Training with Ido Portal at the Australian Movement Meeting

The first time I ever saw Ido in action was sometime around 2008/09 when I was looking around on YouTube for Capoeira videos.

I found the video below called "Self Dominance".

Like most people who had seen it, I was amazed. So as usual I followed the YouTube rabbit hole and looked at the rest of his videos that he had uploaded at the time.

What I found was a library of movements that were connected to Capoeira, but had their own distinct difference and purpose. Being exposed to these movements showed me different ways of breaking them down into their basic or original form.

The biggest stand out for me was the way he taught the Queda De Rins, (or QDR as everyone else calls it these days). No one else at that time was really doing instructionals on YouTube, I still use some of the teaching techniques from these early videos.

Fast forward to 2013 and I attended the Movement X seminar at CrossFit U in Melbourne. The event was hosted by Alex Cheong and Ido, Odelia and Vic were all there to instruct.

The event was pretty much what I was expecting - two days filled with training, moving, playing and learning. I highly recommend attending this workshop as a first exposure to moving around with Ido and his team. I still feel like it was the best seminar I’ve ever attended in terms of knowledge bombs that were dropped that weekend.

To give you and idea, here’s this doc someone had created from their experience in the US.

A year later, Ido returned to Australia to run more workshops, and the one I had my eye on was The Corset workshop

The event was held at Revolute Movement Academy in Sydney, and this time the teachers were Ido, Odelia, and Summer.

The Corset is a total body protocol – it’s all about building flexible body armour. The content is a wide range of strengthening and stretching movements that he has gathered from his studies in different parts of the world.

I walked away with a bunch of really practical tools that I now use as part of my own ongoing training, and on my students and clients.

Most recently I managed to get to the first Australian Movement Meeting, which was also held at Revolute.

I think there were 70 or 80 people in attendance, and it was a very intense couple of days, but in a really good way.

Each morning attendees were divided into two groups, with one group working on hand-balancing for 90min with Odelia and Liav, while the other was doing either support work, pulling strength or leg power with Ido and Johnny.

Here’s the aftermath of leg power.

Every afternoon we spent about 3hrs working on locomotion, dance, fast feet, internal martial arts, meditation, and breath work.

For each of the three days we averaged 6.5hrs of moving/training (yes, I’m still sore). For me it felt like they combined Mov-X and Corset together, and turned into a 3 day workout, which is awesome to know what it kinda feels like when everything is put together.

Here are the rest of the photos from the event.

I definitely recommend attending any of Ido’s seminars. I’ve heard that some people think that it’s too pricey, but trust me you will learn a lot.

Some people also think that he’s too angry or strict. He’s definitely strict but that’s how he gets the results that he gets.

I can’t think of anybody else on the this planet who has as many people doing one arm handstand or one arm pull ups as he does.

He really is a funny dude but you only see that in person, not YouTube.

Now go play :D