To watch the same video in YouTube format, click below.
Chuck Mellick working his power swing with a 16 lb. sledgehammer.
Chuck Mellick has been working with Whole Brain Planet co-founder Michael Lavery since January 20th of 2008 to develop his ambidextrous pitching and his power as a switch hitter.
Michael Lavery and Chuck Mellick
Chuck's hometown newspaper The Tracy Press published an article on Chuck February 14th, 2008. Here is that article and the link: http://tracypress.com/content/view/13587/2243/
Switch pitcher
Bob Brownne / Tracy Press / Thursday, 14 February 2008.
Ambidextrous athlete uses both sides of the brain to better his game.
When Tracy Yankees pitcher Chuck Mellick got back into baseball last year, he was about to discover the key to a new level of athletic performance.
Sometime this year, he expects he will throw 90 mph fastballs with both his right and left arms. To Mellick, this feat is about more than just the attainment of a personal goal. It’s a new way to think about how his body and brain work together.
“I’m excited,” he said. “If nobody’s ever done it before, I think a lot of people will be interested in it.”
Coming back stronger
It had been 16 years since Mellick, 38, last played baseball at Cosumnes River College, but when he signed up for the 2007 season in a local league of the National Adult Baseball Association, he threw the fastball harder than ever.
Mellick is right-handed and developed his skill as a left-handed batter to improve his right-handed swing. He found that switch-hitting improved his throwing as well, so he figured that if he developed his left-handed pitch, he could improve the speed and accuracy of his dominant right-handed throws.
He gained more than a better fastball. The result was all-around improvement in hand-eye coordination and even a boost in overall strength.
Building neural connections
Mellick now believes his efforts in college to build strength with weights were misguided. By contrast, training in ambidexterity has enabled him to become stronger, quicker and more flexible. The change isn’t just in his body, he says, but also in the way his mind and body have together forged a more effective athletic mechanism.
“When you do this, you’re building neuron complexes in your brain to fire your muscles faster,” he said.
That’s no surprise to Michael Lavery, a Laguna Beach trainer and former pro baseball catcher who seeks out ambidextrous athletes.
He saw a video Mellick posted on YouTube, in which Mellick demonstrates his ambidextrous pitching skill using a rubber ball in Tracy’s In-Shape Sports Club racquetball courts.
When Mellick started to throw left- and right-handed, Lavery said, he discovered that ambidexterity develops the brain in ways that previously had only been hinted at. He added that if the athletic establishment wants to take physical fitness and coordination to the next level, it must teach that the left and right sides should be equally strong and effective.
“The quantum jump in sports leagues could be the ambidextrous athlete,” he said. “If kids are shown the idea of ambidexterity at an early age, it could create a wave of ambidextrous athletes growing up.”
Not just for sports
Lavery is famous for his ability to bounce a golf ball on a hammer. He makes it look easy in his YouTube video, and has also been featured on David Letterman’s show and on ESPN. He also bounces the golf ball while he runs and flips it back and forth between hammers in his left and right hands.
Ambidexterity is already typical among baseball batters and in sports like handball, karate and snowboard. Lavery said he works with other ambidextrous athletes in baseball, tennis and golf.
Now, he’s out to prove that the result of that type of exercise is growth of the brain, with the benefit that the body becomes stronger, quicker and more flexible than ever before. He sees Mellick, who at age 38 is a better athlete than he was in his 20s, as proof of his point.
“We’ve never had an experiment that we could anecdotally and physically measure,” Lavery said. “I believe this thing is going to grow.”
Practical applications
In the meantime, Mellick has started practice and will begin play in late March as a member of the Tracy Yankees, the local team of the local Valley Baseball Wood Bat League, a part of the NABA. The team plays at Sierra High School in Manteca, Billy Hebert Stadium in Stockton and Tony Zupo Stadium in Lodi.
Mellick knows his training technique could prove to be effective in games, and he might find a chance to put his left-handed pitch to use in league play. His right-handed fastball was clocked at 91 mph last year, and he expects to get it up to 95 mph. His left-handed pitches are at 82 to 83 mph.
“Maybe, in a game, I could get it up to 85 or 86 once I get the adrenaline going,” he said.
He added that with every workout, he gets stronger and better coordinated, so he plans to keep the radar gun handy to record the pitch when he attains the 90 mph left-handed fastball.
We want to hear what you have to say. To reach reporter Bob Brownne, call 830-4227 or e-mail brownne@tracypress.com.
Below is an article from back in the high school pitching days of Chuck Mellick at Oak Ridge High School .
