Coordination vs. Capacity

Dick Fosbury performing his famous flop

A Story of Coordination In the 1968 Olympic Games, a lanky American engineer named Dick Fosbury stunned the world with a high jump technique no one had seen before. He surprised the whole world by his choice not to use the traditional straddle method which was the unanimous standard of all Olympic jumpers. Instead, Fosbury launched himself backward over the bar, head first, landing squarely on his shoulders. Despite his non-athletic appearance (he looked like he just came out of a physics lab, to be honest), he won gold and set a new Olympic record. His innovated technique was later named 'The Fosbury Flop' and is still used to this day. In my opinion, Fosbury redefined what it meant to physically excel. His victory wasn’t due to training harder or faster, it was through finding a better coordination for the task. Fosbury didn’t beat his competitors by out muscle and agility but by thinking out of the box and organizing his body more intelligently.

His story is a reminder that skill is not always a product of raw capacity. Very often, it’s about creating relationships between weight and gravity, between body parts, space and timing. Fosbury taught the world a lesson about coordination. 

The Ground as Teacher: Coordination Through Floorwork Contrary to the immediate image of acrobatic agility, I'd argue that Floorwork should not be centered on athleticism but more on coordination. When we move close to the ground, we lose the reliance on verticality and the demand for alignment. As soon as alignment and a dangerous fall is out of the picture, the consequences for off balance are less severe, and therefore we can move in angles that would be less accessible upright. Furthermore, the ground 'limits' the free space for movement and invites us to work with weight shifts between different points of contact. The work of the feet can be done by any body part when we move closer to the ground.

This follows the basic premise of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu: close to the ground the coordinated fighter will win and not the stronger or faster one. The idea is that generating Momentum on the ground is not as 'athletic' as it is while standing up, and that a thorough study of advantageous positions can lead to better control.

Drawing also on the principles of Moshe Feldenkrais, floorwork becomes a practice in awareness rather than ambition. Feldenkrais taught that improving movement begins with sensing and refining HOW we do what we do. Not by pushing harder, but by becoming more precise in how we coordinate action. In his book 'Higher Judo' he also highlights the disadvantage of having the hips so far from the ground in relation to other animals. He says that this creates limited gait options and 'hides' some qualities of movement that can only be attained though slow, attentive and smooth exploration. 

Brazilian Jiu Jitsu - The proximity to the ground and emphasis on coordination creates an activity that welcomes

Space for Expression Beyond function and coordination, floorwork also offers a rich space for expression. With time, the ground becomes a canvas: intimate, tactile, and varied. Unlike classical ballet, which often places the body in a vertical display of technique and line, floorwork invites a more internal, less "exposed" form of exploration. It allows a different kind of emotional and physical vocabulary, one that doesn’t rely on spectacle or virtuosity. In that sense it is more "contemporary" not just in aesthetic but also in spirit: open-ended, inclusive, and less bound by inherited or cultural traditions. Your floorwork will become a fingerprint of you and the work you put into it, and not bound to any specific tradition.

Mechanically speaking, the possibilities multiply when movement is no longer dictated by hierarchy up vs. down, effort vs. grace. The progress of floorwork is almost 'scientific' in that sense, either something works or it doesn't. The intuitive and conscious research of what are the things that work for me is a sweet spot between art and science.

This process and its open-ended discipline also leads to insights outside the floor. The embodied knowledge and insights that are gained doesn't stay confined to floorwork it can enrich even more structured practices like yoga, calisthenics, or martial arts. What emerges is not just better coordination, but a clearer sense of how do I move? and who I am when I move?

Floorwork adapts to each practitioner's individual expression

Capacity vs. Coordination The final point is that the floorwork practice meets you where you are and take you further from there. It doesn't need any specific capacity as a starting point but will definitely enrich any capacity that's already there through improved coordination. 

Taking this idea further, it's a practice that emphasized the dynamic nature of physical capacity. Capacity can expand when coordination becomes more intuitive and intelligent. As in Fosbury’s leap, evolution in movement emerges sensing differently, and connecting better rather than training harder. This evolution is powered by knowing better the self, the task at hand and the forces that act upon our body.