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Tyson Popplestone is a Comedian from Melbourne Australia. Join him for a brand new interview each week.
tyson (00:00.567)
For a man who's done plenty of podcasts, is probably not something that worries you at all, but it's funny, whenever I hit record on here, some people, you can see them tense up. Ha ha ha.
John Quinn (00:09.121)
It is, it is. It doesn't matter if I've got a camera looking at it or not mate, I'm still a fool. Yeah, no.
tyson (00:14.605)
Uh...
I remember when we very first caught up on my other podcast, Relax Running, Dean Huffer, who put me onto you, physiotherapist here in Melbourne, said, you're not going to meet a more interesting bloke, especially when you look at his calendar. He goes, he opens his diary and it's just something from sort of 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. or whenever it is that he finishes. And he just told me before I hit record that today was supposed to be a day off and you're running around as it is. What's been on the schedule today?
John Quinn (00:47.054)
I had a couple of people for tennis today and done their speed agility. We do a lot of work now, just accelerative sort of speed is a lot of work I do. So I've also had a meeting with one of my athletes and we've structured up their program. And then I've had a very interesting meeting actually with a lady who's in her 80s and she'll go nameless but she was, she's the wife or widow now of a very prominent New South Wales politician but she loves her running.
And we meet up every now and then and talk about her running and what she's got to do. And for an individual now, she's approaching her 80s and she wants to run her best times for that age category. And she's as driven as any athlete I've ever worked with. So I find it very motivating. And I don't really want anyone to know, but I've actually never worked a day in my life. And when you sit down with someone like that, it just reinforces how blessed I am
My job, it's great and very inspiring. I love it.
tyson (01:49.995)
What event is she training for? Is she a sprinter or a distance runner?
John Quinn (01:52.826)
100 and 200 and her big thing today was she she's been told that Strength training in particular power cleans could really help her It's interesting and I'm not laughing at her I just think it's amazing that you know She's so motivated to want to investigate what she can do to move forward
tyson (02:14.027)
It's awesome. I've actually been listening to a book called outlive by dr. Peter Atiyah I'm not sure if you've heard of him, but he's a sort of a health span Lifespan coach I guess is the best way to describe it And one of the things that he says is a lot of people have this idea that when they get into their 80s and 90s They still want to be able to function and he said okay But let's have a look at your life now and we'll put you on a little bit of a course and imagine It's a graph. So if you want to be able to carry your groceries home from the shops when you're 85
John Quinn (02:19.991)
Mm-hmm.
tyson (02:43.327)
Right now you need to be able to have a maximum grip of you know X kilos or be able to hold your body weight for a certain amount of time and you can't do that So one of the first things that he'll do for people is start to get him on a little bit of an action plan Which says okay if this is where you want to be in 50 years Where do you need to be now and a lot of us just nowhere near Where we think we should be in order to be where we would like to be so it's inspiring when you hear stories like that, yeah, I get it you laugh not because
We're laughing at it, but just because it's so out of the ordinary you hear someone in such good shape at that age
John Quinn (03:13.894)
I think too, it's a bit deeper meaningful, especially now it's a poignant day. I'm not sure when people are listening to this podcast, but this is the day, or yesterday we found out that Matty Rendell, a very famous person in Australian football, passed away suddenly from a heart attack. And he's not that old, he's in his 60s. And only last week, whilst I didn't talk to him, I did say hello to him. We were at a funeral or a memorial session for Craig Stewart, who again...
isn't very old and really you've lived today like it's the last day you've got because you really don't know what's coming and yeah make the most of the time you've got so having an 80 year old wanting to power clean that's pretty inspiring.
tyson (03:58.919)
It was actually listening to Peter a tears book that made me reach out to you originally because I know you've got Your hand right into the elite Performance sport so for those of you who don't know Queenie you're well you could probably describe it better who you're working with I think you're working you said with the penrith panthers as well as the GWS Giants here in the AFL
John Quinn (04:17.762)
Yeah, the Panthers are down in Melbourne this week playing the storms, so that'll be a big game. So I've been with the Panthers now for a couple of years. I look after speed, agility, and every now and then I'll do individual work with the players. And I've really enjoyed my time, or I'm enjoying my time with Penrith. I'm with the Giants as well, so I spend a couple of days a week with GWS. I've got a pretty good squad of athletes that I work with and see them a few days a week.
Another job that's probably a bit left of centre, I've been there now for seven years, I just spend one day a week at a private school here, Scots College. And Scots, for those Melbourne listeners, is the brother school of Scotch. And I mentor the boys there. So nothing to do with sport, nothing to do with education. It's the year 12 boys and they're doing a special program. And I will sit down with them one on one for an hour and we'll just talk about where they're at.
with their life and what's going on. And we talk about the challenges they've got from not being able to understand or communicate with the teacher to the issues they're having at the school through to home problems, marriage breakdowns, personal relationship issues, self-identity problems, life issues, study problems, who knows? And my role is to listen and then put them into the direction that they need. But the most rewarding aspect of that role is only this week.
I've got about three emails from the boys. One's goal, he wanted to be able to work overseas in finance. And he's got a photo of himself outside the New York Stock Exchange with a sign, I've made it. It's great.
tyson (05:59.735)
That's unreal. Yeah, because by degree, you're an exercise physiologist, aren't you? But I guess just working hand in hand with athletes, naturally the psychological side of performances is if not as important, I mean, it is arguably more important, or at least at the very least as important as the physical training. So just by default, that would come into the conversation of training and performance anyway, wouldn't it?
John Quinn (06:23.042)
Look, coaching is multifaceted and as a coach you wear many hats. And yes, I'm a sports scientist and I've done all the nerdy subjects at university, but even in doing those, my worst subjects when I was studying at school were the science subjects and mathematical subjects. I was more a humanities person and so it's interesting that my career has taken me down a science path, but I treat it from a humanity perspective.
point of view. So I say it quite often to people that I don't coach footballers, I don't coach athletes, I coach people and to get the most out of a person you look at all aspects of their life to allow them to come through. Now one significant aspect of that is their ability to move and so the biomechanics are so important and their strength is so important and being able to run with correct
coordination and speed and power all those things vital of course but this doesn't mean Jack if you haven't got your head in the right space and your heart's not in the right space so it's very important to be able to relate to people on those three grounds and look that's up for everybody but I found it's very effective and look at the end of the day I'm not coaching for anyone other than the athletes I work with and I'm true to me you've got to be authentic and that's me
I coach people and I work with them on a physical level. I work with them on a mental level and I work with them on a spiritual level. And spiritual, someone might think, God, we're not deep and meaningful and religious. But if I stand at the race at half time before we take the field and we're down by four goals and I say, for God's sake, you guys, show me a bit of spirit, would you? This pathetic, that first half, let's go. I'm not asking anyone to just fall on their knees and bless themselves. I'm asking them to look within themselves.
to what is it that makes you who you are, what defines you, that to me is your spirit. So how do you bring the spirit out of a person? And it's multifaceted and I've learned a lot over the last five or six years, I've been working with a number of refugees at track and field athletes and the stories they've got and you might redefine spirit as resilience and commitment and hope and optimism, well, all of those things and.
tyson (08:40.556)
Hmm
John Quinn (08:42.302)
Yeah, again, I find that quite inspiring. It helps me to help them.
tyson (08:47.391)
Have you seen the documentary? I don't know if you've got time for it, Quinnie, but there's one that's just come out, an eight part series on Netflix, The Tour Unchained. I recommend it. I was talking to another running coach this morning about it and it's interesting that you mentioned the physical, the mental and the spiritual side of performance because essentially for those of you haven't seen it, the documentary, it follows each team or about five of the major contenders for the
John Quinn (08:54.602)
No, I haven't. No.
tyson (09:16.683)
Tour and it looks at not only the courses that looks at their recent form It looks at how they've gone the day before it follows some of the treatment It's really interesting from the mindset or perspective of an athlete just to see how it is that they function But one thing that becomes really apparent really quickly is how much that spiritual side to steal your phrase Stands out and it's usually as you say in a moment. There was one episode. I watched episode 7 today
And there's a particular rider who, he was a French rider. I'm trying to think of his name, but it was his first time being offered the opportunity to actually go out there and shoot for a podium finish. And with about five stages to go, he fell way off the back. He started to question his form and then just got a tune up by their club leader, not only him, but the rest of the team. And just to hear him speak about what his intentions were for the next week and why they were his intentions, and just to see the way that he attacked the race.
I mean, spiritual seems like a pretty good word to describe what it is that they're going through because I guess you challenge physically and mentally to such a point that I guess that's the next level above both of those things.
John Quinn (10:24.346)
Oh, look, you talked to people talk about runners and you talk about a runners high. I think runners high is when your mental, physical and spiritual all align. That's when you hit your sweet spot for running. And it happens in any number of sports, you know, the but, you know, we're uninteresting running. So that's where you hit it most. And whether it's, you know, the distance runner that, you know, you far because they're running or the sprinter that's going.
at their maximum velocity yet they feel like everything's in slow motion and they can take every nuance of what's going on around them. That's the true essence of running and that's what, or that's the true essence of sport I think, when all of those things align, it defines why we do it.
tyson (11:07.603)
Yeah, I was speaking to my wife, Jessie, just I don't know if it was today or yesterday, but I've essentially been on a six month journey of just navigating my way through bloody calf strains. And Quinny, some of that I'm ashamed to admit has just been a lack of knowledge and understanding of actually how to do it and no research, just thinking, yeah, I think I feel good, get back into it. I think I'm back onto a winning formula. I'm trying to get ready for the Melbourne Marathon in October this year.
John Quinn (11:30.714)
Look, I'm a big fan of hope and optimism, but sometimes you've got to divert back to logic. You can convince yourself this is right and I'm okay, but no, you do have to sometimes strip it back and go through it. And look, when I work clinically as an exercise physiologist, so I come down there to Melbourne every month doing that. That's really what you've got to do most times, is just look back at where people are.
tyson (11:38.191)
Yeah, that's right.
John Quinn (12:00.89)
Injuries, people say they're bad luck. There's very, very few instances is an injury bad luck. It's usually of your own making. You may not want to admit it, but it's usually linked to terrible load, poor training venues, so the surfaces aren't right, or you're doing too much, or you're not recovering enough, or a combination of all of those things. You've got to strip that back, but.
What I find with a lot of the athletes I work with is that it comes down to posture. And once you strip that back, you have a look at that. I actually have been using an app now, both in a clinic setting and with coaching. And I don't get any plugs for it, so there's no return for me, but it's called Yoga, Y-O-G-G-E-R. And you just basically point your phone or your iPad at...
the individual and it will give you all the biomechanical markers. It does it and it can show you where your imbalances are and so on. And I found that really powerful. I've got a girl that I'm coaching at the moment. She's actually a refugee from Afghanistan and English is I don't even think it's a second language. I think it's about a tenth and you know communication can be really challenging, but a picture says a thousand words. So when I put this in front of her, it just makes instant.
instant sense and away we go. So that's a really simple way, but you can use it while you're videoing or you can take photos with it and it does the mechanical analysis for you. Really powerful stuff.
tyson (13:36.467)
Wow, so is that something that's used just for athletes or is that something that a person on the street who's just trying to improve posture can use to make little changes there?
John Quinn (13:46.218)
You could do, anyone could do that and have a look at it. I feel that for me, for what I do, it sort of pays for itself because I'm using it with, you know, in the clinic setting and I'm using it with my athletes and you know, that's my livelihood. I don't know if I was just doing that for fun, but look, if it saves you from an injury and three weeks of, you know, it depends on how you value things. It's not really that expensive anyway. I couldn't tell you how much it is off the top of my head,
It's a very effective little app and I do use it quite a lot.
tyson (14:20.227)
So when you've got the video or the camera on one of your athletes or one of the patients that have come in to see you, is it giving you as sort of the physiologist pointers on what it thinks or a few standout points or does it just show? No, so, okay.
John Quinn (14:33.866)
No, no, you need to have a look at that. But it's amazing when you remove the body from it and you're just looking at dots, you can see the malalignment of the individual. It's so obvious to you that one shoulder sitting up like this, you know, when you're looking at a body, it's not quite, especially your own, you can't see for looking. But the actual dots that it puts on the key anatomical points, it's as clear and evident as you could want it to be. Yeah, it's a great little tool.
tyson (15:01.439)
Gee, I can imagine some of that would be genetic, like the posture. Well, I don't know if this is genetic. My wife had a problem with really mild scoliosis a few years ago, and she got on an exercise program with Karen Holzer, and she sort of pointed her in the right direction, and it stopped a whole heap of headaches and things for her. But what are some of the reasons that people are out of whack like that? What causes it?
John Quinn (15:23.746)
Oh, mate, it's a lifestyle. Go down to the local shopping mall and just sit down there for 10 minutes and look around you. Even you go to a coffee shop and most people are looking down because they've got their mobile phones in front of them. So they're like this and their heads on an angle. You know, your head weighs about five to six kilos. But when you put it onto this tilt like that, it goes up to more than 27 kilos. So you've got that weight going into your spine, top of your spine. And then...
You know, these young kids, they're students, so they're spending a lot of time writing or on their keyboards working. So their posture's in that position here like that, which we call kyphotic. So they're like that. Well, that puts stress on further down the back. And if you're then going to go out and do some running, that loads down your hamstrings. So the thing we need to do is strengthen that. And, you know, I've used this term a lot, and I'm not sure who to really attribute it to. So I'll claim it, but it's really not mine. But you've got to strengthen what you stretch.
tyson (16:19.64)
Hehehe
John Quinn (16:22.046)
and stretch with your strength then. So if you're in this position, you know, you've got to stretch your front out and strengthen your back out to take you back into this posture so that you're more upright. And that will take the load off your back, but you'll be able to run better. You know, people, especially the boys I've got coming in, you know, for running or even in the clinic, they wanna have a bigger chest and they're wondering, how much should I have to bench? Well, half the problem, it's not a bench. They need to work on their back so that their chest actually gets in the right position. So, but yeah, posture is a...
is key for me. So work on that. I see postures like the launch pad for performance. Think of a rocket and you're shooting for the stars. Well, you want a pretty good launch pad for that rocket. Well, my rocket are the athletes that I work with, whatever sport they're in. So I've got to make sure my launch pad is as solid as it possibly can be. And that starts with things like posture. It starts with things like their movement, their basic movement patterns.
and the coordination patterns and so on. So you get all those things in place and then the rest becomes relatively easy.
tyson (17:25.543)
Yeah, I've been driving down to Melbourne. I'm in Point Lonsdale So it's about an hour and a half on a good day each way And I've been doing that about three days a week for maybe the last 12 months and at home a lot of the time My work is done. I've got a stand-up desk and I'm trying to be more I am fairly conscious of it like oh The majority of my training is I'll do some strength or a flexibility and some form of cardio I'm starting to introduce a little more stability and just keeping things fun. Just trying to keep it interesting to me
Not a whole heap of coordination, which is something I guess it's in another category but something i'm trying to stay on top of just as my young boy gets older so I can still beat him at one-on-one basketball but driving down to Melbourne for the first time a little while ago I noticed that the sort of my coccyx had developed like a little bit of a dull pain and I went to the gym like I always do each Wednesday and I was going through my deadlift routine went through a warm-up set and I felt like a little bit it felt slightly weak just at the lower part of my back
And I thought, okay, I'll take it easy. So only I went up to 70 kilos, which is, um, you know, usually I'll sort of push towards 90 or on a good day, maybe a hundred for some of the reps and, uh, went to 70, which should have been comfortable. And after about the second rep, I just felt this at the time, I had no idea what it was the next day, I realised it was a strain and oh my goodness, like the, just the lack of function or the function that you lose through an injury, like injury like that. Absolutely.
blew my mind, but it was sort of a double-faceted interest point to me. Because the first thing was, I think the weakness had developed when I'd just been spending so much time in a weird position in the car. And then also just having a bit of a wake-up call as to how important spinal health is. I mean, there are two things that I probably knew, but I'd never really experienced directly. Um, you know, and it took about a month.
John Quinn (19:13.998)
No, I see it a lot. I mean, everyone knows it, but not very many people actually understand. And it's very difficult to understand unless you're experiencing it firsthand. And look, it's probably not from sitting in the car, that just highlights, it exacerbates the condition that you've got. But a lot of it comes from, again, lack of strength in your postural muscles of your low back. So strengthening those muscles, you know, I hear people say, oh, I don't do strength work because I'm a distance runner, you know, I don't want to get big.
Well, that's, it's not about being a distance runner. That's a, you don't understand strength training. You don't have to get big doing strength training. Strength training doesn't have to equate to being a bodybuilder, you know. So you need to strengthen those muscles through there. One of my favorite forms of strength is actually Pilates. And Pilates is really underrated, I think, for track athletes, particularly endurance-based athletes, because it's really postural and movement. It's about elongating muscle length. It's actually strength training for ballet dancers.
but it translates very well for runners. But again, we spend a lot of our time in flexion. So flexion's when you're seated and think you're like an L, that's flexion. But when we perform, we're in extension. So that's a straight line of pushing back behind you. So again, from a training, a coaching point of view, I really enjoy giving my athletes things like hills and sleds and people think, oh, you know, you're just like that because it gets them fit. Yes, it does get them fit and strong, but.
it also puts them, it exaggerates that position of extension and movement through that full range, which is what we're trying to get. So maybe if you are experiencing that, I'd be talking to you about, without having to look at what's going on from a postural point of view, if all of that's okay, I'd be then looking at how do we strengthen your postural muscles if you lie back. I wouldn't be doing deadlifts for strengthening that, even though that is one, I wouldn't go there if you're having issues. And then I'd be getting you doing activities like,
towing a sled or a hill run. Just a gentle hill. When I talk about hill, I'm not talking about like Anderson Street Hill where you're slogging up the hill. Just a 10 degree gradient is all you need.
tyson (21:20.403)
Yeah, sure. Yeah, it was really interesting. I actually, I during lockdown that was here in Melbourne, I when the gyms were closed, Alice bakey, I'm not sure if you know who that is. She's a running Pilates instructor. She's a friend of mine. She's been on the relaxed running podcast a couple of times. And she invited me to come on to a course with her or a zoom call where she had about 20 girls. And I'd been a regular in the gym for you know, the last five or six years before this, I thought, oh, this would be this would be cute. Like big strong guy like myself will come in and
Just show them how it's done. And Quinny, I think you know what's coming. It was unbelievable how many points of weakness I had in my body that I had no idea existed. It's still, even as you say that, I've taken a mental note to maybe introduce it into the week of training again. But I think I've become so ritualized with the three things that I mentioned before, the yoga, the strength and the running, or the aerobic work that I just haven't really considered where to fit it into.
John Quinn (22:15.554)
Yeah.
tyson (22:15.923)
a training like, would you, with that routine, I'm sort of doing one or two things every day as it is, would you substitute a gym session for a Pilates session?
John Quinn (22:25.158)
I would do that. So it would be the midweek session. I'd put that in because it is a strength session It's just a different expression of that You've just got to be careful if you're only doing a couple of sessions a week of the other strength that you're not going to get The adaptation so I do to say you're normal if you want to call it that in the gym by strength and one of the Pilates yeah, I first got introduced to Pilates when I was working with the Institute of Sport down in Tasmania and
one of the physios there was quite big into it and I'd never heard of it and I was applying that to my track squad down there and I learned a lot about it. And then when I came to the Bombers in 1998, I had no real involvement with AFL up until that point at all. And some of the players were getting odd injuries. It's not so odd, it's actually making a bit of a resurgence, osteotis pubis.
where there's an inflammation around the pubic bone. And I introduced Pilates to S and footy club back in 1999. And I can remember Kevin Sheedy looking at the program, he's going, what the hell's Pilates? But it's a common thing in all footy clubs or whatever the code and across the globe. I think it's a great methodology for strength. And even...
When again, I referred earlier to some of the clinical patients that I've got, whilst they're not going to Pilates class, a lot of the strength aspects of my programs are Pilates based in what I'm prescribing. So one would be, have a theraband and they're getting to a sit up position and you're just going to cycle your legs, just push your foot out like a runner, but hold a theraband above your chest with tension.
So it activates your core, but you've got a running action. I reckon that is a fantastic strengthening exercise for a runner. Guess what? It's born out of Pilates. That's where it comes from, yeah. But you can do that, you know, this afternoon at home. Just need a TheraVen or something to provide you with some tension.
tyson (24:24.254)
Yeah.
So you've got your, you're laying down on your back. You've got your feet in the.
John Quinn (24:33.982)
On your back, yeah, doing like a cycling action, like, you know, just extending your foot. Imagine that you're running, you're lying on the floor, on your back and you've got a running action, just extending one leg after the other, but above you, you're holding a band with tension with your hands, so you're not using your arms in the running action.
tyson (24:52.023)
So what other elements are you doing with the clubs that you're working with? I know you said that speed and agility is a big part with the AFL boys. Are you taking care of these other things as well, like in the gym or is your focus more specifically on the field?
John Quinn (25:05.882)
No, no, more in the field. They've got guys that are doing rehab and that type of thing. I do sports science and I come up with crazy ideas really for GWS especially. You know, I started to Nick Poulos, he's the high performance manager of the Giants, you know, we're having a bit of a laugh, you know. I think laterally and sometimes I'm thinking so far laterally I'll meet myself around the back, you know, sort of a bit of a nutter, but.
It's good. One of the things I'm actually looking at the moment, like there's an extension of Pilates, this could be the biggest side of crap you've heard for six months, but is bungee fitness. And I've seen them with them in shopping centers with young kids, but it's just like a bungee thing and you're running. But they've now started to use that in different places overseas for non-impacting fitness and conditioning. So if you've got a lower limb injury that you can do at work and you get an enormous workout, especially for posture and for core.
So I've actually put that proposal in already for the Giants that we start doing a bit of bungee for our guys who can't do impact. Like it's not that long ago that a deload treadmill just came in, you know, where you can inflate a bag around you and it takes the impact. So I could have an athlete running it, you know, just 20% of their body weight. It's got its pros and cons. Like I'm a, I do use it if I need to, but it's got its pros and cons and it does change the way you run.
But look, it's a way of gradually loading. I'm a big fan of deep water running. There's no impact. But yeah, the concept of the bungee, where you're in midair and you can do all sorts of different things, it's really activating core. Look, again, training is all about mental and physical. So if an athlete's getting a bit of a buzz from doing different training and it's getting them fit and strong, well guess what, the old spirituality belief will start to kick in. And so whatever it takes, as long as it's legal.
I'm there.
tyson (27:01.383)
Yeah, so what are you in a harness? I think I've seen what you're talking about. Is it where you're on a trampoline? They've got the bungee cords either side of the connecting to the harness
John Quinn (27:08.974)
that they could be, they could be on the trampoline, or you could just, there is a way you can crank it up a little bit so they don't have full impact on the ground. So they can do all sorts of things. You can actually have them running in the air and then just coming back and lightly touching the ground. You can have them doing jumps up. It's a very much a core and functional control session. So stay tuned on that. If it looks like it might be okay, I'll come back to you and tell you how effective it's been. I'm just trying to get that one literally, pardon the pun, but I'm trying to get it off the ground.
tyson (27:38.851)
Yeah, it is interesting. It's amazing what we laugh at on one day and a couple of years later It's I mean like that Kevin Chidi palates example is classic probably in the late in the late 90s 90% of people would have been saying palates It was just a foreign concept like something like yoga But I've noticed since having kids my three-year-old is constantly on the move and his whole life He's just play and I mean I heard this stereotype about kids before but I was having a conversation with one of my comedian friends the other night just
John Quinn (27:38.882)
Yeah.
tyson (28:08.615)
how it's been such a reminder to me to stay fit and healthy so you can continue to just bring that element of play. And it doesn't matter whether he's on a skateboard or whether I kick in the football or whether he's walking over rocks in bare feet at the beach and just trying to navigate. I feel everything that he's doing is just a benefit to his health. And it's no surprise just looking at him. How much
you know, shape or fitness or whatever you want to call it, we lose as we get older because pretty much every element of what he does disappears from our life. Once we get into school and uni and, you know, day to day life for the most part, I mean, there's exceptions to that, but yeah, majority.
John Quinn (28:47.178)
We place importance on things that rightly or wrongly, whether they are important, you know, when you talk about the innocence of young kids. I love just observational coaching, if you like, and look at any young kid that, you know, a preschooler and they just live in the moment. They're not even thinking 30 seconds ahead. It can be dangerous sometimes. Walk with a kid along the street, you know, you've got to be with them because they can get away from you in a flash because they're not thinking about a consequence of what might happen in 10 or 15 seconds.
They think about what is important to me right now, I'm going to do this. And I'd like to have my athletes think like that sometimes, just be in the moment and focus on what you're going to do at this very point in time. And I'm going to give it a hundred percent effort of everything I've got just because I can. And that's the innocence of youth. And, but unfortunately we start to rationalize as we get older about this is going to hurt. And if I do this, I might get that. And if I don't get that time, then this is it.
we start thinking consequence, we start thinking outcome, and we focus on the wrong thing, you know, and you've got to be careful, like self-talk is so important. I said to these young tennis players I had this morning, you've got to listen to how you're talking, and if you start a sentence with, oh, look, I don't think I can do that, you've already said, I don't, and that you can't do something. So that starts to become what you believe you can do. And I said to you, look,
tyson (30:09.015)
Mm.
John Quinn (30:11.118)
We're gonna do an exercise now, but I don't want you to think about oranges because today's talk is about apples. What was the first thing that popped into your head? An orange. So as a coach, I've got to be mindful of how I'm talking to my athlete about what I want them to do and what they are capable of doing, what they will be able to do, what they will feel, what they will see, what they'll experience, not what they can't do and what I don't want them to do. So it's positive coaching versus negative coaching.
Yeah, words are very powerful. We've got to be careful how we use them. I read not so long ago that, I'm trying to remember who it was that said it, but he said that's why we call it spelling, because words cast a spell on our mind. Yeah, it'd be very difficult to say.
tyson (30:54.659)
Yeah, yeah well said well it's like training isn't it? It's actually been one thing that I've been trying to be a little more focused on lately not because I'm incredibly depressed or down in the dumps or anything But I've just done a bit of a mental check and thought this is one area of my life That that I could really improve on I think the physical training side of things is in a pretty good place but I mean the fact it's invisible is probably one of the things that makes it more difficult, but
Just, I find cognitive behaviour therapy really helpful, just to develop a little bit more of a positive storyline. Cause I think, just probably the foundation of it is, just the routine maybe of kids, as much as I love it, like, and I wouldn't change it for the world, just sacrificing so much of that free time had been a frustration for me. So I was like, okay, I know in 10 years time, I'm gonna look back at this with such sentimental eyes, like why not bring that attitude into it right now?
And just as a result of bringing that into just being with my boys and trying to challenge some of the negative, not negative, probably negative takes, I guess, on a situation where it's like, I'd rather be doing my work. Just going, okay, I mean, this is like, it's limited time that you get with your kid. And then just through practicing that, being out there at the skate park and constantly challenged, I thought, okay, well, why not try and introduce this throughout my day and just catch myself. And at the moment, I think I'm the equivalent of like a flabby man trying to take up running.
with my mental talk, there's so many times where I'll, and I'm getting a lot better, but there's so many times where I'll catch myself in like this, oh, I shouldn't be doing this now, I wish I could be doing this, that it kind of shocks me. And when you become aware of it, it's really interesting just how much room you have to grow. And I would say that generally, I'm a fairly optimistic, positive person. So, I mean, this is a double-edged sword, yeah. The same can be applied with exercise. A lot of people probably don't realise how inactive their lifestyles are until they start to implement.
a little bit of activity into their day-to-day life. You just become more and more aware of it. So with the self-taught stuff, where do you start an athlete with that?
John Quinn (32:54.23)
asking them what it is they dream about, what do they see their future as, what do they see as successful? Because it's not about myself as the coach, it's about what they want. And once you take on board what your hopes, dreams, aspirations of the person you're working with actually are, then you start pushing them towards that. And I think the most exciting thing is when they don't understand their own potential and you're able to plant seeds so that they slowly but surely understand their.
their future and you're taking them, you're guiding towards them. It's a very rewarding part of coaching.
tyson (33:28.799)
Yeah, yeah, apart from, I mean, there's so many elements that come under the umbrella of physical performance and wellbeing as we're well aware. What are some other things that you're doing with the guys that you're working with, whether it's the 80 year old sprinter, the tennis players, the footballers, whoever it is, is there anything else that's grabbed your attention at the moment?
John Quinn (33:50.082)
Oh, I don't know if it's anything that's really grabbed my attention with them. That's probably above and beyond the ordinary. I think that you just, I try to catch teach each of them as an individual. So it's what, what comes up from those people. I think you've also got to be careful in there that whilst you're working with all of these people, getting the most out of them. And you were starting to allude to it a moment ago when you were talking about spending time with your young fellow that, you know, you've got to be careful that you keep growing yourself.
You know, when you stop growing, basically you're dying and you gotta keep moving and looking for different ways. You don't know everything about everything. How is it? How can you keep growing yourself? And for me, I've always come from the arty farty side, the literature side. I love reading, you know, and I've got, you know, so much stuff that I'm always trying to take on board. Time is the big thing. And you know, we're talking there about an app for...
biomechanics and stuff like that. Well, there's so many different things out there now where you can get books and you just listen to them like a podcast and listen to books. And now there's apps out there that are basically around abbreviated books. And you can, I drive into work now, say into Olympic Park, it might be a 20 minute drive, but by the time I've got there, I've absorbed a book, all the key points of a book. And I try to take those key points in because
Whether we're talking about success on the track and getting to the Olympic Games, whether you're talking about success in, I just want to shift an extra kilo, whether you're talking about success, I want to get that promotion and become second in charge of that department, whether you're talking about, I want to be the best mom that I can possibly be to my kids, whatever you define as success, the rules are the same. And if you're listening to books and business on success,
Just draw the parallels over the world that's yours. So the name of the latest thing that I've found, which I think is really good, is called Headway. So that's another app that I use. And it just allows me to, basically I'm absorbing seven books a week. And I'm just taking on a lot of concepts. And I suppose I've got to be careful I don't drown myself in facts and figures and numbers and thoughts and theories, but I love it. But.
tyson (36:13.467)
Yeah, except I thought you were gonna say Blinkist, which is another one. It sounds very familiar What's headway? Is it a is it a sort of a rival? Brand to blink us, I guess
John Quinn (36:19.361)
It's similar, yeah.
Yes, yes. And again, I don't have any affiliation with these people. I'm just talking to you like we're down at the pub having a beer. But yeah, that's not what I use. And I find it's really effective. I just plug it on in there. And you know, if I'm not listening to SCN on the radio, I'm listening to a book and someone talking about the virtues of goal setting or whatever it is.
tyson (36:46.01)
What book have you been listening to most recently?
John Quinn (36:51.135)
Uh, the, oh gee, I've, I've listened to one just this morning and it was on, uh, all about goal setting and it was called breaks. And I listened to, um, I'll basically, you know, in these like lace books, I could actually be way to say, I'll tell you the last books that I've been listening to. Um, here it is in front of me. No excuses. Um, I can't say it on your podcast, but it's unfuck yourself.
tyson (37:13.515)
You can, I'm sure you can. Yes.
John Quinn (37:17.378)
Talking to strangers, the power of the mind, the 80-20 principle, giving yourself time is what that's about. And again, I'm listening to those abbreviations of those books, and if I really like them, like I listened to it first, then I went out and got the book Atomic Habits, and then it had a workbook that came with it, so I started working through the workbook. Really powerful stuff, and then I can then teach others, the athletes I work with particularly,
tyson (37:36.507)
Ah, great book, yeah.
John Quinn (37:46.878)
on how to incorporate that into their lives as well. So yeah, I'm getting good value and I think my athletes are getting good value out of that as well.
tyson (37:53.691)
Yeah, so you've got probably even a more efficient system than what I do. My go-to is I'll usually go to audible I'm not a member on headway or blinkist or anything though I probably should be by the sound of it But I'll download a book there and if I absolutely love it Then I'll keep an eye out for the hard copy book or I might order it and put it on the shelf um But what was I going to say you said something then about Uh, oh, yeah, no, it was atomic habits That was one that stood out to me in a big way because i'm such a goal setter. I love the idea of goal setting
And James Clear, the author of the book, he goes, well, your goals are fantastic, but what a lot of us forget is process. And I love that idea. I was like, oh, that's been my missing link because it's so good to say I want to climb Everest, but maybe I should take a hiking class or whatever it is. And I think so many, yeah.
John Quinn (38:28.179)
Yes.
the
tyson (38:42.523)
Yeah, yeah for sure. Yeah, it's gained a whole heap of traction. I didn't realise how popular that was. Actually, I went and listened to quite a few podcasts with the guy as well, because even his story about how that book came about was quite interesting. Just started with a blog and started to put some blogs out there that got really popular. And I can see how it is, because it seems to be one of the struggle points for a lot of people is we've got all these ambitions and dreams, but I guess that key ingredient of process is one that too many of us forget, whether you're...
Like you say, a mum trying to be a better mum or an athlete trying to make the Olympics, it applies equally to both of us.
John Quinn (39:17.662)
Yes, yeah, and to achieve those goals, you've got to have a certain level of selfishness as well. And when you've got responsibilities, whether it be to your family, to your employer, whatever, it's very hard sometimes to then say, no, this is just for me. But you've got to structure your day in such a way that you don't neglect the most important asset you have, and that's you.
tyson (39:40.499)
Yeah, from your perspective, Quinnie, when you look at just the general population, and I can imagine that varies far and wide, depending on where you're looking, what are elements of just physical mental performance that so many of us are letting ourselves down with from lack of exercise programs to lack of positive self-talk to anything else that you can insert under that umbrella of general wellbeing?
John Quinn (39:47.528)
Mm.
No, I think it's sometimes it's out of fear of failure that people don't set a realistic goal. They either just float, so, oh no, I just want to get fit. I just want to lose weight. So there's nothing measurable on that. So you know, what does fitness mean? You know, if you've been in hospital for a year, fitness is being able to get out of bed and get down to the bathroom by yourself.
But if you might call fitness, I want to be able to complete the city to surf in Sydney, or I want to do my first marathon. You know, it's, so you've got to put something on it and then put some quantifier what that is. So I think there's a lot of that. I think a lot of people talk about what they want to do, but they don't put any of the ways you're going to measure it. And there's no process about how they go to get that. And from a coaching point of view, that's part of what I've got to do.
is make sure I keep my athletes accountable to what we're trying to achieve and keep focused on that.
tyson (41:03.763)
Yeah, what I liked about you from the first time I met you was we sat down at Olympic Park Sports Actually, it wasn't Olympic Park Sports Medicine sport and spine. I can never remember the name of the place you in
John Quinn (41:13.191)
South Yara, South Yara Spine and Sports Medicine.
tyson (41:16.047)
That's say it's probably a good thing. I haven't been there enough to have memorized the name just yet Which is a sign of good health I imagine but yeah down there in south. Sierra I remember sitting there with you and you showing me the aura ring and to me that was a first this is about three years ago now and it was Unbelievable for me to see that because you showed me what just looked like a pretty standard ring And then you're starting to break down some of the elements of what it can do and how that's beneficial to performance And there's so many
John Quinn (41:37.033)
Mm.
Yeah, well it's really helped me. I've got it on there. That's just looks like a normal ring and the aura ring I got it because Back in 2014. I suffered from an autoimmune disease. So there was no warning it just I just got hit with it and It was limbic encephalitis. So encephalitis is Inflammation of my brain and the limbic part of it is the most primitive part of the brain So it's all about memory and things like that
And that really stuffed me. I spent over a year in medical care and then another 12 months after that in supervised care. And there are a lot of specials and people around the world who, the prognosis wasn't very good. In fact, it's got less than a 5% survival rate from the type of thing that I had. And I'd love to say it was my fortitude, it was my resilience, it was my strength, it was my character.
It wasn't any of that. It was just God's divine intervention and a bit of luck thrown in on the side that I've come through that. But, you know, I've been given an opportunity to go for it again and impact as many lives as I can going forward. But one of those was I needed to get my own life in order. And part of that, what really got affected and it is a part of the brain in terms of relaxation. But.
I wasn't sleeping. I was only getting three or four hours of sleep a night. And it's not uncommon for me to be up even now at five o'clock. But the Aura Ring has really enabled me to measure and understand my sleep patterns and cycles. So I'm now averaging around about seven, seven and a half hours of sleep a night, which for me is fantastic. And it's made a real difference because the harder you work, the harder you need to recover. And the most important
part of recovery is actually sleep. And you know, we have this thing that if you have a nap during the day, that that's not a good thing, but it is a good thing. And you let your body regenerate and then go again. You've just got to take that time out for yourself. Just like you're taking time for training, you got to take time for resting. And resting isn't sitting in front of the TV watching a movie. Sometimes it's just having a good sleep. Get to bed.
tyson (44:01.143)
Hmm. Yeah, it's always the first thing to go for me I can tell whenever I've had a bad run of three or four nights with sleep It's not uncommon for me to get usually it's sinusitis or some form of a cold and this is sort of crept up a couple of times since having kids because as I'm sure you'd know this there's more than that more than a couple of nights where a Good night's sleep just isn't even an option if I want to stay married I mean as much as I try and handball it to Jesse and say you take care of it
That lasts 10 minutes until I'm out on the couch or in the doghouse or wherever else I need to be. So did you say the autoimmune disease was the reason that you weren't sleeping or it was part of one of the consequences?
John Quinn (44:40.562)
Yeah, the consequence of it, it affected that part of my brain. And so, yes, but it's gradually got better. But one of the other things I've done, I reckon, has been interesting is I've supervised, I've co-supervised a couple of PhD students through Greater Western Sydney Giants and also through University of Western Sydney. And it also came from encephalitis, where...
I lost a bit of function of my right eye and it wasn't tracking right. And when I was in hospital, they brought these glasses and I put these glasses on and they were literally tracking the movement of my eyes. And I like had a little epiphany there, like imagine how we could use these for sport because that's tracking your eye movement, whatever. Anyway, sure enough, we can use them for sport. And so we got some in at the Giants and the supervised study I was involved with was tracking the eye movement.
decision-making. And when I looked at our best players at the Giants, I think of someone like Toby Green. He's got this really impressive search pattern that you can pick up from these glasses of what he looks at in a given period of time. And if I give that to someone who's not skilled, it's less than a quarter of the visual scope that he's got. So that was important for me, coming from a non-AFL state such as New South Wales.
because I was looking for talent amongst a population that don't know how to spell AFL. So I'm going out to Western Sydney and I wanna know, I could measure their speed, I could measure their ability to jump, I could measure their VO2 max, but now I can measure their ability to make decisions. But one of the things that I wasn't aware of from doing that was sleep impacts on your ability to make decisions. Now that's in a sporting context, but intuitively I also believe that also would impact on our day-to-day decisions.
In fact, I believe we make dumb decisions when we're tired. And I think experience would probably tell most people that that's true. But yeah, we've got a long way to go in that study. But I think that where we're looking at that now is doing work in the area of concussion, which is very popular now. But eye movement is also impacted on things like concussion. So I wouldn't be surprised in the coming two to three years.
tyson (46:39.199)
Yeah.
John Quinn (47:03.69)
where you'll see games like AFL where players will be putting on Apple virtual reality goggles after they've had a head knock and we'll be able to assess straight away where they're at with their visual. We'll be able to say to a player, you need more rest and recovery because you're not ready to do high involve complex tasks. We'll be doing that on work sites to make sure that the people that are working there are ready to go. I think we're moving into exciting times and it's all through the eyes are going to tell us.
where we're at. So the link between decision making, things like conditions like concussion and brain health, they're all coming into one for me. And yeah, I'm looking forward to that side of things. I mean, I did a talk a week or so ago to a bunch of students and I told them, I'm really envious of you. Like I'm 58 now, and over the next 30 years, things are going to jump forward, which means...
that in 30 years you'll be 48 and you guys are going to be at the forefront of this stuff, you're going to be driving it. And if I'm still here, God willing, I'll be some old fart sitting in a wheelchair watching you going, I knew this was going to happen. But I think things like that visual search, I think things like nanotechnology, like the stuff that we've got like GPS units on, players backs and measuring, we're going to have that in just a thread now with nanotechnology. It'll be just in a thread.
tyson (48:11.178)
Heheheheheheh.
John Quinn (48:27.658)
And we're measuring things from heart rate to sweat rate to whatever. It's all coming. It's an exciting future for anyone involved in science, but anyone involved in sport. If you think things are really whiz-bang now because that new app you've got on your Apple Watch, you won't see nothing yet.
tyson (48:45.263)
Yeah, I mean the AFL would be excited about that because I know that these head knocks is a really big focus point for them At the moment fact the first time I'm not sure if you saw it the other night. I was watching Geelong playing who were they playing? I wasn't it wasn't the Giants. That was the week before oh, they're playing Melbourne and Gary Rowan accidentally knocked out Jeremy Cameron both chasing the ball and For the first time the AFL said okay. We're not going to replay this because it's quite graphic
John Quinn (49:04.774)
Yes, I saw.
tyson (49:10.331)
They changed their mind after about 25 seconds. They said, okay, we'll show you a we'll show you a less graphic view of it Um, but I thought uh, I thought that's really interesting take like this There's obviously a lot of discussions happening at the afl for a decision like that to be made because for a lot of people It's almost a drawing card or at least it draws in Highlight rules on youtube. So the fact that there's technology like this Which is actually going to be able to be of benefit i'm sure gets um, you know Both players and those in control of the afl pretty excited
John Quinn (49:40.83)
Look, I think we're drawn to You know, it's almost like latitorial sports. We've been doing it for thousands of years whether it was the Christians in Rome or whatever coming through to now and you look at Australian football mate the impacts and like when I sit on the sideline in Rugby league some of the boys penrith mate their biceps are bigger than my quads they're massive and they run into each other, you know at 10 meters per second and
And I wince when they hit each other and they just do it and get up laughing. You know, you look at American football and the impacts that are going on there and on it goes. Look, that's the entertainment failure of sport. But the consequence of that, particularly with head knocks, I think we're only just starting to understand and we're starting to see it show itself in things like dementia and Alzheimer's and these sort of things, conditions that are impacting the brain. And you know, we're going to start living, or we are living longer now than what we did.
even 20 years ago, the lifespan is getting greater. And yeah, we need to understand more about the brain. And I don't think we've, I think we've respected it, but we've respected it from a removed position. We've got to really understand how this is, how it works and what we can do to rehabilitate from injury knots like Jeremy Scott. And I think sports come a long way, you know, mandatory time out from the game is a massive step forward.
tyson (51:04.621)
Yeah.
John Quinn (51:08.97)
You know, it used to be a badge of honour if you'd come back and played that game or in the next week. But it's not such a badge of honour when you're burying those people and they've got degenerative brain conditions that are likely linked to those gladiatorial head knocks.
tyson (51:22.951)
Yeah, CTE, isn't it? I'm not sure if that's the only one. I'm sure you would know a heck of a lot more about this than me, but I watched a really sad documentary about an NFL player, which was the Alex Fernandez, I think his name was, and it was the first time I'd heard of CTE. I had no idea, and I still have very little understanding of NFL, but you know, you watch some highlights and you can see how much impact's going on there.
But just conversation around, you know, things like head injuries, dementia, dementia. I'm trying to think of this couple, it's an American couple. And I don't know their titles, but essentially they're committed to the study of dementia. And they were breaking down some of the facets of what can lead people down that road. And even though we're living a longer period, like I sort of touched on at the start, Peter Atiyah speaks about how so much of that longer life is not necessarily healthier. It's just, we've learnt to be able to extend.
the duration of, you know, sometimes it's healthier and sometimes it's just life. But they looked at things like exercise and diet. And one of the big standout points to me, Quinny, and I don't know, this is an interest point for you, but I've started to hear a lot about, you know, the process that, first of all, that our processed foods go through, but even things like fruit and vegetables, some of the roundup sprays and the, I think they call it glyphosate, they've started to look into the impacts on that on things like cancer and...
just general health and well-being and For me as a guy who had thought he had his finger on the pulse of what good health was It just seems to be a thousand miles deep the tunnel of how it is that you can improve because even when you think you're Eating a really good diet. I Don't know how much of our food has glyphosate on it, but it seems that there's even more room for improvement Where you probably didn't realize there was
John Quinn (53:07.114)
Yeah, well, you know, I think there's a lot of it with going back on my own stuff I decided I'd do more study because I was prescribed 27 different types of medication that I was going to have to take for the rest of my life I didn't want to do that and I thought there must be more natural way to do this I went I did a post-grade cert in Nutrition through Deakin University and I wanted to go through Deakin and do it online Because they wouldn't know anything about
the encephalitis that I'd had and think, oh, the poor bugger will just put him through. But I also wanted to be able to retain the information because I had issues with memory and recall. So having to do a formulated study where I could be assessed and either knew it or I didn't and got through. So, you know, I've got a couple of degrees on my wall, but the one I'm probably proudest of most is my post-grading nutrition, just because it represents far more than just doing a course at university. But I'm quite convinced that
the long-term implications of refined foods is not going to be happy reading for us. And in fact, I think future generations will look back and go, what were those guys thinking? Like fancy eating that or doing that. And I think another area too will be the whole DNA around nutrition. And I think if you are from say Irish background, Irish heritage where
been eating carbohydrates for more than 2000 years with all the potatoes and everything else. I think my nutritional needs and base is very different to one of the West African athletes that I'm coaching that really had a high protein and a very simple carbohydrate diet and water, you know, for pretty much their whole existence. And then suddenly you introduce them to these different foods. I even look at Indigenous Australians up until
white settlement here in Australia, their diet would be significantly different. And you know, what we think of as white sometimes is bloating and bloating comes from infection. And I think that, yeah, we're killing ourselves sometimes with food. Got to be careful. It's a whole new area coming. Well, it's already here, but it's an area of great potential, I think.
tyson (55:10.016)
Yeah.
Yeah. Jessie.
tyson (55:24.167)
Yeah, one thing that was really interesting for me when my wife was teaching she for a couple of years She went out to an aboriginal community called Yalina in South Australia And she said yeah She said as soon as she got there one of the most standout features was Yeah, your welfare payment would come through and there was a local milk bar Which was taking the piss on prices essentially because they knew that a lot of the community would spend it and so many of the people Um, jesse was explaining they don't have the same value on
John Quinn (55:32.833)
I've heard of it, yeah.
tyson (55:51.675)
money as what an Australian society has at the moment. They're not as obsessed with this idea of a big house. They just want to go down and use their money and they'll buy coke and they'll buy processed food. And it was just, I guess, a lack of education. But she said one thing that was really sad to see, first of all, how they were just taken advantage of from the locals who had a business idea. And they knew that the welfare money that was coming in would just go out just as quickly.
But then she also said it was not uncommon just to see money laying around on the street because people would sit down, they didn't really have an appreciation for what it was. They didn't look at it in the same way that you and I would as though it's like this treasured commodity that had to be taken care of. It is interesting, like that whole conversation of just going back to a natural diet, whether it's here in Australia or American Indians or wherever it is that you look. I mean, there's so many benefits that come with being able to store food for a longer period of time.
John Quinn (56:31.969)
Mm.
tyson (56:47.507)
I guess that's a flip side of it as well. People lose that relationship with food, which I can imagine the Aboriginal world would have been super in touch with.
John Quinn (56:57.81)
Yes, yeah, no, I think it's, you know, I think some, well, I really believe we've got to go back to getting back into that wholesome stuff, but you know, the reality of life and economies of scale and big business, don't know how that'll happen. So at the end of the day, you've just got to take responsibility for your own life and your own choices. And it comes back to what you just said about education. It's education, but I think as much in your story before, it's as much about opportunity.
tyson (57:18.038)
Yeah.
John Quinn (57:27.014)
and what you've got as it is about the education side. It's having the opportunity to, or choice, and sometimes they don't get the choice, and the bigger markup or the bigger value is in highly processed foods. You know, it's probably cheaper to ship you in a can of Coke than just to give you a bottle of water.
tyson (57:45.743)
Yeah, one of the things I've been learning about a lot recently is just seed oils and how it's contained within everything I went down and bought a thing of butter the other day and it had it was it said on the front It was spreadable. I've never really bought butter I've only just developed a little bit of a taste for it But um, I was looking at the container and it said it was spreadable and but it said it was organic and I got home And 30 of it was like a canola oil
And even me who I got fooled by the organic label thinking, okay, if we're going to do butter, we'll do the organic version. Then you get it home. It's not even like most of it, or at least a good portion of it's not even the thing that you thought you were buying. Yeah.
John Quinn (58:23.87)
Yes, yeah. No, no, it can be a challenge, but you know, they're things for us to move forward. And in the world I work, it's about making sure the athletes I've got understand that. But I'm probably lucky in a way that I've got a number of athletes in my squad that have come from a very impoverished background and they're, you know, from Africa and different parts of Asia where they haven't had access to a lot of money and a lot of foods like this. And they'd no sooner
go to McDonald's and have a Big Mac, then they would, you know, walk naked down the street. They wouldn't even cross their mind. And, you know, they just look for their right foods of what they've got. But yeah, it's about, you know, you've got, I've got to catch myself sometimes because it's pretty easy to start your day off with a coffee and a biscuit rather than, it's a bit more holistic and wholesome.
tyson (58:56.919)
Hehehe
Yeah.
Yeah before I let you go, Quinn, I'll tell you I used to train with a Sudanese guy called Dua Yoa and he moved to Australia I want to say when he was about 10 or 11 from Khartoum in Kenya, sorry in Sudan He had a really wild story about how it was that they got out of there There's things that you can't even imagine but in terms of relationship to food I remember living in Ballarat one day and we were driving down to do a really difficult workout we had 8x1k with a minute recovery that night and It was about 4 o'clock in the afternoon and he said oh man
so hungry, I wish I ate before we came. And I said, oh, like, what have you eaten today? He goes, no, I haven't eaten since yesterday. For me, it was unbelievable that was even an option. So you talk about the relationship with food and for him, I knew his family pretty well. It wasn't uncommon for them and not because they were poor anymore or they were struggling. It was just so how they had lived growing up that it didn't really even cross their mind that hey, it's breakfast, it's lunch, it's dinner.
John Quinn (01:00:10.87)
Yeah, well, and they're so used to that. But see, I bet he's changed now. He would have adopted this Western life. I, one of the more, you know, sometimes you get a lesson and you don't think, there's nothing there to get. I went to India for cricket and I worked with the Indian Cricket League for a while and I was with the team from Bangladesh. And about three months, I was working with the team from Bangladesh and I was in this tuk with this guy, with one of the players. And this...
poor Indian was peddling his little tuk thing along. And there's a little boy, he's probably about eight or nine, and he's, yep, yep. And the tuk driver's telling him, you know, whatever. And I said to the Bangladesh guy with me, what's he saying? He's saying, he's telling him to piss off. And I said, but the kid kept coming back, and I loved his persistence, we got caught in the traffic, and this kid and they're going for it, and this little boy's arguing with him. And I said,
What's he saying to him? And he said, well, the driver's saying if he doesn't go away, he's going to get off and hit him. And the little boy's saying back to him, you do your job, and I'll do mine. And the sad thing about that as we went on in the traffic, I thought that little boy's job is a beggar. And I reckon if I went back to New Delhi today, I'd probably find him there because that's his limitations and his options of life is so narrow. His job is to target foreigners to get money.
I remember putting my hand in my pocket and I gave him an equivalent of 20 bucks, which was probably a month's salary. And I just slipped it into his hand and he disappeared back off into the bloody crowd of minions. But I'll never forget that. You do your job, I'll do mine.
tyson (01:01:52.759)
Hmm. Yeah, far out. Said with a whole heap of cheek as well. Ha ha ha. Queenie, I could talk to you all day, but I'm gonna let you go, because I know you gotta get down and look after your athletes. Mate, thanks so much for coming back on. Always great to chat.
John Quinn (01:01:59.212)
Yeah.
I hope it wasn't too deep and philosophical on all but no, always great to chat mate and all the best. If there's something here that's triggered the interest of anybody, please make contact through my website. I'll get back to you for sure.
tyson (01:02:21.331)
Yeah, all right. I'll link that in the description for anyone interested. All right, Quinnny. I'll leave you to it. See you later everybody
John Quinn (01:02:26.667)
Alright, I'll see you. Bye bye.