Stuart McMillan
ALTIS CEO
The Shuffle Start & Goodhart’s Law: when good enough is good enough
The so-called shuffle start has been making waves in the last few years, especially among elite circles [and most-especially in the United States]. It is characterized by a low projection angle from the blocks, an ultra-low heel recovery [often seen as a toe-drag], and a high step frequency. This may be a controversial take, but I’ve long believed that this...
The Paradox of Performance: Power Meets Grace
The performance of an athlete, in its most exquisite form, is a dynamic interplay of power and grace. A spectacle that mesmerizes us as it seamlessly blends fluidity with ferocity, combines violence with peace, and merges aggression with elegance. It's an art form where strength and subtlety coexist, creating a harmonious symphony of human potential. There's a reason Ali's motto...
The Nested Dynamics of Speed: Lessons from Russian Dolls
Russian dolls, known as Matryoshka dolls, are hollow wooden figurines originating from Russia. They nest inside each other, with the smallest doll at the center. They are adorned with vibrant colors and intricate designs. Matryoshka dolls symbolize family, generations, and Russian culture. They are collected and cherished worldwide as decorative items. But what the heck have they got to do...
Embracing the Unknown: The Island of Knowledge and Coaching
Recently, I reread Marcelo Gleiser's great book, ‘The Island of Knowledge: The Limits of Science and the Search for Meaning,’ and — as always with almost every book I read — reflected upon its implications in sport performance and coaching. One of the primary themes in the book is that of ‘embracing ignorance’. Gleiser argues that the acquisition of knowledge...
Meet the neighbors
How often do you speak to your neighbors? Do you even know them? Research shows that most Americans don’t trust their neighbors. Why not? And what has this to do with speed, you ask? Today we will discuss the relevance of an increasingly isolated world, and how that might affect your understanding of lots of things as they relate to...
Struggling with skill
I alluded to this a few weeks back, and promised I was going to get back to it — which is what I’ll do today: talk about speed, why we should treat it with the respect it deserves, and how — through understanding one simple rule — you can better teach it. So first, the rule: speed is both a...
alligator boogaloo
I wrote the following short piece well over a decade ago -- back when I first started sharing my thoughts publicly. I started a blog called 500words (this was prior to the old mcmillanspeed site), where every post had to be 500 words right on the nose. This was my 2nd or 3rd one -- and I share it here...
Stop Trying to ’Fix’ Athletes!
I’ve never been comfortable with the term ”corrective exercise”. In this short post, I’ll tell you why. When we stand back and look at the big picture, the challenge to improving the health and performance of athletes may seem overwhelming. How can we help athletes improve the quality of their movement with all the complexity and subjectivity that it entails? ...
Let’s Connect
Introducing our new Membership — ALTIS Connect We are re-imagining The ALTIS Membership. You might be familiar with ALTIS 360 — our on-line portal consisting of 100s of hours of amazing video content — ranging from presentations from our own staff and many of our expert friends from around the world, to behind the scenes training footage, to exclusive access...
Sprint Science Categorization
This short post is meant to accompany a two-part article I wrote for SportSmith HQ - where I updated my thoughts on my push-pull categorization. In sport, we use categories all the time: through placing things into categories (‘categorization’), we are better able to recognize, differentiate, and understand the complex systems we interact with. A number of categorization systems already...