Latest / The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast / #328: Chris Korfist: Homewood Flossmoor (IL) High School | From Football Coach to Sprint Guru
Transcript
- 0:02You're listening to the Gil Athletics Connections podcast
- 0:05with host Mike Cunningham. Track and field world juvenile
- 0:12tuned in to our humble servant Mike Cunningham for another
- 0:16extraordinary message for Gil Athletics Connections.
- 0:20Here we go back on the Gil Athletics Connections podcast.
- 0:23So humble to be your host, Mike Cunningham, national business
- 0:25development manager here at at really the the Willy Wonka's
- 0:28Chocolate Factory attract man, I just have such a good time here
- 0:31and I'm pumped for this morning's conversation and
- 0:34excited for you to hear more. Maybe maybe a little different
- 0:37angle for this guest. You've heard him on lots of
- 0:40podcasts. I know he's written.
- 0:42He's really into a lot of coaching education as far as I
- 0:44know, and some of the things he does and he's done a really
- 0:47great job. And I'm excited to kind of peel
- 0:49the onion back here, peel some layers and learn more about him.
- 0:52Help me welcome from Homewood Flossomer up in the great
- 0:54Chicagoland area, the wise, the wonderful Mr. Chris Corpus.
- 0:57Chris, how are you today? I'm good.
- 0:59How are you? Man, I, I'm pumped actually
- 1:01today I, I just, I don't know, it's a Monday and I'm not a guy
- 1:04who, you know, doldrums about Monday and all that kind of
- 1:07stuff. I'm excited about Mondays
- 1:08because it starts my week off and I get to do things like
- 1:11this. So I, you know, I'm, I'm excited
- 1:13about my week. Yeah, that's great.
- 1:15And it's not 95°, it helps too. Yeah, I think it's like 90
- 1:19today, though. It is.
- 1:20Yeah. My son is a competitive bass
- 1:23Fisher, fisherman. And Saturday had practice,
- 1:27Sunday had a tournament. Saturday it was like, you know,
- 1:29real feel like 100. It rained a little bit on
- 1:31Sunday, so it only got to 90. And he was like, oh, it was so
- 1:33great. Still 90.
- 1:37I'm from Alabama originally, so this is a little bit in my, my
- 1:40wheelhouse. I I complain much more during
- 1:42December and January, you know, up here than I do in in July and
- 1:46August. Do we know that's coming here?
- 1:48We know that's coming. What's what was the Game of
- 1:51Thrones winter is coming. Yeah, that's that's my every
- 1:54year. I just like, oh, just get ready,
- 1:55Mike, get ready. I try to travel as much as
- 1:58possible during those months, that's for sure.
- 2:02It gets a little rough sometimes, yeah.
- 2:04Exactly. Well, Chris Mann, super excited,
- 2:06appreciate you joining us here on the podcast to kind of like I
- 2:10said, learn more about you, learn about your journey, learn
- 2:12how you got into coaching and what your background in track
- 2:14and field is. You were I was telling you
- 2:16before we hit record, you were nominated for the show and I
- 2:18love, love, love when we have nominations for the show.
- 2:21In fact, a lot of the listeners, guests that you guys have heard
- 2:24have been nominations. I do an absolutely terrible job
- 2:28of actually writing down who did that nomination.
- 2:31So Chris, I'm so sorry. I you have fans, at least one
- 2:34fan out there that thinks. One fan.
- 2:36Sometimes that's all you need. It's better than better than
- 2:39actually. You can have negative fans.
- 2:41That's that's not good either. I'm sure I have those as well.
- 2:45As I feel like that sometimes. Exactly.
- 2:47So Chris, let's get in our way back machine and learn more
- 2:50about you assuming and and you know, assuming it's not good
- 2:54that you are a track athlete. And we have certainly learned
- 2:56plenty of coaches have gone on to become really, really great
- 2:59track coaches and not done track and field as an athlete.
- 3:01Where does the sport, where does track and field start for you?
- 3:06My freshman year in high school, I ran one year, they made me
- 3:12high hurdle and we didn't have a high hurdle coach or we didn't
- 3:15have a hurdle coach. I went to a big high school,
- 3:19went to Larkin High School in Elgin, but we only had one coach
- 3:23and he was a distance guy. So everyone did a distance
- 3:25workout and then in a meet, it was like, all right, here's
- 3:28where you're going to go. And after one year I had enough
- 3:32and I thought that was the end of my track and field, you know,
- 3:36journey. And then I didn't start doing
- 3:40track again until my third year teaching at Hinsdale Central
- 3:44High School. OK, hold on.
- 3:46So there's a big leap there. Let's pause there.
- 3:49Very similar to you in regards to how I I hurdled but no
- 3:54practice. No, it was literally show up at
- 3:56the meets and good luck. What did you do?
- 4:00I can see how that'd be frustrating, right?
- 4:02I mean, that's just. Yeah, I pulled a lot of cinders
- 4:04out of my knees and elbows and hands.
- 4:07Yeah, yeah, exactly, Exactly what did you do for the rest of
- 4:11high school? Did you do any other sports or?
- 4:13I played football and then I played football at Northern
- 4:16Illinois and then I was a strength GA at Northern
- 4:20Illinois. And then I went into high school
- 4:24education and I was a social studies teacher.
- 4:27I say was because I his was because I retired this year.
- 4:30Nice, congratulations. And I was football.
- 4:32I was all in the strength and conditioning football.
- 4:36That was my thing. And the athletic director and
- 4:40head football coaches in South Central at the time was Ken
- 4:42Shriner. And we're trying to turn the
- 4:45program around and he said we want to be like Wheat
- 4:47Warrenville S. All of their football players
- 4:49are on track in the springtime. You're coaching track, you're
- 4:54the Sprint coach, and I'm like, all right, so there it was.
- 5:00All right, so pause there. Let's learn about where coaching
- 5:03was for you. So you played football through
- 5:06high school. As you're going through high
- 5:07school and you're getting coached, you got coaches, you
- 5:09know, different position coaches and your head coach, things like
- 5:12that. Strength, maybe a strength and
- 5:13conditioning coach was as you look to go to Northern Illinois,
- 5:16go Huskies, was coaching in your mind at all?
- 5:20I was supposed to go to law school and I wanted to be FBI
- 5:27or, you know, ATF, something like that.
- 5:30Yeah. And criminal justice of some
- 5:33kind with a law degree. Yeah.
- 5:36And that didn't work out. Why you said you were supposed
- 5:40to be family members or just oh. No, that's what I my gramp was a
- 5:44judge, my dad was a lawyer. And it was just kind of yeah,
- 5:47yeah. What the path that you took?
- 5:49And when I graduated from college, I didn't want to be a
- 5:54lawyer anymore. Do.
- 5:55You get like a history major, That's what a lot of my history
- 5:58major, yeah, yeah. See a lot of CIAFBI.
- 6:00That's a lot of history major types.
- 6:02And it was a weird time in the with the government in 1989.
- 6:07You know, they weren't really hiring a lot of people.
- 6:10So it kind of looked like it was going to be a fast track to a
- 6:13dead end. So I was, I graduated from
- 6:16college, wasn't sure what I did. I decided I'll just go into
- 6:19education. Teaching sounds like fun, you
- 6:23know, instead of, as my dad said, because my dad kind of
- 6:26said, you know, are you really wanted, do you really want to be
- 6:29a lawyer? You're going to spend all of
- 6:30your time solving people's, you know, dealing with people's
- 6:33problems. Why don't you go into education
- 6:35where you can teach someone and try to prevent problems down the
- 6:38road? And I thought, yeah, it's kind
- 6:40of a interesting way of looking at it.
- 6:42Yeah. Did he were there any teachers
- 6:45or anything in your family? My mom's a teacher.
- 6:47Yeah, OK. So there's some understanding of
- 6:50what the profession is. Yeah, so I went to Hinsdale
- 6:55Central and learned a lot as Aga.
- 7:00You know how to coach. This is, again, it's 1990 now.
- 7:04And so there's no real, there's not 20 people on staff.
- 7:08It was Jim Zielinski, who's still at University of Illinois.
- 7:11Me and another guy, and we did football and every other sport.
- 7:15And you'd had different parts of your day that you would go and I
- 7:19didn't know much. You know, I think as a young
- 7:21coach, you, you take up what you don't know with passion and
- 7:27emotion and excitement and be pumped and do all the yelling
- 7:32and screaming and all that. And I think as you age, you
- 7:35realize, you know, you can't be pumped and scream all the time
- 7:38because then guys never know when they've actually done a
- 7:41good job. It's, you know, you've got to be
- 7:43very selective when you give that kind of excitement and
- 7:46praise. Otherwise they expect it every
- 7:47time. And so you just kind of learn
- 7:51from there. I love the little thing that you
- 7:54just added to something that I think a lot about.
- 7:57When we first get into coaching, we typically fall back to how we
- 8:00were coached. We we don't know anything else.
- 8:03But I love the little caveat you just put in there.
- 8:06So there's still a big chasm. So we're young and we're excited
- 8:09and hopefully we're excited, right.
- 8:11And So what do we feel it? And we feel it with passion.
- 8:13And you know, passion is great, but we need bridled passion, not
- 8:17unbridled passion. So yeah, that's really
- 8:19interesting. That's a neat little.
- 8:21I guess you call it wisdom. Really at this point, at that
- 8:25point. Well, that that's what you gain,
- 8:27where you can eliminate. Yeah, all the screaming and
- 8:32yelling and pump up and jumping around and yeah, high 5 and
- 8:37chest bump and all that stuff. So was that when you got the,
- 8:40the edict that you're going to become the track coach and, and
- 8:43you probably maybe immediately thought like, oh, I, I ran
- 8:46track. OK, I, I, I know something, I
- 8:48don't even know what not to do. Were you the rah rah pump yell
- 8:52everyday? Well, yeah, cuz I was 24, you
- 8:57know, and that's what you knew and that's what kids responded
- 9:00to and and we sucked at the beginning.
- 9:03I had no idea what I was doing. I've always been interested in
- 9:06speed, you know, I've always messed with it.
- 9:09I've always wanted to be faster, you know, You know, as an
- 9:13athlete, you always want to get faster.
- 9:15And you know, the stuff that I was doing was great, but I
- 9:19wasn't getting any faster. But I took what I knew and tried
- 9:24to apply it in high school. And then eventually we weren't
- 9:28getting any better. We weren't winning.
- 9:30We were getting our butt kicked and scoring no points at meets
- 9:33and things like that. So, you know, I need to make a
- 9:35change. Something's not going on.
- 9:36Maybe squatting 500 lbs isn't the key to running 11 flat 100
- 9:42meter dash, right? Right.
- 9:43So what'd you do? That's a great self-awareness.
- 9:46Well, this is, again, computers don't exist.
- 9:49Then there's no such thing as the Internet, you know, it's
- 9:52very rudimentary. You start writing letters to
- 9:56people. You read books and you write
- 9:58letters to people who wrote books.
- 10:00And you ask, hey, can I come follow you?
- 10:02Can I take you out to lunch to learn something, to ask you some
- 10:05questions? Can I, You know, so you
- 10:08desperate, you look for some kind of mentors, but usually the
- 10:14people that you're asking are super busy and maybe you'll get
- 10:16an hour of their time if you're lucky.
- 10:20And so you just kind of start piece mealing things together
- 10:24and see what works and what doesn't work.
- 10:26And when something starts to work, you start to think that
- 10:29this is the Holy Grail of workouts and such.
- 10:32And then you have the odd kid or multiple odd kids where it
- 10:36doesn't fit anymore. And I think in track and field,
- 10:39you know, you got to have six good sprinters if you want to
- 10:41win something. 1 is great. You know, you get that one kid
- 10:46every 10 years that runs 10/7 and you hang your head on that
- 10:50kid for 10 years until the next one comes along.
- 10:53And that wasn't good enough for me.
- 10:55I wanted I wanted that every year.
- 10:57And how can I replicate it? So I just started compiling
- 11:02stuff, talking to people, but mostly it was trial and error
- 11:08because again, I didn't have access to someone's e-mail or
- 11:12YouTube or TikTok or all the other things where I can get one
- 11:15workout idea. You know, you had to think, you
- 11:18actually had to think about what you're doing in question.
- 11:24What are we doing? And and not hang your hat on
- 11:26anyone exercise or one program. You just create a pallet of
- 11:31things and you try to learn how to apply the appropriate things
- 11:35for the different athlete and see what goes.
- 11:38You know, I love how it's so easy to get caught up in today.
- 11:42You know, 2025 and I can literally pick up my phone and
- 11:46almost get in touch with anyone almost, you know, it's very it
- 11:50would be very hard for me not to find to find someone that I
- 11:52couldn't in our world, specifically track and field
- 11:55could not somehow make a connection and typically get a a
- 11:58response. To be real frank, right back in,
- 12:01you know, 90s and and such. You're right there.
- 12:03Not even YouTube. There wasn't even a place.
- 12:06Did you do the so back then when I was coaching, I remember
- 12:08getting the old US ATF VHS that would show like the 100 meter
- 12:12hurdles from the front, the back, the sides.
- 12:14It would be all the heats and finals from like the most recent
- 12:17USA's. Did you even have that or were?
- 12:19You. Oh yeah.
- 12:20You know, I would go to track clinics and football clinics
- 12:22because I was coaching football then.
- 12:23Too. Yeah, yeah.
- 12:24And I still, I threw them all the way over COVID because I
- 12:28don't have a VHS player. I literally had probably 100
- 12:32different VHS tapes on from this guy or that guy.
- 12:36Yeah, You know, if I found out someone is coming to speak in
- 12:39the Midwest, like one time Tudor Bompa came, oh wow, to DePaul
- 12:44and there was a snowstorm and I've told this story before and
- 12:48I said I'm, I'm going to go down and see Tutor Bompa.
- 12:51And I got, this is again, early 90s.
- 12:53I had a big black Bronco, you know, a 1982 Bronco Giant, you
- 12:59know, road warrior thing. And I, there's no ways or any
- 13:05way to go down. And I knew 55 was jammed up.
- 13:07So I backstreeted my way to DePaul University in this
- 13:10snowstorm, went into the basement where this conference
- 13:14where this talk was, and it was literally me and one other guy
- 13:18that I brought with me with Tudor Bompa, and no one else
- 13:22showed because the snow is so bad.
- 13:23Way so you basically had a private session.
- 13:26Yeah, we sat and talked for a couple hours.
- 13:28Dude, that has to be now looking back, you know, knowing Tudor,
- 13:34that has to be so impactful in your career.
- 13:37Well, so here's The funny thing. It wasn't, I mean, it was kind
- 13:42of what not to do. OK.
- 13:44Because, you know, he's big into periodization.
- 13:47And so I followed it. We sat and planned things out,
- 13:50we talked about stuff. And then I realized later on,
- 13:54you know, not immediately of course I went with it and I had
- 13:57macro cycles, mesocycles, mini micro mesocycle, you know,
- 14:01whatever kind of cycle you want and had all my volumes built out
- 14:05with percentages and stuff like that.
- 14:07And eventually it got to the point like, what if this kids
- 14:10having a bad day? What if this kid missed
- 14:13practice? What if this kid, his girlfriend
- 14:16broke up with him? He's going to be done for, you
- 14:18know, and it, it got to the point where it was really kind
- 14:21of pointless to monitor all of that just based on some piece of
- 14:25paper that I had planned out back in January, you know,
- 14:29practicing track here in Chicago.
- 14:31We're supposed to get 8 two hundreds in today with two
- 14:33minutes rest. Well, it's snowing.
- 14:35Right. We're not going out.
- 14:37It's snowing, right? And the wind is 50 miles an
- 14:40hour. You, you just can't plan like
- 14:42that. I think in his scenario, in a
- 14:45Soviet black situation where they control your entire life,
- 14:50that was that could be appropriate.
- 14:52Yeah. But for a high school coach, I I
- 14:55think it gave you some broad strokes, yeah, but it really
- 14:58wasn't a easy way to monitor athletes.
- 15:02You know, first of all, you're dangerously getting me close to
- 15:05talking X's and O's, which I won't do that, but.
- 15:08I'll pull you in if you. Want No, I know you.
- 15:11I know enough about you on that. But what I do like about what
- 15:14you're talking about here, it's interesting to me because
- 15:16sometimes so huge coaching education fan.
- 15:20So it is a little bit hard for me to not talk ex as notes,
- 15:22coaching education changed my my, my career in my in my life,
- 15:25honestly. And I think sometimes we get
- 15:29into talking about these in the box perfect situations, kind of
- 15:35what you're describing at 2 doors, like, oh, yeah, if I own
- 15:37your life, if I'm training you and you know, I have the perfect
- 15:40facilities, indoor and outdoor, perfect weather, I get to
- 15:43prescribe everything. Maybe that would work.
- 15:45But there is real life. And what is in Chicago for track
- 15:50training is different than what is in Miami.
- 15:52High school is different than what collegiate and middle
- 15:55school is different than pros. And so because it was
- 15:58interesting, I did a little experiment this actually this
- 16:00weekend. So when you're listening to
- 16:04this, we recorded this back on August 18th.
- 16:07So on August 16th, so 2 days ago Saturday, I went over to
- 16:11Bloomington and Boo Scheck Snyder, who's my mentor, my, my,
- 16:15my, my North Star. I love him to death and Vince
- 16:18Anderson spoke. I know Vince.
- 16:20And, and I love Vince as well. I don't mean to like not say I
- 16:22don't love Vince because I talk so highly.
- 16:24Great, great. Yeah.
- 16:25And so Vince had a slide about volumes and such for 400 and I
- 16:29was like, I just wonder what the no context.
- 16:33That was actually terrible for me.
- 16:34I gave no context. I just posted the slide on
- 16:36Twitter and was like, hey, So what do you agree or disagree?
- 16:38Boy, 39,000 views later, there was, you know, the whole
- 16:42spectrum, you know, from one person, which I just dislike
- 16:47these type of comments. Hey, if you know who said that,
- 16:50Vince Anderson, you won't have to ask anything.
- 16:52You just know to do it. I'm like, well, that's just,
- 16:53that's terrible. And I don't even think Vince
- 16:55would agree to that either just because some's name and past you
- 16:59don't question anything all the way to, you know, of course, the
- 17:02conversations of volumes and speeds and things like that.
- 17:05But context I think is the keyword here what you're talking
- 17:08about. Cuz I think a lot of Tudor and
- 17:10what he talked about with Puritization, but I also have
- 17:13coached Chicago track and field high school.
- 17:15And I also know that yeah, I rarely was outdoors January.
- 17:18In fact, I've never was outdoors January, February, etcetera.
- 17:21So no, I get that. So.
- 17:22You know, I, I think we've come to a point because we live in a
- 17:25Society of fear that you have coaches that need something or
- 17:29they can justify what they're doing based on a angry parent
- 17:33phone call. And we've become more followers
- 17:37of one cool exercise that, you know, we'll throw in there for
- 17:39some spice. But we're exercise instructors
- 17:44and monitors and organizers where we've got a whole team.
- 17:49We've got 40 kids that we've got to put through a workout.
- 17:52And when you do that, whenever you paint by numbers, and I use
- 17:55that term loosely, we lose the art of coaching.
- 17:59Yeah. And so really what we need to do
- 18:01is really focus more on not what everyone else is doing, but take
- 18:05your palette and apply it to what your situation is with your
- 18:09athletes because they're all different than my athletes.
- 18:13And take chances and see what happens.
- 18:16Yeah. Instead of being I'm this guy.
- 18:18I'm that guy. Yeah.
- 18:21And we're losing that. And that's why I have a lot of
- 18:26followers on social media. But I rarely post, although my
- 18:29retirement goal is to start posting again.
- 18:31Don't worry, I was gonna bring that up as a big social media
- 18:34guy and I heard you on JT airs podcast, the on track and field
- 18:38podcast, which you got to go check out.
- 18:39It's a great podcast. JT does a great job on track and
- 18:42field is a great. Company.
- 18:43You put it out there that you, you know, one of your goals was
- 18:46to increase your social media postings, and so we're going to
- 18:51hold you to it. I you're going to take the most
- 18:55complex thing a human being does, which is sprinting from a
- 18:57neurologic standpoint. Everything is throttled down,
- 19:02everything's amped up, and we're going to reduce it down to 1
- 19:05exercise with one guy doing something.
- 19:08And that might be applicable for one person and it's probably not
- 19:12applicable for the person that's actually doing the exercise.
- 19:15And try to apply that to people who really don't need that.
- 19:18Yeah. So I don't know what I'm going
- 19:22to do. My son who's awesome at social
- 19:24media, I think he's got a couple 100,000 followers.
- 19:27Dad, I'll do your videos for you.
- 19:29And it's like, yeah, but still, I don't want to be part of the
- 19:34noise. Yeah, I don't want to add to
- 19:37noise that's out there. I need to turn the noise into a
- 19:40signal so everyone can receive that and get something out of
- 19:44it. Because when I scroll through my
- 19:46phone, which I'm trying to do less of, that's another
- 19:48retirement goal. I just see that's wrong, that's
- 19:52wrong, that's wrong, that's wrong.
- 19:54Why are you doing that? Why are you doing that?
- 19:56And I don't want to be part of that.
- 19:58Yeah, but I'm gonna try. I'm gonna try.
- 20:00I would encourage you, and I need to come back to something
- 20:02else you said there. Remind me to talk about the
- 20:04palette for painting your analogy that you're using there.
- 20:08I would encourage you on social media to see what everybody else
- 20:11is doing and then go do the opposite of that.
- 20:14You know what, what I what I think is missing in track and
- 20:16field specifically. And you know, I think mostly
- 20:18Twitter. I'm on Instagram a little bit,
- 20:20but Twitter's where, you know, I kind of spend my life and you
- 20:25know, like I think about there's a lot of negativity.
- 20:29There was someone else is wrong and that means I'm right.
- 20:32By the way, if I say someone else is wrong, that means I'm
- 20:34right. And there's less nuance and
- 20:36really talking about the nuances and more about just, you know,
- 20:41hey, this is what you should be doing.
- 20:42This is what you should be doing.
- 20:43So just. My, my experiences this summer
- 20:46have been some guy torched me just for existing, said I'm not
- 20:52nuanced at all and I don't understand.
- 20:54I'm all flash. And it's like, well, if you know
- 20:56me and you actually listen to what I say, I'm probably the
- 20:58most nuanced person out there. Yeah, The other side, though, is
- 21:01also not to listen to what people say.
- 21:03Oh, I know. I mean, but but also it's kind
- 21:04of a weird tug of war to also listen to what they say.
- 21:07You know what I'm saying? It's a really weird tug of war,
- 21:09social media, so. Then I tried to kind of mock the
- 21:11whole thing. So I did a presentation with Cal
- 21:14Dietz and Dan Victor this summer.
- 21:16We call it Revolutions of Speed. And so the person who set it up
- 21:19for us said, you got to do some social media.
- 21:21So I walk my dogs in various forest preserves around Chicago
- 21:26illegally in the morning and let them off the leash and they hunt
- 21:30coyotes and stuff like that. And so I was pretending like I
- 21:32was in Burma or something like that.
- 21:34And we're studying this person. And some people took bad
- 21:37seriously. Like, are you really in Burma?
- 21:40No, look, I got the same clothes on in every different place I'm
- 21:42at. And then I posted my brother was
- 21:45in South Africa for work and he went to a cheetah rescue and we
- 21:49had he got a videotape of them. So I guess in South Africa
- 21:53people take cheetahs. It's pets and it's illegal.
- 21:57So there's a rescue that retrains them how to hunt so
- 22:00they can be re released out in the wild.
- 22:02So they take like a 1080 machine, not an actual 1080, but
- 22:06because this goes way faster and they pull targets for the
- 22:11cheetah to chase. OK, I thought they were hooking
- 22:13the cheetahs up. I was like, hold on a minute.
- 22:15OK, No. So it goes down and then it goes
- 22:18through like this thing. So the cheetahs got to turn in
- 22:21all that. So my brother's got it on film
- 22:23because my brother's there. And then I wrote something funny
- 22:28about feed the cats. My brother's doing research for
- 22:30me on what they're feeding the cats in South Accra.
- 22:32Something like that. Yeah.
- 22:33Yeah. And it turned into a
- 22:35deceleration thing because the cheetah stopped when the thing
- 22:38stopped. And he goes, see, it doesn't
- 22:39matter how fast you go. It's about how fast you stop.
- 22:41And it turned in, like, like, come on, guys.
- 22:44Yeah. Yeah, that's OK.
- 22:46I think this goes back. I think this goes back to what I
- 22:49wanted to make sure I pointed out.
- 22:51I love your analogy about paint my numbers, painting the palette
- 22:53and things like that. And because because several of
- 22:55the comments on that post that I talked about from this weekend,
- 22:58we're like, well, hey, there's a lot of context here.
- 23:00Who's the athlete in front of you?
- 23:01Because that what would that specific slide Vince was talking
- 23:04about might absolutely work for Joey, but may not work for Tina,
- 23:09Lisa, etcetera. You may have to do something
- 23:11different for them. But or maybe not even but
- 23:13because but erases everything in front of a caveat to that is
- 23:16that pallet. I agree 100% with that.
- 23:18So maybe I need more blue for this athlete, more red for this
- 23:20athlete, etcetera. But you have to have a pallet.
- 23:24And I think that's where coaching education, I think
- 23:26that's where a 2 door level twos, USTFCAS, etcetera, Altus
- 23:31help is. You get this big inventory of
- 23:34things that work for many, many different people and then your
- 23:37job is the coach. Here's the art, if you will, is
- 23:39to pull from all the knowledge that you've learned what works
- 23:42for Tommy Lamont, etcetera. Yeah, And I and I think, again,
- 23:46part of the coach is you've got to create that bridge for the
- 23:49kid to get to their goal. And so part of that, there is
- 23:51emotion there, but it's got to be appropriate.
- 23:55There's got to be great communication where we're both
- 23:59on the same page, you know, do you, what do you want to do and,
- 24:04and how can I help get you there?
- 24:06OK, here's our plan. And with my athletes, I'll write
- 24:08down on paper. Here's our, here's our plan on
- 24:11how we're going to get to your goal.
- 24:13And here's the exercises that you need.
- 24:15Because if you came to my track practice, again, we're not doing
- 24:17XS and OS. But if you came to my track
- 24:19practice, you would have no idea what's going on because
- 24:22everyone's doing what they're supposed to do, what their path
- 24:26to their goal is. And so there's no, you know,
- 24:31we're all not doing the same thing, I mean.
- 24:34And I think that's a great example that that works for you
- 24:37and your program. And there's someone out there.
- 24:39I literally just had someone on the show or actually they'll be
- 24:41in the future that has 235 kids on their team.
- 24:46I'm not sure that would work for that person.
- 24:48But if they have a good background, a good palette,
- 24:51they'll make the what's. But does he have 240 sprinters?
- 24:55No, of course not. No.
- 24:56So of course not. So yeah, you're going to send
- 24:58people the other way. I have 25 sprinters, so that's
- 25:02what they give me at HF. That's all I get.
- 25:05Yeah, that's. Right.
- 25:06And I'm not complaining about that.
- 25:07It's awesome because we have, we have 210 kids on our team.
- 25:10Oh, wow, Is that right? Yeah.
- 25:12Homework. Look, See, you got me jumping in
- 25:14the future, right? Well, I do want to know this
- 25:16because now it's top of my figure, top of my head.
- 25:18How many students at homework philosophy?
- 25:19We have 2700. We're a 3A school.
- 25:22Wow. That's a good school.
- 25:23So almost 10% of the entire student body is on the track and
- 25:28field team. Yes, for boys and girls.
- 25:30That's cool. I love that.
- 25:31That's really cool. We are, we are a track school.
- 25:34Yeah, I love that to keep that up.
- 25:36All right, pause, go back to your to your originating.
- 25:39You're going to become the track coach.
- 25:40You are the track coach. You're doing things.
- 25:42It's not working. I love great lesson here, I
- 25:46think is the self-awareness that it's not working and that maybe
- 25:49that means I need to do something different.
- 25:51Sometimes we it's easy, especially for us coaches who
- 25:54are teachers. It's very easy.
- 25:56Dude, I'm, I'm teaching history, Mike.
- 25:59I'm grading all these papers. By the way, I have a, a personal
- 26:02life, maybe a spouse. I have my own passions and
- 26:04charities, etcetera. Easy button.
- 26:07I'm going to keep doing this. I'm not going to go out and
- 26:09explore more. I have a lot of empathy for guys
- 26:12and gals like that, especially our high school teachers slash
- 26:16coaches. So I have a lot of movie for
- 26:18that. But you do have that
- 26:19self-awareness of like, OK, we got to do something different.
- 26:21Now you mentioned reaching out and this is pre Internet, pre
- 26:25cell phone, pre social media feels like basically the
- 26:28dinosaur days now today. So who were some of the first
- 26:31people that reached back out to you when you wrote him a letter?
- 26:34I was like, hey man, I need to pick your brain.
- 26:37What can we make sense? I.
- 26:38Started kind of in the weightlifting thing and I was
- 26:40really into weightlifting. Louis Simmons.
- 26:43Oh wow, is that right? In the back of USAUSA
- 26:47Powerlifting magazine he had a four line advertisements in the
- 26:52classifieds and said hey, if you want to check things out.
- 26:57So I called the number and Louis Simmons picked up and he said
- 27:01hey, well why don't you come out?
- 27:02You know it cost X amount of dollars to come out for the
- 27:04weekend, which is great because the knowledge that you get there
- 27:07is incredible. Yeah, yeah.
- 27:09And then come out. We're meeting for breakfast at
- 27:12the Cracker Barrel at this time and then we'll drive over to the
- 27:16gym and you hang out at the gym all day.
- 27:19Wow. You get to sit, you know, you
- 27:21saw all the great lifters of the era come and go.
- 27:24And Louis was a teacher. He would teach you what you
- 27:27heard and. How was that?
- 27:30Because I, I only know Louis through, I think Netflix had a
- 27:33documentary through lore. Yeah, I knew of him.
- 27:36Didn't he call it like the dungeon or something like that?
- 27:38Like how was that that experience?
- 27:39So when I went, both of the times that I went out there, it
- 27:43was the IT used to be a pizza place and he converted it into a
- 27:48gym in a strip mall onto Morris Ave. in Columbus.
- 27:53So you would go out in the parking lot on this and you
- 27:56would drag sleds in the parking lot.
- 27:57And there's, you know, there's a laundromat, there's a 711, and
- 28:02there's these enormous men and women dragging sleds around.
- 28:06And Louis was gracious. He was friendly.
- 28:14He answered every question that you had.
- 28:17He really wanted to teach his way of doing things, that is.
- 28:22So cool. And it was a great experience.
- 28:26Great, great guy, right? I've heard you know direct but.
- 28:29Oh, he's direct, but that's that's who he is and that's who
- 28:33he needs to be to work with those kind of athletes and to
- 28:36build that culture. But he was a wonderful human
- 28:40being. That's awesome.
- 28:42What, what do you, what do you take away today?
- 28:45Because that was how many years ago, roughly?
- 28:4825. What do you still like today
- 28:51when you look at your training? It could be training, it could
- 28:54be philosophy, culture, building.
- 28:56What do you directly attribute to this?
- 28:59I learned this from from Louis Simmons.
- 29:01One thing doesn't fit all. Like you see you going there,
- 29:06you see everyone doing different lifts for what their weaknesses
- 29:09and so you build your weakness. Oh, interesting.
- 29:11Based on your sport. And eventually Louis said to me,
- 29:13you know, because I bought, you know, I had a belt squat, I had
- 29:16chains, I had Power XI, had reverse hypers, I had glued
- 29:19hams. I did everything and it wasn't
- 29:21going as well as I wanted. It greatly improved.
- 29:24But eventually Louis said, you know, maybe you need to go talk
- 29:26to some other people because you're trying to take my sport
- 29:30and apply it to your sport. Powerlifting is not your sport,
- 29:35OK? You get stronger hamstrings.
- 29:36You're going to run fast that that's for sure scientifically
- 29:40proven, But there's going to come a point where you need to
- 29:42do other things, and I think you're at that point now.
- 29:46Interesting. So, and I think that's where,
- 29:49you know, people get stuck today as well.
- 29:51We base our entire program on a squat or a clean or a deadlift
- 29:55or or whatever, because there's always has to be this weight
- 29:58room component. But really it's just exercise.
- 30:03And if we get rid of the names of things and just say all this
- 30:06is exercise, let's let's get rid of lanes here, right, Right.
- 30:10Let's do what's best for that kid to accomplish that goal.
- 30:16And I think that's kind of what Louis did.
- 30:18Yeah. Because reality, they use
- 30:20equipment when they lift, they wear shirts, they wear SWAT
- 30:24suits, they wear all those different things.
- 30:25They have elbow wraps, all that stuff.
- 30:30It's athletic in a different way.
- 30:32But that's not sprinting. Sprinting is how fast can you
- 30:35apply force The ground. Their sport is can I apply force
- 30:41for a second and move a lot of weight because every lift lasts
- 30:45about a second. Ballpark.
- 30:47I know someone's going to call me on that, but ballpark, that's
- 30:49what Louis was looking for. Yeah.
- 30:51Related, not adjacent, right. Yeah, yeah, Yeah.
- 30:54OK, very cool. Who who else?
- 30:56Who else when you reached out? I think from there it just
- 30:59became like 2 ships passing where I'd have a brief something
- 31:06with someone else and I would move on just because I got what
- 31:08I wanted out of him. And I know that sounds horrible.
- 31:11So my mentorships when I was younger was really more a
- 31:15hodgepodge of I had a question from someone.
- 31:18I think Hans and Hank Rajenhoff are great.
- 31:20They answered a lot of questions.
- 31:24They owned Nemes, who invented the first power plate.
- 31:30Hank is probably the most decorated track coach, maybe
- 31:36ever. Then I feel sad that I don't
- 31:40know that. Tell me Hank, I don't know this
- 31:43name. Hank Krejenhoff, He is.
- 31:44He's Dutch. OK.
- 31:46You know, we made a big deal about Ben.
- 31:48Ben Johnson and what was his coach's name.
- 31:51The people are going to kill me for that, too.
- 31:54Charlie Francis. Thank you.
- 31:56Yes. Hank's coach Moore, world
- 31:58champion, more champions than him.
- 32:01So he's he's a European, he's older now.
- 32:05He was always very gracious with answering things.
- 32:08He did a lot of work with Bosco, Carmela Bosco.
- 32:15And so they were a partnership. And so I got to look at a lot of
- 32:19Bosco's work about plyometrics and things like that.
- 32:23I had a brief stint with Charles Poliquin so early on it was a
- 32:30lot of the strength people. I've never had a a real track
- 32:34mentor. It's all been trial and error.
- 32:37So how did you, as you're learning from Louis and Hank and
- 32:41Bosco, how do you like sometimes I'm concerned about when someone
- 32:46goes to their first like big coaching education, they come in
- 32:50and completely 180 their program the next year.
- 32:52And I'm not sure that that's the proper way to do it.
- 32:55Maybe that's how you did it. How did you start with, you
- 32:58know, you got to convince the kids, you talked about
- 33:00communication and the kids got to believe in you.
- 33:02You got to convince other coaches.
- 33:03You've got either people on the staff or you know, football and
- 33:06track seemed like it was pretty married.
- 33:07So I feel like the if the even if someone is on the football
- 33:10stack. I ran, I still ran the strength
- 33:12program OK while I was a track coach and I always had free
- 33:19reign to do whatever I wanted. OK.
- 33:21So there was no like when you came back in and said, hey,
- 33:22we're going to start, we're going to stop doing this, we're
- 33:24going to start doing that. No one said.
- 33:25Chris, what are you doing there? And so I got away with it
- 33:30because we were doing really well.
- 33:34So so you did start seeing? Oh yeah.
- 33:36Immediate results at Hinsdale Central.
- 33:38You'd everyone knows Hinsdale central Illinois, right?
- 33:41It's a very upper class school and all of a sudden we're
- 33:44getting second and third in state in the four by one with a
- 33:47bunch of Country Club kids. I'm getting, I'm getting kids
- 33:50recruited to SEC football teams because I've got, you know, kids
- 33:55that are long jumping 2223 feet. I've got kids that are running
- 33:5810510 six that have no business running those things.
- 34:02When did you know it was working?
- 34:04Like was there a early state, not state meet, early meet?
- 34:07Was there early testing? What?
- 34:09Was it like, so that's when Joe Newton screamed at Stan Reddle?
- 34:14How the hell are they beating us?
- 34:16I could see Joe. Yeah, Joe did not like Joe's
- 34:22consummate competitor, so he did not like that.
- 34:24He did not enjoy that. So then from Hinsdale Central I
- 34:28did one year at Downers NI, left Hinsdale Central, there was a
- 34:32change over in the football program and the new head
- 34:35football coach made me hate football.
- 34:40So I only lasted one year cuz really my goal is to be the head
- 34:43football coach at Hinsdale Central.
- 34:45That was my dream, right? Pause right there.
- 34:49That brings up a great question. I love asking this typically
- 34:52about our athletes who do both, but I think this is interesting
- 34:55for you as a coach at this point in your career where where you
- 34:58were right there where you know your goal was to become the head
- 35:01coach of Hinsdale Central. Would you say you were a
- 35:03football coach who coached track or track coach who coached
- 35:06football? I was a football strength coach
- 35:09who coached. Track yeah OK got it I think
- 35:11that helps frame where our mindset is of things so so I can
- 35:14assume we all know what assuming does that then all this these
- 35:18things that you're learning while it it was born of my track
- 35:22team is not that good you're you're still number one thing is
- 35:24OK this all helps to become. A better football.
- 35:26We were winning in football. I mean, we would lose one or two
- 35:29games a year. OK.
- 35:30All right, keep going. Sorry, I think that's just
- 35:32important to help. Us.
- 35:33So then I quit football, which is hard to do.
- 35:37It's kind of like a divorce. When you went to Downers.
- 35:39When I went to Downers, I didn't.
- 35:41That was the end of my football career.
- 35:43Wow, did you know? Meaning did you think like, oh,
- 35:47there's I'll be back to football?
- 35:49No, I was so sick of what I saw happen that there was no way I
- 35:54would ever coach football again because it just showed me how
- 35:56ugly the whole thing was and how how people were and.
- 36:03How did you It's very easy for us even today to whether it's
- 36:08back then, today in 2025 and by the way, in 2050, I'll still be
- 36:11battling this concern of mine. It's easy for us to to make our
- 36:16identity our job. So, you know, Chris is a
- 36:19football coach or Chris is a track coach.
- 36:22How did you adjust? How did you handle you?
- 36:27Sounds like you put football in a chest and locked it up and
- 36:30said, OK, I assume, but OK, I'm going to move forward as a track
- 36:32coach. How did you handle losing that
- 36:35part of your identity? It's hard.
- 36:39It's really hard because I love football.
- 36:43I still love football, but I love football.
- 36:46I love football ever since I was a little kid.
- 36:48I would do anything to be able to play one more game.
- 36:52Right now, almost anything. I would love to have to go play
- 36:59catch with someone, you know, I still, I still miss it greatly.
- 37:05But that's that's gone. Yeah.
- 37:08And I think part of wisdom is you let things go as you get
- 37:13older, and the older you get, the more you lose.
- 37:18So that was just something that that literally, it was like a
- 37:21divorce. Yeah, it was literally like a
- 37:23divorce. So there is depression.
- 37:25There was, you know, bad mouthing me at my own school for
- 37:29why I quit. You know, you know, I did this.
- 37:33I did that. And I'm this, I'm that because
- 37:35the other coach, you know, painted me as this horrible
- 37:37person when all along I was right because he'll get fired in
- 37:41a couple years after I've left. So then I had a lot of success
- 37:47as a track coach. I went to Downers N for one
- 37:49year. We almost beat York.
- 37:54We had a really good Sprint squad that year.
- 37:56And then that whole staff left. And so about halfway through
- 38:01that track season at an indoor conference meet, Stan Rattle
- 38:05came up to me who is, you know, Joe Newton's sidekick and in my
- 38:09opinion, the best coach I've ever coached with.
- 38:11Cuz I worked with Joe Newton. Yeah, OK.
- 38:15And he goes, you got on downer stuff.
- 38:19And I said, yeah, he goes, well, why don't you come coach at
- 38:21York? And at first I thought, I hate
- 38:23York, I hate Joe Newton, I hate Stan Riddle.
- 38:26I have spent my entire career trying to beat you.
- 38:28And I did. I We Hinsdale Central beat York
- 38:32twice for conference championships.
- 38:34Wow, that's no easy task. Holy, no easy task.
- 38:37Yeah. And so Stan said, why don't you
- 38:39meet me at this restaurant next Tuesday night and let's talk.
- 38:45And I said, OK, I'll, I'll hear you out.
- 38:49And so we met at a restaurant and I ordered meatloaf because
- 38:52it looked good. And it was.
- 38:56And he said, we want I want you to come coach the sprinters for
- 39:00me. And I, you know, you know, I had
- 39:04to get over the fact that I'm eating dinner with Stan Rattle,
- 39:09right? Turns out if I if I had to pick
- 39:11a mentor it would be Stan Rattle and it's not for XS and OS Stan
- 39:17Redel is Obi Wan Kenobi. He could do Jedi mind tricks on
- 39:22people and get it someone to believe anything, and so could
- 39:24Joe Newton, but Stan was much more subtle.
- 39:26Yeah. Between the two of them, they
- 39:29were incredible, incredible mentors.
- 39:32I mean, he got you from a my words.
- 39:34Hell no, I'm not working for your.
- 39:36What are you talking about? To let's have Meat Loaf.
- 39:38Let's let's talk about this, Yeah.
- 39:41So the next year I was at York and.
- 39:45What year is this? 5. 05. 05.
- 39:51OK, got it. Yep.
- 39:52OK, keep going. So Stan said you do whatever you
- 39:57need to do with the sprinters. I'm not gonna cuz Stan was the
- 39:59Sprint coach. And he goes, you do what you
- 40:03need to do. I'm not going to question you on
- 40:04anything. Wow, just go.
- 40:07And I had a state champion that year in the 400 meter dash.
- 40:10We placed in all the Sprint relays and we got third.
- 40:13And for my next 10 years at York, we won a trophy 8 of the
- 40:1610 years. That says a lot about Stan and
- 40:21his ego. Ego's not bad.
- 40:22Bad ego is bad. He was able.
- 40:25Did Obi? Did Obi Wan have an ego?
- 40:27Yeah, yeah, He had an ego, absolutely.
- 40:29It's what made him. I cannot believe I'm going to
- 40:30talk Jedi with you. That's what helped make him want
- 40:33to become a better Jedi and help other Jedi's Bad ego is bad.
- 40:35I disagree with you on that. Bad ego is what took Luke.
- 40:38I can't believe I'm having a Star Wars conversation.
- 40:40Did not see that one coming, Chris.
- 40:42I disagree with you. I think Obi Wan knew that ego
- 40:47would destroy you as it did Anakin.
- 40:51Yeah, bad ego. Did I agree?
- 40:53And he just followed his way and he knew he had to do whatever he
- 40:58had to sacrifice whatever he needed to to get where he needed
- 41:02to go. And I think that's what Stan did
- 41:04is he gave up his ego. Yeah, I'm not saying I was a
- 41:08better coach. I just cuz he won some stuff
- 41:11too. He still holds by a single A
- 41:12records with his Walter Lutheran teams.
- 41:14And he won state championships there, right.
- 41:18It's just I had at Walter Lutheran, those were kids that
- 41:21came to run track. I had, you know, a bunch of
- 41:24hodgepodge from York, which were great.
- 41:26And it's a phenomenal program. To work with both of those
- 41:29coaches was an incredible experience.
- 41:33And Joe Newton didn't like me to begin with either because I was
- 41:37not a huge volume guy. I didn't beat the shit out of my
- 41:40beat the crap out of my kids. I didn't run him into the
- 41:42ground, but eventually I knew I was in.
- 41:49This is probably too much information, so I'm down at the
- 41:51state track meet in York. You would bring so many people
- 41:54that we would have a whole floor down there.
- 41:56Right. And someone said Coach Newton
- 41:58wants to see you cuz there's there's protocol with Joe
- 42:02Newton, OK, right. I mean, there's the kissing of
- 42:05the ring. There's, you know, there's cuz
- 42:08he's Joe Newton, right? Sure, sure.
- 42:12And so he I go into his room and he's sitting there in a bath
- 42:15towel and we start having a talk and we find some common ground.
- 42:23Like he's obsessed with Wyatt Earp.
- 42:26He's obsessed with Westerns. That was his thing.
- 42:28He loved reading about Western, Western history, all that.
- 42:30That was his thing. OK.
- 42:32And I said, you really love Wyatt Earp.
- 42:34And he goes that I think that's the greatest figure from the
- 42:37West. And I, so I got a strange story
- 42:39for you. My great uncle was partners with
- 42:43Wyatt Earp. They owned a silver mine
- 42:45together. No way.
- 42:47California and my dad has the deed that's got both their
- 42:50signatures on it for the silver mine.
- 42:53Wow. And if you don't believe me, you
- 42:56can go ahead and Google the Corfus mine out in California.
- 42:59It still exists. He had to have liked that, like
- 43:02he had to be. I mean, you know, you have
- 43:04family ties to his, his guy. Yeah.
- 43:07So after that, Joe Newton was probably my second biggest
- 43:12supporter. Stan would be the first.
- 43:14Because of something your great uncle did.
- 43:16Well, that and helped him win trophies because we were scoring
- 43:19points. Oh yeah, that too.
- 43:22We won a couple state championships, you know, I mean,
- 43:25we were in the hunt every year. Yeah, yeah.
- 43:27Oh. Yeah, in the year that we were,
- 43:30we didn't. The wheels literally came off
- 43:33every which way you possibly could, which made me a much
- 43:35better coach because I thought, holy shit, I'm here to win
- 43:39trophies in. The wheels came off of my bus
- 43:42for this team. What have I got to do different?
- 43:47Maybe it was me, maybe it wasn't the kids.
- 43:49Maybe I did some things wrong and you know, and there is,
- 43:53there was always pressure. I mean, I knew why I was there
- 43:57eventually. Stan and I are still very close
- 43:59friends and I would say Joe Newton was my friend and there
- 44:03were other great coaches there. It was a great staff.
- 44:08But I knew I was there. You know, I, I travelled from
- 44:12Hinsdale Central New York every day to go to go to practice and
- 44:16I live on the other side of Hinsdale Central from New York.
- 44:19So it was a long commute home every day, but I knew I was
- 44:22there and then I got better and we went back and we want to
- 44:26state trophy the next year. Were you teaching at Hinsdale
- 44:29Central still? I've always been teaching at
- 44:31Hinsdale Central, so I have coached at four other high
- 44:33schools while teaching at Hinsdale Central.
- 44:35Is that right? Yeah.
- 44:37Is that I am? I am that guy, yeah.
- 44:39Yeah, is that awkward at all? No, it's just a different shirt.
- 44:44You wear a different logo on your shirt.
- 44:45I still stayed the same. The logo might change.
- 44:48But you, I assume you had to have taught some kids that were
- 44:50on the Hinsdale Central team sure that you would then go up
- 44:53to York and. Yeah, I don't care.
- 44:55Yeah. Nobody ever asked why, you know,
- 44:59Nobody ever. It's just the way it was.
- 45:01Yeah. I didn't want it ultimately, you
- 45:04know, I probably should have, you know, it just worked out the
- 45:09way it did. Yeah.
- 45:09Yeah, yeah. For whatever reasons.
- 45:11So I talked about, you know, Stan, you know, dropping his ego
- 45:15loud and saying come in and coach the sprinters, reverse
- 45:18that. How was that for you knowing?
- 45:20So he's still on staff. You're coaching a lot of his now
- 45:24former athletes. Was there ever any, I don't know
- 45:27the right word here, Not deference, but you know, a
- 45:30little bit like over your shoulder like, well, I know he's
- 45:33watching and we're doing things differently.
- 45:35Was there ever any? And, for lack of a better term,
- 45:37awkwardness? That's not the right term I'm
- 45:40really going for. You he he went behind my back
- 45:43once and snuck in a different workout early.
- 45:49Early. I told him not to do it again.
- 45:51Yeah. And it never happened again.
- 45:54OK, So you never so after that incident you felt very
- 46:01confident. All right, this is my group.
- 46:03No, I, I was, I was doing what I was, what they brought me on to
- 46:07do. I couldn't do any better.
- 46:10I mean, we're winning stuff. We're we're coming close to
- 46:13state records, we're setting meet records, we're resetting
- 46:17school records every year, which is a good school to set records
- 46:20at. Very good point.
- 46:21And then eventually, Stan said he's going to retire, and so did
- 46:26Tom Clancy, who is at the jumps coach, was another phenomenal
- 46:30human being who I learned a lot about a lot from.
- 46:35And Joe Newton said, yeah, I've got one more year.
- 46:38And so the whole staff turned over.
- 46:40And then Montini, you know, there's some weird things that
- 46:45happened at the end. Montini, which is a Catholic
- 46:51school nearby in Lombard, I knew the head coach.
- 46:55They're pretty well. And they've got a great football
- 46:57program. And they said, hey, we heard
- 47:00things aren't going at your. Can you come by Montini?
- 47:04And I said, OK, now Montini York has a 200 meter indoor field
- 47:08house. They have a phenomenal outdoor
- 47:09track. Montini has nothing, nothing.
- 47:13So I went over to Montini and I go into the room where we're
- 47:17supposed to have this interview. And I walk in and there's the
- 47:22president of school, the athletic director, head football
- 47:25coach, Chris Adriano, who's won multiple state championships and
- 47:30one of the great coaches of high Illinois high school football,
- 47:35and Pete Conley, the the head track coach.
- 47:38And before I even sat down, the president said, let me start
- 47:42this. What's going to take for Chris
- 47:44Corpus to come coach at Montini? Wow.
- 47:48And I said, well, I'd love to work with the football program.
- 47:52And Chris Hadriano said absolutely, I'll give you all my
- 47:56kids. Dude.
- 48:00And so that was at Manteno for five years.
- 48:04We did really well. We had kids in the finals and a
- 48:07lot of things every year. We were a small team but it
- 48:11worked out better because we literally ran in a 30m hallway
- 48:152/3 of the season. Yeah, I know that one.
- 48:19Yeah. And so then I went in for my
- 48:22retirement meeting with TRS and the TRS lady said you got to get
- 48:26back coaching in public schools because you need that money for
- 48:30your pension wasting money. And so I told Tony Holler that I
- 48:36think I I'm going to I got to leave Montini and with an hour,
- 48:40Nate Beebe from home at Flossmoor called me on the phone
- 48:44and said, and by the way, he slow played me all the places
- 48:48that I coached at. He kept inviting us to his
- 48:51indoor meets so I can see their facilities all the time.
- 48:57So it's like, oh, I know this place.
- 48:58I like this place. This is familiar to me.
- 49:00Yeah, and within an hour of me saying something to Tony Howard,
- 49:04Nate Beebe offered me a job. Love it, love it.
- 49:08All right, pause there because that, that'll bring us to our
- 49:10homeward. Floss more, floss more era.
- 49:12Go back. You mentioned at York one year
- 49:15all the wheels fell off the bus. This, that, that sound when you
- 49:19said that, that made me call back to when you were coaching
- 49:25and you know, things weren't going well.
- 49:27And so I wanted to start reaching out to people back when
- 49:29you when you first started, what did you do during the when the
- 49:33bus fell off? And again, you have some so much
- 49:34self-awareness, which is really key, I think to a lot of maybe
- 49:37your development here in the growth as a track coach.
- 49:42What did you, did you do anything there?
- 49:43Did you reach out to anybody? Did you double down on
- 49:45something? What did you?
- 49:46Because I think that's a comp, hopefully not a common thing,
- 49:48but I think that happens in our coaching career.
- 49:50One year something really bad happens and we have a lot of
- 49:53decisions we can make. Stay the course, throw the baby
- 49:55out with the bathwater. Lots of decisions.
- 49:57What did you do? I looked so it doesn't I don't
- 50:02write down any of my workouts. I don't have anything right.
- 50:04I haven't done that in decades just because everyone's doing
- 50:09something different. That's kind of that is when I
- 50:17got into our PR and be activated.
- 50:20That's when I started use. I've somehow ran into Douglas
- 50:24Heal. It's a long story.
- 50:26And I brought Douglas Heal out to do be activated, which
- 50:30eventually becomes our PR. And I started applying that
- 50:34because I've always been looking for the neurologic button and I
- 50:39think that had a huge component in it.
- 50:41And then I actually learned about testing muscles and see
- 50:44what's actually working and what's not in recruitment
- 50:47patterns and what's actually working in our body.
- 50:50And so I said, well, maybe that's what I'm missing.
- 50:53I'm great at setting up these plans and getting kids to run
- 50:56faster. But what if I'm doing too much?
- 51:00What if their bodies had enough? What am I doing to make sure I
- 51:04know when they've had enough? How can I neurologically work
- 51:09around that to build some endurance and some, you know,
- 51:13some some mental toughness, you know, not from a can I grind you
- 51:19into the ground? But can I fire my glutes?
- 51:23Can my the proper recruitment pattern happened for 11 seconds
- 51:26or 22 seconds and that's where I went.
- 51:29And that's the year we came roaring back when I started
- 51:32applying all the neurologic stuff, which today is our PR and
- 51:36we came roaring back and we ran 41 flat in the 4 by 1.
- 51:40I had people in the finals. I mean, we placed in all three
- 51:44events and all three relays and scored.
- 51:48I think we scored 35 points as a Sprint squad.
- 51:51Wow. When you say you started
- 51:54learning these things, double click into that.
- 51:57Where are you? Are you getting biology books?
- 51:59Are you going to a clinic? A symposium?
- 52:02Where are you learning? You said you learn that that
- 52:04means you had to go. Started with a chiropractor here
- 52:07in Westmont named Sean Allen, and I've always been.
- 52:11He and I have been friends for decades now, but he was always
- 52:15the guy that put my guys back together.
- 52:17And Sean kept saying, dude, I don't have time.
- 52:22And so he started teaching me stuff.
- 52:24And then I ran into Douglas Heel and I just saw it.
- 52:27He made me see the body in a completely different light, OK?
- 52:31And so I had a new lens to see what I'm doing in OK.
- 52:38Tell me his name again, Doug, do you say?
- 52:39Douglas Heal. Douglas.
- 52:42Douglas Heal. Yeah, got it.
- 52:44OK. And he's the one who?
- 52:46He is a South African physio who created be activated.
- 52:52And that's what became RPR. RPR after having Douglas out
- 52:56learning in a bunch, Cal Dietz and I met with Douglas and said,
- 53:00you know, we're going to, we need to make this for everyone,
- 53:04not just people who take your class.
- 53:06And so Cal and I made it into something that you can apply to
- 53:11yourself, something that kids can do just to create another
- 53:16layer between performance and injury.
- 53:18OK I know zero about our PRI, hear about it on social media
- 53:23but since I don't coach anymore I I don't care.
- 53:26Meaning if it works for someone, I don't judge it right?
- 53:29Tell me. And I and I realize by the way,
- 53:31I give you permission if you will, if this delves into XS and
- 53:34OS. I'm just curious here.
- 53:36What is RPRII know? I've heard something, I've heard
- 53:39something about sternum rubs. That's all I know.
- 53:40OK, so reflexive performance reset is the idea that muscles
- 53:45will shut off? Say that again.
- 53:46I'm not very smart to hear things very fast.
- 53:47Say that again. Reflexive Performance Reset,
- 53:50that's RPR is the acronym. Got it, Got it.
- 53:54So muscles can shut down for a variety of reasons which will
- 53:57create a compensation pattern when you go to recruit.
- 54:01So for example, if my butt's not supporting, my hamstrings going
- 54:05to pick up or my lower back is going to pick up the slack of
- 54:08what that muscles not doing? OK, I can see that.
- 54:10OK. Because really we have to walk
- 54:13and there's 87 different recruitment patterns that you
- 54:17can use to go forward. OK.
- 54:20Which is why you see so many different forms when you go to a
- 54:22track meet and you get past the first heat or the fast heat.
- 54:27You get the heat 22 of the 200 you watch all night. 8 kids.
- 54:31Everyone's different because they're all using different
- 54:33recruitment patterns to get to the finish line.
- 54:35Got it. OK, so Douglas came up with a
- 54:39way that we can get those muscles back online.
- 54:43And it's something as simple as just rubbing certain spots on
- 54:46your body that gets them back in into place.
- 54:49And that's where people are like, well, this is crap, this
- 54:51is voodoo. This doesn't work because how
- 54:53can I rub a spot and make a change?
- 54:55And my point is this. When you're teaching, when a
- 54:57baby's learning how to crawl, it doesn't understand language yet,
- 55:01right? There's got to be some kind of
- 55:02cue to let the baby know that it's safe to bring a knee up.
- 55:06Yeah. So when the babies learn to
- 55:08crawl, first of all, they prop themselves up so they can
- 55:11navigate and look straight ahead.
- 55:13But then they start rocking back and forth.
- 55:16Remember those days? So what they're actually doing
- 55:18is they're rocking on the spot. That resets the SOAS muscle.
- 55:22The SOAS muscle is the first step in recruitment for hip
- 55:24flexion. Because it's.
- 55:26Stabilizes your spine, it connects your torso and your
- 55:30hips together, and it says it's safe to go into hip flexion.
- 55:33OK, so we're just going to go back to what babies did to know
- 55:36how it's time to go into hip flexion and just rub that spot.
- 55:42That's how it works. So, so when I've seen someone,
- 55:45it might have been JTI don't know, they talked about Chester.
- 55:49So it's. That's the first step because
- 55:51the problem with a lot of people today is they breathe and when
- 55:55they breathe, they use their lungs for a variety of reasons.
- 55:58But that puts you into a fight or flight stage.
- 56:00That's what you call a survival breath.
- 56:03To get into a performance breath, you need to breathe
- 56:05through your stomach, which actually sets you into a
- 56:08relaxation phase. And again, we have all kinds of
- 56:12different things to, you know, prove these different things,
- 56:16tests and stuff like that. So we want to get you into a
- 56:20performance state where you can actually react instead of do
- 56:25things out of fear or do things out of fight or you know, all
- 56:30the different things that put you can instantly put you into a
- 56:33poor recruitment pattern. Right, right, right.
- 56:36So just breathing can help reset you.
- 56:38So. Are these, so if you, if you, if
- 56:40you came to our track practice, the first thing our all 200 kids
- 56:44do is they're on their back in our 200 meter indoor track or a
- 56:48football facility and they are breathing for 5 minutes with
- 56:50belly breaths, no headphones, no nothing.
- 56:54Just breathing, concentrating on relaxing, getting into a mental
- 56:57state to go ahead and perform. But before warm up, before
- 57:00anything. Before anything, if you came to
- 57:02our track meet, I think it frustrates people because they
- 57:04go, they go by and go. All the home of philosophy kids
- 57:07are laying down. They'll take you smart.
- 57:11What are they doing? And they're all breathing.
- 57:13Yeah, yeah, yeah. 5 minutes. OK, practice 5 minutes because
- 57:19we figured the rest of the day they are under stress, whether
- 57:21they're looking at their phone trying to get somewhere,
- 57:25someone's telling them they suck, someone tells them you
- 57:26know all the different things that they go through.
- 57:29I need 5 minutes of time whether it's self reflection but your
- 57:33belly breathing just to reset your body so we can have a good
- 57:36practice. How do you get Speaking of high
- 57:39schoolers again, I have a lot of grace for 1418 year olds, man.
- 57:42I mean, I remember when I was 1418 and, and we like to, you
- 57:45know, I'm getting close to 50 now.
- 57:46We like to think, you know, all these young kids, they don't
- 57:48understand about, it's like, well, you didn't understand
- 57:50either. I didn't understand either when
- 57:51I was a 1418 year old kid. Things that I thought were
- 57:53important back then certainly are not important now, and vice
- 57:55versa. Things that I don't think were
- 57:57important, they were important. What girl I talked to, what I
- 58:00made in history class, etc. How do you?
- 58:02Cuz this is pretty different. I don't hear of our PR on every
- 58:08tweet Tweet. How do you get we're?
- 58:10Horrible marketers a. Freshman.
- 58:13That's funny. How do you get a freshman that
- 58:15joins your team and your first day of practice, you're like,
- 58:18all right, I'm going to teach you this.
- 58:19We're going to do belly breaths. We're going to lay it.
- 58:21And they're, I just have to imagine they're giggling.
- 58:22They're looking around like, is this some kind of camera joke?
- 58:25Like what are we doing here? So when you have a returning
- 58:28Allstate kid who's leading it and they call you out on it and
- 58:32they tell you if it's if you can't do this, then this isn't
- 58:35the place for you. You fall on the line, I think at
- 58:39home at Flossmoor and at York. I think what makes both those
- 58:42programs special is our older kids become coaches.
- 58:47Yeah, yeah. I have.
- 58:50Last year I had three kids that they would they could coach for
- 58:55me. They know me so well.
- 58:58One kid was hurt who's a returning Allstate kid.
- 59:01He'd come to track meets. He'd have his book bag.
- 59:03He'd have everything that I would normally do and he would
- 59:07do it all because he knew the program.
- 59:10A Joaquin Jordan, a multiple time Allstate kid.
- 59:13He is an expert at block starts and so he'll help kids with
- 59:16block starts. So we have turned some of the
- 59:19leadership over the kids. Same thing happened at York.
- 59:22All the discipline was from the older kids.
- 59:24I've never had to say anything because all the kids have bought
- 59:28in. They know we have a great
- 59:31relationship and they want they want their team to be the best
- 59:35and so they kind of take that over.
- 59:39You know this better than I do as a teacher.
- 59:41You know, kids learn different ways.
- 59:43Some need to see it, some need to hear it, some need to touch
- 59:45it. I think sometimes in
- 59:46specifically here in track and field, we forget that way to
- 59:49learn is also to teach it. It helps reinforce some of the
- 59:54things that you think you know and you do know by actually
- 59:56helping somebody else. That's a great example of the
- 59:59leadership, but you just got to say disguise it.
- 1:00:01You call it leadership, but it's it's teaching that they are
- 1:00:03teaching the younger. Yes, and part of being a leader
- 1:00:06is teaching. I mean, that's that's one thing
- 1:00:07that we always forget that is you're trying to bring someone
- 1:00:11along that that wasn't there. And that's what leadership is.
- 1:00:14And I think our older kids understand that.
- 1:00:18And you know, they all have different roles.
- 1:00:20Like we have one kid that's the cheerleader and he knows that's
- 1:00:23his role. That's kind of what he fits
- 1:00:25into. So it's kind of how our team
- 1:00:29grows. And I'm not saying it's perfect
- 1:00:31every year. Two years ago at HF, we didn't
- 1:00:33have a good year. Our leaders took his bad and
- 1:00:36that was partly the coach's fault for allowing it to go so
- 1:00:40far. But yeah, when when you have the
- 1:00:46kids coaching and teaching, I think it goes a long way because
- 1:00:50they know because someone did a good job coaching them or
- 1:00:53teaching them. You know, I at Homewood
- 1:00:56Philosopher probably our undoing is the phone because everyone's
- 1:01:00filming everything. Everyone wants every block start
- 1:01:03filmed and critiqued and all that.
- 1:01:05Well, some of my older kids have had it done so many times.
- 1:01:08They know what to look for. I got kids that run 10 to 1080
- 1:01:12machine. They know it better than most
- 1:01:15coaches that own 1080s. They understand the programming.
- 1:01:18They understand the force velocity curves and things like
- 1:01:21that because they want to learn and they learned and they can
- 1:01:24apply it. Like coach put that at 13 for
- 1:01:26me. My my curve was off last time.
- 1:01:29Yeah. All right.
- 1:01:30Put it 13. Yeah, so.
- 1:01:32So is RPR all before a practice or a competition?
- 1:01:37You can do it anytime. That's the beauty of it.
- 1:01:39OK, But we do it before practice.
- 1:01:42So after we're done breathing, we do the at HF, they call them
- 1:01:46the spots. We're gonna do our spots.
- 1:01:48And so it's the spots that you rub.
- 1:01:50Yeah, OK, OK. The official term is wake up
- 1:01:52drill. It's cuz you're waking up a
- 1:01:55muscle. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- 1:01:56But every school calls it different things.
- 1:02:01Someone is listening right now and maybe that you, you said
- 1:02:04you're terrible marketers. I love that.
- 1:02:07And they want, they want, they want to learn more about that.
- 1:02:09Where would they go to learn more about this?
- 1:02:12Reflexperformance.net. There's all kinds of YouTube.
- 1:02:16Some guy with Cal Cal Dietz is my partner in our PR.
- 1:02:19He's the strength coach for University of Minnesota hockey,
- 1:02:22and he's an Olympic. He's strength coach.
- 1:02:24For hockey, yeah, he went to some guy's gym and they
- 1:02:29videotaped it. So it's for free on YouTube.
- 1:02:32And any day now, and I've been saying this for two years, we
- 1:02:34have an app that will be out that shows you how to do it for
- 1:02:36free. Any day now.
- 1:02:38Any day now. For now, let's go to say it
- 1:02:41again. Reflexive.
- 1:02:43I think it's reflexive performance.net or reflexive
- 1:02:45performancereset.net. OK.
- 1:02:47In today's real world of AI, Google and things like that, if
- 1:02:53you just put in RPR or say that, say what RPR stands for again.
- 1:02:57Reflexive performance. Reset.
- 1:03:01Reset. Yeah.
- 1:03:02So if you put that in, that should bring up that website as
- 1:03:04well for that. Yeah, OK.
- 1:03:06Love that. All right, move us back to now.
- 1:03:09We join HF because we need to get back into the public
- 1:03:13teaching because of your retirement.
- 1:03:15Yeah. The longer commute.
- 1:03:18Oh yeah, how? How far?
- 1:03:20How long are you commuting each day?
- 1:03:24Well for my house or for it's 5 minutes closer from my house
- 1:03:27than it is from Hinsdale Central.
- 1:03:29OK, but I would be line it out of school at the last bell,
- 1:03:34hustle of my car, try to get out of the parking lot.
- 1:03:38They were nice. They moved practice back to
- 1:03:40start later so I could make it. So it's probably 25 minutes to
- 1:03:45half an hour there and 2025 minutes home.
- 1:03:48Because you were, up until your recent retirement, you're still
- 1:03:51teaching at Hinsdale Central. I'm still teaching at Hinsdale
- 1:03:53Central. Wow, man, it's so interesting.
- 1:03:56You know, on one hand you are this this sometimes has a
- 1:03:59negative connotation. Please don't take it that way.
- 1:04:01A journeyman in the sense of, you know, Mantini and you're
- 1:04:04working I'm. A hired gun.
- 1:04:05I know that. But you have consistently taught
- 1:04:09and your base has always been right there at Hinsdale School.
- 1:04:13That's interesting. Great school on the best schools
- 1:04:15in the country. Yeah.
- 1:04:16Academically, yeah, yeah, yeah. I love that.
- 1:04:18All right, so the, I think you said the athletic director had
- 1:04:22been slow recruiting you for years.
- 1:04:24I love that you get to HF. How do you implement, what do
- 1:04:28you do differently? Each school is a little
- 1:04:31different. I I would hope facilities and
- 1:04:33things like that. How do you get started there?
- 1:04:36When Nate Beebe said do what you need to do and go and we started
- 1:04:44and then COVID hit. Yeah.
- 1:04:48How did that change what you do, how you do it, I should say.
- 1:04:53COVID. Yeah.
- 1:04:55I think we would want to state championship that year.
- 1:04:59Pretty sure Marshall Ellis already broke the school record
- 1:05:03in the 60. Wow, as a junior and then I'll
- 1:05:09never forget we got told this meet got cancelled and Nate
- 1:05:17Beebe said I think I can get us up into a meet at Rock and
- 1:05:20Hananaga cuz we only thought it would be a couple weeks.
- 1:05:23Yep. So we thought we were going to
- 1:05:26Hananaga and then that got cancelled and then literally we
- 1:05:33were the only team in the building and we thought we got
- 1:05:37to get one practice in because we don't think we'll be back
- 1:05:40until after spring break. Do we let the kids put their
- 1:05:43music into the PA system because we're the only people in the
- 1:05:46building rock it out. And we ran 23 second runs and
- 1:05:51told the kids, I will see you guys in a couple weeks.
- 1:05:55We'll post some workouts, which became illegal.
- 1:06:00That's. Right.
- 1:06:01And that was it. And there went that whole
- 1:06:04season. So then when we came back, we
- 1:06:07had that abbreviated season, which was later.
- 1:06:11Right. And and then it went back to
- 1:06:14normal again. What did you do?
- 1:06:17So you're striking me as a very, you know, very appropriately as
- 1:06:23you were, you know, originally going to go on to become a
- 1:06:25lawyer and your history major. So a lot of reading, a lot of
- 1:06:27study, and a lot of, for lack of a better term, self improvement.
- 1:06:32That's just what education is. What did you do when, when we
- 1:06:36finally knew COVID was here, you know, no more practice, no more
- 1:06:40meets, no more anything. It was, it was an amazing time
- 1:06:45in my opinion, for coaching education.
- 1:06:46A lot of things since we didn't have anything else to do, there
- 1:06:49are a lot of things popped up. What did you do, if any, in
- 1:06:53regards to not only participate in, but did you do any of those
- 1:06:57things, those activities yourself?
- 1:07:02I did a whole bunch of webinars with Dan Fichter, which we sell.
- 1:07:08We, you know, all kinds of neurologic stuff, training
- 1:07:10stuff. I did a long self reflection on
- 1:07:16what I'm doing. I literally pulled out
- 1:07:17everything that I accumulated over the years and threw stuff
- 1:07:21out. I wrote a three-part article for
- 1:07:23Simply Faster on I think I called the Education of Me or
- 1:07:26something like that. My thought process kind of along
- 1:07:30the way and then I illegally trained people out of my
- 1:07:34basement of. Course what you wrote that
- 1:07:39three-part article, the education of me and you said
- 1:07:42you, you know, you kind of I love this like going back to the
- 1:07:46base is very important to me, whether it's training, coaching,
- 1:07:51private sector, you know what we do here.
- 1:07:53Base is extremely important to me.
- 1:07:55What did you learn? Did you?
- 1:07:57Was there anything you thought that you evaluated and said?
- 1:07:59This is outdated or I need to improve this?
- 1:08:02I need to stop doing this. My God I forgot about this.
- 1:08:04I need to X10X into this. I think I looked at all this
- 1:08:09stuff that I used to do and wondered why I did it and what
- 1:08:12still was applicable, and realized that I was a pretty
- 1:08:15good coach a little while ago, that I was doing good things and
- 1:08:20that you shouldn't just get rid of things just because you're
- 1:08:22growing. You do need to have, you know,
- 1:08:25keep on to some of the things and don't change for the sake of
- 1:08:29changing, which I'm bad at. I'm really good at changing
- 1:08:34because I'm bored with doing something.
- 1:08:35Yeah, yeah, I think that makes you normal.
- 1:08:39Yeah, yeah, I'm. I'm, I'm, I got caught up for
- 1:08:44the last decade, 15 years of doing a lot of reading and
- 1:08:48learning, but I would, you know, read and learn a book and put
- 1:08:53some things in action and be right back into a next book or
- 1:08:55next article or next podcast, etcetera.
- 1:08:58And I what I finally about how about 7 year before COVID, I had
- 1:09:03a mentor of mine who was like, when do you ever like put it
- 1:09:06into practice? Like you go right into the next
- 1:09:09thing of learning. That's great.
- 1:09:10You know, I'm a massive lifelong learner, but sometimes you got
- 1:09:13to put an application to find yeah when you're gonna.
- 1:09:14Apply what you know, and sometimes you don't need much,
- 1:09:17right? You don't need much.
- 1:09:19I mean, if you look at B.B. King, B.B.
- 1:09:21King became one of the greatest guitar players ever playing
- 1:09:23three notes. Sometimes he can play one note
- 1:09:26better than anyone and play one note for an entire song, and
- 1:09:29it's mind blowing. Yeah, Miles Davis said.
- 1:09:32Sometimes it's what you don't play that makes you.
- 1:09:34Great. Yeah, Yeah.
- 1:09:35Boy, could you not restate that for coaching as well?
- 1:09:38What you don't do makes you a great coach sometimes.
- 1:09:40That's right. Yeah.
- 1:09:41I mean, sometimes we do one thing at practice.
- 1:09:44Yeah. Because that's, that's what's
- 1:09:45needed, yeah. You know and.
- 1:09:47If you think this is, I don't know.
- 1:09:49I love music history. Yeah, I know nothing about it
- 1:09:52besides Vanilla Ice. So Miles Davis came from, you
- 1:09:55know, the Charlie Bird there, Charlie Parker, the bird era
- 1:10:00where it's all these notes, you know, the song Ornithology, how
- 1:10:03many notes can you play and all that, you know, bebop jazz, and
- 1:10:08you play all these strange. And then Miles Davis came back
- 1:10:11and said, wait a minute, we're missing the whole thing here.
- 1:10:14Let's see what happens if we just play one note.
- 1:10:17And how good can we? How well can we play that one
- 1:10:19note right? And that's where cool jazz
- 1:10:22became something. And it became, do I need to play
- 1:10:25all this to get my message across?
- 1:10:27Do I need to do all this to be great?
- 1:10:29Right, Yeah, that's interesting. Huge fan of coaching education.
- 1:10:36But I do wonder sometimes, do we over coach it?
- 1:10:40And maybe it's OK if we over coach over index on coaching
- 1:10:44education because enough of us are not indexing at all into
- 1:10:46coaching education. But when you learn something
- 1:10:48from a clinic, a class, a podcast, etcetera, the real
- 1:10:53evaluation as a coach then is, well, how much of that do I need
- 1:10:56to put into my program? Sometimes a lot, sometimes very
- 1:10:58little, sometimes none. Maybe it's just a cool idea that
- 1:11:01I like to think about. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, right,
- 1:11:04yeah. And I think that to your point
- 1:11:05about going back and kind of self reflecting, maybe that's
- 1:11:07what you need every, you know, you can't prescribe it like
- 1:11:10every five years coaches, you should go back and look at
- 1:11:12everything. But when the timing is right,
- 1:11:15going back and looking at old clinics or whatnot.
- 1:11:18You know your old notes and things like that from, from
- 1:11:20whoever you know, cuz I see, you know, I've run track and
- 1:11:24football consortium with Tony Holler.
- 1:11:26So and I still go to clinics all the time.
- 1:11:28I go see people speak all the time.
- 1:11:30I speak at clinics and I like to go see other people speak.
- 1:11:32You know, it's great to hear what other people are doing, but
- 1:11:36you know, I'm old now and a lot of the guys up speaking are
- 1:11:41young and so you kind of know where they're coming from.
- 1:11:43They're excited about something. And but I still love hearing
- 1:11:47them speak and I love trying to get things from them or
- 1:11:49sometimes reasons not to do things.
- 1:11:52You know, they're all into this. Like I don't want to do this
- 1:11:55because XYZ based on my background and and what I have
- 1:12:00learned over time, right? What's appropriate here?
- 1:12:03Right. How did you?
- 1:12:07So a big passion of mine is to help and help coaches find their
- 1:12:10voice. Part of that is this podcast
- 1:12:12helping people, showcasing how they've got to where they are
- 1:12:15today. Your, your journey is extremely
- 1:12:18unique. I, I, I still think, you know,
- 1:12:20I've done 330 something interviews like this and you
- 1:12:23would think at some point I'll be like, oh, well, yeah, this is
- 1:12:25exactly like these five coaches. Every single one has a unique
- 1:12:29twist and turn and yours is certainly one of those.
- 1:12:33And I'm always trying to help coaches find their voice in the
- 1:12:36sense of like speaking at coaching clinics or having their
- 1:12:39own podcast and things like that.
- 1:12:41How did you, because you know, you, you spoke at several
- 1:12:44clinics before. How did you get the and maybe,
- 1:12:47you know, maybe this is a dumb question because you're a
- 1:12:48teacher. So you do this everyday air
- 1:12:50quotes there in front of kids. How did you get the gumption to
- 1:12:53actually stand up in front of your peers, though?
- 1:12:55That's different than a bunch of 16 year olds, No offense to 16
- 1:12:58year olds, but getting in front of other coaches, there's a
- 1:13:00little bit of, you know, there's fear of judgement.
- 1:13:02In fact, very, I think one of the first sentences you said
- 1:13:05today was, you know, we, we live in life of fear at times.
- 1:13:08How did you get the gumption to get over that and start becoming
- 1:13:12a prolific speaker, if you will? I, I think the Illinois IT guy
- 1:13:17asked me to come speak and it was a lot of fun.
- 1:13:20And you know, I think Tony Holler and I got into TFC
- 1:13:24because we had a lot to share. And you know, two of the things
- 1:13:29that I try to run my life by is be what's missing.
- 1:13:35And I'm an outside of the box coach.
- 1:13:36I do things very non traditionally, you know, so I
- 1:13:40get flame for whatever and I just wanted to share that.
- 1:13:45And part of it is, you know, what have you done today to help
- 1:13:48a stranger? So I'm in front of a whole bunch
- 1:13:50of coaches who are looking for answers for things.
- 1:13:54And I think I'm very practical and, you know, I analyze things
- 1:14:00a lot and I have good results that I could share that with a
- 1:14:04bunch of people I've never met before.
- 1:14:06What would be your advice? Someone is Illinois track
- 1:14:11coaches clinic has reached out to them to speak and I hear this
- 1:14:14a lot with our like our Gill 1918 Project podcast.
- 1:14:18The number one answer back is, oh, I don't think I have
- 1:14:21anything to share and that's bubkis.
- 1:14:23I think everybody has something. Everyone's got to share.
- 1:14:26Someone right now has been reached out by Illinois or
- 1:14:28Wisconsin, all these amazing track clinics out there and
- 1:14:30they're like I'm here, I'm tear to get rid of the word Justin
- 1:14:35only in our vocabulary. I'm just a track coach from the
- 1:14:38middle of Ohio, the Nowhere, Iowa, etcetera, etcetera.
- 1:14:42What's your advice for them to to take that first step?
- 1:14:46I think there's nothing better than speaking because it forces
- 1:14:49you to think about what you're doing and be able to present it
- 1:14:53to people. So you really have to think
- 1:14:55through what you're going to present.
- 1:14:57Are you going to add some scientific research?
- 1:14:59You know, where's good videos where I can show good and bad.
- 1:15:04So it really forces you to think about what you're doing and put
- 1:15:08it into a thought that you have to share.
- 1:15:12Unlike a podcast, nothing against podcasts, but really
- 1:15:14they're just conversations like I have no idea what you're going
- 1:15:17to ask next. So this is all off my cuff that
- 1:15:20I'm coming up with this stuff. But when I get up and present,
- 1:15:23I've had months to put stuff together where I can think it
- 1:15:25through and and it clearly that maybe someone can take something
- 1:15:29home or make them really my job. When I speak, and again, I speak
- 1:15:35all over all throughout the year, it's really to make you
- 1:15:38think about what you're doing. I'm not saying you have to do
- 1:15:41what I do or you might think I'm crazy, but I'm just getting you
- 1:15:45to reflect on what you're doing to make you a better coach.
- 1:15:47Because really as a teacher, that's what we ultimately want
- 1:15:50to do is did I make you think today?
- 1:15:52Did I make you ask a question? Did I make you question what
- 1:15:54you're doing? That way I can make you a better
- 1:15:58coach because you have a better idea of why you're doing things
- 1:16:02rather than I got it off the Internet and I read one book by
- 1:16:07this guy who coached some really fast people back in 1988, and
- 1:16:11I'm gonna apply that and I'm now Coach X guy, Yeah.
- 1:16:15Yeah, yeah. Hey, boy, I couldn't agree more
- 1:16:18with how you put that in regard to the podcast, podcast, etc.
- 1:16:23And great timing here, if you'll allow me.
- 1:16:26And that's why I started the Gill 1918 project.
- 1:16:28We call it the Ted Talks, the track and field podcast.
- 1:16:31It's you self recording. It is not it's not an interview.
- 1:16:35And what I one of one of the many goals reasons I wanted to
- 1:16:39start it was for those people who think they want to to speak
- 1:16:42one day at Illinois, Wisconsin, Ohio, Florida, etcetera, but
- 1:16:46don't know how would I put together a presentation?
- 1:16:48Well, here's a very easy way. You can just record it.
- 1:16:51There's no one in front of you, there's no one you think is
- 1:16:53judging you and etcetera. You're not even going to see the
- 1:16:55people who hear it eventually on the podcast.
- 1:16:57So but I think that's exactly right.
- 1:16:59There is difference between an interview like like this, even a
- 1:17:03structured interview you talked about, you don't know what
- 1:17:05question I'm going to ask next. And you know, for you guys and
- 1:17:07guys I've listened for a while, you know, I don't send, they
- 1:17:09have no idea what I'm going to ask them.
- 1:17:11But even a structured interview where it's like, hey, I'm going
- 1:17:13to here's the four questions I'm going to ask you, Chris, there's
- 1:17:15still a difference between putting my thoughts and actions
- 1:17:18on paper, whether it's through a PowerPoint presentation or
- 1:17:22through a recording for 10 to 30 minutes, et cetera.
- 1:17:24There, there's much more intentionality, if you will,
- 1:17:27with that. Yeah, I'm, I'm with you 100% on
- 1:17:29that. That's why we want to do a
- 1:17:30little different twist with that Gil 1918 Project podcast.
- 1:17:34So I appreciate that. So Chris, what has changed for
- 1:17:37you? You retired, you finally the
- 1:17:40base of Hinsdale Central that's been retired.
- 1:17:43That's so amazing to me, honestly.
- 1:17:45How many years did you coach at Hinsdale Central?
- 1:17:5012. Wow, that's amazing.
- 1:17:52You're retired, but thank God for us in track and field.
- 1:17:56You're still coaching. How does your how does your life
- 1:17:58change you? You freed up a lot of time, I
- 1:18:00assume. Well, I, I own AI, don't own a
- 1:18:05facility. I, I train people out of my
- 1:18:07house. My facility is my basement.
- 1:18:10And I've got incredible equipment.
- 1:18:11I've had all kinds of people that come train here.
- 1:18:14I think a couple years ago it got into the Chicago media that
- 1:18:20I trained David Montgomery, you know, the Lions running back, He
- 1:18:23trained here for three years. And I had, you know, there's
- 1:18:26articles in the Tribune and all that about them.
- 1:18:29And I'm still keep in contact with David.
- 1:18:31Cool. So when I'm not coaching or
- 1:18:35teaching, I'm training people out of my house.
- 1:18:38So it doesn't stop for me at track practice.
- 1:18:40Like I'll leave track practice, come home, have dinner, and then
- 1:18:44I'll have a group of kids from other schools train with me.
- 1:18:49I train all day Saturday, all day Sunday.
- 1:18:51Yeah. So summer for me.
- 1:18:53This is a really busy summer. I had a lot of clients this
- 1:18:56summer and everyone's back to school so I haven't really been
- 1:19:02retired yet. I'm waiting for some free time
- 1:19:05here so I can see what retirement is like.
- 1:19:08You traded one busy for a different busy yeah.
- 1:19:11Are these people you train, are they all performance based or is
- 1:19:14there a general population health based as well?
- 1:19:18That makes sense. I'm not sure I'm.
- 1:19:19Asking, I guess, to kill time when I start getting bored, I'm
- 1:19:22going to have to take a general population.
- 1:19:25OK, but it's mostly all athletes.
- 1:19:27These are athletes, Yeah, different.
- 1:19:28Sports, different sports, whoever wants to come, it's
- 1:19:32scary because you're going to a guy's basement at A at a house.
- 1:19:37And so some people say he trains out of his house.
- 1:19:39Well, then I'm not going and that's fine.
- 1:19:40Yeah, yeah, right. I do have a 1080, you know, a
- 1:19:42$60,000 ten 80 quantum. I've got a 1080 Sprint.
- 1:19:46I've got some of the best equipment you can buy.
- 1:19:48How big's your basement? I mean, you got to have some
- 1:19:49room. We can do.
- 1:19:52It's 60 feet long, 30 feet wide. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- 1:19:56So we do in the winter time, we do one second runs.
- 1:20:00Yeah, yeah. Getting some good acceleration
- 1:20:02stuff. Yeah, You know, how fast can you
- 1:20:03get out? Because really that's what it
- 1:20:04comes down to is how fast can you get on your first step.
- 1:20:07And I know we're not doing X's and O's.
- 1:20:08But yeah, but but that's a but hold on.
- 1:20:10That's a good place for me to put in.
- 1:20:11Guys, if you're listening to that and you're and maybe you're
- 1:20:13intrigued by what he just said right there, he recently
- 1:20:15probably 6:00-ish, maybe weeks from when you're listening to
- 1:20:19this now. He was on JT airs podcast.
- 1:20:21I know I mentioned it on track and field podcast.
- 1:20:23I listened to that a couple weeks ago and they do a great
- 1:20:26job, JT great job as a host, Chris as a guest.
- 1:20:30They talk about, I remember you talking about the one second run
- 1:20:32and things like that. They he delves in a little bit.
- 1:20:34He gets about another layer or two into it.
- 1:20:36So highly recommend when you get done with this show today,
- 1:20:39pause, look, same app you're using right now, go to the on
- 1:20:42track and field podcast. Look for Chris and many other
- 1:20:44guests they've got there. But Chris gets a little bit more
- 1:20:47in depth in there. So sorry, I just wanted to plug
- 1:20:48J TS podcast. Yeah.
- 1:20:52So I never really stopped training.
- 1:20:54Yeah, I do consultant work for some professional sports teams.
- 1:20:59I've been doing that for a while now, which is fun cuz how often
- 1:21:03does a high school social studies teacher walk into an
- 1:21:05NFL, you know, facility and they're asking for your opinion
- 1:21:09on things and you're doing assessments.
- 1:21:11You know, that's kind of cool. So I'm always doing something.
- 1:21:17Do you start all your sessions with a belly breathing?
- 1:21:21At my house, yeah. Yeah.
- 1:21:22I'm just curious. I hope they, I hope they do that
- 1:21:24before they come here because they they have things that they
- 1:21:27need to prepare when they come train here.
- 1:21:28Yeah, good point. But you're, you're so you are.
- 1:21:31You're teaching that with everyone.
- 1:21:32You're. Paying for an hour.
- 1:21:34Right. And 5 minutes of you is and.
- 1:21:36So you they're laying breathing. That's a good way to lose
- 1:21:39clients. I was thinking, I was like,
- 1:21:40that's a, I'm not calling what you're doing this.
- 1:21:43I'm thinking of how I would do is like, oh, I'd make them do 15
- 1:21:46minutes. What a scam I can get.
- 1:21:47I only have to do 3/4 of the work.
- 1:21:48Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's fine. So, but that actually says a lot
- 1:21:51about you. You're like, yeah, yeah, you're
- 1:21:52not going to come to my place and you need to do this, by the
- 1:21:55way, but you're not going to come here and do that for 5
- 1:21:56minutes. You're paying me for my time.
- 1:21:58You don't want that. Go do it before you get here.
- 1:22:00So you got a lot to do in an hour.
- 1:22:01Yeah, you can do a. Lot about it breathing in the
- 1:22:03car out in the street. That's great, yeah.
- 1:22:05Yeah, that says a lot about you actually.
- 1:22:06That's that's a real positive. So as you look at 20, what do we
- 1:22:10got 2026 coming in and you're coaching at HF, another year in
- 1:22:15the program, What's got you excited?
- 1:22:18I think I shouldn't say this. I'm knocking on wood.
- 1:22:22We could have a really good team this year.
- 1:22:25We were second state last year. We almost broke the state record
- 1:22:29in the four by one. That's my goal.
- 1:22:30I want to break the state record in the four by one.
- 1:22:32What is it? It's 48 seven.
- 1:22:36As I say, we've run 40 in here in Illinois, right, 40?
- 1:22:39.87. Not many though.
- 1:22:41By Creep, Mini and Brian O'Donnell who is the coach there
- 1:22:45now? Coaches at HF.
- 1:22:47Oh. Nice, but I had all
- 1:22:49underclassmen last year and we went 40.8 or 41841 O 8. 41 O
- 1:22:56eight OK and it's 40.8. 40.87. Yeah, dude, it's what an amazing
- 1:23:01sport. I mean, you're talking about the
- 1:23:04the time of snapping my fingers and you've got to figure out,
- 1:23:06well, how do I get these four dudes?
- 1:23:08Yeah, do that fast. I mean, that's just what it's
- 1:23:11that's what to me is it's the most amazing sport.
- 1:23:12Not about 10 yards to get to the first down.
- 1:23:14This is, we're talking about that quick and that's gonna be
- 1:23:18your goal all year. You're gonna be working to
- 1:23:20improve that. They do that and then put it all
- 1:23:23together on the right day, which is again, the timing aspects.
- 1:23:25It's amazing. But, you know, I'm just going
- 1:23:29ahead, you know, and see what retirement's about.
- 1:23:34What do you want? To do not work 78 hours a week.
- 1:23:36Yeah. Besides that, what do you want
- 1:23:37to do in retirement? Do you want to speak more?
- 1:23:39Do you want to write a book? Start your own podcast?
- 1:23:42What do you want to? Do well simply faster wanted us
- 1:23:45to start a podcast and I did one, but it's taken them six
- 1:23:48weeks to manufacture. It's like I'm not getting the
- 1:23:51feedback here that I it's worth my time hang out.
- 1:23:54It's starting to rain here. I got to shut.
- 1:23:56My, Oh no, I mean we're so close.
- 1:23:59I immediately looked at it was like, is it raining here yet?
- 1:24:02Well, it's pouring. Oh really?
- 1:24:04Oh man. I don't know.
- 1:24:07I'm just going to kind of go where I'm supposed to go.
- 1:24:12I want to coach, you know, I don't feel like I'm retired.
- 1:24:15I remember my first year teaching.
- 1:24:16There are some guys retiring in social studies and I thought, my
- 1:24:20God, when I retire am I going to look that old?
- 1:24:22I'm going to say you look fantastic for someone who's
- 1:24:25retired, brother. I want to do that.
- 1:24:26Yeah, yeah, yeah. Thanks.
- 1:24:28So I don't know. My kids are both in their last
- 1:24:32year of college so. Nice.
- 1:24:34Are they gonna become coaches? No.
- 1:24:37No. My daughter's in her last year
- 1:24:39of pharmacy school. Dang.
- 1:24:41And my son is designs and flies drones.
- 1:24:45That's what he's studying to do. Oh, that's cool.
- 1:24:48Yeah, that that's an actual, like, career path here in 2025.
- 1:24:52Isn't that amazing? Yeah.
- 1:24:53Back in our days we had, I don't even know if we, if you and I
- 1:24:56had RC planes, they were very rudimentary if we did back in
- 1:24:59the 80s and 90s and now that's a real deal job.
- 1:25:03Like we, we hire Gil, we hire drone pilots, if you will.
- 1:25:07Yeah, he's so there's only two schools in the country that have
- 1:25:12that program, Purdue in North Dakota and he's at North Dakota.
- 1:25:15So he'll have his commercial license.
- 1:25:16So that's an actual like his major.
- 1:25:18Will be it's a major is unmanned flight.
- 1:25:21Shut up, I didn't know that far. I thought he was doing.
- 1:25:25Oh, he that is a major. Wow.
- 1:25:29And he helps design them and not just, you know, DJI fun drones.
- 1:25:36I mean, they're building things that do things.
- 1:25:39Some, some of it's probably not good, but you know what I mean.
- 1:25:42Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- 1:25:44That's super interesting though that a kid has a passion like
- 1:25:47that and actually has a path to he's like a supported his entire
- 1:25:52life. That's been his obsession his
- 1:25:54entire life. That's so cool.
- 1:25:57I love it. I love when people find their
- 1:25:58passions and then pour into it, man.
- 1:26:00Yeah. Even better when it has some,
- 1:26:02you know, positive aspects and, and both those career paths for
- 1:26:06for your son and daughter have positive aspects for our
- 1:26:09society. So I love that.
- 1:26:11I hope, yeah. Well, any, any path can be
- 1:26:15negative. So yeah, I mean, coaching can be
- 1:26:18negative. Let's let's be real here.
- 1:26:20We've all seen those. Guys, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
- 1:26:22yeah, yeah. I love it, man.
- 1:26:24Chris, where can we find you? You said on J TS podcast and you
- 1:26:30said it earlier here, you want to be better more.
- 1:26:32I don't know if prolific is the right word, but more effective
- 1:26:36at social media. So where can we go to find that
- 1:26:39social media so we can hold you accountable for that?
- 1:26:41I think my my Twitter or X thing is it's just Corefest.
- 1:26:47So if you don't know, that means we haven't started taking some
- 1:26:50steps into becoming bored. Let me look.
- 1:26:52I got this. One right here.
- 1:26:53But this shows where you're at. You haven't really started going
- 1:26:56at it if you don't even know. No, I've been too busy.
- 1:27:00That's no, that's a fair. That's a fair.
- 1:27:02OK, how do I find where my basic stuff is?
- 1:27:06Are you on Twitter? At Korfist is my Twitter.
- 1:27:10KORFIST, OK. I've got over 9000 followers,
- 1:27:15that's pretty good. Right, bad for doing nothing.
- 1:27:17You know what anybody want to say nothing?
- 1:27:19I mean, not on there every day. I'm on there every day and I've
- 1:27:21only got 18,000. So I mean, you're gonna, you're
- 1:27:24gonna pour a little gas on that and you're gonna have hundreds
- 1:27:27of thousands for crying out loud.
- 1:27:28Do. I make money if I get that.
- 1:27:30You can, yeah. I.
- 1:27:31Like money. Yeah, you can.
- 1:27:33You can be. I can't believe I'm gonna plug
- 1:27:35this guy's Twitter. You can be like Aaron Brown, who
- 1:27:39you know makes his life as a troll on social media and he
- 1:27:41makes good money on Twitter and Instagram.
- 1:27:44I I'm I don't like. Don't be a troll, I'm just I.
- 1:27:46Don't wanna. Be a troll.
- 1:27:47No, no, no, I'm just saying that there is there is ways to make
- 1:27:49money in social media. And I think a guy like you who
- 1:27:52has not only a lot of value to give, but you seemed very much
- 1:27:55to have a desire to give as well to give value.
- 1:27:58And and that is worth something like you mentioned earlier about
- 1:28:01Louis charging people to come to his gym.
- 1:28:04Like I, I don't have any issues in our sport and track and field
- 1:28:07of people working to make money. One, because we don't pay our
- 1:28:10track coaches enough anyway. No point blank.
- 1:28:12Two, you're a teacher. We don't pay our teachers
- 1:28:13enough. Point blank.
- 1:28:14Stop there but the value that our coaches have, that our track
- 1:28:18and field coaches have, that's value and value should be paid
- 1:28:22for and there's market value You know, you may not be in the
- 1:28:25sport of football, so maybe you're not paying $1000 for a
- 1:28:28clinic, but people who host clinics, host their own
- 1:28:31webinars, things like that there there should be compensation so
- 1:28:34I'm. And we do and, and Tony Howler
- 1:28:37and I do run Trek Football Consortium every year in.
- 1:28:40December that's right. Tell me what?
- 1:28:41So did you 2 create that? Yeah, so tell.
- 1:28:44Me more about that, because I've seen a lot of that and you know,
- 1:28:46Tony, we've had on the show before.
- 1:28:47I don't think we got into TFC. Tell us a little bit more about
- 1:28:50that. This seems like the melding of
- 1:28:51your two passions here. We thought that not against
- 1:28:57anyone else, but we just thought that you go to clinics, you hear
- 1:29:00the same thing over and over again.
- 1:29:02You either get, this is what we do and or you get, I had this
- 1:29:06great guy this one time and here's what I did with him.
- 1:29:12So you really didn't learn anything.
- 1:29:13There was nothing new. And I've been to hundreds of
- 1:29:16those clinics where it's like you walk out and there's nothing
- 1:29:18on your notebook paper. Maybe the first time you go
- 1:29:22there is because it's the first time you've seen someone get to
- 1:29:25train someone that ran 10/1 or 10 flat or 99 or 98.
- 1:29:29But after a while, it's like they really just everyone kind
- 1:29:32of does the same thing. And so Tony and I thought, well,
- 1:29:36we both did things differently. Let's try to teach coaches
- 1:29:41different ways of thinking that. Have you guys been friends for a
- 1:29:45while? Yeah.
- 1:29:45We were friends for a while. Yeah, good.
- 1:29:47OK. Sorry, sorry to interrupt you
- 1:29:48there. I just now knowing Tony's
- 1:29:50history and amazing path. I just wondered where like this
- 1:29:54is something newish or? He the year after we got second
- 1:30:02in state at York. So this is 2000, six, 2007, and
- 1:30:10my sprinters ran really well. He wanted to see what we were
- 1:30:15doing, why York suddenly got good sprinters and so he came to
- 1:30:20practice. Yeah.
- 1:30:22And I remember this. He saw us run 23 second runs,
- 1:30:25Yeah, which I invented and asked what we did.
- 1:30:30And I said, you know, we run 10M flies, you know, pretty.
- 1:30:35And then we just kind of developed a friendship from
- 1:30:37there. We both love music.
- 1:30:40We both love books. We both love movies.
- 1:30:42And we thought, you know what we're tired of, You know, we
- 1:30:47both speak in a clinic and it's like, you know, we don't get to
- 1:30:50speak enough, you know, because we have different things to
- 1:30:53share with people. And really, you don't move the
- 1:30:55bar unless you hear other things or other people's ideas.
- 1:30:58And we thought, well, why don't we start this clinic and invite
- 1:31:01a bunch of other people that are kind of out-of-the-box thinkers.
- 1:31:04Yeah. And I forgot what we called it
- 1:31:08at first. The name has changed.
- 1:31:09It's not an official business. There's nothing official about
- 1:31:12it. We don't have, we're not
- 1:31:14incorporated or anything like that.
- 1:31:17And we just started going, and I think this is kind of pre social
- 1:31:21media, it was just based on how well we were both doing that
- 1:31:26people started showing up. And then we started reaching out
- 1:31:29more and more to more people to come speak with different ideas,
- 1:31:33whether they're researchers, you know, strength coaches, you
- 1:31:37know, all these different realms to come in and share ideas with
- 1:31:40people. And then it's kind of turned
- 1:31:41into a community where, yeah, it's expected that you're going
- 1:31:45to hear people that say different things, and that's the
- 1:31:47people are there for. Is it a football clinic?
- 1:31:51Well, we are looking for different ways to improve
- 1:31:54athletes. Instead of waiting for the kid
- 1:31:58once every 10 years, why can't you get one of those kids every
- 1:32:00year? Right.
- 1:32:01Why can't you make seven of those kids?
- 1:32:04So so it's not you're not going to go to the TFC.
- 1:32:07Do you get? Do you call it that for short
- 1:32:09we? We call it TFC.
- 1:32:10So we have, I think what's unique about our the way we do
- 1:32:15it is we have 3 veins. There is a football performance
- 1:32:21vein, there is a strength performance vein and then
- 1:32:26there's a track performance vein.
- 1:32:28So if you wanna hear about why what this team is doing from
- 1:32:32Minnesota that's won three state championships, let's see what
- 1:32:35they're doing. That guy is there.
- 1:32:37And we tell our speakers, hey, this isn't a let's just show you
- 1:32:41what you're doing. You're there to teach, you know,
- 1:32:43don't show me game film over and over again.
- 1:32:46And here's Jimmy Jones again. He's going to Notre Dame.
- 1:32:48Of course Jimmy Jones is going to outrun everyone.
- 1:32:52It's. Going to Notre Dame.
- 1:32:53Notre Dame doesn't recruit slow people.
- 1:32:55But on the football side of it, is it if I go, am I?
- 1:32:59Not X's and O's. OK, that's what I was going to
- 1:33:01say. Am I?
- 1:33:01It's. Performance can I make my
- 1:33:03football team faster because I think everyone knows and would
- 1:33:06agree the faster your football team is, some more games you.
- 1:33:09Want so it's performance based, not the the 3-4 defense, the air
- 1:33:14raid, etcetera. It is about how do I make this
- 1:33:17football player a better receiver as an athlete or.
- 1:33:20How do I put a better team team on the field?
- 1:33:23The first quarter, 15 minutes to go.
- 1:33:25Got it, got it, got it. And so you're using obviously
- 1:33:28football and you're using strength and conditioning and
- 1:33:30track. Yeah.
- 1:33:32Teachings altogether. Got it, Got it.
- 1:33:34So if you want to what can you do rather than a squat to get
- 1:33:38better performance in your sprints, then you would go into
- 1:33:41the performance vein. Or how my training block starts.
- 1:33:44What am I doing to develop Max velocity?
- 1:33:47How am I training steps 3-4 out of my acceleration?
- 1:33:49That would be that vein, right? Are you OK?
- 1:33:52So that's curious because there is an internal war between the
- 1:33:57sports, not necessarily the coaches, the sports of football
- 1:34:00and track. You know, I think most smart
- 1:34:03individuals and forgive me, Chris, if you're against this,
- 1:34:05something tells me you're not. But if you're if you're against
- 1:34:07this, I did not call you not smart by saying that that track
- 1:34:11and football are very complimentary sport.
- 1:34:13Like man, your football player should be doing track and maybe
- 1:34:16vice versa. So this seems very I'm married
- 1:34:21to that like if I'm if I'm yeah, so, but but the the the problem
- 1:34:27is is I feel like the majority of people are no, no, no, you
- 1:34:30should be doing football 365 days.
- 1:34:32That's wrong. Can I?
- 1:34:33I? I agree, but there that is a
- 1:34:35prevailing thought. Oh sure it is and and part of.
- 1:34:37It is like the majority is that is that thought.
- 1:34:40So I think coaches don't like to deal with failure, right?
- 1:34:46So if you have this team and you actually start measuring how
- 1:34:49fast people go electronically and you've been through your
- 1:34:53Husker Power 3000 workout and then you go to run 40s
- 1:34:57electronically, you got slower. That's not good.
- 1:35:01I just wasted my entire thing. So I'm just going to use
- 1:35:06different things like we're building teamwork here, we're
- 1:35:08building our team together, we're working together, we're
- 1:35:10grinding together, doing all these things than non
- 1:35:14measurables so I have a better team.
- 1:35:17And if I can control you year round, I know that you're going
- 1:35:20to be part of our team. Because if you go out for track,
- 1:35:23look at that guy over there. What does he know about speed?
- 1:35:27You know, I'd rather have you here with me and get stronger
- 1:35:29because everyone thinks that you have to be stronger to play
- 1:35:32football. I've been at multiple NFL
- 1:35:34facilities multiple times. It's not what the high school
- 1:35:39coach thinks it is. You're not going to build an NFL
- 1:35:42football player with your, you know, your Husker power of 3000.
- 1:35:47Those are just larger individuals.
- 1:35:50Those are bigger men than your average person.
- 1:35:53Their head is this big. That's not a normal head size,
- 1:35:58right? Right.
- 1:36:00But we we chase in football, we chase what the roster looks
- 1:36:04like. Yeah, yeah, look.
- 1:36:05At it. Look at him across the front,
- 1:36:07Coach. You know, you sit down, you're
- 1:36:08Scott and you get out the program.
- 1:36:10Coach, look at that. They got 7 guys across the front
- 1:36:13270. Yeah, but you only play 5 across
- 1:36:15the front. It doesn't matter.
- 1:36:16They can scum it and they're gonna grind us down and there's
- 1:36:18nothing more humiliating. They can ground down at our home
- 1:36:21field for homecoming. They're gonna say we didn't work
- 1:36:23hard enough. I'm gonna lose my job because
- 1:36:25they're not working hard enough and we need to condition.
- 1:36:28But you know, Coach, we've been conditioning all year.
- 1:36:31Why did they suddenly get out of shape the first day of practice?
- 1:36:33Well, because I said so, Coach, and we're not gonna get out
- 1:36:36work. Nobody's gonna out work US ever.
- 1:36:37In the history of football, we will be the hardest working team
- 1:36:40because that's what I can control.
- 1:36:41Yep, Yep, it is so. If you look at the hit what's
- 1:36:44going on in the NFL right now, there's a guy by the name of
- 1:36:46Thomas Linski. Again, no XS and OS here.
- 1:36:49He used to be the head strength coach for the Jacksonville
- 1:36:51Jaguars. Great coach, great thinker.
- 1:36:57Not a social media guy. He has been doing, he's left
- 1:37:02coaching the NFL and he works for a different company now and
- 1:37:06he is trying to prevent injuries in the NFL, which make or break
- 1:37:09your season for sure, regardless of who you.
- 1:37:11Are yeah, your career? And he talks about ramping.
- 1:37:15He has multiple presentations on our TFC website about ramping.
- 1:37:20But you know, most of the injuries that happened in the
- 1:37:22NFL happened the first couple days of practice because they
- 1:37:25come out and say, we're going to run 50 fly routes.
- 1:37:27We're going to do this and we're going to cry and cry and cry and
- 1:37:30route out of the gate. And you just ground away 1/5 of
- 1:37:33your team. So you've got to move into it.
- 1:37:37You've got to build up to that what you want.
- 1:37:39But everyone thinks they need to be in game shape week 11 week
- 1:37:43before the red and white scrimmage, right?
- 1:37:46And and and we've wrecked our team.
- 1:37:49I've learned from the Paul. Because the Paul Bear Bryant
- 1:37:53Junction boys. And I learned from the the high
- 1:37:57school coach in Arkansas, can't remember what school.
- 1:38:00It's the guy that never punts, never kicks.
- 1:38:04Yeah, I know him. And you know, he's he, I
- 1:38:07remember reading an interview where he's like, man, I've had
- 1:38:09lots of college coaches come by to learn and no one's doing it.
- 1:38:14And what we learned is that it's safer to do what you just
- 1:38:17described there to you. We're going to outwork them.
- 1:38:19We're going to out condition them and lose that way than it
- 1:38:22is to come and try something new and correct.
- 1:38:24And whether you want to say it's mathematically correct or what
- 1:38:28and lose that way, you'll be gone in much faster.
- 1:38:30That's right, because we never do another job.
- 1:38:32We we coach out of fear because all it takes is one parent.
- 1:38:36I played it wherever in college and we didn't do it this way.
- 1:38:42And you know, I see that team walk out there on Friday night
- 1:38:46and they're not in shape at all. What's going on?
- 1:38:48I'm gonna transfer my now you're gonna transfer your kid and
- 1:38:51you're gonna all these different things.
- 1:38:53So the AD by law has to call you in and say, hey, you're getting
- 1:38:57accused of not working hard enough.
- 1:38:59And no teacher wants the parent phone call.
- 1:39:01Nobody wants to go through that and get into it with a parent.
- 1:39:04And we don't know where the parents are coming from or what
- 1:39:06they've actually done or anything, but they might have
- 1:39:08seen it on YouTube or something. Nobody wants that.
- 1:39:12So it's just safer for your career because you love
- 1:39:15coaching. You don't want to lose that job.
- 1:39:16Trust me, I coached. I loved coaching.
- 1:39:19I didn't want to lose that job. Yeah, it's horrible.
- 1:39:23Yeah, it's horrible. So you sometimes coach out of
- 1:39:28fear because it's safe. Yeah, yeah.
- 1:39:30Safer. Safer that way.
- 1:39:31Sad. Yeah, it is.
- 1:39:33It is but. Well I love the full 360 we just
- 1:39:38went on about. We coach out of fear, literally
- 1:39:41is how we opened up today's conversation, man.
- 1:39:44And I don't care how good you are, there's, you're always
- 1:39:46going to get that. You're always going to have
- 1:39:49parents who see it differently and want what's best for their
- 1:39:53kid from their viewpoint rather than they don't see it.
- 1:39:56We're A-Team. We're trying to win team stuff.
- 1:39:59Yeah, you know. Yeah, remember, there's people
- 1:40:02out there that think Nick Saban did it wrong, Bill Belichick did
- 1:40:05it wrong, Mouse Holloway does it wrong.
- 1:40:07You know, there's always someone out there that.
- 1:40:08And The Beatles suck. And The Beatles suck.
- 1:40:10And there's people that hate The Beatles.
- 1:40:12That's exactly right, Chris. I don't hate you, man.
- 1:40:15I love you, brother. I am so glad we got to do this.
- 1:40:18Thanks for having me on. You know, behind the curtains
- 1:40:20guys, when I reached out to Chris and you know, Tony, I know
- 1:40:23you're listening. So you'll, you'll get a kick out
- 1:40:25of this if he hasn't already told you.
- 1:40:26I must have just had Tony holler on the brain because I, I
- 1:40:29connected these two. I knew they in my head, they
- 1:40:31were connected. And so I emailed Chris and I
- 1:40:32said, hey, Tony would love to have you on the podcast.
- 1:40:37Chris replied back like, you probably are trying to talk to
- 1:40:39Tony Holler. And I just replied back, Nope,
- 1:40:41I'm just an idiot. Your name is Chris, not Tony.
- 1:40:43So I don't think I'll make that mistake again.
- 1:40:46So I'm super glad, man, super happy to have gotten to known
- 1:40:49you a little bit better today to to learn and.
- 1:40:51Now it's fun. For your journey, a really
- 1:40:54unique journey. I mean, I love this.
- 1:40:56I love the staying in high school, I love staying in
- 1:40:58Chicago, and my first coaching job was at De La Salle in the
- 1:41:00Catholic League. And so I have a real passion and
- 1:41:03love for the Chicagoland culture of track and field.
- 1:41:07It really is amazing. It's intense.
- 1:41:08It's it's unique. It's we get good crowds.
- 1:41:11If the weather is nice, we get good crowds and it's intense.
- 1:41:15Yeah, I, I just remember, you know, that was my first coaching
- 1:41:18job. And I remember just people just
- 1:41:20reaching out to pour into me like no one turned me down.
- 1:41:23And we were all the biggest competitors.
- 1:41:24You know, one of the people I think about the most is Ed Adams
- 1:41:26at Leo was one of the first people that, yeah, gave me a
- 1:41:29ride home from the Catholic League meetings and stuff.
- 1:41:31I mean just. Wonderful human being.
- 1:41:33Wonderful human. Many coaches there was.
- 1:41:35With incredible amount of success, of course.
- 1:41:38Yeah, big time. Exactly.
- 1:41:39In fact, I think Tony said that's what kind of set him on
- 1:41:42his journey. Ed Leo would whoop their butt
- 1:41:45and he was like, something's got to change.
- 1:41:46Very similar to you. He was like, man, something's
- 1:41:47got to change. And I think that's a real key
- 1:41:49aspect to your story. Tony's and others as well.
- 1:41:52And I think we can really grow from that when we take a step
- 1:41:54back and go something's not working.
- 1:41:57If something's not working for you, other many of coaches
- 1:41:59things are working for you that it's not maybe the same things
- 1:42:03we tell our kids to not point fingers and point thumbs
- 1:42:06instead, instead of saying, well, it's the kids, it's this,
- 1:42:09I don't have a facility, blah, blah, blah.
- 1:42:10Maybe it's just you got to do some tweaking with how you're
- 1:42:13actually coaching them and, and sometimes it's not the XS and OS
- 1:42:16by the way, it is culture, how you treat kids, what you, what
- 1:42:21the end goal is for practice meets, the season, etcetera.
- 1:42:24So one way to think of it is a kid didn't do it, probably
- 1:42:27because it wasn't communicated clearly what the end game was.
- 1:42:30That's right. That's a great what what we're.
- 1:42:32Trying to do here. That's a great.
- 1:42:34Very rarely when you run track and field, you go out there and,
- 1:42:36and do poorly because you want to do poorly, right?
- 1:42:40That that's high, intense. You're lined up against seven
- 1:42:43other guys on a line and everyone's watching.
- 1:42:46That's a great point. I love it, Chris, man.
- 1:42:48Thank you so much, man. I am just thank you.
- 1:42:50I appreciate your time. The most expensive thing you can
- 1:42:52give me is your time, man. So I'm really grateful for that.
- 1:42:54Retired now, so I got lots. Well, I learned that's not true.
- 1:42:58Guys and gals, thank you so much for being here.
- 1:43:00Man. I just, I really enjoy this.
- 1:43:01This is one of those episodes where, you know, I didn't know
- 1:43:04Chris at all. Like I said, I called him the
- 1:43:06wrong name for crying out loud. But I'd heard a lot about him.
- 1:43:09Someone reached out and nominated him, and that means
- 1:43:11the world to me. If someone else thinks highly of
- 1:43:13him, I know there's a lots of other people that think highly
- 1:43:15of him. And I love the servant
- 1:43:17leadership of the the track and field consortium.
- 1:43:21I'm sorry, the track and football Consortium, the RPR
- 1:43:24stuff, that's all that's him giving.
- 1:43:25You know, he, he was given, people poured into him and this
- 1:43:28is him his way of reaching out and giving to others.
- 1:43:31And I think that's that's to be celebrated.
- 1:43:33So if you are interested in those things, check them out.
- 1:43:35He's also very prolific. You'll see him on other
- 1:43:38podcasts, writing articles, clinics, etcetera.
- 1:43:41Show up and introduce yourself and I think you'll be better for
- 1:43:43it. So thanks again for being here
- 1:43:44today. Join us next week.
- 1:43:46Do it all over again. Thanks guys.
- 1:43:48If it goes to appreciate the coach the ones that pour people
- 1:43:51most every season needs a voice of reason speaking the growth
- 1:43:54you got to prep before you carry the load ice coffee to the soul.
- 1:43:58For those of us who stay on the go proper handoff to stay in the
- 1:44:01zone which you packing for the road.
- 1:44:03There's more than one way to go taking dose that's paying.
- 1:44:05You're told it ain't practice, it's your purpose.
- 1:44:07Saint Clair. It can't happen until you listen
- 1:44:09with both is you can't mentor without a mentor of experience.
- 1:44:14You can reinvent those years Every plan's got to stand and
- 1:44:17deliver to and the price sacrifice can you give up you.
- 1:44:20It's a choice and a fight, not a win or lose.
- 1:44:22It's not a ploy boy device. Y'all can make more moves.
- 1:44:25It's not about how to, it's all about why you don't know till
- 1:44:28you know who you are inside 6,000,000.
- 1:44:31Waste of time, choose none. So y'all cross finish line.
- 1:44:34The work ain't done so we learn from the experts but y'all got
- 1:44:37to put in the network. Your athletics is the network.
- 1:44:40It's all about connections put together for the profession to
- 1:44:43where every track coach could be blessing.