Interview with Helen Hall

Helen Hall is best known as a movement coach specializing in helping people improve their running efficiency, but I know her as a movement detective extraordinaire.Helen has a vast toolkit that allows her to observe peoples’ movement problems over the spectrum of their entire movement lifespan. She’s come to understand that our early movement development has a massive, yet underestimated implication in many pain and movement problems that persist in spite of trying everything. Everything, that is, except considering what insults to their systems may even have happened before even leaving the comfort of the womb…Helen has helped me tremendously with my own body. We met in 2019 in London when I was there for an Anatomy in Motion course. She invited me to come over to her clinic in the country side to have an assessment with her new, high-tech motion analysis treadmill X-ray device (Doris). The impact of that one session was transformative for me (and its a story I describe to Helen in this interview). She asked me a question that truly changed the course of my personal and professional movement explorations: “Did you crawl as an infant?”. This led me down a fascinating path of studying infant reflexes, or, as Helen prefers to describe it, early movement development.Helen inspired me to learn more about the impact that infant reflex development has on our options for movement as adults. Understanding our early movement development can help to make sense of why people get stuck in chronic pain cycles that don’t resolve in a linear way, in spite of doing everything that logic suggests should help. In our conversation, Helen and I discuss:* What are some tell tale signs that investigating early movement development might be a missing link? * Hussein Bolt’s interesting movement habits that Helen wishes she could test* The impact of not crawling on movement patterns* How Helen uses the most advanced motion sensing technology currently available in her clinic to help athletes with in depth movement analysis* Why concussions can negatively affect movement patterns* Importance of testing reflexive foot movements as hypo or hyper-responsive and how this can impact on gait (an why you might wear a hole in the big toe of all your socks)* So many stories of peoples’ mysterious pains understood through Helen’s holistic, movement based approach* Helen’s “Lego block” analogy for understanding early movement development * Is there a link between early movement development and ADHD, and how could retraining specific movement patterns help our sensitive nervous systems?And much more. I barely scratched the surface of my list of topics to discuss with Helen, so hopefully I’ll get to have a chat number two with her in 2026. My favourite part of this interview was when Helen validated my goal in life to be average, as she states (and I paraphrase), “The best we can hope for for our child at birth is average. Not exceptional, but average”. Why? Because it sets them up for the best possible set of options, not limited by being exceptional on either end of the developmental spectrum. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this interview with Helen Hall. Where to find Helen online:Helen’s book: Even With Your Shoes OnInstagram: @helenhallpfmYoutube: @ThePFMWayWebsite: www.helen-hall.co.ukHelen’s courses on Thinkific: Rethinking Movement Efficiency The PFM WayHere’s a little more about Helen Hall: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 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.Thanks for reading Movement Detectivery! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. Get full access to Movement Detectivery at monvolkmar.substack.com/subscribe