Adam Haniver [00:00:29]:
Hello, everyone. Episode 111. Okay. So I'm gonna call this one the five c's of cornering. The let's see, five c's of cornering. Something that I came up with a while ago when just trying to make sense more of the process. Now, this is just my own thinking around what effective cornering is and rather than going into the whole deep psychology, I just want to go into this kind of a mnemonic, I suppose it is, the five c's of cornering. Just want to start with that. So what are those? First one is calm, then clean, chat, check, and encourage. Right? So if you're looking at the one encourage, I've shoehorned that one in with a big c on encourage. Calm, clean, chat, check, and encourage. So let's just go through those. So just before we actually do the whole part where we climbed into the ring and calm the box in the first c, Just a few little things I think is always useful to speak about. One is actually knowing whether the boxer wants to sit or stand, what are their preferences on that, and do they understand the physiology around how that will help them recover. Another thing as well is the boxer having their own towel, especially if you're at a show and you've got three or four boxers, especially your own home show, we don't wanna be wiping the boxer down with the same towel that you've had on the last three or four bouts as well, and there's blood, snot, sweats, and all sorts of God knows what all over that towel. Another little thing I found quite useful as well, if you think about it, is not to have a white towel. Now reason being is white shows blood, and if you're wiping blood all over the place, one it can make the boxer panic, and two, it might not just generally look good for the referee, etcetera, all these bits and pieces. So red, black often works quite well. If you need to throw it in, I understand the white towel is an easy one to see, but whenever I've thrown in the towel, I have to step up and just kind of wave it, that sort of thing. Anyway, just a few little asides before, we start. 

Right. So the first C, calm. So the boxer is knackered. They're absolutely knackered. So they're fatigued. There's elements of still fear playing in their brain, and when they're in that kind of fatigue state, sort of mentally highly aroused, they're very, very sort of less receptive at that immediate point. So their safe haven is to recover, is to breathe, recover before we even want to start talking about anything. So calm is a really important one, and that goes for the coach as well. So we need to manage our emotional state when we climb up those stairs and get through the ropes. We wanna do it quickly, but we need to do it calmly. And I think, the boxer reads into a lot of what your face says, what your body language says, the cadence of how quickly you're talking has massive impacts on their ability to relax, stay controlled, and then importantly, to start taking on information. Another thing I wanna put in this calm part, that also applies to the assistant coach. We've seen a few debacles in pro boxing. Obviously, the camera getting up very, very close. And right from there off, there's a million coaches in the corner shouting and screaming lots of different bits of information. One, that's ridiculous because they can't take it on anyway. But two, even if they were able to take on information, they're in a state at the right at that point where they've just returned to the corner where they want to prioritise recovery mentally and physically. Okay. So just a couple of things to think about there. So being calm for the boxer, your body language, your face says a lot. So let's just get them calm. So at that point, I don't really need to be saying much at all, if anything. Now one thing I wanna qualify is it's horses for courses. You need to know your boxer. That is one of the most important things. So it could be that actually from the start, I do wanna keep this intensity high, and I do wanna be kind of, like, in their face a little bit, but you have to know your boxer very, very well. But in general, I think a calm safe haven is important because you wanna actually prepare yourself to give good information over. And if you manage your state, that will work. 

Second C is clean. So we're wiping the face, we're clearing the eyes with the towel. Nobody wants sweat and things like that in the eyes, and it's uncomfortable. So if we're not wiping the face, clearing the eyes, then the boxer is gonna be not looking at you because they're gonna be blinking all the time, they're gonna be uncomfortable. Again, you're putting them in that kind of, flight or flight stage where they're not able to sort of think rationally. Cooling with the spray is always a nice one, just over the shoulders, dabbing with the towel. Some people like to do things like the ice pack on the back of the neck. So little things like that are great. And then we have all these different types of things that, you do see in the corner going on with the flapping the towel and different ways to do that just to get a bit more air to the boxer and help them cool. And these are all valid, different processes that we can use. But just that kind of clean we're offering a bit of water. Generally, when I boxed, I was offered one just to spit to rinse the mouth out, and then I'd have another sip just to kind of make sure I'm getting a bit more fluids on and my mouth's not bone dry. And that's great for breathing as well. So you'll be breathing quite heavy, so we don't wanna be breathing dry down our windpipe. Some boxers have a breathing process where coaches would mirror in front of them with their rib cage going up and down with the hands and palms facing up, up, down. So we're just doing that whole clean, stroke, calm process at the moment. So we're kind of two processes in. We've got the calm, the clean, and we're not even really started chatting yet. Now as I mentioned before, some people may wanna start chatting, but in terms of tactical information, I think we need to make sure that the boxes are ready first. The last thing I wanna be doing is throwing loads of water down their mouth in the calm stage. I remember spitting water out over people before because I hadn't recovered properly, and I've made that mistake in my earlier career as well. Boxers kinda like spluttering water out because all they wanna do is breathe. So we don't need to be offering that yet. 

So anyways, we've got to the third C, the chat part. So the chat also depends on what your analysis is during the round, And that can come from you, and it can come from your assistant coaches as well. I've also heard this, and I try and do this myself is where I will look at my boxer and think, what is it I need? What's the most important thing to have impact in that golden minute that I need to say about my boxer, but also having another eyes on the opponent and what is it their opponent's doing? Sometimes we just think what should our boxer do, but that should be tethered and coupled to the actions of what our opponent's doing. Maybe there's a mistake that their opponent's doing and we can exploit that. So maybe one coach looks at their boxer and the other coach looks at the opponent, and then we can have that decision of what are those two points ideally, three if need be, and if you know your boxer can take that information on. So two points ideally, but three if need be of what you're gonna say to the boxer. So the chat part is so important. Now less is more on here. So when we do chat, sometimes, again, it's personal preference, but I would like to get down quite low towards the boxer. So I've got good eye contact, and we've got that avenue or channel of communication where we're looking at each other, and I can see if the boxer's responding to what I'm saying. So one or two points three if you must, but it depends on the boxer as well. Very clear and concise. Ideally, we wanna be looking at almost anchor words. So rather than going, I need you to get on your jab and double your jab, it could be something very simple as jab, control the gap. Control the gap. So that less information is really important. And I think what we do there is we tie in that information to what we've been doing in the training as well. So that language and information is very consistent when we're bringing it into competition, so there is more sort of, cognitive space for them to actually process that information as opposed to lots of different words, information they haven't really considered, and you've not had that kind of dry dress rehearsal of that conversation. So anchoring the words to short and sharp behaviours becomes really important, but that does take a long time in the gym as well. And especially if you've been working with boxer for a long time, we can actually work on what those anchor words, look like. And, of course, during the round, it's the same. You can be using these anchor words to help remind us little points to bring the boxer back on to task. Okay. So that's the chat part, and I think that's where the really best coaches make their biggest impact. But if you think about the calm and the clean, that part also ensures that they are ready, open to that information and open to that chat. 

Okay. So the fourth one, and this is the one that I think most people don't do and probably need to. It's check. So we've gone calm, clean, chat. The next one is check. So checking for understanding, essentially. So we've given two points, maybe three points, and then we ask back, what are we going to do? What was the first thing we're gonna do? If the boxer can't articulate quickly to you what it is, possibly unlikely that they've actually understood what those instructions were because either they've not been calmed correctly or you don't have that kind of prior understanding between each other or relationship between each other where you've been developing that in training. So the check part is understanding what you're saying is about to have the impact that you want it to have tactically, technically in the ring in the next round to follow. So a little check might be, okay. So what's the first thing we need to do? Now the boxer may stumble over that, so we might need to be a little bit more specific. So we might need to say, what is the first thing we need to do with our front hand? And I said, oh, yeah. I need to use that. I need to use it with the hook, and I need to use the lead hand as a jab a little bit more. Okay. So we're still checking their understanding without giving them information. So I think a lot a problem a lot of people do is they reinforce they say it twice. So they might say, I need you to get on the jab a little bit more. And then later, I need you to get on the jab a little bit more. But that still doesn't mean that information has been understood and taken on board to then actually make the behavioural change in next round. So actually having that check question where you're slightly pushing them to recall that information, then you know that it's been taken on board. Now some people might be listening to this now and thinking that doesn't work for my boxer. It may not. They may be someone who purely needs to be told all the time and throw a lot of information that it is horses for courses. These are just general guidelines I feel, but sometimes we need to deviate from there because it's all about the boxer in front of us. But I always tend to have a little check at the end. So what is it gonna do? Tell me about your tell me about this. Tell me about that. Great. And if they don't understand or maybe they miss one, I will have that couple of seconds just to reinforce it. That yeah, okay, I've got it. I need to get on my lead hand a little bit more. Fine. Right. 

So the final C is, like I say, I've shoehorned it in a little bit, encourage. So that can come from both coaches. So for me, that's when both coaches can now jump in if they want to the person pulling the stool. The second can little slap on the heel as they go away. Come on. You can do this. Again, it might be some kind of anchor word or keyword that you've already worked on just to reinforce, a certain behaviour, but that that message needs to be consistent. So there is a little bit of encourage at the end, you know, we can do this. Come on. Push it back. We need this round. Give it everything you got. All those little motivational pieces to send them out into battle again. They're really important. Horses for the courses, but I think a good coach knows what type of encouragement to give. Let's go out on our shield type thing or if it's a bit more controlled and concise. It all depends upon that boxer in front of us. 

So there we go. It's calm, clean, chat, check, encourage. There are lots of different models out there, of course, and then lots of studies and showed that there are lots of ways to help this, but I feel that five C's there is just a nice simple way of scaffolding and helping the coach to understand a nice process, and that's gonna help their boxer. Try it in sparring. Make sure sparring looks like a bout sometimes so you can you can actually practice this. I think coaches don't really practice this. They only perform it, and there's a big difference between performance of what you're doing and practicing it. Getting feedback from the boxer, getting feedback from other coaches, I think this is a good process. So there we go. That is my rant on the five C's of calling. Calm, clean, chat, check, encourage. Love to hear your thoughts on what you do out there, what your process is. Great. Cheers, guys. Have a great day. Tada.