ABOUT HELEN

MY APPROACH

I have a lifelong habit of both enjoying movement and of analysing it, and I use my passion to help those stuck in chronic pain and injury patterns. I believe bodies are amazing and capable of Perpetual Forward Motion, - PFM - and I apply all my movement understanding to our innate movement patterns of walking and running.

Using the most advanced motion analysis technology in the world, I combine objective clarity with over 4 decades of experience and study in the field, to seek out root causes of chronic pain and injury that seem resistant to standard treatment protocols.

I call it The PFM Way to Movement Efficiency; I’ve written a book called ‘Even With Your Shoes On – Discover your Natural Path to Smooth, Efficient, Enjoyable Running’.

I’m also sharing more of my thought processes and principles in The PFM PILOT Series: Pain & Injury Lifelines via Online Tutorials. Busy professionals working in the field of pain and injury, will find easy tools that can be applied quickly to enhance their existing practice. Non-professionals, but those willing to ‘self-analyse’, will find approachable material to explore ‘self-help’.

MY MOTTO IS “IF YOU THINK YOU CAN DO IT – YOU PROBABLY CAN.”
(INSPIRED BY THE HOLSTEE MANIFESTO)

MY BIOGRAPHY

I was presented with the Sash of Honour at the Queen’s Annual Royal Air Force Awards, 1982 and following over 6 years serving in the Royal Air Force as an Air Traffic Control Officer, retrained as a fitness instructor and remedial massage therapist.

Continuing therapist training evolved into a specialisation in vascular and lymphatic circulations through Dr Vodder Manual Lymph Drainage and Professor Leduc Medical Lymph.

Working with lymphoedema patients then athletes led to progressing my already long-term focus on Efficient Movement – particularly in the context of walking and running – to the road and triathlon cyclist.

This resulted in founding both Ten-Point: The Efficient Running & Cycling Studio and Perpetual Forward Motion Ltd – The PFM Way to Movement Efficiency.

Ten-Point taught bike-fitting to UK and European bike-fitters using the most advanced bike-fitting tool in the world – the GURU bike-fitting system.

The PFM Way rethinks conventional wisdom surrounding movement, pain and injury, approaching the problems of chronic pain and injury from ‘non-standard perspectives’ and enabling “lost causes” — those who have tried ‘everything’ — to find a way to break their pain/injury cycle. Supported by objective data provided by the most advanced gait analysis tech in the world and the first of its kind in the UK, I have created online courses – PFM PILOT – to share this knowledge, because I feel passionately that these ‘non-standard perspectives’ should be standard, conventional and widespread.

I am a cofounder of Barefoot Audio, an audio tool merging evocative coaching cues to inspirational music composed specifically with efficient running in mind.

In my injury clinic, I specialise in the solving of chronic pain and repetitive injuries, be they in the neck, shoulder, back, hip, knee, ankle or foot and connected to sports or not. Coaching better walking, running and cycling-form is often a follow-up outcome of the pain and injury solutions.

I am the PFM Efficient Running Master Coach and on-line coach for multi-sport athletes, author of the YMCAfit Barefoot/Efficient Running course and manual and was the coach to the inov-8 Natural Run programme.

I am an endurance athlete: minimalist ultra-distance runner and 8 times Ironman and credited with being the world’s first ‘barefoot’ Iron(wo)man.

PROUDEST SPORTING MOMENT

Completing ‘the hardest Ironman in the world’, Ironman Lanzarote, in 2011 with a 41 min PB over Ironman Austria, 7 loo stops and a “I think it’s all over” moment in the swim, hanging off a course marker buoy for a while – the stubborn Yorkshire streak won!

QUALIFICATIONS:

Anatomy in Motion AiM Fully-Qualified Level 4 Practitioner.
Movement Development/Reflex Integration, incorporating both RIT and MNRI methodologies.
Corrective High-Performance Exercise Kinesiology CHEK Practitioner Level 2.
Corrective High-Performance Exercise Kinesiology CHEK Exercise Coach.
CHEK Golf Performance Specialist.

Holistic Lifestyle Coach Level 2.
Fully qualified Level 3 Vodder Manual Lymphatic Drainage therapist.
Fully qualified Leduc Medical Lymphatic Drainage therapist.
World’s first female F.I.S.T. Tri & Road bike fitter, trained by Dan Empfield of Slowtwitch and
Europe’s only female F.I.S.T. Advanced Tri & Road bike fitter.

GRATITUDE

One of my highest values is education and whilst I’m better at giving than receiving (still learning how to create balance between the two) I’m very keen on the concept of fair exchange. My other main core values form a bit of an equation:

Connection (me with you and you with your body) + clarity (my depth of knowledge and your understanding) = running JOY

And without ALL of my teachers, all the lovely folk I’ve coached through the years, and my friends who’ve adventured with me, I wouldn’t have the understanding I have now and continue to develop; the understanding that enables me to use the latest technology available, to connect that which lay unconnected, to unveil the reality and to offer folk sovereignty of, and autonomy over, their bodies. I feel strongly that we shouldn’t be defined by the label of our injury or condition or syndrome … our bodies are experiencing something and if that something is slow to change despite best efforts, it’s probably because something is in the way. Let’s find it, root it out and CREATE CHANGE.

I’ve read a lot, studied a lot, listened a lot, run a lot, thought a lot, been influenced a lot and woven a lot of information together. I’ve gone round in a few circles in my time, but I always pop out somewhere interesting. Here are my teachers and guides, all of whom have helped me be me:

Gary Ward and Chris Sritharan of Anatomy in Motion
Matt Wallden, Leigh Brandon, Dan Hellman and Angie Chek of the CHEK Institute
Matt Wallden
Dan Empfield of Slowtwitch
Christa Sieber of Sieber and Paasch Institute, RIT-Reflexintegration
Trace Baumann of SwimMastery alongside Christa, above
Dr Svetlana Masgutova, Pamela Curlee and her team of amazing teachers at MNRI
Darren Barnes-Heath of Newlands Chiropractic Developing Brains
Hildegard Wittlinger and Anne Vadgama of the Vodder Method of Manual Lymph Drainage
Professor Albert Leduc and Olivier Leduc of the Leduc Method of Medical Lymph Drainage
Kirsty Hawkshaw, without whom Barefoot Audio wouldn’t exist
Clair Taylor-Powell – my fellow spirit on this roller-coaster adventure called LIFE.
Kendra Toothill … because “there’s only one Kendra Toothill” (private joke, but so much truth in it, it deserves to be mentioned).

The Royal Air Force was a constant and rolling education over the course of 6.5 years, with bosses to salute every which way I looked, and prior to that, my maths teacher Mrs Thornley, deserves special mention, as she had the patience of a saint. Maths remains an unconquered challenge …