In my newsletter a few weeks back, I asked my readers one simple question:

What are you struggling with? Or what do you want to know more about?

And while I wasn’t sure I could pull it off, I answered every single one of the e-mails.

And trust me, there were a ton!

These questions gave me some great ideas for future posts, and I actually want to lump a group of them together here today.

Keep in mind, the hard part here is I hate talking about myself, or acting as though I’m bragging. But I think all of these questions will give you deeper perspective into why I’m here, what my goals are, and where I’m going as a coach.

Mike, why did you get into the performance training field?

Growing up, I loved sports.

I lived on a horse farm in the country, and didn’t have anyone around that was even remotely close to my age.

As you can imagine, I spent a ton of time outdoors playing sports. It could be hitting the baseball off a tee, shooting hoops in my gravel driveway, or bumping a volleyball up against the barn door (how’s that for being hill billy!).

As I got older, my passion for sports only grew. I loved basketball, and would often record games on VHS tapes so I could play them back time-and-time again. Virtually every coach I ever had in my life referred to me as a “gym rat.”

I clearly remember between my sophomore and junior years our high school got weight equipment for the first time. We had two rooms: One with all the shiny chrome and selectorized equipment, the second a converted boiler room where we had received a ton of hand-me-down free weights and dumbbells from Ball State University.

The room had no windows, it was tucked away in the most remote section of the school, and it stunk to all hell.

But I’m sure you can imagine where I spent all my time!

That summer, I not only dedicated myself to expanding my basketball game, but getting stronger as well. I was a good athlete, but not great. I felt like if I could run faster, jump higher and bang with bigger, more physical guys, I could be an asset on the court.

It only took a month or two, but I started to see changes.

There was more zip on my passes. I extended my shooting range a couple of feet.

And some of the bigger guys that used to push me around were struggling against me in a 1-on-1 setting.

From that day forward, I was hooked.

Fast forward to college, where I continued to “lift,” but it was really just following a bodybuilding style program, sans the leg work. After all, I was getting enough leg work from all the intramural sports I was playing at the time!

I spent the summer of my senior year interning in the athletic weight room at Ball State.

Just like I was hooked when I started lifting, I knew that this was my calling.

Not only did I get to help athletes just like myself get bigger, faster, and stronger, but I saw even more changes in myself during this period.

After my internship, I realized that I was a joke of a strength coach. We had girls on our powerlifting team routinely out-squatting me, so I knew if I wanted to make a mark in the industry I needed to talk the talk and walk the walk.

Quite simply, I needed to get stronger and get serious about my leg training.

The results were nothing short of amazing. I went from a volleyball/basketball player who could just barely get the rim (touching around 10’2″ or 10’3″) to grabbing the rim with both hands off a drop step (touching around 10’6″ or 10’7″) just by training my legs!

I know this sounds silly now, but I’d been filled with all the lies.

“Deadlifts are bad for your back.”

“Squat will blow out your knees.”

So that’s what drew me to the industry. I was always a gym rat that loved sports, and when I found a new love in strength training, the ability to merge those into one unique passion has made me a very happy man ever since.

What the heck is a performance coach?

I’m really partial to the term performance coach, and there’s a reason for this. When I was coming up in the sport of powerlifting, I thought that strength was the be-all, end-all of training.

Every single client back squatted, no matter or what.

“Oh it hurts your back – you must be doing it wrong!”

I was nothing if not spirited in my defense of the big lifts.

And for good reason; as I outlined here maximal strength is one of the key foundations for athletic development.

But it’s not the only quality.

At this point in time, I don’t consider myself  a strength coach.

Or a conditioning coach.

Or a flexibility coach.

Or a strength and conditioning coach.

This may sound like semantics, but it’s not.

I am a performance coach, and both of these words are important for different reasons

A performance coach is focused on developing a well-rounded and holistic athlete.

Athletes are required to have some combination of strength, speed, power, flexibility, mobility, and conditioning to be successful in their spot.

Every sport is different, and every athlete unique, but at the end of the day my goal is to improve an athlete’s performance.

The second word is no less important: Coach.

Here’s a very lay definition of the word coach:

“An athletic instructor or trainer,” or “a tutor who gives private or specialized teaching.”

This describes what I do to a “T.”

I work with athletes, and I do my best to give them specialized teaching/training that will make them more successful on the court or field.

How did you get started training pro athletes? And why do you enjoy this so much? You’re really lucky to work with them!

It’s getting a bit foggy now, but I started training pro athletes (seriously) in 2011 or so. I can’t remember who came first, but it was either Lori Lindsey of the US Women’s National Soccer Team or Danny O’Rourke from the Columbus Crew.

I got the honor to work with both of these people because I had a reputation as a coach, and for helping people get better.

A big part of this came from me helping people via my writing and speaking about the topic of coaching. If I hadn’t put in the time and effort to educate people along the way, I may never have had the opportunity to work with either of them.

Since then I’ve had the opportunity to work with Roy Hibbert from the Indiana Pacers, Radley Haddad from the Yankees organization, and a handful of the top recruits in the nation in both soccer and basketball.

So the question became, why am I so excited about this?

For a handful of reasons, frankly.

Number one, because this is what I’ve worked my entire life for. All those long days coaching and cuing in the gym, all those late nights watching videos or reading books, it’s all come to fruition for me.

So in that vein, I feel a little validated, and that all that hard work has finally paid off.

But there’s more to it than that. I don’t think it’s so much about my ego at this point, but rather the thrill and excitement of knowing that I can make a difference with someone playing sports at the highest level.

I’m reminded of a quote that I’ll paraphrase from Charles Barkley (who once lost $2.5 million in 6-hour playing blackjack!) about his love of high-stakes blackjack:

When you’re used to playing the $10,000 per hand table, the $500 per hand table just doesn’t cut it.

This is a great way to put it. I love knowing that if I don’t do a great job with these athletes, that they won’t perform at their best level.

It’s high-risk, high-reward. Does that make me an adrenaline junkie?

Regardless, I have to be at my best each and every day. And perhaps even more importantly, I have to keep getting better.

I love that pressure and thrive on it.

Last but not least, I’m just naive enough to think that if I do my job as a performance coach, I can really escalate the performance of even the highest level athlete.

What if I could help Roy Hibbert become the Defensive Player of the Year in the NBA?

What if I could help Lori or Danny get another contract? Or a bigger contract?

But with all that being said, I don’t credit for their natural talents, hard work and dedication. I can’t stand when performance coaches act as though they are the sole reason for an athletes success.

Rather I consider myself a piece to their performance puzzle. If I do my job well, then I set a foundation for future success.

I don’t take credit – I just want to play a role in speeding their development

I am not my athletes – but hopefully I’m a small part of them

You’re heavily involved on the IYCA, but yet you don’t seem to work with kids these days. Do you still enjoy training kids?

It’s funny – I spent the bulk of my coaching career working with kids (12-18 years old), but currently only work with one.

But don’t believe for a second that I don’t enjoy training kids.

I love training kids. In fact, I think this is where we need the highest level coaches. When kids are young they are so malleable and can be shaped and molded, but for better or worse.

The right coach with a long-term approach can lay all of the necessary foundations (movement, strength, aerobic) to give any child the best long-term chance of success.

And the wrong coach can overtrain, injure, or burn-out even the most resilient and dedicated athlete.

For now, working with a younger population isn’t something have a ton of time for. I have to prioritize in some form or fashion – with the businesses, my family, my training and my own education, something has to give.

But as my children grow older, I can definitely see myself jumping back into the fray.

I want them to play as many sports as possible (assuming they’re interested).

I want them to enjoy the simple acts of play and movement.

I want them to learn and explore their body. That’s it not just their to sit and grind away the hours in school or at work, but that it’s this beautiful vehicle that they should take care of and pride themselves in.

This is what I’d love to teach all children.

They don’t get it in schools, and with more and more early specialization going on in the sporting world, it’s no wonder that kids are getting injured at a record-setting pace.

And don’t blame it on the fact that more kids are playing sports – the simple fact is in a lot of ways we’re regressing as a society when it comes to movement, and if we don’t do something about it our kids will continue to suffer.

Long story short, expect to see more from me on this front in the future.

Why do you continue to do this? What’s end game?

The best athletes in the world don’t rest on the laurels. In fact when the competition is resting, they’re in the gym training, watching tape, or doing something to make themselves better.

As a performance coach, I do my best to follow this model as well.

I love making an effort every single day to get better. To learn something new.

I think one of the things I love the most, though, is the challenge. When I was writing programs back in 2010, I thought I had it all figured out.

Then I read Joel Jamieson’s conditioning book, and realized I didn’t know shit about conditioning.

The same could be said when it comes so speed, strength, power, or almost any phyiscal quality. There’s so much information out there to read, assimilate, and apply that it can be overwhelming.

But that’s also why I like it. I will never get bored.

Plus, I love the challenge of taking the information and integrating it into a program. Some of my high-level athletes have incredibly complex programs, but every time there are little things I’m tweaking or refining to make it better.

And when you factor in the wide variety of athletes I have the pleasure of coaching (soccer, basketball, baseball), there’s always a new challenge in front of me.

Summary

The Q&A format may have made this feel a little disjointed at times, but I hope you enjoyed it overall.

Quite simply, I’m every bit as passionate about our industry as I’ve ever been.

And hopefully I can pass along a little bit of that enthusiasm to you, my reader.

All the best

MR

P.S. – Got questions about training athletes? Leave ’em below and I’ll do my best to answer them!