In my business (elite level athletic development), there’s a very fine line between selling out and making a living. I’m sure this can be said for many industries but I can’t think of one that this is more true than mine. There are lots of charlatans, bamboozlers, and con-men in my field claiming to be things they are not. They cover up their inadequacies (that they likely aren’t even aware of) with fancy facilities, untrue claims of athlete development that are nothing more than loose associations, and false assurances of science-based training that unfortunately take advantage of a largely naive and uninformed consumer base. And if you listened or talked to them, you’d find most of them speak as if they have all the answers. I think that in general, these guys actually BELIEVE what they’re saying. They BELIEVE that their training is science-based despite the fact that their methods are often refuted by research. They BELIEVE that they’ve actually developed the athletes on their resume despite the fact that the overwhelming majority came to them having already been very successful. They BELIEVE in their ‘cutting edge’ training methods despite the fact that they’re often pointless at best and dangerous at worst. I’m giving these guys the benefit of the doubt and hoping they are just ignorant or lost in their own world because the far-worse alternative is that they’ve sold their personal and professional integrity to make a dollar.

Don’t get me wrong. I can rationalize why they’d do it. Everyone has to make a living. If you’re in this business you are your own product. With that said, these guys make a lot of money. In fact, they make a lot more than me. I know it for a fact. I’ve done extensive market research on the industry in general and some of this research has been on these guys. It actually doesn’t bother me though. At least not any more. I am confident in what I’m doing and confident that my strength is not so much what I know but that I desire to know what I DO NOT know (so that I can learn it).

I will say that the one thing these guys are VERY good at is marketing. They know how to market themselves to sponsors, clients, and investors to earn their respect and ultimately their money. For this I have the utmost respect for them as this is something that I’m recognizing is VERY important to making a living in this industry. There are MANY great minds, some of whom I am proud to call mentors, who’ve never achieved the public notoriety or financial success as some of these guys but are infinitely more knowledgeable with far better results in the athletic development arena. When I first came to this realization it was kind of disheartening. It made me think that the cream doesn’t ALWAYS rise to the top. Further reflection though indicates that I just needed to look at the field more broadly and recognize that it’s in its infancy.

In the private sector of elite athletic development at this time, marketing is just as important and arguably MORE important as the skills you bring to the table as a coach, teacher and applied science practitioner. Hopefully this will change and I optimistically liken the current state of the industry to pre-Tiger golf
. You know what I’m talking about. The time when the sport was dominated by out-of-shape, rich, white guys with lots of skill but little athletic ability. Then along came Tiger, and he brought all the skills of those old timers PLUS God-given athletic ability enhanced by training. He had the entire package. He came in and essentially redefined the sport. Nowadays, you can’t expect to be a regular winner on the PGA tour if you don’t bring trained athleticism and mad skills to the course. I’m hoping the same will soon be true for my industry….to be the best of the best should require Trump like market-savvy combined with the athletic development skills of a Dan Pfaff, Boo Schexnayder or legendary weightlifting coach Ivan Abjiev. I don’t claim to have either right now but that’s definitely what I’m shooting for.

As I wait for a facility to take my business full frontal, one of the things that has really become clear to me is that if you’re going to go at it alone and pursue your dream lifestyle and job, one thing you’ll need is patience. Without patience you’ll go crazy. Insane in fact. Fortunately, I’ve been in this situation before, waiting for the big break so to speak. Waiting on things (investors, partners, etc) that present themselves as huge potential opportunities that may or may not pan out. In my experience, most of them don’t pan out for a variety of reasons. Even more important than knowing that however is to know that things will likely take longer than expected. When someone tells you ‘I’ll know in 10 days!”…expect to be waiting at least twice that long. And when you do get the response, it’ll probably be something that warrants another fatally optimistic “10 days!” If you’re a freelancer or entrepeneur and want to keep your sanity, stay the course, trust your instincts, and most of all be patient.

Kelly Sonora over at onlinecollegedegree.org just emailed me and let me know that this blog made their list of top 100 blogs for young entrepreneurs.

I’m a little surprised since my content is all over the place but I’ll take it…even if I did squeak in at number 100. Check out the list there’s a ton of great blogs on there, some of which I already read. My personal fave and one of the few blogs I try to read religiously is Seth Godin’s blog.

Check it out and check out the list. If you’re entrepeneurial minded I’m sure you’ll find some great reading there.

Conspicuously absent from my last mega update post was any new news on opening my training facility. The reason for that is that there is no update. In fact, things are exactly the same as they were 2-3 weeks ago. I’ve actually been through enough of these things to realize that I tend to be fatally optimistic on time lines and it’s always best to expect about two to three times as long as you think you should be. So the update is basically this- the group at Impact training facility is undertaking a massive restructuring. They have already agreed to the first step which keeps me in the hunt for their facility. The second step is final decision making about outsourcing services and facility remodeling, and so far no decisions have been made. My contact has kept me in the loop on most things and just asked that I be patient. I’ve surprised myself at how patient I’ve been able to be. I’m still very optimistic that things will work out at Impact but if not I have other avenues to pursue for a facility, including the original plan of working together with my baseball colleague. All in all, while I’d like to have known by now, I’m looking at this as a ‘no news is good news’ situation.

Sorry for the delay. I had a lot going on. The good news is that gives me a lot to update on. Too much, in fact. So I’m gonna try to summarize the past couple weeks as best I can.

The 2 biggest things that have happened over the past 2 weeks is that I passed my dissertation defense with flying colors and moved my wife and daughter from OH (where we had been living for the past 6 months) to Cary, NC (where I moved about a month ago). I actually did both in a 3 day stretch. The dissertation defense went great. I had been unusually nervous before it but it didn’t seem to be fully warranted and my committee approved my dissertation with very few edits. The move to Cary went equally well. My brother-in-law and my in-laws helped with the move and it was relatively easy. 5 days after the boxes were unloaded in to our apartment and we’ve almost got everything in its place. Good thing too, since we’re having an athlete I work with spend the weekend here.

While those 2 things have been the center of my work-related universe over the past 3 weeks I’ve also had some other exciting things happen:

• I was able to relocate my track club from the Metropolitan association of USATF to the NC association and change the affiliation of all of our athletes competing at the USATF indoor national championships  so that we’d be properly represented. This process isn’t as easy as it might sound.
• I purchased new uniforms for all members of the club and got them embroidered and screen printed…a laborious task that took far more shopping than I’d thought.
• The members of the track club have been doing great – with 3 top 8 placings at this past weekend’s USATF indoor national championships; as well as great winning performances from the two international members of the team.
• I was invited to speak at the Beijing Sports University for a week in May. I’ve never been to China and really was hoping to be there in 2008 to do video analysis for the U.S. at the Olympics so this will be a great ‘consolation’ prize.
• Immediately prior to that week trip to Beijing, I’ve been asked to do an exciting USATF Level 1 school in Orlando, FL. Teaching coaches education schools is one of my passions and I’m excited that I’ll be able to meet up with my good friend Ron Grigg.
• I rented and took possession of a storage facility that I plan to use to house a soon-to-be-released line of incredible bumper plates and Olympic weight lifting bars. In addition to using them in my training facility, I’m also going to be the East coast distributor for the manufacturer.
• Thanks to some well-connected friends, Smoot Carter & Paul Dietzel, I had great meetings with the Executive VP of Alumni Affairs at LSU and also the new LSU Athletic Director while I was in Baton Rouge. I see both as being potential partners in future business endeavors.
• I’ll be coaching a friend’s athlete this weekend at the USATF indoor multi-event national championships which are held only 10 miles away from me in Chapel Hill, NC. I’ve met him once before and know his coach quite well. Our coaching cues and philosophies are quite similar. He should be a solid contender and hopefully I’ll be able to help him. He’ll be repping my HPC Elite track club for the competition.

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