One of the things that I most enjoyed about working at a place like the US Military Academy was the people I was able to meet and develop relationships. I also had many good friends from my youth who have moved very far away. I was concerned that after moving for the 3rd time in as many years that these relationships might be lost so it’s nice to be able to keep in touch and see these people.

As the world becomes more open and people relocate to different cities, states and even countries, there’s nothing better than being able to see old friends.

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I’m in Reno now.  Las Vegas next week. All told I’ll be away for 10 days. It’s kind of bittersweet.
I’m in Reno for the USATF Annual meeting and Vegas National Podium Project. I really like traveling and I’m going to get the chance to see some of my good friends and visit one of my favorite places (Vegas). All the while, it’s been a long time since I’ve hit the road and after a jet-setting spring and summer I was enjoying being a homebody. In fact, until today it had been about 4 months since I’d gotten on to a plane. That’s easily the longest I’d gone in the past 5 years. My last year at West Point, it seemed like I was gone every weekend. If it wasn’t a track meet where we travelled by bus (or sometimes plane) and were gone for 3 days, it was a business trip for consulting, coaching, or research. Many times it was both in the same weekend – catching a redeye from whatever city our meet was in to the West Coast for HPC work and then catching a redeye back to NY so I could be in on time for work on Monday. This meant that I was away from my wife and daughter a lot. A LOT. In fact, I missed about 1 month of the first 3 months of my daughter’s life because I was on the road. That was an eye-opener…especially when I was often too busy with business obligations even when I was at home to spend much time with the fam. I was often coming home from work at USMA late in the evening only to eat dinner and then do HPC business work for 4-6 hours a night.

It made me think that I needed to make a career change- either stick with collegiate coaching or focus on HPC. While both had pluses and minuses one of the many factors that pushed me towards pursuing HPC full-time was that it would allow me to spend more time with Cate and Eva. It’s worked. Now that I’m self-employed I’ve gotten to see my family every day for the last 4 months and spend a lot more time with my daughter.  Even though I’m not making as much as I was while I was working at West Point and doing HPC, I’m making enough to ‘get by’ and have made a tradeoff that I have yet to regret.

So while it’s nice to leave the rural country abode I currently call home, this extended trip is a nice reminder of one of the many reasons pursuing HPC full time was the right move at the right time.

The most important thing I’ve done is take a new mindset on how to tackle seemingly monumental tasks. Normally, I’m GREAT at taking on a million things and juggling them with a high level of proficiency. On the flip side though, I SUCK at completing the jobs that I start. On top of that, I tend to take on anything that is offered or thrown at me and often find myself wasting time trying to get things PERFECT rather than just finishing it. The combination of these traits means I’m often baking a lot of really great cakes but all the while having a hard time putting the icing on the cake so to speak. This was especially true with my dissertation. Since I started rethinking my approach, things have been more productive though. Instead of looking at the remaining chapter of my dissertation that I have to write and thinking “where do I start,” or “I can just do it tomorrow,” now I approach it with the following two points in mind:

1. I give myself a fairly low minimum level of expectation for daily work on a given task. For example, on my dissertation writing, I now tell myself that I have to write a paragraph a day. That’s it. Just a paragraph. Sometimes I write 2 or 3 in a day but I’ve pretty much been just writing 1. I know it doesn’t sound like much but I’m actually finding that when stringed together over time, these little bits of progress will add up to the completion of my seemingly monumental task.  It’s kinda like the lifetime prisoner who chips away a fraction of his prison wall each day. Before he knows it, he’s broken free from what was holding him back.
2. The second thing that I’ve done is tried to put my OCD perfectionism at bay. I fight the urge to stay on something until it’s perfect and instead just plow through whether the work is good or not. On the surface, this doesn’t sound like a good idea but I’ve found that because of how I operate, it’s better for me to “Just Do It” because if it isn’t perfect the first time around I’ll fix it later. With writing, this approach makes it easier to just sit down and wright and is a nice way of busting through periods of writer’s block.

If you find yourself in a position like I’ve described and have the same disposition as I do, try out these tips and let me know if they work for you.

1. Communicate often
2. Make sure you and the athlete recognize that the plan is a road map
3. Don’t plan too far in advance
4. Use video reviews for technical activities
5. Do some pre-testing with new athletes
6. Be flexible
7. Individualize the training plan and don’t be afraid to tweak it when necessary

I’ll expand on some of these if there’s an interest. If you’re interested post to comments.

So back to the original question- “Where are you located?” Well, I’m temporarily located in a small, country city town village in Southeastern Ohio and the extent of my world class facility / office / training center can be seen in the picture at the top.