Innovative and creative goal-directed behaviours in complex neurobiological systems, such as apes and birds, has been studied extensively and involves the discovery of novel patterns of behaviour by an organism. There has not been the same focus on creative behaviour in sport, although much research in sport sciences and pedagogy has been aimed at improving athletic performance. Traditionally, performance optimization methods have been implemented to identify the set of movement parameters that might maximize competitive outcomes for specific elite athletes. However, as in the case of Dick Fosbury, the elite high jumper, sometimes exploration of novel movement patterns can not just improve performance but actually push it to a new, higher level. Inventions of novel performance solutions occur regularly in sport and have been well documented in activities like track and field, exemplified by the 'O'Brien' (or rotational) technique in shot put or the 'straddle' and 'Fosbury flop' techniques which replaced more traditional and less successful 'scissors' and 'eastern cut-off' high-jump techniques. In the last few decades alone in gymnastics, 14 novel technical elements have appeared. Yet despite this process, creativity in sport performance has sei dom been the subject of systematic research, revealed by the absence in sport science of established theoretical rationales for studying and explaining creative behaviour. In the following text, we present a model of creative behaviour in sports and dance and some new empirical results based on the ecological dynamics approach.
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