The year is 3014 by Tony Riddle A.K.A @theprepdoctor

I can’t STAND for this anymore by Tony Riddle



I have had a few comments on how extreme I can be, specially after sawing my sofa in two at home and throwing it away. I always have to explain that it is my choice and just because I am different, this doesn't make me extreme. 

You too might have a different opinion If you actually did your own research into the affects of seated posture and how detrimental it is to your movement system.



Imagine this scene:



The year is 3014 and you are at a seminar about mother natures amazing ability to heal and how Man potentially threatened their own existence.



You are in a completely clear glass room, yet can still take in the surrounding trees and beautifully natural scenery. You are able to absorb Vitamin D and smell nature, but yet protected from the harsher elements. There isn’t one chair in the room and all of the participants at the seminar are either kneeling, squatting, or striking thinking poses, it’s ground transition central.



The lecturer is presenting you with facts that Man became so obsessed by technological advances that they neglected their own complex design and threatened civilisation as we knew it..



He explains:


“There was once a time when humans were controlled and propaganda was rife. An uprising had occurred for returning us back to nature, but those involved were cast out for being too extreme. The organisation had threatened their world and the fear of loosing their comfort and their highly addictive food groups had created a huge emotional reaction. The organism had become weak and easily manipulated. They were addicted to a lifestyle that was creating sick victims and they were given false hope of magic cures.”


“Cancer was a very different disease back in 2014 and people didn’t understand that there was no cure as such. They piled money into charities, huge amounts of money, when all along those organisations knew that the only cure was prevention. They knew you had to return back to a natural lifestyle, start moving naturally, eating natural organic produce, sleeping correctly and have proper spiritual connection with our Mother.”

“Instead they carried on, compromising their organism, disrespecting themselves in a form of self hatred. Their most common form of surgery was the gastric band. The band was fitted so that they could keep eating their industrialised food groups. Some were so over weight that they had to use a form of transport to move 100m”.



The lecturer shoots a huge image of a chair into the sky with his 3d projector and the room gasps!


“ Yes this is a chair, along with the industrialised food groups these were the main culprits for of our demise”

“Today you can squat anywher and there are no chairs, but back then you didn’t even have an option, you had to sit. Even when studies showed how detrimental seated posture was to the health of the organism, you still didn’t get a choice. There wasn’t even an area to squat in! Before they took smoking out of restaurants you had an option to be on the smoking side or the non smoking side, but when sitting was compared to be the new smoking in terms of health issues. They still had no option, but to sit and frowned upon If you were to squat.”


“We had taken away all of what we are capable of today, the chair was creating a stagnant race. Our ankles, knees, lower backs and our posture were all affected by this beast. We had literally become sitting targets and it was of little wonder why we had become so threatened as a species. We had done to ourselves what no other species would have dreamed of doing. We had fed ourselves fake indigestible food groups that were unrecognisable by natures design and then taken away our amazing and unique ability to mimic movements of mother natures animals. Loosing site that no other animal can impersonate another the way we can.”

“We can become the Duck, the cheater, the lizard, the fish. A fish can only be a fish, a cat a cat, a lizard a lizard. Instead they would sit in a chair that had no overlapping advantages into any of our natural movement patterns.”

“Yes this is hard to believe my children, but it is true. We now take for granted our great movement equality, but believe me; most couldn’t even walk or run correctly and had to be coached in how to move and eat”

“When they finally invaded we didn’t stand much chance, with the inability to move or defend ourselves and the lack of basic survival skills we were sitting ducks.”


“Our only saviour was that small minority that hadn’t fallen for the Bull Shit and had chosen to move and eat how nature had intended. The very people that our anscestors had cast out for being extremist would come to our rescue. They were once looked at as if they were crazy for playing out in nature, whilst the other kids were locked in their cage like bedrooms, disconnected from one another. These uncompromised 'WARRIORS" were preparing themselves for an event such as this. You see they knew, if you take away mans ability to defend himself, or move then they are weak and vulnerable, this is how you bread a nation of worriers."

"It had taken us a long time for us to make the change, but once the big ego's finally put their hands up admitted they were wrong it was a inevitable that the change had to occur. We soon realised that we had become both the slave and the slave master. The New Nature Order hadn't wanted us to revert right back to hunter gatherer roots and forget all about the things we had been successful with, they just wanted to drop all the things that were draining our planet, both spiritually and weakening our our defences. They had given us the true meaning of a "SELF DEFENCE" and that is when it dawned on us, that the "Creating Warriors not Worrier" approach wasn't about creating an attacking army".


"If anything, we have learnt that it is O.K to make technological advances, but we must maintain our connection with nature. Nature really does have the answers. We are smart, but only when we are nature smart"!

Tony Riddle  A.K.A @theprepdoctor

Have you created a victim? by Tony Riddle A.K.A @theprepdoctor

by Gloves founder Tony Riddle

Are you being victimised by your soft surroundings?

You wake up at 6.30, in your Super King size bed, put on your Ugg slippers to walk across the shag pile carpet, down the stairs and sit and eat breakfast - yes, you are a victim.

In a desperate attempt to have what you think everyone should have, you have created a softer, weaker self, enslaved in comfort and poor choices.

Yeah the bed, the slippers and the shag pile are great, but then there's the sofa, the washing machine, tumble drier, dishwasher, car that goes to the car wash... And yet we are obsessed by physical exercise and weight loss. Take all of this away and what have you learnt?

When was the last time you gave the car a good wash and a Mr Miyagi "wax on wax off"? I'm guessing a while ago, and I bet you worked up a sweat and earned your lunch.

Soft seating and cushioned footwear are no different to the softening of our environment, and with that we have become victims. The more compliant the surface, the stiffer you become. Make your floor cushioned and rubberised and you will lose the ability to move around on hard surfaces with stealth like accuracy. Sit or slouch on a compliant sofa/couch and you will stiffen and create stagnation in all the areas that you are designed to move from.  Unfortunately with this, you will start to load areas of the body that are not designed for load and become fearful and start chasing pain, going from one practitioner to another. Trying to find a cure for the list of aches and pains you have developed, when really, you are the one at blame and prevention is better than cure.

PracticingYoga, guess what! Take the marketed mat away and they are f$%ked. Let's not forget the spiritual aspect of the yogi. Really spiritual: coffee morning at Starbucks, driving your 4x4 to your poorly lit, air conditioned practice in your Lululemon clothing - now that's spiritual!

You marvel at the way toddlers move around on the floor with ease and not a grimace in sight, but you too could once move this way. Yes, it is a skill, one that you had, and lost, but one that can be programmed back in. It can be done. It will involve you moving around on the ground and using ground transitions and avoiding the soft sofa.

The problem is, it will involve you getting out of your comfort zone. A tough pill for the subconscious to swallow. The thought of taking away your comfort will induce an emotional response called anxiety, and to take away this feeling of anxiety the subconscious will sabotage you and fill what little conscious thought you have with complete an utter nonsense.

"What no Sofa, what will the neighbours think"!

If you really want to get your physical, social and spiritual needs met then start looking and mimic a child's movement and play, instead of letting them mimic our compromised lifestyle. Monkey see, monkey do. Get out the house and climb, jump, crawl, run and wrestle in nature. Move the way they do and don't fall for the crazy notion that a pervert is going to pick them up the moment your back is turned whilst in the woods.  Remember there are more perverts on the Internet than there are in your local woodland and you don't seem to have a problem with letting them sit in their cage of a room scrolling the internet,  when they should be out there at one with tumbling and rolling.

Create a 'Warrior' not a 'Worrier' by Tony Riddle A.K.A @theprepdoctor

by Tony Riddle, Gloves Club founder

After having children I have become really selective in the information or software that I choose to upload into their system. Yes that's right: I look at my children as a system and hopefully after you read this, you might do too!

Memes, or programmes that are uploaded into the mind can have positive or negative affects. Lets take books before bedtime as an example.

Zoo baby?

My wife loved a series of books, called The Large Family. The books looked great on the surface and feature a family of loving elephants, but scratch away at that surface and it's a feast of cake and inactive lifestyles that are corrupting the minds of my beautifully crafted natural eaters and movers. Had these books fed a positive message of the elephants returning back to what they do naturally then it wouldn't be such a catastrophe that has resulted in them entering "Room 101".

The message is one that tells my girls that it's too hard to work out or eat well, and work is stressful, and the parent elephants shouldn't be parents at all, that they are simply too selfish and uneducated for the needs of their children. Children don't need to know what a diet is - the term itself is a bad programme. Just because mummy elephant is troubled with her weight doesn't mean she needs to feed her child up to look the same. Surely she could look at how she got in that state and would see that this is exactly what not to do to her own.

One of the books shows how the mum is trying to loose weight and bans bad food. No cake or biscuits for anyone, but finds herself at midnight drawn to the fridge and caving into eating cake. When weakness calls she finds herself in the kitchen and the whole family are there devouring the cake too. The food groups that were bad are now proven to be desirable and you can't help but eat them. Great memes. Talk about a virus for the mind.

Exercise and diet haven't worked, it's too difficult, and it's OK to fail. Yes, great messages just before bed. It's of little wonder why I have such difficulty getting accurate food diaries out of my clients. How long have you been programmed into eating inflammatory foods and sugars?

Food choices - are you in control?

You have to understand that we have blank slates as children and you were once one too. These blank slates have hardwiring that has taken millions of years to sculpt, millions of years that have monumentally been destroyed and continue to be destroyed in a blink of an eye. The blank slate just keeps uploading our information. We are their tribal elders, they learn from us. Our movements, our foods, our conversations and we are products of our parents and schooling. We need to take responsibility not only for our actions, but for our parents actions too and look at the disastrous state of humanity.

"We did what we were born to do, what we were trained to do."

Spartans. "We did what we were born to do, what we were trained to do."

As a result of programming, these great warriors were able to overcome great and traumatic situations. The news that the current zoo human is incapable of carrying out a fundamental movement such as walking or running for a bus is an insult to what these great organisms produced but again, training the mind should take presidence. If we all had to undergo an education in the fundamental needs of the organism, maybe we would not see the pathologies that we do today.

Q: What are you trained to do?
A: Simply what you are programmed to do.

I'm not saying reenact the scenes from 300, but simply be mindful of what you're trying to achieve. If you put as much effort into the food groups and fundamental movement patterns and play as you do with your child's academic results then they will become a far more successful self.

Create a "warrior" not a "worrier".

Teaching old dogs new tricks by Tony Riddle A.K.A @theprepdoctor

by Tony Riddle, Gloves Club founder

I once took a course with the ABA ASDAN award, when the course was set up to offer local kids the opportunity to acquire credits towards their GCSE in boxing. It was a great incentive for young kids who were having trouble with their education to gain an extra qualification. 

The ABA course tutor was called Quiton Shillingford (Managing Director Boxing Awards), Q for short. Q is a well respected individual with a great teaching method and with all courses you hope to come away with a real pearl of wisdom on how to improve. On this occasion I was not disappointed - the pearl was something very valuable indeed as importantly, I learnt what not to do.

You see, Q had a great story of his first experience with boxing. Q began to explain that he was a real Jack the lad, always in out and of trouble, and so on this particular occasion Q and his three friends decided they should take up boxing and pay a visit to their local boxing club. They got as far as the door and bailed out, ran away and hid behind a wall. Q, bold as brass, decides it's his moment and poking his head in the door, he approached the owner.  “Excuse me Mister”, Q begins to say, and it was at this point that stupidity and big testicles won the day. Q found himself thrown in the ring, with absolutely no understanding of boxing, and it was obvious what the outcome would be. Q wasn’t to win and it was only stupidity that allowed him to go back again and again.

Gloves members sparring under the watchful eye of Coach Tony

This lesson that stuck with me and it is one of the reasons at Gloves we have a system in place that will ensure you will never have to go through that initial humiliation/annihilation that so many have had to endure when being educated in the sweet science. 

The method of chucking someone in the ring with your best middleweight is great for assessing raw talent and humiliating the poor not-so-talented contender, but think of how much talent is being missed and where we would be if we were all coached in the fundamentals of movement at grass roots. For me 80% of boxing is footwork, then you have to learn to throw the ten punches, move in four directions and then finally the defence of those ten punches before you enter the ring. For some this journey will seem like an eternity, but for me it is essential. When in fight or flight mode you will be amazed what knee jerk reactions can and will be applied.

My memory of learning the ten punches meant a jolly to Pasedena Texas with my cousin, Lee Saxby, to train with the great Kenny Weldon. Kenny, the world's best balance and technique coach, had a great system in his gym - a huge warehouse where you would carry out drills for days on end until he felt you were ready to even hit hand pads. The hierarchy for Kenny was footwork and being a purist he knew his stuff. Some of the terminology was a little strange, but as it turned out, we all spoke the same language. 

I remember a conversation I had with Lee whilst walking back from Kenny's about predictability and it is something that stuck with me. If you had an apple on a table and you pick that apple up, your mind will have made a picture, a mental map. If you were to keep placing the apple in what you perceive as the same area and keep repeating the process, your mind will have already predicated its next move, based on the preservation of energy and minimising the risk of injury. There would be tiny little adjustments that you would have no idea had even occurred. If you then add a lion into the equation (Roar!), the movement pattern would be grossly affected, unless of course someone had coached in the fundamental movement patterns on how to slay the ferocious beast. It’s a very simple process - if you haven’t been given the tools to deal with the job in hand, you are being dealt a handicap and I don’t know about you, but I would much prefer to learn how to slay than be slayed.

Kenny teaching boxing fundamentals

This is what we shall refer to as our default and a default is something you will keep drawing upon unless it has been thoroughly coached out. If Q for instance became the guy cowering in the corner, then that would have been his first memory of the sweet - or in this case - not so sweet science. His survival brain would have made a mental picture of that event and the moment that he stepped into the ring again, he would expect to have a rise in blood pressure, heart rate, tension and unfortunately the same knee jerk cowering. If we had nurtured Q from an early age, made every experience a positive and gave him the footwork, the arsenal of weapons and more importantly, the defence to deal with his slayer he would have a completely different default to fall back on.

You don’t want your initial reaction when under pressure to be to wave your arms around like a human windmill or to cower in the corner. It is the survival brain that will be making all the decisions at this stage and it is my belief that neither are good skills to draw upon in the ring. You need to remain calm under pressure; trembling in your boots or turning into a bag of rage are not the best attributes a boxer can obtain. You might have heard of the term you can’t teach an old dog new tricks...For me it is simply a default model that has become a mental map of the past and will have an astounding influence on the predictability of any future movements. It is the same with the selection of the strength and conditioning exercises you prescribe which should overlap into the discipline, the same care and time conditioning should be coached for the emotional experience.


Slay or be slayed!