Latest news with #TheBalance
Scoop
13-05-2025
- Business
- Scoop
It's World Cocktail Day! And Kiwi's Continue To Drink Better
Press Release – Spirits New Zealand The change in drinking habits has been happening for years. A quick flick at the Stats NZ data shows that, per capita, were drinking 25% less that we did in the 1970s and 80s. On May 13, 1806 The New York tabloid – The Balance and Columbian Repository – is reputed to have published the first definition of a cocktail and 219 years later our love affair with 'a stimulating liquor, composed of spirits of any kind, sugar, water and bitters' continues. And although the average Kiwi is drinking better and better the rise and rise of the humble cocktail continues. 'There is little doubt that New Zealanders are drinking less – the official health and stats data shows it and our sales data confirms it,' says Spirits NZ CEO, Robert Brewer. The change in drinking habits has been happening for years. A quick flick at the Stats NZ data shows that, per capita, we're drinking 25% less that we did in the 1970's and 80's. And the most recent official NZ Health survey says five out of six of us (84%) are drinking beer, wine and spirits responsibly. That's an increase of 4.7 percentage points over the past four years (78.7% 2019/20). 'In spite of a drop in consumption spirits have been somewhat insulated and the cocktail is a big part of the reason,' says Robert. 'It's all about a confluence of two consumer trends – a move to a more premium product and a COVID-fuelled love affair with the cocktail. Consumers might drink less but they'll spend a little more and go up the premium tree – great news for premium spirits producers,' he says. Robert says the other great thing about a cocktail is that it does not need a lot of spirit to create a fantastic taste with most cocktails in bars coming in at under two standard drinks.
Scoop
13-05-2025
- Lifestyle
- Scoop
It's World Cocktail Day! And Kiwi's Continue To Drink Better
On May 13, 1806 The New York tabloid – The Balance and Columbian Repository - is reputed to have published the first definition of a cocktail and 219 years later our love affair with 'a stimulating liquor, composed of spirits of any kind, sugar, water and bitters' continues. And although the average Kiwi is drinking better and better the rise and rise of the humble cocktail continues. 'There is little doubt that New Zealanders are drinking less – the official health and stats data shows it and our sales data confirms it,' says Spirits NZ CEO, Robert Brewer. The change in drinking habits has been happening for years. A quick flick at the Stats NZ data shows that, per capita, we're drinking 25% less that we did in the 1970's and 80's. And the most recent official NZ Health survey says five out of six of us (84%) are drinking beer, wine and spirits responsibly. That's an increase of 4.7 percentage points over the past four years (78.7% 2019/20). 'In spite of a drop in consumption spirits have been somewhat insulated and the cocktail is a big part of the reason,' says Robert. 'It's all about a confluence of two consumer trends - a move to a more premium product and a COVID-fuelled love affair with the cocktail. Consumers might drink less but they'll spend a little more and go up the premium tree – great news for premium spirits producers,' he says. Robert says the other great thing about a cocktail is that it does not need a lot of spirit to create a fantastic taste with most cocktails in bars coming in at under two standard drinks.
Belfast Telegraph
08-05-2025
- General
- Belfast Telegraph
Seven drinks you probably haven't tried ahead of World Cocktail Day
You probably won't be familiar with a newspaper snappily entitled The Balance and Columbian Repository. It appeared briefly in upstate New York from 1801 until 1807, and although it covered everything from politics to agriculture, the issue of May 13, 1806, gives an obvious clue as to why the paper didn't last long. The only item on the front page was a lengthy poem called 'The Wasp'. However, tucked away on the inside pages of that same edition was an article that ensured The Balance and Columbian Repository would never be totally forgotten. In a piece written by editor Harry Croswell, under the headline 'What is a Cocktail?', the drink was defined in print for the very first time.
USA Today
27-04-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Finding ‘balance' with Simone Biles wasn't always easy, longtime coach reveals
Finding 'balance' with Simone Biles wasn't always easy, longtime coach reveals Show Caption Hide Caption Simone Biles' message for foster care children: 'You can do anything' Simone Biles is a national ambassador for Friends of the Children, and she shares her message for children in foster care. "Simone never would have made it in my gym." Aimee Boorman has heard that line, over and over, from other coaches when they talk about the gymnast she helped lift to heights never seen within their sport. "They say it with a sense of pride," Boorman tells USA TODAY Sports, "and it's like, 'So you realize how many potential Simones you have pushed out of your gym?' " Biles was the kid who always loved the gymnastics part, but not the work that went into making her the best. Some days she just wanted to go home. Those characteristics didn't necessarily change as she grew into the decorated champion America knew. Boorman, though, was willing to manage them in a way others wouldn't. Biles' coach from age 7 through her four-gold-medal performance at the 2016 Rio Olympics remembers her as one of her more challenging pupils. "If everybody is just strict and obedient, you grow stale as a coach," Boorman says. "So when you have somebody who's throwing something new at you all the time, on an emotional level, on a personality level, you gotta grow. And I think some of those other coaches weren't willing to grow. "When people say, 'Well, there's only going to be one Simone,' I'm like, 'That's not true.' You have to know how to manage that athlete to get them to the point they could be a Simone." Boorman's approach – nurturing, forgiving, even relenting – was novel to coaching within a sport of forced discipline and regulation. She lays out her methodology, ingrained in her by a tumultuous childhood experience, in "The Balance: My Years Coaching Simone Biles." The book, which was released last week, reveals a back story of how athletes develop and mature but also how they can have giggles on their face before and after their most triumphant Olympic moments. Boorman and co-author Steve Cooper spoke with us about facing unique challenges while coaching and parenting our athletes and how we can overcome them in unexpected ways. "Nothing about Simone's greatness was inevitable," Cooper said during our Zoom interview. "It was a process. It wasn't just luck." 'If it wasn't fun, she wasn't having any part of it': Without love for a sport, it's difficult to move forward Boorman is often asked if she knew when Biles would become superstar. The answer: When she became one. "Up until that point, anything can happen," she says, "and any given day, if Simone didn't have that passion and that love for gymnastics inside of her, she could be like, 'I'm done. I'm gonna go run track.' " Boorman recalls the joy she felt as a young girl in the early 1980s, when she first flung herself from the bars of Lakeshore Academy in Chicago, but also how quickly a reckless coach drained it from her. No matter how long she stood on the balance beam, her arms raised until they were numb trying to get Coach Jeremy's attention, he wasn't satisfied. His name is a pseudonym, but also an extreme archetype for an era of the sport: No positive reinforcement, no acknowledgement of effort and sometimes little hope. And yet, like most kids, Aimee yearned to please him. She arrived early one day, straining to grab his undivided attention by working out on her own. She broke her leg. Then he ignored her for months until she finally quit. "I was really useless to him because I couldn't compete,' she says. She was pulled back when she coached preschool kids after school a couple of years later. There was something bright within them that she used to feel, something we can so easily push out of young athletes if we don't nurture it. It was a light she saw in a 7-year-old who bounced around Bannon's, the gym north of Houston where Boorman started working as a young adult. Simone Biles couldn't sit still, but when she did, she pushed herself up off the ground with her arms and slid her legs from straight in front of her to a position in which she was lying on her stomach. "What she was doing is not normal," Boorman says. "We knew that she was going to be able to learn very quickly, but she was just a little girl, and she didn't like to do the conditioning, and she didn't want to have to take extra turns. She just wanted it to be fun. And when it wasn't fun, she wasn't having any part of it. She didn't want to be involved at all. "There will be a point where they turn a corner and they need to make a decision on if they want to continue and put in the extra hours and extra effort and all of that, but if you don't have that basis of love for the sport, they never get to that point." COACH STEVE: 70% of kids drop out of youth sports by 13. Why? 'There is no possible way you could disappoint me': Every day, even a bad one, is an opportunity to move forward Like other kids, Biles had fears. One was a mental block on her beam series. Boorman would ask her to complete it three times, but would never leave her out there too long like Jeremy had done. They would just come back the next day and try again, a give-and-take that would continue throughout their time together. "There were times that she would come in the gym in the morning and she would have a sense of dread about what she was going to have to do based on what she did or didn't finish the day before," Boorman says. "And I hope that when she walked in and saw me, and I was like, 'Good morning,' and I was very light with her, that then she could go, 'OK, wait a minute. Maybe I'm not in trouble. Maybe I didn't disappoint her.' " Boorman, through the torture, had felt like she was letting Coach Jeremy down. To this day, she tells her students, "There's no possible way you could disappoint me." It's up to them, not her, what they became but it's her job to support what they want. "As a coach, you could never want it more than the athlete," she says, "and if you do want it more than the athlete, then there's a problem. I know a lot of overzealous young coaches who are like, 'Oh, but I want an Olympian,' but you're never going to have an Olympian because that's what you want. "If we focus too much on the championship and on that win, then we're losing the human in the process." She likes to live in a "compliment sandwich," where constructive criticism is surrounded by praise and effort, even on so-called bad days. Those are a matter of perspective, anyway. "I have an elite gymnast (who) had been out of the gym for a couple of months, not really training, and she came back in and successfully did a skill that she hadn't done in two months, and she was like, 'That was terrible,' " Boorman says. "And I was like, 'You haven't done it in two months, and you did it. We're going to celebrate those wins, and it's going to be better tomorrow." Boorman wanted her students to be comfortable around her so they would express themselves. That way, she could see deep inside and better understand them. "Simone's not a person to go (in) the corner and go through her stuff in her head to get her in the zone," she would learn. "She has to be there, completely relaxed, cheering on other people. And then when the green light goes on for her to compete, she's like, game on. But she doesn't waste any of that in her mind. In her mind that, ???? focus is a waste for her. Other athletes are completely different." 'Its just gymnastics': The needs of the athlete – not those of the coach – have to come first Biles realized her connection with "Coach Aimee" at 13, when she was invited to a U.S. women's national team development camp and saw teammates who weren't as close with their coaches. They all trained under the strict orders of the program, which wasn't for Biles. "People who are ridiculously talented don't have to work that hard," Boorman says. "So when she had to work hard because she was struggling with something, she was not the most pleasant to be around, because it was very frustrating for her and it was easy for her to give up. I can say she was incredibly dedicated. I can't say she was an incredible hard worker. She knew it became the job that she chose to do and coming in and putting in the hours and everything. But I've known a lot of people who are much harder workers, I guess is the gentle way is to say it." Martha Karolyi, the program leader, called Biles sloppy and lazy at one of her early visits to camp. Boorman says that killed her confidence, and she declined their next invitation. Biles didn't start training a lot of hours until she was 16 or 17. "If we had focused on the refinement earlier, she could have been winning meets earlier, but there was also the risk of burnout," Boorman says. Those mid-teen years coincided with what Boorman calls the toughest days coaching Biles. "It was never, 'I don't want to do this, I want to do this,' " Boorman says. "But there were the normal teenage antics, the head butting and things like that. And so I had to be very strategic about when I would push and when I would let go. I know this can be construed as you're kicking somebody out of practice, but there would be days that I would say, 'I think practice should be over for today because we're not getting anywhere. Neither one of us is having fun.' "And sometimes she was like, 'Bye,' and other times she's like, 'No, I'm sorry. I want to get this done. I'm just frustrated.' But no matter what every day was, we turned the page." Ahead of the U.S. Classic in 2013 in Chicago, Boorman says Biles intentionally fell off the apparatus, jumped off the beam and let herself fall on her vaults. It was her way, her coach said, of controlling an environment where she didn't want to work. Boorman wouldn't force Biles through workouts, but she would let her fail in competition to make a point. When she took a nasty fall, they moved on to the next event. "I've always been a big supporter of family vacations and take the day off," Boorman says. "We need mental health days. When I was a gymnast, there was no such thing, and I think that there's too many sports in general, they want you to come in when you're sick, when you're tired, when you're mentally exhausted, because that's going to build character. And I just disagree with it. I feel like, if you take one day off and you rest, you're going to come back so much stronger. "It's just gymnastics. You shouldn't be risking your health just to achieve a sports goal." When she was no longer working with Boorman, Biles removed herself from the 2020 Games when she developed "the twisties." She had concluded, Boorman says, that "the Olympics were not more important than her life." "I think somewhere in her she knew it was going to be OK, and I think that was probably because early on in her career, it was OK to just pull yourself from the competition," says Cooper, Boorman's co-author. Overcoming 'the twisties' in 2016: 'You only have to live up to your own expectations' The twisties occur when a gymnast can't tell where he or she is in the air. Biles also beat them ahead of the Rio Olympics, which Boorman reveals in her book. She was 19 and had won two world championships titles in a row and feeling the pressure of weight and expectations of being the favorite of her first Olympics. Instead of forcing twists, Boorman temporarily removed them from Biles' routine, which relieved the pressure. "And each day I would say, 'OK, do you feel like twisting today?' And she'd be like, 'Well, yeah, but I think I can only go off beam.' And so she would only do her beam dismount.' She wouldn't twist off bars or floor or falls. "It would be baby steps from there. She might come in one day and say, 'OK, I think I'm ready to do this today.' And then she would start to do it and be like, 'No.' And I'm like, 'OK, don't worry about it. There's so many other things we can do.' And then instilling that confidence in her that she wasn't going to lose her skills was important as well. They were relying on the repetition they had already done. "We had taken so many years to refine them that the muscle memory was there," Boorman says. "We just had to clear out her brain." They gradually noticed she was cured over time, like the way we notice other peoples' children growing, then realize ours are, too. "I always told her that she wasn't responsible for other people's expectations of her," Boorman says. "That was their problem and shame on them for setting those expectations. She only had to live up to her own expectations." Steve Borelli, aka Coach Steve, has been an editor and writer with USA TODAY since 1999. He spent 10 years coaching his two sons' baseball and basketball teams. He and his wife, Colleen, are now sports parents for two high schoolers. His column is posted weekly. For his past columns, click here. Got a question for Coach Steve you want answered in a column? Email him at sborelli@
Irish Daily Star
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Daily Star
Kanye West and wife Bianca Censori spent month at VIP rehab center to save marriage
Kanye West and his wife, Australian model Bianca Censori , have spent a month at an exclusive wellness center in Majorca, Spain, on what's been described as a "make or break" holiday. Bianca was reportedly the "driving force" behind the decision for her and Kanye to visit The Balance Rehab Clinic, where they sought to mend their marriage after months of difficulties. A business associate of Bianca disclosed that the couple participated in marital counseling sessions, which are part of The Balance's services. Despite its reputation as one of Europe's premier private drug and alcohol rehab centers, it seems the pair were there for relationship therapy. Their month-long residential stay, which included romantic dinner dates in Spain, appears to have been successful. Controversial rapper Kanye and Bianca are said to be "finding themselves in a much better place" and have managed to reconcile their marriage. Read More Related Articles Jenna Bush Hager announces major career move in heartfelt statement Read More Related Articles Yellowstone's Kelly Reilly moves on from series as she joins new detective drama Bianca was reportedly the "driving force" behind the decision for them to attend a VIP wellness center (Image: Getty Images) This news is the latest twist in the celebrity couple's tumultuous relationship. Their LA friends were worried they were heading for divorce at the end of February, reports the Mirror US . However, this "much needed break away from the USA, where they are alone together" has seemingly given their love and commitment a much-needed boost, helping them overcome tension and problems. An insider insists that Kanye was never at risk of being sectioned by medical officials, despite recent media reports. In fact, it was Bianca's decision to head to Majorca after friends recommended the facility - a place that doesn't just focus on rehab treatment but also offers holistic, physical therapy and massage therapies. The associate mentioned that Kanye was initially "trepidatious" about the visit, even penning a rap song claiming she was trying to have him "committed"- ironically titled Bianca. However, the LA-based source maintains that "after some misunderstanding about the trip, where Ye initially tried to leave the island, he then discovered it was her who needed the support. He became a resident and only attended programs or events which he wanted." Within days, Yeezy had "turned a corner" and found it "found being there to work things out with Bianca very refreshing. People don't all have to be there to undergo heavy duty treatments and so he supported Bianca as she moved forward with her own program." The source added that Kanye "found being there to work things out with Bianca very refreshing. People don't all have to be there to undergo heavy duty treatments and so he supported Bianca as she moved forward with her own program. "He was super relaxed and felt like it was a real vacation away from the stresses of life and reconnected with his wife very much on a spiritual level. The one month stay has 'made them realize how much love and care they have for one other' (Image: Instagram/ye) Kanye was initially "trepidatious" about the visit (Image: FilmMagic) "They had the opportunity to discuss their problems and sort through their differences. Some of her friends didn't have much hope for them lasting, but things are looking really positive now. It is up to them to keep that momentum going." A business associate commented on the recent visit to an exclusive clinic saying, "There is a lot of misunderstanding and misinformation concerning this visit. Sure this is an elite specialist clinic for those afflicted with very serious addictions and health issues, but it is also the type of place which allows other clients to focus on themselves away from the distractions of their own particular widespread world problems." The same source shared that "Bianca has made it clear she is feeling better and much more optimistic about her marriage. It is impossible to understand the dynamics of their relationship given how so much information is put out, without anyone having true insight into what is really happening." They added that "However one thing has become clear - this stay has certainly made them realize how much love and care they have for one other." The Balance Rehab Clinic offers treatments for guests at its secretly located villas with prices starting at 37,400 Euros per week, rising up to 149,400 Euros for a full range of services, as detailed on their website. Kanye and Bianca were reported to have moved from The Balance residential villas to the haut monde Neuendorf House. They've pledged to maintain outpatient treatments with The Balance's team, availing themselves of the "intensive outpatient" (IPO) programs beginning at 27,800 Euros weekly. While in Majorca, Kanye has been busy creating new music for his anticipated return. One of his songs even alludes to his time there, with lyrics suggesting that his wife tried to have him hospitalized during one of his recent social media outbursts. In the rapper's song Bianca, from his forthcoming WW3 album, he sings: "My baby she ran away, but first she tried to get me committed / Not going to the hospital 'cause I am not sick I just do not get it. She's having a panic attack and she is not liking the way I tweeted. Until Bianca's back I stay up all night I'm not going to sleep / I really don't know where she's at." An insider shared: "That song was written specifically about the start of their journey in Majorca at The Balance, it appears clear from his lyrics that he suspected that an intervention was the purpose of the stay. "He did depart and stayed away from Bianca, while she remained at The Balance. Then he returned, they made up and have been doing well since." The Balance Rehab Clinic markets itself as "a collection of premium mental health solutions that provide the space and support for affluent individuals to get back to a state of balance." Many high-profile celebrities, top-tier athletes and wealthy individuals have sought "highly confidential treatments" at the facility, which offers a range of holistic therapies including sound, music, art, and equine therapy. The Balance addresses a wide array of conditions such as addiction and mental illness, trauma and PTSD, depression and anxiety, sleeping and eating disorders, enhancing performance and overall longevity. Their approach is described as a dynamic, multi-disciplinary system that ensures interconnected care for each client. Kanye West and Bianca Censori have been married since December 2022 (Image: WWD via Getty Images) The Balance's website states: "We understand the affluent lifestyle and the unique pressures, stressors and family dynamics that come with it. Our goal is to go beyond surface-level solutions to treat the system as a whole. We look at the brain, biochemistry, and background of each individual we treat." The Balance was established by Abdullah Boulad, a Swiss entrepreneur and healthcare expert. The inpatient programs are based in luxurious accommodations in Mallorca, Marbella, Zurich, and London. News about their stay surfaced earlier this week when Bianca was spotted with Jayne Fitzmaurice, an employee at The Balance. According to her profile, Fitzmaurice is a certified recovery coach, family coach, interventionist and a personal manager. In a promotional clip, Fitzmaurice described the role of a personal manager at their clinic: "A personal manager is with a client 24/7. The personal manager is there to offer discreet support, contain those difficult feelings, and enable the client to process without fear of judgment or any filtering." When approached for a statement, a representative for the clinic responded: "The clinic has no comment at this time." For the latest local news and features on Irish America, visit our homepage here .
