Latest / The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast / #246: Danny McCray-Private Coaching Tutor #APXP

Transcript

#246: Danny McCray-Private Coaching Tutor #APXP · The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast

• 0:00
  During the high school season, I am a track and field tutor.
• 0:04
  I am not your coach, I said in the same.
• 0:07
  Way during the During the high school season.
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  During the high school season. You consider yourself more as a
• 0:12
  tutor, correct? Explain more that that's that's
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  intro. I've never heard that before.
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  Tell me more about that. So when I was going back and
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  forth, I couldn't really understand why it was so hard to
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  partner with so many different coaches.
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  And I would. And and just being empathetic to
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  them. If I'm a high school coach, I
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  got 60 kids on the team. They could be from a number of
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  different private coaches, club coaches.
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  I can't sit there and talk to 60 different private and club
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  coaches if I'm the high school coach.
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  And then vice versa if I'm the club coach, I may have 30
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  athletes. I can't go all the ways back and
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  work tightly with 30 different coaches in the sort of time on
• 0:50
  the phone. So how do we kind of come up
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  with a? How do we kind of come up with a
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  system that can kind of work and coincide with each other?
• 1:07
  Track and Field World UNL tuned in to our humble servant Mike
• 1:11
  Cunningham for another extraordinary message on Gil
• 1:15
  Athletics connections. All right, here we go.
• 1:31
  Back season five of the Guild Athletics Connections podcast.
• 1:35
  I am so humbled to be your host National Business Development
• 1:37
  Manager for Gale Athletics, Mike Cunningham.
• 1:40
  As always, you can reach me because I live there still
• 1:42
  today, even on season 5I still live on Twitter.
• 1:45
  So if you want to reach out to me, it's at Mike Cunningham over
• 1:47
  on Twitter. Now let's get to today's
• 1:50
  episode. You know, people.
• 1:54
  Get on to the podcast in a lot of different ways.
• 1:57
  This one is this is one of the unique ways.
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  I guess I actually don't know today's guest at all.
• 2:03
  The first like communication we've had is literally the 5
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  minutes before we hit record here.
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  Besides some emails to schedule the actual podcast here, I have
• 2:13
  just been following this guy on Twitter and Facebook for a while
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  now and just thought. Sounds like a kind of a cool
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  dude to be real frank with you. He's got some you know from from
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  social media. I know he's got some history in
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  track and I know he coaches and things like that.
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  But we're going to learn more today so help me welcome from
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  You know he's not even from anywhere That's the crazy part
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  from Texas. We're going to learn more where
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  I didn't even ask where in Texas but I know he's in Texas.
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  Help me welcome the wise the wonderful Mr. Danny Mccrae.
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  Danny, how are you Sir? I am doing well, Mike.
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  Thanks for having me. Where where are you in Texas?
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  I never did ask. I'm actually in Houston, TX.
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  OK. I was going to guess that, but I
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  as soon as I said Houston, though, you were like, no, I'm
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  from Dallas, man, or whatever, you know?
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  I know, but I grew up in Killeen.
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  Is that right? OK, shout out to Killeen, the
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  home and then we eventually moved and settled in in Houston.
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  Well, it's partly by accident, but partly also not by accident
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  that I'm. I'm representing my Texas.
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  I got my TTFCA shirt on today, man.
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  I'm, I love Texas coaches. I love TTFCA&THSCA.
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  We do a lot with those organizations.
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  So you know, any Texas coaches always welcome here on on this
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  podcast my friend. Thank you.
• 3:21
  Danny, let's learn more about you.
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  Let's start with let's, let's get back in our way back machine
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  here and let's. I start with where does track
• 3:31
  begin for you? Let's just start there.
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  Oh wow. Track began for me in 8th grade.
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  I remember being in junior high, trying track and field for the
• 3:43
  very first time. Had no idea that I could run.
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  I was actually a high jumper just fiddling around in junior
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  high track. Didn't know anything, didn't
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  know any better, just try to find an event to compete in.
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  Then one day at the district track meet, having never ran
• 3:58
  before, someone went down on the infamous four by four and they
• 4:02
  needed a leg and they were looking around for somebody.
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  You hear all the jokes about it. They were looking around for
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  somebody to run the four by four and the guy doing the high jump
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  say hey, I'll do it and then we go run the four by four.
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  And I remember getting the stick I was on anchor leg and I'm so
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  old that that was the day where they still have the gun lap for
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  the four by four. And so and so I remember I
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  remember getting the baton in second place here in the gun
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  lap, but the pistol go off. I'm walking off the track, I'm
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  in lane 8 and I'm hearing all these people yelling at me and I
• 4:42
  don't know why anyone's yelling at me.
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  And my junior high coach hops over the fence and he's yelling
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  at me run, run, run. And so I turn around from lane 8
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  and I start running. And by this time, the anchor leg
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  for the team ahead of me was probably about 120 meters around
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  the track. And I caught him by about 2:50
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  and then finished. And then literally, it was at
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  that very moment that myself and anyone else around me figured
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  out, oh, we found a hidden talent and a hidden gem would
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  have never known before that day.
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  That was my introduction to track and field now.
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  How did that go down after the 401st meter?
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  And what I mean by that is the 400 Hertz you weren't training.
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  In fact, you might have been the one event that is like the least
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  farthest away from training for the quarter by jumping for 10
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  steps and jump. Here we are taking lots of
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  steps, 400 meters when you cross that finish line.
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  Elation cuz you won, That's cool elation because people were like
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  holy crap where did that come from?
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  That's a high jumper pain. You know the booty lock, the the
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  the bear jumping on your back. What was it like after you got
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  done with that leg? Honestly, I never experienced
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  any lactic acid in that race, and that was only because I was
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  so scared. I mean, I was, I literally was
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  terrified because my junior high coach was yelling at me and
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  everybody in the stands was just yelling at me.
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  And so it's just that fear combined with adrenaline that by
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  the time you get through a duration, you're ecstatic,
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  you're elated, you don't even know what's going on.
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  And it just so happened at the At that time, the high school
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  coaches were at the meet at the same time, like, oh, we can't
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  wait for you to come up here next year.
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  So you have all these things rushing through and you don't
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  even have time to feel tired. I didn't even feel tired at that
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  point in time. And literally my life changed in
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  that moment because that's also when I met my first summer track
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  coach, Billy Spiller senior, who then introduced me to AAU track.
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  And so that was my first time then actually sprinting and it
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  was that summer. And and I tell you, it literally
• 6:54
  changed my life that day in that moment.
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  Were you a sprinter from now on? Like, no more high jumping or
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  yeah, no, no more high jumping. Let me let me first also go
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  backwards. I was a terrible high jumper.
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  So this was this was just more or less let's find a body.
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  Hey, can he can he clear one height and we'll we'll go ahead
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  and we'll put him in the meet. So I was a terrible high jumper,
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  terrible high jumper. And then it was in the
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  summertime when coach Spiller had me running for the CT
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  cruiser, shout out to the CT cruisers.
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  That's when I got the opportunity to run this the one,
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  the two and the four. And and that that summer they
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  were having the AAU during Olympics in Kansas and I had
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  qualified 1-2 and four and then went to the meet and then found
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  out at the JOSI wasn't able to run.
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  The reason why I wasn't able to run is I was in the wrong age
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  division. I was 14 but I was running in
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  the 1516 age division and when you you can't run up in age.
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  So when I got to the meet, I literally had to go to my first
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  AAU Junior Olympics and just sit and watch it.
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  You. Is that still true today?
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  You can't run up. You cannot run up.
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  It makes complete sense that you can't run down.
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  I don't know that I understand at all that it doesn't make
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  sense to run up. Yep, because you have to qualify
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  in your age division. And so when they have the
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  qualifying rounds that start district and then regionals and
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  then JOSI had missed the district and regionals for the
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  14 year olds so they couldn't move me down to my age group
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  even though I made it in the 1516 year old age division.
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  You know, in that age group, that's a pretty precocious age,
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  right? And there's a lot of things that
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  feel very completely unfair. And you know, you think about
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  when you're that age, Think about when I was that age.
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  And there's things that just, you know, it's life and you know
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  that what you're describing there is just life.
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  Mistakes happen and we move on. But as a 131415 year old, it
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  feels like the end of the world. Did that just devastate you?
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  I mean, I can't imagine going to a track meet and just watching
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  when I'm supposed to be competing.
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  It was very hard, but I was so new, I really didn't know any
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  better. All right.
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  I I still remember taking a picture with Rodger Kingdom and
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  I remember, you know, taking a picture with these great
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  athletes that I was just happy to be there at that point.
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  So even though it didn't work out that summer, I was like, OK,
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  you know what, we'll try it again next year.
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  And it was, again, this started middle school track season, mark
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  might end in March and then now we're doing summer track in
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  June. So it was just a very short time
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  period. I didn't even know what I was
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  missing because I hadn't been competing that long.
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  So you said a very strong statement that that race, that
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  4x4 changed your life. It didn't.
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  Tell me more about that as a as it relates to the high school
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  side of it now. So I ran that race and again, I
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  I had no idea that I can run because I didn't start playing
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  organized sports until eighth grade.
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  So I was that that typical kid that didn't have all of the
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  youth sports, private trainers, you know, AAU basketball.
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  I was that kid just played around the neighborhood and that
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  we had the first opportunity to play organized sports was middle
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  school. In 7th grade I got in some
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  trouble, so I didn't even get a chance to participate 7th grade
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  athletics. So then eighth grade for me was
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  just wide open. First, new experiences.
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  So then that race allowed me to then realize, oh, OK, I can run.
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  Well, the thing that's that's different about why summer track
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  is so important, it's because it gave me the opportunity to
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  realize what existed beyond my neighborhood.
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  I only knew running up and down the street.
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  It wasn't until now you start competing against kids across
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  the country that you're like, oh, I'm pretty fast.
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  I didn't know I was this fast. And then that then opens the
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  door when you go to high school, lot greater confidence.
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  Now you know and you going to school year and you decide I'm
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  running track now and at that point in time I was a 100 and
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  200 meter sprinter, wasn't even a quarter Miller and you know I
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  was constantly winning races performing well.
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  And then my freshman year of high school there were two
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  seniors that missed the bus on a varsity track meet that they had
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  pulled me up from the freshman team to the varsity team just to
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  go to run a four by two. And I remember being on the bus
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  that day and the coach said I'm looking for some people to run
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  the quarter at this meet. And unbeknownst to me, the coach
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  was behind me and I remember saying to my friends I am not
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  running a 400 and he was standing behind me and coach
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  Malone says, hey, I have found the person that's going to run
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  the 400 at this meet. There's a There's a lesson
• 12:00
  there. Keep your mouth shut.
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  Yes, keep your mouth shut, keep your.
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  If I'd have just toiled in obscurity and and just hit
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  amongst other people, I would have not been in that moment
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  that day. But I also would not have the
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  opportunity to go run. And literally the first time I'd
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  ever run 1/4, I was getting 14 freshman varsity team, First
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  time I had them in the open 400, first time I ever ran it 49.
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  Nine was my first time. And so I'm like, OK, and I
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  didn't even realize that that was pretty good.
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  At that time, I was just at the track meet running 1/4.
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  I don't know if there's an old rapper named Flavor Flav.
• 12:43
  You say that like we don't know who that is.
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  Come on, man. Listen, I don't know who could
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  be listening, you know. I don't want to age myself too
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  much, but they're, you know. Growing up, well, first of all,
• 12:52
  you said he was an old rapper, which I'm like, that's what I
• 12:55
  grew up on. So you automatically age
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  yourself and me, by the way. And by the way, hold on.
• 13:00
  So in the magic world of podcasting, you know, you're
• 13:03
  actually listening to this in 2024, but we're actually
• 13:05
  recording this in 2023. Did you see 'cause you brought
• 13:08
  him up? So I have to talk about it now.
• 13:10
  Did you see where he sang the national anthem?
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  Oh, it was terrible, No. No, it was terrible.
• 13:15
  Listen, you know what? No, let me take that back.
• 13:17
  Let me take that back. Hey, considering that he is not
• 13:21
  a singer, let let me look it through a different lens.
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  Exactly. He actually he actually carried
• 13:26
  was. Not bad, yeah.
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  I thought it was. I only pressed play well.
• 13:31
  Two reasons because it's flavor flavor.
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  But also I was like, oh, this is going to be.
• 13:35
  A train wreck like this, come on.
• 13:38
  Singing the national anthem. Terrible.
• 13:41
  And it's like, oh, man, he like he, he didn't flub any words.
• 13:44
  He stayed on time. Now, the only disappointment I
• 13:47
  had was he did not end the song with his flavor.
• 13:51
  Yeah, there was nothing. He just ended it like he was
• 13:53
  supposed to. And I was like, well, that's a
• 13:54
  little disappointing flavor, flavor.
• 13:55
  I wish you'd give him a little bit of flavor for that at the
• 13:58
  end. But yeah.
• 13:58
  OK, All right. You brought him up.
• 14:00
  So I had to. I know.
• 14:01
  I was very proud of him that he did not.
• 14:03
  Yes, you're right. You're right.
• 14:04
  That's why I had to retract my statement.
• 14:06
  Yes, I had to retract it. All right.
• 14:08
  All right, now give us your actual flavor flav story.
• 14:10
  OK, so do you. So if you know him and you
• 14:13
  watched him perform, you know how with his hands all tight.
• 14:17
  That is literally what I look like.
• 14:19
  The last 100 meters of my foreigner today.
• 14:22
  Absolutely no arm movement. They were locked in the chest.
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  You asked me earlier about lactic acid.
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  Well, I felt it there for the very first time.
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  That's when I realized. What the Cord was really about,
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  that feels like that's what that feels like, all right.
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  And then and then that that literally changed my life.
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  Because at that point in time, that's when the coach decided to
• 14:44
  leave me on varsity as a freshman.
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  Say, hey, you know, we're just going to, we're going to stay
• 14:48
  here for the whole season. And I remember at the time I had
• 14:53
  also picked up the long jump. But when I ran 49 in the
• 14:57
  quarter, I remember the next week in practice, the varsity
• 15:00
  coach walks out to the jumps coach and walks over saying
• 15:04
  McRae will never long jump again.
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  Hey, let's get him out the pit. We're going over to the track.
• 15:09
  Do you so kind of interjecting a current Danny Mccrae into the
• 15:13
  past Danny Mccrae, because now you know one of the things that
• 15:15
  we have today that we didn't have that day right there the
• 15:18
  next day at practice and they're like, hey, Danny, you never
• 15:20
  launch them again your quarter mile or sprinter, right.
• 15:23
  But today we have perspective. We have that hindsight's 2020
• 15:27
  and we're going to learn more about your coaching, your
• 15:29
  athletic and your coaching experience.
• 15:31
  But do you, I'm just curious about that.
• 15:33
  Do you think that was a mistake? And I'm not saying, you know,
• 15:37
  you know how your career went out.
• 15:38
  So it's easy to say no because I did X&Y&Z.
• 15:41
  I'm talking about when we find a kid that has that hidden talent,
• 15:43
  We didn't know they could be a hurdler.
• 15:44
  We didn't know they could be a long jumper.
• 15:45
  We didn't know they could be a sprinter.
• 15:47
  And so we automatically say, hey, stop developing them in the
• 15:50
  long jump, just stay over there. Do you agree with that?
• 15:54
  Do you think they should have kept you training as a long
• 15:56
  jumper as well? I'm just curious about that.
• 15:59
  So it's hard for me to look back at that day and say that he was
• 16:02
  wrong because I understood why he did it.
• 16:04
  Probably about a week before that happened, one of the best
• 16:08
  lawn jumpers on our team blew his knee out at practice going
• 16:12
  into the pit. So I know that my coach at that
• 16:15
  time had a heightened sense of awareness when it came to that
• 16:18
  injury. He was definitely concerned.
• 16:21
  He was gun shy because of what happened to Pete the week
• 16:25
  before. So then he walked to me and I
• 16:28
  understood at the time. But again, I was 15 now, so.
• 16:34
  I'm the host, so I get to ask these crazy questions and I
• 16:37
  caveat this with there is no bigger fan of track coaches.
• 16:40
  So even that your coach back then, I love him to death for
• 16:44
  what he does and what he did. The impact he made on on young
• 16:47
  people is immensely important. But what you just described
• 16:51
  there was he, I'm a Satan. Very layman.
• 16:55
  Very. Not so PC terms.
• 16:58
  He didn't care about you in the long jump getting hurt until you
• 17:02
  ran 49 point. Then he was very concerned.
• 17:05
  Yeah. OK.
• 17:06
  Didn't think about it. You're right.
• 17:07
  Good perspective. Yes.
• 17:08
  Good. Yes.
• 17:09
  I know that wasn't his. I know he did not say hey on
• 17:11
  Thursday, I didn't really care about Danny, but then he ran
• 17:14
  fast on Friday. So Monday I really care about
• 17:16
  that. I know that's not the
• 17:17
  perspective. I'm just always curious about
• 17:19
  when we especially at a young age here as a freshman that's
• 17:22
  still extremely young that we take them away from multi events
• 17:25
  when I think. Multi events is very good for
• 17:28
  your development. That's where I say and and I'm
• 17:29
  not saying mistake in regards like coach was wrong, I'm just
• 17:31
  saying like now if you look back it's like oh maybe you've been
• 17:33
  even more athletic or more athletic quicker if you'd have
• 17:36
  kept doing long jump and type activities.
• 17:39
  Anyway, I digress. I digress.
• 17:40
  So you're a sprinter now, though?
• 17:42
  Yep. Sprint it out, Sprint it out.
• 17:44
  Until that day. And that's when I became pretty
• 17:47
  much a quarter Miller. Ah.
• 17:48
  So now you're quarter Miller. OK.
• 17:50
  And I was your quarter Miller and you know back in those days
• 17:54
  we didn't, I don't think high school coaches understood the
• 17:57
  value of off events, right, how the two and the one go to the
• 18:03
  four, all right. It was just you ran 2 relays and
• 18:08
  your main individual event. That was your schedule for the
• 18:11
  week, every single week. And it wasn't until the
• 18:14
  summertime that I had the opportunity to run the one and
• 18:18
  run the two. So I went back to the 1-2 and
• 18:21
  the four in the summertime and then occasionally run a relay
• 18:26
  depending on what meet we were at.
• 18:28
  Did you run your whole high school career running high
• 18:31
  school track and also then doing summer track?
• 18:34
  Yes. How did that go, 'cause we're
• 18:36
  going to get into that probably fairly throughout today's
• 18:39
  podcast. I think 'cause I know Danny has
• 18:41
  a a very nuanced understanding and and way he activates his
• 18:47
  summer coaching and I'm very intimately involved with high
• 18:51
  school coaches. And so I'd like to have that
• 18:53
  discussion because it seems to be a discussion that comes up
• 18:56
  every year and there is a lot of.
• 18:58
  Fighting, for lack of a better term.
• 19:00
  So, so did you run your all four years doing both, all four
• 19:03
  years, all four years? How did that go?
• 19:06
  Not how did it go? Like you know were you
• 19:08
  successful? How did it go like do you
• 19:10
  remember communication between high school coach and summer
• 19:13
  coach conflicts or Nope, they worked in together or you know
• 19:17
  what it actually was two totally different things.
• 19:19
  They didn't even they didn't talk to each other not because
• 19:22
  they were anti each other. They just it was like Oh no, I
• 19:25
  ran in high school until. May 15th or whatever.
• 19:27
  And then I went summer. How?
• 19:28
  How did that experience go through high school?
• 19:30
  More. More of the latter, right?
• 19:32
  It literally was just that. Now there's no more summer
• 19:36
  track. It's club track.
• 19:38
  But when I came through, it was strictly summer track you.
• 19:42
  I played football in the fall. I ran high school track in the
• 19:46
  spring. After the very last meet of high
• 19:49
  school track, high school season was over.
• 19:52
  High school coach went on his way and then we eventually went
• 19:55
  to our summer track coach and we didn't really have meets outside
• 19:59
  of June, July, August and then by the time you finished the
• 20:04
  Junior Olympics in August, it was time to go to two a days
• 20:07
  back in football. So there was always a very clear
• 20:10
  distinction. Between what went on in high
• 20:13
  school and what went on outside. And I'm a huge proponent of
• 20:16
  communication and I believe those two entities should be
• 20:19
  communicating together throughout the year as
• 20:22
  appropriate. But now I'm kind of wondering
• 20:24
  hearing you describe that and I know it's different today and
• 20:27
  let's not necessarily talk about today, but because we'll we'll
• 20:30
  get to today, right. But in that scenario, I think
• 20:34
  what what was wrong with that? That was pretty clear.
• 20:38
  Hey, we're in track and field season.
• 20:40
  Not saying this meanly, but don't talk to me.
• 20:42
  I'm doing I'm a high school coach.
• 20:43
  High school teacher. Let me coach my kids and then as
• 20:45
  soon as state meet or regional or whatever.
• 20:47
  You know however far you make it all right if you if you, Danny,
• 20:50
  want to go run summer track, great.
• 20:51
  I'm not going to speak into it. Whatever that you you and your
• 20:54
  parents choose that coach so have had it.
• 20:56
  What's wrong with that? So at the time, obviously
• 21:00
  nothing. I think it worked out well for
• 21:02
  me, but in that time period, there was a lot less information
• 21:08
  that was available. The skill, the overall skill of
• 21:11
  the athlete wasn't as high as it is today.
• 21:14
  And so that that came as a result of more time, right?
• 21:21
  So then as you had more time, more knowledge, more skill base,
• 21:25
  one of the things I always appreciated about my high school
• 21:27
  coach, it's by the time my freshman year it ended, I ran
• 21:31
  4710 in the quarter about that year and I remember my high
• 21:37
  school coach saying, hey, I don't know what to do with you.
• 21:42
  Oh, hey, hold on. That's huge.
• 21:45
  I don't know. Is like a superpower band.
• 21:47
  Like you know how much trust you garner when you tell someone I
• 21:50
  don't know instead of BSN? That's bravo to that coach.
• 21:54
  Hey, man, I see. I didn't know I could make Bill
• 21:56
  47. Yeah, Ghost Bill Farley was the
• 21:59
  man he was. He meant a lot to me.
• 22:02
  He was, he was my calculus teacher and at the same time he
• 22:06
  was also my track coach. And he could say he's, I
• 22:08
  remember him saying I don't know what to do with you.
• 22:11
  So the best thing that I know to do is to try to connect you with
• 22:15
  people who know what to do with you.
• 22:17
  And I remember him talking to my dad, and that was the first time
• 22:20
  I got the opportunity to go to a track and field summer camp at
• 22:24
  the University of Houston. And that's when I first met
• 22:26
  Coach Chalez. That's when I first met, you
• 22:29
  know, at the time, Carl Lewis and Leroy Bra, when they were
• 22:32
  still competing. And I got a chance to go down
• 22:34
  there and learn from them and then learn different drills to
• 22:38
  do at that time. I'd always kept having hamstring
• 22:40
  problems. Now all of a sudden, Coach
• 22:42
  Chalez is showing me different things to do to strengthen my
• 22:45
  hamstring, All right. We were able to take this
• 22:48
  information back to my high school coach.
• 22:50
  My high school coach was also the offensive line coach on the
• 22:55
  football team, all right, But he was a West Point grad, super
• 22:58
  smart, and he just tried to work to figure things out, all right?
• 23:04
  And so he was the 2nd Sprint coach.
• 23:06
  I can't forget about Coach Malone, you know, rest in peace.
• 23:09
  Coach Malone did a really good job with me my 9th grade year
• 23:14
  kind of shepherding me. And you know, we learned through
• 23:18
  some things together. There were some things I wish I
• 23:20
  would have changed about my freshman year, looking back in
• 23:23
  hindsight, but I believe that at the time he was the right person
• 23:28
  for me to make that transition from 8th to 9th grade.
• 23:31
  Then he eventually chose to take a different job at a different
• 23:34
  school. And then Coach Farley came in.
• 23:37
  And then with Coach Farley, I think that that was just a the
• 23:41
  perfect blend moving forward for me.
• 23:43
  And I. And I really thank him to this
• 23:46
  day for being the kind of man that would simply say, I don't
• 23:49
  know, I just love and appreciate to this day.
• 23:52
  I think about that when I'm with athletes to this day and I'm
• 23:55
  like, hey, there's some things I don't know.
• 23:58
  There's something I need outside counsel Because if you,
• 24:00
  especially the more talented the athlete, have, the more gifts
• 24:04
  that they have, sometimes you're not ready for those gifted
• 24:07
  athletes and you don't want to simply ride on what God gave
• 24:11
  them. You want to help them to
• 24:12
  maximize what God gave them. And you may not be equipped with
• 24:15
  all the tools. You can go to every coaching
• 24:17
  seminar. You can get level one, level 2
• 24:20
  certified, I double F certified. But you can still lean back on
• 24:24
  some different people to kind of help.
• 24:26
  And I think this part of why I am this way is because I
• 24:29
  actually saw someone do that with me when I was 1516 years
• 24:34
  old. I I I like if you're listening,
• 24:37
  you got to go back and listen to that story.
• 24:39
  I mean, that truly is an amazing example of a coach who's doing
• 24:44
  amazing. I mean, he gets a freshman
• 24:45
  running 47. Come on, we would all take that
• 24:48
  every day, twice on Sunday. And yet has the leadership, the
• 24:54
  confidence, the lack of ego to say, oh man, I don't know what
• 24:59
  to do now, so let's go find some help Or, you know, you go to the
• 25:03
  camp. I mean, what a, what a.
• 25:05
  What a lucky break, honestly. You go and there's Tom and Carl
• 25:08
  and Leroy. Come on, literally.
• 25:09
  It's a little bit like, wow, you kind of lucked out there, buddy.
• 25:12
  And then you bring back stuff and coach is like, oh, OK, we
• 25:15
  can start incorporating some of that.
• 25:16
  Oh, I see where they like, that's Bravo, man.
• 25:19
  That's that is more of what we need in teachers, coaches,
• 25:22
  ourselves, athlete. That is what an amazing example.
• 25:25
  I love that. So how did high school go?
• 25:28
  And as you start getting into senior year, what's the plan?
• 25:32
  Are you going to college? Do you want to be a businessman?
• 25:36
  Do you want to be a coach? Do you want to go to the
• 25:39
  University of Houston? Tell tell me about that process.
• 25:42
  So I think going into my sophomore year, things changed
• 25:47
  and I ended up winning State of the Sophomore in the 400.
• 25:51
  Then we went to J OS after my sophomore year and then I won
• 25:56
  national championship in the one, the two and the four in the
• 25:58
  same meet and life started to change.
• 26:02
  Then one stayed again my junior year, then came back my senior
• 26:07
  year and then was US number one that year as well and made the
• 26:11
  US team, the US junior team rather.
• 26:13
  But all that whole time I was a football player.
• 26:16
  Yeah, I was going to ask, where's football in this?
• 26:18
  Yeah. Yeah, yeah, Football was my was
• 26:20
  my primary sport and I ended up. That's why I received my
• 26:24
  scholarship to Texas A&M. Was in football.
• 26:26
  Is that right? Wow.
• 26:29
  Yep. I had no clue.
• 26:30
  See, this is what I love about taking people who I have no clue
• 26:33
  about them. I had no idea.
• 26:34
  You played football and you got a scholarship at Texas A&M.
• 26:37
  That's crazy. That's awesome.
• 26:39
  So that that's kind of why. Why Texas A&M?
• 26:42
  There's a lot of, you know, in Texas, you know, and I don't
• 26:45
  know if it's because you are such a big state.
• 26:47
  There's a lot of. Grouped them specifically not
• 26:53
  only professional sports but in your colleges, you know, Houston
• 26:56
  has, you know the people are Houston Cougars people and there
• 26:58
  are A&M people. My, my, our, our boss, our our
• 27:01
  CEO went to Baylor he's from Illinois, but he went to Baylor
• 27:04
  and there's a Baylor Group. They're a little bit smaller,
• 27:05
  but there's a Baylor group and obviously Texas and Texas, I
• 27:08
  mean it's it's very culturally different.
• 27:10
  Texas Tech people are different than A&M people, etcetera.
• 27:13
  Why? Why A&M?
• 27:14
  You grew up in Houston. No, I grew up with Colleen.
• 27:17
  So Colleen, it's probably, it's probably about 30 to 45 minutes,
• 27:21
  One Direction to go to Austin, 30 to 45 minutes the other
• 27:24
  direction to go to Waco. And so growing up, there was a
• 27:28
  quarter mile by the name of Willie Caldwell that ultimately
• 27:31
  ran in Baylor. But he graduated from my high
• 27:33
  school. And so with Baylor being so
• 27:36
  close to Colleen and Baylor being the king of quarter miles
• 27:38
  at the time, there was that that that natural attraction toward
• 27:43
  Baylor. And many people thought I would
• 27:44
  might end up at Baylor. UT always had a good track
• 27:48
  program, always had a good football program.
• 27:50
  They were right down the street. You know, I had the opportunity
• 27:54
  to go visit UCLA, and UCLA was probably one of my dream schools
• 27:59
  until I realized that way. At that time, there were no PAC
• 28:04
  12 networks. So there was, we only had
• 28:07
  regional things being played on TV.
• 28:09
  And so my parents, amazing parents, my and I tell the story
• 28:14
  to this day why I love them so much and why I try to do the
• 28:18
  things for my son. I didn't even know my patient.
• 28:22
  My parents actually had vacation because they literally went with
• 28:27
  me everywhere I went. If there was a football game,
• 28:30
  they were there. If there was a track meet, they
• 28:32
  were there. It didn't matter.
• 28:34
  It wasn't as I got older that I realized they were actually
• 28:37
  using all of their annual vacation to basically follow me
• 28:40
  around to all my sporting events, to be that parent, the
• 28:43
  set of parents for all of my friends whose parents couldn't
• 28:46
  come to these meets. As I say, that's really special
• 28:49
  and it's actually, unfortunately, unique.
• 28:52
  Did you realize that in the time, did you see, you know,
• 28:55
  your buddy Joe and his parents are never there and, you know,
• 28:58
  teammate Timmy, not even. And you're like me, My parents
• 29:00
  are. It actually might have been.
• 29:02
  Again, we're talking about teenager kids.
• 29:03
  So teenager Danny might have been at some point.
• 29:05
  It's like, oh man, my parents are here again.
• 29:07
  Like, can I just, you know that that was actually obvious.
• 29:09
  I love my parents being there. I always so my dad was, and I
• 29:14
  think I get this habit from him too.
• 29:16
  No matter what stadium it was, my dad would always sit in the
• 29:20
  same spot, no matter what stadium it was.
• 29:23
  So no matter where I was playing football or I was running track,
• 29:26
  I kind of knew if I couldn't. Knew what he was right.
• 29:28
  I kind of knew the the general vicinity of the area in which he
• 29:31
  was. That's.
• 29:31
  Cool, man. I love they were there and they,
• 29:34
  you know, my my parents, you know at the time my dad had a
• 29:37
  van. So all of my friends were
• 29:39
  coming. They were ride with us with our
• 29:40
  van. They'd be the parents that would
• 29:42
  go back out and get everybody food and we all eat together.
• 29:46
  It it just became it was so normal.
• 29:49
  I just expected it. What?
• 29:50
  What? What'd Mom and dad do?
• 29:52
  So my dad was a Command Sergeant Major in the United States Army.
• 29:56
  Oh yes, Sir. And my mother at the time was
• 30:00
  working as a as a civilian contractor for the military.
• 30:04
  So she worked on the on the Fort Hood military base.
• 30:07
  So you didn't. There was no getting away with
• 30:09
  stuff. No, no, no, no.
• 30:13
  It's especially I remember when I was real young, like being in
• 30:17
  like when I, we lived in Maryland and even Germany when
• 30:22
  my dad was a drill Sergeant at the time.
• 30:25
  And, you know, it's it's just like the movies sometimes.
• 30:28
  Waking up to the flashing lights in the room.
• 30:30
  On your feet, on your feet, on your feet.
• 30:32
  No dragon slowly out of bed, you know, hey, you had to get up.
• 30:37
  I remember, I remember, you know, having chores that needed
• 30:41
  to be done before my dad came home for lunch and and
• 30:45
  wondering, OK, why do I have to cut the lawn at 7:00 in the
• 30:49
  morning if I'm home all day? Why can't I just mow the lawn
• 30:53
  when I feel like mowing the lawn And it was Nope, we're going to
• 30:57
  be done this at this time, this day before I get home.
• 31:00
  You know, you will not lie around in the bed all day and
• 31:03
  watch TV and cartoons. You're going to work.
• 31:05
  So yeah, it definitely you learned a lot.
• 31:08
  I learned so much from him and he certainly instilled a mindset
• 31:13
  in me because of the discipline the military provided.
• 31:16
  Yeah. OK.
• 31:16
  I was going to say to be a good football player good enough to
• 31:18
  go to an A&M and the be the track athlete that you were
• 31:22
  disciplined is one of the words I always think of.
• 31:24
  I mean it's very few people who have the natural talent to do
• 31:27
  that it you have to have the natural talent and the
• 31:29
  discipline it's it's it's when you have the trifecta you have
• 31:32
  those two plus the actual attitude like I love to run the
• 31:34
  quarter. I love to be a running back or
• 31:36
  whatnot that you get the real special, you know, Barry Sanders
• 31:39
  type of people and things like that.
• 31:40
  You you had a you learned a lot of discipline from from mom and
• 31:43
  dad. Absolutely, absolutely.
• 31:48
  It was. I remember when no pass, no play
• 31:51
  was first introduced in Texas and I remember my dad saying no
• 31:57
  pass, no play. In the Mccrae household is is
• 31:59
  79. Anything under 80, you don't
• 32:03
  play. And I don't care what a coach
• 32:05
  says, I don't care about anybody asking me if you come home with
• 32:09
  anything less than an 80, you won't play.
• 32:12
  And shout out to dad and Mom. I know Mom's there, too, man.
• 32:16
  Holy cow. That's amazing.
• 32:18
  So what? So you're going to go to A&M?
• 32:20
  You go to A&M. What was the the academic side,
• 32:23
  though? The professional side was it?
• 32:26
  I'm going to be a business owner.
• 32:27
  I'm going to be a teacher. I'm going to be an NFL player.
• 32:31
  What was the thought as far as like a career as you went into
• 32:33
  A&M? So leaving high school, I had
• 32:36
  two things written in my senior book.
• 32:39
  I thought I was going to be a professional athlete or I
• 32:43
  thought I was going to actually three things.
• 32:45
  Professional athlete, lawyer, slash sales.
• 32:49
  That was kind of my route leaving high school.
• 32:53
  And you know what ended up being that way?
• 32:56
  I ended up being having the opportunity to become a
• 32:58
  professional athlete and then retiring from pro sports and
• 33:02
  then went into a sales and marketing career.
• 33:06
  So it kind of matched up. Where'd you get your degree in
• 33:10
  marketing and sociology? So you said you you became a
• 33:13
  professional athlete. It's it's fun that I get to not
• 33:16
  know what sport it was actually in football or track, so I can
• 33:18
  feel. Is that right?
• 33:20
  Yep, Yep. So talk to us about time at A&M
• 33:24
  who this is pre Pat Pat Henry. I know we really think of Pat
• 33:27
  Henry now Pat was Pat was kicking butt in at Blend
• 33:29
  University College in LSU at the time.
• 33:31
  Yeah exactly. So who was the coach there?
• 33:34
  There's a famous coach there. It has to be the.
• 33:37
  I can't think of their name. My coach was coach Ted Nelson.
• 33:39
  Yes, Ted Nelson, yes, yes, yes. So what?
• 33:43
  What was it like? You know, we we think we know
• 33:45
  what it's like to be at A&M today.
• 33:47
  What was it like be actually being there when you were what?
• 33:50
  What years are we? We there at A&M?
• 33:52
  So I was there from 92 to 97. I had one red shirt year to an
• 33:55
  injury, but 92 to 97 all. Right.
• 33:57
  So how was it there during that time?
• 33:59
  It was fantastic. I think my time in college was
• 34:03
  second to none. And the the friendships forged
• 34:07
  overtime, you know, just the relationships, the experiences.
• 34:11
  I think it was a perfect blend of being independent and
• 34:15
  dependent, right? It was just a great time period
• 34:19
  for me. And I think A&M was everything
• 34:20
  that I hoped it would be when I left high school.
• 34:24
  It was better because of the people that was around.
• 34:27
  And then Coach Nelson, he was a quarter mile, a former quarter
• 34:30
  mile or himself that ran at A&M that eventually took over the
• 34:34
  team that he ran for. And that the whole sense of
• 34:37
  community being a part of the team that was on the rise.
• 34:40
  Because at that point in time, Baylor had the quarter mileers.
• 34:44
  We had the opportunity to build quarter mileers to build a name.
• 34:48
  And I think we did a lot of things.
• 34:50
  Even the other day when I went to go look at the new updated
• 34:53
  A&M Top 12 record boards, it was really cool to see so many
• 34:59
  athletes from my era, which in and of itself is so impressive
• 35:04
  because what Coach Henry has done there has been next level.
• 35:09
  So the the amount of talent that he's brought in there since he
• 35:12
  walked through those doors for anybody prior to athlete, prior
• 35:17
  to his regime coming in to still be reflected on those boards
• 35:21
  only kind of reaffirm the type of talent that we had at the
• 35:25
  school at that moment. That's a good point.
• 35:27
  Did you play football all four years?
• 35:29
  So I played three, so the only year I didn't play was my last
• 35:31
  year, so. How did you you know?
• 35:34
  You seem to be fairly. Resilient.
• 35:39
  You know in high school you've got a high school coach and
• 35:41
  coaching staff for football. You know you have your Sprint
• 35:44
  coach. During high school season you go
• 35:46
  to a different Sprint coach. So there's some some pliability
• 35:49
  of like OK, I can roll with the punches.
• 35:50
  This coach does things not only technically different like how
• 35:53
  they actually coach, but personality probably a little
• 35:56
  bit different. Now you go into collegiate
• 35:59
  sports, you've got a new and more time intensive football
• 36:04
  coach in in in process. And then you have a Ted Nelson
• 36:07
  who I I assume is maybe does things a little bit differently
• 36:10
  on the XS and OS side, but also personalities a little bit
• 36:13
  different. How did you, I mean how did you.
• 36:15
  That's a that's a sticky wicket to kind of navigate, right.
• 36:18
  And and then we're already talking about you have
• 36:19
  professors and personal, I mean there's, you know there's a lot
• 36:22
  of different ways and things coming at you.
• 36:24
  How did you navigate, you know, full time big time college
• 36:27
  football and full time big time college track?
• 36:32
  It was. It was tough but not
• 36:36
  unmanageable because that's what I've always done.
• 36:39
  You know, obviously the biggest challenge, going to college and
• 36:42
  then being on a football scholarship is recognizing that
• 36:45
  football comes first. It pays the bills.
• 36:47
  It's why I'm there. I I remember after my Senior
• 36:51
  High School the summer before going to become a freshman
• 36:55
  making the U20 team and at the time they called it US Junior.
• 36:58
  So the U20 team. And the ironic part is that that
• 37:03
  was a team that Coach Henry was actually the coach of.
• 37:07
  And there were we went to we had the TAC US championships and the
• 37:13
  top four places were all Texas kids.
• 37:17
  One was the Texas was a freshman at Baylor and then he became for
• 37:22
  Texas. But the other three behind them
• 37:24
  were all three Texas athletes. So we're all excited about going
• 37:29
  to represent the US and having a four by four made-up of all
• 37:34
  Texas athletes. So shout out to DI Minor, shout
• 37:37
  out to Chris Jones and shout out to Milton Mallard because that
• 37:40
  was supposed to be the team and we all wanted to be on that team
• 37:43
  together. Well, that particular year,
• 37:46
  Stanford was playing A&M in a preseason classic.
• 37:50
  So we were starting football earlier than we would normally
• 37:54
  have started football. And because as a freshman,
• 37:57
  freshman come in before the rest of varsity comes back.
• 38:00
  So I was not able to go to World Juniors that year because we had
• 38:04
  started football. And so then that was just
• 38:07
  another brief introduction to this is college life.
• 38:10
  And so then there was all these expectation, at least the first
• 38:13
  year that the first spring I would participate in spring
• 38:19
  football. So now you're off and you're
• 38:22
  moving the track season. You get there late for indoor
• 38:24
  because we played in a bowl game my freshman year.
• 38:26
  So you end the season January 1st, football season end of
• 38:30
  January 1st, but then track season is starting January 15th.
• 38:34
  So there's no training, no background.
• 38:36
  I remember that most kids have a 33rd, probably like a month
• 38:41
  break between the first semester and 2nd semester.
• 38:43
  Well, the first half of that was gone for me because we're doing
• 38:46
  bowl preparation. The second-half was gone for me
• 38:49
  because we were now getting ready for the track season.
• 38:52
  So I would literally just basically end one and come to
• 38:54
  the next. And were you still supposed to
• 38:56
  be 1/4 Miller? I was still supposed to be 1/4
• 38:59
  mile. 'Cause, you know, having the
• 39:02
  last day of let's call practice bowl game January 1 or whatever,
• 39:05
  And then, you know, maybe there's a meet on the the 9th
• 39:08
  that weekend for a 60 meter guy. And I know it's different,
• 39:10
  There's, you know, you got to get your track legs under you.
• 39:12
  But way easier to run a 60, yes, then 1/4 like that seems.
• 39:17
  I mean there, you know, you got to train to be 1/4 mile.
• 39:20
  Not that you know, train to be a 60 meter guy.
• 39:21
  But I'm just saying like that seems hard, like impossible,
• 39:25
  maybe even. And it was.
• 39:27
  It was compounded by the fact that when I came through high
• 39:31
  school, the whole idea of a high school athlete running indoor
• 39:35
  track in high school wasn't even heard of.
• 39:39
  So my first experience running indoor was my freshman year.
• 39:43
  And this was before Mondo tracks and rubber surfaces.
• 39:46
  We were running on 170 meter wood tracks.
• 39:50
  That was my first experience to indoor track and the first thing
• 39:53
  to think about trying to run 1/4.
• 39:55
  And I'm looking at the track and saying to myself, all right now,
• 39:58
  how many times around is this before we get to 400 meters?
• 40:02
  Where do I start? Where do I stop?
• 40:03
  Yeah. And I'm like what am I?
• 40:06
  This one I'm supposed to run on these I'm I'm getting splinters
• 40:09
  in my fingers. Just put my hands on the track.
• 40:12
  You know that It was just it was very different and it was a
• 40:14
  challenge and I and and again adjustment to shout out to Coach
• 40:18
  Nelson for being able to be flexible enough with the
• 40:21
  adjustment when I first started to let me run.
• 40:25
  At that time, the 55 meters let me run the 55 meters indoors and
• 40:29
  then hop on some 4 by fours so I can start to get acclimated to
• 40:33
  run in 1/4 again via the four by 4 relay.
• 40:37
  And that's how we made it. That's how we made it happen.
• 40:39
  We was go back to that U20 team. Do you remember where U20
• 40:44
  Championships were supposed to be?
• 40:46
  I do not. I wish I did.
• 40:48
  I I don't know, somewhere overseas I.
• 40:50
  Assume. Sorry, somewhere overseas, I
• 40:53
  assume? Yes, Yes.
• 40:54
  Would this have been your first overseas trip?
• 40:56
  How did that make? You.
• 40:57
  Well first. That would have been my first
• 40:59
  over trees overseas trip to compete.
• 41:01
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, right, right. But.
• 41:03
  My dad was in the army, so we lived in Germany for six years.
• 41:06
  That's right. Yeah.
• 41:07
  OK, So So maybe that plays into it because I'm thinking of this,
• 41:10
  you know, I hate to call Killeen a small town Texas kid, but you
• 41:13
  know, small town Texas kid here who you know doesn't have a lot
• 41:16
  of opportunities to go to overseas and go to maybe Bolivia
• 41:19
  or Chile or wherever that might meet might have been.
• 41:22
  And I know you can't go because it's football and you certainly
• 41:25
  love football, you're at A&M to play football.
• 41:27
  So I get that. But I had to think there were
• 41:28
  some, maybe some conflicted emotions there about.
• 41:31
  Absolutely, absolutely, man. I had.
• 41:34
  I wanted to be there so bad because at the U20 trials.
• 41:39
  That's when that was my first time running sub 46 and so I ran
• 41:44
  4574, my senior of high school. And so there's that natural
• 41:49
  sense that says one more meet where could I be in another meet
• 41:54
  and then the and then the concept of knowing that again
• 41:57
  the four guys that were going to be on a 4 by 4, three of us were
• 42:00
  literally class of 92. So we had, we had competed
• 42:04
  against each other. And now we have the opportunity
• 42:07
  to go put on the red, white and blue together, right?
• 42:11
  There were many conflicting emotions at that point in time
• 42:15
  that I wish that. And I'd seen sometimes other
• 42:18
  programs, at least in the future, where they made some
• 42:21
  concessions and they would let the athlete, hey, we're OK, go
• 42:26
  take advantage of this opportunity and then come back
• 42:28
  and rejoin us. But I just came through.
• 42:30
  I came through in an era where that wasn't, that wasn't the
• 42:34
  norm. I'm always interested.
• 42:37
  You know, there's amazing athletes out there.
• 42:38
  You are obviously one of them during this time frame and you
• 42:42
  know they say for professional track the easiest way to go from
• 42:45
  #1 to #100 is to turn pro that that same, that same sentiment
• 42:49
  is in high school track. The easiest way to go from the
• 42:51
  number one quarter Miller in the country in high school is go, go
• 42:55
  running college. It's very few.
• 42:57
  You know, and you mentioned, you know, the level of talented, of
• 43:00
  of high school, of collegiate athletes, specifically all
• 43:03
  athletes. But college is just, it's just
• 43:05
  crazy. I mean, it's really ridiculous
• 43:08
  what goes on And incidentally, on all levels, by the way.
• 43:09
  I mean you get D3 kids running 10.
• 43:11
  Oh, I mean, so don't don't get at me at this D1D2 stuff.
• 43:15
  All of the levels are just crazy.
• 43:17
  I I blame the coaches, by the way.
• 43:18
  Whenever they complain about like, man, it takes, you know,
• 43:20
  10 flat and I'm like, well, well, it's you your fault.
• 43:23
  You're coaching them too good. I mean, but it's what do you,
• 43:26
  you know, if you want to make an 11 flat coach worse, I guess.
• 43:28
  I don't know. That's right.
• 43:29
  That's right. So I'm wondering, you know, and
• 43:31
  I'm doing some a little bit of assumption here that when you
• 43:33
  went into college at A&M for track that you weren't winning
• 43:37
  every race like you might have done in high school.
• 43:39
  You were getting your your butt handed to you because I'm just
• 43:41
  assuming there were other great kids that you know were juniors
• 43:43
  and seniors weren't coming off football etcetera.
• 43:44
  How did you handle going from being the man, the guy who's
• 43:48
  winning everything at your high school level, winning state
• 43:51
  titles in Texas for crying out loud, going to U 20s, making
• 43:55
  Team USA, things like that to again, I'm zooming here a little
• 43:58
  bit like, you know, you go to your first.
• 44:01
  Well, you were. You weren't Big 12, Were you Big
• 44:03
  12? Southwest Conference.
• 44:05
  That's right. I knew it.
• 44:06
  So your Southwest cover, which was amazing by the way.
• 44:09
  It was basically the precursor to the SEC.
• 44:13
  You go to the conference meet and you get 7th or 8th maybe, I
• 44:15
  don't know you, you correct me, but it's like how did you, how
• 44:17
  did your ego handle that? You know it.
• 44:20
  It was definitely different. The ego was fine.
• 44:27
  The competitive drive always wanted more.
• 44:29
  And I recognize what I was missing.
• 44:31
  You know, it's when you start to get off to a good start and then
• 44:34
  you got to leave to go back to spring football.
• 44:37
  And spring football is long. It's, it's.
• 44:41
  You know it's an easy month and by the time you by the time you
• 44:46
  do that, you come out of spring football.
• 44:48
  You come out of spring football. After all that contact and time
• 44:51
  away from track. It literally was right before
• 44:54
  the Southwest Conference meet when I came back out to the
• 44:56
  track again and before spring football had started.
• 45:00
  I, you know, I at the time there was like a.
• 45:04
  The NCAA qualifying list where if you hit a certain time,
• 45:09
  that's how you qualified versus the process now going through
• 45:12
  regionals. Yeah, the descending order list,
• 45:14
  just like we do indoor still. Yep, you had an automatic.
• 45:17
  If you had an automatic time, you were there and then they
• 45:19
  were just filling around the people to make that didn't make
• 45:22
  the automatic time based on how many spots they needed to fill.
• 45:26
  So I'd already hit the automatic spot in the 200, already hit the
• 45:30
  automatic qualifier in the 400. And then we had a really good
• 45:34
  4x4 at the time. And at that point I split 43,
• 45:39
  nine my freshman year. And this is before going back to
• 45:42
  spring football and then going back to spring football.
• 45:46
  Now all of a sudden, you know it's rough, you know, you know
• 45:49
  you're going through a month contact all the above because
• 45:52
  you had to earn your spot, come back out to the track conference
• 45:55
  meet wasn't good. And then eventually I got hurt.
• 46:00
  So then going into my freshman year, they were NCAA S in New
• 46:03
  Orleans and I'm watching the NCAA meet because I pulled my
• 46:07
  hamstring and so I had. So I had to sit out that year
• 46:11
  and I think that that actually motivated me moving forward.
• 46:15
  And then also as I got a little older, there were some
• 46:19
  concessions made by Coach Slocum on the football team that now
• 46:23
  when it came to spring, that by the next time all I had to do is
• 46:27
  go to meetings instead of meetings and practice.
• 46:30
  Right. So they kind of keep my body
• 46:31
  fresh, keep my training progressing.
• 46:32
  You mentioned Slocum. Did you have Jackie, Cheryl on
• 46:35
  staff? No, no.
• 46:36
  So Jackie, So Jackie was gone. So it was just just Coach Slocum
• 46:40
  at that point. I met Jackie when I coached at
• 46:41
  Mississippi State. That's how I know.
• 46:45
  Yeah, yeah, there's some stories, let me tell you.
• 46:48
  Well, I could only imagine it was a master motivator.
• 46:52
  Yeah, I used to hear about. I used to hear about the Jackie
• 46:54
  Cheryl days old. Players before I got there so
• 46:58
  and and maybe you answered this because you you just talked
• 47:01
  about you played football for three years and finished out
• 47:04
  with track and field. Did you ever feel like you know
• 47:06
  you're hearing that story about you know going through spring
• 47:09
  ball and and you're right not only is it the contact and the
• 47:11
  beating up of actual football practice but it's the time away
• 47:14
  from actual track practice is what it's a it's a it's a double
• 47:16
  dose of of Vadnais especially for 1/4 Miller.
• 47:19
  But did you ever feel like, and we haven't talked much about
• 47:22
  your your football prowess but did you ever feel like 1 Sport
• 47:25
  was holding you back over the other like man, if I just did
• 47:28
  football I could make the draft or man, if I just did track I
• 47:30
  could make the Olympics. Did you ever feel like in kind
• 47:33
  of an internal struggle? So the opposite probably should
• 47:37
  have felt the internal struggle. I think what happened was I had
• 47:40
  done it for so long. It became a way of life.
• 47:43
  That's the only thing that I knew, and I was afraid to not do
• 47:47
  one or the other. I needed to do them both When in
• 47:51
  reality, by the time my junior came, that's when I I remember
• 47:55
  going to the Olympic trials in 96 and then walking away and
• 47:58
  saying, ma'am, I wonder how much further I could go if I actually
• 48:05
  had a fall to train. If I didn't have anything
• 48:08
  pulling me away, how much further could I go in track?
• 48:12
  And lo and behold, that's what then ultimately allowed me to
• 48:16
  come to peace. Went the decision to not play
• 48:20
  football my last year and then say because at this point in
• 48:22
  time like I'm good, but I'm not NFL good.
• 48:25
  So I believe that I can be world championship Olympic level good
• 48:32
  and track and I have opportunities there.
• 48:34
  Let's explore those. What a tug of war of of I'm
• 48:39
  going to say ego, because I don't believe ego is necessarily
• 48:42
  bad. I think bad ego is bad.
• 48:44
  So you show humility of like yeah I'm good, but I'm not NFL
• 48:49
  good. Like like let's be realistic
• 48:50
  here. I could I could maybe make a
• 48:52
  practice squad or you know maybe hang around but I'm not draft.
• 48:55
  I'm not top three round draft. So to have that humility but
• 48:59
  then you have to have the ego and this is good ego of like
• 49:02
  yeah but I think I can make the Olympics maybe like if I just do
• 49:04
  full time like it's it's a that's a heck of an internal
• 49:08
  struggle tug of war there. Like being able to have extreme
• 49:11
  humility on one sport and then extreme positive confidence on
• 49:16
  another. Right.
• 49:18
  You know it's I never thought about it that way.
• 49:21
  That's a that's a great perspective It's just for me I
• 49:23
  think it was just fueled by competitiveness.
• 49:27
  It I I just I hated walking off the track in Atlanta in 96 and
• 49:33
  the saying to myself I can do better, right.
• 49:36
  I can do more. I didn't.
• 49:39
  I didn't really understand. Really good practice efforts,
• 49:44
  you know, back in back when I ran.
• 49:47
  There wasn't an over emphasis across the board on mechanics.
• 49:51
  You know, there wasn't as much emphasis on race strategy, all
• 49:56
  right? It was let me train you as
• 49:59
  efficiently and effectively as I possibly can.
• 50:02
  Gun goes off, let's go get it. And I wanted to see what it
• 50:07
  would be like if I actually could dedicate more time to
• 50:11
  learning and understanding the craft of track.
• 50:15
  So where where did you go? Where does, where does someone
• 50:17
  who's under Ted Nelson's tutelage is going to make a stab
• 50:21
  at the next round? And there's no draft for track.
• 50:23
  So it's like, OK, I'm, I'm pro. Here we go, Let's try to make
• 50:26
  some money somewhere. Where does one go to for
• 50:29
  training? What?
• 50:30
  What do you do? So and it's it's interesting you
• 50:34
  say that because it kind of goes back to sometimes a story can go
• 50:38
  full circle. As I said earlier, UCLA was one
• 50:41
  of my dream schools and. I almost went to school there,
• 50:45
  had it not been so far away from home.
• 50:48
  And at the time, John Smith was the coach at UCLA and had the
• 50:52
  relationship with John through high school.
• 50:55
  And then John and Emmanuel Hudson had recently formed their
• 50:58
  own management group called HSI. And then John reached out.
• 51:05
  Then Emmanuel reached out. We had the connection.
• 51:07
  And then that was all right. I know where I'm going to go
• 51:10
  next. You were the HSI.
• 51:13
  Yes, I was. I was an HSI, so I'm just a tad
• 51:16
  bit younger than you. I you you graduated 92, I think,
• 51:19
  right? High school.
• 51:19
  I graduated 94. So we're we're one of the same.
• 51:23
  And I remember during my high school, so 90 to 94, you know, I
• 51:27
  was a track geek and I remember HSI was the thing, man.
• 51:30
  Like, that's like, we wanted to all be H 'cause it was the only
• 51:34
  like, group. Like we knew about Santa Monica
• 51:36
  Track Club. Of course, that definitely was a
• 51:38
  thing too, but HSI brought Swagger to it.
• 51:42
  Yeah, with with Maurice and all of them.
• 51:44
  I mean that was just the place to be.
• 51:46
  You were at HSI, How how you know?
• 51:49
  So I I got to visit IN2000A training session down there.
• 51:54
  So Otto and Maurice and John and Larry and and and it was just so
• 51:59
  that, like, I mean, I'm just in awe of these individuals and,
• 52:02
  you know, they're cracking up making jokes.
• 52:04
  And I was like, man, this has got to be like the greatest life
• 52:06
  in the world. Like they they run a little bit.
• 52:09
  Then they come to the side and chill and tell jokes.
• 52:11
  And I was like, this is amazing. How how was that time during
• 52:16
  HSI? You're you're going to tell me
• 52:17
  exact topics. You're like, Oh yeah, no, Mike,
• 52:18
  all that was a facade. It was terrible.
• 52:20
  No, no, no, listen, I think, I think overall, you know they're
• 52:24
  they're always ups and downs, sure, of course, of course.
• 52:26
  But overall, it was a great experience for me.
• 52:29
  It taught me a lot about life, got me prepared for life.
• 52:32
  I still remember probably one of my first experiences when I got
• 52:36
  there. Get into practice and at the
• 52:38
  time MY2 training partners were Antoine Maybank and Quincy
• 52:43
  Watts. And so I remember getting there
• 52:46
  and and Antoine, Antoine and I are still cool to this day.
• 52:50
  I laugh at this story so Maybank says to me as he's shaking my
• 52:54
  hand. Last one in first one to go.
• 52:59
  And and that's And so he's and so he's to the pros.
• 53:04
  Welcome to the pros. Now he's laughing.
• 53:06
  You know he's being welcoming, but I could tell there's still
• 53:10
  some seriousness, even amongst the jest.
• 53:13
  And as I look around, because I got there like a year after
• 53:17
  Maurice. So I'm out here looking at
• 53:19
  Antoine. I'm out here looking at Quincy
• 53:23
  Otto, John Drummond, Maurice, you know.
• 53:27
  You know Marie Jose Perek, right?
• 53:30
  It it was just, you know, Inger Miller.
• 53:32
  It was just a different, it was a different atmosphere, a
• 53:34
  different group. And you get the chance to
• 53:37
  recognize professionalism. You get to understand that this
• 53:40
  is a dog eat dog world. And the one thing about running
• 53:44
  professional track and field that's very different than many
• 53:46
  other sports is because there's no salary cap, there's no,
• 53:50
  there's no ceiling, but there's no floor either.
• 53:54
  So you can go and make a lot of money.
• 53:57
  But you could also be broke on the other end of that spectrum.
• 54:00
  And so being out there and seeing people, that was my first
• 54:03
  time outside of football, seeing track athletes who had money.
• 54:08
  And then you're like, hey, you know what, there there's
• 54:11
  something out here. There's an opportunity.
• 54:14
  I want to be a part of that. And I think Emmanuel was also a
• 54:16
  really good business manager and he did some things early on like
• 54:21
  we would have a retreat every single year.
• 54:24
  And he would bring in financial advisors to just really help us
• 54:27
  to understand and prepare for track but also life after track.
• 54:31
  So I I always respect him and appreciate him for that.
• 54:35
  And so then now even Fast forward and I know we haven't
• 54:38
  even talked about this, but to see like this past summer when
• 54:42
  Bryce what made the his first. You know, US championship meet
• 54:46
  and so he's at the US Championships and he's running
• 54:49
  And then to see him get a chance to meet Emmanuel, you know, and
• 54:53
  then the the relationship that he has with Otto Bold and and to
• 54:56
  talk to him. And so the same people that I
• 54:58
  kind of grew up around and I grew up with, so to speak.
• 55:01
  You know Larry Wade, I've known Larry since.
• 55:04
  You know he and I were like 15 years old before we even went to
• 55:07
  A&M together. And so Larry is like an uncle to
• 55:10
  Bryce. And so to be able to have all of
• 55:13
  these connections with people that I ran with, trained with,
• 55:16
  you know, to see Quincy transition from professional
• 55:20
  track athlete to now director of track and field at USC.
• 55:23
  And then to see him talking to Bryce, to see Joanna, who I knew
• 55:28
  could. Joanna was training at UCLA when
• 55:30
  I was running with John at UCLA. That to see these people embrace
• 55:34
  my child. It's just, again, it's just it's
• 55:37
  a testament to the overall experience.
• 55:40
  That I had when I was with HSI. That's right.
• 55:43
  That's a great point and it's hard to see when you're a
• 55:45
  22/23/24 year old doing this, but those relationships you were
• 55:49
  forming were they were valuable then, but boy they got a lot
• 55:54
  more valuable as we became 34 and 44 year olds and have
• 55:57
  children etcetera. So what a great head in your
• 56:01
  shoulders. And, you know, you described mom
• 56:02
  and dad, so I can't see you being the opposite of this.
• 56:04
  But, you know, you could have been in there and got in, went
• 56:06
  in cocky and, you know, yeah, first in, first out, whatever.
• 56:09
  I'm here to take your spot. Maybe, you know, all this stuff
• 56:11
  and it's like, oh, you know, and Quincy sees that and goes, man,
• 56:13
  that guy's a jerk. I'm not going to recruit his
• 56:16
  kid. You know what that guy was when
• 56:17
  we were around here? You know, so just to know what
• 56:20
  you do today absolutely will affect tomorrow, the next day.
• 56:26
  So that's absolutely cool. Let's, let's move forward here a
• 56:28
  little bit. Let's get into some coaching.
• 56:31
  So, you know, you go through a professional career, you have a
• 56:34
  great degree from Texas A&M, you go into the the workforce.
• 56:38
  Where does coaching begin for you?
• 56:40
  This was great to have athletics.
• 56:41
  We're not really an athletics podcast.
• 56:43
  We're into coaching. So let's learn more about Coach
• 56:45
  McCray. OK, so I can tell you, I can
• 56:49
  tell you without a doubt that coaching was an afterthought for
• 56:53
  me. I never even thought about
• 56:55
  coaching. Not at all.
• 56:56
  There was no, you're you're. I mean you're running some
• 56:59
  greats here now with John Smith and Ted Nelson and obviously
• 57:01
  great high school and and summer coaches.
• 57:03
  There was no like, oh man, that's cool what they do.
• 57:05
  I mean, maybe I want to be that one day.
• 57:07
  Not at all. Never.
• 57:09
  If I'm if I'm you know, because this is the podcast where we're
• 57:12
  certainly being honest and candid when I left track.
• 57:16
  I had a very bad taste in my mouth regarding track and field.
• 57:22
  You know when in 2000 in the Olympic trials, you know, there
• 57:27
  were people who beat me in the open quarter who were later
• 57:30
  found out to be having tested positive, right?
• 57:34
  So that experience of having my career also being impacted by
• 57:38
  people who are on performance enhancing drugs literally had me
• 57:41
  walk away and it was like a decade long time period.
• 57:44
  I didn't even want to track me. We didn't watch meet, didn't go
• 57:47
  to attract meet, nothing. And when my son first started
• 57:52
  playing sports, and again, we talk about God's timing and
• 57:55
  God's plan, I had a plan and a vision for my son, none of which
• 58:00
  even included sports. So, OK, yeah, OK.
• 58:03
  None of which including sports. I I wanted him to speak multiple
• 58:06
  languages. I want him to be able to play a
• 58:08
  musical instrument. I thought about Bryce being an
• 58:11
  international businessman, so I was trying to think about let's
• 58:14
  how do we, how do we prepare him to go that direction?
• 58:17
  Actually, ironically enough, it was his mother who first
• 58:19
  introduced him to sports and playing YMCA soccer.
• 58:25
  And so then the YMCA soccer turned into flag football.
• 58:31
  And then one of the coaches that played flag football asked me to
• 58:35
  help be the assistant coach for the flag football team.
• 58:37
  Cool. So spent some time with my son.
• 58:40
  I'll do that. And then that kind of that kind
• 58:43
  of manifested into moving the flag football to them.
• 58:47
  My son wanting to play tackle football.
• 58:49
  And at the time when my son wanted to play tackle football,
• 58:52
  this was kind of the beginning of the awareness around CTE and
• 58:56
  how we needed to train kids differently to play football.
• 59:00
  And there were so many youth coaches that I've always felt
• 59:02
  like, how did they even get to coach a football team?
• 59:05
  They don't know anything about football.
• 59:07
  Not continuing their education around football.
• 59:09
  And with the fear of head trauma being there, I wanted to make
• 59:13
  sure that I had some kind of control over that.
• 59:15
  So I then created my own youth football organization to have my
• 59:19
  own team. And at that point in time, some
• 59:22
  of my old college teammates were now either college coaches, NFL
• 59:27
  coaches. So I could go back to them and
• 59:29
  say, OK, I haven't been around this game in a long time, How
• 59:32
  are you teaching these kids how to tackle now?
• 59:35
  What do you, what kind of offenses are you running?
• 59:36
  What kind of defenses are you running?
• 59:37
  So then bringing that back to a, in essence a third grade
• 59:41
  football program that kind of grew 5th grade, 6th grade
• 59:44
  through junior high. We did that and then my son
• 59:48
  wanted to play basketball. So we got him connected with his
• 59:51
  AU basketball program and then it wasn't too long before that
• 59:54
  before someone said, hey coach, can you help us out?
• 59:58
  And I hadn't coached basketball ever, but now I'm sitting on the
• 1:00:00
  bench as an assistant coach for his for his AU basketball club.
• 1:00:06
  Then then we get to junior high. And I always laugh because
• 1:00:11
  Bryce, I tell people Bryce was actually cut from his junior
• 1:00:17
  high track team in 7th grade and had so many kids.
• 1:00:21
  They used to also have what's called AD Squad of Developmental
• 1:00:24
  Squad. That's all he can run because
• 1:00:26
  their practices would literally consist of time trials.
• 1:00:29
  So you had to compete every week to be able to run in the track
• 1:00:32
  meet. So that was his 7th grade year.
• 1:00:34
  So then now he gets ready to go into eighth grade and he wants
• 1:00:37
  to run track and now it's 8th grade year.
• 1:00:39
  It's different. And this is again we talk about
• 1:00:42
  coaches and our appreciation for our coaches.
• 1:00:45
  I I think about, I think about Coach Burton his his eighth
• 1:00:50
  grade coach who literally introduced him to the hurdles.
• 1:00:53
  And so it wasn't me, it was a junior high coach who
• 1:00:56
  introduced, who saw something, an opportunity in him.
• 1:00:59
  That with me being a sprinter, I would have been trying to force
• 1:01:04
  a square peg into a round hole over and over and over again to
• 1:01:08
  try to make him be what I was familiar with.
• 1:01:11
  But this coach saw something in him, tried a different Ave. he
• 1:01:16
  loved the different Ave. And at that point, I'm like, I
• 1:01:18
  know absolutely nothing about hurdles because when I was
• 1:01:21
  growing up, what they did was they would take all the kids who
• 1:01:23
  couldn't run fast and they put him over in the hurdles.
• 1:01:27
  So now it was trying to research with, trying to help him with
• 1:01:31
  hurdling. That's when he got connected
• 1:01:34
  with a club coach and we that's when he became and noticed the
• 1:01:36
  distinction now I'm using between the club versus summer.
• 1:01:39
  All right. So he he joins club greater
• 1:01:42
  Houston track club. Great group of men and at that
• 1:01:46
  point in time I'd already coached Bryce football coach
• 1:01:50
  Price basketball. He's now 8th grade.
• 1:01:52
  The last thing I want to do is coach him for track and I
• 1:01:58
  already had. I still have my seven O 7 team
• 1:02:00
  going on so it was kind of like I'll drop you off the track
• 1:02:02
  practice. These are my days off and I'm
• 1:02:05
  going to be coaching the football seven O 17 that Bryce
• 1:02:08
  was also competing on at the same time.
• 1:02:10
  And the great Houston track Club coaches would always ask me hey,
• 1:02:14
  can you coach? Can you coach?
• 1:02:15
  Can you coach? Oh no, you guys got it.
• 1:02:17
  You don't need me. I am very content with dropping
• 1:02:20
  him off. I'm very content with sitting in
• 1:02:22
  the stands cheering for him and then what?
• 1:02:25
  One thing happened to his division coach at the time and
• 1:02:28
  he needed to take the step away for some family matters.
• 1:02:32
  And they were toward the end of the season now.
• 1:02:35
  And the coaches circle back around the the, you know, CJ
• 1:02:38
  Singleton and and Keith Stubblefield, the 2 owners of
• 1:02:42
  great agent track club asked me to help out.
• 1:02:45
  And I still. I was like, Nah, you guys got
• 1:02:47
  it. I'm very good.
• 1:02:50
  You guys can finish them out for rest of the season.
• 1:02:52
  Bryce turns around to me and he says, Dad, you always told me
• 1:02:58
  that when God put you in a position to help other people
• 1:03:02
  you need to help them. And I stopped at my tracks like,
• 1:03:05
  oh man, you got me, you got me. All right.
• 1:03:09
  I see how you played this, You got.
• 1:03:10
  Nice, dude. And so they were going to Club
• 1:03:14
  Championships that year and they needed me to fill in.
• 1:03:18
  So I filled in. They kind of gave me the
• 1:03:21
  autonomy. So these are your group of kids.
• 1:03:24
  You do what you think is best. We're not even going to get in
• 1:03:26
  the way. And I remember having a
• 1:03:29
  discussion with them and they thought that the the kids I had
• 1:03:32
  at the time had a greater potential to win a four by one.
• 1:03:35
  I looked at them and said, I think this is a better 4x4.
• 1:03:38
  They turn around and say, hey, we told you this is your group.
• 1:03:43
  You do what you want to do with these kids.
• 1:03:46
  So we go down to to Orlando for the AU Club Championships at the
• 1:03:49
  time and for the 1314 division. They win the Club National
• 1:03:56
  Championships in the four by four and that was kind of the
• 1:03:59
  birth of the coaching bug for me.
• 1:04:01
  At that point in time. I had so much fun.
• 1:04:05
  Watching Bryce compete actually reignited my love for track and
• 1:04:10
  field. Again, it brought because I can
• 1:04:12
  honestly have Bryce not started running track.
• 1:04:14
  I guarantee I would have never watched another track meet,
• 1:04:17
  would have attended one. But because Bryce is competing,
• 1:04:20
  he was enjoying it. It literally rig.
• 1:04:24
  It reignited my passion and my love and then it was all right.
• 1:04:27
  Well, no. Now if I'm going to do this, I'm
• 1:04:29
  outdated and tracked just like I was outdated in football.
• 1:04:33
  I'm outdated and track. Now let me start picking the
• 1:04:35
  phone and calling the college coaches that I know because now
• 1:04:39
  at this point in time, a lot of the guys that I competed with,
• 1:04:43
  they're now coaching. All right.
• 1:04:44
  And I, you know, and I still had people from the professional
• 1:04:47
  network at this time. You know, Leroy, who I met when
• 1:04:50
  I was in 9th grade, Leroy's coaching, He's the head coach of
• 1:04:54
  U of H at the time. All right.
• 1:04:56
  My last year competing professionally, Leroy was my
• 1:04:59
  coach. So now I'm like, OK, so I'm if
• 1:05:02
  I'm going to do this, I need to start making some phone calls.
• 1:05:05
  I need to start trying to figure out because the way that I've
• 1:05:07
  learned certainly isn't going to be good enough for the way kids
• 1:05:12
  are learning and doing what they're doing right now.
• 1:05:14
  And then I ended up connecting with some other great high
• 1:05:18
  school coaches because now I needed to understand beyond just
• 1:05:22
  simply the coaching, the coaching techniques, XS and OS
• 1:05:26
  as you would talk about. I needed to understand how to
• 1:05:29
  connect with a high school athlete and you know, and shout
• 1:05:35
  out to Mike McKinney, Sammy Dabs and Clayton Brookings.
• 1:05:37
  Because I remember watching Bryce in 9th grade, his first
• 1:05:41
  time running indoor and he runs 53 seconds at an indoor meet.
• 1:05:45
  And I remember saying to him in the stands, oh man, I don't know
• 1:05:49
  about this, for Bryce, track might not be the sport for
• 1:05:52
  Bryce. I think he might need to stick
• 1:05:54
  with football and then turning around and telling me you're
• 1:05:56
  crazy, you're crazy this kids in 9th grade and they and they
• 1:06:02
  reminded me at that point in time, my vision of a high school
• 1:06:06
  athlete was warped because I ran 4710 in 9th grade.
• 1:06:10
  So if I ran 4710 in 9th grade and I don't have any exposure to
• 1:06:13
  what's really out there in high school, 53 looks pedestrian to
• 1:06:17
  me. But because Clayton and Mike
• 1:06:20
  were also high school coaches, dabs at the time was working
• 1:06:23
  with high school athletes, they knew what the progression kind
• 1:06:27
  of looked like for 9th grade and beyond.
• 1:06:29
  And they were literally chastising me on in the stands
• 1:06:32
  at the meet and that and that made me take a step back and
• 1:06:35
  like, OK, these kids aren't bad. I just have a warp mentality of
• 1:06:41
  what's supposed to be good for high school.
• 1:06:44
  And so that was really good for me to kind of level set and have
• 1:06:47
  people to help me level set all right.
• 1:06:51
  That that's really interesting. I'm actually on the waiting list
• 1:06:55
  for a new book. I can't remember the name of it
• 1:06:56
  now, but the premise of it is we.
• 1:07:00
  We in society and maybe it's American Society.
• 1:07:03
  I don't know but maybe it's I for sure can see this heavily in
• 1:07:06
  sports society and track society for sure is we get real giddy
• 1:07:12
  and up for the 9th grader who sets the national record or the
• 1:07:16
  12th grade that sets the the wins the AAU nationals or the
• 1:07:20
  freshman who runs 47 point and it does.
• 1:07:26
  I I wonder how many 53 second quarter Miller freshman.
• 1:07:30
  Don't go on to become 45 second quarter Millers one day because
• 1:07:33
  we're like, Oh yeah, it's not your event.
• 1:07:37
  You know, last year we had a kid run 47 as a freshman and you
• 1:07:39
  know you're 6 seconds off bubs. Maybe we need to go look at the
• 1:07:42
  high jump or something that we're so focused on early, not
• 1:07:49
  development, early stardom and then what really life is, is
• 1:07:53
  about, well, where did you end? You know, you didn't start out
• 1:07:56
  as a as in sales and business and marketing, as a genius as a
• 1:08:00
  freshman in college. But you went on to learn and
• 1:08:02
  from experiences of the job, you know, and look at the track
• 1:08:05
  athletes who have gone on to become, you know, 979 eighty
• 1:08:08
  guys. That were at some point they
• 1:08:10
  were 11 flat people by the way, actually even slower you know
• 1:08:14
  and so it's just I'm really excited.
• 1:08:15
  I wish I could remember the name of that book.
• 1:08:17
  I'm really excited about reading that.
• 1:08:19
  When you do, let me know. Yeah, I will.
• 1:08:21
  I'll send it to you after this just just so you know it's it's
• 1:08:23
  out now. I just I'm a big library guy so
• 1:08:25
  I wait for my library book to come in.
• 1:08:27
  So so you know again Danny you're you're really giving us
• 1:08:34
  AI. Don't use this term lightly, but
• 1:08:36
  a a real master class in humility.
• 1:08:39
  You know, you know, you were a top notch football player.
• 1:08:42
  You are a top notch track athlete.
• 1:08:44
  If you were to have come out when you eventually got back in
• 1:08:47
  the track, and especially with your own son, for crying out
• 1:08:50
  loud, I mean, there's possessiveness over that, right?
• 1:08:53
  OK, that's Mike. You know, I love these kids, but
• 1:08:55
  I love my son, right? No one would have blinked an eye
• 1:08:59
  if you just said, hey, you know what, guys, this is how you
• 1:09:01
  train 1/4 Miller and you spout out how you were coached or what
• 1:09:04
  you learned from John Smith. Again, you you had said things
• 1:09:06
  that John Smith. I mean, who would have?
• 1:09:08
  Argued with you and yet you said, OK, well, it's been a
• 1:09:12
  while. Maybe things are different.
• 1:09:14
  Let me go find out. Like that's humility, you know,
• 1:09:18
  to call up a a Leroy, to call up a maybe a queue and be like,
• 1:09:21
  hey, So what should I be doing these kids And, you know, maybe
• 1:09:24
  some of them were like, dude, you ran 45, like do what you
• 1:09:28
  did. You know, they, they didn't.
• 1:09:29
  I know them. They're really smart.
• 1:09:30
  They talked, they talked you through.
• 1:09:31
  But that's a real like when I think about coaches and the
• 1:09:34
  coaches we've had here on the podcast.
• 1:09:37
  And the ones that have, they're all successful in their own
• 1:09:40
  right. When we talk about the ones that
• 1:09:42
  are winning championships, which that's not always the definition
• 1:09:44
  of success, but in this example it is.
• 1:09:47
  They're the ones who ask questions, who stay curious, who
• 1:09:51
  stay. The more they know, the more
• 1:09:54
  questions they ask. You know, I I think of people
• 1:09:57
  like a Keba Tolbert, a Bouchexnader, a Mouse Holloway.
• 1:10:00
  All three have, you know, a podcast alums.
• 1:10:03
  And I think about the success they've had.
• 1:10:04
  Amazing. And then I think about when I
• 1:10:06
  talk to them, they're always asking questions.
• 1:10:08
  They ask me, I haven't coached in 17 years and they're like,
• 1:10:11
  hey, so Mike, when you did it, what'd you do?
• 1:10:12
  And it's like, well, first, I don't want to screw you up.
• 1:10:14
  So I'm not answering that question.
• 1:10:15
  But it's just, it's just. Always interested me.
• 1:10:18
  In fact the the book that I'm talking about that I wish I
• 1:10:20
  could remember was Kayla Tolbert on Twitter saying, hey, I got
• 1:10:24
  this new book that every coach needs.
• 1:10:25
  I'm 60 pages in and it is unbelievable, like, you know, so
• 1:10:29
  he's still learning. Kayla Tolbert's genius and he's
• 1:10:32
  still learning. And I I just love that humility.
• 1:10:36
  It's like, all right, I got to go.
• 1:10:37
  I I know some stuff. I'm not starting from Ground
• 1:10:39
  Zero, but I also know that I don't know everything.
• 1:10:41
  So I need to go. Go work it out.
• 1:10:43
  That's interesting. There's some smart people there.
• 1:10:45
  There's a lot of smart, successful people.
• 1:10:47
  So how did you? How did you develop you and the
• 1:10:50
  staff? How did you develop Danny and
• 1:10:52
  what compare and contrast his high school and summer club
• 1:10:57
  experiences versus yours? We talked about yours was very
• 1:11:01
  compartmentalized. High school season was high
• 1:11:03
  school season and then summer season was summer season.
• 1:11:06
  How was was Danny's So Bryce. So Bryce is.
• 1:11:10
  Did I say so? Bryce's was very different
• 1:11:14
  because it came in a different time period, right?
• 1:11:16
  He he needed to learn how to hurdle.
• 1:11:19
  I couldn't help him. I didn't know how to coach
• 1:11:21
  hurdles, so I had to go find someone.
• 1:11:23
  And you're talking about Vince? Anderson said it best once.
• 1:11:27
  He said. There's probably less than 100
• 1:11:30
  really solid hurdle coaches in this whole country and we're
• 1:11:34
  talking about on all levels combined.
• 1:11:36
  That's how special that event was or is from a technical
• 1:11:40
  standpoint. I was a hurdle coach and Vince
• 1:11:42
  once told me I was 101st. Now I know him, I know that he
• 1:11:48
  didn't. He didn't say that to you so and
• 1:11:50
  said, but he is. He would have made me think I
• 1:11:53
  was #1. That's how great of a motivator
• 1:11:55
  he is, man. He made me like, you're the best
• 1:11:56
  heard of coach in the world. And I believe I'm like Vince.
• 1:11:58
  You're right. That's, you know, he he's
• 1:12:00
  amazing. Love him.
• 1:12:01
  Love him. I have so many files still where
• 1:12:04
  this man just willingly gave me things while he was at A&M.
• 1:12:08
  That helped me to even prepare Bryce.
• 1:12:11
  I didn't know what to look for now.
• 1:12:13
  I had. I had his charts.
• 1:12:15
  I had his projections. I could plug in times.
• 1:12:18
  I had the opportunity to meet coach James Spivey, who's in
• 1:12:21
  high school. He's probably one of the most
• 1:12:23
  prominent herbal coaches in that Houston area.
• 1:12:26
  His list, track record of experiences and compliments are
• 1:12:29
  a mile long, 70 plus years old, Doesn't get on social media, but
• 1:12:34
  all he has done is produce results.
• 1:12:37
  Had the opportunity to then take Bryce over to him when he was
• 1:12:41
  this summer before 8th and 9th grade so he could start to go
• 1:12:44
  and and that he had a philosophy at the time.
• 1:12:45
  He would not take football players.
• 1:12:47
  You had to quit football if you wanted to work with him because
• 1:12:50
  he wanted so much time with the hurdles.
• 1:12:51
  It says old school right there and and he knew sometimes the
• 1:12:55
  conflict with football coaches and he and he always felt like I
• 1:12:58
  don't want to invest so much time in someone when this isn't
• 1:13:01
  going to be what's going to take them moving forward when I can
• 1:13:04
  be invested at time with someone else.
• 1:13:06
  And then we he we had an agreement that he actually
• 1:13:09
  trusted me when I said, hey, I can manage him away from you.
• 1:13:14
  You just worry about coaching him.
• 1:13:16
  I'll take care of football. And Bryce was his first football
• 1:13:20
  athlete that he let into his program.
• 1:13:22
  And so then again, we talk about relationships.
• 1:13:26
  Relationships are what allowed me to be able to still work with
• 1:13:28
  his high school football coach to to help him to get out of
• 1:13:32
  certain things that he could do track when it was track time.
• 1:13:36
  And I think there is, you know, obviously there's a level of
• 1:13:38
  credibility that comes along with my past athletic
• 1:13:42
  performances that gives me the opportunity to talk to the high
• 1:13:46
  school football coach because say, hey, I know what you're
• 1:13:47
  doing. I know what you're trying to do.
• 1:13:50
  I've played it. I get it.
• 1:13:52
  High school track coach, I've done it.
• 1:13:54
  I've played it. I get it.
• 1:13:56
  Hey, this is what he needs. This is how I like to manage it.
• 1:13:59
  And it was just a different opportunity for us to
• 1:14:01
  collaborate because also he was in an event that we really
• 1:14:05
  didn't have someone to teach him how to do.
• 1:14:09
  And so I think that was a all year process with a hurdle
• 1:14:13
  coach. But then now he has his club
• 1:14:14
  team and so now I'm coaching club track at this point.
• 1:14:18
  And now for the first time he's introduced to an indoor track
• 1:14:22
  season. And that becomes always an
• 1:14:24
  interesting dynamic because he's leaving football in the fall.
• 1:14:27
  Now we're getting ready to run indoor track when the high
• 1:14:31
  school program is simultaneously getting ready for outdoor track
• 1:14:34
  because we start so early in Texas in February that now we've
• 1:14:37
  got to get him ready to run in January.
• 1:14:40
  Which means that I have to start training him a little bit during
• 1:14:43
  the football season. Now.
• 1:14:44
  Fortunately at the time he was playing subvarsity football, so
• 1:14:48
  he would be, he'd have his games on Thursday and then now Bryce
• 1:14:52
  not with the track on Saturdays. And we do at least one track
• 1:14:55
  out, one track work out a week then he would be with Coach
• 1:14:59
  Spivey on Sundays for hurdles. So he so he took advantage of
• 1:15:03
  sub varsity games being played on Thursday.
• 1:15:05
  We used the weekend for track. Now we go and get him ready for
• 1:15:09
  indoors and at the time I'm not doing any coaching during the
• 1:15:12
  school year. So once the indoor track season
• 1:15:15
  over with, just turn him back over to his high school program.
• 1:15:19
  And at the time, his high school coach was, you know, a pretty
• 1:15:23
  good men's coach or boys coach, excuse me.
• 1:15:26
  And he ran track himself. So he kind of got it and and I
• 1:15:30
  felt like for the first time I could leave Bryce in good hands.
• 1:15:35
  And it was actually his departure that made me coach
• 1:15:40
  more because had I had that high school coach not left that
• 1:15:46
  program, I wouldn't even be coaching the way that I'm
• 1:15:49
  coaching now because Bryce would have had a solid offseason
• 1:15:52
  program. He'd have had, he'd have been
• 1:15:55
  well taken care of. And if there's nothing for me to
• 1:15:57
  do, I can be on vacation, so to speak, during that time period.
• 1:16:01
  But when he left the program with him, left a track guy.
• 1:16:06
  And so one unique thing about his high school at the time, it
• 1:16:09
  was one of the rare high schools where the boys track team was
• 1:16:13
  not being led by a football coach.
• 1:16:15
  They had a singularly focused track coach for the boys
• 1:16:19
  program, which enabled them to be able to have an offseason
• 1:16:22
  program. And so then when he left, their
• 1:16:26
  created a void. And so then I had to fill that
• 1:16:29
  void for him. And then in the process of
• 1:16:31
  trying to fill the void for Bryce, I recognized how many
• 1:16:34
  other kids were missing solid offseason programs and they
• 1:16:40
  weren't able to prepare for indoor as many of the of their
• 1:16:44
  high school coaches. They might not have understood,
• 1:16:47
  you know, training cycles to be able to to bring a kid through a
• 1:16:50
  full year. They might not have understood
• 1:16:52
  the significance or the importance of indoor.
• 1:16:56
  It might be because we don't offer indoor as a high school
• 1:16:59
  sport in Texas. There becomes that natural
• 1:17:02
  divide between the club and the high school during that time
• 1:17:05
  period where the kid wants to run indoor track.
• 1:17:08
  And maybe because the high school coach doesn't have a
• 1:17:10
  vested interest in indoor track, now they're like, I don't want
• 1:17:13
  you to focus on this because we start track season so early in
• 1:17:17
  Texas in February. I don't want anything to happen
• 1:17:20
  to you during this month. I want you ready to go in
• 1:17:23
  February. So there.
• 1:17:24
  So Bryce's experience was a whole different dynamic because
• 1:17:29
  things that changed and then now all of a sudden, you know, if I
• 1:17:32
  think about this realistically, the kids that I work with, I
• 1:17:38
  probably have them eleven out of the 12 months of the year.
• 1:17:43
  So now that that brought a different dynamic to how I think
• 1:17:46
  about my coaching because I have to kind of have a plan for them
• 1:17:49
  in the fall. I got to have a plan for them in
• 1:17:52
  the indoor season. I also have to think through how
• 1:17:54
  do I manage with their high school programs.
• 1:17:57
  So I got to think about this block of time, which is the high
• 1:18:00
  school track program. How do I, how do I partner with
• 1:18:03
  them the best way that I possibly can, but also giving
• 1:18:06
  them the respect of understanding.
• 1:18:07
  It's your time because I was like that with Bryce, with all
• 1:18:11
  of his high school coaches. None of them will tell you I
• 1:18:14
  interfered with him. It was during the high school
• 1:18:17
  team. It was their program I stepped
• 1:18:20
  out. The only supplemental work that
• 1:18:24
  Bryce got when he was at George Rance High School was with Coach
• 1:18:28
  Spivey for the hurdles. Because that was such a
• 1:18:30
  technical event, we all kind of agreed we're not going to get in
• 1:18:33
  the way with what Coach Spivey is doing.
• 1:18:35
  And because at the time, his high school head coach, he
• 1:18:39
  wasn't a hurdle guy. He understood the 300 meter
• 1:18:42
  hurdles just from a from a race structure standpoint.
• 1:18:45
  So he could take Bryce there and we felt comfortable with that.
• 1:18:47
  But he wasn't a technical hurdles coach.
• 1:18:50
  They didn't have the 110 program.
• 1:18:52
  So Bryce had the technical aspect with an outside coach and
• 1:18:58
  then when that coach, when that coach actually left George Ranch
• 1:19:01
  now we didn't even have anybody that was that could help him
• 1:19:04
  with either hurdles. But by that time, Bryce kind of
• 1:19:08
  understood what he needed to do and then I could kind of step in
• 1:19:11
  where needed. And then we by this time we had
• 1:19:13
  COVID. The COVID year 2020.
• 1:19:15
  When we came back, 2021, the the new high school coach allowed me
• 1:19:20
  to come up to the school on hurdle days and I could sit in
• 1:19:25
  the stands. So I couldn't be a part of the
• 1:19:27
  practice. But I could sit in the stands,
• 1:19:29
  watch Bryce. Bryce would have a cell phone
• 1:19:32
  out at the track. I could record him coming
• 1:19:35
  through a Rep, He would go back between the reps, call me from
• 1:19:38
  his cell phone. I'd coach him from the stands.
• 1:19:41
  I'd send him the video over and he kind of look at the video in
• 1:19:44
  there and that's that's how he kind of worked through his
• 1:19:47
  senior year. But it was it was just it's
• 1:19:49
  always been a very different dynamic because things have
• 1:19:52
  changed. Now you talk about how fast
• 1:19:54
  athletes are now. There's no way that you can be
• 1:19:58
  as fast as they are now without having a higher level of
• 1:20:02
  coaching, more consistent coaching over the course of the
• 1:20:05
  year. And that also leads to some of
• 1:20:07
  the potential rubs between. The coaches and how they're
• 1:20:12
  trying to blend in programs and work with athletes.
• 1:20:15
  And I want to spend our remaining time on that, but
• 1:20:17
  before I do, I want to talk to Dad.
• 1:20:21
  Danny McCray as Bryce. You know Bryce was one of the
• 1:20:24
  top heard. There's top track athletes
• 1:20:27
  recruiting wise. You went through a fairly
• 1:20:31
  extensive and I know it's different from when you were
• 1:20:33
  recruited from when Bryce was recruiting and you're coming
• 1:20:35
  through COVID as well, which you know.
• 1:20:38
  Monks it all up as well. How did you handle as dad Bryce
• 1:20:44
  being recruited. He's being recruited by the top
• 1:20:46
  of the top. Yeah.
• 1:20:47
  How did that yeah. How do you how do you how do you
• 1:20:49
  you know I'm I'm a dad of a almost 13 year old 13 when
• 1:20:52
  you're listening to this and and you know you have as a as a
• 1:20:57
  parent this mixture of I I want to be involved.
• 1:21:00
  I need to be involved, but I also need them to make their own
• 1:21:03
  decisions, So I I can't imagine right now.
• 1:21:07
  And my kids are only 13, so luckily I got a few years, but I
• 1:21:09
  can't imagine going through that process of a kid making a very
• 1:21:13
  important decision where they go to school.
• 1:21:15
  How did you guys navigate that? First, I think as I tell all the
• 1:21:19
  kids in our program, it is absolutely amazing to me that
• 1:21:22
  one of the most important decision that you're ever going
• 1:21:24
  to make in your life is choosing which university you attend, and
• 1:21:27
  you're making that decision at 1718 years old.
• 1:21:30
  Have you have you been listening to the podcast?
• 1:21:33
  No, because my plan was to go after to listen.
• 1:21:35
  Because we talk about this, we don't talk.
• 1:21:37
  I haven't put it in the words, you just put it there in regards
• 1:21:39
  to the college selection. But I do think it is ludicrous
• 1:21:43
  that we ask 18 year olds to pick a major that is supposed to be
• 1:21:46
  the rest of their life as 18 year olds like.
• 1:21:49
  So the very same vein there, that's like, wait a minute, we
• 1:21:51
  we're in the same track on that one.
• 1:21:53
  Well, absolutely. And one of the rules that I
• 1:21:55
  have, not only for Bryce and for all the kids that I coached, was
• 1:21:58
  one of the same rules that my dad gave me.
• 1:22:01
  Hey, you can ask me anything you want, but don't ask me where you
• 1:22:04
  should go to school. That's a decision that you got
• 1:22:07
  to make. I will walk Bryce and any other
• 1:22:10
  athlete through the pros and the cons.
• 1:22:12
  And I think one of the things that's kind of helped me along
• 1:22:15
  the way is the relationship that I have with so many college
• 1:22:18
  coaches and the way that I know them.
• 1:22:21
  I know their programs. I can think about the pros and
• 1:22:24
  cons for most universities, and I can help the kids think
• 1:22:27
  through. What are you looking for?
• 1:22:29
  What's most important for you? And these were some of the
• 1:22:32
  things that I kind of had to work with with Bryce because you
• 1:22:35
  know we had a rule and say hey Bryce there was a cut off for
• 1:22:39
  the academic ranking of universities hey you you can
• 1:22:42
  they have to be in the top 70. And I said because for him you
• 1:22:46
  know Bryce was was also we we laugh about this as father and
• 1:22:50
  son are. You talking about like the US
• 1:22:52
  World News and reports. We're going to talk about that.
• 1:22:55
  Danny, keep going. We're going to talk about that
• 1:22:57
  here in a second. Go ahead.
• 1:22:58
  So. So with Bryce, it was like,
• 1:22:59
  look, don't bring me a school that's not ranked in the top 70.
• 1:23:03
  I said because I feel like you were US number one in high
• 1:23:06
  school coming out. All right, You've run fast
• 1:23:10
  enough to where you can get the best of both worlds.
• 1:23:12
  You don't have to make any concessions for what you're
• 1:23:14
  looking for academically and you don't have to make any
• 1:23:16
  concessions for what you're looking for athletically.
• 1:23:18
  You've earned this. So for you, I want you to pick,
• 1:23:22
  I don't care what school, but don't have the drop off beyond
• 1:23:25
  this number, all right? Because for me, academics is so
• 1:23:29
  important. Because I told him and I'll tell
• 1:23:31
  other kid you you will wear, you will wear dress shoes much
• 1:23:36
  longer than you ever wear track spikes.
• 1:23:38
  So we need to make sure that the decision going into this is
• 1:23:42
  built around that first. And so it was, it was different
• 1:23:47
  and unique because some schools and I, despite me telling them
• 1:23:52
  some schools spent more time recruiting me than recruiting
• 1:23:55
  Bryce. And I was telling them Bryce is
• 1:23:57
  going to make his decision. You don't have to win me over.
• 1:24:01
  Win him over and then some schools, you know, they they
• 1:24:05
  they cultivated the relationship with him.
• 1:24:07
  He was still trying to figure out what he wanted to do.
• 1:24:10
  COVID was so different because his his senior year, they
• 1:24:16
  weren't even having official visits.
• 1:24:18
  Yeah, I was going to ask, did he even get to take official
• 1:24:19
  visits? So unofficial, I guess has to
• 1:24:22
  say yes. Officially, No.
• 1:24:25
  There was no way that I was letting Bryce only have a
• 1:24:28
  virtual tour of a university and go there.
• 1:24:32
  So his senior year I basically said we're going to do this the
• 1:24:36
  same way we would had you been able to be fully recruited with
• 1:24:40
  official visits. You pick your five schools that
• 1:24:43
  you want to see, I'll take you there myself.
• 1:24:46
  So we'll go around, we'll see the facilities and at the time
• 1:24:50
  they couldn't have any interactions with us, the
• 1:24:53
  college coaches, which to me made it better, to be honest,
• 1:24:56
  because we didn't have to have all the bells and the whistles.
• 1:24:58
  We didn't, you know, we got a chance.
• 1:25:00
  You get to see reality. We got to see everything for
• 1:25:03
  what it was. All I needed from them was OK.
• 1:25:06
  Where are these buildings? Can I get a map?
• 1:25:09
  Are there anything that you believe or is there anything you
• 1:25:12
  believe we need to see while we're down here?
• 1:25:14
  You give me that stuff, I will go map it out myself, right?
• 1:25:19
  We got a chance to even watch some people from afar practice.
• 1:25:23
  You know, we couldn't get in the gates, but we can stand outside
• 1:25:26
  the gates and we could watch. So I wanted him to be able to
• 1:25:28
  make the most informed decision that he possibly could make.
• 1:25:31
  I I love that you did that I I was working with a dad who's I'm
• 1:25:37
  trying to keep. This is is so you can't identify
• 1:25:42
  who I'm talking about here who had an athlete.
• 1:25:46
  A child that was one of the top, like #1 or #2 in the nation and
• 1:25:50
  went to a university, a great university, and was
• 1:25:53
  transferring. And that's when the dad called
• 1:25:56
  me up, was like, hey, we're looking at these schools.
• 1:25:58
  What do you know of these, you know, just kind of advising on
• 1:26:00
  that side of things. And I, I guess I never realized
• 1:26:05
  that this, the child never got to take physical trips either.
• 1:26:09
  And so all of this and I was like, Oh my gosh, how many kids?
• 1:26:12
  Chose a school based off of a YouTube video or a Facebook.
• 1:26:17
  You know a zoom cause like I never thought about that and I
• 1:26:21
  and I wondered if in today's you know the transfer portal gets
• 1:26:25
  this very, you know, devil thing.
• 1:26:28
  And I, which I always remind people like, no, we transferred
• 1:26:30
  before the transfer portal, right.
• 1:26:31
  Like like this is not brand new here.
• 1:26:34
  It may be easier. And by the way I'm a proponent
• 1:26:36
  of it. I know and you know.
• 1:26:38
  I know all my coaching friends are yelling at me right now.
• 1:26:40
  I shouldn't say all because it's a very controversial topic.
• 1:26:43
  But I love that a kid. At the end of the day, they're
• 1:26:45
  still a student, so I think they should be able to go to school
• 1:26:47
  wherever they want, whenever they want to crank with you.
• 1:26:50
  But I also know how it affects my friends who are coaches,
• 1:26:54
  professional life as well, you know, their jobs.
• 1:26:56
  I I, I do have a lot of empathy for that, but it just hit me
• 1:26:59
  when I was talking to this dad. I was like, Oh my gosh, how many
• 1:27:01
  kids. That's why I was wondering with
• 1:27:03
  with Bryce, I'm like, Oh my gosh, did he have to pick his
• 1:27:05
  school based off? Have a Facebook video or what,
• 1:27:08
  You know, whatever. Like, that's crazy.
• 1:27:09
  Think about when any of us went to go to school, anybody outside
• 1:27:12
  of COVID, you got to go see, you got to go talk to, you get to go
• 1:27:16
  explore. And this was like, you like our
• 1:27:18
  brochure come to school. I love that you guys took it
• 1:27:23
  upon yourselves. Like, all right, well, we're
• 1:27:24
  going to go check out these campuses.
• 1:27:26
  And I wonder if it ain't better the way you're talking about it
• 1:27:28
  of like, because, you know, coaches, we have to recruit.
• 1:27:31
  And so we do the bells and whistles.
• 1:27:32
  And we know those bells and whistles are not necessarily
• 1:27:34
  there once you get on campus. Let's be.
• 1:27:37
  Real here. So I love this like, hey man,
• 1:27:38
  there ain't no bells and there ain't no red carpet here.
• 1:27:40
  This is the the carpet of the school.
• 1:27:41
  We're going to go find out what real, what reality looks like.
• 1:27:44
  I love that, man. Bravo to you and family for
• 1:27:47
  doing that. I do want to talk about
• 1:27:48
  something real quick. You brought up the top 70 U.S.
• 1:27:52
  news and World Report. So I'm the kind of guy this is
• 1:27:54
  going to shock you and you listeners, you're going to be
• 1:27:56
  shocked to this. I listen to a podcast and I
• 1:27:58
  automatically think I know everything about that topic.
• 1:28:01
  So. But I really bring these things
• 1:28:04
  up because I want you to explore them.
• 1:28:05
  Not not only you, Danny, our guest, but well, do you have any
• 1:28:08
  more children? No, Sir.
• 1:28:10
  All right, So you don't have to worry about this anymore.
• 1:28:11
  But you listening that do have children.
• 1:28:13
  So I'm a huge fan of. Have you heard of Malcolm
• 1:28:17
  Gladwell? No.
• 1:28:19
  He's an author. He's actually a big time track
• 1:28:22
  guy, was like a Miller back in university.
• 1:28:23
  He's from Canada, Jamaican by descent and you know Canadian by
• 1:28:28
  living in education. Huge track fan, big big like a
• 1:28:31
  track nerd. He's like an author and he's an
• 1:28:33
  amazing author. Wrote books like Blink, which is
• 1:28:37
  one of my favorites. Outliers, which is one of
• 1:28:39
  actually everyone of his books is amazing.
• 1:28:41
  Blink, Outliers, Tipping Point was one of the first ones that
• 1:28:43
  really put him on the map. He's he's an amazing.
• 1:28:48
  Researcher and then takes all that kind of research and is an
• 1:28:51
  amazing storyteller. Go through books and now he has
• 1:28:54
  a podcast, which of course is escaping my brain for some.
• 1:28:59
  If you just in your podcast app, search Malcolm Gladwell, it'll
• 1:29:02
  come up Revisionist history where he takes topics that are,
• 1:29:06
  you know, forgotten or misunderstood and brings them
• 1:29:09
  out right. So he talked about the US News
• 1:29:12
  and World Report and how this thing is actually concocted.
• 1:29:15
  And you know, he's got a lot of data scientists, people behind
• 1:29:17
  him doing all this stuff, right. And the reason I was really
• 1:29:19
  interested in this is because one of the schools, actually,
• 1:29:23
  podcast alum from Dillard University was on the podcast
• 1:29:27
  track. Coach from there was on the
• 1:29:29
  podcast and I'm getting old Danny.
• 1:29:33
  That was, that was episode like. Yeah, that was episode like 80.
• 1:29:37
  So Oh my gosh, his Twitter's like.
• 1:29:41
  The track coach. Oh my gosh, I see him all the
• 1:29:43
  time. I'm so sorry.
• 1:29:44
  I know you're listening and you're so disappointed me.
• 1:29:46
  If you if you want to know, look in the podcast up and search
• 1:29:49
  Billiard University and that will bring up his episode.
• 1:29:52
  He's at Dillard University and Malcolm used Dillard as the
• 1:29:55
  example. Dillard University, a small HBCU
• 1:29:58
  school down in the New Orleans area, is never going to be in
• 1:30:02
  the top 70, top 100 of the US News World Report.
• 1:30:06
  And he showed because of graduation rates and what the
• 1:30:09
  the kids that actually go on, what jobs they do and acceptance
• 1:30:12
  rates. And really it's a lot about
• 1:30:14
  endowment. And you can imagine that Dillard
• 1:30:16
  has a less endowment than a Harvard.
• 1:30:19
  And where if they were? I think he, if I remember he
• 1:30:22
  took out endowment from the equation and maybe something
• 1:30:28
  else. I don't think it was student to
• 1:30:29
  teacher ratio. There's some other kind of like,
• 1:30:32
  is that really important to education?
• 1:30:34
  And Dillard would have been like, I'm probably exaggerating
• 1:30:37
  here because I'm acting like I know it all because I listen to
• 1:30:39
  one podcast. But I think Dillard would have
• 1:30:41
  been like a top 10 on the US News and World Report, OK?
• 1:30:46
  It was really amazing. I just I I remember sending it
• 1:30:48
  to the I can see that I can believe.
• 1:30:49
  It I remember sending it to the track coach and I was like,
• 1:30:51
  you've got an amazing school there.
• 1:30:53
  But unfortunately when I go to look at the US news or report, I
• 1:30:55
  go maybe I shouldn't look at Dillard and it's like actually
• 1:30:58
  you should absolutely look at a dealer.
• 1:31:01
  So anyway, just set aside because I always like to each
• 1:31:03
  other people into it. Dillard is a fantastic
• 1:31:05
  university. That was a great example.
• 1:31:07
  So how did? And I don't want to, you know, I
• 1:31:08
  don't like necessarily talking about people who aren't that are
• 1:31:11
  right in front of me, but I'll take some liberty to it since
• 1:31:14
  he's your son. Bryce ended up choosing Georgia
• 1:31:17
  Carol Smith. Gilbert.
• 1:31:18
  Boy, I'm not sure you could go wrong there.
• 1:31:20
  I love Carol. Known her for a long time.
• 1:31:23
  She is committed to being a future guest.
• 1:31:25
  She's just super, super busy this summer, so I couldn't get
• 1:31:27
  her this year, but she'll be on the show and is now transferred
• 1:31:30
  to Texas A&M. How did As far as what you want,
• 1:31:34
  you know, you could say I don't want to talk about it all and
• 1:31:36
  we'll move on. It's completely OK.
• 1:31:38
  How did the decision go into going to Athens and then
• 1:31:40
  deciding I'm going to follow Dad's steps and become a a 12th
• 1:31:43
  man? Is that how you say, I don't
• 1:31:44
  know. Is that 12th man?
• 1:31:46
  No. He's safe for his journey.
• 1:31:47
  Was a little bit unique in that when he chose Georgia and signed
• 1:31:51
  with Georgia, he signed underneath the previous coaching
• 1:31:54
  staff, so. Which is funny, because that
• 1:31:59
  coaching staff is now right here.
• 1:32:01
  I'm in Champaign, IL. I shouldn't say the coaching
• 1:32:03
  staff, but Petros, the Head Coach podcast alum by the way.
• 1:32:07
  And I love Petros, by the way, so they're not only will I, I
• 1:32:10
  will never allow coaching bashing on this podcast anyway.
• 1:32:12
  So, but yes, love. Petros, by the way, So love.
• 1:32:15
  Petros was the head coach. Yes, yes, yes.
• 1:32:17
  And then Althea Thomas, so coach AT.
• 1:32:20
  Another podcast alum Love AT Come On.
• 1:32:22
  Yep. And Bryce absolutely adored her.
• 1:32:27
  I remember during COVID, I could come downstairs and I could tell
• 1:32:32
  who he was on the phone with just because of how he was
• 1:32:35
  smiling and laughing. I knew you must.
• 1:32:39
  You must talk to Coach AT. Yeah.
• 1:32:40
  How you know that? Because I could just tell.
• 1:32:42
  Right. So then it was he signed and
• 1:32:46
  then they had to transition. That makes you clear.
• 1:32:49
  Complete sense. And so he it was almost a re
• 1:32:52
  recruitment so to speak and he took his official, his actual
• 1:32:56
  the only official visit he ever got to take was After that they
• 1:33:01
  they changed the rules and he could actually go visit UGA.
• 1:33:05
  And so Carol brought him in with the other athletes that she was
• 1:33:09
  recruiting at the time. So that was our opportunity to
• 1:33:11
  meet her. Great coach, great woman.
• 1:33:17
  You know, I always laughed. It's like Mama Carol, you know
• 1:33:19
  it. It's she's going to care about
• 1:33:21
  those kids for for Bryce, it was a good opportunity for him to be
• 1:33:26
  there. It was a different opportunity.
• 1:33:28
  It was a different school for him.
• 1:33:30
  He didn't understand the difference in big, small, big
• 1:33:33
  school, small school terms of teams.
• 1:33:35
  When, you know, for Bryce's situation was so unique in that
• 1:33:39
  when he got there as a freshman, there were no other freshman
• 1:33:43
  sprinters and hurdlers. There were no other sophomore
• 1:33:45
  sprinters and hurdlers. It it was literally Matt Elijah,
• 1:33:50
  Caleb Kavanaugh. Those group were juniors at that
• 1:33:53
  point in time. So when he went there, it wasn't
• 1:33:56
  the same that you would know, the same experience that
• 1:33:59
  normally a group of freshmen have when they first come on.
• 1:34:02
  That also helped him to grow up a little bit.
• 1:34:04
  But it was also the dynamics and changes that he came off of
• 1:34:07
  COVID, where his last year and a half of high school was inside.
• 1:34:12
  And I think that there's also some emotional maturity that we
• 1:34:17
  missed on that group of kids because, you know, he didn't
• 1:34:20
  have a prom, You know, you know, all these things that he missed
• 1:34:25
  out along the way, all right? He didn't have the typical
• 1:34:28
  homecoming dance. And you know, the the process of
• 1:34:31
  getting your car at this point, period of time he's learning
• 1:34:34
  online where they're telling you, hey, you can, you can turn
• 1:34:38
  your work in 1159, all right? But then you still turn your
• 1:34:41
  work in late and there really isn't a whole bunch of
• 1:34:44
  consequences that follow you as well there.
• 1:34:47
  So for him there was just a lot of experiences that he had to
• 1:34:51
  then adjust to changing when he was when he was in college And
• 1:34:57
  and also there's also difference of styles and expectations.
• 1:35:02
  All right. And and what you want from your
• 1:35:04
  athletes and you know when you're when you're your director
• 1:35:08
  you have the opportunity to build and create the team you
• 1:35:11
  want and the way you want it and you need to fall in line.
• 1:35:15
  And I think they were just some things that Bryce will be the
• 1:35:17
  first one to tell you that there were mistakes that he made.
• 1:35:20
  And I can tell you that Carol loves him.
• 1:35:22
  He loves Carol. And and I think for him it just
• 1:35:26
  came to a point where he wanted to try something different.
• 1:35:30
  All right. Being and then being able to
• 1:35:32
  come back home, go to, you know, go to A&M, you know, go to go
• 1:35:36
  to, you know, school that had a little bit of a different
• 1:35:39
  emphasis on quarter hurdles. Yeah, a different team that's
• 1:35:43
  involved. You know what I love about that
• 1:35:45
  first of all? Niall Laguenia at Dillard Okay,
• 1:35:48
  yeah. Yeah, and he's awesome.
• 1:35:50
  He's one of the 1st 100 guests we've had here, so I love follow
• 1:35:53
  him online. Yeah, exactly.
• 1:35:55
  He's great, man. I love him to death.
• 1:35:57
  You know what I love about that story is.
• 1:36:00
  Not necessarily the peak behind what an 18 seventeen 1819 year
• 1:36:03
  old kid is going through but what I really like about that is
• 1:36:06
  you on the outside. We we we've had George Williams
• 1:36:09
  on the podcast before. Great coach from Saint
• 1:36:12
  Augustine's Olympic coach and he is famous for.
• 1:36:15
  You've heard me say this many many times on the podcast
• 1:36:16
  before. If you're not in the huddle you
• 1:36:19
  don't know the play and what that is.
• 1:36:21
  It's really a a a way to think about judgement and how you
• 1:36:24
  judge others. And so it's real easy using
• 1:36:27
  Bryce as the example because we have him right in front of us
• 1:36:29
  here with Dad is to say, Oh yeah, there's another transfer
• 1:36:32
  portal. Kid went to Georgia, didn't like
• 1:36:35
  the new coach decided to leave, went back to daddy's school.
• 1:36:38
  You know, it's very easy to judge that.
• 1:36:40
  So now they actually hear the story.
• 1:36:42
  It's like, oh man, this kid didn't even get a visit and then
• 1:36:44
  when he got there, the team was different.
• 1:36:46
  Left by the way on good terms. Him and coach Samantha Gilbert
• 1:36:49
  are are great like that's. That that's why you don't judge
• 1:36:52
  people. That's exactly why you don't
• 1:36:53
  judge the situation. You weren't in the huddle.
• 1:36:55
  You don't know what in the world was going on.
• 1:36:57
  So I appreciate you you sharing that I, I I do want to.
• 1:37:00
  I do want to say one thing about that.
• 1:37:02
  It's funny, people often times assume even advice being accrued
• 1:37:06
  the first time and then when hit the transfer portal that it
• 1:37:11
  would be me staring him to A&M when it was the exact opposite,
• 1:37:18
  right? Bryce made these decisions all
• 1:37:19
  on his own. He had, you know, to to not go
• 1:37:22
  to A&M the first time and to choose Georgia over A&M.
• 1:37:26
  And then when he left, when people hit him up when he was in
• 1:37:30
  the transfer portal, I tried to get him, hey, go look at these
• 1:37:33
  schools, go take these visits. He made the decision because he
• 1:37:37
  had done his homework. He's like, no, this is kind of
• 1:37:39
  where I want to go. And so it's completely
• 1:37:41
  independent of me and which makes this even more special to
• 1:37:45
  me to be able to, you know, a side note, I was there a couple
• 1:37:48
  days ago this week when they updated the top twelve all time
• 1:37:52
  leaderboard and to see his name there and he only he was only
• 1:37:57
  been in school for one semester. You know, Bryce's journey was so
• 1:38:02
  different because his freshman year in Georgia he got hurt and
• 1:38:06
  then so he got hurt end up having a stress reaction in his
• 1:38:09
  hip and you're like man, a 19 year old with a stress reaction
• 1:38:12
  in his hip. We don't want to have a stress
• 1:38:13
  fracture. So he didn't do anything this
• 1:38:15
  summer. So he that's why he didn't get a
• 1:38:17
  chance to go to U 20s. And he was the number one kid in
• 1:38:22
  the US at the time #3 in the world for his age and it hurt
• 1:38:26
  him not to be able to go to that meet.
• 1:38:29
  So he didn't practice in the summer, then didn't practice in
• 1:38:32
  the fall. He literally didn't get back on
• 1:38:35
  the track again and start working out until January 15th
• 1:38:37
  of this year. And so then Fast forward and
• 1:38:40
  then to see him PR and then run 4970 become #11 all time at A&M
• 1:38:45
  to walk walk those halls on Wednesday and to see my name his
• 1:38:52
  name and we're there together and watch him at practice and
• 1:38:55
  see man you're like man this this kids actually pretty good.
• 1:38:57
  It's just a, it's just a really good feeling and it's but to
• 1:39:01
  know that these are his choices, but most importantly, to see him
• 1:39:05
  have the connection in the network of friends that are at
• 1:39:08
  A&M and how they how they how they hang out with each other.
• 1:39:12
  I'll go back to the beginning of the podcast.
• 1:39:13
  When I told you about my experience at A&M, I'm literally
• 1:39:17
  seeing him experience these very same things that I got this
• 1:39:21
  opportunity to experience. He's having a blast.
• 1:39:23
  I've never seen him with a bigger smile on his face than he
• 1:39:27
  has now. I mean, he's an hour and a half,
• 1:39:30
  not even an hour and 15 minutes of the street, and he rarely
• 1:39:32
  even comes home because he's having so much fun there.
• 1:39:35
  Well, I I would have assumed if you were really that overbearing
• 1:39:37
  parent that was going to make your kid transfer back.
• 1:39:39
  He had gone to Houston because that's much closer.
• 1:39:41
  And by the way, he's got Carl and Will and all those, you
• 1:39:44
  know, it's not like great people, great staff.
• 1:39:45
  Yeah, So I'm saying it's not like that's any, you know this
• 1:39:49
  that's a great school to go to for track and field.
• 1:39:51
  So I I took the parent. Oversight, 'cause I'm like,
• 1:39:54
  yeah, I know you're, you know A&M and I know A and people
• 1:39:55
  stick together. But it's like, man, Houston
• 1:39:57
  would be closer. And by the way then that could
• 1:39:58
  be a practice every day. And I I could be seeing
• 1:40:01
  everything that was going on if I if you if I'd have made him go
• 1:40:04
  to Houston. So yeah, I took that out, out of
• 1:40:07
  the out of the equation early on that, hey, let's spend the rest
• 1:40:09
  of our time here, Danny, let's talk about, give us a kind of an
• 1:40:12
  oversight on what you're doing now coaching And then maybe more
• 1:40:17
  importantly, besides 'cause we know you're coaching in summer
• 1:40:20
  or I should say club. You know I like to bust myths.
• 1:40:24
  I like to have, you know hard discussions, hard topics that so
• 1:40:27
  that we can get things on the table and you know kind of move
• 1:40:30
  together as coaches. You know there is this not myth
• 1:40:34
  there is this it's it's not I I like to stay away from big words
• 1:40:39
  in regard I'm from Alabama. I like to stay away from big
• 1:40:41
  words. I like to stay away from like
• 1:40:43
  complete. So like a lot of or the majority
• 1:40:47
  of because you know there's no stats.
• 1:40:48
  We don't really know this. I I typically think actually
• 1:40:51
  things that we're hearing and reading on social media are
• 1:40:53
  actually very small snippets of of what's going on.
• 1:40:55
  I think it's the the the vast majority of things going on in
• 1:40:59
  the track coaching world are positive.
• 1:41:00
  But I do know we have these discussions about high school
• 1:41:03
  coach versus club coach and in Texas it is a little unique.
• 1:41:08
  You do have more of a club culture in Texas than you do in
• 1:41:11
  say Alabama or even here in Illinois.
• 1:41:13
  And we we have a pretty good club culture here in Illinois.
• 1:41:15
  But in Texas from pole vault clubs to, you know, full team
• 1:41:20
  track clubs there, there's a much more of a culture there in
• 1:41:23
  Texas. How are you what what is your
• 1:41:27
  stance on high school coaching, high school kids when they're in
• 1:41:32
  track season versus you talked about the early January,
• 1:41:35
  February and then the late, you know after state meet summer.
• 1:41:38
  What What's your philosophy of your role throughout that
• 1:41:42
  season? OK, so it has evolved over time.
• 1:41:48
  As I've learned more and experienced more, my thoughts
• 1:41:51
  have changed. You know, I really not.
• 1:41:53
  That's a That's a good sign. So one of the one of the
• 1:41:58
  interesting dynamics that I've seen and let me just first make
• 1:42:01
  a disclaimer, whether it be private coach, club coach, high
• 1:42:03
  school coach, there are great ones, there are good ones and
• 1:42:06
  there are bad ones on either side.
• 1:42:08
  And sometimes the problem is the good ones don't know they're
• 1:42:12
  good, and the bad ones don't know they're bad.
• 1:42:15
  And you're still impacting a child.
• 1:42:17
  You're still having a young athlete.
• 1:42:19
  And track is one of those sports where it's really interesting.
• 1:42:22
  Track is just one of those sports where everybody thinks
• 1:42:25
  they're all the same, right? So if we look at football,
• 1:42:29
  football is one of those sports where there's a natural
• 1:42:31
  hierarchy because there's wins and losses Here you don't see
• 1:42:35
  people saying, hey, you know, like Gary Joseph is a very
• 1:42:39
  successful coach. High school Katy, TX won out of
• 1:42:42
  state titles, you know? You don't see people say I'm
• 1:42:45
  just as good as him, All right? You won't see I'm just as good
• 1:42:48
  as Nick Saban. I'm just as good as Bill
• 1:42:50
  Belichick. You know, sometimes A-Team
• 1:42:53
  sports there, there's just a differentiation in level of
• 1:42:57
  skill where with track, everybody thinks they're the
• 1:43:01
  same for the most part. A lot of people say, I'm saying
• 1:43:03
  everyone. A lot of people think they're
• 1:43:05
  the same. There's not much difference
• 1:43:06
  between me and them. They just happen to have an
• 1:43:09
  athlete that has better clay. You know they're just getting
• 1:43:12
  the faster the more talented kid.
• 1:43:14
  If you give me that same athlete, I can get those same
• 1:43:18
  results and it and it's and when you realize in track that's not
• 1:43:23
  the case there. There there really are people
• 1:43:25
  who continuously Dr. Results at a higher level than other
• 1:43:29
  people, Absolutely. And you should stay to say, hey,
• 1:43:31
  look, can I figure out what they're doing?
• 1:43:34
  Well, if you get high school and club coaches together, all
• 1:43:39
  right. You get some of those same
• 1:43:41
  dynamics. One of the things that I also
• 1:43:43
  felt like much to the much The funny thing I tell people, high
• 1:43:49
  school coaches are often times very responsible for the club
• 1:43:52
  coaches feeling like they've got a lot of success.
• 1:43:55
  Because from a training standpoint, most of the high
• 1:43:58
  school coaches as time has gone on, there was always this this
• 1:44:04
  mindset that you want to do everything 1st and Sprint last.
• 1:44:09
  Work on our speed development late used to be a you always, I
• 1:44:12
  still hear people say, oh man, we've been doing this, this and
• 1:44:15
  this and we still haven't been doing these speed work yet.
• 1:44:18
  Like that was like this big rite of passion to success.
• 1:44:21
  And so a lot of high school coaches would wait so long to
• 1:44:25
  even develop speed that all the gains that they were think they
• 1:44:29
  were going to get with the athlete.
• 1:44:31
  They were just delaying them to the summertime.
• 1:44:33
  And the club coach in the summertime is going to get all
• 1:44:36
  the benefit of that late delayed speed work that you have.
• 1:44:40
  So you said stay there. I know you got more, but I want
• 1:44:42
  to stay because I want to that that's interesting.
• 1:44:44
  Never thought about it like that because just recently, at least
• 1:44:48
  recently when we're recording someone, I won't, I won't out
• 1:44:52
  them on Twitter. I retweeted it so you could you
• 1:44:55
  know go check that. But someone said there are a lot
• 1:44:58
  of high school coaches that are anti, I'm kind of paraphrasing
• 1:45:01
  that are anti summer club coaches that are anti summer
• 1:45:05
  club coaching that are still taking credit for all the work
• 1:45:08
  that we do. Meaning, you know as a club
• 1:45:10
  coach I have made these athletes great And then you're going to
• 1:45:12
  go win the conference or regional or state title and
• 1:45:15
  you're going to take all the credit and not give me any
• 1:45:16
  credit. You're kind of flipping that
• 1:45:19
  here a little bit and saying, yeah, some of that, some of
• 1:45:22
  results that you're getting is because of the way that maybe I
• 1:45:25
  don't agree with or coaching during track and so they're
• 1:45:28
  actually delaying it so you get the benefits.
• 1:45:29
  That's super interesting to me. Because it it happens right and
• 1:45:34
  so and then there's different levels of high school coaches
• 1:45:37
  right. And some run quality programs
• 1:45:42
  and some not so much and it and it the same thing happens on the
• 1:45:45
  outside and and so I think the dynamic that happens is that now
• 1:45:50
  you have a lot of people going back and forth and trackage is
• 1:45:53
  one of those sports quite frankly if you get a kid,
• 1:45:56
  especially a high school kid, boy or girl, they're growing,
• 1:46:00
  they're developing, their their bodies are still changing.
• 1:46:03
  If you just have them do something, they're going to get
• 1:46:06
  better. And so as a result, if there's
• 1:46:09
  improvement, who's to say that that improvement is bad?
• 1:46:11
  So the coach that's driving that at high school, even if they
• 1:46:14
  have an unorthodox training philosophy, by definition their
• 1:46:18
  their system was successful and the same thing could apply to
• 1:46:22
  the outside coach. And then it's only when you
• 1:46:25
  invest in more knowledge that you begin to figure out why an
• 1:46:30
  athlete might change. Right.
• 1:46:31
  Why they might improve, I think sometimes and and not not to
• 1:46:36
  pick on my high school colleagues, but I've always felt
• 1:46:39
  like if high school track coaches invested in coaching
• 1:46:44
  education at the same rate in which high school football
• 1:46:47
  coaches invest in their coaching education, our sport would be
• 1:46:51
  vastly improved. Because in football, you cannot
• 1:46:55
  advance without coaching education.
• 1:46:58
  All right. So I'm going to defend my high
• 1:46:59
  school coaches by what you just said there.
• 1:47:04
  So I go to a ton and if and if I'm not there, certainly one of
• 1:47:07
  our teammates are there to, you know, all the large, I'll say,
• 1:47:10
  high school coaching clinic. So the Wisconsin track and field
• 1:47:14
  coaching clinic, the Texas track and field coaching clinic, the
• 1:47:16
  summer Texas High School Coaching Association, things
• 1:47:19
  like that. And trust me, I am seeing it's a
• 1:47:23
  vast majority of those are high school coaches and not club.
• 1:47:25
  It is not me saying you're you're wrong and it's actually
• 1:47:27
  club coaches and on top of that I have a ton of empathy for my
• 1:47:34
  high school coaches because they're coaching high school
• 1:47:38
  during the spring typically let's say you know the the vast
• 1:47:41
  majority for sure I can say vast majority here are only coaching
• 1:47:43
  during whatever the season. There's not preseason and and
• 1:47:46
  all that kind of stuff there. There is some places but the
• 1:47:48
  vast majority is March April May is is is high school coaching.
• 1:47:52
  They're also the to your point to your your coach is the
• 1:47:55
  calculus. The math teacher maybe they're
• 1:47:58
  they're married when they have a the family.
• 1:48:00
  They also have outside passions, charities churches etcetera.
• 1:48:04
  So I have a lot of empathy for the coach who says I am doing
• 1:48:08
  the best I can. I'm not spending an extra 5
• 1:48:11
  hours a week every week to learn more about how to coach
• 1:48:14
  sprinters or hurdlers or stuff. I I I've got a 2 year old that
• 1:48:17
  I'm trying to get through you know diaper, whatever.
• 1:48:20
  You know all the all the life, life life.
• 1:48:21
  And I know you as a club coach and every club coach is
• 1:48:23
  listening right now. You also have life.
• 1:48:25
  I have a ton of empathy for you for that as well so.
• 1:48:28
  So I don't know about about the I I think more high school
• 1:48:32
  coaches should do more coaching education because I see them
• 1:48:34
  doing a ton. I taught level one for years.
• 1:48:37
  Lots of high school coaches. So I'm I'm glad this gives me
• 1:48:41
  opportunity to expand on that because I don't want my high
• 1:48:44
  school colleagues to think that I believe that none of them are
• 1:48:48
  working. They will get the pitchforks.
• 1:48:49
  They will come for you. I.
• 1:48:50
  Don't. I don't want that.
• 1:48:51
  I just want grab right here. I don't want that smoke.
• 1:48:54
  I don't want that smoke. But but here's here's what I had
• 1:48:57
  throwback at you. You've seen a lot of coaches, a
• 1:48:59
  lot of these clinics. Think about in the state of
• 1:49:02
  Texas. How many high schools do you
• 1:49:04
  think between 1A to 6A have? Track and field programs I'd
• 1:49:08
  imagine the most. Right, so now we're looking at
• 1:49:11
  minimum minimum 1000 high school.
• 1:49:13
  Let's just start there. Say we know there's 1000 high
• 1:49:15
  schools. Easy.
• 1:49:16
  Yeah, all. Right.
• 1:49:17
  So if you multiply that number by the number of coaches that
• 1:49:20
  are on each staff. That number is not reflected in
• 1:49:23
  most of these coaching clinics that we see, the culture we
• 1:49:25
  should there should be an abundance of coaching clinics.
• 1:49:28
  If we're looking at this by saying how many people are
• 1:49:31
  attending programs, that's I'm with you.
• 1:49:34
  And what I think might be a little bit of, I'm going to call
• 1:49:38
  it harshness. You're not being harsh, but I'm
• 1:49:39
  going to use that word. Texas is remember we all are in
• 1:49:43
  our own box, right? And we some of us and I think
• 1:49:46
  you're one of these people worked very hard to think
• 1:49:49
  outside of our box, but we are still in boxes.
• 1:49:52
  Texas is extremely unique for track and field coaches and I
• 1:49:57
  think it's because of the size. So you know we go to the
• 1:50:00
  Wisconsin track clinic, there are 1000 plus coaches at that
• 1:50:05
  clinic. It's Wisconsin, it's small, it's
• 1:50:07
  not even the size of DFW, right. What's another one?
• 1:50:11
  Ohio, a little bit bigger populous state, but certainly
• 1:50:14
  not populous like a Texas. And there's 1000 high school
• 1:50:18
  coaches there. And I remember when I first got
• 1:50:21
  into Gill and I went to the first Texas track and field
• 1:50:23
  Coaches clinic and there was 100 and and I was thinking like, Oh
• 1:50:28
  my God, it's Texas to to your point where you're saying that I
• 1:50:31
  was like, oh, there's going to be a billion, there's a billion
• 1:50:33
  schools there. I think the size of Texas
• 1:50:38
  hinders the high school coaching association.
• 1:50:42
  You've got Lubbock way out there and then nothing else.
• 1:50:45
  You've got the DFW area. You've got Houston, which is
• 1:50:48
  that. That's got to be what's 6:00-ish
• 1:50:50
  hours, 5:00-ish showers between Dallas and Houston.
• 1:50:52
  Yeah, yeah, I've done the, I've done the 35 enough that I kind
• 1:50:55
  of knew that it. It's just I I think it's hard to
• 1:50:58
  get Houston people to come up to Dallas for a clinic and vice
• 1:51:01
  versa. And and Port Lubbock is just,
• 1:51:03
  they're just out there. They never get to come to
• 1:51:05
  clinic. I think the size of Texas, which
• 1:51:08
  has a lot of advantages actually is a disadvantage to getting
• 1:51:11
  them all at a clinic. So I'm with you on that.
• 1:51:13
  I just think you're seeing just Texas.
• 1:51:16
  Absolutely. Let me make that as a
• 1:51:18
  disclaimer. My experience is my experience,
• 1:51:21
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. When I'm looking just in the
• 1:51:23
  state of Texas. Yeah, right.
• 1:51:25
  And because remember Texas is such a football heavy state.
• 1:51:29
  Correct. And I know so many football
• 1:51:31
  coaches and I listen to them and how much they had to spend when
• 1:51:34
  they go, when they go to college campuses to get education
• 1:51:37
  there's there's all because they have to understand schemes
• 1:51:41
  what's going to be the evolution.
• 1:51:42
  So they are always pushing to get that advantage.
• 1:51:45
  Agreed. I I don't see that I haven't
• 1:51:47
  seen that in track. I think there should be clinics
• 1:51:50
  everywhere. I agree online.
• 1:51:52
  So I agree. I agree.
• 1:51:54
  We we also don't have the culture 'cause I love your point
• 1:51:56
  about the high school coach who goes to the football coaching
• 1:51:59
  staff or even other high school coaching Staffs to learn the
• 1:52:01
  schematics and things like that. I I've heard of high school
• 1:52:04
  coaches doing that, but it's like the Unicorn.
• 1:52:07
  We don't have that culture. Which is odd because I feel like
• 1:52:10
  almost any high school coach could call up any almost any
• 1:52:13
  other college or high school coach track check and field here
• 1:52:16
  and they would talk to him. I I I just, I've met, you know,
• 1:52:19
  I almost said a vast majority. I've certainly not met met the
• 1:52:22
  vast majority of coaches in this country.
• 1:52:23
  That's my goal. But every track coach I've ever
• 1:52:27
  met, 99.9% of them are like, oh man, I'd talk to Danny any day
• 1:52:30
  or hey, I called up Mouse and he answered like, but we don't have
• 1:52:34
  that culture and track and field coaching.
• 1:52:36
  I I agree and and wish we did. Especially here in Texas, we
• 1:52:39
  don't. And so that kind of that kind of
• 1:52:41
  brings me back to your question earlier.
• 1:52:43
  So where I am and where I have evolved and going back to
• 1:52:45
  something you said about being empathetic, right, The high
• 1:52:48
  school coach has a so I'm I'm going to give this as a perfect
• 1:52:52
  example. I remember I was frustrated
• 1:52:56
  because when the George Ranch coach left, Bryce didn't have an
• 1:53:02
  offseason program and I was a little bit bothered by the lack
• 1:53:07
  of the offseason program. And I want to give again head
• 1:53:11
  coach Clayton Brookings, head coach of Duncanville Boys track.
• 1:53:14
  He says to me, he goes, all right, Danny, so you want the
• 1:53:20
  track coach who's who now is the.
• 1:53:23
  The girls track coach who you want her to run the offseason
• 1:53:27
  program, he's like she teaches, she's the head cross country
• 1:53:33
  coach. So she's already at practice in
• 1:53:35
  the morning for the kids who have cross country.
• 1:53:38
  And then he asked me and said does she have children.
• 1:53:40
  I said yes, she has children and he goes, so now she's married,
• 1:53:43
  has children, has to teach, do homework, be in the morning
• 1:53:47
  across country. Where do you expect her?
• 1:53:51
  To put together this offseason program for your son.
• 1:53:55
  And I was like light bulb, OK, got it.
• 1:53:58
  All right. I'm not going to put that
• 1:54:00
  responsibility on her. I'll do it.
• 1:54:03
  And that's when I started to to coach in the offseason and then
• 1:54:06
  where I kind of grew with that, as I tell my high school
• 1:54:09
  athletes during the high school season, I am a track and field
• 1:54:14
  tutor. I am not your coach, I said.
• 1:54:17
  And the same way during during the high school season.
• 1:54:20
  You're in the high school season.
• 1:54:21
  You consider yourself more as a tutor.
• 1:54:24
  Correct. Explain more with that.
• 1:54:25
  That's that's intro. I've never heard that before.
• 1:54:27
  Tell me more about that. So when I was going back and
• 1:54:30
  forth, I couldn't really understand why it was so hard to
• 1:54:33
  partner with so many different coaches.
• 1:54:35
  And I would, and and just being empathetic to them.
• 1:54:39
  If I'm a high school coach, I got 60 kids on a team.
• 1:54:42
  They could be from a number of different private coaches, club
• 1:54:45
  coaches. I can't sit there and talk to 60
• 1:54:48
  different private and club coaches if I'm the high school
• 1:54:51
  coach, and then vice versa if I'm the club coach.
• 1:54:54
  I may have 30 athletes. I can't go always back and work
• 1:54:57
  tightly with 30 different coaches and until the time on
• 1:55:01
  the phone. So how do we kind of come up
• 1:55:03
  with a how do we kind of come up with a system that can kind of
• 1:55:05
  work and coincide with each other?
• 1:55:07
  And so I try my best to really put a foundational plan together
• 1:55:12
  in the offseason to carry them through.
• 1:55:14
  Then I know I'm going to take them through.
• 1:55:16
  Indoor track. But then, now the indoor track
• 1:55:18
  has ended. I am no longer your track coach,
• 1:55:21
  I'm just your track tutor. So no different than if I were a
• 1:55:25
  student in a math class. Whether I was advanced or
• 1:55:29
  struggling, I could go get tutoring to help either
• 1:55:32
  accelerate me or catch me up. And the math teacher would never
• 1:55:37
  be upset because the student decided to get some tutoring.
• 1:55:42
  So then I. I would wonder why would the
• 1:55:44
  high school track coach get upset?
• 1:55:47
  It's the same concept. So what I had to also recognize
• 1:55:51
  is that being a tutor means the tutor is supplementing what the
• 1:55:57
  teacher is doing at school. The tutor is not trying to
• 1:56:01
  recreate the lesson plans, not trying to recreate and say OK,
• 1:56:04
  we're going to do this this way even though your your math
• 1:56:08
  teacher school said do it this way.
• 1:56:10
  The The tutor isn't trying to take over for the math teacher.
• 1:56:15
  The tutor is there to help the student recognize.
• 1:56:17
  OK, if you're struggling with this, let me help you with this.
• 1:56:20
  If you don't understand how to do that, let me help you do
• 1:56:24
  that. And so when we get to the high
• 1:56:25
  school track season, I know that they're already getting some
• 1:56:29
  work done at their school. But I'm also cognizant that if
• 1:56:34
  you're the high school coach, even as well-intentioned as you
• 1:56:38
  possibly are. Numbers and time often preclude
• 1:56:43
  you from the level of detail that an athlete may need in
• 1:56:46
  specific areas. So then that's where I come in.
• 1:56:50
  I feel like I said OK, well then, now if I have an athlete
• 1:56:53
  and you know you are a short sprinter and you are having
• 1:56:59
  technical challenges with your acceleration pattern, well they
• 1:57:04
  may be at school doing the bulk of the running, so.
• 1:57:07
  You don't have to come to me to get the additional running.
• 1:57:10
  You're coming to me. We're going to work on this very
• 1:57:13
  specific thing that you need to get better at for your race.
• 1:57:16
  Maybe it's something technical from a running mechanic
• 1:57:19
  standpoint. This is an opportunity for us to
• 1:57:21
  work on your running mechanics because I can't expect the high
• 1:57:24
  school coach to have the eyes for everybody that's out there
• 1:57:27
  because often times they're understaffed as well.
• 1:57:31
  So that's why I look at myself during the high school season
• 1:57:34
  and saying I'm a track and field tutor.
• 1:57:36
  Now there may be programs that I've got.
• 1:57:39
  You know I I typically try to keep no more than 18 kids in my
• 1:57:43
  program at any point in time because I just feel like I like
• 1:57:46
  to have a smaller coach to athlete ratio so we can have and
• 1:57:51
  I'm not a systems coach, I am an individual coach.
• 1:57:54
  So I try to figure out what this person needs, how they train
• 1:57:57
  differently. You can always do that with
• 1:57:59
  smaller numbers. So being able to then work with
• 1:58:02
  these kids that. May not be able to get something
• 1:58:06
  at their school to supplement them while they are in their
• 1:58:09
  high school season without trying to then step on the toes
• 1:58:13
  of the high school coach is probably the best, the best
• 1:58:17
  scenario that I can think of. I've heard this argument so many
• 1:58:23
  times and in so many different ways and yet I have never heard
• 1:58:28
  it explained like that. This tutor principle if you
• 1:58:32
  will. And when you, you know for a guy
• 1:58:33
  who was not very good at math and still not for you to use the
• 1:58:36
  math example, it's like oh I get it.
• 1:58:39
  The tutor you know in today's you know get told you have two
• 1:58:41
  kids So you know we're doing all this Common Core math stuff
• 1:58:43
  which is not how you know as old folks learn how to do it and and
• 1:58:47
  as two as the parents and you know I'm going to let's be real
• 1:58:50
  here. My wife it's not me as my wife
• 1:58:52
  is helping our children through it.
• 1:58:54
  She doesn't go well. Hey I know your teacher wants
• 1:58:57
  you to figure out this math problem this way but let me just
• 1:58:59
  show you the easier way the way I did it.
• 1:59:01
  No no. She goes OK you're having a hard
• 1:59:04
  time understanding the way teachers doing this.
• 1:59:05
  Oh OK. I see teachers doing blah blah,
• 1:59:07
  blah. She's supplementing that that is
• 1:59:10
  that. Do you think that is repeatable
• 1:59:16
  around the country? And it takes a mind shift
• 1:59:20
  though, right? I mean, it takes some ego
• 1:59:22
  dropping the bad ego, it takes some communication.
• 1:59:27
  But that idea of A2 during the tracks, now the reverse is
• 1:59:31
  either true or the reverse is when you go to summer, it's OK,
• 1:59:34
  high school coach, enjoy your summer because now we're under
• 1:59:37
  my program. That's just an interesting
• 1:59:40
  mindset. How did you?
• 1:59:43
  You said you've evolved. How did you evolve into this
• 1:59:47
  this tutor mindset? OK.
• 1:59:49
  Great question. I think it has to go back to my
• 1:59:54
  core passion. If if I think about why I do
• 1:59:58
  what I do, the most thing that I take pride and excitement in is
• 2:00:06
  the percentage and number of kids in our program who go on to
• 2:00:11
  sign athletic track scholarships.
• 2:00:14
  If I weren't doing, if it weren't for that, I promise I
• 2:00:17
  would not be doing this, All right?
• 2:00:19
  We've had our program. We've had over 11 national
• 2:00:22
  champions. We've had multiple US, number
• 2:00:26
  one overall high school kids, state champions.
• 2:00:29
  So from an award standpoint, we've done that.
• 2:00:32
  But what I'm also proud to say is that over the last six years,
• 2:00:36
  100% of the seniors who came from our program all went on to
• 2:00:42
  get college scholarships. And even looking at active NCAA
• 2:00:46
  rosters, even going through the attrition of kids going to
• 2:00:49
  school and might not make it, We'd literally from our training
• 2:00:54
  group right now have 25 kids on active NCAA rosters.
• 2:01:00
  This year we have 8 seniors, 7 of the 8 already have offers to
• 2:01:06
  go to school. So.
• 2:01:07
  But by this time next year, you know, like I have, we have one
• 2:01:11
  athlete that's in their last year.
• 2:01:14
  We have one athlete that most likely will turn pro at the end
• 2:01:18
  of this year. And so that by the time the 2024
• 2:01:21
  kids go to school next year, we'll literally have over 30
• 2:01:25
  kids on active NCAA rosters. That to me is cut.
• 2:01:30
  This is what we do and why we do this.
• 2:01:32
  But I also do recognize that my passion, it may not necessarily
• 2:01:38
  be the same passion for that high school coach.
• 2:01:41
  Their responsibility is not to get kids to college there.
• 2:01:46
  They are paid to run that high school track program.
• 2:01:50
  We got to be careful. You and I could talk for another
• 2:01:53
  two hours. I'm not cutting you off like
• 2:01:55
  we're stopping now, 'cause I'm assuming you're watching your
• 2:01:57
  clock, 'cause we're over a time. I'm good.
• 2:01:59
  I'm good. Yeah, yeah, OK.
• 2:02:01
  But you are delving into topics that and you know, this isn't a
• 2:02:05
  free show in regards to, like the the guest who gets to just
• 2:02:07
  say whatever they want. You've seen me and I have.
• 2:02:09
  Even today, I'll challenge someone because what you just
• 2:02:13
  said right there, we're not going to talk about 'cause I
• 2:02:14
  want you to keep going, but. When you said you know high
• 2:02:16
  school coaches, number one priority is not necessarily to
• 2:02:18
  get them to college. Oh my.
• 2:02:20
  Go to Twitter and I will show you people that say if you if
• 2:02:24
  that's not your number one priority, you are a disgrace to
• 2:02:27
  the coaching profession. I agree with you by the way,
• 2:02:31
  because I also agree you know when I when I hear you say in
• 2:02:33
  those those stats and those are amazing stats.
• 2:02:35
  This many kids getting scholarships and this many
• 2:02:37
  getting offers and this many still on a roster, that's
• 2:02:39
  amazing because what you're doing this is the positive
• 2:02:41
  impact that a coach makes. You are helping change young
• 2:02:44
  kids lives I. Love your your quote of you will
• 2:02:47
  wear dress shoes much longer in life than you will wear.
• 2:02:50
  Track spikes is spot on. Enjoy your time and track and
• 2:02:54
  and God bless. If you get to go to the
• 2:02:56
  professional level that that's bonus time because we're all
• 2:02:59
  done typically after high school or college.
• 2:03:03
  Enjoy because you're you're using that you're leveraging
• 2:03:05
  track to get your education so you can go on and and and make a
• 2:03:08
  career but what what? I know my high school coaches
• 2:03:11
  are going to say it's like well yeah, Danny.
• 2:03:14
  You have 18 kids. I've got 100 on my roster.
• 2:03:18
  Of course, I don't have 100% going on to do track, by the
• 2:03:21
  way. I've got kids that are on track
• 2:03:23
  on my track team because they wanted the cool uniform or they
• 2:03:27
  just their best friend was running.
• 2:03:28
  And that's OK. This is the most inclusive sport
• 2:03:32
  in the world and that's what makes it one of the greatest
• 2:03:35
  sports in the world, so. We we might have to one day do a
• 2:03:38
  Part 2 by the way but I I actually have an idea when we
• 2:03:41
  get off for recording make sure I we we talk about real quick
• 2:03:44
  but keep going with with in how you evolved into this tutor
• 2:03:48
  because that's the real important part I want to capture
• 2:03:49
  here so that so that was the catalyst to the evolution.
• 2:03:53
  I At one point in time was that same outside coach that thought
• 2:03:59
  if going to college is not your number one priority as the high
• 2:04:03
  school coach, shame on you. That used to be I was that guy,
• 2:04:07
  I was that guy. And then I had to take a step
• 2:04:10
  back to think about all the things that you just described.
• 2:04:13
  They have a team and there's a wide assortment of talent
• 2:04:18
  variation amongst that team. Every kid has needs.
• 2:04:22
  They're all different, right? And so I stopped putting that
• 2:04:27
  burden and the onus of responsibility on the high
• 2:04:30
  school coach. And I, and yes, I know the high
• 2:04:33
  school coach, they want what's best for the athletes.
• 2:04:35
  They are happy and ecstatic. When a kid goes and assigns a
• 2:04:38
  scholarship, they want that. But they don't necessarily have
• 2:04:41
  the time. Some might not have the skills.
• 2:04:43
  They might have the capacity to support a number of different
• 2:04:45
  reasons that can stand in the way of that.
• 2:04:48
  That's what helped me to recognize, hey, I'm really a
• 2:04:51
  track and field tutor. This is what I like to do.
• 2:04:54
  So the kids who come to my program are kids that come to my
• 2:04:57
  program who have aspirations of running track in college.
• 2:05:02
  So then now that becomes my part of my job.
• 2:05:05
  You know, I can help them improve their skills or find
• 2:05:09
  their skill set to make them more competitive.
• 2:05:11
  I can help them to understand what's going to be expected in
• 2:05:14
  order to get a college scholarship.
• 2:05:16
  I can utilize my network to be able to help place people, get
• 2:05:20
  people attention, so that's why I say the tutor.
• 2:05:24
  I am literally here to supplement the high school coach
• 2:05:28
  during that high school season. How does a A summer coach is
• 2:05:32
  listening right down and you're tugging at their hearts, you
• 2:05:36
  know, you know I'll remind people that ever.
• 2:05:39
  I don't know. This might be my first, like,
• 2:05:41
  definitive every coach, certainly the vast majority of
• 2:05:45
  coaches, will lead with I do it for the kids.
• 2:05:49
  But I talk about, hey, you need to make more money.
• 2:05:51
  Yeah, we don't do it for the money.
• 2:05:53
  I do it for the kids. And that's great.
• 2:05:55
  That's awesome. Although I do think you should
• 2:05:57
  be making more money because you need to raise families and
• 2:06:00
  charities and passions, etcetera.
• 2:06:02
  But we'll say I do it for the kids, but then we'll say I want
• 2:06:06
  the credit and I'm not getting the credit.
• 2:06:09
  You know what? That's not good.
• 2:06:11
  So some somewhere right now, there's a coach listening to
• 2:06:14
  you. A club coach, summer coach.
• 2:06:17
  And they're like, man, I I think Danny's right.
• 2:06:19
  Maybe I can make a bigger impact here if I be.
• 2:06:22
  If I thought about this tutoring during the during the high
• 2:06:25
  school season, how does someone, you've been through this
• 2:06:28
  evolution now and you continue to evolve, to evolve, continue
• 2:06:32
  to refine, how does someone start that journey?
• 2:06:36
  That's a big question you may not have actually thought about
• 2:06:39
  because this is different. It's one thing to internalize it
• 2:06:42
  and externalize it by your actions.
• 2:06:43
  But now I'm asking you to think about.
• 2:06:46
  Other coaches that might want to start that journey doesn't
• 2:06:49
  happen overnight. This didn't happen overnight.
• 2:06:52
  What is? What's 123 things?
• 2:06:57
  Posture. Read.
• 2:06:58
  Maybe it's reading, Maybe there's a book, maybe there's a
• 2:07:01
  coach. I have no idea.
• 2:07:03
  But for you, what would you recommend someone's like, you
• 2:07:06
  know, maybe I need to explore this.
• 2:07:08
  What would you suggest? I tried not to speak in
• 2:07:13
  absolute, So here's going to be my first absolute for the day as
• 2:07:15
  well. When you said that that coach
• 2:07:19
  will say I do it for the kids, I will say you are all 100% right,
• 2:07:24
  you all doing it for the kids. The difference is what are you
• 2:07:29
  trying to do for the kids? That may vary.
• 2:07:33
  And so when you first come in, you kind of walk in, You should
• 2:07:36
  say we're all doing this for the kid, so we're not adversaries
• 2:07:40
  here, we just have to look at. You're talking about club coach,
• 2:07:44
  club coach and high school coach, high school private we
• 2:07:46
  are. Not adversaries.
• 2:07:48
  Not adversaries. Love it.
• 2:07:50
  We're just trying to think about what direction.
• 2:07:52
  So because my passion was helping kids get to college,
• 2:07:57
  that was the lens. I look through things.
• 2:08:00
  Well, if you're the coach of the high school, that might not be
• 2:08:03
  your passion. You're that that passion for
• 2:08:05
  helping that kid might be the kid needed some social
• 2:08:09
  constructs. The kid needed to be able to
• 2:08:10
  interact with other people. You know, there are so many
• 2:08:13
  different reasons why you're doing it for the kids.
• 2:08:16
  But let's just start there. We're doing it for the kids.
• 2:08:19
  We are not adversaries, right? And and then we have to
• 2:08:24
  remember, equity is not equality.
• 2:08:28
  We don't. We we make the mistake of
• 2:08:31
  thinking that all kids have the same needs and everybody needs
• 2:08:35
  to be treated the same. No, we that's not.
• 2:08:39
  Every kid has something different that they need.
• 2:08:42
  Every kid has something different that they're working
• 2:08:44
  on. All right?
• 2:08:46
  And so I think that's the kind of the first step you got to
• 2:08:47
  take. Then I think from the outside
• 2:08:50
  you have to be able to invest in yourself from a coaching
• 2:08:53
  knowledge standpoint. I think one of the things that
• 2:08:56
  has helped me in the relationship that I have with
• 2:08:59
  high school coaches, it's like it or not, I'm going to get a
• 2:09:04
  little bit of credibility just because of what I've done in the
• 2:09:07
  past, my own athletic experiences that helps me to
• 2:09:11
  cultivate relationships and conversation with coaches that
• 2:09:13
  maybe some other private coaches wouldn't get right.
• 2:09:17
  They're not going to make the assumption, say, well he knows
• 2:09:19
  what he's doing because at the end of the day, a high school
• 2:09:22
  coach, this is their team. They want their team to be
• 2:09:25
  successful. The last thing that they want is
• 2:09:27
  someone who is interfering with their team's success and quite
• 2:09:32
  frankly if you have someone that might not be as skilled now now
• 2:09:36
  there's detriment to the athlete and and so you you're so there's
• 2:09:40
  a trust that goes involved in that.
• 2:09:43
  One of the things I think that's also where the the outside coach
• 2:09:47
  can make things easier for the high school coach.
• 2:09:50
  It's a shout out to a mod Roper Summer Creek Girls high School
• 2:09:54
  coach told me something about three years ago.
• 2:09:56
  He goes, Dan, you got to remember, you guys have been
• 2:09:59
  working with these athletes before we ever get them.
• 2:10:02
  So they're coming into high school already having forged
• 2:10:05
  relationships with you guys. So they're now their parents.
• 2:10:08
  Second guess us, the athlete, second guess us.
• 2:10:11
  And so coach Mike McKinney, high School coach would remind me,
• 2:10:15
  say, look, you don't want to tear down a high school program.
• 2:10:19
  So I would always be very mindful not to comment and
• 2:10:22
  critique on training methods, training styles.
• 2:10:26
  Just because their system might be different from mine doesn't
• 2:10:28
  mean that it's not good, right? Because if you plant that seed
• 2:10:32
  into an athlete or their parent, you, you end up doing more harm
• 2:10:37
  than good, right? So my goal is for to try to help
• 2:10:41
  the athlete have a better relationship with the high
• 2:10:44
  school coach, because then they can talk whether the high school
• 2:10:47
  coach wants to talk to me or not.
• 2:10:49
  And if they have a good relationship with the high
• 2:10:50
  school athlete, the athlete can then convey what they need, what
• 2:10:54
  they're trying to work on, how they're trying to do these
• 2:10:56
  things. So the high school coach doesn't
• 2:10:58
  feel like I got to deal with 50 outside coaches.
• 2:11:01
  I only got to deal with the athlete that I have in front of
• 2:11:03
  my face right now, right? And so I think those are two
• 2:11:07
  steps that I would tell people to take instantly.
• 2:11:09
  Then the third is to continue to work with your own education
• 2:11:14
  within your craft. You know, it doesn't take long
• 2:11:17
  before two people having a conversation can realize either
• 2:11:21
  I'm the person I'm talking to knows their stuff or they don't.
• 2:11:24
  And that doesn't mean we have to always agree on philosophy.
• 2:11:28
  We don't have to agree on philosophy for me to know, hey,
• 2:11:30
  this person has put some time into this, hey, for what they
• 2:11:34
  believe in, they're prepared for.
• 2:11:36
  And if that's the case, all we're trying to figure out is
• 2:11:39
  how can we both, at best just kind of coincide and work with
• 2:11:45
  each other? That I think is a step that you
• 2:11:48
  can take. And then of course, even trying
• 2:11:51
  to take what I do professionally.
• 2:11:53
  So I manage and coach. I manage and coach people
• 2:11:57
  professionally in my day job. And I remember an AVP one time
• 2:12:01
  told me probably about six years ago, he just made a comment in
• 2:12:05
  passing one day. He said, imagine the work that
• 2:12:09
  can get accomplished when no one cares who gets the credit.
• 2:12:14
  And I try to take that into this role.
• 2:12:18
  And it's like, hey, no one has to know that I coach you.
• 2:12:22
  You wear the high school uniform, you go run fast.
• 2:12:25
  The only thing that matters to me is that you perform well.
• 2:12:28
  And if you're opening the doors for you to go to college because
• 2:12:31
  this is our passion. And so you can have what we're
• 2:12:34
  not diametrically opposed to each other inside and outside.
• 2:12:38
  We're all doing it for the kids in a different way.
• 2:12:41
  We just have to figure out what that way is and we cannot on
• 2:12:45
  either side. I'm not a big fan of the command
• 2:12:49
  and control style of leadership, and I think sometimes if you're
• 2:12:53
  a coach on either side, if your method is command and control, I
• 2:12:58
  think that there's going to be more harm than positives that
• 2:13:01
  are done. You see the IRD?
• 2:13:03
  Was it your dad? Yeah.
• 2:13:06
  In the command and control business, that's right.
• 2:13:07
  I don't mean that negatively. I'm just saying like, and that's
• 2:13:10
  why I said it. That's why I said it because he
• 2:13:13
  would also tell me that the difference between when he was
• 2:13:16
  in the military, he said I had to lead troops in the battle.
• 2:13:18
  He said he's like, you know, Daniel and he's the only going
• 2:13:21
  to call governor named Daniel. Listen, when you go to war, we
• 2:13:25
  don't have time to keep thinking about the different ways to do
• 2:13:28
  things because there are literally lives on the line.
• 2:13:31
  Great point. So, so I don't look at sports
• 2:13:35
  that same way, right. I look at sports like I look at
• 2:13:40
  my professional work environment.
• 2:13:41
  It should be a collaborative effort.
• 2:13:43
  You know we're we got to be talking and figuring these
• 2:13:45
  things out because you can learn from everyone.
• 2:13:49
  I think about the the most growth I've had this year in
• 2:13:53
  2020, I guess the now the 2024 season.
• 2:13:56
  So this offseason program, the most growth I actually had came
• 2:14:00
  from a parent, a parent of one of my athletes who happens to be
• 2:14:05
  studying a lot on his own. He he reads things because he's
• 2:14:08
  invested in his daughters development and we would talk
• 2:14:11
  about different things and he would challenge me on different
• 2:14:14
  things. He would challenge me.
• 2:14:15
  I go back, talk to other people, read research, and I'm bringing
• 2:14:19
  new things back to my program this year.
• 2:14:22
  Based on what someone who had didn't run track themselves.
• 2:14:25
  They were not a track coach. They were just things that they
• 2:14:28
  found that they've researched, they brought back to me.
• 2:14:30
  So I think you can always learn when it's collaborative, you can
• 2:14:33
  learn from anyone. And as long as you're trying to
• 2:14:36
  figure out how can I learn, then the program gets better.
• 2:14:39
  We collaborate. The high school program, I I
• 2:14:42
  think and I think most high school coaches, they want to do
• 2:14:45
  a good job, they want to do well.
• 2:14:47
  So when they see, when they see that, you know, we've had some
• 2:14:52
  success that very proud of, they may stop and ask well, how do
• 2:14:56
  you do it with this kid. And I think with our program,
• 2:14:58
  what I've learned over the years, even most recently,
• 2:15:00
  there's a wide range of kids in our program in terms of their
• 2:15:05
  high school situation. Like I've got some kids where
• 2:15:08
  they're don't even have to train at their high school at all.
• 2:15:11
  They can just train exclusively 100% with me.
• 2:15:16
  There are some schools, I got some programs that are like,
• 2:15:18
  hey, let's think about the different days of the week.
• 2:15:21
  These days they can come with you.
• 2:15:23
  These days they're with us. Then there's another group of of
• 2:15:27
  of coaches where it's no, we want to be 100% hands on and we
• 2:15:33
  don't want to make any concessions for anything that
• 2:15:35
  they might have to do after school.
• 2:15:37
  That's just not what we do. So I have kids from all that
• 2:15:41
  spectrum. And So what has taught me over
• 2:15:43
  the years is, OK, well, how do I manage this relationship?
• 2:15:47
  How do I manage this relationship?
• 2:15:49
  How do I manage this relationship all while knowing
• 2:15:52
  that these kids are at the practice.
• 2:15:54
  If you're the kid, that's the program that's hands on and
• 2:15:57
  they're not achieving the success.
• 2:15:59
  And they're looking to the kids who have complete autonomy from
• 2:16:02
  their program and they're achieving success.
• 2:16:04
  They're looking at these kids and like, why can't I have this?
• 2:16:09
  And their parents are asking, why can't we do this?
• 2:16:11
  Can we get our kid over that school?
• 2:16:13
  You know? And so then I have to manage
• 2:16:15
  that because I know that they eventually have to go back to
• 2:16:18
  their high school. And I don't want them carrying
• 2:16:21
  these type of thoughts and sentiments and attitudes back to
• 2:16:23
  the high school because I know it's not going to end well.
• 2:16:27
  Right. So these are literally things
• 2:16:31
  that over the years allow me to evolve to kind of where I am
• 2:16:35
  right now. You know, it's amazing.
• 2:16:36
  We started today's podcast talking about how the level of
• 2:16:40
  track and field on all levels, high school, college and pros
• 2:16:44
  has just. I mean it's like we took 10
• 2:16:47
  years, a leap in the last two to three years.
• 2:16:49
  It's quite amazing. You know, I I just think about
• 2:16:53
  where there is tension between a club coach and a high school
• 2:16:57
  coach. Like, how much better could the
• 2:17:00
  kids be if we could just? You know, you and I are of an
• 2:17:05
  era where we know what this quote comes from.
• 2:17:06
  We could all just get along if we could work collaboratively
• 2:17:10
  and together. Wow.
• 2:17:12
  Like we may actually be holding back the level of track and
• 2:17:15
  field. Like what could it actually be
• 2:17:17
  today, you know, to end today here, Danny, You know, I love
• 2:17:21
  that quote you had from the VP where, you know, imagine what
• 2:17:25
  could happen if, you know, we did work and we didn't worry
• 2:17:27
  about who got the credit, You know, one of the.
• 2:17:31
  Quotes or, you know, saying slogans that I really like is
• 2:17:34
  success is not pie. And what that means is I read
• 2:17:38
  you, I read. You did you see that the other
• 2:17:40
  day? Yeah.
• 2:17:41
  Is, is, you know if a high school coach is having success,
• 2:17:44
  that does not take away from you summer coach and vice versa.
• 2:17:49
  If summer coach has success, that does not take away.
• 2:17:51
  It's not pie. It's not if I get a bigger
• 2:17:53
  slice, well, that leaves a a smaller slice for Danny to have
• 2:17:56
  success. It's it's infinite.
• 2:17:58
  We can all have success. And I think to my point.
• 2:18:01
  About maybe we're actually holding track athletes back
• 2:18:04
  specifically in the high school side because that's where the
• 2:18:06
  high school club summer club coaching is is occurring is man,
• 2:18:11
  maybe that pie should is a lot bigger.
• 2:18:15
  If we could just work together, yeah, if we could just work
• 2:18:17
  together. But there's also a, sorry, as I
• 2:18:20
  said, there's also a different dynamic, I'll say this that I
• 2:18:24
  didn't mention. What also makes things difficult
• 2:18:26
  is if you're a private coach. Sometimes I don't do private
• 2:18:30
  coaching for a living. I have a primary day job.
• 2:18:33
  But if this is, if this is your primary day job as a private
• 2:18:36
  coach, this how you make your living.
• 2:18:38
  You need, you need volume, you need volume, you need bodies in
• 2:18:42
  your program. So then to justify the cost and
• 2:18:47
  to get the volumes because this is how you make your living.
• 2:18:51
  There are a lot of times it's going to put you in direct
• 2:18:53
  conflict with the high school coach because I can have kids in
• 2:18:56
  my program and say, no, you did this day at school, man, don't
• 2:19:00
  even come. Hey, stay where you're at, all
• 2:19:03
  right? Or hey, you know what?
• 2:19:06
  You do this at school. We can do some technique here.
• 2:19:10
  I have kids in my program that literally drive over an hour one
• 2:19:16
  way every time they come to practice.
• 2:19:20
  And so if there are things I can give them to stay at home and
• 2:19:24
  don't have to get on the road and have two hours round trip, I
• 2:19:26
  would prefer for you to do that. So I want to find this, but I
• 2:19:30
  also recognize I this isn't what I do for a living, so I don't
• 2:19:34
  need volume. I can make it with 18 kids
• 2:19:37
  because I just want to have a small group.
• 2:19:38
  And I think there's there's just so many different things that
• 2:19:41
  are different today that weren't that did not exist when you and
• 2:19:46
  I were coming out of high school.
• 2:19:47
  That makes this whole dynamic very different because if you're
• 2:19:51
  if you're an outside coach that does this professionally, you
• 2:19:56
  might look at the high school coach and say you're messing
• 2:19:58
  with my money because I need the kids in my program to perform
• 2:20:01
  well because that's going to attract more kids to my program,
• 2:20:04
  attract more kids to my program. I make more money to feed my
• 2:20:08
  family. Great points and I think this
• 2:20:10
  all goes back to my man George Williams.
• 2:20:13
  If you're not in the huddle you don't know the play.
• 2:20:16
  You know that's I did not think about that aspect with the the
• 2:20:19
  full time personal coach. You know what what we we tend to
• 2:20:25
  think that the high school coach has it easier and then the high
• 2:20:29
  school coach thinks oh man, the college coach has it easier.
• 2:20:32
  And inside of college we think oh man, the NCAA guys and gals
• 2:20:36
  have it easier. And then we think oh man, the
• 2:20:38
  Division One coaches, they got it so easy and then we cut it
• 2:20:41
  down to oh the power five coaches, they have it so much
• 2:20:44
  easier. And even inside the Power 5, by
• 2:20:45
  the way, there is a distinct division there.
• 2:20:48
  And we think, oh gosh, Florida A&M, we got it so easy.
• 2:20:53
  And in reality is we all have our struggles, we all have our
• 2:20:58
  thing, even Florida, who, you know, they're winning all the
• 2:21:01
  titles. And Mouse is amazing.
• 2:21:02
  The staff that he has there is absolutely fantastic and they're
• 2:21:05
  in Gainesville and it's Florida and it's sunny.
• 2:21:08
  I promise you there are things that a mouse is like oh man, you
• 2:21:11
  know what I can't get a kid in if they don't have maybe this
• 2:21:13
  academics or if they don't do this or they do this he's got
• 2:21:16
  struggles. I guarantee you I'll do if we
• 2:21:19
  would just have we go back to that E word empathy let's all
• 2:21:23
  work towards because again I remind you, I think every one of
• 2:21:26
  us would say I do it for the kids.
• 2:21:28
  Well, if that's true, then you'd set aside your ego.
• 2:21:32
  You'd set aside another dollar, which I know you need.
• 2:21:35
  You know, in your in your in specific situations, you'd all
• 2:21:39
  set it aside and say, OK, then let's what's what does it really
• 2:21:43
  mean? I'm doing it for the kids.
• 2:21:45
  Absolutely, Danny, man. It started off by talking about
• 2:21:50
  Flava Flav and here we are talking about the Private
• 2:21:55
  Coach's financial statements here.
• 2:21:58
  Danny, thank you so much, man. You know, it's it's it's it's
• 2:22:04
  quite humbling, you know, for specifically for a guest like
• 2:22:07
  you, Danny. You know, I invite you onto the
• 2:22:10
  show and you know, I I already block off 2 hours of your time.
• 2:22:13
  So you're already kind of like, oh man, what's 2 hours?
• 2:22:15
  That seems like a long time. And here we are at the two hour,
• 2:22:18
  20 minute mark here and you have no real idea.
• 2:22:21
  Well, what's Mike gonna ask me? What's Mike gonna do?
• 2:22:24
  None. And yeah, there's no Pre scout
• 2:22:26
  of, you know, kind of behind the curtains here.
• 2:22:27
  No one gets pre questions. By the way.
• 2:22:29
  There's no like I was, I was. Actually thinking I was like,
• 2:22:31
  where are the pre questions? Yeah, we don't do that, man.
• 2:22:33
  Make me nervous. We do real life here.
• 2:22:35
  When you meet someone, you don't get scripted questions.
• 2:22:38
  You say you what's on the top of your mind.
• 2:22:40
  And so you know, first of all, I'm so grateful for you, for
• 2:22:44
  your trust, for for me and for Gil, you know joining us here
• 2:22:47
  without having any preconceived knowledge of what's going on
• 2:22:50
  here. So thank you for that.
• 2:22:51
  Very grateful for your time. You're extremely busy.
• 2:22:55
  I understand that. So you know, anytime you can
• 2:22:57
  give me two plus hours your time, that means an absolute ton
• 2:23:01
  to me. Time is extremely valuable.
• 2:23:03
  So, so thankful for that. And then for you being a track
• 2:23:07
  coach. I mean, it's literally my whole
• 2:23:09
  world. I mean, you know, I don't.
• 2:23:10
  You know, when I think about what you do as a track coach and
• 2:23:14
  other coaches out there on all levels, high school, club,
• 2:23:17
  professional, collegiate, you know, I honestly, when I think
• 2:23:20
  about what a coach means to me today, I think of my wife and my
• 2:23:24
  kids and my home and things like that, that none of that happens
• 2:23:29
  without what you do. It doesn't.
• 2:23:31
  It doesn't. So I'm so grateful for you
• 2:23:35
  choose. You could do a lot of things and
• 2:23:36
  you do a lot of things, but you choose to be a track coach and
• 2:23:40
  that is the positive impact you make on young people, man.
• 2:23:45
  Thank you. It's, it's amazing.
• 2:23:46
  So I'm just so grateful for you and so grateful for you teaching
• 2:23:50
  us things. I mean, these are things that
• 2:23:51
  we. I like having these discussions
• 2:23:53
  because I think it's important for the coaching body to hear.
• 2:23:56
  And so I'm just so grateful to, you know, let me push back on
• 2:23:59
  you and let me challenge you some.
• 2:24:01
  I'm really grateful for really authentic conversation, man.
• 2:24:04
  That's how we move the profession of coaching forward
• 2:24:07
  in a positive manner. So Danny, thank you so much man
• 2:24:10
  for being here today and. I'll tell you and and thank you.
• 2:24:14
  On the bottom of my heart for allowing me to be on you know
• 2:24:16
  what? When I think about what you do
• 2:24:18
  and just the people that you've had on these podcasts, that's
• 2:24:23
  humbling. To even think that I will be
• 2:24:26
  amongst the company of some of these people, these great
• 2:24:29
  coaches, these great people. So to be thought of as worthy
• 2:24:33
  enough to be a part of that group means a lot to me.
• 2:24:36
  I greatly appreciate it and I and I hope that our conversation
• 2:24:39
  today helps just one of the coach that's out there.
• 2:24:44
  Learn more. Be more inspired.
• 2:24:46
  Think about their reason, their why for doing it for the kids
• 2:24:49
  and it. Hopefully you know, a young
• 2:24:51
  athlete who might be trying a different event might hear it
• 2:24:55
  and see what my path may be. A father and son, coaching staff
• 2:24:59
  or duo. Rather see how that dynamic is
• 2:25:02
  transition to college, a high school and the outside coach
• 2:25:04
  collaborating more effectively. A lot of these things if if one
• 2:25:08
  person has helped. It is.
• 2:25:10
  It is worth the time. And again, I appreciate you
• 2:25:13
  allowing me to join the podcast today.
• 2:25:15
  Thank you to Gil Athletics. Thank you to you as well.
• 2:25:18
  It's been a fantastic afternoon for me and I can't think of a
• 2:25:21
  better way to enjoy Friday afternoon.
• 2:25:23
  Oh man, thank you man Humbles man.
• 2:25:25
  Appreciate you. And you humble me by being here.
• 2:25:28
  You know, again, I'm. It's hard to say the words out
• 2:25:30
  loud that it's season five. I don't know when we first
• 2:25:35
  started recording these in the Trust because no one was doing
• 2:25:39
  podcast back then to so the Trust for people back then.
• 2:25:42
  I'm just so, so humbled and amazed that we're in season
• 2:25:45
  five. You've already seen the guests
• 2:25:46
  we've had here so far in season five.
• 2:25:48
  Trust me, we just going to continue rolling and bringing
• 2:25:51
  you amazing people that choose to be track coaches because you
• 2:25:54
  deserve it. You deserve to hear their
• 2:25:55
  stories. You deserve to learn from them.
• 2:25:57
  So thank you for being here this week.
• 2:25:58
  Join us next week as we continue our mission of uplifting and
• 2:26:01
  honoring coaches from around the world.
• 2:26:03
  See you everybody. Love it.
• 2:26:04
  Bye. If it goes to appreciate the
• 2:26:16
  coach the ones appoint people most every season needs a voice
• 2:26:20
  of reason to speak in the growth you got to prep for you carry
• 2:26:23
  the load, ice, coffee to the soul.
• 2:26:25
  For those of us to stay on the go, proper handoff to stay in
• 2:26:27
  the zone with you packing for the road.
• 2:26:29
  There's more than one way to go. Take notes.
• 2:26:32
  That's damn, you told. It ain't practice.
• 2:26:34
  If your purpose ain't clear, it can't happen to you.
• 2:26:37
  Both is can't mentor. Without a mentor kiss of
• 2:26:40
  experience you could reinvent those kids.
• 2:26:42
  Every plans got a standard to live up to.
• 2:26:45
  Enterprise, sacrifice. Can you give up you?
• 2:26:47
  It's a choice and a fight, not a win or lose.
• 2:26:49
  It's not a ploy but advice. Y'all can make more moves.
• 2:26:52
  It's not about how to. It's all about why.
• 2:26:54
  You don't know till you know who you are inside.
• 2:26:57
  Six when you waste the time, choose none.
• 2:26:59
  Until we all cross the finish line.
• 2:27:01
  The work ain't done. So we learn from the experts.
• 2:27:03
  We all got to put in the leg. Work kill.
• 2:27:05
  Athletics network. It's all about connections put
• 2:27:08
  together for the profession. To every track coach could be
• 2:27:11
  blessed.