Latest / The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast / #169: Gill1918 Presents Guy Thomas-Rekortan (Rekortan Penn Relays Speaker Series)

Transcript

#169: Gill1918 Presents Guy Thomas-Rekortan (Rekortan Penn Relays Speaker Series) · The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast

• 0:00
  Hey Yang, welcome back here to the Gil 1918 project special
• 0:03
  series here. Got a few kind of short clips
• 0:06
  coming up over the next few days, few weeks.
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  The great team over at record Tan surfacing shout out to Tim
• 0:13
  Jordan and Mary Beth Price. They put on a speakers series, a
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  coaches speaker series at the Penn Relays this year 2026.
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  And you know me, if there's any value to bring to coaches, I
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  want to bring to all of you here listening on the Gil Connections
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  podcast. So we've got all of the speakers
• 0:30
  and we've chopped them up to where their individuals will
• 0:32
  have their individual episodes. Again, grateful for record Tan.
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  Go check them out. You know how to Google.
• 0:37
  So go check out Record Tan servicing.
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  And I hope you enjoy the Gill 1918 project.
• 0:42
  Welcome to the Gill 1918 project, a podcast series by
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  coaches for coaches powered by Gill Athletics.
• 0:48
  Think of this as the Ted talks of track and field coaching.
• 0:51
  Short, insightful and packed with valuable strategies to help
• 0:54
  you grow as a coach. We're bringing the once a year
• 0:56
  track clinic straight to your ears daily.
• 0:59
  Interested in creating your own episode?
• 1:01
  Everyone's welcome to participate.
• 1:02
  Check out the show notes below For more information.
• 1:05
  Now let's get into today's topic.
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  Our last speaker for the day is a gentleman that is been in the
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  industry for quite a period of time has seen a lot of the
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  evolution of the track industry both from a construction
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  standpoint, a product development standpoint, as well
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  as just different brands that have come in and out of the of
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  the Track World here over the recent decades.
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  Guy Thomas is our Senior Director of Technical Support
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  for APT and Record Tan. APT being Advanced Polymer
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  Technologies who was the manufacturer of our track
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  systems in Pennsylvania, great organization that you should be
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  familiar with as well. Guy's going to talk a little bit
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  about track systems as well as answer any questions you might
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  have concerning tracks and things.
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  When I came on board here with Record Tan in 2023, coming from
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  the the athletic surfacing of turf, I didn't know much about
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  tracks. And for the grace of God, Guy
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  Thomas took me under his wing and it's taught me so much.
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  Big mentor to me and I'm grateful for his for his time
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  and the knowledge that he shared with me has been phenomenal.
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  I'm still learning everyday from the guy.
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  So, without further ado, Guy Thomas.
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  Thanks, Tim. Good afternoon, everybody.
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  Appreciate you coming to this record and discussion,
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  especially speaking about gel tracks.
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  So again, my name's Guy Thomas. I'm the global technical
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  director for Advanced Polymer. We're the company that actually
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  makes the materials that make up this this gel stuff and it's
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  really cool. Want to be able to give you a
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  little bit of history on that. I can tell you from the global
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  role sounds kind of, you know, interesting, impressive.
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  All that really means is I get a lot of calls all hours of the
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  day. So as Tim said, industry
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  veterans, so some of the old timers here, you may go back to
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  the three M Parton days. That was my learning grounds on
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  the polyurethanes. It's an interesting industry and
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  for all of us that are in the track business, what you really
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  have to understand historically, and we all started, you know,
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  working, you know, running on soil, grass.
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  It really wasn't until cinders came out that we started to look
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  at it as an all weather track and cinders were actually used
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  all the way up to the 64 Olympic Games.
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  It wasn't until the Mexico Games in 68 that the three M tartan
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  track was installed. So that was actually the very
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  first synthetic track used in that marketplace.
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  Since 68 urethane tracts have been developed in a lot of
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  different aspects of the different systems and we can go
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  through it a little briefly. You basically have three basic
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  systems in the marketplace. You have a base mat, structural
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  spray, a pore system. You have a sandwich, an industry
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  term. So you have a base layer and
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  then you have the top layer on top of that and then you have a
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  full pore. The full pore is consider the
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  top of the line system. When you look at the the
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  systems, they basically go from good, better, best in budget and
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  performance and durability. The top of the line systems are
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  the full core systems. That leads us into the gel
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  system here today. The gel was developed from a
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  chemical standpoint about 10 years ago.
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  Our first track was Du Page College, and from there we work
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  to develop it further. The uniqueness about the gel is
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  that, well, let me let me just read exactly what a gel is
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  because it's kind of technical there.
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  I will encumber here. It's technical, but it's an
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  interesting take. A gel is a material that
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  occupies a unique space between a solid and a liquid, exhibiting
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  the properties of both. It's a coherent mass that
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  consisting of a liquid and particles too small.
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  Think nanotechnology that can actually be seen by a
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  microscope. So we're actually taking those
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  type of chemicals and combining it with a track system to create
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  world class tracks. And so as a tech guy, in trying
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  to maybe not geek out and talk about all those types of things,
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  I tried to think what other technology or what other example
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  can I make that'll make sense? So I would assume everybody here
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  buys cars, they buy trucks, and you're like, well, I'm not sure
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  where he's going with this. So when you buy one of those
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  things, you're typically looking at it like, you know, what's the
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  brand, what's the color, you know, what's the make, what's
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  the model, what's the history. So you look at that kind of
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  thought process and you try to lay that over on a track.
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  So now what we're going to say is anytime you're looking to
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  even buy any one of those vehicles, you may say, hey, I
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  really stuck on the brand. But let's face it, guys, every
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  time you buy the vehicle, what's important, you want to look
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  under the hood, right? You want to see what's under
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  there, What's, what's making this thing go?
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  Why is it fast? So what we're talking about
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  today on the gel is we want you guys to understand that as the
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  track is constructed, we want you to look under the hood.
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  So in this case, I'm peeling the top layer of this track system
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  off, and that's what this gel is.
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  This is the driving thing that makes these tracks work and give
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  you the performance. What's unique about this, even
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  while I'm I'm going to talk about the gel, is this top
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  layer. Again, we're looking under the
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  hood to the gel, but this top layer is unique in its own
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  properties. This material was used as an
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  overlay on the Jamaican track last year, and just by putting
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  this Wrecker tan overlay on that old track, Thompson ran the 7th
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  fastest 100 meters in record. So when you start looking at the
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  ability of the gel to give all the properties on that track and
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  overlay it with a top layer to give it that performance, we're
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  giving you the best of the both worlds there.
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  So what we're trying to tell the people here today is to take the
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  time to look at the benefits of that gel.
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  The the main benefit of this system in this gel is from an
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  athletic standpoint. Your athletes can go out and run
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  on this track and train very hard.
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  You're spending 90% plus time from a training aspect versus a
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  meet aspect, and yet you can have those athletes train on
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  that track long and hard and they can recover from it.
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  And the important thing is with that meat, when that gun goes
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  off, you're going to be able to get world class times on these
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  tracks. So again, I guess what we're
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  trying to say here today for you guys, and I'm not a sales guy,
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  but you know what I want to tell you guys, over the years I've
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  installed a lot of these tracks and I'm telling you that this
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  track as all those unique characteristics, they're going
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  to give you the best combination of a training track and a
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  performance track. So any questions on that?
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  It holds up well to the public use.
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  So again, going to my physical sample here, that top layer has
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  a holds the APDM granules in for the surface.
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  It gives you your final color, your texture and your
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  wearability. So it holds up very well long
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  term. Hey gang, Mike Cunningham here.
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  Hey, I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Guild 1918
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  Project series. It's really my mission, my
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  passion to bring you massive amounts of value and I hope this
• 9:30
  one hit the mark. The Gill 1918 Project is really
• 9:35
  dependent on you if for you to build your own episode, to hear
• 9:38
  your voice, to have your voice heard you have something to say
• 9:42
  and teach other coaches out there.
• 9:44
  So please get a hold of me, e-mail, text message, Twitter,
• 9:49
  smoke signals, get a hold of me and let's help create your
• 9:52
  episode of the Gill 1918 Project.
• 9:54
  Hope you enjoy the day, they will see you tomorrow.