Latest / The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast / #292: Tonja Buford-Bailey-TBBTC

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#292: Tonja Buford-Bailey-TBBTC · The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast

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  You're listening to the Gil Athletics Connections podcast
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  with host Mike Cunningham. Track and field world UNL tuned
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  in to our humble servant Mike Cunningham for another
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  extraordinary message for Gil Athletics Connections.
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  All right, guys, gals, it's season 6 and this is episode 1.
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  I can't believe that we're on our sixth year of the podcast.
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  I wish we had like streamers and balloons and all that.
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  But instead of that, I've actually, you know, I've
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  actually started in the last couple seasons having like
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  legendary legacy, like just, you know, a little bit higher in the
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  stratosphere guest to kick us off boost.
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  Scheck Snider has been one of the past.
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  Dan Path has been one in the past and this year, well, we've
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  got Sprint Season 2 superstar right here.
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  Help me welcome good friend. Love her to death.
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  She does an amazing job. I can't wait to share her
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  journey with you. Help me welcome the wise, the
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  wonderful Miss Tanja Buford. Bailey Tanja, how are you?
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  Hi, how are you? Thanks for having me.
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  I'm doing great. Probably not as good as you.
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  What? What a year.
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  Holy cow. Goodyear.
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  Goodyear. Dude.
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  Yep, it was a great year. Yeah, we'll, we'll get into
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  that. I'm just, you know, we got to
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  know each other. We'll talk about this part of
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  your journey here at University of Illinois and instantly became
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  a fan of you, not only because what a great coach you are, but
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  what a great person you are and even got to meet and know your
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  family a little bit. So just to see the steps along
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  the way, man, it's just, it's really cool to be on the
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  sideline of being a fan of you, Tanja.
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  It's it's fun to see. Yeah.
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  You know, I, I sort of consider Champagne in my hometown.
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  I lived there a lot of years. My kids grew up there.
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  I went to school there, I coached there.
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  So really, really strong connection there.
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  Champagne. Urbana and we we lived in the
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  same neighborhood. I think it at one point too.
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  Yeah, yeah, I remember that because I'm here going by it's
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  like that was her house. Thought about that.
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  All right, well, so for Tanja here, so you have a little bit
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  of a unique journey here in that you were a superstar athlete as
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  well. It's interesting to see you
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  coaching superstar athletes when, you know, wasn't that long
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  ago. Let's be real that you were on
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  that side, going through those workouts, having the goals of
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  making it to the Olympics and medals and things like that.
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  Three, three time Olympics. Is that right?
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  Yes, Sir. Dude first.
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  Of all, I feel like it was a long time ago because I'm
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  turning 54 on Friday, so I feel like it was a long time ago I.
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  I was trying to be nice, Tonja. You don't have to be nice.
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  Go ahead. Well, first of all, the three
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  Olympian 33 Olympics, I have to you know, that that's some a big
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  shout out because you know, I have such high esteem for like,
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  if you make an Olympic team 1 Olympic, you are in a fraternity
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  of, you know, small, small, small numbers.
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  You make 2. Holy cow.
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  I mean, that's legacy. Like you're, you're
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  automatically of legacy in in our sport for for the sport and
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  specifically for your event. Three.
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  I mean, it's got to be, I'm say a handful and I mean that, you
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  know, it's probably, it can't be 100 Americans that have made
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  three teams. It has to be under 100.
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  So I mean that's. And the sport of track?
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  Probably not. That.
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  Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yeah.
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  Right. Yeah.
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  Probably other if you come by and other sports.
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  Yeah, take out those gymnastics. It actually is really, really
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  hard. And I tell you what, even though
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  I made three teams, I still stress how hard it is a coach.
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  I stress how hard it is to my athletes, how hard it is to make
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  the team, even if you're I, I, I've been around the sport for
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  so long. I've seen people doing really
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  well all year and I mean, metal contender well and don't make
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  the SO just because our trials are something that it is just
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  unimaginable for our sport just to get through the mental
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  wrangling that you have to do to get through our trials and
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  through the rounds. And not not just from the
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  physical standpoint, but the mental standpoint.
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  And everything has to line up right And it has to be on that
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  day at that time, you know what I mean?
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  So, but credit to my coach, he always made that clear to me.
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  So I never cared about, you know, if I ran a race earlier
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  that year that didn't go well, who cares, right?
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  And so I try to, you know, get my athletes to understand that,
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  that, you know, So what, this meet didn't go well, who cares
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  as long as the the most important one of the year goes
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  well, right? Because you can't, you know, if
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  you, if you listen to Gabby's interview right after the race
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  and she was like, they're there, you know, that I think Louis
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  Johnson was asking her about the Olympics and she was like, this
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  is at the trials. And she was like, well, I had to
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  make it through this because there is no Olympics if I don't
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  make it through this day, right? So that's, you know, those are
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  things that I'm proud of myself as a coach when I get my
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  athletes to understand those kinds of things.
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  And of course they can look at me and go, you made 3 Olympic
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  teams. It must be easy, you know.
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  And I'm like, no, no, no, no. Let me tell you, everything has
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  to be lined up. And even if it does, if and even
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  if it isn't all lined up, sometimes you got to pull a
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  rabbit out of a hat in other ways, which is what I did in
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  2000. I was not at my best.
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  I was coming back from having my son.
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  I was having a lot of Achilles issues.
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  And so I wasn't really in a position at all where I ever
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  should have been on the Olympic team.
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  But I, I, I used my experience in my know how of getting
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  through that meat to, to make it work.
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  So. Yeah, well, I don't want to
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  focus too much on your athletic side and we're going to start
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  working on the coaching side here.
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  But I do have, you know, for for someone who had such a long
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  career and it's such a successful career, I'm curious,
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  what did you learn? Like what was the your most
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  learning aspect of it, whether it was a race or a result or a
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  practice? And kind of maybe more
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  importantly, tying it back into you now being coach Buford
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  Bailey, not just athlete. How do you translate that,
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  communicate that into your athletes today?
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  Well, everything that I do as a coach is a foundation of me
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  being an athlete, so it's always tied together.
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  Thankfully, because I have that experience.
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  There's so many things, but the one thing that I had to say 1 is
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  that they always tell you when you're young and you're coming
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  up that, you know, it doesn't matter if you win or lose is how
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  you play the game or those kind of quotes or you know, you know,
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  it's just not true. And that's when I learned that
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  little lesson. And that was in 95 when we went
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  under the world record and I lost.
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  There is a huge difference between the winner and the
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  loser, even if it's by that much.
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  Now, I'm not, I'm not saying that in a negative way, I'm just
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  saying that there is. So the great thing about that
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  is, is that it, it only intensified my desire to want to
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  win, right? Which means I continue, continue
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  to work harder even though you're at the top every practice
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  and you just understanding how a fraction of a second in our
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  sport can make a big difference and everything that you're doing
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  off the track can alter that fraction of a second, right?
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  So that's it. I said I wasn't going to ask
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  more than one question, but now you said something that made me
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  think about did you say you went under the world record but
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  didn't win the race? Right.
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  How does that feel? I mean, that seems crazy because
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  you know, in our sport, you know, there's a hierarchy when
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  we get to the very top of like Olympics, right, that's a big
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  deal. Next up is if you're a medalist,
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  like that's cool that you're an Olympian, but Oh my gosh, you're
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  a medalist gold medal. And then we still for right or
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  wrong world record. You know, there's always these
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  arguments. Would you would you rather set
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  the world record or win the gold medal?
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  But world record, like that's just another infamy.
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  How does I I think that kind of actually blows my mind that you
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  you you do what you know, as little kids, maybe we always
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  think about doing set the world record and you but you didn't
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  win the race. How do you That seems like a
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  unbelievable, very steep emotional roller coaster.
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  It is some mental gymnastics and we're I'm going to answer this
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  and then we I'm going to, we're going to make sure we don't stay
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  on this topic. First of all, going into that
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  race, I had no idea I could lose.
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  I had tricked myself. By the time I got, I was under
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  the stadium before we went out to the track, no one on earth
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  could have told me I was going to lose.
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  So that was already like embedded in my mind.
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  Not that I was in this superior position.
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  I just had convinced myself that this was my time and I was going
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  to win no matter what, right? So when I realized I didn't win,
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  I was shocked, right? So that was the first part.
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  And then Kim came over to me and she said look, and she showed me
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  the board that had the world record.
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  And I was like, oh, but I was still like.
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  I. Can't believe I I can't believe
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  the race is over and I and I didn't win.
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  And she said, come, come with me, do the victory lot with me
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  because we did this together. And it was like, it was great.
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  Then, yeah, I was really traumatized.
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  Just that I didn't win. I wasn't.
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  And then and then after I kind of settled in for a minute, I
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  was like, oh, that was pretty fantastic.
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  So you have to give yourself a little bit of grace.
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  But if you are a really highly competitive athlete with that
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  kind of mindset, the shock of losing is the first thing that
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  happens before you start to conceptualize everything else.
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  And then I started then after I started becoming the second
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  place person and the non world record holder who broke the
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  world record, but I don't get the world record and all of
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  that. Then it becomes more of a
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  disappointing but, and but again, I don't ever want it
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  because I, I really feel like the I'm glad I was a part of
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  that was amazing race. It's historic and I don't have
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  any really real negative thoughts about it.
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  But other than you, there is this mental gymnastics that
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  happens. But, and to answer your
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  question, it's definitely in my opinion, I'd rather be an
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  Olympic champion than a world record holder.
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  Because. Again, now Kim Batten's not the
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  world record holder anymore. I mean, she said.
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  It's still for a very, very long time, but they go away.
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  They can be. It's always going to be in the
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  record books, but it doesn't stand forever.
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  Most of the. Time.
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  So yeah, records are fine and and I will say I never ever ran
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  a race to break a record. So I was never thinking I'm
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  trying to run fast and break the record, which I think always
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  causes you not to run as fast as you want to run.
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  And I, there's a many of examples of that, but So what I
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  always tell my athletes is try to convince yourself in a
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  realistic way, not delusional in a realistic way, that you are
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  capable of winning every single race that you run in, if you
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  really are capable, right? But you have to have that
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  mentality. I appreciate you sharing that.
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  You know, it's an experience that I'll never have.
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  I was the fifth leg of our 4x4, so you know, I don't really have
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  a shot ever. Ever had a shot to do that?
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  You would have. Had a shot if someone got
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  injured. Or yeah, they were very healthy.
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  They were very healthy people for some reason.
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  All right, Tanja, let's talk about.
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  So we're going to focus on the coaches you had in your life
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  growing, growing up and through as an athlete.
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  And then we'll focus on, you know, so how did you switch and
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  become coach? Was that always the plan?
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  And then we'll talk about your your coaching career, which is
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  quite fascinating. So let's start with, I assume
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  maybe high school. Is that high school where you
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  started track? I started with Harold Lefty
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  Martin at Northwest Track Club in Dayton, OH.
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  He is a legendary club coach. Levana Martin, Florio's dad.
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  So I grew up in that program when I was 8, and I was with him
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  all the way through meeting Gary Winkler.
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  So I actually have had two coaches.
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  Well, yeah, two coaches in my entire middle school and high
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  school coaches at my school, but those were my two coaches.
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  So I had a coach from 8 to 18 and then from 18 until, you
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  know, I still call Gary my coach.
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  Yeah, yeah. So that's why I feel like, you
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  know, with athletes, if you find a real, if you, if you really
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  have a loyalty to your coach, good or bad, ups and downs, then
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  I think you'll have actually a more fulfilling career.
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  I see these athletes running back and forth trying to find
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  the magic bullet. And it's like, listen, in life
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  with anything, I've been married 29 years with anything, you're
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  going to have times where you like have to just figure things
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  out. And so people don't want to do
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  that. They want, you know, I didn't, I
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  didn't run well or this year didn't go the way I wanted to.
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  Let me go find something else, right?
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  Instead of taking full accountability for you know, how
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  things are going and where you want them to go, right?
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  So for me, I never ever questioned anything that once
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  you start doing that, once you notice yourself as an athlete,
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  start saying, well, why are we doing this in the way?
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  But didn't we do this last week? Or explain to me why, you know,
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  what is the philosophy of what you know?
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  I can never imagine me asking my coach like, explain to me why
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  you came up with this If that's the case, I just coach myself
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  why I don't. Athletes don't need to have
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  input in how they're being coached if they trust, respect
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  and have loyalty to their coach. If not, find that person that
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  you do have that with and stop asking questions.
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  I know a lot of people don't like to hear that.
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  And I know like people like to say, like, you know, athletes
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  should be in no, no, let the coach do their job so that if it
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  doesn't go the way you want it to go, you can actually say,
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  hey, coach, what's up? Or the coach can say, I did
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  something wrong and I got to figure out what's going on here,
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  right? But if everybody has their hands
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  in it, and social media and your friends and other coaches
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  whispering in your ear, then you're never going to get to the
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  root of the problem. I agree what you're it's kind of
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  some issue what you just said. There's consistency is key.
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  And if you're hopping from different program to different
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  program, well, you'd never get consistency.
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  I agree with that. So let's start with this first
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  block this 8 through 18. I love what you just said there.
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  And I think there's probably a lot of people listening and
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  shaking their head and things like that.
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  But an 8 year old doesn't know that.
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  Maybe a 17 year old doesn't know that, but maybe a 17 year old
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  who's been with the same coach starts at least figuring that
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  out. Where does that come from?
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  Is that a was there a parent's influence of like, no, you're
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  staying with this coach or we've committed or you're committed
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  like 14 years old, You don't even know what you want to wear
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  the next day. How in the world do you know
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  that I should be staying with the same coach?
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  My mother is a very loyal person and if my mother liked him, I
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  like him, right? But also they treated me like
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  family and they took care of me because, you know, we grew up
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  really poor, me and my sister, and we didn't even have money
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  for to go to these hotels and travel.
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  And then and, and Mr. Martin took care of us.
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  He made sure that every meet that I went to or that I wanted
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  to go to or needed to go to that he was going to make sure I
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  could, I could make it right, whether or not my mom could
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  afford it or not. In the when I was in middle
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  school and high school, I would get bused to their the school in
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  there community and I will walk to their house after school
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  every day. So I was with Missus Martin and
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  the and the Lebrand, which is their other daughter.
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  And so like I was a family to that to them, right.
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  So again, like that's that loyalty that, you know, was far
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  outside of just what was going on on the track.
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  So really at that age it was more than just the sport, right?
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  It was a community and A and a family environment for me so.
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  Assuming you were pretty I I know you became a pretty good
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  athlete. Assuming you were pretty good
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  athlete growing up through middle school and high school,
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  did you play other sports and if so, why?
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  Basketball. I played basketball and then
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  eventually Mr. Martin was like, so when I went to high school,
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  he was like, you can't play basketball.
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  Is that right? And he was like, Nope, because
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  you get injured. We're trying to get scholarship.
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  And he just really, I want to play basketball so bad.
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  And the basketball coach said my high school would be like trying
• 17:49
  to talk me into it. And I would ask and he'd be
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  like, Nope, total control over what I was doing.
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  And, you know, that was I, I, you know, back where now it's
• 18:01
  really specialized. And it wasn't a specialized back
• 18:05
  then, but he kind of knew that that was going to be my path.
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  I mean I'm sure if I look like I was going to be a WNBA style
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  person maybe, but. Yeah.
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  Dribble or shoot, I now defense, Defense and rebounds.
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  That was me. That's it.
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  That's it. You.
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  You were the. You were the.
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  Don't dribble the ball. You would have been the Dennis
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  Rodman I. Could I could do a layup.
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  I was the Dennis Rodman. I was going to get rebounds,
• 18:32
  going to be elbowing some girls, but that was about it.
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  Yeah. So he was just like, it's not
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  worth it but in it. But it worked out because I was
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  also doing club track stuff going to I I ran to Illinois
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  when I was in high school. I went to an Illinois meet and I
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  would go to Indiana and go to indoor meets and stuff when I
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  was running in high school. So I was still just doing stuff
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  with my club coach while I was in high school.
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  So, so very focused towards collegiate, collegiate
• 19:00
  scholarship. Talk to us about that process.
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  Why did you choose University of Illinois?
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  And so there's kind of two paths when you're thinking about
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  picking a school, right? 1 is, OK, who, where am I going
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  to run and who's going to be my coach?
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  But also like, what am I going to major?
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  What is my career going to be? So as you're going to look into
• 19:18
  colleges, why Illinois and Gary? And then academically, what were
• 19:21
  you thinking about professionally?
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  Like what a teacher, a doctor, a business owner?
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  Talk to us about that. All about the Coach OK, but I
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  but I will say so one day, OK, I got told that low income my mom
• 19:34
  worked two jobs by herself six kids.
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  So I was, I didn't have anybody checking my homework.
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  Or. Forcing me to study and I was
• 19:46
  always really smart and so I could just do the work, but I
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  wasn't managing it well. Like I wasn't turning in
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  homework, I wasn't studying. I was trying to wing it with
• 19:55
  tests and stuff because I knew I was smart.
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  So one day the counselor called me in and said we have like
• 20:00
  thousands of letters, all these letters from these schools, but
• 20:04
  you need to pick a junior college.
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  And I was like, pick a junior college.
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  What? And I was like, that is one
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  thing I will tell you that my club coach never did was check
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  my grades. And I think he just assumed that
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  I had good grades because I had really, really good grades in
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  elementary school. I got like straight A's in
• 20:22
  elementary school, but I was struggling in high school.
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  I had a sister. She passed away in 2019, and she
• 20:28
  was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy.
• 20:30
  So the family was kind of struggling there.
• 20:32
  And my mom was, you know, pretty depressed and stuff.
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  So we was just having a hard time.
• 20:37
  The family was and so on My grade slip, right?
• 20:41
  And then I was like, I'm not going to a junior high college.
• 20:45
  I'm number one in the nation. What are you talking about?
• 20:48
  And so then she was telling me back then it was just this
• 20:50
  regular 2 point O or 700 on the ACSAT.
• 20:54
  It was not the sliding scale, right?
• 20:56
  Right I. Didn't have a 2 point OI had
• 20:58
  like a 1.8 or something like that.
• 21:00
  I didn't even know I was like what?
• 21:02
  And so I didn't even realize that there was classes that I
• 21:05
  failed and didn't do well in it. I never even saw my report card.
• 21:09
  OK, so. Tanja, this, this blows me away
• 21:13
  a little bit because I know I know of you as a very smart and
• 21:16
  capable person. Oh, oh, I'm about.
• 21:18
  I'm. About to so my my assumption is
• 21:20
  like, oh, she's a three five I'm.
• 21:22
  About to tell you how I turned this whole thing out.
• 21:25
  Now this is 1 semester before the end of my senior year.
• 21:30
  This is December going into one semester left.
• 21:35
  So I look straight in that counselor's eye, which now that
• 21:39
  I look at it, I'm like, why would, why, how did the
• 21:41
  counselors let me get in this? But you know, actually I had AD
• 21:46
  in geometry and geometry, my track coach.
• 21:50
  And I don't, I don't have a, I'm not ashamed to say this.
• 21:52
  My track coach was my geometry teacher.
• 21:55
  And I bet you I only got the D because I was so attractive.
• 22:00
  So anyway, I look straight across to the counselor and I'm
• 22:03
  like, well, what do I have to do to make this A2 point O?
• 22:05
  And she was like, it's impossible.
• 22:07
  And I was like, I, I cannot go to AG.
• 22:11
  It's just I can't go to AG. You don't understand what we're
• 22:15
  doing here. So.
• 22:19
  So I'm like, nothing's in. What do you mean it's impossible
• 22:22
  to well, you'd have to get straight A's.
• 22:24
  So I was like, OK, ma'am, thank you.
• 22:26
  And I left there like, all right, going to get straight
• 22:28
  A's. So I went to I was in, I was in
• 22:33
  the French. I was A, I loved French and so I
• 22:35
  was taking French and I was really close to my French club
• 22:38
  teacher or French teacher. And she said, I'll, if you
• 22:41
  become president of the French club and you do all this extra
• 22:44
  work and plan all these events and do the fundraising, then
• 22:49
  I'll give you A and you get an AI will bump it up to AH, which
• 22:52
  is the honors and you get extra credits for it.
• 22:56
  So I actually got as in every class, history, algebra 2, I got
• 23:03
  a honors in French social sciences, all of I got an A in
• 23:08
  every single thing and AH and I, I ended up with like a 2.2.
• 23:12
  Dude. I graduated.
• 23:14
  Which that doesn't surprise me because obviously the the
• 23:18
  knowledge of the ability to have knowledge was there.
• 23:21
  The importance wasn't just there for for many reasons.
• 23:23
  I'm no judgement. Like there's many reasons why
• 23:25
  someone wasn't saying, hey, you got some skills here, we need to
• 23:28
  do this academically as well. So my French teacher was like,
• 23:30
  come to come to class after, come to my room every day after
• 23:35
  class and and study like if you have a history test, study it
• 23:38
  like look it over and get the stuff.
• 23:40
  And I was like hustling and working.
• 23:41
  And I was like, oh man, I'm taking these tests and I know
• 23:45
  every answer. Man, I really wish I had known
• 23:48
  this. I'm like, I know this is so
• 23:50
  easy. I have a really good
• 23:51
  photographic memory. I'm like studying all these
• 23:54
  wars. I'm like, man, and, and I mean,
• 23:57
  interesting in it and going in there and knocking the test out,
• 24:00
  getting straight A's killed it. So going into college, I was
• 24:04
  like, oh, I just got to look like take a little time to
• 24:06
  study. But I will tell you I got
• 24:09
  involved in this program in high school and it was an outreach
• 24:13
  program and we would go to elementary schools and read to
• 24:20
  the kids. I love reading.
• 24:21
  I'm a crazy book person. And so I we were reading to the
• 24:26
  kids And I remember one we went to one where my little brother
• 24:29
  was, he was in elementary school at the time and I saw him and I
• 24:33
  was like, you better be good. So brilliant.
• 24:36
  I mean, this boy is brilliant. Like my dad, like photographic
• 24:40
  memory never studied a day in his life at age, but and I
• 24:46
  started like doing this with these kids and I said I really
• 24:49
  like this. I think I want to be a teacher
• 24:52
  right. And so I automatically when I
• 24:55
  went to Illinois, I got in the elementary Ed program right
• 24:58
  away. I didn't even have to do the
• 24:59
  year to get myself in. I applied got right in started
• 25:03
  with elementary Ed. So I got my degree in elementary
• 25:05
  education. I actually taught 4th grade for
• 25:07
  two years in between my professional career and becoming
• 25:11
  a coach in Dallas Metroplex area, Carrollton.
• 25:14
  Yeah. So I already knew what I wanted
• 25:16
  to do for school. Very cool.
• 25:19
  And I and that's how. And so when college was great, I
• 25:22
  ended up with a three-point something.
• 25:24
  Yeah. Illinois, which is a tough
• 25:26
  school. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 25:29
  You kind of alluded to this, but how did you pick?
• 25:31
  You obviously had a lot of choices, no?
• 25:34
  That was easy. I wanted to go to University of
• 25:38
  Florida, where May of Kearney was.
• 25:40
  That's where I wanted to go. And my club coach was like, no,
• 25:44
  you can't go. So I was really upset and I was
• 25:50
  like I always said, did she call?
• 25:52
  Did she call? Because back then it was just
• 25:55
  different. There was no e-mail and I and I
• 25:59
  would, and they always, most of the time, read, reached out to
• 26:02
  your club coach. So he was totally controlling
• 26:05
  that. And he was like, and this is
• 26:07
  good because we're talking about coaches.
• 26:08
  So he was like, and, and I kept asking him did she call?
• 26:14
  Did she call? And he said, no, she she does
• 26:19
  not want you. OK, She does not want you.
• 26:23
  I was number one in 100 hurdles and I think, no, I was number
• 26:27
  one in the 400 hurdles and #2 in 100 hurdles.
• 26:31
  And he was like, no, she doesn't.
• 26:32
  She doesn't want you. And, and pretty much I stopped
• 26:34
  asking. So I was like, OK.
• 26:37
  And he said, however, there's this coach.
• 26:44
  Who? I believe is one of the I don't
• 26:47
  even know how he found Gary or how he knows.
• 26:50
  Like that's a stupid thing to say because, you know, I'm sure
• 26:55
  he was doing clinics and stuff and he happened to be in the
• 26:57
  clinic probably at the USATF. So he said, there is this guy
• 27:02
  and I believe he's one of the most brilliant technical
• 27:08
  technician, coach, Sprint hurdles coaches out there.
• 27:13
  But it's it's not a school like it's not the LSU.
• 27:16
  It's not sexy. Yeah, I was talking to LSU and
• 27:20
  they were like, we want you, but we don't need you in 100
• 27:22
  hurdles. Just come.
• 27:24
  Just run the 400 hurdles. And I'm like, no, no, no, no.
• 27:26
  I want to run 4 by 1. I want to run 4.
• 27:29
  I want to run. I didn't even like the 400
• 27:32
  hurdles. There was no way you were going
• 27:33
  to convince me to go to college to run them.
• 27:36
  No, my whole first year Illinois, I taught Gary out of
• 27:39
  running the 400 hurdles. I hated the 400 hurdles.
• 27:42
  So I didn't want to do that event.
• 27:44
  I wanted to do the 100 hurdles. And LSU was like, we got
• 27:47
  hurdlers 100 hurdlers week to Angela Stanley, Cinnamon
• 27:50
  Sheffield, Don, Don Bolt. We don't need Mary, we don't
• 27:55
  need you. And I was like, I would never do
• 27:59
  that you. Know.
• 28:00
  So then he was telling me about Illinois and he was like, you
• 28:03
  know, it'll be pretty much about you.
• 28:06
  Gary will give you a lot of time.
• 28:09
  Just meet with him. And I was like, OK, cool.
• 28:12
  So he came to my house and in the hood and he had a laptop and
• 28:19
  he was like doing stuff on his laptop.
• 28:22
  And I was like, what, you know, a laptop with like a stick
• 28:28
  figure person going over hurdles.
• 28:31
  I was amazing stole so and and mind you, this was like March
• 28:39
  because I had the academic thing going on.
• 28:41
  I was working on my grades at the time, right.
• 28:44
  So this was March and I went to Illinois campus and it was
• 28:48
  during the flying Illini and it was during March Madness.
• 28:53
  And we I can say we now, but we were killing it.
• 28:56
  And I was like, this is a really cool low key place.
• 29:00
  It was just me on the visit, wasn't that cold.
• 29:04
  I drove down because it's like 4 hours from Dayton and I was like
• 29:09
  you know what got stuff going on at the house.
• 29:13
  I won't be too far away. Go straight Indy, check it out.
• 29:17
  Cold weather didn't bother me because I grew up in Dayton
• 29:20
  because everybody would say you want to go warm or more, but I
• 29:22
  didn't even understand the concept of that like what that
• 29:24
  was going to mean. Like I'm like it sounds cool but
• 29:26
  I don't really care. I don't ever feel like like
• 29:29
  running in the halls is normal to.
• 29:31
  Me so. I don't care.
• 29:32
  No. And so after I met him and he
• 29:39
  had this kind of goofy personality for like this tall,
• 29:42
  white skinny dude, he looked like Woody.
• 29:47
  Down to the boots, yes. Cowboy boots, tight jeans,
• 29:51
  cowboy hat, button down western shirt.
• 29:55
  So I was like, I like this guy. He's cool.
• 29:59
  And you like, he just had a personality that was cool.
• 30:02
  Like, you know, but he, but I saw exactly what Mr. Martin was
• 30:07
  telling me about, about the technical side of it.
• 30:09
  And I was like, yeah, he's telling me all this stuff about
• 30:12
  hurdles that I didn't even know exists.
• 30:14
  I know you run and when you get to the hurdles, you jump.
• 30:17
  Even in the program that I was in, that's when I realized like,
• 30:21
  I, I didn't know nothing when I was running before, like, and
• 30:26
  then right away he started working on technical stuff with
• 30:28
  me and just teaching me everything about the event.
• 30:32
  And I was soaking it up and I loved watching videos and just
• 30:38
  learning and being a student of my event.
• 30:43
  People say I'm a student of sport.
• 30:44
  No, you're not a student of sport because you can ask me a
• 30:46
  million things about, you know, pacing of the steeplechase and I
• 30:50
  can't tell you right, or the discus throw.
• 30:53
  But I was a student of my event like the 400 hurdles.
• 30:58
  I knew inside out, right. And so we we had that behind and
• 31:05
  I wanted to, you know, learn the way he, you know everything he
• 31:11
  knew. I'm like, he's really smart.
• 31:12
  He has all this information. I want to absorb it, right.
• 31:14
  So that's why I ended up in Illinois.
• 31:15
  It was specifically Gary Winkler.
• 31:17
  Like I found out later that he was looking at other he had
• 31:20
  applied for other jobs. You know, you find that out
• 31:24
  later after you don't know that. And I'm thinking who would have
• 31:28
  been on the first thing smoking of Gary here, because I think of
• 31:31
  Exodus Florida. He had applied for all these
• 31:33
  things. I was like, I'd have been on the
• 31:35
  1st. I don't care what he'd have been
• 31:36
  like. They're going to Timbuktu.
• 31:39
  I'd be like, all right. Yes, we are.
• 31:43
  Yeah, there've been, no question about it.
• 31:45
  So, you know, it's every person who becomes a coach has an
• 31:49
  individual style. There are some that are a little
• 31:51
  bit more extreme than the others.
• 31:52
  And that's not that's not necessarily a bad thing.
• 31:54
  I I consider Gary an extremist in the sense of very unique,
• 31:58
  quiet, methodical, intelligent. He he my take and I love that
• 32:05
  you know, he taught my level 2 for sprints was a mentor of mine
• 32:09
  love him very much, but not going to be the raw raw coach.
• 32:14
  You know, there's the there's the raw, raw people and there's
• 32:16
  places for that. That's not going to be you're
• 32:19
  going to find your own internal raw raw when when you're coached
• 32:22
  by by Gary. How did as you're working
• 32:26
  through and you're soaking up all this information on hurdles
• 32:28
  and you're learning how to hurdle better and you're
• 32:30
  hopefully doing better academically as well.
• 32:32
  So you end up getting a degree. That's the good point.
• 32:34
  So you end up doing OK there. How did the relationship from
• 32:39
  freshman? It's much more, I have to think
• 32:42
  authoritarian. You know, Gary tells you XY and
• 32:45
  Z maybe by your senior year, because you know the style, you
• 32:48
  know, you you're more in the leadership.
• 32:50
  Maybe there's a little bit more input.
• 32:51
  How did the relationship grow throughout those four to five
• 32:55
  years or did it at all? Was he much?
• 32:57
  Did he stay authoritarian the whole time?
• 33:01
  Yeah, he stayed authoritarian the whole time.
• 33:04
  And then right away when I came to the program, I was like, it
• 33:09
  was me and another girl that was a walk on that were freshmen, so
• 33:12
  there wasn't a big freshman class.
• 33:14
  So everybody else is upper class.
• 33:16
  And I saw a lot, some of the girls kind of like resist.
• 33:20
  They didn't like him or they were resisting him or it's, you
• 33:24
  know, like being territorial and stuff.
• 33:27
  And I was just kind of like just sitting back observing and I was
• 33:32
  like, yeah, I'm going to not be that.
• 33:39
  Like I'm going because the the ones that were teaming up with
• 33:44
  Gary were successful. So I'm like.
• 33:49
  You recognize that quick. Going to be the one this is.
• 33:53
  I can say bitch right? I'm not, I'm going to be the one
• 33:57
  sitting back bitching and not be successful.
• 33:59
  I want to. I'm going, I'm falling in line,
• 34:03
  right? Because the ones that are
• 34:04
  falling in line, Marita Payne, Michelle Finn Burrell and Selena
• 34:11
  Mandy Milner, they're doing well, very well.
• 34:18
  You know, So and to me that was pretty easy.
• 34:22
  And I never, I was just never the athlete that questioned my
• 34:25
  coach. So whatever he told me.
• 34:27
  And like I said, it's pretty obvious that he knew what he was
• 34:29
  doing. Why would he listen to me?
• 34:32
  I don't know anything about coaching, you know, so he's not
• 34:38
  like overly emotional and never yelling or anything like that.
• 34:47
  Very matter of fact, I used to run the 400 hurdles and so I ran
• 34:53
  really fast when I was like 14 and I broke like the national
• 34:58
  age group record when I was 14, and then I never could run
• 35:01
  faster until I turn like 20. It's a really big mental thing
• 35:07
  for me. That I yeah, sure I'm.
• 35:09
  Ever going to run faster than I when I was 14 so I don't want to
• 35:13
  do it anymore. Right.
• 35:15
  With anything, I was just like, I don't want to do it.
• 35:18
  And so I used to run like this, all hesitant and you know, I
• 35:22
  just wouldn't. I was just always protecting
• 35:24
  myself when I run. So I'd have to sit with him when
• 35:28
  we were watching videos and he'd be not yelling, but just like
• 35:31
  open your arms up. Why?
• 35:33
  Why are you grabbing? You know, and, and I would just
• 35:37
  be like, you know, so that was like stuff that would scare me.
• 35:42
  Like even though he wasn't even aggressive, but I was like, kill
• 35:47
  me if I don't get this, right. And so one day we were at Rice.
• 35:53
  I remember so clearly I was a sophomore in college.
• 35:56
  We were at Rice. And I said, I was so worried
• 36:00
  about that next Monday going to watch film that I said, I don't
• 36:06
  care if I fall. I just, I don't care.
• 36:09
  I'm just going to run with my I'm just the whole time I'm just
• 36:14
  going to run like this. I'm just going to run like this
• 36:16
  the whole time and I don't even care.
• 36:18
  I I rather fall bust my head open then have to deal with him
• 36:22
  on Monday right. So I ran the whole race like
• 36:26
  that and I went from like my PB of like a minute to like 56 in
• 36:34
  one in that one race I worked like a four second PB.
• 36:40
  Wow. Oh I know I didn't get this
• 36:42
  laptop. My my phone it's dying.
• 36:45
  Let me grab my charger. Yeah, go ahead.
• 36:48
  Let me get it real quick. That's that's a really good
• 36:51
  example of listening to your coach as she grabs her charger.
• 36:56
  Just kind of astounded, just listening to that story of
• 36:59
  coach, you know, giving her the cues of like, why are you so
• 37:02
  tight with your arms, open them up, and then trusting coach and
• 37:06
  saying, you know what, fine, let's see what happens.
• 37:08
  I don't want to hear about it again on Monday.
• 37:12
  I'm going to do the open arms and if I come in last or fall
• 37:15
  flat on my face or run a 10 second slower than my PB, well
• 37:20
  then maybe I can say something. I don't think she would have
• 37:22
  said something to him though about that.
• 37:24
  And then goes out and PRS by 4 seconds in the 400 hurdles.
• 37:31
  Come on. I mean, that's the kind of story
• 37:34
  we need to be sharing with our athletes about believing and
• 37:37
  trusting and listening to our coaches.
• 37:39
  What a great, great example. There, I know.
• 37:42
  And, and so Mike, I'm done. And I'm like, is that what he's
• 37:46
  been telling me this whole time? Is that all I had to do?
• 37:53
  And of course I'm doing that. Yes.
• 37:55
  Right. Right.
• 37:56
  I wouldn't been able to do it. I wasn't doing that practice and
• 37:59
  I'm like I just did. I just, you know, it was a fear,
• 38:03
  right? I just got over that fear
• 38:05
  because like I said, I had to, I had to come to terms with I'm,
• 38:10
  I'm going to, I'm going to crash out if that's what it takes,
• 38:13
  right, right. And that's what I didn't want to
• 38:15
  do, right? And after that I made Pan Am
• 38:19
  team, I got a bronze medal of Pam Nams out of lane one, made
• 38:23
  World University Games. Like my whole career just
• 38:26
  changed in that one. That's why I remember so
• 38:28
  clearly. That was.
• 38:29
  Me like not wanting to get the criticism from my coach.
• 38:34
  I was like, I just can't deal with it.
• 38:36
  How did you said you didn't even want to run the 400 hurdles when
• 38:39
  you first got to? How did he even convince you
• 38:41
  that hey, this is your actual race here?
• 38:43
  He told me because I was my freshman year, we got the Big 10
• 38:47
  and I was convincing him like if you let me, I promise you I can
• 38:52
  score in a 200 at the big teammates freshman year if you
• 38:55
  just don't make me run the hurdles.
• 38:57
  And so I think he I know he understood how much I just
• 39:02
  despise or I was running. It was terrible.
• 39:05
  I was overweight too at the time.
• 39:07
  And so he agreed and I thought finally, so I ran 100 hurdles or
• 39:14
  100 hurdles as a freshman and in the 200 I got third.
• 39:19
  But I was like, finally, I don't have to do this.
• 39:22
  So first day of practice sophomore year.
• 39:25
  And he said, OK, so let me just explain something to you because
• 39:28
  you could talk to your athletes like this back then.
• 39:31
  He said. So you're running the 400
• 39:34
  hurdles this year and if you don't want to, then you can go
• 39:40
  on back to Dayton. It's up to you.
• 39:45
  What do you? Go.
• 39:47
  What do you think he saw? Because like, I started putting
• 39:50
  myself in his shoes. I have this freshman.
• 39:53
  I know she could be a pretty good foreigner hurdler, at least
• 39:55
  I think that but she wins the 100 hurdles and she loves that
• 39:57
  that's cool. She got third in the 200 by the
• 39:59
  way. That's no I was waiting for you
• 40:01
  to tell me a story like you crashed out in the 200.
• 40:03
  Didn't you make final? You got third come back for a
• 40:05
  sophomore year cool let's make you the best 100 hurdle 200.
• 40:08
  But he. Knew I would never be a three
• 40:10
  time Olympian or Olympic medalist in the 100 hurdles or
• 40:14
  the 200, which is the event that I my favorite event was the 200.
• 40:18
  Never. I mean, he just knew it.
• 40:20
  And then he said, he told me one day, I'll never think, he said,
• 40:22
  these legs are going to make you well because one time I wasn't
• 40:24
  taking care of myself and he was like, these legs are going to
• 40:28
  make you some money one day, so you better start taking care of
• 40:31
  yourself. You know, just stuff like that.
• 40:32
  I'd never forget those. Things.
• 40:35
  But no, he knew I wasn't. I wasn't making an Olympic team
• 40:37
  in 100 hurdles. But but for but for him to stick
• 40:41
  to his gun, you know what I'm saying?
• 40:43
  Like that's. He saved me.
• 40:45
  He saved me because I was really stubborn about it at the time.
• 40:52
  And that's what I wanted to do. I didn't even like the 400
• 40:58
  hurdles. I didn't like it at all.
• 41:02
  And so then when I realized that he, I could not get him to
• 41:06
  change his mind and I knew I wasn't going to get him to
• 41:10
  change his mind because I, I didn't even know how to
• 41:12
  alternate. So I had never learned that.
• 41:14
  So I was learning to alternate and I would run into the hurdle
• 41:17
  and stop. And one time he was like, if you
• 41:20
  do that again, I'm sending you home.
• 41:21
  There's that practice. And I did it.
• 41:24
  And he would. And he was like, I didn't think
• 41:26
  he was going to seriously do it, right?
• 41:28
  I was just like, you know, it's a figure of speech.
• 41:30
  Right, right, right. He's.
• 41:31
  Like go, get out of here, get out of here.
• 41:33
  And I'm like, no, no, I'm I'm promising, he said.
• 41:35
  No, get, go. And I never that's my only
• 41:39
  practice I ever missed in four years.
• 41:40
  I got never. Injured.
• 41:41
  I never missed practice and I was like walking up that hill,
• 41:47
  you know, the hill never went around to hurdle again.
• 41:52
  Like he's like very like he doesn't play when it comes to
• 41:57
  like discipline. And if I tell you I'm going to
• 42:01
  do something, I'm going to do it.
• 42:02
  Like I saw him leaving people. We go on trips.
• 42:06
  If we if the bus is pulling off at 10, the bus is pulling off
• 42:08
  at. Ten.
• 42:09
  Yeah, There's no bus. There's a.
• 42:10
  Head coach when I was at Illinois, I don't care if you're
• 42:13
  the superstar, like you can figure out how to get here Uber,
• 42:17
  but the bus is leaving at 10:00. So but so when I was at Texas
• 42:22
  and that wasn't that discipline, I couldn't handle it.
• 42:25
  It was like we going how long are we going to wait here for
• 42:28
  everybody to show up? Hour, two hours, like what are
• 42:32
  we doing? You know, I wasn't the head
• 42:34
  coach. So that was really tough to
• 42:36
  because I couldn't function under that because I was so at
• 42:40
  such a dis even my club coach, Harold Martin, Mr. Martin,
• 42:45
  practice start at 6:00, like you were already jogging by 6:00.
• 42:50
  We had one hour practice, so at six you go you so everybody knew
• 42:55
  to be there on time. These were disciplined coaches
• 42:58
  that I had my whole career as an athlete, as a track runner.
• 43:02
  So it that was something that was just never a option for me.
• 43:07
  As you as you graduate from the University of Illinois
• 43:10
  Elementary education, now there's a pro career that
• 43:13
  happens. Did Gary coach you all the way
• 43:14
  through the pro side? That's awesome.
• 43:18
  Again, speaks towards that consistency is is key in regards
• 43:21
  to training. Was there any change in because
• 43:25
  now you're becoming an adult, right.
• 43:27
  You're 22 in the move on. You were 2528.
• 43:30
  You know, as you're an athlete. So you're you're an adult now.
• 43:33
  Any change in relationship between you and coach any did he
• 43:38
  coach it differently? How did I mean had to continue
• 43:42
  to be some kind of evolution of the relationship?
• 43:45
  Yeah, the only I was the no one changing.
• 43:47
  Gary wasn't ever changing. I you know, I ended up getting
• 43:50
  married in in the time that I was a pro athlete.
• 43:54
  I got married, I moved away. I was doing remote training back
• 43:59
  and forth. I had a child.
• 44:01
  So everything that I was doing in my career was my life
• 44:07
  changing. Gary was pretty status quo the
• 44:09
  whole time, right? And, and he was really patient
• 44:14
  with me with all of that, right? You know, because it started
• 44:18
  getting to the point for me. That track was my number 2 and
• 44:21
  #3 on my list of priorities, right?
• 44:24
  And he never was like, it's your shit together.
• 44:26
  It was kind of like, I see her life evolving and it's how cuz
• 44:30
  he was always like that. You know, it's different when
• 44:34
  you're 19 or 20 and something. And as a coach, you're saying, I
• 44:40
  am trying to get you to understand the foundation of the
• 44:45
  sport and why you need to go this path versus another one,
• 44:50
  right? So it's like if you look at it,
• 44:52
  it's, it's really even the same evolution I've had with Gabby
• 44:55
  when she first came to me and you know, even getting her to
• 44:59
  understand because she's so she she's so great that she not even
• 45:05
  just on the track that she always knew she's going to do
• 45:08
  something really important and valuable.
• 45:11
  She's got out of degrees and she's smart and she's gets in
• 45:14
  front of people and, and and they attracted her really
• 45:19
  easily. So she didn't she wasn't really
• 45:22
  that engaged in the sport, right?
• 45:24
  It's like I can, I could I, I'm going to be great whether I have
• 45:28
  this sport or not. A lot of us in the sport don't
• 45:31
  feel that way, right? So it was me trying to convince
• 45:35
  her like I know there's a million things you can do, but I
• 45:42
  mean, I but this you can, you can make something really big
• 45:45
  out of this thing, right, You know, and, and I mean she sees
• 45:51
  that now, but I think at first she's kind of like I can, I can
• 45:54
  be running AI can have my own hospital one day if.
• 45:57
  I you know where. You're going to make money,
• 45:59
  you're going to do big things, you're going to do great things.
• 46:02
  And, and so I think when when they're young and they're in
• 46:06
  that foundational stage, it's important for a coach to be very
• 46:13
  adamant about the direction. Then as they evolve, then
• 46:20
  they're going, meaning the athlete is going to start taking
• 46:24
  their own path, right? And you just kind of got to sit
• 46:27
  back and watch because they're young adults growing into
• 46:32
  adulthood. We were already there.
• 46:35
  So we have to let them work through their life the way they
• 46:40
  feel, they seem, they see fit. You know, yeah, it's amazing.
• 46:45
  You know, when you coach a kid at any block of their time, when
• 46:48
  you coach a kid from 1418, you know, freshman year through
• 46:51
  senior year, there's a lot of changes.
• 46:52
  That kid goes through college. When you coach him from 18 to
• 46:55
  22, there's a lot of things that you know, the the the little
• 47:00
  fresh birdie can't barely even walk and fly freshman to like
• 47:03
  senior year, like you're about to go into a career, like
• 47:05
  there's a lot of changes continuing that all the way
• 47:08
  through a full elite career. You talk about getting married
• 47:13
  and having a child like that's an he saw you at 1817 years old
• 47:17
  when he recruited you and now you're I was.
• 47:19
  Older because my birthday is in December.
• 47:21
  I was 18. OK.
• 47:22
  And you're now this full-fledged adult with a husband and a
• 47:24
  child. And we're still trying to and.
• 47:27
  Now I'm an old lady and I was just at his his Hall of Fame in
• 47:33
  my 50s, you know? Yeah, like that is a huge
• 47:38
  evolution of time. But yes, you see different
• 47:40
  phases in. He saw all the phases in in my
• 47:45
  life. Right.
• 47:46
  Yeah. Being an adult, yeah.
• 47:48
  So cool. That's amazing.
• 47:50
  So you go through and you have an amazing, awesome professional
• 47:53
  career, Mini Olympic, mini Olympics medals.
• 47:57
  You retired, you already told us you so you when you retire, you
• 48:01
  go and you start teaching 4th grade down in Texas.
• 48:04
  Love that. How does coaching come involved?
• 48:07
  It seems like you're on a well on a path to be a teacher, which
• 48:09
  is a great. I mean, if I were interviewing
• 48:12
  right now as a teacher, I'd be like, this is the most amazing
• 48:13
  thing in the world. You affect young people.
• 48:15
  How did this come about? Absolutely.
• 48:17
  So when my junior year in college, we were getting ready
• 48:21
  to start doing our what you call C and I, which is the curriculum
• 48:26
  and instruction classes. And then you go into where you
• 48:31
  going to go to the school and actually do your residency.
• 48:34
  And whatever. And your student teaching and I
• 48:37
  happen to be in this one class where they were where they were
• 48:40
  talking about the pretty much the administrative side of it.
• 48:45
  And so we they start talking about salaries.
• 48:47
  Wait A. Minute.
• 48:52
  What have I gotten myself into? And I'm like, and, and because
• 48:57
  I'm a high achiever and this is still college, not a pro yet,
• 49:00
  but because I'm a high achiever, I'm like, but what do you do to
• 49:04
  get like the big bonuses and like like out if I'm out
• 49:08
  teaching everybody, then I, I, I should be rewarded, right?
• 49:14
  Nope. So I'm like, oh, this is a weird
• 49:20
  one because I'm knee deep into this teaching thing.
• 49:23
  So anyway, I so I retire. I I I start teaching and I
• 49:28
  actually was able to secure a real one of the top open
• 49:33
  positions at a brand new elementary school in Carrollton,
• 49:37
  TX. How?
• 49:39
  How did you get to Carrollton, by the way?
• 49:40
  Because I'm still picturing. From Fort Worth so we.
• 49:43
  OK. We just.
• 49:44
  Got it, got it, got it. So, so I had my son already did
• 49:54
  the first year. In the middle of the second
• 49:57
  year, I got pregnant with my daughter and I took the normal
• 50:02
  six weeks off and then I took another six weeks off.
• 50:06
  And then I said I got to go back though to see my kids before the
• 50:12
  end of the year, right? Because I had her in April.
• 50:15
  So I was like, let me see them before the end of the year so I
• 50:17
  can kind of say goodbye to them before I start the next year.
• 50:19
  And then I got a call from Gary and he was like, you want to be
• 50:22
  my assistant coach? And I was like, what?
• 50:26
  And he's like, yeah, I have a position coming up and you
• 50:29
  volunteer for me. And I'm like, I don't like.
• 50:33
  And my first question was or first thing to him, I said, you
• 50:37
  know, I got 2 little kids, like little.
• 50:40
  My daughter was like 3 months old with me.
• 50:44
  He was like, yeah, I mean, I know.
• 50:47
  And I'm like, OK, but I just need you to know I need to be
• 50:51
  with my kids. Like I'm not one of those.
• 50:53
  I'm not missing stuff. You know.
• 50:56
  And he's like, I got you. And that's ended up how it was.
• 51:00
  But he told me like he's like, let's.
• 51:02
  And so then once we started kind of getting into the groove, he
• 51:05
  was like, I want you to learn for five years and then you
• 51:11
  could become the head coach. But you got to learn everything,
• 51:13
  the insides, the outs, the administration side, how to deal
• 51:16
  with parents, the budget, scholarships, everything.
• 51:21
  And that means you will be a shadow.
• 51:26
  And, and the and most importantly, the first few years
• 51:29
  you're going to be more of a shadow than you going to be
• 51:30
  coaching. And I'm like, OK, yeah, yeah,
• 51:33
  that makes total sense to me. Until I started getting to the
• 51:36
  point where I wanted to coach and I thought I had learned all
• 51:38
  this and I want to, you know, and I would, so I, but I would,
• 51:43
  if he were having a meeting with a parent, I would sit in the
• 51:45
  meeting and see how he handled it right.
• 51:48
  That's I think that people don't understand about when they have
• 51:51
  assistant coaches and they just, they don't ever train their
• 51:55
  assistant coaches to be like you go coach your event area.
• 51:57
  And don't. You know, no, it was not like
• 52:01
  that. Every single time he went to a
• 52:03
  budget meeting, he would ask the administrator if I could sit in
• 52:08
  crazy stuff that I'm telling you, coaches don't do this now.
• 52:11
  And so these. Coaches get the the assistant
• 52:14
  coaches that have been long time assistant coaches get head jobs
• 52:17
  and they don't even know what a budget looks like, right?
• 52:20
  They don't know how to handle an irate parent who thinks their
• 52:24
  child is always right. They don't under they don't know
• 52:28
  how to plan a track trip, right, right, because Gary did that.
• 52:33
  He didn't have that. The secretary do that.
• 52:35
  He's like this is where we going.
• 52:36
  This is what time this time we want, you know, and now they
• 52:38
  have more director of arts now, but there's so many
• 52:41
  administrative things behind the scene.
• 52:42
  And then even just how to be a leader, because that's goes down
• 52:46
  to the relays, relays, right? Even, you know, the relay
• 52:52
  position at any level, relay coach position at any level is a
• 52:58
  leadership position. Not that hard to get to stick
• 53:02
  around the track, right? The athletes know how to do it.
• 53:06
  They've come up in programs where they've had to do it.
• 53:09
  It's simply, and now there's some tweaks here and there, but
• 53:12
  it's simply managing people and managing other people around
• 53:16
  people to make sure things go as smoothly as possible.
• 53:19
  And if you're a strong leader, then it goes really smoothly,
• 53:23
  right? And those are things that, you
• 53:26
  know, you have to know to be a head coach.
• 53:28
  So I went into this very cooperative.
• 53:33
  And then I think maybe two years into it, I'm like, you know
• 53:36
  what? I kind of want my own group.
• 53:37
  I want to see it wasn't more like I think I'm this or I just
• 53:41
  like I need to see if I can get an athlete from point A to point
• 53:49
  B to a race successfully without Gary because I don't know if I'm
• 53:56
  doing this or I don't know if he's doing.
• 53:57
  This right, right. And so he, she started.
• 54:02
  So I I remember one year we were at the NCAA meet in California
• 54:10
  where where we always go Sacramento.
• 54:12
  Sacramento State so. I was like, I'm gonna go, I'm
• 54:13
  gonna go ask him. I'm just going.
• 54:15
  I'm gonna say like, you know, I really want, you know, so I I
• 54:19
  said my whole, got my whole speech together and I'm nervous
• 54:21
  and I'm walking up and I'm like, so I really think that I've
• 54:24
  learned a lot. No.
• 54:25
  OK. Thank you.
• 54:31
  Because, you know, they used to talk about me.
• 54:33
  Mike, I'm going to tell you that I know the coaches.
• 54:34
  You should do this. They don't know I know, but they
• 54:37
  used to call me Gary's clipboard girl.
• 54:43
  They did. So I had a little ego too, where
• 54:46
  I was like, I know more than y'all think I know and I'm going
• 54:49
  to show y'all. But I didn't have the authority
• 54:53
  to do it. And Gary was right because I
• 54:55
  wasn't ready, right? So then year 3, we go through
• 54:59
  the whole year and I'm getting more and more anxious because
• 55:02
  you have to understand this is a single gender program.
• 55:04
  So there's only three coaches. So there was the field coach, me
• 55:07
  and Gary. That's right, there was, well,
• 55:10
  I'm sorry, the distance coach and me and Gary, no field coach.
• 55:13
  So guess who was standing next to the pole vault when pole
• 55:17
  vault practice, guess who was that shot put practice?
• 55:20
  Guess who was that discus practice?
• 55:23
  Hammer, long jump, triple I, I was there for every single event
• 55:29
  and I learned so much about all the other events.
• 55:33
  And one time Gary told me, he said, well, when this is your
• 55:36
  program and your shot put coach gets hit by a bus, because of
• 55:40
  course this is something Gary would say, if your shot put
• 55:43
  coach gets hit by a bus on the way to the Big 10 meet, you can
• 55:48
  coach the shot put. That will be your first thought.
• 55:58
  So that that was. So awesome.
• 56:01
  I've I've been standing by every single technical practice of
• 56:06
  every event other than the distance events, which is why
• 56:10
  did you see my milers? Apparently they went out too
• 56:12
  fast according to. You know.
• 56:15
  All of the social media you're. Listening to this in January of
• 56:18
  2025, but we're recording this in December and literally today
• 56:21
  on the social media was or No, it was on Reddit this morning.
• 56:24
  That's where I read it on Reddit about Gabby runs a mile.
• 56:28
  And then there was this whole discussion of how she ran the
• 56:30
  mile. I'm very surprised that she
• 56:31
  can't run 4:30 and all that. I was like, whoa, bro.
• 56:34
  Yeah, yeah, lots of Internet chatted about.
• 56:36
  This mile could run faster if it was a different pace, but do you
• 56:40
  know how hard it is to get a girl that can run 2221 seconds
• 56:44
  to run a 42nd 200? I mean, that right there is
• 56:49
  painful. OK, I'd rather you know, so and
• 56:52
  then and guess what? I don't want a teacher to run
• 56:54
  that slow. It's a mild time trial that has
• 56:57
  no value to what you know, So no, I don't want to.
• 57:01
  I don't want to dive that deep into pace.
• 57:04
  OK, but. But yeah, so I I think that
• 57:11
  another year later, I we did the whole spiel.
• 57:15
  We were at nationals, same place, Sacramento.
• 57:18
  I got my nerve up. And this time I said I am not
• 57:22
  taking no for an answer. I'm just not.
• 57:26
  I'm getting my nerve up. I'm going to do it.
• 57:29
  He's going to hear me out. And I had stuff written down.
• 57:36
  Gary, can we talk? I believe I am ready next year
• 57:44
  to have my own group from start to finish because I need to see
• 57:48
  what I'm capable of doing as a coach.
• 57:50
  You know what this man said to me?
• 57:53
  No, you're right. You're like, hold on, I wasn't
• 57:59
  prepared for that. Hold on, I.
• 58:01
  Wasn't I don't. Even need to go down my list.
• 58:03
  Yeah, yeah. That wasn't an option here.
• 58:07
  Awesome, he said. But here's the Here's the deal,
• 58:11
  because he does his workouts in week blocks where Monday the
• 58:16
  whole week is set out through Friday.
• 58:18
  It's not I'm not one of them coaches where athletes don't
• 58:20
  know how many sets and reps they have.
• 58:23
  And I'm surprising them and throwing them off and, you know,
• 58:27
  making them feel insecure about, I don't know if I got 10 more or
• 58:31
  two more, you know, you know exactly how many sets.
• 58:35
  I guess you have it. So he said have your training
• 58:40
  done by the end of the week for the next week.
• 58:45
  So bring it to me Friday. Let me have a look at it.
• 58:49
  So if there's some things you need to do differently or some
• 58:52
  things I see. So I would sit down myself and
• 58:55
  write the plan for the week and all the back then it was more
• 58:59
  periodization stuff. I don't really do that as much
• 59:01
  anymore, but so I would write it out and then he'd say you got 2
• 59:07
  galactic days back and look, you got this, you know?
• 59:11
  And I'm like, Oh yeah, you know what?
• 59:12
  I didn't see that one. And so I tidy it up a bit, take
• 59:16
  it back to him and be like, yeah, yeah, that looks good.
• 59:18
  OK, boom. And I would do that.
• 59:20
  And I did that for a while till it got to less and less of
• 59:26
  Corrections. Right.
• 59:28
  Less and less of showing him and, and, and more of me, you
• 59:32
  know, like skipping a week and do because less and less direct
• 59:36
  and less and less changes. More and more of me doing it
• 59:38
  right. See, that is teaching, that's
• 59:41
  training, right? And that's how I learned to put
• 59:47
  the pieces together in a, in a training week, what the week
• 59:52
  looks like and why it's the way it is.
• 59:53
  And why do you add certain things?
• 59:56
  And and then understanding that just because it's written, it's
• 59:59
  not written in blood, you can change.
• 1:00:01
  It. You know, you see how the
• 1:00:03
  workout is going per individual and make adjustments, right?
• 1:00:07
  So that's how I learned to be a good coach is from Gary.
• 1:00:11
  Just doing going through that. A lot of people don't know that
• 1:00:13
  that's what Gary's clipboard girl was doing.
• 1:00:16
  You know, it's, it strikes me that, you know, I paid $1000 or
• 1:00:22
  whatnot to go to level 2. Gary was my level 2 teacher.
• 1:00:24
  You were getting paid to do that same, but much but much more in
• 1:00:29
  depth education. Like I had to pay to get that
• 1:00:30
  education from Gary. You only got it for a weekend.
• 1:00:32
  That's what I'm saying. And you got it in depth.
• 1:00:34
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I was getting.
• 1:00:36
  It every day. Quick comment, I love how you
• 1:00:39
  said, you know the workout isn't written in blood.
• 1:00:41
  I used to say this isn't the 10 commandments.
• 1:00:43
  It's not written in stone. I, I I get to change this, you
• 1:00:46
  know, I. Can change it if I want, right?
• 1:00:47
  Right. Right.
• 1:00:48
  And most importantly, you know, what you started with this
• 1:00:51
  conversation. I, I have a real passion in
• 1:00:53
  agreement with what you said there.
• 1:00:54
  I don't think, you know, I get to talk to, you know, air quotes
• 1:00:57
  every coach in the country, high school through college on a
• 1:01:00
  daily basis, you know, whether it's through social media,
• 1:01:02
  through this forum here with the podcast.
• 1:01:04
  And I think overall, some are doing a good job, but overall we
• 1:01:08
  are doing a terrible job with our assistant coaches in regards
• 1:01:12
  to their professional development.
• 1:01:14
  One of my favorite questions to ask, and I will ask you this
• 1:01:16
  here in a couple minutes when they get their first head
• 1:01:18
  coaching job is were you prepared?
• 1:01:21
  Were you ready? And it's kind of, it's a little
• 1:01:23
  bit of a test. I'm kind of giving away a little
• 1:01:25
  bit of the secrets for the future guests here.
• 1:01:26
  It's a little bit of a test because when they come in and
• 1:01:28
  say, Oh yeah, I was ready, it's like, but you didn't know how to
• 1:01:32
  do budget. Like, like you think you had to
• 1:01:34
  learn on the job. That's what most new head
• 1:01:36
  coaches do. They have to learn so much on
• 1:01:39
  the job. I love that Gary involved you in
• 1:01:42
  budgeting and travel and scheduling and recruiting.
• 1:01:45
  That I'm so passionate about this, I can say it without
• 1:01:51
  blinking an eye is when I took the associate head coach
• 1:01:57
  position at Texas, that is what I thought had happened because
• 1:02:02
  that's what I thought that everybody did until I realized
• 1:02:07
  it did it. What?
• 1:02:10
  Why? Why do you know You got a lot of
• 1:02:11
  experience, but I have my own theories.
• 1:02:14
  Why do you think more head coaches don't think of part of
• 1:02:18
  their job duties as the director head coach is to grow up their
• 1:02:22
  assistance to maybe one day, if they want to be one day, become
• 1:02:24
  head coaches. It's really a lack of
• 1:02:26
  delegation. Why do you think I want to say
• 1:02:29
  most A lot of head coaches don't delegate more to their staff?
• 1:02:35
  It's two things. They either want to keep them
• 1:02:39
  down in the position they're in because then one day when they
• 1:02:43
  become head, they're going to be my competitor.
• 1:02:45
  And the stronger they are, the the tougher my competition is.
• 1:02:50
  Or they're just selfish and don't care.
• 1:02:53
  They're focused on themselves. You know, it's they, they're
• 1:02:56
  their, their main goal is to win a national championship and
• 1:02:59
  they're not investing the time. That's the only two things I can
• 1:03:02
  think any any coaches that I ever worked with, I I let them
• 1:03:09
  do their own thing, but I always wanted them to actually, my
• 1:03:16
  assistant coaches helped me more than anything.
• 1:03:18
  I like Jeremy Rasmussen was my distance coach and he would say,
• 1:03:23
  hey, coach, you do them interest yet, you know, don't you go
• 1:03:26
  ahead and do them, you know, like they were always like, I
• 1:03:29
  always wanted people who had more degrees than me and more
• 1:03:34
  like around me so that we could all so I didn't fail, right?
• 1:03:38
  And that we could all be successful.
• 1:03:40
  And so and and of course, because again, that's how that's
• 1:03:44
  how I was trained. So, yeah.
• 1:03:46
  So that's the only two things I can think I don't I don't have
• 1:03:49
  an answer for. That has to be the reality,
• 1:03:52
  because otherwise it doesn't make any sense.
• 1:03:54
  That's my sense as well, that it's a another way of saying it.
• 1:03:58
  The way I would say it is it's an ego issue.
• 1:04:00
  It's an ego issue, It's a loss of power and.
• 1:04:02
  Assistant coach and you are begging your leader to teach you
• 1:04:09
  and train you. I don't think you're in the
• 1:04:10
  right program. You should go because that's The
• 1:04:14
  thing is I, I, I don't want to speak on something that I, it's
• 1:04:21
  never been hard for me to get a coaching job.
• 1:04:23
  So I don't want to make it seem like it's easy and you know, you
• 1:04:28
  should turn that job down if it's not the right.
• 1:04:30
  I mean some sometimes you got to just go where get in where you
• 1:04:33
  fit in. So I would never do that.
• 1:04:35
  I mean, I hear it's it's hard for some people to get coaching
• 1:04:39
  jobs, so they can't really be picky, right?
• 1:04:41
  So I don't want to ever come across like that.
• 1:04:44
  That's not my experience. So I don't want to make it seem
• 1:04:47
  like that. But at the same time, I would
• 1:04:50
  encourage you if you have a head coach and a leader that is
• 1:04:55
  willing to do that, if you can't ask every now and then, hey, can
• 1:04:58
  I? Can I?
• 1:04:58
  Even if you don't have an aspiration to be a head coach
• 1:05:01
  because you never know what can happen to say, do you mind if I
• 1:05:04
  sit in in a budget meeting? Do you mind if I sit in with
• 1:05:10
  this when you talk to that parent or whatever?
• 1:05:13
  Some some coaches, if they're having trouble with an athlete
• 1:05:16
  that's not, you know, I'm a head coach, there's a sprinter, I
• 1:05:21
  have a Sprint coach, but I don't even allow my Sprint coach to
• 1:05:24
  sit like what is that? You know?
• 1:05:27
  So yeah. And I and I know what happens
• 1:05:30
  because it happened to me when I was in.
• 1:05:32
  You made me think of the other side of it because I'm such a
• 1:05:35
  big proponent of leadership. I always kind of put things on
• 1:05:37
  the leader. And so in this case, the head
• 1:05:39
  coach. But you did make me think about
• 1:05:41
  the other side of it. Maybe there's some apathy of not
• 1:05:44
  even being ambitious enough to ask.
• 1:05:46
  Like they like they. I just assume he's going to he
• 1:05:48
  or she's going to tell me to do XY or Z.
• 1:05:53
  Yeah, it's probably some combination of both there
• 1:05:56
  instead of yeah, I've been very focused on, you know, the head
• 1:05:58
  coach. OK, So Tanja, what was it like?
• 1:06:02
  Gary retires, first of all, you know, a legend, as you mentioned
• 1:06:05
  Hall of Famer. I mean, everybody knew he was
• 1:06:06
  going to be in every Hall of Fame that would be available to
• 1:06:09
  him. He retires.
• 1:06:10
  You take over the head coaching job.
• 1:06:12
  It's it's one thing to take over a program as the first time head
• 1:06:16
  coach. That's one thing.
• 1:06:17
  I mean, that's that's its own set of issues and things you got
• 1:06:19
  to learn things like that. But you're replacing your guy,
• 1:06:23
  your mentor, your, I mean, the guy who grew you up.
• 1:06:25
  Now I'm going to ask that same question of were you ready?
• 1:06:28
  But you've already kind of described Gary has done more
• 1:06:31
  than what I've heard in a lot of other cases of actually
• 1:06:33
  preparing you. So you might be the closest to
• 1:06:35
  one who could actually say, yeah, I was ready.
• 1:06:37
  Yeah. OK.
• 1:06:37
  OK. What was that like?
• 1:06:39
  You walk in on Monday and now it's head coach.
• 1:06:41
  It was easy. Let's go.
• 1:06:42
  I'm doing I'm look, I had I had started thinking about what I
• 1:06:46
  wanted to do and I put together rules and guidelines for how I
• 1:06:53
  wanted the team to specific things had a team meeting.
• 1:06:58
  I'm like everybody, we're reading through these these
• 1:07:01
  rules initial each page and turn it in to me.
• 1:07:05
  So when you get caught after midnight, you shouldn't have
• 1:07:10
  been there because you we went, you know, it's not going to be
• 1:07:13
  on me. We, we have a curfew.
• 1:07:16
  And if you're called out after that, then you got to deal with
• 1:07:19
  it with the administrator, right?
• 1:07:21
  Because I've told you not to do it.
• 1:07:24
  So we had, you know, things, certain things about being on
• 1:07:26
  top. But The thing is, our team was
• 1:07:30
  already so disciplined because Gary was already the head coach.
• 1:07:33
  It's not like you're taking this team where there's been all of
• 1:07:37
  this lack of discipline and you're like, I got to reel
• 1:07:41
  everybody in and everybody is so used to being undisciplined that
• 1:07:45
  they're pissed that you come in with these rules.
• 1:07:48
  It wasn't like that. You already part of the culture
• 1:07:50
  of building that as well. So it's not like this big
• 1:07:52
  transition. It's like, oh.
• 1:07:53
  People on the team, well, 3/4 of the people on the team because
• 1:07:57
  the sophomores, juniors and seniors, the freshmen,
• 1:08:00
  sophomores and juniors were already there.
• 1:08:03
  And so now you just have this new freshman class of people
• 1:08:06
  that I recruited. And they don't know anything, so
• 1:08:09
  yeah. So, yeah, it was really easy for
• 1:08:12
  me to transition into that. And then I was able to pick my
• 1:08:15
  own coaches, and I didn't pick people who were friends.
• 1:08:17
  I did not know these people. Yeah.
• 1:08:19
  Who might? Herb Jeremy Rafi I never I went
• 1:08:23
  through strictly resumes. And I.
• 1:08:27
  Called their previous coaches. I didn't know them.
• 1:08:30
  They weren't friend of mine. Mike Herb, he's at Indiana right
• 1:08:34
  now. I don't know if you know Mike.
• 1:08:35
  He's a podcast alum. OK, this guy is unbelievable and
• 1:08:40
  I'm going to tell you what did it for me with him because it's
• 1:08:43
  another coaching thing too. I was at the USA Championships
• 1:08:46
  and he knew I had the job, had the job coming up.
• 1:08:49
  I had the position out. Of course, he he sent his
• 1:08:51
  resume. I didn't see it.
• 1:08:53
  Never recognize the name. I probably I saw it, but I
• 1:08:56
  didn't see it, right. So he reached out and he's like,
• 1:09:00
  hey, I really want to talk to you about the job.
• 1:09:03
  And I'm like, yeah, OK. Like everybody and their brother
• 1:09:06
  does. And he said, you know you're
• 1:09:09
  going to be at the championships, right?
• 1:09:11
  I'm like, yeah. And he said, well, I don't have
• 1:09:12
  any athletes there, but I can come up and meet with you and,
• 1:09:16
  and, and and drive up and talk to you.
• 1:09:18
  And I'm like, OK, I'm not going to have a lot of time, but OK,
• 1:09:23
  like, all right, fine. And so then he ended up going
• 1:09:26
  through the championship meet and he ended up calling again
• 1:09:29
  and like, hey, can I meet with you?
• 1:09:31
  And and then I, he told me he had drove and I was like, Dang,
• 1:09:34
  I really got to meet with him because he he like got on the
• 1:09:37
  road. I got it.
• 1:09:38
  And so I was like leaving or I just know there was something
• 1:09:40
  where there was only a little bit of time and I was like, he's
• 1:09:43
  like, where are you? And I'm like, well, yeah, I'm at
• 1:09:45
  this hotel. I was at the main hotel.
• 1:09:47
  I'm getting in the elevator and he's like, OK, I'll just, if you
• 1:09:49
  can just give me two minutes, that's fine.
• 1:09:51
  So he comes and he gets hold on, gets in the elevator.
• 1:09:57
  We had an elevator conversation for probably 15 seconds.
• 1:10:03
  And he got out and I said to myself, somebody that would be
• 1:10:12
  that aggressive and available, and I just want you to to look
• 1:10:20
  to the whites of your eyes, right?
• 1:10:23
  I was like, I got to look more into his resume, right?
• 1:10:27
  So already before I looked at the resume, I saw the human and
• 1:10:31
  I'm like, and then when I read and I was like, you know, what
• 1:10:36
  with his tenacity and he's done a really good job.
• 1:10:42
  I think it was Redlands or somewhere that he was at.
• 1:10:45
  I was like that That's the kind of person I need, right?
• 1:10:51
  And that's how he ended up getting a job, just by putting
• 1:10:54
  himself in a position to like he went after that job.
• 1:10:59
  Right, I'm, I'm glad I love this.
• 1:11:02
  And this is what, you know, when we talk about building legacy
• 1:11:04
  and things like that, that's what we're building with our
• 1:11:06
  library here because we've had Herb on the show and one of the
• 1:11:10
  things that was fascinating through his story was how he got
• 1:11:13
  this job. Cuz, you know, I hate to say the
• 1:11:17
  Internet, it's not even the Internet.
• 1:11:18
  I'm not even gonna blame the Internet on this one.
• 1:11:20
  The culture of, I'll speak specifically to track and field
• 1:11:24
  coaching, hiring on the collegiate side is, oh, if you
• 1:11:28
  don't know someone, you ain't getting the job.
• 1:11:31
  And so Mike shared that story and it was a it's oh.
• 1:11:35
  Did he tell the story about me? Yes.
• 1:11:37
  Oh, he. Did yes and it was a cool like
• 1:11:39
  hey see other people that are listening you don't it certainly
• 1:11:42
  helps let's not sugar coat things here, but it's not
• 1:11:45
  impossible I'm. Like stop hiring your friends
• 1:11:50
  and if you notice they always are, they're only there for a
• 1:11:54
  short period of time anyway. Like I've never changed our
• 1:11:58
  coaches. I had the same coach the entire
• 1:12:00
  five years and I was head coach. I had the same 5.
• 1:12:03
  The same. So this is where I'm curious,
• 1:12:04
  this is where we want to learn from you.
• 1:12:06
  So go back, how did you learn that?
• 1:12:09
  It's when we talk about all the things that Gary helped you to
• 1:12:13
  be involved with so that you can learn ahead of time.
• 1:12:15
  So budgeting, recruiting, all these other things.
• 1:12:19
  One of the things that I've noticed that we have almost zero
• 1:12:23
  formal or it's all informal formal training with head
• 1:12:26
  coaches is a staff evaluation, hiring and firing staff.
• 1:12:31
  So how did you it? It's easier.
• 1:12:33
  It's the fall back to say, Oh, well, I know so and so so I'm
• 1:12:36
  going to hire them like I have a comfortability it's.
• 1:12:39
  Easier to fire somebody you're not friends with if they're not
• 1:12:42
  doing the job right. So, so where?
• 1:12:44
  So continue on with that. Where did you learn this though?
• 1:12:46
  What, how, how did this, how was this natural for you?
• 1:12:49
  And it's not natural for the industry.
• 1:12:51
  It seems hypocritical of me saying that because Gary hired
• 1:12:53
  me, right? Yeah, great point.
• 1:12:57
  But I was his only familial hire.
• 1:13:00
  Every everything else was that way.
• 1:13:02
  OK. OK.
• 1:13:05
  And, and again, it is easier to fire somebody if they're not
• 1:13:09
  doing their job, if they're not your friend.
• 1:13:10
  We don't. We don't think about that part
• 1:13:11
  when we're hiring the friend. That's a great point.
• 1:13:13
  I'm going to take that back. I'm not going to say don't hire
• 1:13:16
  your friend, but make that a prerequisite in the hiring.
• 1:13:21
  Process. That's your number one
• 1:13:22
  qualification. That's a problem.
• 1:13:23
  Start getting rid of every of the ones I don't that don't
• 1:13:27
  sound familiar to me. And because Coach Herb's resume
• 1:13:33
  was still in the pile, it hadn't been eliminated because I didn't
• 1:13:37
  recognize his name. I just didn't recognize his name
• 1:13:39
  right. I was really planning to do a
• 1:13:41
  thorough evaluation, but it definitely does help.
• 1:13:44
  If I'm not a friend of yours. You don't know who I am, you
• 1:13:48
  don't recognize my name, and you make yourself available to me,
• 1:13:53
  right? In a way that others don't,
• 1:13:55
  right? I mean, this guy wasn't at the
• 1:13:58
  meet. He made himself available for
• 1:14:00
  the meet. It's different if I'm already at
• 1:14:02
  the meet. I got athletes here.
• 1:14:04
  I'm a run into you anyway. What made?
• 1:14:06
  It different is that and with all the effort and time and the
• 1:14:10
  money he spent to get there, he was OK with 15 seconds and it
• 1:14:14
  wasn't like, I can't believe she tried to play me off like that.
• 1:14:18
  And. She is, and I'm trying.
• 1:14:21
  I told her I was going to be, you know, because I didn't do a
• 1:14:23
  good job of making myself available because the time had
• 1:14:26
  gotten away from me. And you know, when I felt bad
• 1:14:30
  that I was like, oh man, I know he.
• 1:14:32
  And that was really the only reason I even took any time to
• 1:14:35
  meet with him is because I knew he had driven down.
• 1:14:38
  And did you get like a sense of like, man, if this dude is, is
• 1:14:44
  if he'll if he'll do this, I feel like he'll do that for
• 1:14:48
  recruiting and for our team. Like in there a little bit.
• 1:14:50
  Like, he's kind of shown his true colors from the jump,
• 1:14:52
  right? Absolutely, absolutely.
• 1:14:54
  Because your work ethic and your dedication and stuff like that,
• 1:15:00
  you cannot put on a paper resume, right?
• 1:15:04
  And you can't always take someone's word for it.
• 1:15:07
  And one thing Gary did always tell me is he said don't ever
• 1:15:10
  give him a recommendation for somebody that you don't believe
• 1:15:12
  in. Don't give a fake
• 1:15:13
  recommendation. So he did tell me that.
• 1:15:15
  He did teach me that too. So I I never, if I say somebody
• 1:15:18
  is like worth hiring, they're worth hiring.
• 1:15:20
  Otherwise I'll just avoid it. All right, So you're U of I,
• 1:15:28
  you're hiring a staff. You guys have success.
• 1:15:32
  You have probably the most fun time in your life besides maybe
• 1:15:37
  your honeymoon or wedding day. You get to go to the football
• 1:15:41
  suite with the Gil Athletics crew with your husband and son.
• 1:15:44
  We had a great time. You you leave to to go to
• 1:15:50
  University of Texas. I broke my heart a little bit,
• 1:15:51
  to be honest with you, because I just love to have you here in
• 1:15:53
  Champaign. Broke my heart.
• 1:15:55
  And I have a special place in my heart for for alums who coach at
• 1:15:58
  their alma mater. Like there's just something,
• 1:16:00
  some reason, I don't know why that's just special to me.
• 1:16:02
  And you go to University of Texas.
• 1:16:04
  So talk to us a little bit about why and how that worked out.
• 1:16:09
  Well, I wanted to stay at Illinois.
• 1:16:10
  I had put together a few proposals while I was there
• 1:16:16
  because you, if you recall, I was the women's coach and I was
• 1:16:21
  also coaching the men's sprinters because they had an
• 1:16:24
  interim right. So I'm the head coach, I'm
• 1:16:28
  successful. We're winning Big 10
• 1:16:30
  championships. We have this interim position.
• 1:16:33
  Most of the programs in the country are now being combined.
• 1:16:38
  Why not? So I call up mouse Mike Holloway
• 1:16:44
  that's my homeboy he called me his home girl cuz we both from
• 1:16:46
  Ohio. I called him.
• 1:16:49
  And I'm like, hey, help me put together a proposal because I
• 1:16:52
  want to put a proposal. They hadn't hired a coach yet,
• 1:16:55
  just had the interim there, Coach Turk.
• 1:16:57
  And I was like, hey, if you can help me put this proposal
• 1:17:01
  together so that I could give it to the AD about potentially
• 1:17:05
  combining the program. And then I become the head coach
• 1:17:08
  for both programs. And he did, and I put together a
• 1:17:12
  couple good ones. I think I talked to Karen Dennis
• 1:17:15
  also, who 'cause she had run head coaching programs and was
• 1:17:19
  the combined coach. And has an Ohio connection.
• 1:17:22
  This. All comes back to Ohio.
• 1:17:24
  I'm getting it. I'm seeing it out.
• 1:17:25
  She's in the Big 10, so, you know, having a little bit more
• 1:17:30
  of a connection with what we're doing in the Big 10.
• 1:17:34
  And they just kept ignoring me and they kept ignoring me and
• 1:17:37
  they kept, you know, just pretending it wasn't even
• 1:17:40
  happening. Wouldn't even respond to me.
• 1:17:42
  Now, this was not Josh. Really believe if Josh Whitman
• 1:17:50
  were there that I would probably even still be coaching at
• 1:17:53
  Illinois, right? Now that doesn't sound off the
• 1:17:55
  wall to me. That's.
• 1:17:56
  What I that's my personal opinion.
• 1:17:58
  So anyway, I get this offer from Texas and I had been begging for
• 1:18:07
  my assistant coaches to get raises because they had not not
• 1:18:13
  gotten any raises and I didn't get the combined position didn't
• 1:18:22
  they wouldn't even talk to me about it.
• 1:18:23
  And so then they hired a men's coach.
• 1:18:25
  Fine, we'll just stay separate. That's fine.
• 1:18:28
  And then they bring him in and give him my identical salary
• 1:18:31
  after I've coached all the men on that team and I'm winning
• 1:18:37
  titles, OK. And I'm like, damn, that's
• 1:18:42
  crazy. And then hire his assistant
• 1:18:46
  coaches and pay them twice as much as my assistant coaches
• 1:18:49
  were getting paid. So this is my opinion.
• 1:18:53
  In my opinion, we helped keep the men's program afloat, myself
• 1:19:02
  and my assistants help keep them afloat while we were in this
• 1:19:07
  interim kind of abyss. And then I was, I was more
• 1:19:15
  devastated about the assistant coach salaries.
• 1:19:19
  And their explanation was, well, they're when you come in at a
• 1:19:23
  different at a certain time, then there's this competitive
• 1:19:27
  thing, right? So you have to they have to
• 1:19:30
  compete salaries for what other assistant coaches at other
• 1:19:33
  universities are getting. Right.
• 1:19:35
  Sure. So I'm like, so then raise their
• 1:19:37
  salary. That's right.
• 1:19:39
  Like I agree with you ADI have to be competitive to keep my my
• 1:19:43
  assistants as well. You know what they told me I had
• 1:19:45
  to do? Getting a new coach coming in
• 1:19:50
  and then they could get that salary.
• 1:19:54
  Wow. So I was like, no, this.
• 1:19:59
  So I so I was already really not happy, unhappy, but I had no
• 1:20:02
  problems with Coach Turk or anything I got.
• 1:20:04
  I was not happy with how the process went.
• 1:20:07
  And I was like, how in the world do we end up in this space where
• 1:20:12
  I'm getting the same salary? And.
• 1:20:15
  My assistant coach are getting less of salary.
• 1:20:17
  No not cool. So when the Texas job came about
• 1:20:23
  and I remember one time I was talking to I, you said I can't
• 1:20:29
  say names, right? OK, so this is a legendary coach
• 1:20:32
  that passed away recently. And I was talking to him and I
• 1:20:36
  always would say it's not about the money.
• 1:20:38
  It's not about the money. And he said stop saying that.
• 1:20:40
  It's always about the money. You you can't say names.
• 1:20:44
  I I prefer you don't say names if it's negative towards that
• 1:20:46
  person. OK.
• 1:20:47
  So this is Brooks. Johnson, thank you.
• 1:20:48
  OK, because a quick pause just for our listeners.
• 1:20:53
  So she mentioned now three amazing people, Mouse, Karen and
• 1:20:57
  Brooks Johnson. I, I, just as you're listening
• 1:20:58
  to this podcast, all three are podcast alums here as well.
• 1:21:01
  And I, I can't implore you enough.
• 1:21:04
  I I've said this many, many times and I'll say it many, many
• 1:21:07
  more times over specifically to this person.
• 1:21:09
  She just said right here, Brooks Johnson.
• 1:21:10
  That podcast changed my life and I'm not even a coach anymore.
• 1:21:13
  So I highly recommend you go back and listen him.
• 1:21:15
  Mouse was an ogi. Think he's like episode 30
• 1:21:17
  something. Fascinating story.
• 1:21:19
  Love his journey. You got to go.
• 1:21:21
  And Karen Dennis, one of the most humblest people.
• 1:21:24
  Love her to death. I'm so happy she's retired.
• 1:21:26
  Meaning she's living a lie. I love that.
• 1:21:28
  I want that for everybody. But what a what a a loss we had
• 1:21:31
  in the coaching profession when she did retire an amazing human
• 1:21:34
  being. So yeah, positive wise, please
• 1:21:36
  say names stick away from being negative people.
• 1:21:39
  So you called Brooks. I love this.
• 1:21:40
  You had Brooks in called an inner corner.
• 1:21:43
  This just happened to be a conversation.
• 1:21:46
  OK, got. It and I just remember one thing
• 1:21:48
  one time he told me stop, stop saying.
• 1:21:50
  That Yeah, love that. Always about the money, because
• 1:21:52
  how much someone pays you shows you your value, right?
• 1:21:57
  So. And we're in a profession that
• 1:22:00
  depresses salaries already. So yes, I love so.
• 1:22:04
  I was already, I was, I, I loved Illinois and I always, I loved
• 1:22:10
  coaching there and I was always happy and I didn't want to
• 1:22:13
  leave. But then when I was offered the
• 1:22:17
  money to go to Texas, what I was hoping was that Illinois would
• 1:22:22
  now step up. That's what I was hoping.
• 1:22:25
  Would happen. And it didn't.
• 1:22:28
  Yeah, they did it. It was almost like they got they
• 1:22:31
  were like, oh, we're not going to be able to compete with that.
• 1:22:33
  Sorry. And so I had even this is funny.
• 1:22:36
  I had even said I will take it at this salary and and you and
• 1:22:45
  and and you pay my assistance X dollars.
• 1:22:47
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they were like they didn't
• 1:22:53
  want to pay that. Do you know they ended up paying
• 1:22:58
  the new coach exactly what I was going to reduce myself to, to
• 1:23:04
  stay there? Wow.
• 1:23:07
  Because then it was like, oh, but that's the going rate, so we
• 1:23:10
  got to pay. It's like, so actually if you
• 1:23:13
  fire me and we hire. Me, right, right.
• 1:23:16
  At that now then I'm good, but that's.
• 1:23:21
  What I was thinking, I was like, how do you fire?
• 1:23:22
  How do you fire your assistants but then immediately rehire them
• 1:23:25
  so you can get them on the new? You know what?
• 1:23:27
  I didn't think about that at the time.
• 1:23:28
  I should have did that. I should say yeah, fire them and
• 1:23:30
  let me rehire. Them dangerous game to play, by
• 1:23:32
  the way. It is dangerous game play and
• 1:23:34
  then fire myself and rehire myself back.
• 1:23:38
  So so. There is not career advice for
• 1:23:40
  anybody listening. Yeah.
• 1:23:42
  So, so understand the amount that I got to go to Texas.
• 1:23:46
  Yeah, OK. So I'm, I'm getting paid this at
• 1:23:49
  Illinois, right? I would have accepted this.
• 1:23:52
  Right, right. And not taking this to stay, you
• 1:23:56
  tell me no and then you bring in somebody and that's.
• 1:23:59
  Yeah, yeah. It really shows a lack of caring
• 1:24:02
  for the people you have right in front of you.
• 1:24:03
  It really does. It's like, I'd rather go get
• 1:24:06
  someone new. I I know what I have in you.
• 1:24:07
  And obviously I'm happy with you because I haven't fired you.
• 1:24:09
  You're still here. I'm.
• 1:24:09
  Glad to tell that story because a lot of people who are
• 1:24:12
  connected to me, even my friends that went to school with me and
• 1:24:16
  the alumni are really disappointed that I left Texas.
• 1:24:19
  And I'm sure it looked like I was just running toward the
• 1:24:22
  cash, which I was because that was my value.
• 1:24:25
  But at the same time, it it wasn't the whole story.
• 1:24:28
  Right, right. Right.
• 1:24:29
  And I definitely if if the if it were different, I would have.
• 1:24:33
  I definitely would have. Stayed.
• 1:24:35
  Now let's talk about Texas. You know, I'm I'm not naive.
• 1:24:39
  I think there are certain universities for many, many
• 1:24:41
  reasons that have a higher propensity to win nationals and
• 1:24:45
  attract the top high school talent and now in today's world,
• 1:24:48
  transfer portal talent, things like that.
• 1:24:50
  Many, many things go into to what that means.
• 1:24:54
  How their football team is on Saturday goes into it.
• 1:24:56
  So you know what kind of brand they have and things like that.
• 1:24:58
  And Texas is one of those schools, you know, if I were to
• 1:25:00
  make. Gary told me go where they have
• 1:25:02
  a successful football team. Yeah, right.
• 1:25:04
  Exactly. Yeah.
• 1:25:05
  So, you know, I put, I put Texas as one of those and you know, if
• 1:25:07
  I were to list 10 programs that I think could or should vie for
• 1:25:11
  a top three team title every year, Texas would be one of
• 1:25:14
  those, you know, great facilities, great weather.
• 1:25:17
  And I think that also plays into it specifically for your
• 1:25:19
  specific events. And then again, you know, the
• 1:25:21
  brand of Tech, you know, Texas, that Longhorn is one of the
• 1:25:25
  brands that I see no matter where I travel in this country,
• 1:25:28
  I will see I'll see an Alabama a which always blows me away since
• 1:25:31
  I'm from Alabama and a Longhorn. It's Seattle, Miami, New York,
• 1:25:37
  LA, I'll I'll see it everywhere, not just in the region of Texas.
• 1:25:40
  So a lot of benefits out of advantages they have there in
• 1:25:44
  Austin with that program. And certainly flow has, you
• 1:25:46
  know, you know, I love him the death.
• 1:25:47
  And if you're listening flow, you know, I've tried to get you
• 1:25:50
  in this. I want you in this podcast, OK,
• 1:25:52
  We got to learn your journey as well.
• 1:25:53
  But so, So what was it like? What you know, you, you come
• 1:25:57
  from U of I. I'm not putting down U of.
• 1:25:59
  I love our home university here. My wife is a Illinois alum, love
• 1:26:04
  that university. But the budgets aren't the same,
• 1:26:06
  The facilities aren't the same. The weather is not the same.
• 1:26:09
  What's it like going into Austin and having the Longhorn brand
• 1:26:13
  behind you as a track and field coach?
• 1:26:16
  It was, resources wise, second to none.
• 1:26:24
  Yeah, the ability to recruit second to none.
• 1:26:30
  American athletes, top American athletes.
• 1:26:35
  I could talk to every one of them.
• 1:26:37
  A lot of athletes that I didn't sign told me specifically, I'm
• 1:26:45
  not coming to Illinois. It's too cold or it's not like a
• 1:26:47
  power program and I and I lose them.
• 1:26:50
  I would not lose those athletes at Texas.
• 1:26:56
  The the kind I mean, I had, I had Ashley Spencer, Illinois.
• 1:26:59
  I had more like a kinison. So I can't say I didn't have
• 1:27:03
  right? Absolutely.
• 1:27:04
  The multitude of talent. Yeah. 2nd to none.
• 1:27:09
  Yeah, I was miserable for five years emotionally, so personally
• 1:27:16
  I was. So that's my Texas story.
• 1:27:22
  OK, if I ask why family? Well, we don't have that much.
• 1:27:26
  Time. Yeah.
• 1:27:27
  No, that makes sense. We don't have that much time.
• 1:27:30
  So walk us through the great. Brooks, the great Brooks Johnson
• 1:27:36
  told me. You've had a head coach where
• 1:27:41
  where you were, where you, he's like, this is great.
• 1:27:44
  This is a this is great for you because you know how to do it
• 1:27:47
  and you know how not to do it. You have a head coach that shows
• 1:27:52
  you how to do it and you got one to show you how not.
• 1:27:54
  To gotcha. I'm with you, OK and?
• 1:27:56
  Then that way and that and and that's a life lesson.
• 1:27:59
  Yeah, got it. So OK to transition into post
• 1:28:02
  Texas life thing because you know, the story doesn't stop
• 1:28:05
  there. There's the good news.
• 1:28:07
  Did you? So it's a quick yes or no
• 1:28:09
  question that can help me set up the next question.
• 1:28:11
  Did you go straight into the having your own group?
• 1:28:14
  Yeah. OK, so so.
• 1:28:16
  I ended up going from. I was at the camp that I was
• 1:28:22
  having my camp at Texas and I could hear, actually heard
• 1:28:33
  Edrick's son's voice because I know his voice.
• 1:28:36
  And that's how I knew they were there.
• 1:28:38
  And I was still have running my camp.
• 1:28:42
  And so I was like, wait. And then they told me, they
• 1:28:44
  said, hey, you can't, you can't use the track you got, you're
• 1:28:48
  done. The new coach is here.
• 1:28:49
  So I had to. So I had my 3 athletes, 3 pros.
• 1:28:53
  I had to figure out where to train at.
• 1:28:57
  So thankfully D2 y'all know D2. Called.
• 1:29:00
  Me up and he said, hey, I have a track down here if you want to
• 1:29:03
  come down here. So I was actually doing the camp
• 1:29:06
  during the day and going up north to train those 3.
• 1:29:11
  So I said no, I'm probably I'm I'm just done with the college
• 1:29:15
  thing. I'm, I'm, yeah, I'm just going
• 1:29:17
  to try this out and see because I always when I was young, I
• 1:29:20
  wanted to have a club team. I always wanted to have a youth
• 1:29:26
  club team. And so I was like, well, maybe
• 1:29:28
  let me just do it on the elite level for now and just see how
• 1:29:31
  it goes. So even that year I had
• 1:29:35
  somewhere I was at. Let me let me just preface this
• 1:29:39
  by saying I didn't do anything wrong, I just didn't get the
• 1:29:42
  job. Yeah, right.
• 1:29:43
  Correct. And they wanted to transition
• 1:29:46
  from me to and Edric and I aren't friends.
• 1:29:49
  So I think that's why they just didn't want, you know, in their
• 1:29:52
  defense, they just didn't want a conflict.
• 1:29:54
  So I had to go, right? That's totally fine because I
• 1:29:57
  had heard a lot of stories that just aren't true about me
• 1:30:00
  getting paid when I wasn't there.
• 1:30:02
  Which is stupid if you guys got comments to know there's no way
• 1:30:05
  Texas is going to pay me to not work.
• 1:30:08
  If anything they had me there rolling forks or something.
• 1:30:10
  I'm I'm doing something if I'm getting paid.
• 1:30:12
  Right when? We get to USA and I even had
• 1:30:16
  other athletes kind of asking like, you know, do you know,
• 1:30:21
  could they come to my group? And I'm like, no, because right
• 1:30:24
  now I don't even know what I'm doing.
• 1:30:26
  Like I literally don't have a track.
• 1:30:28
  I don't have hurdles, I don't have blocks, I don't have a
• 1:30:30
  whistle, I don't have cones. All the things that I had so
• 1:30:33
  much access to that just came naturally, but I didn't realize
• 1:30:37
  I didn't have until I didn't have it.
• 1:30:39
  And I'm like, I don't even know if I'm going to be successful at
• 1:30:42
  this with the three that I have that I'm responsible for.
• 1:30:45
  So the last thing that I want to do is bring on something that I
• 1:30:50
  don't know if I can handle. And I have to say the loyalty of
• 1:30:55
  them, Ashley Spencer, Molokai Kinison and Courtney Ocolo.
• 1:30:59
  OK, I can think of the third. Yeah, to ride with me in the in
• 1:31:05
  their UT alums, they have access, you know, I'm pretty
• 1:31:09
  sure if they wanted to, they would have had access to if they
• 1:31:12
  had just separated themselves from me and they didn't do that
• 1:31:16
  right. So that's a certain loyalty
• 1:31:18
  right there too, that, you know, I have to give them credit for
• 1:31:22
  it. But I didn't want to put and add
• 1:31:24
  any more to that, not knowing what this was even going to do.
• 1:31:29
  The. First person that I went and
• 1:31:31
  talked to when I was at the USA Championships with Dennis
• 1:31:34
  Mitchell and I was like, OK, Dennis, you doing this pro
• 1:31:39
  thing? What you think?
• 1:31:40
  You know, what do you, what you think?
• 1:31:42
  I mean, is it hard just asking him general questions about what
• 1:31:47
  do you do for health insurance? Right.
• 1:31:50
  Doesn't exist, and still doesn't exist.
• 1:31:52
  And. You know, just trying to get
• 1:31:55
  some feedback. And now mind you, this is the
• 1:31:57
  NCA meet is over, we're at the USA Championships and I know I
• 1:32:03
  don't have the job at this point.
• 1:32:05
  And so I'm just kind of knowing that I'm in my mind going to
• 1:32:09
  transition. So I just kind of asking and I
• 1:32:13
  was like, I'm just going to try it for a year.
• 1:32:15
  And what? And all three of them made the
• 1:32:21
  world championship team. And and Doha, all three of them
• 1:32:28
  made the Doha team. And more like a was coming back
• 1:32:30
  from a ruptured Achilles. To holy Cow.
• 1:32:34
  So yeah, so then I said, you know what?
• 1:32:37
  I think I got this. I can make this work.
• 1:32:39
  And so that's when I started really, you know, growing and
• 1:32:45
  adding more people. And stuff like.
• 1:32:47
  That and I started my track club and.
• 1:32:50
  That's what fascinates me. You know, if someone like we had
• 1:32:54
  a great experience a a year or two ago now I had a college
• 1:33:00
  athlete, a senior reach out to me saying, Hey, I want to become
• 1:33:04
  a college track coach. I've listened to your podcast.
• 1:33:06
  I, you know, can we just have a chat?
• 1:33:08
  And you know, me, I'm always looking for content.
• 1:33:09
  I was like, because I'm thinking like in the future, I was like,
• 1:33:12
  yeah, yeah, cool. Only if we can record this
• 1:33:14
  conversation. Like I want to, I want to be
• 1:33:16
  able to like time stamp this 22 year old college senior and then
• 1:33:19
  10 years from now when he's the head coach of whatever, you
• 1:33:22
  know, like I kind of want to do that.
• 1:33:24
  And but when we talk about a kid like that who wants to become a
• 1:33:27
  track coach, like that's a easy conversation to have, like, oh,
• 1:33:30
  apply for jobs, maybe go to the USTFCA convention and network
• 1:33:34
  and things like that. My head can't wrap around how
• 1:33:38
  you go from all the support you have as a college or high school
• 1:33:42
  coach. Like I think about these kids
• 1:33:44
  that GoPro early for track and it's like, did you just lost
• 1:33:49
  your what? Depending on your school, your
• 1:33:51
  massage therapist, the person who schedules your meets, by the
• 1:33:54
  way, you've lost that. You've lost your transportation
• 1:33:56
  being paid for. You've you've lost your shoes
• 1:33:59
  that you get like you've got to figure all that stuff out now.
• 1:34:02
  And the same is for the coach. You're going to you're going to
• 1:34:05
  start a pro group. That's cool.
• 1:34:08
  You don't get to just call up high schools and recruit kids
• 1:34:10
  anymore. That's what you did in college.
• 1:34:11
  You don't like how do you create this?
• 1:34:15
  That is amazing. I was like Mike, I don't.
• 1:34:18
  Have. Yes, I remember that.
• 1:34:19
  Yeah, I don't. Have hurdles.
• 1:34:20
  I don't have blocks. I don't have a tape measure.
• 1:34:22
  I don't have a wheel. I don't have cones like I I
• 1:34:26
  didn't have anything. As you're building this out, was
• 1:34:31
  there any fear of like, oh, did I?
• 1:34:33
  Did I mess up here? No, you know what?
• 1:34:36
  I'm a strong. I'm my strongest when my back is
• 1:34:38
  up against the wall. When I'm cornered, I'm like, Oh
• 1:34:42
  yeah, I'm ready to rock'n'roll. So no, I was like pretty
• 1:34:47
  determined to make sure because at the time it was those things,
• 1:34:50
  I was pretty determined to make sure those 3 was going to be
• 1:34:52
  successful. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:34:54
  By the way, I had to make comment.
• 1:34:55
  You mentioned that those 3 stuck with you.
• 1:34:57
  This is a lot about you, by the way, them as well.
• 1:34:59
  You know, loyalty is a character trait in my in my opinion, but
• 1:35:03
  you can't be loyal to bad things.
• 1:35:05
  And so you obviously had a great leadership and relationship with
• 1:35:08
  them and they obviously believed in you to take them where they
• 1:35:11
  wanted to go for their career to stay with you.
• 1:35:13
  Can't be loyal to each other if they're not both all in.
• 1:35:16
  That's right. That's right.
• 1:35:17
  The same amount of credit is. What you're saying?
• 1:35:19
  Yeah, yeah, I love that. And I just think that says a lot
• 1:35:20
  about you. And, you know, they had options,
• 1:35:22
  they were good athletes. So they.
• 1:35:22
  They had I'll help you many options.
• 1:35:24
  So I love that. So build us through how you
• 1:35:27
  built this up because now, I mean, you're full-fledged.
• 1:35:30
  I mean, you know, obviously with Gabby and other people, like
• 1:35:31
  you're producing metals on a yearly basis.
• 1:35:34
  Like how have you maintained that?
• 1:35:36
  Have you built it? Have you grown it?
• 1:35:38
  Well, I just, like I told you, I have a lot of really great
• 1:35:43
  leadership traits that I've learned along the way.
• 1:35:48
  I have a certain way of doing things and I don't tolerate
• 1:35:55
  certain things. And if, if it's not working, I
• 1:35:58
  just cut it right off right away so that it doesn't fester.
• 1:36:02
  And I didn't do that in the week.
• 1:36:04
  I learned, I learned a lot as a as a pro coach, you know, I
• 1:36:07
  learned a lot of things that's different from the college
• 1:36:12
  scene. And yeah, I think the biggest
• 1:36:15
  thing I learned is that the athletes are professionals and
• 1:36:19
  they need to behave like professionals.
• 1:36:21
  And the moment that that isn't going in that way that I need to
• 1:36:27
  cut it off. Because here's the thing, you
• 1:36:31
  still think about the athlete as we're going through this process
• 1:36:35
  and you don't want to ever interrupt their process no
• 1:36:38
  matter what. So for example, we started this
• 1:36:41
  conversation by saying how important the major US
• 1:36:45
  championships are. So whether it's a world
• 1:36:47
  championship trials or the Olympic trials or whatever like
• 1:36:52
  that. So if you have an athlete that's
• 1:36:53
  crashing out a month before or two months before you still
• 1:36:58
  thinking I just I need to I'm because see, they don't realize
• 1:37:03
  that they sabotaging themselves. And so I'm like, I need to try
• 1:37:07
  to save you. OK, My only way to save you is
• 1:37:11
  to accommodate with your foolishness for the next couple
• 1:37:15
  of months, right? I don't, I don't, I ain't doing
• 1:37:20
  that no more. I'm going to let you go on and
• 1:37:23
  crash out on your own, right? Because what happens is that
• 1:37:27
  they end up inadvertently affecting people around the
• 1:37:31
  other people around who are getting ready for a major
• 1:37:34
  championship, right? And so you don't think of it
• 1:37:37
  that way because you in this bubble of you and that athlete
• 1:37:40
  trying to make it work, and you don't understand what's
• 1:37:42
  happening with everybody else around you.
• 1:37:44
  So that's just not so because, again, they've picked their
• 1:37:48
  lives up. They've moved to your city.
• 1:37:52
  They so act professional. Yeah, that's not my job to worry
• 1:37:58
  about. If if you're working at a
• 1:38:00
  Fortune 500 company and you need to be fired, they're not going
• 1:38:06
  to worry that your child is at in a school in this town or
• 1:38:10
  whatever. It's time for you to go.
• 1:38:13
  So that's that's this is this is this is professional.
• 1:38:17
  This is professional track and field.
• 1:38:19
  We had Dennis Mitchell, you know, a good friend on the show
• 1:38:21
  as well, and he mentioned that about like it.
• 1:38:23
  You have to be careful in your recruitment because one person
• 1:38:25
  can come in and spoil the whole thing.
• 1:38:28
  When you look at all the things, you know, we talked about a head
• 1:38:30
  coach of a college, you know, there's scheduling, there's
• 1:38:33
  budgeting, there's equipment, there's obviously recruiting.
• 1:38:36
  You may be on panels to help hire the basketball coach.
• 1:38:40
  There's all these responsibilities and elements.
• 1:38:44
  When you're the running your own club, you still have a lot of
• 1:38:47
  these things, scheduling, recruitment of athletes, the
• 1:38:52
  things like that. What's the hardest part?
• 1:38:54
  Like is it facilities? Is it trying to find the next
• 1:38:57
  kid or two that you're going to invite into the group?
• 1:39:00
  Is it taking care of the ones that are in front of you?
• 1:39:01
  What's the the hardest part? What's the the biggest struggle
• 1:39:04
  of being a professional coach so.
• 1:39:05
  I try to be real chill. So that way I don't make that a,
• 1:39:09
  you know, like So what I do is I actually text my group daily.
• 1:39:15
  So I will text them the night before to say here's where we're
• 1:39:19
  at and what time. Even though I already know, I
• 1:39:22
  may know two days in advance because we're going to, but I, I
• 1:39:25
  want, because I also want them to be on that schedule to that
• 1:39:30
  anything can change at any moment, right?
• 1:39:33
  It could change in my with my day because I have other things
• 1:39:37
  going on in my life. I can work around what they got
• 1:39:41
  going on And so and that way we all kind of make every now and
• 1:39:46
  then I'll forget and be like, coach, what time it starts
• 1:39:48
  tomorrow. You forgot.
• 1:39:50
  That's rare, but I do it every single day and it's not at the
• 1:39:52
  same time every day. It's when I think about it,
• 1:39:54
  right. And but that's a routine that
• 1:39:56
  they understand. So it's cool because I was able
• 1:40:00
  to rearrange things today because I'm doing this with you.
• 1:40:04
  So we we just make it chill like that.
• 1:40:06
  Then we all it's all good. So when you're talking about
• 1:40:11
  scheduling, what about like you have other influences?
• 1:40:14
  These guys and gals have agents, they have media
• 1:40:17
  responsibilities. Ultimately, if they go do all
• 1:40:21
  these media things and all this other stuff and don't make
• 1:40:24
  teams, you're the one that people look at.
• 1:40:26
  They don't go. You had to go do.
• 1:40:27
  Yeah, yeah, OK, no, we make that work.
• 1:40:30
  So we actually, y'all wouldn't even imagine the stuff that we
• 1:40:34
  went through last year with Gabby in that prior on the run
• 1:40:38
  up to the Olympics. But I had learned lessons not
• 1:40:41
  from myself because I was not that big of an athlete, but just
• 1:40:44
  from hearing of other athletes who had gone, who were the face,
• 1:40:49
  let's say, of the Olympics. And what?
• 1:40:51
  So what we did was we put together a schedule.
• 1:40:55
  She and I sat down together and pulled up the calendar.
• 1:40:59
  I printed it out of calendar with the months on it and we
• 1:41:01
  wrote in tell me all your events coming up.
• 1:41:04
  And then we had to make a deadline for it all stops this
• 1:41:07
  day. So for example, we had to get
• 1:41:11
  her to run 1/4 a open quarter even though she ran the quarter
• 1:41:16
  at or 4 by 4 at the World Relays because we were just continuing
• 1:41:20
  to try to put her in a position where there was no discussion
• 1:41:23
  about this four by four thing, right.
• 1:41:26
  So she was going to run it at the trials and then she needed a
• 1:41:29
  mark. So it was like this day.
• 1:41:35
  So the LSU meet, that's it. Can't do anything between then
• 1:41:40
  and the trials. And then there was this big
• 1:41:43
  thing she had to do that week. So she literally did this event
• 1:41:47
  and flew to Louisi Baton Rouge from there after standing on her
• 1:41:51
  feet. So it wasn't even the mark you
• 1:41:54
  expect to get because she had all this stuff going on around
• 1:41:57
  just, we needed a mark, right? That's why we say we don't take
• 1:42:00
  ourselves too seriously during the year because no one else
• 1:42:02
  knows why you're doing what you're doing or how you even got
• 1:42:06
  to this point. All you see is a time, and you
• 1:42:09
  try to make all these judgments off of this.
• 1:42:11
  One time thing of our sport and also the worst part of our
• 1:42:14
  sport. Yeah, you.
• 1:42:16
  Don't know why how we got to this point or why we're here at
• 1:42:19
  this point or why even well, if if you're that busy and you're
• 1:42:23
  that preoccupied and you missed that much training, why even go
• 1:42:27
  to LSU and put it on the track? Well, we got to get a mark, OK,
• 1:42:31
  And and guess what, you have to get a mark early enough that if
• 1:42:35
  that mark doesn't work out, you have to have a backup, right?
• 1:42:39
  You can't just rely on that race to be the race because in your
• 1:42:45
  mind it was going to be perfect. But then guess what?
• 1:42:48
  A big storm came through and the meat got cancelled.
• 1:42:51
  Your fight. Got cancelled or you know, you
• 1:42:55
  were warming up and felt something in your hand me and
• 1:42:57
  couldn't, you don't know. So now you have to make it where
• 1:42:59
  we have all this other stuff planned.
• 1:43:01
  We got to make sure we get this quarter in, but you also have
• 1:43:04
  these other meats, this plan where you can't run the quarter
• 1:43:06
  right. So now are we running around
• 1:43:08
  trying to find. So you got to do it early enough
• 1:43:09
  where if you have to find another race to get 1/4 on you,
• 1:43:12
  you got that time right. Can't wait till this the last
• 1:43:15
  minute and you have no other opportunities.
• 1:43:17
  So those are schedules that I put together, but I know the
• 1:43:22
  sport so well at this point that I can kind of figure out how to
• 1:43:28
  to manage it with the problem. And, and I'm cool with all of
• 1:43:31
  the agents. I have all that my athletes
• 1:43:33
  agents, I'm real cool with them. Most of them I even knew, you
• 1:43:36
  know the mark blocks that where I knew them when I was.
• 1:43:38
  Running, Yeah, that's a good point.
• 1:43:39
  Yeah, yeah, that's a good point. So this may bleed right into and
• 1:43:43
  this will be our last question here as we wrap up.
• 1:43:46
  Again, thank you so much for your time.
• 1:43:47
  Tell all the athletes, Gabby and them I'm sorry that I
• 1:43:51
  interrupted coach being at practice.
• 1:43:53
  You. Know, let's talk a little bit
• 1:43:57
  about Sprint. You know, I love the exposure
• 1:43:59
  our sports getting those kind of things.
• 1:44:02
  When you think about media days and stuff like Gabby might have
• 1:44:05
  to have with New Balance and stuff, those are interruptions
• 1:44:07
  like I assume you would rather have.
• 1:44:09
  I just have practice every time and day that I want, right,
• 1:44:13
  Having a camera crew and such come into practice and at the
• 1:44:17
  houses for the interviews and things like that.
• 1:44:18
  Those are disruptions. What what was that like?
• 1:44:20
  That's a, you know, that's a fairly unique thing.
• 1:44:23
  I would assume for you that, you know, big budget production
• 1:44:25
  Netflix type thing comes in and has demands and requests from
• 1:44:28
  you. How did you, how did, how did
• 1:44:29
  that all? Was it cool or was it not cool?
• 1:44:31
  She handles it very well as as you know, I wasn't in Sprint
• 1:44:35
  that much either one of them, and that's because I think they
• 1:44:38
  could tell I didn't really want to be.
• 1:44:43
  They weren't paying me so. Yeah, right.
• 1:44:44
  Yeah, that's. Right.
• 1:44:46
  I'm too old to make social media work for me where I'm going to
• 1:44:48
  be. Yeah, I didn't.
• 1:44:51
  I just didn't see the value in it for me.
• 1:44:53
  And so I just kind of. But but you still had to as the
• 1:44:57
  coach had to work around like I assume I assumed no I.
• 1:44:59
  Definitely had to. You had some Rep for Gabby and
• 1:45:02
  then they were like, hey, can we get her out of the blocks again?
• 1:45:04
  You're like dude. No, they they actually didn't
• 1:45:06
  ever do that because oh, there was no, there was no fake when I
• 1:45:10
  was around until like, can we do that Rep again?
• 1:45:12
  None of that. Yeah, OK.
• 1:45:14
  But but yeah, just having their presence there all the time was
• 1:45:19
  a bit of a distraction. Yeah, right, right.
• 1:45:22
  But yeah, I mean, she's real chill about it, so it it worked,
• 1:45:27
  but yeah. Did you feel like you had to be
• 1:45:31
  guarded because cameras are on? Oh yeah, 'cause I got a I'm I'm.
• 1:45:37
  What rating are you going for here, Netflix?
• 1:45:39
  Let me know that. And I like, I'm just like, well,
• 1:45:42
  there was a lot of times where I would really say, they would
• 1:45:45
  ask, come over and say, can I Mike you?
• 1:45:47
  And I'd be like, no. Yeah, that's I love these Mike
• 1:45:50
  UPS that they do, you know, like usually a lot of NFL coaches,
• 1:45:52
  but they've done it a couple with track coaches and I'm like,
• 1:45:54
  oh, we need to do more of that. And then I'm like, I don't know
• 1:45:56
  that I would ever do that. I'd be, you know, if I trust
• 1:46:00
  myself. For the final of the trials, I
• 1:46:03
  was like, no, I just don't want to.
• 1:46:06
  Like I don't want to be bothered today.
• 1:46:08
  I we need to because the more I mic, the more they're going to
• 1:46:13
  be around us. Right.
• 1:46:17
  If somebody else's mic, they're going to spend more time with
• 1:46:19
  them because they got audio. So I'm like not just final.
• 1:46:24
  We got to get through this final.
• 1:46:25
  And I, I think I said like, come on the prelim or the semi or
• 1:46:28
  something. And then after the semi, it's a
• 1:46:29
  wrap, right, right. I mean, of course they're going
• 1:46:32
  to be there with the cameras, but being miked up and trying to
• 1:46:34
  get through that final, no. Yeah.
• 1:46:38
  Do you have any insider info? Is there a Sprint 3 coming out
• 1:46:41
  or? There, I don't know anything
• 1:46:45
  about Sprint three, OK? I just know there's a lot of
• 1:46:50
  film. That.
• 1:46:52
  Is on the chopping room floor. That Yeah, Yeah.
• 1:46:56
  Cool. I love that.
• 1:46:56
  You know, I you know, I love our sport.
• 1:46:58
  Getting any more media? I love that for me, I've always
• 1:47:02
  been, I told you this before we maybe was on record.
• 1:47:05
  I don't know. Anyway, I love like my favorite
• 1:47:07
  parts of Sprint. It was great seeing Gabby and
• 1:47:09
  Noah and Grant. I love the well actually with
• 1:47:12
  those guys and gals. That's so cool.
• 1:47:14
  I love that and I see that already when I watch the trials
• 1:47:17
  and look things like that. I don't get to see the people
• 1:47:20
  that I think are the most important.
• 1:47:21
  And sure, you can flame me all you want.
• 1:47:23
  I don't care. I know the athletes are great
• 1:47:24
  and that's cool, but it's the coaches for me.
• 1:47:26
  And so, you know, seeing Lance and Dennis and you and Michelle,
• 1:47:30
  it was really the far. No, it was just that was cool to
• 1:47:33
  me because it's like, you know, I think of you guys as
• 1:47:35
  superheroes. So it's like, oh, they're
• 1:47:36
  getting their due and I just wonder.
• 1:47:38
  What they did, they did it. I mean, they show Edrick, which
• 1:47:41
  I like. I don't know A.
• 1:47:42
  Lot of people, that's right. I would have been outside of
• 1:47:44
  that knows you know him. Great point, I texted him.
• 1:47:47
  He did. With Julian.
• 1:47:48
  Yep, I texted him after I watched that show and Lance and
• 1:47:53
  yeah, exactly right. I just really, really love that.
• 1:47:56
  So I love that. I hope more comes from that and
• 1:47:59
  I hope they do. You know, I've not people have
• 1:48:02
  said that they like this. I've not heard that they're
• 1:48:04
  actually going to do this. But I'd love a throws and a you
• 1:48:06
  know, for me, because the hurdles, I'd love a hurdles.
• 1:48:08
  That'd be my my personal favorite.
• 1:48:10
  I'd love to see all that and there's some obviously great
• 1:48:12
  athletes there. But Taja, thank you so much,
• 1:48:15
  man. You know, it is always humbling.
• 1:48:18
  I know how busy coaches are at any point in the time of the
• 1:48:20
  year, but I know you know, the demands of you from the people
• 1:48:24
  you coach and the things that you do with your own family and
• 1:48:26
  stuff like that. Your time is so valuable to me.
• 1:48:28
  So I'm just so grateful, you know, to sit down and and share
• 1:48:31
  that time with us and share your journey through this great
• 1:48:33
  profession. Really great.
• 1:48:34
  Thank you so much, I got to go back and watch some of the other
• 1:48:36
  videos of people you mentioned. Yeah, I tell.
• 1:48:38
  You dive deep into it. It's the Brooks Johnson, I tell
• 1:48:44
  you, you know, he thought differently.
• 1:48:47
  You know this from experience. And like I said, as a non coach
• 1:48:53
  when I interviewed him, it changed my life.
• 1:48:55
  It it helped me to judge people less to be real frank with you.
• 1:48:58
  And, and that's funny for people who think they know of Brooks,
• 1:49:01
  who don't actually know him, would maybe think that that's a
• 1:49:04
  preposterous statement to make about him.
• 1:49:06
  Bro, go back and go listen to his interview.
• 1:49:08
  I'm so, so, so proud that I was able to get his story on wax
• 1:49:12
  before he passed. That's a, a library treasure
• 1:49:15
  that, you know, there's many coaches 20 years from now,
• 1:49:16
  they're going to be able to know his story and his journey a
• 1:49:19
  little bit through that. And so I'm grateful for that.
• 1:49:21
  And same with Mouse and, and Karen.
• 1:49:23
  So, and now you, you are now officially on wax on in the
• 1:49:26
  library. People a long time from now will
• 1:49:29
  be able to find out your journey.
• 1:49:30
  And, and really amazing, I tell you, I think back, I like to
• 1:49:34
  like think of a theme of, of people's journeys.
• 1:49:36
  And if I had to put like one word to your journey, I would
• 1:49:39
  call it consistency. I mean, it's amazing the, the
• 1:49:42
  longevity of your career. And you can basically say I had
• 1:49:44
  two coaches. I mean, that's, that's unheard
• 1:49:46
  of. I mean, literally unheard of.
• 1:49:47
  There's people who have more than two coaches their freshman
• 1:49:49
  year. In a year.
• 1:49:52
  That's what I'm saying. So I love the consistency.
• 1:49:55
  I love what you're doing with your athletes and consistency.
• 1:49:57
  You know, Ashley Spencer has had a heck of a career with you for
• 1:50:00
  a long time now, it seems. That makes me feel old because
• 1:50:02
  feels like she was just in high school.
• 1:50:04
  I remember exactly where she was in high school.
• 1:50:06
  So I just love that consistency, consistency in your marriage,
• 1:50:09
  you know, would you say 29 years, you're almost done 30,
• 1:50:12
  you know, love that, that again, consistency, man.
• 1:50:16
  So I just I appreciate you modeling that and showing that
• 1:50:19
  leadership and that very important characteristic and and
• 1:50:22
  consistency. So thank you so much, Tanja.
• 1:50:24
  I'm so grateful for this time. Thank you.
• 1:50:27
  Thanks, Mike. I appreciate it.
• 1:50:28
  Absolutely, guys. Thank you for being here.
• 1:50:30
  Like I said, go back, you know, one of the things as we get
• 1:50:33
  near, you know, we're in season 6, we're getting nearer to
• 1:50:36
  episode 300. I love the new people that we
• 1:50:38
  have. You know, having Tanja right
• 1:50:39
  here. This is awesome way to kick off
• 1:50:41
  season 6. But my fear is there are 200 and
• 1:50:44
  something other amazing coaches that we've had on the show and
• 1:50:47
  you need to you need to be able to see them and listen to them.
• 1:50:49
  So Brooks and Mouse and Karen, our top like 5 if I remember off
• 1:50:54
  top ahead, Boo Scheck, Snider, Dilty, Taylor, Latif Thomas,
• 1:50:58
  another rest in peace there. Dave Smith at Oklahoma State is
• 1:51:03
  up in the top five, top ten. There's just so many amazing
• 1:51:06
  guys and gals out there. Amy Dean.
• 1:51:08
  Amy Dean is a podcast alumni. Absolutely.
• 1:51:12
  Because she's just had a birthday.
• 1:51:14
  This. Weekend.
• 1:51:14
  That's right. And someone said, isn't she in
• 1:51:19
  her 40s or early 40s? And I was like, wait, wait,
• 1:51:22
  wait. Amy was coaching when I was in
• 1:51:24
  college, but she was like 20. Yeah, we learned she.
• 1:51:28
  Start coaching along. She's been coaching for a long.
• 1:51:30
  Time, you know, I pigeonhole people.
• 1:51:32
  So for malice, it's like, oh, he's from Florida.
• 1:51:33
  And then you learn, no, he's from Columbus.
• 1:51:34
  Like that's amazing to me. Amy Diem, I just think, oh,
• 1:51:37
  Miami, she's from Florida, West Virginia girl.
• 1:51:39
  I mean, just, you know, you learn so much about these
• 1:51:41
  coaches and their backgrounds and it's really special to see
• 1:51:45
  the men and women who choose to be track coaches, special people
• 1:51:48
  that do special things for young people and that really that's
• 1:51:51
  the whole goal. So Tanja, thank you so much,
• 1:51:52
  guys and gals. Thank you so much for listening.
• 1:51:54
  Join us next week. We'll do it all over again as we
• 1:51:56
  go into Season 6. We're six years old, so continue
• 1:52:00
  along with us. I got some great people coming
• 1:52:01
  up for you. We're gonna have a lot of fun,
• 1:52:03
  so we'll talk soon. See you guys.
• 1:52:05
  Thanks. If it goes to appreciate the
• 1:52:09
  coach the ones that point people most every season needs a voice
• 1:52:13
  of reason speaking the growth you got to prep before you carry
• 1:52:15
  the load ice coffee to the soul. For those of us who stay on the
• 1:52:18
  go proper handoff to stay in the zone which you packing for the
• 1:52:22
  road. There's more than one way to the
• 1:52:23
  go. Taking those that's paying
• 1:52:25
  you're told it ain't practice If your purpose ain't clear, it
• 1:52:28
  can't happen until you listen with both is you can't mentor
• 1:52:31
  without a mentor of years of experience.
• 1:52:33
  You can reinvent those years Every plan's got to stand and
• 1:52:36
  deliver to and the price sacrifice can you give up you
• 1:52:40
  It's a choice and the fight not to win all those.
• 1:52:42
  It's not a ploy boy device. Y'all can make more moves.
• 1:52:45
  It's not about how to it's all about why you don't know till
• 1:52:48
  you know who you are inside 6,000,000 waste of time choose
• 1:52:52
  none. So we y'all cross finish line.
• 1:52:53
  The work ain't done so we learn from the experts but y'all got
• 1:52:56
  to put in the leg work kill athletics with the network.
• 1:53:00
  It's all about connections put together for the profession to
• 1:53:03
  every track coach could be blessing.