Latest / The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast / OG Guest #38: Jud Logan-Ashland University (USTFCCCA Hall of Fame)

Transcript

OG Guest #38: Jud Logan-Ashland University (USTFCCCA Hall of Fame) · The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast

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Track and Field world Juvenile tuned in to our humble servant
0:14
Mike Cunningham for another extraordinary message for Guild
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Athletics connections. Hey gang, we're back here with
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another bonus episode for you tonight.
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It's the USTFCCCA Hall of Fame induction and posthumously our
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man Judd Logan will be going in bow time.
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I love it, Absolutely love it. Deserved, earned and deserved.
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So to help celebrate tonight, and I think you can catch it, go
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over to USTFCCCA over on Twitter and they'll talk to you about
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they'll, it'll show you where you can actually watch the
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ceremony if you're not in Orlando in person.
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But tonight you can watch that. And today you can hear his voice
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telling his journey right here on the Gill podcast.
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We were so honored to have him guest #38 he did an absolutely
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banging job. Love that we are able to catch
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his journey and his words on wax.
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Check it out here. It is Jed Logan on the Gill
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Connections podcast. Hey gang, welcome to the Gil
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Athletics Connections podcast, the show that brings you the men
1:17
and women of track and field and explores their unique stories.
1:20
The show is brought to you by Gil Athletics.
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Head on over to gilathletics.com to find all your track and field
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equipment needs. I'm your host, Mike Cunningham,
1:28
national sales manager for Gil, and this episode our guest is
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Ashland University head coach Judd Logan.
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Really have been working hard these past few weeks to get Judd
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on the show, really to talk about his culture that he is
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grown and cultivated there at Ashland University.
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We get to talk about just how he started at Ashland, what culture
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meant to him. Really learned a lot about his
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old coach, Al Shatterman. What an amazing mentor he had to
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learn the importance of culture as it relates to track and field
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excellence. Really.
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Also, get a quick health update. You'll be glad to hear things
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are going in the right direction.
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So without further ado, please help me welcome the wise, the
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wonderful Judd Logan. I got throwers on the brain here
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today. We have Judd Logan on the
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podcast. Judd, how are you?
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I'm doing great. Thanks for finally getting this
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together with me. I know we had to clear a lot of
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stuff through compliance. There's a lot of stuff in this
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in this COVID time that has people worried about their jobs
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and whether they're allowed to say what they want to say.
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So let's let's get through this thing.
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Hey, man, it was worth it. The back and forth and the
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scheduling and rescheduling. It was worth it to get you on
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the podcast. So if you don't know Judd, we're
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I mean, every credential you can think of, four time Olympian.
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I looked it up. There has not been many
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Americans in track and field that have hit 4.
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This this is a very small elite club that you're in here and
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then former American record holder and interestingly that
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Lance Deal actually broke your American record in the hammer.
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I was there when he did it. It was 1994 in Knoxville, TN and
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I was a fan of the sport. I was retired at the time and
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hadn't really thought about making a comeback.
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But I was at Knoxville when when Lance broke the record.
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And as he hit it, I put my hands up into the air and I
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acknowledged him. And he looked at me, put his
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hand on his heart and he bowed. And it was.
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It was a nice moment between the two of us because we were great
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competitors, but we were better friends.
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That's respect right there, yes. So I thought it was really
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funny. Near the end of Lance's
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interview, I told them, you know, from what I know of and
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you know when better than I do, you know, what a great guy, very
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selfless that, you know, he wants to see his American record
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broken one day because that's moving the sport forward.
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And he shut me down. He goes, no, no, I'm very
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selfish. I don't ever want anybody to
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break my record. Is that how you felt or it seems
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like you kind of were, like you knew it was passing the torch a
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little bit? In the moment, of course, I
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didn't want anybody to break it between the weight throw and the
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hammer throw. I broke the American record 13 *
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1 time. I had it for a day.
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I had it for a day and Bill Green from out in California
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broke it the the, the day after I broke it at the Jesse Owens
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meet. And so, you know, you understand
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that that's fleeting. For me, it was very important.
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I wanted to be the first American to ever throw 80
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meters. And that was a huge moment for
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me that happened at Mount SAC in 1986 that got me the cover of
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track and field news. And so that was a special moment
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because that was something I was pursuing even more than the
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American record. I eventually went to Penn State
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in 1988 in a low level meet and everything came together and I
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threw 8188, which was the final American record, 268 feet, 8
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inches. I think Nate was five years old
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at the time, my son and we had taken him over there with us.
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And you can hear him yell in the background when I when I let it
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go. So fabulous memories.
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Luke McKay at Penn State took me over and he goes, I want to see
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the circle you threw out of because we haven't removed any.
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We don't throw here anymore. But I took him down the circle
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still there. The cage is still there, but
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they trained down at the other end at A, at A, at a brand new
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area of land that they have. But that was really cool for me
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to kind of go out there with Luke and take a look around and,
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and, and remember that memory of, of 8188.
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Could you visualize? Could you see the video playing
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while you were in the ring? Oh 100% yeah.
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Total recall. I remember in round five, it
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started raining and there's a throw on video somewhere.
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Well, Rob Lasorsa has the American record throw that he's
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put up on Twitter before. But in round five, my glove got
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wet and I lost the throw about 15 feet outside the sector to
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the right, a little over 270 feet because my glove was wet.
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And the thing about that, Mike, is when I got back after that
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meet, I said to my training partners, I said I've got this
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thing figured out. I don't think I'll ever throw
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under 80 meters again in a competition.
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And I didn't do it till four years later.
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I didn't throw under 80. No, I didn't throw over 80
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again. Oh, difficult it is.
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That's how difficult it is. I came home from that meet and
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over the course of the next couple months made every mistake
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an athlete who's coaching himself can make.
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From overtraining to over caffeinating, to not wanting to
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drop distance and practice, to pushing it in the weight room to
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start doing new things I've never done before.
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And next thing you know, I've got an iliotibial band problem
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in my hip IT band. I ended up after Seoul, Korea of
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having to have surgery which cost me 5 months.
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So I learned a lot from that process.
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And you know, my whole career as a thrower, I did not know at the
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time set me up to be a coach because I always tell my kids, I
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said, look, I've made every mistake that you can possibly
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make. I've been coached by Stuart
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Togra. I've been coached by Harold
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Conley. I've been coached by Al
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Shatterman. I've been coached by the greats.
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I've trained with Sadiq, Tam, Lipinoff, Bonderchuck, but I've
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made enough mistakes on my own that I'm going to be able to
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save you from 70 to 80% of the mistakes that I made as an
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athlete because I only got you for four years and possibly 5 if
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you red shirt. So we're talking over a career
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of 1518 years that I learned all of this stuff.
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So, you know, at that time, I never wanted to be a coach.
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I, I wanted to do radio and TVI wanted to do broadcasting.
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I actually turned down a job with ESPN in 1984 to train for
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the Olympic trials because my coach, Al Shatterman, believed
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that I had a great shot to make the team.
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But I had to turn down that job that was going to pay me $16,000
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a year and eventually maybe get me on TV on a cable network that
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wasn't even in the state of Ohio yet.
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So I've had some a lot of things happen in my life that I didn't
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know the reason they were all happening.
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But they all made me the person that I am and LED me to when I
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started at Ashland to develop the culture that we have here.
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Yeah. And that's one of the reasons we
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want you on the podcast. We are going to talk about
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culture. For anybody who has been on the
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outside looking in at Ashland, whether it's through social
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media videos or maybe you competed against one of the
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athletes or one of the coaches even, it is undeniable there is
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a unique culture that happens in Ashland.
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OH, before we get there, I know people listening right now.
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Are they, they know about your health issues and things like
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that. And if you don't, you, you know,
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judge as a head coach of a big time division two program here,
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don't be fooled just because it's only and I'm doing air
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quotes here, Division 2 big time program here, always battling
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for conference and national championships.
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And then, well, I'm going to let you tell the story.
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Judd, why don't you give us a synopsis of the story and and an
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update on how things are going? Sure.
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And 2019, I was diagnosed with B cell ALL leukemia and that was,
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it was a punch in the gut because they had pretty much
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ruled out the cancers and we're focusing on another area that
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was causing my platelets to drop so low.
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But when I got that diagnosis, my daughter, who just happened
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to be a nurse practitioner in oncology, made some phone calls
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and got me into the best care that I could possibly get over
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at the Cleveland Clinic. And we started a regimen.
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We started a clinical trial, and I had to pass three big hoops to
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be allowed in this trial. You couldn't be over the age of
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60 to get in the trial. I was 59 1/2.
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I had to have a certain chromosome.
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And it wasn't bad or good. You just had to have this
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chromosome to be allowed in the study.
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And I had it. And then there was one other
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hoop that I had to jump through. But we got in this clinical
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trial, I've got an incredible leukemia Dr. and we started
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treating this thing and almost immediately I started having
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fantastic results. Unfortunately, I had to miss the
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2019 indoor NCAA Championships, where in 25 years of coaching,
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15 years as head coaching, we've been second three times, we've
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been third four times, we've been fourth five times, and we
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win the national championship. I miss the confetti cannon.
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I don't get to touch the gold. But, you know, I watched that
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whole thing on the live feed and, you know, saw my team get
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on the podium and, you know, obviously, you know, raise my
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spirits. And, you know, moving forward, I
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got to be part of the outdoor team.
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And we traveled to Texas. And going into the final day, we
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were behind Angelo State by 26 points.
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And on paper, they were supposed to just run away with this
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thing. They have somebody false start
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in one of the hurdles. Miles Pringle gets into the 200
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because there is a disqualification.
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He gets moved up and gets 4th. And then Trevor Bassett comes
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and wins the 400 hurdles. Alex Hill exceeds his mark in
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the discus. And next thing you know, we're
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going to the 4 by 4 with a chance to lock down 2nd.
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And if Angelo falters at all in the four by four, we got chance
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to win this thing. So they announce on the
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loudspeaker that Angelo's lining up for the four by four that
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they've never finished outside the top five in the last 10
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years in the four by four. Well, that's not something you
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want to hear. Even if we want it.
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Even if we want it, we couldn't win it.
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We couldn't win the title. And so, you know, they knew that
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and their guys went out and they just kind of overdid it.
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They went like it was a 4 by 300 and they kept dying in the last
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100 and we moved up into second behind.
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Who was it? George Williams, Team Saint
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Augustine. Yeah.
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And you know, we end up running three O 8 for 2nd place and they
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get 7th or 8th and we're national champions by one point.
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We won the indoors by the one. Yeah, we won the indoor by one
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point. We won the outdoor by one point.
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And I got to be there for that confetti cannon.
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I got to be there for that moment.
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But in April, late April of last year, 19, I was diagnosed with
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remission, meaning that they have done a bone marrow biopsy,
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they have done a inner fecal lumbar puncture, and they
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couldn't find any leukemia, which means that I was in
14:54
remission. And that means that it doesn't
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mean the cancer's gone or it's not coming back.
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There's just no more mature cells.
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So I've been on that process now and I'm 14 months in remission
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and I am on my last cycle of chemotherapy.
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I'm hooked up right now. I've got a 28 day.
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Yeah, I got a 28 day Fanny pack on.
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I'm on a drug called blenatubumab that's, you know,
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hooked up to my port. And when that finishes, I will
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then be tested again for bone marrow biopsy for lumbar
15:34
punctures to make sure I'm still 0.00.
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And then I move into an 18 month maintenance phase where I only
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have to go in every three months for a little bit of treatment.
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And hopefully we've got this thing, we've got this thing
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cooked. But I just never envisioned
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getting to that last cycle of this 18 month clinical trial.
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And that's going to come to an end here sometime in June.
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Oh man, that is. That's the best news you could
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hear. Absolutely awesome.
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Absolutely. The only better news that I
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could get is that schools are opening up and I get my kids
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back and I have an opportunity to safely get out and start
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coaching some kids, maybe starting off in some smaller
16:25
groups. But you know, I've, I've, I'm
16:28
not going to lie to you, Mike, I've enjoyed a little bit of the
16:30
downtime. I think any coach that tells you
16:33
they haven't enjoyed a little bit of the downtime is lying to
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you because it's, it's such a stressor to, you know, we do
16:43
more than coach with, with our kids.
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You know, I probably do more from 7:00 to 9:00 at night on my
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text messaging with kids and, you know, putting out fires and
16:59
talking about practices than I ever do during what people
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consider coaching hours. So there's, there's no 40 hour
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week in, in a coach. And to think that we don't need
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that downtime and we don't need to recharge that battery.
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I'm, I'm not Superman and I've actually, I'm in a really good
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place right now where I'm, I'm done.
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I, I want my kids back. I want to start doing what I
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love. I want to start building.
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We're still the defending national champions.
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I know that I've got to take care of my health.
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As someone who's been diagnosed with with leukemia, I have a,
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what's considered a compromised immune system.
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So yeah, I, I don't go to the grocery store.
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I don't go to patios. I don't go where there's a lot
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of people. My wife has done an incredible
17:50
job of isolating me, making sure people are OK, we're going to
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come visit. And they're like, yeah, no,
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you're not Zoom, Zoom in. So something you said there,
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Judd, really important as a former college coach myself, and
18:05
obviously at Gil Athletics, we care about the sport of track
18:08
and field. We would love to be having track
18:09
meets and things right now, but it's someone personally whose
18:13
passion is the person of a, of a coach, the person whose
18:17
profession is coaching track and field.
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I think you hit the nail on the head there about using this time
18:22
to double down on family time, double down on personal health
18:26
time. There's been a huge upswelling
18:29
on Facebook specifically, but of professional development, you
18:33
know, trading ideas and thoughts amongst coaches and that's
18:36
awesome. Love that that needs to be going
18:38
on regardless of coronavirus time or not.
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But then using this time away from the job of coaching track
18:46
and field and working on the person with their family and
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financial and personal health. Man, that is so important right
18:54
now. I you hit the nail on the head
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there for sure. Yeah, and everyone's, everyone's
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giving back in every way that they can.
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You know, we as coaches, we all share the same toolbox.
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So if I, if I tell you what drill I do or what my thought is
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in the weight room or, you know, exercises that we do and heavy
19:15
hammers and light shop puts, you got the same toolbox.
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It's really going to come down to your personal flair and how
19:24
you implement and develop and motivate your kids and, and that
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can't be duplicated. And so that's, so you know that
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I think that's why everyone's realized that it, it doesn't
19:38
hurt to share and it actually makes you a better coach for you
19:42
to have an opportunity to talk about your philosophy.
19:46
Absolutely. And you know, one of those tools
19:48
and it's something, it's a tool that maybe a lot of people don't
19:51
think about. And you talked about this in the
19:53
motivation side of it and how you train your kids and how you
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use the aspect that you have at your specific program is
20:02
culture. And as we thought about this
20:05
interview with you, Judd, from the outside looking in, the
20:09
culture of Ashland track and field seems to be, well, first
20:14
of all, it's definitely envious. I know people are envious of the
20:17
culture you built there. But it seems like it is a
20:21
culture of intensity and improvement and winning.
20:25
I'd like to have a discussion about your thoughts of the
20:28
culture there. Maybe explain what you being on
20:31
the inside. What is that culture?
20:32
How did you build it? Was it conscious?
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Start talking to me about the culture of Ashland track and
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field. Well, my, my life giver in life
20:42
was a 1972 Olympian by the name of Al Shatterman.
20:47
And what I mean by like giver Mike is somebody that can
20:49
illuminate wider space around you.
20:53
Then you can potentially see for yourself.
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I was Mac champion. I qualified for one NCAA
20:59
championship. I was in College in the 80s.
21:04
I was, I love track, but I was, I was partying too much.
21:09
I, I wasn't given, you know, I wasn't given an Olympian type
21:13
effort because I didn't know what that was.
21:16
He came my senior year in January and he changed my
21:20
culture. And he told me that if I would
21:24
give him the next two years of my life and that I would give up
21:28
this job, I would get married because that's going to, you
21:32
know, give me some, some, some some solidarity and some
21:36
commitment. And if I would just buy in for
21:39
the next two years that he said I can take you from #22 in the
21:45
United States to the top three, and I'll put you on that team.
21:48
And so a lot of the culture that I brought to Ashland, the
21:53
positive mentality, the intensity, I learned from Coach
21:57
Otterman and well. Let me ask cause So what coach
22:02
said there a lot of coaches have said and, and maybe, and maybe
22:07
honestly, they could do it as well.
22:10
When you think of some other great coaches of the, you know,
22:12
the Mouses and Pat Henry's and Robert Johnson's just off the
22:15
top of my head, they have probably, I can imagine that
22:17
they have. Told.
22:18
An athlete or two, hey, if you will just listen to me, just
22:21
give me two years. You had to make the decision,
22:25
though, to actually do it. Many kids are given that
22:28
opportunity and not and don't accept it.
22:31
What was it to you that made you say, OK, let me give it a shot?
22:35
What? Let me give up the partying and
22:36
all the other stuff and let me give it a shot and if it doesn't
22:39
work, OK, move on or whatever. What triggered for you to
22:42
actually do it? I think it was the culture that
22:44
I grew up in. You know, I went around town as
22:48
a eight to 10 year old boy. In every restaurant that we went
22:52
in, all the eyes were diverted to my father.
22:54
He was an All American at Ohio State, played for Woody Hayes,
22:59
played two years with the Green Bay Packers before he he hurt
23:03
his knee. My brother Jeff was the number
23:05
one recruited tailback in the country.
23:08
You know, I had Joe Paterno, Woody Hayes, all of these great
23:15
coaches coming in my house talking to my brother.
23:18
And my brother Jeff eventually ended up at Ohio State.
23:22
And I remember him calling home saying, Dad, I don't know if
23:25
Ohio State's the right place for me.
23:27
There's this guy in front of me that's pretty good by the name
23:30
of Archie Griffin. And so his first two years,
23:34
Archie won two Heisman's and then my brother was the heir
23:38
apparent. His junior year rush for 1300
23:40
yards was on the Heisman list. And so there was this culture of
23:45
success in my family and I knew that, you know, some of the
23:51
choices I made in college and got what I got caught up in
23:55
wasn't really honouring how we were raised or how we were
23:58
brought up to be the ultimate achievement, whether it was
24:02
sports or not. My brother Whitney is a
24:05
financial analyst and he didn't do sports in college, but he
24:10
went on to be one of the most successful businessman in the
24:14
Columbus area and he he honored that legacy.
24:17
My brother Andy played football at Kent State and tied a guy by
24:21
the name of Neon Deon Sanders for 12 interceptions his senior
24:26
year in in college and then had a cup of coffee with the
24:30
Cincinnati Bengals. And so he's a sporting goods
24:33
owner now. And so we've, we've all, my
24:36
sister is the, the rock of the four boys.
24:40
She's our, our calming point. She's our biggest cheerleader.
24:43
She's someone that with my mom being in a, in a home now and my
24:49
father having passed away three years ago, she's calm kind of
24:53
the calming influence on, on all of us.
24:56
But I just made a decision to go all in.
24:59
And you know, I got a job at a YMCA working 4 hours a day and
25:06
my wife took on a lot of the burden.
25:08
And I just realized that if if she was going to do that for me,
25:12
then I was going to have to make the most of my time.
25:15
And I remember training 3-4 hours a day, coming home
25:20
exhausted and, you know, moving all the way up to, you know, top
25:27
ten in the United States going into 1984.
25:30
And I said to Coach Scheiderman, so how are we going to make this
25:34
jump to the top three? And he said, we're going to work
25:38
harder. And I said, I don't know if I
25:41
can give you any more hours. He said, oh, it's going to be
25:45
half the hours. This whole last year was your
25:48
base training. Now we're going to start working
25:50
two hours. We're going to start focusing in
25:54
on the peaking process. And you'll break the American
25:57
record in May and then you'll go out to the Olympic trials in
26:00
June and make the team. And all of that came true. 244
26:04
seven at the Jesse Owens meet in Columbus.
26:08
I went out to the Olympic trials by myself with Coach Otterman,
26:12
but no family because I was so clear that I was going to make
26:17
the team that I knew my family couldn't afford to go to LA
26:19
twice. I said, you wait for the games.
26:22
They're like, what if you don't make it?
26:23
And I said that's not an. Option.
26:24
Don't worry. Yeah, don't worry about it.
26:27
So I went out to LA and, you know, made that team.
26:31
But that process and then starting to travel and 1985 and
26:36
1986 and going to the Goodwill Games in Moscow and Germany and,
26:42
you know, visiting all the countries, I became a sieve for
26:46
just grabbing all the information that I could.
26:51
And then when Bill Gallagher called me about the Ashland job,
26:55
'cause they had just lost their coach, I wasn't willing to leave
26:59
North Canton. So I commuted and I said I'll do
27:03
it for a year till you can find a coach.
27:05
But this isn't something I don't think I want to do.
27:08
After six months of being at Ashland, I said don't, don't
27:12
hire anyone else. I I want this job.
27:15
And I would have worked for Bill Gallagher forever.
27:18
He was just as good a man as you could ever be.
27:22
He loved Ashland, he loved everything about it.
27:25
And then when he decided to get out, the president asked me if I
27:29
wanted to be head coach. And I said, boy, I don't know.
27:32
That's a lot of responsibility. And he said, well, just so you
27:35
know, if we hire another head coach, he gets to pick his
27:39
throws coach. I said you got yourself a head
27:41
coach. Motivation.
27:45
Again, six months later, you know, I can't believe that I've
27:51
done anything else my whole life than the head coach because now
27:55
I can fully implement the culture across the team instead
28:00
of just in my own throws group. And yeah, and that's one that's
28:05
one of passion. I'll take passion over talent
28:09
any day. Passion and talent makes
28:12
champions, you know, the kids that are willing to work when
28:16
the coach isn't there. We have a saying.
28:18
Champions are made when no one's watching.
28:20
The championships are one when everyone's watching.
28:24
And so that's the mentality we have.
28:26
The second one is that you can be good, you can be better, or
28:30
you can be the best, but the, the key is good, better, best.
28:33
Never rest until your good gets better and your better gets
28:36
best. And so just some cliche little
28:39
quotes that we try to to live by.
28:42
And then the most important thing about culture is surround
28:45
yourself with people that can do what you can't do.
28:50
And you know, I've had some great coaches.
28:52
I had, you know, a litany of coaches over the years, but I'll
28:57
talk only about my current staff with my associate head coach,
29:00
Ernie Clark. Wow, what a help.
29:04
And me going to the national meet and scoring 40 points in
29:09
the throws and not getting on the podium and now having a
29:13
Miles Pringle and a Trevor Bassett and a three O 8 4x4 and
29:18
the I think he had five guys provisional in the 200 this
29:22
year. And he's creating this culture
29:24
and he's bringing in the type of athletes that can add to the
29:27
throws group. We've actually downgraded the
29:31
amount of scholarships we put in throws to a manageable level
29:35
that I can still get who I want, but I need to be able to give
29:39
him more because he's done such an incredible job.
29:43
And then Jake Sussman is our cross country and distance
29:46
coach. And then Abby Majeski, who was a
29:49
511 1/2 high jumper, won a national title for us as our
29:53
jumps and multis coach. So she understood the culture.
29:57
Ernie's raising the culture and he's pushing me to be a better
30:01
head coach than I've ever been. And I couldn't have won that
30:04
national title without it. Yeah, we were blessed to have
30:07
Ernie early in the podcast. So if you want to learn more
30:11
about the Ashland program, definitely go back a few
30:14
episodes and check out Ernie Clark's journey to Ashland,
30:18
which seems like it was just predestined for him to get to
30:21
Ashland, hearing his story, and definitely has a lot of good
30:25
times and value that he's brought to your program there.
30:29
When you are talking about what you said earlier a little bit
30:31
about with the coach Schotterman and with your wife, it sounded a
30:36
lot like you were talking about that you decided that you were
30:40
going to do it for other people, that it wasn't going to be about
30:43
Judd, but OK, my wife is going to take care of the homestead
30:47
and my kids. Well, then I better make the
30:50
Olympic team. And Al, if you're going to give
30:52
me two years, well, then I better, I better give that to
30:54
you and drop the old habits. Seem like the culture was
30:58
starting to be built on doing it, being responsible for
31:01
someone else being. I'm not sure if I'm saying the
31:04
right the right. Way.
31:05
No, I understand fully what you're saying.
31:07
I built a support system around myself of things that, you know,
31:12
I'm, when I look back to the college years, I kind of just
31:15
got caught up in that culture and kind of alienated family
31:20
and, you know, alienated a lot of family values that I had
31:25
grown up with. And then I started rebuilding
31:28
the support system, started having kids of my own, which
31:31
makes you grow up in a hurry. I put a fabulous list of maso
31:36
therapists and chiropractors and, you know, strength coaches
31:42
around me that were willing to be part of my team, willing to
31:46
be part of Team Logan because you, you need that.
31:50
You need that support system. And so in the culture at at
31:56
Ashland, I try to be all of those things to those kids that
32:02
Mike the best way to define the culture in our program.
32:04
I'll never forget this. It was probably 8 years ago and
32:09
I'm pretty intense. It meets and our kids are
32:11
intense. And when we hit a big throw,
32:14
we're yelling, we're screaming, we're we're pulsing, we're
32:17
creating an energy. It's why all the big D1 schools
32:20
want Ashland at their meet. Kentucky's like, yes, Penn
32:24
State, yes, yes, please come Jesse Owens, yes, please come.
32:28
We need that Ashland energy. We need that environment.
32:31
It makes our kids do better. And I'll never forget we had a
32:35
kid by the name of Dustin and he was a shop putter and he was
32:42
trying to qualify for the Nationals and his PR was 55
32:46
nine. And he was going to need
32:47
probably 56 six to get to the meet.
32:51
And we we get into the last row and I went up and I grabbed him
32:56
and I put one hand on each side of his face and I pulled it 1/4
33:01
of an inch from my face. And I said, look, think back to
33:04
fall conditioning. Think back to the burpees and
33:07
the truck pushes and the tire flips and how hard you work from
33:11
this. But here's the most important
33:12
thing. I need you to be special right
33:15
now. And as I'm sitting there holding
33:18
him, he's got his eyes locked on me.
33:21
And I said, now go in and do what you're capable of.
33:26
And he goes in on his last throw and throws 57 feet, qualifies
33:30
for the national championship, knocks a kid from another school
33:35
down a spot and out of the national meet.
33:39
And the mother says 10 feet away to her son.
33:46
If your coach ever grabbed you in the face like that, that
33:51
would be it. I would have him fired so fast.
33:54
And I hear the the son say to to his mom.
33:57
If Coach Logan ever grabbed me in the face like he just did for
34:00
his athlete, it would be the greatest moment of my life.
34:05
So there's there's the culture. What a difference in perspective
34:10
of that moment from two different constituents there.
34:13
Yeah, it. Was not a moment where I was
34:15
yelling at him. That was a moment where I told
34:18
him that I loved him and I believed in him and I just
34:21
wanted him to have his opportunity to shine.
34:24
And the and the the student athlete on the other team, He
34:28
knew that he'd been around us for years.
34:31
But so the perception is, you know, sometimes that that that's
34:35
too much intensity for me or you know, but I'm not a yeller and a
34:41
screamer and practice. I'm a motivator.
34:44
And if I ever raised my voice and practice to a point where
34:49
it's now become that you've done something wrong, it's two or
34:54
three times a year. It doesn't happen again.
34:56
And the seniors take care of it. So I'm I'm not Vince Lombardi,
35:02
I'm I'm Judd Logan and that's, that's an easygoing guy.
35:06
And it's really hard to get on my bad side.
35:08
I only ask that when you cross the doors for practice time that
35:12
you give me your best effort. And Mike, I'm a huge believer in
35:16
body language. You know, the the kids know the
35:20
only way that they're ever going to be asked to leave practice is
35:24
after they make a bad throw. They go kick a shoe or throw a
35:29
hissy fit. I give them one warning.
35:32
Tell them that's not acceptable in our program.
35:34
I think how you carry yourself, win, lose or draw body language
35:39
tells me so much about when I was competing and I would read
35:44
the body language. I just started checking people's
35:46
name off the list. Nope.
35:48
It's not going to be him today, it's not going to be him, it's
35:51
not going to be him, it's going to be me.
35:53
Because they didn't have that belief in themself and you have
35:56
to carry yourself that way. That's interesting.
35:59
When I think back to the meats, and I've been to a few of them
36:03
now where your team has been specifically throws right now,
36:07
and I want to make sure we're we're talking about the whole
36:09
team here, but specifically with the throws.
36:11
I can remember, like I can play the the memories of my head
36:14
several times of a kid hitting APR or moving from 3rd to 1st
36:18
and the excitement and everything that goes along with
36:21
it that you described. I can't I've, I've certainly
36:24
seen enough bad throws as well. You know, you know, not PRS and
36:27
I shouldn't call those bad throws, but you know, not PRS
36:30
and not winning throws. And you're right.
36:32
I can't think of a time where a shoe was kicked or undoing the
36:36
glove and throwing it. That's it's all positive body
36:39
language, not negative body language.
36:43
Unacceptable in our program and that was started back with the
36:48
early group of athletes that I had.
36:51
I inherited a great group when I came in, although they were
36:53
juniors and seniors. I got kids to the national meet
36:56
who have never been there. I got kids who were 5th and 6th
36:59
place All Americans to be national champions and then I
37:03
got a hold of Adrian Blewett and Jackie Jesling, all all in the
37:10
same five year period. They red shirted two different
37:12
years, but they had their third, 4th and 5th years together.
37:16
Those two girls, 26th time All Americans between the two of
37:22
them and numerous national champions national records,
37:28
Adrian's shot put record still stands as the national record.
37:33
Jackie just had her hammer record broken.
37:36
Course, the weight record got destroyed about six years ago.
37:40
And that event for women is just the the craziest event to me.
37:44
I, you know, when I think back to Jackie throwing 67 feet and
37:49
now these girls are the so many college girls over 80 feet.
37:53
It's just it's, it's just, it just blows me away.
37:57
But you know, I always thought my legacy was going to be, I
38:01
wanted to, I wanted to coach long enough to have the most All
38:04
Americans and the most national champions in NCAA history.
38:08
And I don't know where I stand. I just actually yesterday with
38:13
the new word coming out that everybody that qualified for the
38:16
D2 meet is now All American. We had five to that list, but
38:20
we're now at 282 All Americans and just the throws in my time,
38:28
which averages out to over 11 a year between indoor and outdoor
38:33
and just the throws and 50 national champions, which
38:36
averages out to two national champions per year over my 25
38:41
years of coaching. So those numbers, although
38:45
that's the legacy I wanted. My legacy is becoming, like you
38:50
said earlier, about the culture that I'm going to leave this
38:54
program with someday, about my incredible coaching tree with,
39:00
you know, just blame Mag and the job that he did at Grand Valley
39:05
State now at Finley, Zach Ball over at Towson State, Jeff Jock
39:10
Medis at Walsh University, Steve Manns is down at Miami of Ohio.
39:16
I think right now I've got 13 or 14 of my former throwers that
39:23
are coaching at either Division Three, division two or Division
39:25
One, and that's a way better legacy to see the results
39:32
they're doing than to keep a stupid tabulation on the amount
39:36
of all Americans and national champions.
39:38
That can be something for people to discuss after I retire.
39:42
But for me right now, my legacy is to to install it.
39:49
And still that culture here do our best moving forward and in
39:54
limited budget eras with cutbacks across every major
39:58
university, track and field, getting dropped at, you know,
40:03
places, you know, saddens me. Baseball programs, Track and
40:09
field programs. And you know, it's just to me,
40:13
it's it's so knee jerk. And I know that there are a lot
40:16
of these are budgetary. I know a lot of them are to
40:19
protect football and basketball to come into Title 9 compliance.
40:23
And but it's still, it's still hurts.
40:28
Track and field's the highest experience for any high school
40:33
athlete across the United States, has the greatest
40:35
participation numbers than any other sport.
40:38
And to limit those opportunities is a is a huge disservice And I
40:44
understand cuts have to be made, but it it it still saddens me.
40:49
Agreed. Absolutely.
40:51
You've been at Ashland for 26 total years, head coach for 15.
40:57
When you were developing the culture for your throws group
41:02
now and for when you moved over to the head coach, now you're
41:05
responsible for all the groups. How did you translate that
41:09
culture across distance, sprints, jumps, etcetera?
41:14
I tried not to micromanage. I told them that I would love to
41:19
meet any recruits that you would like me to meet.
41:22
I have a pretty good track record of closing kids that are
41:27
right on the brink. But I don't want to micromanage
41:30
your recruits. I want you to be active.
41:34
I'm not going to tell you how to run your program.
41:36
I'm not going to write your weight training.
41:38
I'm not going to tell you who to run or compete this weekend.
41:42
My coaches have full autonomy to, you know, I've never
41:47
discussed changing a relay order with Ernie in the five years
41:52
that he's been there because I have a premonition or, or
41:55
whatever. I just try to be their biggest
41:59
cheerleader and to give them all the resources they need to be
42:02
successful. And I'll take care of the, you
42:07
know, the opening speeches and how we travel and what kind of
42:11
culture we're going to have when we stay at hotels.
42:15
What I'll let them know what's expected of them.
42:19
But after that, that's your group and they have to create
42:23
their own identity. And it doesn't have to mimic the
42:26
throws, but we have to be under one umbrella of knowing what
42:31
we're working for. That the the, the name on the
42:35
front of the uniform is the name that we're competing for.
42:38
And that's Ashland University in the tradition, you know, the
42:42
kids that are competing today are standing on the back of
42:46
giants in in in in the sport. You know that Kurt Roberts, you
42:52
know who you know, went on to make world teams And Brian
42:56
Vickers, who just went in the Hall of Fame, was a 15 time all
43:00
American here when he was at Ashland.
43:02
Then the Adrian's, the Jackie's, the kid, Wade Johnson's, all of
43:06
these people that came before them and the Katie Najat of the
43:12
world. You know that these are all Drew
43:15
Wendell, these are all Ashland kids, and these are all world
43:19
names that people know that came before you.
43:22
And that opportunity is there for for kids like a Trevor
43:27
Bassett, who's now taking over the mantle for Miles as Miles
43:32
moves into his professional career.
43:34
And don't be shocked if Trevor Bassett ends up being top five
43:39
in those 400 hurdles at the Olympic trials next year.
43:42
Because this kid in my 25 years of coaching has as much
43:46
discipline to his training than anyone I've ever been around in
43:53
25 years, and he is exceeding what anyone would have ever
43:59
thought his talent level would allow him to do through hard
44:03
work and through God's gifts. With your ability to spot
44:07
talent, there's no way I'm going to doubt that premonition that
44:11
you just had for the for that kid, that's for sure.
44:15
You know, it's interesting. I got to talk with Mr. Kidway
44:18
Johnson just a few days ago and told him about upcoming
44:23
interview here with you, Judd, and told him I would, you know,
44:26
really wanted to focus on the culture.
44:28
And so I asked Kidway. I was like, what do you think?
44:31
How did that how did that culture get built at Ashland
44:33
coming from, you know, he gets a different perspective of it than
44:36
you do. And I wanted to to give you what
44:39
his quote was and get your feedback on how he said it.
44:42
So his his answer was that the culture was born, I'm
44:47
paraphrasing here so kid way, don't don't get me for not
44:49
quoting your word for word here, but the culture was born from
44:52
the cafeteria that it was actually after the practices and
44:57
after the weightlifting sessions when the kids were all together,
45:00
the athletes were all together, that that is where the real
45:04
culture was developed. It's a great point.
45:08
I, I remember one of the greatest compliments I ever got
45:11
was we were at a meet at Kent State and one of the other
45:16
coaches walked up to me and he said, hey, great job today.
45:19
Can I just ask you a question? How do you get your kids to like
45:22
each other? And I said that culture is built
45:27
outside of practice. When we finish up being a
45:31
private school when I was at Kent State, we have 6 different
45:35
cafeterias that we could go to when we were done with practice.
45:38
And at Ashland, there's one main dining hall.
45:41
It's ranked in the top five in the country for, you know,
45:44
unlimited buffet style rotisserie chickens made to
45:47
order eggs, things like that, that are just unbelievable.
45:52
And dinner time at Ashland with our group of track kids is
45:56
usually about an hour and a half.
45:58
Kids don't want to leave. They talk about practice.
46:01
They give each other grief. You know, they play tricks on
46:04
each other. It's it's kind of like our
46:07
fraternity house is the cafeteria.
46:09
So yeah, that's kid boys, kid boys, spot on.
46:13
That, you know, that's The thing is a coach, too many coaches try
46:18
to make that happen. They try to force their kids
46:22
into a group and, you know, play games and try to get them to
46:27
like each other and try to make them hang out with each other.
46:30
That that has to happen naturally.
46:32
And that has to come from your leaders.
46:34
There has to be in every group somebody who's been through the
46:38
program, who understands what I want, who understands that they
46:43
know what they need. And to see these kids mature
46:47
into those adult leaders is to me, just as valuable of a moment
46:52
for me than any All American or national champion.
46:57
Something that you said there, maybe think about the saying
47:00
that you know, with culture, it's the hardest thing to build
47:05
but the easiest to destroy. What are some things that maybe
47:09
you do through the recruiting process, the interview process,
47:13
You have coaches that come in that from time to time in your
47:17
program. Is there anything that you do to
47:19
kind of make sure you weed? Out culture killers.
47:24
You know, a lot of our kids that we recruit grow up in the Judd
47:29
Logan Olympic track and field camp.
47:32
We have a three winter camps and then we have a three day summer
47:35
camp where we normally have about 250 kids.
47:38
You usually have kids come in from 8:00 or 10 different
47:41
states. You know, we, we order all kinds
47:45
of equipment. You know, Kim and I every year
47:49
at Gill will have our big equipment order for the track
47:52
camp to get ready for that. And we'll give, we'll give, you
47:57
know, things like that. We'll have a camp store and, you
48:01
know, just some of that stuff that just creates that culture.
48:04
But we get to know these kids. I get to start checking body
48:08
language and how they treat other people when they're
48:11
freshmen and sophomores now, I watch them mature and I give
48:15
them a lot of rope. The problem is sometimes you
48:18
give kids a lot of rope with it and they hang themselves and
48:22
then they they become unrecruitable to me, regardless
48:24
of talent. So I've got a pretty good eye
48:29
for that kind of thing. So our camp develops.
48:33
You know, I remember a kid by the name of Brent Fairbanks from
48:37
Austintown Fitch. He threw the weight 7510 in high
48:43
school with the 25, and he was ranked #3 in the country.
48:46
Jordan Dice was #1 Jake Wiki that Kent State was number 2,
48:52
and then Brent Fairbanks was #3 all three learned how to throw
48:55
the weight at the Judd Logan Track and Field camp.
48:58
And so I ended up, you know, guys went to Arizona, Wiki went
49:03
to Kent State. And Brent Fairbanks and I had
49:06
just developed this relationship.
49:08
He could have gone anywhere in the United States.
49:10
And his true freshman year in college, he threw 73 feet in the
49:16
weight throw and was the number one freshman in the country,
49:20
beating those other two guys by 6 or 7 feet.
49:23
And so he's somebody that just bought into my culture and was
49:28
looking for a private education, You know, so when we sell
49:32
Ashland, we sell it on the fact that every class that you're
49:36
going to ever take, the entire time you're here is going to be
49:39
taught by a professor. No teaching aids, no, no G as
49:45
there's going to be 15 to 18 people in your class.
49:48
There's going to be accountability with professors.
49:51
There's going to be accountability with me.
49:55
And if that's not for you, if you're like somebody who likes
49:58
to sit in the back of a class and doesn't want to be
50:00
accountable and think that it's OK to show up at practice 5
50:04
minutes late because that worked in high school, I said please,
50:08
please do not come here. You will not make it.
50:11
You will be exposed by your teammates in a heartbeat and you
50:16
won't make it. And so you know, other coaches
50:21
are like would do anything just to get the kid on campus
50:24
thinking you're going to be the one to change them.
50:26
I lay it all out for them on the recruiting visit of what's going
50:29
to be expected. And I beg them not to come if
50:33
that's not what they're looking for.
50:35
Now, if you are looking for accountability, if you are
50:38
looking for maybe some of the greatest training partners
50:42
you'll ever have in your life to push you to, you know, to these
50:47
heights, we've had visits, Kip Ways come back and visit and
50:50
work with our team. Connor Mccullough's come back,
50:53
Sean Donnelly's come back, AG Kruger comes and visited.
50:57
We've had Randy Barnes. We've had all of these people
51:00
come and spend time with our team.
51:04
You know, Drew Wendell comes back, Katie Najek comes back,
51:07
and to have all of these people, you know, that are, you know,
51:12
been gone or had some association to our program come
51:16
back in and be willing to talk to these kids about what it
51:19
takes to be the best. That just adds to the culture.
51:23
But we do the wedding out process through the recruiting
51:28
process. You definitely have an amazing,
51:31
not only alumni base for athletics, but like you
51:35
mentioned earlier, the coaching tree alumni as well.
51:39
I'm going to put you on the spot here, Judd.
51:41
You don't know that I'm going to do this.
51:43
So you said something there that I hear from.
51:46
I bet you if I asked, I'd hear it from every coach without
51:50
naming names. So you said that you're able to
51:54
kind of weed out some of these potential, what I'm going to
51:57
call culture killers because of the the amazing Judd Logan
51:59
Olympic Camp and things like that.
52:01
Have you ever not offered a stud someone that definitely would
52:07
come in and help you program because of something you've seen
52:10
at camp or heard on their social media or something like that?
52:14
No naming names here. Yeah, yeah, I have.
52:17
And I've also been burned by it. I remember recruiting a young
52:23
lady and I saw her have a blow up after a bad day with her mom
52:30
and she said some not such nice things.
52:33
And I'm like, Yep, we're done. And she went on to mature and be
52:38
an amazing athlete and another program became their team
52:41
leader. And I'm like, boy, did I really
52:43
miss on that one. Because if I'd have held myself
52:47
to those standards, Judd Logan would have never been recruited
52:50
to Ashland University. So.
52:52
I. Do I do have I'm a I'm a big
52:55
believer in second chances. I'm a horrible believer in 3rd
52:59
I'd. Like I like I'm a quote that I
53:02
like that. 100%. Let's move to some of these just
53:08
I hate to call them infamous, but these videos, this intent,
53:12
this raw intensity that you guys have in the weight room.
53:17
I want to know first of all, is that a throwers only type
53:21
intensity? And then also, what do you do if
53:24
you ever got a guy like me that would just not have handled that
53:27
intensity at all in the weight room?
53:29
Well, what I do in the beginning is I pair everybody up with a
53:33
mentor. So we've got 6 freshmen coming
53:35
in, three girls, three guys this year in the throws program and
53:40
each of them will have a mentor, somebody who I think is going to
53:44
be the one to take them from the three foot water into the deep
53:50
end. And sometimes you, you need, I'm
53:53
the lifeguard, but sometimes you need a swim assistant, somebody
53:58
that can help them, you know, with what's expected.
54:02
And so I have a mentorship program through my throws.
54:07
And that intensity, the intensity in the weight room is
54:12
what teaches kids how to compete.
54:14
You know, I've been, you know, I've been criticized for, you
54:20
know, spending too much time in the weight room or putting too
54:23
much of an emphasis on strength training in my own training and
54:27
not enough throwing, not enough technical work.
54:30
And that and that wasn't the case because if it weren't for
54:34
the weight room, I would have never found my intensity you
54:38
had. There's just something about
54:42
getting under a bar that you have no idea if you're strong
54:46
enough to go up and down with it, but you've got 15 to 18
54:50
maniacs behind you telling you can.
54:52
Maniacs, yes. Screaming and yelling with
54:57
intensity. And when they do it, the look in
55:00
their eyes, the breakthrough that they have that carries over
55:04
into the ring. Now.
55:06
One of my former throwers who never made All Americans the
55:09
head strength and conditioning coach here.
55:11
The husband of my jumps coach, Malcolm Majeski, He's the
55:15
strength and conditioning coach for the other 400 athletes here
55:20
at Ashland University other than the throwers.
55:23
So he takes earnings group through their workouts.
55:26
They've got the music blaring, they've got the same intensity
55:30
going, maybe not as heavy a weights, but he knows he was
55:35
there. He was part of that throws
55:36
culture. And now he's doing that with the
55:39
football team, He's doing that with the with the sprints group,
55:42
he's doing that with the jumps group.
55:45
And so Malcolm's a huge asset to the university and everything
55:50
that you know, he he does. But you know, my group is my
55:55
group. And so that that gets some of
55:57
the work off of his plate. Plus he knows it's something
56:00
that I that I really enjoy. I've said this before in a
56:04
number of talks before, Mike and I, I just believe this to be
56:09
incredibly true, that a, a bad coach that's believed in is
56:15
better than a good coach who doesn't have his team.
56:18
But then you take a good coach that has all the science, that
56:23
has all the toolbox and gets belief, man, oh man, the results
56:28
are endless of what these kids could do, what they could ever
56:33
dream. Because I have to have this
56:35
spotlight that says, you know, what are your goals, what are
56:38
your dreams? And then it's very rare that you
56:42
have to temper or you have to draw them back into reality. 90%
56:46
of the time you have to say, I think you're better than that.
56:49
I think you can achieve more than you think you can.
56:53
And let me show you how. Let me show you where I was.
56:56
Let me show you the people that came into my life that made a
57:00
difference in me. Let me show you the path.
57:03
Let me blaze that trail with you.
57:06
And the more we stomp that trail down together, the more you'll
57:10
be able to find it by yourself. So, you know, I I've said this
57:14
also, I don't believe that there are any great coaches.
57:20
I believe that are good coaches that are blessed to have talent
57:26
that give them the ability to appear as great coaches.
57:30
When Roy Williams won his first national championship with
57:34
Michael Jordan, they said what an unbelievable coaching job you
57:39
did. This year.
57:40
He goes not even in my top five, OK, but the talent level that he
57:48
had to win and taking everything that he had learned from his
57:52
career was what enabled Roy Williams to win the national
57:56
title. But he had had less talent in
57:59
other years where they didn't win, the talent didn't win the
58:01
championships. And he believed he did a better
58:04
coaching job. I don't believe in great
58:06
coaches. I mean, you, you don't, you
58:09
don't stick Mike Schefsky at A1 AA school and, and, and think
58:15
that you're going to win the national championship with him
58:19
just because he's Mike Shashefsky.
58:21
You've got to put pieces around every coach to have success to
58:26
win. And that's an ego Buster for
58:30
some coaches. But it's just the truth.
58:32
Yeah, I like that there. You know, every conference in
58:35
the conference championships has a coach of the year program
58:39
typically goes to the winner, the winning teams head coach
58:43
sometimes goes to a team that went from 10th to 3rd or
58:46
something like that. There's some conference out
58:49
there, maybe it's more prevalent than I realized, but there I
58:52
know there's some conference out there that actually gives a
58:54
coaching staff instead of a coach of the year, they do a
58:57
coaching staff of the year typically to the winning team or
59:00
you know that that amazing company.
59:03
Yeah, the GLIAC started it two years ago.
59:05
Oh, is that right? Is that was that the GLIAC?
59:07
Yeah, I love that that is. Jerry Baltus and I both believe
59:12
that we were getting way too much credit, right?
59:15
We've got these incredible Staffs and two years ago in our
59:18
summer meeting we decided to switch the award and called it
59:21
the coaching Staff of the Year. That is brilliant because
59:25
there's a little bit of an ego if you say, oh, yeah, yeah.
59:28
And I realize the head coach does so much more.
59:31
I get it. You know, you're you, you got so
59:32
much more of the administration work and paperwork and stuff
59:36
like that. But it still takes your staff to
59:39
do this. It just makes so much more sense
59:43
to name a staff of the year instead of a coach of the year.
59:48
Absolutely. Leave that to the UST CCA with
59:51
their regional awards and that that makes sense, you know,
59:53
assistant coaches of the year and things like that.
59:55
But on the conference. Level.
59:57
Absolutely, yeah. But on the conference level,
1:00:00
it's the staff who mentor and work with these kids.
1:00:04
And then really it's the kids that have, you know, stepped up
1:00:06
and and won the the trophy. You know, when when we started
1:00:10
out in the GLIAC, when I think back to the schools that we had,
1:00:14
we had Finley, we had Tiffin, who's won multiple national
1:00:18
championships. And a lot of those schools
1:00:21
started to fall away because of the travel cost.
1:00:25
And we ended up staying in the GLIAC because it's such a
1:00:28
powerful conference. I mean, you got Grand Valley,
1:00:31
you've got Ferris State, you, you know, you've got schools
1:00:35
like that Saginaw Valley and some of these other schools.
1:00:38
But we ended up being the holdout and being the, the
1:00:42
school, the only school in the state of Ohio to stay in the
1:00:45
GLIAC. Whereas Malone and Walsh and
1:00:49
Finley and Tiffin who are in our recruiting footprint all joined
1:00:55
the G Mac. And this week we announced that
1:00:59
we will be moving to the G Mac after one more year in the GLIAC
1:01:04
and then we're going to buy out our second year and start in the
1:01:07
G Mac conference. And what that actually does is
1:01:10
that actually swings the power to have Ashlyn now in the G Mac
1:01:15
with Tiffin and Finley and you know Walsh and Hillsdale.
1:01:21
We now become the stronger track and field conference.
1:01:24
We bring a women's basketball team that's played for the
1:01:27
national title and 1-2 in the last four years.
1:01:31
We bring a football team that's, you know, got a 7 to 800
1:01:35
percentage winning, you know, so we bring a lot to the G Mac and
1:01:40
the Gliac's going to be fine anytime that Grand Valley's
1:01:43
anywhere. I mean, to me, they're the
1:01:45
Premier Division two program in the country.
1:01:48
When you've got 30,000 students on campus and you can offer off
1:01:52
campus housing in your first year, something that we can't
1:01:55
do, the lower cost of state school versus a private school,
1:02:01
Their beautiful 300m indoor facility that they have the,
1:02:06
what Jerry Baltus has done with that distance program.
1:02:10
And now Matt Conley, one of my former people that worked under
1:02:14
me is, is with me not under me, is now the throws coach at, at
1:02:21
Grand Valley. And what a, what a dynasty they
1:02:24
have across the board. You know, they, they, they, they
1:02:28
win at everything that they do. I know JB likes competition but
1:02:33
I have to assume he life is a little bit easier conference
1:02:37
wise for him now in 2022. It it may be on the men's side.
1:02:43
I'll tell you what, Grand Valley's women's program is so
1:02:47
good. They scored it.
1:02:49
A couple coaches in the GLIAC scored it.
1:02:51
They dropped them into the Mac team.
1:02:53
They're they're women's team wins To me.
1:02:57
You put them in the Big 10. They finished third.
1:03:00
I mean, they're they're women's distance program and women's
1:03:03
throws and jumps and everything. Yeah, they're, they're, they're
1:03:07
incredible. Now, my record as head coach in
1:03:12
15 years, having competed against Jerry 30 times, I think
1:03:17
we've won seven conference titles and lost 23.
1:03:21
I think at the NCAA we flipped that and we beat them 27 out of
1:03:27
30, really on the men's side, yeah.
1:03:30
Now we can't, we can't do that to them on the women's side.
1:03:32
They're too good. So, you know, he's he's going to
1:03:36
miss that level of competition with us being there.
1:03:39
He's too much of A competitor. But the cool thing about the
1:03:43
GMAC is our women's team becomes relevant again with Hillsdale
1:03:47
and Finley and Tiffin and Walsh and Malone and some of these
1:03:51
other schools that I don't even know all the schools that are in
1:03:54
the GMAC yet. But you know, it's, it's going
1:03:56
to be good for our program. I know we're going to save about
1:03:59
$175,000 across the board in, in travel and not having to go up
1:04:05
to the Upper Peninsula and travel 12/13/14 hours in the
1:04:09
middle of December with our volleyball and basketball teams.
1:04:13
So it's it's a good move for Ashland.
1:04:17
That's awesome. And, and ultimately, if that's a
1:04:19
good move for Ashland, it's a good move for the sports, each
1:04:22
one, women's basketball, volleyball, etcetera, because it
1:04:25
enhances competitiveness. The the money savings,
1:04:29
obviously, because then you can enrich the student athletes and
1:04:32
students of these great schools in different ways.
1:04:35
Absolutely. And you, I've been on you.
1:04:36
You were talking about Ashland's dining hall and it is famous as
1:04:41
a guy who has not never gone to that.
1:04:43
I didn't go to school at Ashland.
1:04:44
I know about Ashland's dining hall, but I have been on
1:04:47
Ashland's campus for Nate's wedding and that is a gorgeous
1:04:53
campus. Man, I really enjoyed getting a
1:04:56
tour and seeing the entire Ashland University campus.
1:04:59
You got a great. Place there.
1:05:01
Yeah, we do. And you know, they, they do a
1:05:04
good job of keeping the campus up.
1:05:05
They do a really good job of being who they are and not
1:05:08
trying to be who they're not, you know?
1:05:11
How important is that? We're a private school with 2500
1:05:15
students. We don't have a huge endowment.
1:05:18
We don't graduate nuclear physicists or doctors or lawyers
1:05:24
or architects. So we, we teachers and business
1:05:30
majors and nurses and you know, things like that, you know, we,
1:05:35
we are who we are. We do what we do.
1:05:37
We just do it well. That's that's true.
1:05:40
And you know, you graduate people like Nate Logan, who is
1:05:43
still one of the dearest people in my life as him and Kim were
1:05:47
my very first two hires at Gill Athletics.
1:05:50
I kind of, I kind of hit home runs right off the bat.
1:05:54
Grand. Slams.
1:05:55
Grand Slams. That's it, That's it.
1:05:57
Well, hey Judd, as we start to wrap it up today, I want to get
1:06:02
put your future cap on here. You're 60 years old now.
1:06:08
Hopefully you've got, and I know you've got many, many years of
1:06:10
coaching, however many you want to do.
1:06:13
How have you started thinking about how are ways to protect
1:06:16
that legacy in that culture you built once you do retire?
1:06:20
Or is that a thought that just doesn't even come across at this
1:06:23
point? Well, I would if I had a magic
1:06:26
wand. I would certainly love to see
1:06:31
Ernie take over the program for me when I leave.
1:06:35
He would be able to do whatever he wants, but he has made
1:06:39
relationships with a lot of my former throwers.
1:06:42
I think that he'd be able to put together a heck of a staff.
1:06:45
He'd be able to take whatever he learned from me and the twist
1:06:50
that he's brought and taught to me and develop his own program.
1:06:56
I also believe that there's a very good chance within the next
1:07:00
one or two years that there's going to be a high level
1:07:03
Division One program come recruit him away.
1:07:08
And at that point, I when I think back at the alumni and I
1:07:14
think back at the people that are in coaching and some that we
1:07:17
don't even know about yet, I think that there's enough
1:07:21
Ashland people and it wouldn't even have to be an Ashland
1:07:24
person that they hired. But I got to believe there'll be
1:07:28
some connection to the staff after I leave.
1:07:32
You know, I'll be 61 this summer.
1:07:35
I would like to at least coach 5 or 6 more years and at that
1:07:41
point, what I've always said is I don't want to be coaching when
1:07:45
I'm 80. I don't want to be that coach
1:07:47
that stuck around and drove around in a golf cart because
1:07:51
that's what he had in his life. I want to be able to spend some
1:07:55
time with grandkids. I really would like to do a lot
1:08:01
of lecturing across the United States and, and motivation and
1:08:07
telling my story and telling some of the philosophies and
1:08:10
creating cultures and, you know, do 8 or 10 talks a year at
1:08:15
universities or businesses or corporations.
1:08:18
Sit down and finally finish this book that I've been working on
1:08:21
for about 9 years and so tell. Tell me about that.
1:08:25
I didn't know about. I didn't know you were.
1:08:26
Well, it's a yeah, it's, it's a, it's a book I'm writing called
1:08:30
Betting Excellence. And it, it comes from a good old
1:08:34
training partner of mine who's now with the FBI.
1:08:38
And he had told me that when he went into the FBI that they
1:08:43
vetted every inch of his life like that.
1:08:47
You just cannot believe how in depth they go into finding out
1:08:52
if you're FBI material. Especially since within two
1:08:55
years he was head FBI, in charge of Michelle Obama, and then
1:09:01
eventually in charge of the entire Obama family.
1:09:04
Oh wow, he was. He was that good.
1:09:06
No pressure. And so when I, when we had a
1:09:09
chance to sit down and talk, I said, you know, that's what I'm
1:09:13
trying to do. 90% of what I do is set in stone.
1:09:18
We're going to clean, we're going to snatch, we're going to
1:09:20
squat, we're going to jump, we're going to throw. 90% of
1:09:23
what I do is set in stone, 90% of my time is spent trying to
1:09:29
figure out the last 10% to make Ashland different than everybody
1:09:32
else. And that's betting you got a vet
1:09:35
excellence. You have to understand what that
1:09:37
word means. You have to understand that that
1:09:38
comes with changes. If you would have asked me 10
1:09:41
years ago if I was going to be on Facebook, if I was going to
1:09:45
be on Instagram, if I was going to be on Snapchat, if I was
1:09:48
going to be on all these social media things, I would have told
1:09:51
you you're crazy without those things, without having that
1:09:55
adaptability and be able to talk to kids about that thing.
1:09:58
You know, Snapchat's how I communicate to my team about any
1:10:01
rate changes in practice because they check that more than they
1:10:05
check their e-mail. So, you know, there's a lot of
1:10:09
adaptation. But in vetting excellence, I
1:10:11
tell the story about 6 steps and when I vetted backwards as to
1:10:18
how I got to where I got to as a coach and as an athlete.
1:10:22
And that first steps comes with meeting your like giver.
1:10:24
And for me, that was we talked about Al Shah, meeting somebody
1:10:28
in your life that can illuminate a path greater than you can ever
1:10:32
see for yourself. And until you meet that person,
1:10:35
and a lot of people already have and speak fondly of that person
1:10:39
that believed more in them than they believed in themselves,
1:10:43
that's that's the start of the journey.
1:10:44
So without giving too much away from what's in the book, that
1:10:49
that's something that has taken a back seat at at times to
1:10:53
different responsibilities that I have and with health issues
1:10:57
and things like that. But I, you know, I'd, I'd really
1:10:59
like to have some permanency to, to that culture and to get it
1:11:06
down on, on paper and didn't, and to leave that behind as, you
1:11:11
know, something that could withstand the test of time.
1:11:14
Knowing the impact that story, your story is going to have on
1:11:20
multiple other people just like the coaching tree.
1:11:23
You've established the culture of your athletes going on to
1:11:27
become teachers and business people.
1:11:30
I want to put one hand on each side of your face and lock you
1:11:34
eye to eye Judd and tell you get that book done.
1:11:39
Get your story on paper to help amplify that that's.
1:11:47
That's, that's the goal. That's I'd obviously like to get
1:11:50
it done pre retirement. Then I'd, I'd like to go out
1:11:54
and, and, and, and speak about it because I think I've got, you
1:11:59
know, I've always wanted to do radio and TV.
1:12:01
So anytime I get to do an interview like this, so I get to
1:12:03
go out and I'd rather speak in a room full of 400 than a room
1:12:08
full of four. So this year I've been asked to
1:12:11
be Ashland's commencement speaker, which is the first time
1:12:14
they've ever had a coach that's still coaching be asked to be
1:12:21
commencement speakers. So I'm looking forward to
1:12:23
sharing that message. It's either going to be with the
1:12:26
COVID, it's either going to be in October at the homecoming
1:12:30
football game prior to that, or it's going to be in December.
1:12:33
But you know what? An honor from.
1:12:34
What an honor, yeah. To be the commencement address.
1:12:38
But that's what I want to do. I want to get out, I want to
1:12:41
speak, I want to share my message.
1:12:43
And to me, that's still coaching, even though it's not
1:12:46
the hammer, it's not the shop put, it's not the discus, it's
1:12:49
still coaching when you're going out and sharing with others.
1:12:52
I just want to expand that you absolutely right.
1:12:56
You're you're coaching people, whether they're in the ring or
1:12:59
outside of the ring on how to become better people and that
1:13:02
affects generationally down the line.
1:13:05
Absolutely job when you get that published, I want to be I won't
1:13:09
be first in line because I know people like Nate and your
1:13:11
family, they'll be first in line, but I want to be in line
1:13:14
to make sure that get my own copy of that for sure.
1:13:17
Absolutely got it. If you listening today.
1:13:21
I I want to challenge you if you're a coach or you know, if
1:13:24
you're any kind of leader and you are whether you're a a
1:13:26
parent, you're a business person, you're a teammate for
1:13:29
some people. I want to challenge you to
1:13:31
really take heart what Judge judge said today talking about
1:13:36
that. There are no great coaches that
1:13:38
you know, you're you're bound on what you do and how you do it to
1:13:41
your team. I think that is just it's just
1:13:45
right on the money. And part of that is culture.
1:13:49
Again, hardest thing in the world to grow and build
1:13:52
positively. The easiest thing to do to to to
1:13:56
take back and and destroy. One of the things that we talked
1:14:00
about super early in today's episode, Judd, was surrounding
1:14:04
yourself with people. And I think looking at the
1:14:07
Ashland Eagles and how they operate at track needs, how they
1:14:12
operate in the weight room. And I've seen them operate past
1:14:15
school from the kidding, the shots.
1:14:17
Adrian Blewett's one of my favorite people in the whole
1:14:19
world, Kurt Roberts. And of course, your son, Nate
1:14:22
Logan, that Ashland culture that you have helped develop there
1:14:27
with your track program definitely does them positive in
1:14:31
the world, positive in their views.
1:14:33
I can't say thank you enough for being here today, Judd.
1:14:35
Man, this was everything I could have dreamed of this to be.
1:14:39
I hope this just gives so much value to people who are going to
1:14:42
listen to it and really understand that there's XS and
1:14:46
there's OS, but there is culture that surrounds it all. 100%.
1:14:53
Awesome. Thank you so much, Judd, and
1:14:54
thank you for the for the great update on your health.
1:14:57
Man, I'm so positive, so pumped for that.
1:14:59
You got many, many years. I know you want to see those
1:15:01
grandkids, but don't quit coaching just yet, all right?
1:15:04
Thanks, Mike. All right.
1:15:06
Thank you, brother. Appreciate you.
1:15:09
Well, guys, that's it for today. Certainly hope you received as
1:15:12
much value from this episode as we did making it.
1:15:16
If you've made it this far, really appreciate you joining
1:15:18
us. Your time and attention are
1:15:20
super valuable and we certainly don't take that lightly and we
1:15:23
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1:15:25
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the mean meantime, if this episode of the Galif EDX
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Really appreciate you. Can't wait to join you next time
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for another episode of the Galif EDX Connections Podcast.
1:16:16
If it goes to appreciate the coach the ones that point people
1:16:19
most every season needs a voice of reason speaking the growth
1:16:22
you got to prep before you carry the load ice coffee to the soul.
1:16:26
For those of us who stay on the go proper hand off to stay in
1:16:29
the zone which you packing for the road.
1:16:31
There's more than one way to go taking notes that's paying
1:16:33
you're told it ain't practice if you're perfect Saint Clair it
1:16:36
can't happen until you listen with both is can't mentor
1:16:39
without a mentor of years of experience.
1:16:42
You can reinvent those years Every plan's got to stand and
1:16:45
deliver to and the price sacrifice can you give up you.
1:16:48
It's a choice and the fight not a win or lose.
1:16:50
It's not a ploy boy device. Y'all can make more moves.
1:16:53
It's not about how to it's all about why you don't know till
1:16:56
you know who you are inside 6,000,000 Waste of time choose
1:17:00
none. So y'all cross finish line, the
1:17:02
work ain't done so we learn from the experts but y'all got to put
1:17:05
in the leg work. Your athletics is network.
1:17:08
It's all about connections put together for the profession to
1:17:11
where every track coach could be blessing.