Author Archives: James Marshall

  1. My books of the year: 2022

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    Tough to choose just one book

    Some good ones that didn’t make the top 5

    It’s that time of year (or slightly early as I am trying to help those looking to buy books before Christmas) to review and recommend what I have read. I started listing back in 2013 so that I didn’t read the same books by mistake.

    I have split the top 5 into fiction and non-fiction and they are listed as I remember them, rather than as winners. If you are wondering if my choices are worth reading (they are just my recommendations) then consider that I have read 80 books this year: you are not hearing from someone who has read one book and tells everyone to buy it!

    Remember: you can use the library to borrow books or, if you have the cash, buy from an independent bookseller. Both help authors more than clicking on Amazon.

    Excellent biography

    Here we go:

    Top 5 Non-Fiction Books

    1. Atomic Habits: James Clear. A well-structured, well-written summary of a lot of different works that I have read and habits that I have adopted. Clear has put them all together in a very good book whose ideas last beyond the time it takes to read it (Recommended by Sophie Jefferson, then Steve Baylis).
    2. How the World Really Works: Vaclav Smil. An outstanding overview of what is important for humanity: food, energy, air, transportation of materials and goods. Myth-busts useless forecasting and ideologies. He doesn’t come up with solutions but states facts that are essential to make informed decisions.
    3. A Writer’s Journal: Lucy Van Smit. A useful and inspiring practical workbook. I took a lot from this, not just about writing. One of the best books I have read about discovering purpose and a welcome antidote to all the macho-posturing, black polo-neck-wearing ‘gurus’ spouting from across the pond.
    4. Terry Pratchett: Rob Wilkins. An excellent biography that encapsulates the life and style of Terry Pratchett. Humorous, with excellent footnotes, and an insight into the writing process of this great author (gift from Pete Bunning).
    5. There Is Nothing For You Here: Fiona Hill. Superb autobiography/ thought piece of this coal miner and nurse’s daughter who ends up sitting around the White House. A grim series of class snobbery and misogyny events might have slowed Hill down but they didn’t stop her. Ends with a couple of optimistic chapters that entreat us not to leave any person or any place behind.
    Excellent and essential

    Top 5 Fiction

    1. Bleak House: Charles Dickens. A huge, entertaining novel set amongst a wide variety of people, situations and professions. Very rewarding.
    2. The Things They Carried: Tim O’Brien. A sublime collection of semi-autobiographical short stories set in the Vietnam War.
    3. A Manual for Cleaning Women: Lucia Berlin. A superb collection of mainly autobiographical stories. An eye for detail, black humour, and stunning turns of phrase. Wonderful.
    4. Station Eleven: Hilary St John Mandel. Excellent, non-linear, novel about the aftermath of a global pandemic. Clever use of the shifts between times and the well-drawn characters.
    5. Treacle Walker: Alan Garner. A sublime piece of fiction that is hard to describe. A magical, fabulous tale that I read in two sittings. So rich.

    The Full List.

    Very good
    1. Bleak House: Charles Dickens. Huge, entertaining novel set amongst a wide variety of people, situations and professions. Very rewarding.
    2. Fires: Raymond Carver. A collection of essays, poems and sublime short stories. Here’s a writer that has lived a tough, short life.
    3. Atomic Habits: James Clear. This is a well-structured, well-written summary of a lot of different works that I have read and habits that I have adopted. Clear has put them all together in a very good book.
    4. The End of the World and Other Catastrophes: Ed. Mike Ashley.  Classic collection of SF short stories from familiar and unfamiliar authors. The Ray Bradbury one is frighteningly accurate.
    5. The Chequer Board: Nevil Shute. A novel set and written, in post-war Britain and Burma highlighting the lives of some ordinary people. More a series of scenes than an overarching novel but tackles racism, religious bigotry and infidelity well.
    6. Traveller at the Gates of Wisdom: John Boyne. A clever premise for a novel set over centuries of world history.  I devoured this book and its writing. Truly original.
    7. Bowerman and the Men of Oregon: Kenny Moore. In-depth book that charts the rise of Oregon track and field and Nike. Starts with tales of Bowerman’s ancestors pioneering across the West, covers several Olympics and includes many anecdotes of runners and their training. Bowerman seems to be a Chuck Yeager-type character that forms part of the American myth.
    8. The Wave of my Mind: Ursula Le Guin. A collection of essays and speeches from this masterful writer.
    9. Consider Her Ways and Others: John Wyndham. Slipstream themed short-stories for the most part. A couple are satires about the objectification of women. Wyndham the feminist?
    10. The Killing Hills: Chris Offnut. A crime novel set in rural Kentucky with a Military Policeman protagonist. Good but the location is the best character.
    11. Station Eleven: Hilary St John Mandel. Excellent, non-linear, novel about the aftermath of a global pandemic. Clever use of the shifts between times and the well-drawn characters.
    12. Livewired: David Eagleman. Interesting research on neuroscience and how the brain adapts to its surrounds and stimuli.
    13. One Thing Leading to Another: Sylvia Warner Townsend. A collection of witty, sometimes fantastical, short stories. Old-fashioned writing that is worth picking through to find some killer sentences.
    14. Beowulf and Sellic Spell: J.R.R. Tolkien, ed. Christopher Tolkien. The epic tale translated and annotated. The tale is great, the annotations and lecture notes are dense and hard-graft but interesting. The supplemental tale and poems are good. Impressive.
    15. The Art of Impossible: Steven Kotler. A mish-mash of ideas gained from Ferris, Dweck, Duckworth and others. Some good points but not worth buying.
    16. A Manual for Cleaning Women: Lucia Berlin. A superb collection of mainly autobiographical stories. An eye for detail, black humour, stunning turns of phrase. Wonderful.
    17. Treeline: Ben Rawlence. Great tour around the arctic circle chronicling and detailing the different trees and the people around them.
    18. The High House: Jessie Greengrass. Well written account of a small family surviving and preparing for a climate event that could happen to us all.
    19. How the World Really Works: Vaclav Smil. Outstanding overview of what is important for humanity: food, energy, air, transportation of materials and goods. Myth busts useless forecasting and ideologies. He doesn’t come up with solutions, but states facts that are essential to make informed decisions.
    20. Follow the River: James Alexander Thorn. Fascinating and inspiring story about Mary Ingles escape from the Shawnee. Average novel though.
    21. How to Cook a Wolf: M.F.K. Fisher. Funny, dry and witty account of how to eat on a budget. Written in 1942 and revised 10 years later, it has useful tips for today.
    22. The Silver Branch: Rosemary Sutcliff. Children’s novel set in Roman Britain. Entertaining.
    23. Consider the Lobster: David Foster Wallace. Mind-bending, thought-provoking essays about a range of subjects. Dense footnotes require a magnifying glass! Interesting accounts on the McCain campaign trail, American English usage and talk show radio. Excellent.
    24. A Writer’s Journal: Lucy Van Smit. Outstanding, useful and inspiring practical workbook. I took a lot from this, not just about writing.
    25. The Heisenberg Principle: Frank Herbert. Short SF novel about genetic engineering and immortality.
    26. 52 Ways to Walk: Annabel Streets. Well-researched series of short articles that is a welcome break from ‘step-counting.’ Some good ideas for those that like to get out.
    27. On Purpose Leadership: Dominick Quartuccio. Poor mish-mash of soundbites and anecdotes. There are three or four good ideas but not worth a whole book.
    28. Ship of Strangers: Bob Shaw. Episodic SF novel. Easy to read and entertaining.
    29. Play Their Hearts Out: George Dohrmann. Sad, tragic and detailed account of a group of young basketball players who are exploited, sold false dreams whilst their coach becomes a millionaire.
    30. On the Beach: Nevil Shute. Classic dystopian novel. The plot is excellent but the writing is a bit stilted.
    31. The British and Irish Short Story Handbook: David Malcolm. Published in 2010, this gives an overview of the development of the short story, its genres, major contributors and analysis of key works. Very useful to help find great authors and their works.
    32. The Constant Gardener: John Le Carre. Excellent thriller about Big Pharma in Africa and corruption within the British Government.
    33. Imagine If…: Ken Robinson and Kate Robinson. Enlightening and inspirational précis of Robinson’s work on creativity and education.
    34. The Thinking Body: Mabel Ellsworth Todd. A classic physiotherapist text from the 1930s. Lots of good analogies and ideas but little practical advice.
    35. Endless Shadow: John Brunner. Short, confusing, SF novel from 1964.
    36. The Arsenal of Miracles: Gardner F. Fox. Mish-mash SF novel from 1964, sexist by today’s standards and a far too convenient ending.
    37. How we learn to move: Rob Gray. Very good account of how athletes learn skills. Great case studies and research used.
    38. American Rust: Philipp Meyer. Family drama novel set in post-industrial Pennsylvania. Excellent exploration of the relationship between two friends who have to deal with the consequences of one mistake.
    39. Another Now: Yanis Varoufakis. A thinly disguised fiction piece about an alternative to our money-grubbing capitalist society. Thought-provoking.
    40. Write it all down: Cathy Rentzenbrink. Disappointing fluff about writing a memoir.
    41. How to be Animal: Melanie Challenger. A look at how humans are animals. Instead of exceptional beings with ‘souls’ and therefore no more important than any other being. Except to ourselves.
    42. Italian Folktales: Italo Calvino. Huge tome of traditional tales compiled and retold by Calvino. The footnotes are excellent. One to be read in chunks.
    43. Disorder: Helen Thompson. Outstanding overview of how our modern geopolitical mess had evolved. Thompson covers three areas: Fossil fuel dependency and the wars around it; financial and monetary policy of the Western democracies (above my brain capacity); and the failure of democracies and how they lead to an autocratic elite. Puts context into our everyday lives.
    44. Maid: Stephanie Land. An autobiographical account of a single mother trying to break out of the poverty trap. Superbly written, heart-warming, despairing and inspiring.
    45. Do Hard Things: Steve Magness.  A good review of how toughness develops from within rather than being imposed by a macho-type authority figure. Well-researched, well-written, useful examples.
    46. The Parable of the Sower: Octavia E. Butler. Amazingly prescient dystopian novel about a young woman surviving a breakdown in society. Great protagonist.
    47. The House of the Dawn: N. Scott Momaday. Novel about a Native American struggling to fit into society after returning from WWII. Flowing, descriptive prose interrupts the narrative, but a compelling backstory.
    48. Cider With Rosie: Laurie Lee. Wonderful autobiographical tale of a young boy growing up in a Gloucestershire village a century ago. Beautiful, funny prose that creates a vivid picture of rural life.
    49. The Ice at the Bottom of the World: Mark Richard.  Rich, raw, funny and tragic short story collection of life in the American underbelly.  I could taste the despair.
    50. Functional Exercise Prescription: Eyal Lederman.  Detailed look at  pain, injuries and how patients recover. Very good models on management and treating the person not just the injury.
    51. The Way West: A.B. Guthrie. A good novel about a wagon train heading to Oregon.
    52. How Minds Change: David McRaney. A very interesting account of how Street Epistemology  and deep canvassing work in the populations entrenched in belief systems: climate change deniers, flat-earthers, and religion.
    53. Rogues: Ed. George R.R, Martin. Collection of short stories. Some are excellent, and a few fillers. Worth reading to discover different authors.
    54. The Brothers Karamaov. F. Dostoevsky. Epic novel that covers religious, familial and societal themes. Rambling in places but worth the investment.
    55. House of Prayer No. 2: Mark Richard. Sublime writing in this memoir of a “special child” growing up in the American South. Interesting stories, well told. Inspirational for writers.
    56. Invisible Child: Andrea Elliott.  Sad journalistic tale of a homeless child and her family growing up in New York City.  Excellent background and commentary.
    57. Gotham Writers’ Workshop Fiction Gallery: Ed.Alexander Steele & Thom Didato. Superb collection of short stories.  Insightful introductions and interviews too.
    58. The Social Distance Between Us: Darren McGarvey.  Tough reading this account of modern Britain and how it got into this state of unequal opportunity. Well worth it to see McGarvey’s insights and reflections.
    59. Song of a Dark Queen: Rosemary Sutcliff. Good YA novel about Boudicca, told from the first-person perspective of her harper. Builds nicely throughout.
    60. The Stories of Frank O’Connor: Frank O’Connor. Great collection that link together in what seems like an autobiographical thread.
    61. A Field Guide to Writing Fiction: A.B. Guthrie. Superb little book that has clear and precise ideas on writing.
    62. Never Let Me Go: Kazuo Ishiguro. A coming of age dystopian novel that centres on the relationship between three adolescents and their role in society. Great prose but the plot is a little contrived.
    63. Living Leadership: G.Binney, C. Williams, G. Wilke. Excellent book on practical leadership. Based on several case studies and research it gives good evidence and examples on how leadership can be exhibited at all levels. Refreshing and useful.
    64. Vintage Contemporary Short Stories. Ed. Tobias Woolf. Wonderful collection of short stories published in 1994. Half of them mention the Vietnam war in some form.
    65. Treacle Walker: Alan Garner. Sublime piece of fiction that is hard to describe. A magical, fabulous tale that I read in two sittings. So rich.
    66. The Airs of Earth: Brian Aldiss. A collection of hard SF stories that have dated badly. Turgid writing with only a couple of plots that stand up well now.
    67. The Things They Carried: Tim O’Brien. Sublime collection of semi-autobiographical short stories set in the Vietnam War.
    68. Giving Up the Ghost: Hilary Mantel. Autobiography of the author’s early life and horrendous treatment by doctors. Great writing.
    69. Hood: Stephen Lawhead. Mediocre rewriting of the Robin of Hood story.
    70. Charity: Mark Richard. Collection of raw short stories that reveal the underbelly of the American poor.
    71. Snow Country: Yasunari Kawabata. A short, poignant novel about a Geisha who falls in love with an entitled gentleman. Great prose and understated descriptions, episodic
    72. Terry Pratchett: Rob Wilkins. Excellent biography that encapsulates the life and style of Terry Pratchett. Humorous, with excellent footnotes, and an insight into the writing process of this great author.
    73. The American West: Dee Brown. A good summary of the brief period of the settling, travelling and fighting that led to the mythology. Interesting personal stories and details.
    74. A Psalm for the Wild Built: Becky Chambers. Wonderful, original novella. As delightful to read as one of the protagonist’s cups of tea.
    75. You Can’t Win: Jack Black. Fascinating autobiography of this small-time criminal and hobo set around the turn of the twentieth century.
    76. Five Days at Memorial: Sheryl Fink. Long, in-depth look, at the disaster-struck hospital in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. Very detailed and prescient about how unprepared we would be for Covid.
    77. Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow: Jerome K. Jerome. A series of humorous essays, published in 1886, is still relevant today.
    78. Jane’s Country Year: Malcolm Saville. Delightful account of a young girl in post-war rural England. 
    79. There Is Nothing For You Here: Fiona Hill. Superb autobiography/ thought piece of this coal miner and nurse’s daughter who ends up sitting around the White House. A grim series of class snobbery and misogyny events might have slowed Hill down but they didn’t stop her. Ends with a couple of optimistic chapters that entreat us not to leave any person or any place behind.
    80. A Prayer for the Crown Shy: Becky Chambers. Another Monk and Robot novella is thought-provoking and easy to read except for the annoying ‘they/them.’ pronouns that slow down the pace of reading.
    81. Bossypants: Tina Fey. A funny insight into parts of the TV-writing-comedy life. Easy to read but worth it.
    82. Before We Get Started: Bret Lott. A series of excellent essays about the writer’s life. The chapter on rejection is essential reading.
    83. Belonging: Kathryn Jacob, Sue Unerman & Mark Edwards. It looks at the important topic of diversity, inclusion and equality at work. Good in parts but repetitive and overlong in others. It has good ideas but is aimed at those in companies.
    84. The Imaginary Girlfriend: John Irving. A short autobiography about this accomplished author and wrestling coach.
    85. Kilvert’s Diary: Francis Kilvert.  The thoughts of a country vicar in the 1870s. His descriptions of young girls make uncomfortable reading. His observations of country customs and folklore are a valuable resource.
    86. Oliver Twist: Charles Dickens. The classic novel that reveals the underworld and drudgery of paupers in London.
    More good books but only one made the top-5

    Further Reading

  2. New Course for sports coaches

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    Rugby players using gymnastics movements

    Gymnastics for sport

    Over the past 5 or so years, I have been running Movement workshops for sports coaches and p.e. teachers. The participants have enjoyed learning how to teach movement and basic gymnastics that they can then share with their players and pupils.


    Players who are stronger, more agile and more adaptable can pick up their sport’s technical skills a lot more easily than those who are weak, uncoordinated and over-drilled.


    I have put together three tutorials that consolidate the workshops that I have run in person and they are now available online.
    The introduction video is here:

    Introduction video

    You can purchase the membership here. It only costs £30 for 2 hours and forty minutes of content.

    These tutorials will allow you and your players to develop their bodies and minds in a safe, progressive, imaginative and fun way.

    I have attached the course outline below.

    Gymnastics-for-SportDownload

  3. Muscles Strengthening exercises: why the 5km run is not the health panacea.

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    Getting stronger with a broomstick

    Muscle-strengthening exercises such as bodyweight exercises, exercise bands, and dumbbell, barbell and machine resistance training exercises have been shown to impact a variety of health outcomes including:

    · Improved muscular strength.

    · Bone mineral density (stronger bones).

    · A decrease in all-cause mortality (the chances of dying from health-related diseases).

    · Improvements in cardio-metabolic health (such as Diabetes, and obesity).

    · Improvements in mental health.

    However, only 10-30% of adults are meeting the recommended guidelines for muscle-strengthening exercises (two sessions per week, targetting major muscle groups). The rates were lowest in low-income, low-education and obese populations.

    Health professionals are missing a trick by not recommending muscle-strengthening exercises for these populations. Especially where there are good outdoor facilities (like in Willand).

    If you are reading this, it is likely that you are an exerciser, teacher, or health professional, maybe a parent too. Are you doing enough muscle-strengthening exercises?

    But what about the 5km run?

    Use your local park to get stronger

    The once admirable goal of running in the park with a friend or two has now, unfortunately, become another opportunity for Middle-Class Virtue Signalling (along with Strava and step-counting). No one seems to be able to do it without TELLING everyone what they have done.

    The Park Run movement, and the NHS’ ‘Couch to 5k’ programme, create so much noise about the benefits of running 5km that they drown out other exercise initiatives, including sprinting!

    This is problematic for two reasons:

    1. Many people don’t like jogging and, understandably, either quit or don’t start exercise at all.

    2. Jogging doesn’t help you lift, pull, push or carry objects or small humans. Like every other form of exercise, it is good but incomplete.

    The health benefits of sustained, rhythmic movement for 15-40 minutes are well-documented and irrefutable. It includes jogging but also exercise modes such as:

    · Cycling

    · Swimming

    · Hiking

    · Rowing

    · Rope Skipping

    · Cross-country skiing (not much use in Devon).

    But, like the ’10,000 steps a day‘, there is nothing magical about being able to jog 5km.

    Other running activities are ignored by the chattering classes including sprinting (not for older people) and racing a mile run (not far enough to boast about): both of which are excellent activities that require varied training intensities and distances (and a lot less injury-inducing volume of training).

    Repeated sprint training has been shown to improve health outcomes more than steady-state aerobic work (like the 5km jog), especially in obese and overweight individuals, and in half the amount of time.

    Don’t be too ambitious at the start

    Vary the activity and train with a friend

    Like many things in life, a balance of different approaches produces a better outcome, than ‘one-size fits all.’ Try blending:

    • Muscle-strengthening exercises (whatever form you like) 2 x week for 20-30 minutes.
    • Some longer, continuous exercise (see list above) 1-2 x week.
    • Some shorter, speedier exercises such as sprints, rope skipping, or step-ups for 5-10 seconds as hard as you can, rest for 10-20 seconds and repeat. Five minutes is enough, 1-2 x a week.

    Exercising can be soul-destroying, especially if you are a beginner, unaccustomed to the feeling of sore muscles and breathlessness, or worried about the safety of the environment around you. No ‘app’ can replace the comfort of a teammate, friend or family member (as long as it doesn’t descend into sibling rivalry).

    If you want ideas on what counts as muscle-strengthening exercises, see my YouTube channel. Or, if you live locally, why not come to one of our club sessions?

    Good luck.

    Common Terms associated with muscle-strengthening activities.

    Resistance Training (RT): any exercise that requires you to work against resistance (usually gravity). This includes many different types of training. It isn’t a goal in itself.

    Weight Training (WT): a subset of RT. Here you are using weights such as dumbbells or barbells to achieve your goal.

    Strength Training (ST): a subset of RT. Here you are trying to get stronger. This can be done in many different ways and using different equipment or your own body weight.

    Weight Lifting (WT): this is a sport that consists of two lifts that require you to lift a barbell from the floor to above your head (see video below). You can use the exercises to help you get stronger and then they are a part of RT.

  4. Coaching at a weightlifting competition

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    Three things I had in mind to help the weightlifters

    Will holding Stanley Bear (club mascot)

    Last weekend I coached three of our club weightlifters at the Wild Boar Tier 3 event: Gabby, Will and Chris. This was their first competition outside of the club.

    Whilst every ‘S&C coach’ does ‘Olympic Lifts’ they do not coach the lifts in competition. There are big differences between training in the gym and competing. Coaching at a competition requires a different skill set and this needs to be practised and improved.

      Here are the three key things I had in mind this weekend:

    1; A happy lifter is a good lifter.

    I am strict on form, technique and standards when training. I critique and show/ explain corrections to help the lifters improve. They work hard and we have less rest than is ideal in order to maximise the limited time we have.

    But on competition day, when the lifters were a bag of nerves, my job was to reassure and encourage rather than critique.

    I gave one or two technical points as a reminder, Chris tends to lean forward from the clean, so ‘Chest Up’ is a cue we use. Gabby and Will needed to get their butterflies flying in formation, so ‘breathe’ or ‘smooth’ were the cue words.

    Gabby’s first competitive lift. ‘Breathe.’

    The rest of the time we chatted about non-weightlifting things, to try and put them at their ease.

    2: Remove all obstacles from their path.

    The lifters’ minds were full of jumping frogs. They need to channel all that nervous energy into lifting the bar above their heads. My job is to do everything else for them so that they just walk weigh-in, warm-up, walk out and lift.

    I can’t make the weight for them, nor can I lift for them (heaven forbid) but I can organise the warm-up, load the weights, remind them to drink and eat and let them know the start times.

    I had to estimate the start times for each of the lifters. Will should have been the easiest because he was lifting the least in his group (he is under-17 youth but was put in the men’s category). However, I got him warmed up, there were two minutes left on the timer, and the software system failed! It was an additional 12 minutes until Will went out. Luckily, he is young and fit, so I dropped the weights and we could do a couple more single loads.

    Gabby was lifting towards the end of her group which meant delaying her warm-up even though everyone around her had started. Counting the lifts, working out how many were going and then timing the warm-up accordingly is a key part of competition coaching. We got this right.

    Stanley and Chris: tired but happy

    Chris was somewhere in the middle of a large group (14 lifters). He had Covid two weeks ago and I was more concerned with his overall energy and recovery levels. I thought he had 6 big lifts in him but no more.

    We couldn’t afford to have him do an extra single or go too heavy in the warm-up. We revised the target that we had and aimed for a happy 6/6. We got the warm-up right, and he lifted well.

    Because it was a huge group, I took him outside for a sandwich and a chat in the fresh air. This 10 minutes interlude helped him recover physically and mentally.

    3. Know the rules.

    At the weigh-in, the lifter has to give their opening total. They are allowed to make two changes in each lift but that can not be more than 20kg above/below what they tell the Technical Official at the weigh-in.

    Chris #7 on the busy board: a lot of numbers need to be tracked

     There is a 2-minute rest between lifts if a lifter follows themselves and a 1-minute rest if they follow on from someone else.

    Extra rest can be gained by changing the totals slightly: the clock is stopped while the loaders make the change.

    I made full use of all these rules to gain extra rest for our lifters. I knew Chris would need the rest between the clean and jerk: they are very tiring. I also used them to get other lifters to go earlier than expected. You can get too clever by half here, but we had a plan, and we worked the plan. I did a lot of to-ing and fro-ing, keeping an eye on the timers and the loads.

    Happy lifter, Stanley and coach

    Knowing the rules helped me manage the clock and give our lifters the best chance possible to achieve their totals.

    That left them with the simple (not so simple!) job of lifting the bar above their head.

    Summary

    We had three happy lifters who enjoyed their first Tier 3 competition. Gabby won, and Chris came second in their groups: we weren’t in control of what other people lifted, but Gabby, Will and Chris all lifted well.

    Well done to them. The smiles were worth it.

  5. Summer reading recommendations 2022

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    It’s that time of year: schools are breaking up, annual holidays are planned and the thought of sitting down with a good book comes to the minds of many people. My summer reading recommendations are taken from the 44 books I’ve read, so far, this year.

    Unread and waiting: my current Tsundoku

    The reason I say the number is that I rarely take recommendations from people who read 1 or 2 books a year: how can they tell what is good or not? It is too easy to be swayed by the zeitgeist. If I recommend a book, it is because I think it will be worth your time.

    I have read some crackers and some duds. However, writing a book, and then getting it published, are impressive efforts (having had my first novel rejected by 23 agents and publishers, I have more empathy). So, well done to all the authors listed below.

    Top 5 non-fiction books.

    Superb and inspiring.
    1. Atomic Habits: James Clear. A well-structured, well-written summary of a lot of different works that I have read and habits that I have adopted. Clear has put them all together in an excellent book.
    2. How the World Really Works: Vaclav Smil. Outstanding overview of what is important for humanity: food, energy, air, transportation of materials and goods. Myth busts useless forecasting and ideologies. He doesn’t come up with solutions but states facts that are essential to making informed decisions.
    3. Disorder: Helen Thompson. Outstanding overview of how our modern geopolitical mess had evolved. Thompson covers three areas: Fossil fuel dependency and the wars around it; financial and monetary policy of the Western democracies (above my brain capacity); and the failure of democracies and how they lead to an autocratic elite. Puts context into our everyday lives.
    4. A Writer’s Journal Workbook: Lucy Van Smit. Outstanding series of exercises and practices that helped me immensely find ‘my voice.’ I had low expectations and was pleased to be blown away. Truly wonderful and deep.
    5. Maid: Stephanie Land. An autobiographical account of a single mother trying to break out of the poverty trap. Superbly written, heart-warming, despairing and inspiring (you may have seen the Netflix series).

    Top 5 fiction books

    Sublime writing and entertaining.
    1. Traveller at the Gates of Wisdom: John Boyne. A clever premise for a novel set over centuries of world history.  I devoured this book and its writing. Truly original.
    2. Station Eleven: Hilary St John Mandel. Excellent, non-linear, novel about the aftermath of a global pandemic. Clever use of the shifts between times and the well-drawn characters.
    3. A Manual for Cleaning Women: Lucia Berlin. A superb collection of mainly autobiographical stories. An eye for detail, black humour, and stunning turns of phrase. Wonderful.
    4. Bleak House: Charles Dickens. A huge, entertaining novel set amongst a wide variety of people, situations and professions. Very rewarding.
    5. The End of the World and Other Catastrophes: Ed. Mike Ashley.  A classic collection of SF short stories from familiar and unfamiliar authors. The Ray Bradbury one is frighteningly accurate.

    Thanks

    Borrowed from the library, a must read.

    Thanks to Devon Libraries for their brilliant service. Libraries have had their funding cut drastically since 2010: they are brilliant institutions that allow people from all backgrounds the opportunity to read, explore, learn and stay warm in the darkness of winter.

    Thanks to all the independent booksellers out there. If I order online, I get the book from Blackwell’s: they run an excellent service and more money goes to the deserving authors compared to the paltry sum that Amazon pays.

    Thanks to Pete, Rob, Susann and Sarah for gifting me some of the books on this list: it is much appreciated. No present is more welcome than a good book.

    The full list of books I have read this year and a brief summary.

    A very good book about learning
    1. Bleak House: Charles Dickens. Huge, entertaining novel set amongst a wide variety of people, situations and professions. Very rewarding.
    2. Fires: Raymond Carver. A collection of essays, poems and sublime short stories. Here’s a writer that has lived a rugged, short life.
    3. Atomic Habits: James Clear. Well-structured, well-written summary of a lot of different works that I have read and habits that I have adopted. Clear has put them all together in an excellent book.
    4. The End of the World and Other Catastrophes: Ed. Mike Ashley.  Classic collection of SF short stories from familiar and unfamiliar authors. The Ray Bradbury one is frighteningly accurate.
    5. Bowerman and the Men of Oregon: Kenny Moore. In-depth book that charts the rise of Oregon track and field and Nike. Starts with tales of Bowerman’s ancestors pioneering across the West, covers several Olympics and includes many anecdotes of runners and their training. Bowerman seems to be a Chuck Yeager-type character that forms part of the American myth.
    6. The Chequer Board: Nevil Shute. A novel set and written, in post-war Britain and Burma highlighting the lives of some ordinary people. More of a series of scenes than an overarching novel but tackles racism, religious bigotry and infidelity well.
    7. Traveller at the Gates of Wisdom: John Boyne. A clever premise for a novel set over centuries of world history.  I devoured this book and its writing. Truly original.
    8. The Wave of my Mind: Ursula Le Guin. A collection of essays and speeches from this masterful writer.
    9. Consider Her Ways and Others: John Wyndham. Slipstream-themed short stories for the most part. A couple are satires about the objectification of women. Wyndham the feminist?
    10. The Killing Hills: Chris Offnut. A crime novel set in rural Kentucky with a Military Policeman protagonist. Good but the location is the best character.
    11. Station Eleven: Hilary St John Mandel. Excellent, non-linear, novel about the aftermath of a global pandemic. Clever use of the shifts between times and the well-drawn characters.
    12. Livewired: David Eagleman. Interesting research on neuroscience and how the brain adapts to its surrounds and stimuli.
    13. One Thing Leading to Another: Sylvia Warner Townsend. A collection of witty, sometimes fantastical, short stories. Old-fashioned writing still that is worth picking through to find some killer sentences.
    14. Beowulf and Sellic Spell: J.R.R. Tolkien, ed. Christopher Tolkien. The epic tale was translated and annotated. The tale is great, the annotations and lecture notes are dense and hard-graft but interesting. The supplemental tale and poems are good. Impressive.
    15. The Art of Impossible: Steven Kotler. A mish-mash of ideas gained from Ferris, Dweck, Duckworth and others. Some good points but not worth buying.
    16. A Manual for Cleaning Women: Lucia Berlin. Superb collection of mainly autobiographical stories. An eye for detail, black humour, stunning turns of phrase. Wonderful.
    17. Treeline: Ben Rawlence. Great tour around the arctic circle chronicling and detailing the different trees and the people around them.
    18. The High House: Jessie Greengrass. A well-written account of a small family surviving and preparing for a climate event that could happen to us all.
    20. How the World Really Works: Vaclav Smil. Outstanding overview of what is important for humanity: food, energy, air, transportation of materials and goods. Myth busts useless forecasting and ideologies. He doesn’t come up with solutions but states facts essential to making informed decisions.
    21. Follow the River: James Alexander Thorn. A fascinating and inspiring story about Mary Ingles’ escape from the Shawnee. Average novel though.
    22. How to Cook a Wolf: M.F.K. Fisher. Funny, dry and witty account of how to eat on a budget. Written in 1942 and revised 10 years later, it has useful tips for today.
    23. The Silver Branch: Rosemary Sutcliff. Children’s novel set in Roman Britain. Entertaining.
    24. A Writer’s Journal Workbook: Lucy Van Smit. Outstanding series of exercises and practices that helped me immensely find ‘my voice.’ I had low expectations and was pleased to be blown away. Truly wonderful and deep.
    25. Consider the Lobster: David Foster Wallace. Mind-bending, thought-provoking essays about a range of subjects. Dense footnotes require a magnifying glass! Interesting accounts on the McCain campaign trail, American English usage and talk show radio. Excellent.
    26. The Heisenberg Principle: Frank Herbert. Short SF novel about genetic engineering and immortality.
    27. 52 Ways to Walk: Annabel Streets. Well-researched series of short articles that are a welcome break from ‘step-counting.’ Some good ideas for those that like to get out.
    28. On Purpose Leadership: Dominick Quartuccio. A poor mishmash of soundbites and anecdotes. There are three or four good ideas but not worth a whole book.
    29. Ship of Strangers: Bob Shaw. Episodic SF novel. Easy to read and entertaining.
    30. Play Their Hearts Out: George Dohrmann. A sad, tragic and detailed account of a group of young basketball players who are exploited, and sold false dreams whilst their coach becomes a millionaire.
    31. On the Beach: Nevil Shute. Classic dystopian novel. The plot is excellent but the writing is a bit stilted.
    32. The British and Irish Short Story Handbook: David Malcolm. Published in 2010, this gives an overview of the development of the short story, its genres, major contributors and analysis of key works. Very useful to help find great authors and their works.
    33. The Constant Gardener: John Le Carre. Excellent thriller about Big Pharma in Africa and corruption within the British Government.
    34. Imagine If…: Ken Robinson and Kate Robinson. Enlightening and inspirational précis of Robinson’s work on creativity and education.
    35. The Thinking Body: Mabel Ellsworth Todd. A classic physiotherapist text from the 1930s. Lots of good analogies and ideas but little practical advice.
    36. Endless Shadow: John Brunner. Short, confusing, SF novel from 1964.
    37. The Arsenal of Miracles: Gardner F. Fox. Mish-mash SF novel from 1964, sexist by today’s standards and a far too convenient ending.
    38. How We Learn to Move: Rob Gray. Very good account of how athletes learn skills. Great case studies and research used.
    39. American Rust: Philipp Meyer. Family drama novel set in post-industrial Pennsylvania. Excellent exploration of the relationship between two friends who have to deal with the consequences of one mistake.
    40. Another Now: Yanis Varoufakis. A thinly disguised fiction piece about an alternative to our money-grubbing capitalist society. Thought-provoking.
    41. Write it all down: Cathy Rentzenbrink. Disappointing fluff about writing a memoir.
    42. How to be Animal: Melanie Challenger. A look at how humans are animals. Instead of exceptional beings with ‘souls’ and therefore no more important than any other being. Except to ourselves.
    43. Italian Folktales: Italo Calvino. Huge tome of traditional tales compiled and retold by Calvino. The footnotes are excellent. One to be read in chunks.
    44. Disorder: Helen Thompson. Outstanding overview of how our modern geopolitical mess had evolved. Thompson covers three areas: Fossil fuel dependency and the wars around it; financial and monetary policy of the Western democracies (above my brain capacity); and the failure of democracies and how they lead to an autocratic elite. Puts context into our everyday lives.
    45. Maid: Stephanie Land. An autobiographical account of a single mother trying to break out of the poverty trap. Superbly written, heart-warming, despairing and inspiring.
    If you have any further suggestions, please leave them in the comments section below.

    Happy reading.

    My recommended reading list for sports coaches and p.e. teachers.

  6. 3 Take Home Lessons from GAIN 2022

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    GAIN conference 2022
    The GAIN attendees on the track

    I have just returned from Vern Gambetta’s GAIN conference at Rice University, Houston. This was my 9th time attending this event.

    It is a mixture of practical workshops, lectures and small group discussions between sports coaches, athletic trainers, strength and conditioning coaches, athletic development coaches, administrators and at least one professional athlete.

    ‘So what?’ You might say.

    What is different at GAIN is the sheer enthusiasm and desire to learn and share ideas ‘off-piste.’ I relish the chance to catch up with consummate professionals who have shaped my career over the last 11 years. I also meet excellent new people every year that teach me something new or offer advice on solving problems that I encounter.

    The jet lag was a killer this year: my body clock seemed stuck in the mid-Atlantic all week. That made anything after 1700 hours a blur. The good news was that the early morning sessions were a blast. My roommate, Andy Stone, and I always get to the track at 0530 to train: an hour before we have to coach.

    Others join us and we come up with some ideas that riff on what others have taught or that we have developed over the years. You can see a sample in the video below:

    Some of the impromptu learning that happens before sunrise at GAIN

    3 Lessons and Take Home Messages

    Everyone likes a list and a key ‘takeaway’ (as if that can replace investing hours of time learning and sharing), so here are some of mine. I shall post a couple of more detailed reviews in the near future.

    1. The importance of variability within training.

     Dr Grace Golden (University of Oregon) gave another excellent presentation on structuring injury rehabilitation. Grace uses Rudolf Laban’s ideas of a movement framework (amongst other sound coaching principles) to create minor variations within exercises: Repetition Without Repetition (RWOR).

    e.g. Instead of doing 3 x10 forward lunges, Grace gets athletes to change an aspect of the movement either every rep or every few reps. This could be an arm position, a foot angle, the distribution of weight, adding an implement, or receiving and passing an object.

    This prepares athletes for the infinite movement possibilities that they will encounter in the cauldron of competition rather than just getting them better at lunges.

    Take home message for me: Add a variation for each set when we do dbell exercises for our beginner groups rather than 5 sets of the same and then changing it the following week.

    2.              Identifying challenges and threats.

    Steve with me and the new book.

    Steve Magness gave a talk based on his new book ‘Do Hard Things‘. Instead of outdated, macho ideas of ‘beasting’ players, toughness can be developed through support and preparation.

    One part of the presentation resonated with me. People often see situations as either a threat or a challenge. They appraise the difficulty of the situation and their ability to handle it.

     I recalled a recent competition where some of our athletes were eager to get on the track and warmed up on their own while a couple shrunk into their skins and looked as if they wanted the ground to swallow them up. Some looked forward to the challenge, the others might have felt threatened.

    Take home message for me: Sit down with our athletes and chat about upcoming competitions. I can help them prepare for the challenge or deal with the perceived threat. I know it’s simplistic, but it is a starting point for a conversation.

    3. Using drop-in microcircuits.

    Nick Garcia coached an excellent gym session before explaining his underpinning philosophy in a clear and concise lecture. Nick uses 3 modules of training with his high school athletes that are categorised by movement. Each module has 3 exercises that are performed in rotation.

    Nick Garcia sharing the good stuff.

    e.g. Module 3:

    · Exercise 1: Hinge/hip/ posterior chain exercise.

    · Exercise 2: Upper body push.

    · Exercise 3: Mobility.

    Within those categories, Nick adjusts the exercise according to the sport. An offensive tackle might do heavy bench press and a volleyball player might do dbell push press.

    Nick deals with large groups of students and has to be very organised to ensure that everyone gets as much done as they can within 40 mins. This shows in his work.

    Take home message for me: A lot can be done in less than 10 minutes if the exercises are clearly explained and are familiar to the athletes. I can create a few ‘quick wins’ modules that I can use with certain groups.

    Brain Pickings.

    I have given a very brief snapshot of some ideas that I am going to implement at our club and in my coaching. Over the next few weeks I shall review my notes and do some deeper reflection. There were several excellent lectures that require further thought.

    I also had some specific questions or problems that I needed help with. I knew whose brains I wanted to pick.

    · Brian Fitzgerald: Coached an excellent warm-up for sprinters and I asked him a LOT of questions about his cues and session organisation.

    Coach Radcliffe sharing some of his hurdles wisdom.

    · Jim Radcliffe: he gave me a short master class in the high hurdles. If he can get an old duffer like me moving over them, then I am sure his methods will help our club athletes. I was buzzing after that lesson.

    · Nick Garcia: gave up his valuable lunch hour to coach me on rotational throws. Our club athletes are keen to throw shot and discus and I needed to know more to help them. Nick broke down the progressions and made me do them time and again until he thought I was nearly there. This will be invaluable.

    Summary

    Thanks to Vern for inviting me over. This was another great event, all the more for not having been run since 2019. I lost count of the number of interesting conversations I had over breakfast, lunch and dinner, as well as in breaks and late in the evening.

    Thanks to Xavier for the maple syrup, Chris Webb for the Indian Clubs and to everyone else for sharing their ideas and enthusiasm with me.

    I hope I can distil the information and help our athletes improve further.

  7. Beware the Sirens

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    Odysseus was able to resist the call of the Sirens by having his sailors tie him to the mast. They stuffed their ears with wax so as to avoid being called to sail onto the rocks and be wrecked.

    Odysseus hears the Sirens

    Odysseus listened to their beautiful song but his ship stayed on course because of the strength of the bonds and the mast.

    The Siren calls of social media ‘influencers’ and ‘experts’ are tempting many young athletes to be dashed upon rocky shores. I am constantly being asked, ‘have you seen YouTuber Billy Bob who says that we should do exercise Y?’ or ‘Instagrammer Chuck says there are 24 points to remember while doing a snatch.’

    ‘No,’ is my answer to all of them.

    My mast was built from being coached by excellent coaches, practising for thousands of hours, and undergoing the arduous (and often repetitive) task of gaining coaching qualifications.

    I can resist the Siren call of big words like ‘Conjugate sequencing’ and ‘Bulgarian/Russian/ Chinese/German training methods because I have learned my trade.

    Unfortunately, beginners are easily swayed by fancy websites, podcasts and social media images. They have yet to realise that perhaps the best coaches do not have time to cultivate a social media presence: they are too busy coaching and working on their craft.

    The young athletes have no filter: their mast is a flimsy paper origami boat that gets buffeted by every breeze, every ripple and the weakest of tidal fads. They would be better off finding a good coach.

    3 things to look for in a coach

    There is no substitute for being coached by an expert coach. Go there with an ’empty cup’ ready to learn.

    1: Some coaches have got lucky and coached a freak athlete: their ‘Golden Ticket’. Look for someone who has coached more than one decent athlete, someone who has had many experiences and can adapt their training philosophy to the person in front of them.

    2: Are they qualified? Some coaches say they don’t have time or energy to get qualified, but the process of undergoing coach education and learning is a lifelong one. If they qualified 20 years ago, are they still undergoing professional development? The qualifications don’t always make you a better coach but the attitude to learning is important.

    3. Do they answer your enquiries within a week? Don’t expect replies instantaneously or at weekends or late at night: they are unlikely to be on Snapchat and have lives to live. Are they welcoming to beginners? I think they should be because every athlete starts somewhere. That doesn’t mean you contact the National Coach and demand to be taught! A respectful reply and a signpost to the right training session are courteous.

    Anyone who is ‘too good’ to do that, or forces you to undergo an initiation or expensive signup fee at the start should be avoided.

    James training at HAWFC

    Three recommended weightlifting clubs.

    I built my mast, and had it reinforced, at these three clubs:

    • Crystal Palace Weightlifting Club: Coach Keith Morgan.
    • Oxford Power Sports: Coach Marius Hardiman.
    • Holyhead and Anglesey Weightlifting and Fitness Club: Coach Ray Williams.

    I would happily send my children to those coaches, and that is the highest recommendation I can give.

    All have a social media presence, but none of them spends their lives on there!

  8. How to start weightlifting pt3: your first competition

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    Your first weightlifting competition.

    The snatch

    Entering your first competition is a big step for every weightlifter. Every single Olympic weightlifter has had to enter as a beginner at some point. Whilst you may not be able to control your nerves, and you can’t control what the other entrants are lifting, you can prepare yourself by eliminating silly mistakes.

    Competition overview

    Weightlifting, like boxing and wrestling, is divided into different weight categories. Men and women compete in different groups and they are further sub-divided into youth and masters.

    In smaller competitions, you may find yourself lined up with people a lot younger or older or even heavier, but the results only count against your category. Usually, 6-8 people are lifting in the same group.

    Each lifter has to weigh in with an official 2-3 hours before their group is due to start. The lifters have a warm-up area to prepare for their first lift. They are called to the competition platform and their names are announced to the spectators about ten minutes before the first lift is due.

    The lifters share one competition platform and the lightest load is lifted first. The weights are continually added to the bar until each lifter in the group has attempted the snatch three times. You might lift three times in succession or you might have to wait for 5 to 8 lifts as other lifters make their attempts. If you are following yourself, you will have a 2-minute rest, if you are following another lifter, you will have a 1-minute rest.

    The same process is repeated with the clean and jerk. If you fail an attempt you can either stay on the same weight or choose to go up. You can never go lighter!

    The winner is the person who has lifted the most weight combined in snatch and clean and jerk.

    A presentation is held shortly after the competition finishes.

    There are three technical officials who judge whether your lift is successful, or not. This is now done electronically and you will hear a buzzer and see 3 white lights for success or red lights for failure. You just need two white lights for it to count. If the electronics fail, then the judges will use a flag system.

    Control the controllable

    Some of our club weightlifters after they got their personal bests.

    This has become a cliche amongst sports psychologists but, watching one of our recent weightlifting club‘s ‘Personal Best’ nights, I was gobsmacked about how ill-prepared some of the young people were.

    This is why we run these sessions: it allows the novices to make mistakes and learn on their ‘home turf (platforms)’. They can then improve and prepare better for the time they enter their first licensed competition.

    Here is a checklist of things that are within your control:

    • Enter the competition early (they sell out fast).
    • Arrive on time (plan your route, know the start time, allow for delays).
    • Make your weight. Only enter the category that you know you can make weight for. Know this in advance and lose weight gradually if you have to.
    • Have a drink and snack ready. If you have had to skip a meal to make the weight, have something ready to eat before you compete. Never rely on finding something at a competition venue.
    • Don’t chew gum (can’t believe I have to write this). You can choke on it.
    • Know your opening lifts. You have to declare this on the competition entry and also when you arrive. You are allowed to adjust this by a maximum of 20kg on both lifts combined before you lift. I.e. if you declare an opening snatch of 60kg and clean and jerk of 80kg, (140kg total) you can adjust to a 120kg or 160kg total depending on how you feel on the day.
    • Have all your weightlifting kit packed and prepared. Check the competition rules to see if you need a singlet or not. You will always need weightlifting shoes.
    • Know your personal bests and what you aim to lift on the day (some people don’t know what they lift!).

    Dealing with the uncontrollable

    Stanley, our club mascot.

    There are certain things you can’t control: the schedule, the weigh-in times and how much your opponents are lifting. The order in which you make your attempts is constantly changing as the other lifters adjust their attempts. You could wait 2 minutes, or have to wait 10 minutes between lifts: this is disconcerting and you might have to get an extra warm-up lift in.

    But, if you have everything else in control, you are better able to focus on the bar and make your lifts. The audience is respectful at competitions and wants to see good lifts. If you are fit and prepared, then be confident and lift the weight above your head. It’s that simple.

    Summary

    It is a good idea to go along to a competition to see how the format works. You can volunteer as a loader (always needed) or cheer your club mates on.

    Otherwise, get used to lifting in front of an audience at your club, and replicate the countdowns and the 6 attempts. This will help you understand the process. Enjoy your first weightlifting competition.

  9. Free the children

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    Which cheetah looks happiest?

    Have you been to a zoo recently? You might see a collection of animals behind bars. They have some space to roam but, for the likes of the speedy cheetahs, not enough to get up to full speed and hunt.

    They were born to do this.

    I have written previously about the stunted development of kittens when their movement is restricted in a lab setting.

    Imagine how the cheetah in the zoo feels: pining against his primal urges, wishing to unleash himself and test his speed against the wildlife of the plains.

    Would anyone disagree that the natural, uncaged environment is best for this, and many other animals, as long as mankind stops destroying their habitats?

    Why do you imprison your children?

    Let children run and move outside

    There has been a trend in recent years to ‘professionalise’ high school sports. This often means trying to copy what is seen at the college or professional sports level. Or, what is perceived to be done at those levels.

    This has meant that high schools have literally put cages into their gyms: calling them ‘Power cages’ (sic) does nothing to diminish the fact that movement is restricted.

    No one calls the cheetah enclosure, a ‘power enclosure’ (not yet, anyway). The limited definition of most ‘S&C’ coaches confuses ‘power’ with ‘force’ and this means increasing ‘power’ by adding load to the young athlete.

    Quick physics reminder

    P=(fxd)/t

    Power = (force x distance)/ time.

    Power will increase if you do things further and faster, not just adding more load to increase force.

    ‘The problem is NOT that athletes have too great a spatial awareness.’ Sprint Coach Vince Anderson.

    Cages restrict movement and limit speed: the two things that young athletes need to develop. The ‘S&C’ ‘coach’ can justify the expense of the cage by showing how much more mass the young people are moving. Despite the fact that it is slow and has limited range. The environment dictates and limits the scope of programming.

    These environments have been dominated by American Football (US) and rugby (Commonwealth countries) and ignore sports where moving external mass (another human, heavy objects) is not part of the sport.

    Fencing, badminton, tennis, hockey, soccer, netball, basketball and squash, to name a few, require fast, agile, coordinated athletes (The d and t of the power equation).

    If you are training young athletes, then think of how they can improve their speed, coordination, agility and range, often at the same time. How does putting them in a cage help?

    Free the children, free your mind. Break the shackles of groupthink.

    Further reading: force, power and acceleration. A summary of Jack Blatherwick’s presentation at GAIN

  10. Book review: How the World Really Works by Vaclav Smil.

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    It’s rare nowadays that I add a book to my recommended reading list. Not because I don’t read much, it’s mainly because of a lot of rehashed ideas that are repackaged and branded as new.

    Highly recommended

    Not this one.

    Subtitled, ‘A Scientist’s Guide to Our Past, Present and Future,’ Smil does an excellent job of covering big important topics that are essential to keeping humanity fed, sheltered and breathing (amongst other things).

    Refreshingly, Smil presents extensively referenced data and information without an underpinning ideology. i.e. instead of starting from a commonly polarised perspective (Big State vs Small State, Vegan vs Paleolithic, Catastrophe versus Cornucopia), he presents the information and then either picks holes in the ideology or supports some of what they are saying.

    Quality information is a starting point for making good decisions: in any profession.

    Big topics that are important

    The chapter headings are:

    1. Understanding Energy (Fuels and electricity).
    2. Understanding Food Production (Eating fossil fuels).
    3. Understanding Our Material World (The four pillars of modern civilisation*).
    4. Understanding Globalisation (Engines, Microchips and Beyond).
    5. Understanding Risks (From Viruses to Diets to Solarflares).
    6. Understanding the Environment (The only biosphere we have).
    7. Understanding the Future (Between apocalypse and singularity).

    * Ammonia, steel, plastics, concrete.

    These are big, important topics. Not pretend important topics such as ‘polarised training versus block periodisation’ or ‘moving to an e-commerce model of good and services’ but forgetting how much we need toilet paper.

    When I read this book, it automatically applied a bullshit filter to the amount of nonsense that is mentioned on social media: petty arguments about diddlysquat that sap energy and valuable brain space from tackling complex and important issues.

    On Forecasting.

    Smil is particularly critical of modelling and forecasting. It is easy to programme numbers into a model and come up with convenient numbers that allow forecasters to predict whatever they want. Conveniently, all climate change models end on dates ending in 5s or 0s.

    The inability of governments to understand what is happening now, let alone what is going to happen in 3 or 7 years’ time, means that we were caught with our pants down when Covid hit (and, after this book was published, Russia invaded Ukraine).

    An example of a forecast gone wrong, and that did not last the publication of the book, was Smil saying that, usually, population forecasts are some of the most accurate because they are based on extensive demographic data.

    ‘For example, The UNs 2019 population forecast for the year 2030 has Poland’s total (37.9 million in 2020) declining to 36.9 million with the low and high variant departing +/- 2% from the mean, and (barring mass immigration that is highly unlikely in such an immigration-averse country) there is a very high probability that the actual 2030 count will be within that narrow range.’ p27

    Of course, mass immigration has happened with over 1.5 million Ukrainian refugees seeking shelter in Poland over the last 2 weeks.

    Summary

    If you want a book that explains how and where your food, goods and energy comes from and how that is likely to change (or not) in the future then this book is for you. I would also recommend it for anyone who is struggling to cut through hyperbole about any ‘trend’ or ‘solution’ to our planet’s needs.

    Buy it from your Independent bookshop here (or visit your local library).