard and in those times like definitely make sure you've got people that you can kind of like lean on for support but um yeah it's like it goes so fast like the biggest biggest cliche that like anyone ever ever say about like parenthood but honestly like it does absolutely fly by so just be like being mindful of that and just like yeah just going with it and not like not giving yourself too much of a hard time as well because I think it's like yeah it can be it can be hard enough and probably even harder in this day and age with the amount of stuff that you see on social media of like oh you should be doing this or you should be doing now like um I think when like probably when we were growing up um and I always chanted someone about this they were like

their parents maybe went like they went to soft play maybe once a week and the rest of them they just like they just played at home right now there's the pressure to do all of these like amazing things all the time um And then like it's obviously a balance. Like you want to, you want to sort of expose your children to as much as possible, but also like not feeling the pressure to like it's okay. It's just like to just chill and enjoy it. That's an interesting one.

I never really thought about that of like probably families probably curating their family life online as well, which would actually put pressure on other people to think, oh, am I doing enough with my kids? Yeah. Yeah. And I think there's definitely more pressure from that perspective like these days. And last one. what advice would you have for people who have just retired from their chosen sport?

I think probably the so I was actually talking to a client about this this week and I think it can be really hard when you get to that point because the main purpose that you've had behind your training is suddenly gone and obviously like slightly different to this but like obviously you see like after the Olympics like a lot of the athletes end up getting a bit depressed because like this big thing that they've been training for has suddenly gone.

So it depends on like the kind of person they are to like to a certain extent. But I think it's really useful from a training perspective to have some short to medium term goals to make your training right now purposeful. And then also like your kind of your longer term purpose. And I think it's probably like kind of ties in probably to when more like people have families and that sort of thing. But like using training as a. way to make sure you're able to like do all the stuff that you want to do for as long as possible

with like with your family um both like that like i spoke about acutely like energy being good mood being good like all those like awesome acute benefits that no one really talks about from a training perspective like making sure you're kind of training from that perspective but also having like a long term like wanting to be able to like run around and play with your kids when there when they're getting a bit older and not feeling sort of like not confident in your body to be able to go and do that essentially yeah and you know what else i was just thinking there as well and i do this really well i know you do like these three-month meetups with your uh with all your members um after they've been training which and stuff like that and just like i think when

people and i'm just thinking about like certain friends who have like played certain sports up until like they were 30 32 35 and then that's gone and then they don't really have anything to replace that even in terms of like you know teammates and community and like brotherhood or sisterhood or whatever it is i think like that's something that people don't realize is important until it's kind of taken away from them oh absolutely yeah no in terms of those those training days i i would personally like to do them more often it's just like obviously logistically and also like for clients getting there and that sort of thing can be can be a little bit problematic sometimes but i completely agree having something like that, like say that sort of that community element is really, really important.

And I think just trying to make your training as social as possible is also something that's really useful, even if it's just like, both from an accountability perspective sometimes, but like chat to a mate who does it like, does a bit of training, just organises go and like train, like train with them and maybe go some food after. That's something like I try and do at least once a month now is like because like because life is busy, you do end up training on your own art it's quite nice to like schedule something like that in that is like yeah you're going to get like go to a good session but you're also going to get some social you're going to go for some food after like that that sort of thing i think is is like a really good way to kind of keep it enjoyable yeah it's

so important and speaking on that you're obviously going to be running a seminar in dublin very very soon can you tell the listeners a little bit about that i am so it's going to be at kison health and performance where did you say it was sandyford sandyford okay yeah um it's going to be on the 23rd of August running from 1230 till 5.30 and it's going to be on everything body weight, but more from a skills perspective than like body weight strength perspective. So we're going to be looking at breaking down handstands from the very base level, looking at mobility, building alignment, looking at kickups, looking at actually getting to balance, plus a few like a few different sort of movement skills around that, which I think a lot of people do sometimes feel

like very self-conscious. Like a lot of people who come to like which are sort of room before and be like, I've not done a handstand since I was like five years old. It's like that's cool. Like everyone will be working at their level but surpassing their expectations by the end of that. And then we're also going to look at some ring skills as well.

So breaking down like again, like the mobility elements of like where we need to be and progressing from there to build towards some front and back levers which are quite advanced like body weight skills and bridging the gap between sort of everything in between and then also some ring muscle up stuff and then part of the day because obviously we're not going to train straight for five hours. Some breaks within that that we're going to talk about like practical programming considerations and how to put that together whether that's like you want to go kind of all in on it or whether you want to just be like a bit of a bolt on that you kind of enjoy doing as part of your

training but doesn't sort of isn't all encompassing and how we go about sort of putting that together. So yeah, that's going to be on Saturday the 23rd. Okay, so if I show up to this, I'm not going to make a fool of myself. He is what you're saying. Absolutely not that. Okay, brilliant. And Tom, people want to keep up with the work you're doing or inquire about coaching or anything like that. Where can they find you? So on Instagram, I am at Tom Project Performance. And I have very, very recently, like I've not even announced this on social media yet, but I've just finished updating my new website, which is project performance.online. So yeah, that's two best places. Love it. Amazing. Listen, thank you for today. I really appreciate it. And I will see you in Dublin

very, very soon. Wicked. Thank you very much, mate.