Everything You Need to Know About Ido Portal, His Movement Training Method, and Why He's Rocking the Fitness World

Most people know Ido Portal through Mixed Martial Arts (MMA).

Irish fighter Conor McGregor is showing the MMA world and casual fans the work of his movement coach just before his UFC title fight.

We have seen them training together, making strange movements, walking on their hands or on all fours, playing with sticks, tennis balls or even walking like lizards on the beach...

Shortly after, Conor McGregor became the MMA world champion by knocking out his opponent in just 13 seconds.

There is reason to be perplexed.

What did Ido Portal do with Conor McGregor?

Is movement training helpful for athletic performance in MMA ?

For my part, it was well before this sudden media coverage that I became aware of the practice of the movement and the work of Ido Portal.

I have always been curious and quite obsessive by nature.

This combination led me, in my career as a professional boxer, to become interested in all aspects of this sport: footwork, mobility, physical preparation, nutrition, injury prevention... And to dive into it body and soul.

So I naturally gravitated towards the practitioners of the movement and Ido Portal that I decided to follow.

It was in early 2017, however, that I began practicing the Ido Portal method by joining other students in his group called Movement Culture .

Another twist of fate that led me to a Thai island when I was making my transition to Muay Thai.

Here is what I was able to remember from it.

It all starts with Capoeira: the dancing martial art of Brazil

Ido Portal began training in Capoeira at a very young age, a martial art from Brazil that combines dance, acrobatics and music.

By observing certain movements of Ido portal, we quickly understand the influence of this practice on his physical development, his ease in moving on the ground, his ability to move in the air...

But also his understanding of movement in general and body mechanics.

It is obvious that if you start, from a young age, with a practice like Capoeira, which promotes total freedom of movement , reconnection with the body, mobility, play, musicality, rhythm and improvisation,

You will tend to look critically at today's fitness world.

The latter is based only on the repetition of a limited number of movements and very rarely mentions notions such as longevity, the body-mind connection, joint health or the discovery of one's physicality.

What is interesting to note about Ido Portal is that he did not stop at mastering Capoeira, he quickly developed an interest in human movement in its entirety .

He has traveled the world in search of great masters in all fields: martial arts, powerlifting (weightlifting), physical preparation, yoga, circus arts, inversions, balance...

And also started experimenting with different forms of meditation , breathing techniques, different types of nutrition… to always complement this nascent idea:

Develop a body capable of doing anything .

The Movement Approach to Physical Training

During his travels and different life experiences, Ido Portal stops identifying himself as a Capoeirista, a gymnast, a bodybuilder, a dancer or anything else,

And embrace the idea of ​​being a “Mover” .

It was a total paradigm shift that I also experienced through contact with this community of Movers, the Movement Culture.

You no longer see different sports as isolated practices, but you begin to read between the lines and observe the common points, the underlying lessons, the intangible qualities that you can extract from each discipline.

You're not talking about sports or exercise anymore, you're talking about overall physical practice.

You no longer talk about techniques, you are rather looking for mastery of physical qualities .

Therefore, complementing your boxing training with ballroom dancing classes makes perfect sense. One can improve your footwork, distance management, and rhythmicity, while the other can.

Why not learn to juggle alongside your basketball training? One allows you to develop a more complex neural network and work on your hand-eye coordination, which is essential for the other.

In short, you get the idea.

We make different sports communicate with each other.

(Vasyl Lomachenko, world boxing champion and Olympic gold medalist, works on his arm-eye coordination while juggling)

The idea is therefore to have a holistic approach to physical training .

This is the fundamental element to begin to understand the work of Ido Portal.

Generalist vs. Specialist: Understanding Ido Portal's Training Philosophy

From there, you begin to understand the idea behind these different forms of training.

It's much more practical and concrete than it seems .

Although it is easy to judge him at first glance and think that he is a guru, hippie, who eats seeds, and talks too much about philosophy and meditation, Ido Portal, is not only a preacher, he does everything he says.

Man is objectively good in all areas.

Which perfectly echoes his philosophy of being able to do anything.

He is the definition of a generalist .

We tend to admire specialists. Those people who dedicate decades to mastering their craft.

This is the case, for example, when you watch the Olympic Games and you see the performances of Usain Bolt. He spent 22 years working exclusively on one attribute: speed.

This is admirable, but is it optimal for longevity and body health?

Are the injuries and damage done to the body over so many years of repeating the same movements necessary to exploit its physical potential?

This is what Ido Portal and the practice of movement call into question.

Isn't the body capable of better?
Isn't there another way to think about physical training?

Be careful, to become a generalist, it is not a question of training a little bit in everything.

To understand this point, we must once again take a long-term view .

Mastering a skill or art requires years of dedication to the practice. It's much more efficient to complete one task at a time than to dabble in a little bit of everything at once.

My opinion is that, to achieve this generalist quality, it is more judicious to operate through a specialization cycle of 2 and a half to 3 years.

For example, you do 2 or 3 years of boxing, then dance, then climbing... One thing at a time. After 4 cycles, so between 10 and 12 years, you will have mastered 4 areas at a relatively high level.

So we can call you a general practitioner.

Developing a body that can do anything

For Ido Portal, it is therefore a question of avoiding repetition and maximizing the adaptability of the individual .

We see him working on rings, doing quadrupedal exercises, dancing, boxing, lifting weights, or even jumping obstacles like in Parkour.

So the key is diversity .

We must constantly learn new things, new patterns, new skills and try to have a foot in as many areas of our physicality as possible:

Balance, strength, agility, coordination, explosiveness, breathing, control….

Learn to learn

Ido distinguishes 3 learning zones:

Zone 1: Learn a new move .

It is generally in the first few months that you will learn 80% of the new movement .

You're going to work really hard, repeat, fail, and try again countless times until you feel like you can do the move.

It's not perfect yet, it's a little shaky, but you know you have little left to do before you've really mastered the movement.

This is the phase in which your neural network grows the most as new connections are created.

Zone 2: Perfect a movement.

It's that phase where you have movement but it's not clean yet.

For example, you can only hold your handstand for about ten seconds and not every time you try. You'll still be a little frustrated, but you know you're close to your goal.

The length of this phase really depends on your dedication to perfecting the movement.

This is also when, without regular practice, you can still lose movement .

Zone 3: Maintain a perfectly controlled movement .

You've achieved complete mastery of the movement. This is the phase where you no longer have to try multiple times before successfully performing your handstand. You can perform the movement anywhere, anytime.

It's really ingrained in you, it's an integral part of your movement vocabulary. You can confidently say what you can do.

So you don't need to work on it as regularly as before and you can afford to do it only from time to time.

Ido Portal's challenges to discover its method and approach

You can learn more about this training methodology and find two examples of direct application of the values ​​that Ido Portal promotes through the Challenges he has posted over the years.

I'm breaking down two of them on this blog:

1. The 30/30 SquatChallenge
   The challenge to train yourself to maintain the deep squat position and become more mobile, stronger, and more resilient in the hips. The concept is simple: 30 minutes of deep squats a day, every day for 30 days.
   
   
2. Hanging Month
   The challenge to reestablish another functional human movement, the Brachiation (Hanging) . Similar to the Squat Challenge, it involves practicing hanging for 7 minutes a day, every day for 30 days. Discover the benefits on shoulder healing, mobility, strengthening the shoulder girdle, and spinal decompression.

Don't hesitate to read these two articles and discover this idea of ​​moving as we are supposed to be able to , freely, without restrictions, without discomfort, without limitation.

Why this movement approach is disrupting the modern fitness world

We can see how this movement approach is completely opposed to what the modern fitness world is selling us today.

We are sold physical development only through the aesthetic aspect .

These “fit boys” and “fit girls” on social media, sellers of complexes , have made us believe that sport is about big biceps and big glutes for the summer.

It's a short-sighted and destructive vision for so many people, young boys and girls who become self-conscious about not fitting into these boxes with these criteria of physical beauty that are imposed on them.

In (modern) fitness, there is no room for exploration , discovery, feelings of freedom and self-control, personal development, love of oneself, of one's body, confidence in one's abilities, that feeling of competence, or even sharing with others.

It's about entering a room with your headphones on, not talking to anyone, being alone, completely disconnected from your body, from your physicality, almost as if you've lost part of your being.

It's almost dehumanizing.

Moreover, it is also the perfect representation of the capitalist world which constantly sells you something: a food supplement, a gym membership, sports equipment, magic pills to lose weight, overpriced clothes... To create a need and a dependency .

In this, Ido Portal and the Movement shock and disturb .

Here, no need for equipment, we talk about personal development and inner wisdom .

We don't sell anything at all.

You can do it all at the park, at home, without spending a fortune on clothes or equipment.

It is accessible to everyone.

It brings together people from all walks of life, regardless of social, age or gender distinctions.

It's accessible all the time.

We want to share a feeling of freedom, calm, play, physical autonomy , returning to oneself, reconnecting with nature and with others.

We play, we exchange, we learn from each other, we help each other.

The Ido Portal Method

Here again, we distinguish 3 phases in training in the Ido Portal method.

This is a general structure to be applied in the development of one's physical abilities .

https://youtu.be/Qwtz9ryjf88

1. Insulation

We seek to learn a particular movement, isolated from any context.

It could be a dance step, a kick, a body shape. It's purely mechanical ; we want to learn a new motor control.

Once the movement is mastered, we can stop working on it and move on to the next phase.

2. Integration

The idea here is to integrate this new movement into the rest of my technical vocabulary.

We try to combine this new word with those we already know , to begin to form new sentences.

We can try to chain our Handstand with a roll and see where that takes us.

3. Improvisation

Finally, with these new combinations, we try to work on our capacity for personal expression with our movements.

We learned a word, then how to make sentences, now it's about creating poetry with spontaneously linked movements.

We become an artist of human movement .

My movement practice

Personally, this paradigm shift has only been beneficial for me.

It allowed me to open my heart and mind to many new practices that I disparaged when I was younger.

I was conditioned to think that ballet was for girls, and that real boys were into fighting.

Today, my ego is much weaker and I don't hesitate to dive into all disciplines and mix all my learning.

I incorporate ballet stretches just before entering the ring and fighting Muay Thai.

I also had the opportunity to meet wonderful people, great martial arts masters, exceptional athletes, experts in their discipline, world champions...

I've been able to travel the world and connect with so many people from so many different backgrounds and cultures, simply because I'm no longer so closed off to the idea of ​​only being good at one thing.

I feel more confident and stronger than ever knowing that I can do anything.

I also feel that I respect the gift of life even more, because I try to live my humanity 100%, to exploit every fiber of my being and every ounce of my potential, respecting nature and others.

Anyway, before anyone calls me a hippie too haha, I'll just conclude like this:

Movement is Life .

To become a better mover, you can read the few fundamental lessons I learned .

Start your movement training and discover the Ido Portal Method

I hope you were able to learn a little more about one of my masters and one of my inspirations in terms of movement.

It's a pleasure for me to share what I've learned and I plan to tell you more on this blog so don't hesitate to subscribe .

If you are in France and want to try movement and get a taste of what it can be like, I invite you to one of our upcoming movement and mobility courses .

Since I travel a lot throughout the year, you can start your journey to greater physical freedom with the Nomadslim Movement online training.

For fans of Ido Portal's work, I recommend the following courses:

– Floorwork Beginners and Intermediate Floorwork to learn floor movement flows in the style of Movement Culture, Capoeira, Ido Portal method and Nomadslim Movement.

– First Floor Flows to learn flows to become more flexible and work on your hip mobility. You can use these sequences for active recovery.

– Beginner Locomotion and Animal Locomotion to reconnect with your primal side and add diversity to your workouts. It’s a great way to work on coordination, core strength, and strengthen ankles and wrists.

We relearn how to move and explore together joint mobility, ground movements, inversions, agility... In short, we discover ourselves!

If you want to start simpler and regain your flexibility easily, don't hesitate to get my 100% free mobility routine, which will allow you to unlock your joints in 15 minutes a day.

Thanks again for reading this article to the end.

If you liked it, please feel free to comment and share on social media . I'm sure you'll be able to help someone else feel better about their body and move freely.

On that note, see you soon my mover.

Nomad Slim
Founder of MOUVERS