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108 - Strength, Service, & Navy Football w/ Jim Kiritsy
194 Plays23 days ago
There's no game like Army-Navy. No neutral site classic, no rivalry week hype machine — just two military academies, one football field, and everything that comes with wearing the uniform. Navy just won. And I wanted to talk to the guy who makes sure those Midshipmen are ready to play it.
Jim Kiritsy is the Head Football Strength and Conditioning Coach at the United States Naval Academy. He built his career at Vermont, The Citadel, and Kennesaw State before landing in Annapolis — and his philosophy has stayed consistent the whole way: injury prevention, athletic performance, and mental discipline. Not as buzzwords. As the actual job.
In this episode, Jim and Tex get into what the Army-Navy game means inside the locker room — not the spectacle, but the weight of it. We talk about his coaching philosophy, how he develops young men who are being asked to grow up fast, and what it genuinely takes — physically, mentally, and culturally — to play football at the Naval Academy.
If you coach, lead, or develop people under pressure, this one's for you.
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Transcript
Introduction to Training Philosophy
00:00:00
Speaker
I've learned and I'm getting old now, right? I've done this a minute, that there is no perfect program because you're training a big group of kids. Not everyone's gonna get all the benefits or all the gains. Some people are goingnna see more, some people are goingnna get worse in some way. Somebody's gonna get hurt, someone's not gonna get hurt.
00:00:16
Speaker
um So it becomes fluid, it becomes living and breathing, right? And and you just have to accept that
Significance of the Army-Navy Football Game
00:00:22
Speaker
that's the thing. And and if you know where you want to be, Then when things are going sideways, you can get it back on course because you at least know where your end goal is There's one game in college football that doesn't need context. No rankings, no conference standings, just 125 years of rivalry, tradition, and two military academies settling it on the field.
00:00:45
Speaker
Welcome to the Captains and Coaches podcast we explore the art and science of leadership through the lens of athletics and beyond. I'm your host Tex McQuilkin and today I'm traveling to Annapolis because Navy beat Army this season.
00:00:58
Speaker
and I get the opportunity to sit down with friend and head football strength and conditioning coach Jim Carizzi. Jim came up through Vermont, the Citadel, and Kennesaw State.
00:01:09
Speaker
He built his philosophy around three things, injury prevention, performance, and mental discipline.
Jim Carizzi's Personal Journey and Experiences
00:01:16
Speaker
Today we get into what the Army-Navy game means inside the locker room, how Jim coaches character alongside conditioning, and what it actually takes to play football for the Naval Academy.
00:01:28
Speaker
With that, let's pass it out to Jim, who helps us raise the game. Ready, ready, and break. We are rolling. Action. Annapolis, Maryland. Thank you for having me, Jim. It's been a long time, man, and I'm so happy that you're in this position.
00:01:43
Speaker
I just watched the game on Saturday, so that's how fresh yeah off the victory we were. yeah caught you on the sideline just catching dudes when they were running out bounds. Yeah, yeah. So if you look closely, you were on TV. I was on TV, yeah. Don't look too close. yeah i'm not I'm not the star of the show, but how lucky I feel to be a part of the Army-Navy game is is is out of control. It's like...
00:02:05
Speaker
You know, the pompous circumstance that surrounds itself with that game is special. It's unique. It's powerful. The people that go, how many people are invested in it, is it's so humbling. and But then, like, the the players, there's 22 players on the field, and every one of them is giving their all. And I don't know how many games you play in where you see that type of commitment and passion from both sides. It's it's just, I'm so grateful to be a part of that game. yeah It's unbelievable.
00:02:35
Speaker
feel it's the only true rivalry that still exists in the nature of the game today. Yeah, I mean, there's not a dollar spent in n NIL. You know, the transfer portal goes out, it doesn't come in um And so those kids, a lot of them go to the prep school together. They're plebs, they rise up. So the seniors have been with their brothers and they've really created something that's not seen a whole lot anymore.
00:03:01
Speaker
And both programs know that that game is the culmination of their experience here. and Right, wrong, or indifferent, they're often evaluated, their legacy is evaluated based on their success or failure in that game, which we were lucky
Motivating Players and Attention to Detail
00:03:16
Speaker
to be on top this year. And then you got a chance to go home for one Army-Navy game up to Massachusetts. Yeah, my first game, first one was was in Foxborough, which is where I grew up, so that was awesome, yeah other than the outcome. Right. um But like Boston like showed out, they wanted the game. They want the game to come back. So like the the hotel was decorated. The the city was abuzz about it. Like it's a historic city to host a historic game. and that And that was my first exposure to it. And until you're in it, you can only imagine what it would be. um and then you kind of get a feel for it and then you win it or lose it. And then you really start to understand
00:03:55
Speaker
And I remember, like, we stayed in Boston after the game, and I get in the get an elevator with my wife with some administrators, and, like, they won't look at me. We just got could he got beat. And, like, these are good people, but, like, the whole building is so attached to that game.
00:04:14
Speaker
Yeah. It's so powerful. And do you use that delayed gratification in the offseason to remind them, hey, we're putting in work in July, Because of November. Because of December. Because that game so often comes down to moments, it's not a hard sell.
00:04:31
Speaker
First of all, the Brigade of Midshipmen care about that game. The Corps Cadets at West Point care about that game. Administrators, alumni. i mean, it's so easy and tangible to feel.
00:04:41
Speaker
But so many of those games come down to just... moments and inches. So the one we just played, you know, there's a fumble on the, on the goal line and we recover that fumble and score in fourth down to take the lead.
00:04:56
Speaker
The game is decided by a fourth and one at the 46 or something yard line that if we get we take a need to end it if we don't get They are 20 yards away from a field goal to win the game. So everything is about inches. And even the year before when we won with a little bit more of a marginal, so the margin of victory was larger.
00:05:14
Speaker
You know, in the fourth quarter, it's one-possession game until we fake punt and go down and score to to make it a two-possession game. So, like, and then there's been goal line stands, won and lost yeah every year in the past 10 years. it's It's like, so you don't have to sell it very hard because the kids know it.
00:05:33
Speaker
They know. that the reason why we care about touching the line or finishing through the line or putting your foot the right place is because that will be the difference in the biggest game. Yeah. And were you following the game just as a man before? To get the opportunity to be a coach here? I've admired that game for years and years. So I went to a military college.
00:05:53
Speaker
ah Division III school with no service required. um I did not go and serve, but I experienced like the core cadet lifestyle. So that gets you interested in it. And then I worked at another senior military school. I worked at the Citadel. When I worked at the Citadel, um you kind of become part of the option world.
00:06:12
Speaker
And when you're part of the option world, now you start to realize that the option goes runs through the academies and then maybe runs through it and goes to the ACC or that's where it's really at at its highest. So you start to know people that are in it. And that's when you really get eyes on it. And the same thing through Kennesaw because that was the option community. And all those people came from Navy in the early 2000s.
00:06:32
Speaker
All the coaches, Coach Munkin at Army, Coach Bohan, you know, when I was with him at Kennesaw, all these people came from Navy in the early 2000s. So I've admired the game from afar for a long time. So it'd be a part of it as a dream. That is awesome.
Building the Kennesaw State Football Program
00:06:45
Speaker
So you've led us there. Let's stick with Kennesaw State. So that's when we connected. 2017, you literally opened up your doors, stayed with you for a week to observe some off-season training yeah from sunup to sundown with the boys.
00:06:59
Speaker
Dude, I a great time. Good. But seeing, I mean, the cool warehouse, are they still training in the warehouse? They It's a beautiful facility. Yeah. Go Sorenx. So, I mean, you got the opportunity to create a culture with the football staff from nothing. Yes.
00:07:13
Speaker
And i mean, how did that start? I mean, because were these guys, I mean, they're starting to just to train them for a year before they started to play. Yeah. So was the format. there So Coach Bohannon hired me help start that program from scratch. And, you know, credit to Kennesaw State. It was a well-resourced FCS program.
00:07:35
Speaker
So I was able to build a beautiful weight room. And then we got our first you know team that came and just did nothing but practice and train for their first year. um And they were tough.
00:07:48
Speaker
gritty, hungry kids to prove themselves. So these are all kids that were betting on themselves that weren't getting opportunities elsewhere. They're like, I want to play Division I football. I don't have these other Division I offers.
00:08:00
Speaker
So I'm going bet on myself and bet on this program. So we'll start this thing from scratch and we'll just go to work. And so we knew, you know, Coach Bohannon had a vision for what type of team he wanted. He wanted a tough, aggressive, fast football team that going run the option on offense and be super aggressive on defense. And so my job was to energize the environment with a ton of accountability. So um we were going to teach the hell out what we needed to do, but we were going to do it with a high energy, high accountability environment. And anyone that came and worked with me on that and anybody who worked in that building could have told you what the standard was from the top down. And that's why we were able to build that thing into something that I'm super proud of and we'll never forget. But I mean, those were just the some of the best young men
00:08:47
Speaker
that I could have ever hoped to work with. Especially as a 26 year old strength coach given an opportunity to go make my mistakes and fail forward and try to learn and grow and learn and grow and learn and grow.
00:08:59
Speaker
And like, but they were trusting and they were committed. And this is the pre-portal era. So we could beat the crap out of those kids. And they just, if they wanted to keep playing, that they to keep showing back up. And what happened was, is we pushed them to their limits and they came back and they were better. And we pushed them to their limits again and they came back and they were better. And that happened micro dosed over every single phase of practice and training and practice and training then games and then training and practice and then games and training and practice and training in games. And it became what it became. and You know, we won six games and we won eight and 12, 11, 11.
Training Philosophies and Social Media Engagement
00:09:32
Speaker
um So, I mean, we we did some pretty good stuff there just because the kids trusted the process and were willing to work really, really hard. Yeah. And you found cool ways to connect. And this is like the dawn of Instagram media.
00:09:46
Speaker
And you really leaned into that to highlight and get the kids invested because they were seeing themselves and how hard they were really working. Yeah, um using video helps. And Don Abouche, when he was at the Citadel, he's who i I worked under there, and he was really on the forefront. okay Like, he was posting stuff on Facebook before people left Facebook to go, I'm just going to go. But um I saw the impact of that and the influence that you could have with the players and also in the networking ability within the strength community.
00:10:15
Speaker
And I just felt like it was a great way to put our players and our training, you know, in the public eye. and and And what I always wanted to do was put something out there that people felt like they were part of the training session. So it wasn't sitting back and letting a camera run. It was like me holding the camera while I'm coaching. yeah So people could feel the energy in the room. They could watch.
00:10:34
Speaker
hopefully see the angles. And it was real training. So, you know, some kids squatted high, some kids squatted low, you know, but you could, you could hear us coach and energize through that. yeah And, and the players loved it and they would share and post it And I try to continue to do the same thing now. I'm a little bit less frequent as I was.
00:10:50
Speaker
And maybe that's just kind gotten a little bit older, but I think it's a great way and the kids love it. And it's good for the program because if it gets out there, it's good for recruiting. It's good for the players and their, and how they can spread their pride within what they do because it's all you know strength conditioning is often done behind yeah closed doors it's behind the scenes it's the stuff that people don't understand and when there's videos of people lifting 500 pounds or pushing heavy sleds or sprinting or competing it's a great way for fans and community and other programs to see what it is that we're doing yeah um so i think there's something to it beyond just me just trying to boost my ego
00:11:24
Speaker
i Believe it and then oftentimes before that what was highlighted for strength conditioning was shown clips on ESPN and it was a caricature of coaching versus like real coaching. Yeah, so it's cool that you had the opportunity and those guys bought in quickly yeah for it. Yeah, I mean, it's the the kids that were playing there and in 2014 are just like the kids now.
00:11:45
Speaker
Like they grew up with phones, they grew up with internet, they grew up with all the media. So it was a way that, I mean, they they bought into quick. I mean, it's it's exploded in the ability to share and tag and all that stuff. But like, it's just, it connects to them. like You know, we have Perch, and I used to be worried about, like, hey, could kids engage with how all that technology works? Like, these kids grew with a phone in their hands.
00:12:08
Speaker
They know how to push buttons and hit start. Like, it's different than when you if you played in the 90s, the early 2000s, and you're just kind of like oh, what do I do here? they they They connect to it. It's part of their life.
00:12:18
Speaker
Yeah. Then you introduced at Kennesaw State to EAT. Do you still continue to build that? did not. I did not, but I used it like crazy. Right. So EAT was Coach Bohannon's, what the pillars of his program are going to be built off. Okay. And I believe he said attitude, effort, and toughness, and then it got moved to EAT, effort, attitude, and toughness.
00:12:44
Speaker
And he this is who we want to be. And I want us trained to be this team. And I said, yes, sir, I'm on it. Right. Because that connects to to my mission. Like, I love Saturdays and I love competing, but I love trying to make...
00:12:57
Speaker
people better versions themselves. And I do believe that going through hard things consistently and being told the truth and being held accountable is what the best lessons you can take from training and what you can take from sport of football or or sport in general.
00:13:10
Speaker
And um so what I felt was important was like, how do we identify and define what each of those criteria are.
Modernizing Navy's Training Approach
00:13:18
Speaker
So for us, and we still do the same exact thing here.
00:13:20
Speaker
So effort is, you know, attack and finish, right? So if we're going to do a drill, you need to attack the drill and you need to finish the drill. And there's consequences for doing it wrong or not doing it at all, right? And so what you see a lot in a simple cone drill is someone who knows how to finish hard, they want to start fast. Or someone knows start fast, they don't know how to finish strong, right? And you can't be an right?
00:13:43
Speaker
in this world. Like it is just an end game. Um, you can't do it right, but do it soft. You can't do it soft, but do it. yeah You gotta be able to do it both. So, um, you know, I, I,
00:13:55
Speaker
We're proponent of up-downs. If you've played or trained under me, you know that you've probably done a few of them. But we identify that it's attack and finish. That's what effort looks like. Urban Meyer says, you know, four to six A to B. Four to six seconds from point A to point B as hard as you possibly can. Right? And you can't leave a shadow of a doubt. And if you do that year-round, you'll be able to call upon it on Saturday. I believe that you can't ask somebody to do something that they're not trained to do. So we need to train to do that. So and so that's what effort is defined as. And that's communicated to them.
00:14:27
Speaker
Therefore, when they fail to do so, we tell them why they failed to do so. Do your uptimes, get back in line, do it better the next time. Mm-hmm. Right? Attitude is how much of a coach, how coachable you are. Right? So are you saying, yes, sir, yes, ma'am. No, sir, no, ma'am. Right? Or you going palms up?
00:14:43
Speaker
Are you like arguing back about receiving feedback? Like you have to trust the coaching, trust the process. Ask questions is fine. But in the heat of battle, you need to trust the coaching. You need to go back to work. Right? So how coachable are you? How well do you receive coaching? and Are you making the same mistakes twice? Because you shouldn't be making the same mistakes twice. Right? At least not the same way.
00:15:02
Speaker
And so that's how we defined attitude. And then we put leadership and under attitude as well. like our Once you've got yourself taken care of, are you bringing anybody with you? right And are you willing to have hard conversations to call people out in the moment?
00:15:18
Speaker
Are you willing to lead by example or how it's going to be? And then and then toughness, the simplest way of toughness is to talk about, for me, is is body language. And we have no hands on knees, no hands on hips, no hands on head.
00:15:31
Speaker
Right. So those I love it. Everything there is about can you control something small under fatigue? um And when you do, there's a consequence for it immediately because you want to be on purpose.
00:15:44
Speaker
You want to live within control of your small decisions. And that can be really, really difficult. And so body language is how we identify your toughness. And then the next thing we throw on there, which is a little bit more difficult to to call out in the moment, is is your consistency. Do you show up every single day? Can you fail on Monday and succeed on Tuesday? Can you succeed on Monday and not fail on Tuesday?
00:16:06
Speaker
Right, and so, like, how do you show up every single day? That's a huge part. That's a little bit less simple to coach in the moment, um but that's more of the conversations that you have, you know, after sessions or before sessions. And um so, you know, effort, attitude, and toughness is is the pillar of what Coach Bohannon wanted to build.
00:16:25
Speaker
And I bought all in on that thousand percent. And Coach Newberry, who's our head coach here, worked at Kennesaw. We worked there together. He brought those same principles. So when I came, it was really just continuing to to emphasize the things that he emphasized and do it in my arena the best I possibly could.
00:16:44
Speaker
Mm-hmm. So did Newberry take the position and brought you with, or did he take and then? So coach Newberry left Kennesaw after the 2018 football season to be the defensive coordinator here. Okay.
00:16:56
Speaker
And then after the 2022 season, he was promoted to head coach. when he When he was promoted, he called me up and said, I think you do a really good job here. Would you like to come? And I said, shit, yeah, ride my bike.
00:17:07
Speaker
um Luckily I didn't have to ride my bike, but you know, I loved my time at Kennesaw and I did not necessarily feel that my time at Kennesaw was done.
00:17:18
Speaker
um There are very few jobs outside of the ones that pay you so much that you have to go um There are very few jobs that I would have actively pursued and academy jobs were really the ones. So I just stars aligned and I was very fortunate.
00:17:36
Speaker
And again, yeah you get lucky, you create your own luck, but You know, being a part of the option community brought Coach Newberry, even as a defensive coach, to an option school. So we stayed within the network. And so it worked. Yeah.
00:17:51
Speaker
And you've already built programs for that style of play. Correct. So it was more about doing what I had done here and then learn how to do it better here and make the pivots that need to be pivoted for us.
00:18:06
Speaker
you know, academy life and the things that go
Balancing Academics and Athletics at Navy
00:18:09
Speaker
that. And where was your mindset where you had the opportunity to create something from nothing with it with the strong team to now there is a culture and an expectation here and you still got some autonomy, but how did you create your own thing within something that was just so well known and established? Yeah. um I kind of came up with this term as i went through my time at Kennesaw and a lot of this thought came coming out of COVID and
00:18:39
Speaker
saw Olympic sports there as well. I didn't train them hands on, but I did oversee that staff and we wanted to do some things. So I wanted to energize, modernize and unify, right? We wanted to energize the training environment to make people want to be a part of the training that happened. We wanted to modernize what we did, you know, from a technology standpoint, from a tactical standpoint, from communication standpoint, how can we modernize our training in all aspects?
00:19:07
Speaker
And then we wanted to unify how can we make everybody in the building feel like they're on the same team. Something I feel like coach Mohan did a wonderful job of was everybody in that football building understood effort, attitude and toughness um from recruiting to the running backs, coach, to the strength coach, to the trainers, to the student managers.
00:19:25
Speaker
And I felt like that was so powerful. I wanted to bring that to Olympic sports and how we all work together. And then when I came here, i brought that same mindset, right? How can we, energize the training environment, not knowing what they've gone through, but I know I was going to inject energy into this thing just by being new and what I could do. How can I modernize the training after identifying what they're capable of handling? And then how can I unify as a new person, having new people in the building? How can sports medicine, strength the conditioning, recruiting, nutrition, this football coaches and the players all work together?
00:19:58
Speaker
Time out. Observation, new coaches getting into the field are really smart and intelligent when it comes to programming or understanding practice plans and their sport, and really bad at people.
00:20:11
Speaker
They have high IQ and low EQ. I spent the past 14 years traveling the world, teaching people how to teach people, lifting weights, understanding sport, but most importantly, connecting with people.
00:20:25
Speaker
I've taken all those lessons from all over the world and put them into a new course, Why They're Not Listening, Coaching Today's Athlete. If you want the first lesson free, head to the website, listen.captainsandcoaches.com to learn more.
00:20:39
Speaker
And now, back to the show. Ready, ready, and break. But yeah, so to to keep keep building on that answer, it's – I went in here, I said, let's energize, modernize, and unify. Without knowing positives and negatives about what was done in this weight room before me, i just said, this is how we're gonna do things. So I'm gonna come in here, and it starts with energizing the training environment, right identifying what we have and what we can get, modernizing it with technology and training approaches, and then slowly unifying and making sure everybody felt like they were on the same team, speaking the same language.
00:21:13
Speaker
Yeah. And then we were talking a little before the show, creating versus changing. Yeah. So then what were some things that you didn't anticipate when it came to changing that then you had to learn on the fly or just grow within your ability to communicate as coach? Yeah.
00:21:29
Speaker
So creating is easier and harder. You're teaching people something that they don't know. So whatever you teach them is all they know. However, They don't know anything.
00:21:41
Speaker
So it's a lot of teaching. and It's a lot of correcting. It's a lot of reminding. It's very exhausting. Changing, you have to convince people that what you're doing is better than what they had been doing and that you're worth following. So um luckily at a service academy, these these young men are pretty obedient by demand of being in the Department of the Navy.
00:22:04
Speaker
And so there's more trust given um just by the nature of the place. And then it's my job to deliver on that trust. So come in and do the things that i feel are important, hammer it home, and then hopefully they can trust me long enough to see the results.
00:22:20
Speaker
um But when it comes to changing, a big part had to do with me learning the challenges and the unique situation of high academic, military,
00:22:32
Speaker
I mean, there's some challenges here that are unique to these three schools that you really don't see other places, maybe outside versions of it in like Ivy League schools. But, you know, we have ah almost 200 person roster.
00:22:45
Speaker
We've got a two and a half hour window to get them all trained and 36 varsity sports all training at the exact same time. So, you know, how how can we to get done what we want to get done within within those restrictions?
00:22:59
Speaker
And then you start to learn that They're in class eight hours a day and they are. yeah And they're not in badminton class, they're in calc three and stuff that goes so far beyond, they're doing math with no numbers, man, it's crazy. So um they're doing stuff that that empties their cup.
00:23:26
Speaker
So you know is it minimal effective dose or is it maximal recoverable stimulus? right but there's a line that if you pass and I have passed it, people are gonna get hurt.
00:23:39
Speaker
Right? And so I had to learn to understand what they went through, what they go through and know when i don't care, do what I say. i don't care when I tell you to stop, go until your eyes bleed, or I need to know when their cup is empty and I need to do just enough to keep them moving in the right direction and get them out of here. And that's day to day, week to week, month to month, semester semester, year to year. And that is a really big challenge that I'm excited to continue to learn and grow and fight. um
00:24:12
Speaker
But not every division one athlete in the American Athletic Conference has to sit through eight hours of class Right, and then come hustling in their uniform, train, hustle and eat, and then have mandatory study hours.
00:24:29
Speaker
And it's just, it's not normal. And that wears on you. And there's other factors too. They got to swim. They got to do their combatives. They got to do all kinds of stuff. So that's where I had to grow to help them
Leadership and Player-Led Teams
00:24:41
Speaker
grow. But the more I embraced it, the more, and and talked about how much I'm learning and changing along the way, the more they appreciated my willingness to meet them.
00:24:49
Speaker
I don't want to say meet them halfway, yeah but meet them where they're at so we can all move forward together. And now this this two and a half hour window to train, that is incredibly unique.
00:25:00
Speaker
So we do have the biggest roster in college football. Yeah. Where normally you'd say, all right, my bigs are coming in in the morning or this is where the bigs go, this is where the skills go.
00:25:11
Speaker
How are we operating this training? So we try to stay away from the mornings because if they're going up until two o'clock in the morning studying for a thermodynamic exam, I'm not going to wake them up at five to bench.
00:25:23
Speaker
Right? So we stay away from the mornings as much as possible. They're up early anyway because they have to be for the life that they have chosen to live. um We take anybody injured and modified and we do have a block at lunch that we can train them for about 45 minutes.
00:25:40
Speaker
So anybody that is post-surgical or acutely injured and is going to be significantly modified, for the training session of the day, um they'll train for 45 to 60 minutes at lunch.
00:25:53
Speaker
um And that gives them the best training they can get. It gives them individualized time. So they're not just getting a sheet, going to the corner and doing their best and then disappearing. I feel like that's our way of respecting them as individuals and giving them the best treatment they can get.
00:26:07
Speaker
At times they may feel like they're moved away or isolated from the team, but they're also getting the best service that they can get. yeah So that's a block of kids.
00:26:18
Speaker
Everybody else comes in the afternoon. And for a while, I would train the bigs at one time and then the skills an hour or so later. And I quickly realized there's not enough time to get all those people trained and get everything done that I want to get done and then start the next session on time.
00:26:37
Speaker
So I was starting a bunch of sessions late in which meant they were having to get cut early and all these problems. And I said, to hell with it. We're going to train them all at once. we're go to bring all these guys in here. They're supposed to be smart. They're supposed to be trustworthy. I'm supposed to be earning this trust. And I am well staffed. There's five of us, right? So like, we're going to go out there. We're going design what we need to design to train the whole team at one time. So instead of time and space being an issue, we just made space an issue, right?
00:27:07
Speaker
Because space is a challenge because it's how, how big of a room do you need to train 175 kids at one time in the off season, right? Or we don't have an indoor, or we have a 50 yard indoor and we got to run 175 kids.
00:27:20
Speaker
um So, but when you eliminate the two groups, now you only have one issue that you have to conquer. So then we can win with logistics.
00:27:31
Speaker
And so there we go. Let's be really concrete in what we're doing. Let's make sure we have great responsibilities assigned to our staff. And then let's go coach the hell out of these kids. And then let's give them a chance to to lose our our trust.
00:27:45
Speaker
Let's give it to them and let them lose it by not doing what we asked them to do. I'm not stupid. Kids are going to skip stuff. Kids going miss reps and not tell us. Kids are going to go get water for five.
00:27:58
Speaker
We just hope that we have convinced them that that's not the right way of doing things. And I think that we do more good than bad there.
Developing Coaching Staff and Collaborative Programming
00:28:05
Speaker
But that's been our answer is just train massive groups. And so I think that it's hard to get really, really strong on short rest. So I'm like, all right, put five to a rack on squat day.
00:28:15
Speaker
Put six to a rack on squat day and we'll and we'll take 40 minutes and squat with four or five minutes rest in between because you lift heavier weights better when you're rested. And now you've got great team engagement.
00:28:29
Speaker
You know, the music cranking. So the environment's fun, but now you've got people communicating with each other and cheering each other on. There's always a spotter and people can do well. um But just do less better. Yeah.
00:28:40
Speaker
Do less better. um Fundamental, not fluff. Do the simple things savagely well, all these terms that you hear. um And, and if we don't do a thousand things, we're going to do the few things that we do really, really well. It just might take a little bit of time.
00:28:54
Speaker
um But I'd rather put five to a rack, six to a rack and train methodically and then have everything on the on the sheet done than have to cut 25% of the sheet just to start the next group on time. right So that's how we that's how we manage that.
00:29:11
Speaker
Yeah. I'm curious just how are captains selected for Navy football? They're voted by their teammates voted and approved by the coaches. yeah And then what opportunities do you present them in the strength training environment to to grow as leaders?
00:29:27
Speaker
Early on, not much, you know, because I was establishing what I was supposed to be from my leadership standpoint. um And so, you know, when I got here and January of 2023, the plebs, the freshmen, those kids are seniors now.
00:29:45
Speaker
So new head coach, new coordinators, new strength coach, let's let us lead, be coach-led, until the players take it over, right? and if the if the players believe in what the coaches believe in, then they'll take it and make it theirs, and they have done that.
00:30:05
Speaker
So, um it's when they played our last game on January 2nd, I'm going to sob like a baby. They're just remarkable young men who are going to do incredible things for this world. I mean, They're remarkable with with the ownership. So over time, we give them more and more, or they've just taken more and more, right? And so one cool thing that's really neat, it's not in the weight room, it's done at team meetings. Attendance is taken by position captains.
00:30:29
Speaker
right position captains are voted by each position. And so they report to us who's here, who's not here. We don't have a huge attendance problem as you, it's pretty awesome.
00:30:39
Speaker
Cause there many people i had to chase and pull out of bed when I was at Kennesaw. I think we took a couple laps around campus. Yeah. class Class checking and stuff. Yeah. That doesn't happen here. Um, but the, um,
00:30:52
Speaker
that that's That's one piece of leadership that's given to them. And then it's, all right, we have to change the time of our lift. going to send it out to position captains. It's their responsibility to get the information to the rest of the of their positions.
00:31:04
Speaker
um We ask them to get up in front of their team and speak. Hey, what was your most impactful moment this week? What was your most challenging moment this week? What teammate of yours inspired you this week? What teammate of yours needs to step it up?
00:31:18
Speaker
right So we're getting them to have some... opportunities to stand up in front practice speaking in front of their teammates, right, and giving their opinions. And they do such a great job with it.
00:31:28
Speaker
You know, we do a way more positive stuff in that than negative. But we're not afraid to ask these kids to to call people out, call out their teammates or so or also to celebrate their teammates and our defensive coordinator. Coach Volker, he does a great job of that in their unit meetings too. It's like, hey, who hey who what what high five you want to give today? And someone will stand up and be like, hey, this kid over here, I watched him practice.
00:31:50
Speaker
He didn't take one rep off. He was busting his balls. He was coaching the younger kids. I watched him do that in unit meetings. It's inspiring. I bring that stuff to the weight room in the training environment as well. um And then, you know, as we've grown into this, our players have embraced effort, attitude, and toughness. Mm-hmm.
00:32:09
Speaker
And so I have seen teammates drop more up-downs than coaches have dropped up-downs. You know that things are going well when the standard is being upheld by the players. So a player-led team is always gonna be the best team, but I will refuse to have an unled team yeah So I'm not going to sit there and have no players lead and then no coaches lead and wait for players to emerge. So I think that these, the senior class, they observed us, they bought in and then they took it over. And so the beginning of January, it's my job to step in and lead until they take it over again.
00:32:44
Speaker
Yeah. And I'll gladly give it to them if they earn it. Man, I love that approach. What I'm seeing just common trends and maybe you experience this is where coaches have a problem with the team and they just tell their captains to figure it out because that coach doesn't have the tools.
00:33:00
Speaker
to solve that know social or interesting dynamic amongst the team. So then they put on the captains, and the captains don't have the social skills. right So then what do we usually get?
00:33:12
Speaker
Seniors just yell in a freshman. Yeah. So it does not build the culture, does not build the body. Right, and I think that all of our coaches here do a great job of communicating the why behind what we do, and we have really smart kids, and they do better with information. When they ask you why we're not running full speed, we're running 80%, or why are we're running full speed instead of 80%, you give them the answer, and they're like, got it, coach, and they go and execute it really, really sharp. So when we give concrete concepts for them to to to understand,
00:33:44
Speaker
they'll they'll take that and they'll go lead with it. There's not a whole lot of ambiguity in Navy football right now. And I think that because of that, players have have been able to jump in and take the reins and lead. And when when when it's thoughts, feelings, and emotions in leadership can inspire, but they can't necessarily lead, right? But when you put words and definitions to things, it helps um become more concrete. It gives people rules to follow.
00:34:13
Speaker
Yeah. And ah I got the opportunity to witness you leave. had a whole rack of interns at Kennesaw. And now you got a full, strong staff. Yeah. You also take interns with Navy football? We do. um well We typically have them in the summer.
00:34:27
Speaker
um But we're open to when we get a good intern, we'll bring them because we, I mean, we got a lot of kids need to be coached in here. yeah Right. When you're on the field and you and the coaches are outnumbered.
00:34:39
Speaker
significantly it's better when they're outnumbered less so um yeah we use interns and coach aunt aunt cimino um he's been with me he was an intern here got hired full-time he runs the internship program we take a lot of pride in doing that well and teaching them how to teach teaching them how to coach and demanding of them and but giving them opportunities we say we deputize them it's like here's your pen right like go out and coach you know we give you trust and then you can lose it or you can gain more of it Yeah.
00:35:05
Speaker
And I guess that that's an opportunity for you to empower the staff to then take charge of this. Yeah. Still overseeing and ensuring however it's there. So yeah, my, my job is to have a big picture and then I believe the best is to let everybody write the program. So these are the things that think are most important this off season. And that goes back to like my objective sheets. It's like, okay,
00:35:30
Speaker
You've got acceleration, you've got max velocity, you've got bigs, you've got skills, I'm gonna take this. And then we all take a day or two, work on it, we bring it to the table, we chop it all up, we give it back. And that way, at the end of the day, everybody should have skin in the game, right? And i I aim, and maybe this is a defense mechanism, I don't think it is, but if I have an assistant on my staff who has no ownership of any of the programming, if we have a rash of injuries, he's just gonna be like, well, I just do what I'm told.
00:35:57
Speaker
I don't think anybody on my staff when we have bad injuries can say, well, i just do what I'm told. i think because everybody has a say in what goes on so we can all be held accountable. I think that's the best way to get ah get the most out of your staff. And I'm lucky to have awesome people who think creatively and have been really good when I've challenged them and they've challenged me and we have really active, positive, productive debate at the table. And I like to think that we write good programs. And if we write a program that doesn't yield a great result, I could put my head down at the pillow at night knowing that we knew what we were doing,
00:36:30
Speaker
we were just wrong. you're You're allowed to be wrong as long as you you know you you didn't you weren't lazy in your thought process, you were thorough in your design, you were reflective along the way.
00:36:43
Speaker
if it doesn't work, we find out why, we go back to the table, we we do better. I've written a program less than 100% And I feel guilty to those players because i they didn't get my best. Right. But if we give it our all and it doesn't work perfect, most likely a lot of it's going to work.
00:36:59
Speaker
yeah And we'll learn from the mistakes. And that's how they can have skin in the game. and And we can all go to the table and try to fix the problems. Common mistake for a strength coach is being a perfectionist or controlling everything and having the perfect program.
00:37:15
Speaker
Did you ever have that? Did you have to get over that? Yeah, we all do. you know And I don't think you should ever stop striving for the perfect program. um But there's, how do you identify a perfect program? And that's what's so hard. It's like, so I've learned and I'm getting old now, right? I've done this a minute, that there is no perfect program because you're training a big group of kids. Not everyone's gonna get all the benefits or all the gains. Some people gonna see more, some people are gonna get worse in some way. Somebody's gonna get hurt, someone's not gonna get hurt.
00:37:46
Speaker
um So it becomes fluid, it becomes living and breathing, right? And and you just have to accept that that's the thing. and And if you know where you want to be, then when things are going sideways, you can get it back on a course because you at least know where your end goal is. um But I'm fully aware, a I'm not great at writing programs.
00:38:06
Speaker
B, know that you can't write the perfect one. If you could write the perfect one, we'd all be doing exactly the same thing. um So I just, go into work and we get all of our opinions.
00:38:19
Speaker
We figure out what we think is best for our players. We go about making it and we go make it. We make sure we run it well. We coach the shit out of it. Players get better. Players don't get better. We go back to drawing table and do it
Building Trust with Athletes
00:38:29
Speaker
again. um I'm pretty open and honest about the fact that I know that people are not going to lift perfectly.
00:38:38
Speaker
I know that people are going to squat high on max day. I know that people are going to starfish on clean maxes. um I know people are going to pull hamstrings on sprint days. um But going to do our best to make those and things not happen. And if they do, going to coach the shit out of it. Hopefully, if three if it happens three times, if we weren't so thorough, it would happen 12 times.
00:39:00
Speaker
And then feedback loops are important. it's It's easy for movement or the timer or the weight to be the feedback. And you're living in a feedback loop of a ah yes sir world environment. Yeah.
00:39:13
Speaker
So how do you instill and trust, not only trust your instincts, but getting feedback from the guys that may feel initially, if they're stepping into a leadership role, that not saying yes could negatively affect them?
00:39:27
Speaker
You just...
00:39:31
Speaker
great question. And I think that the only way to get them to be vulnerable like that is to spend time with them. So we do breakfast check, right? And um the brigade does breakfast, the whole brigade eats at the same time, but we have team tables where a football team eats together.
00:39:50
Speaker
um But you can slither your way through it, right? It's like, oh, hey, 35th company, I'm eating with football. Hey, football, you're eating with 35th company. And then you just take an extra 30 minutes to sleep, right? It's, I'm sleeping in his house, he's sleeping in, we're going to drink in the woods.
00:40:06
Speaker
um Well, we're like, no, because that's low character. We're going to get in trouble for that. And you're not eating, so you're not ready for your day. So we started breakfast checks. So there's two strength coaches at every breakfast and you sit at the tables, you get to know them.
00:40:19
Speaker
Yeah. right And you you find out where they're from and what theyre how many siblings they have and what their dreams are or something funny that's happening, what class are you going to? or and And when you have all those touch points, you're more likely to get an honest answer from things.
00:40:37
Speaker
um And so that's not a coach's eye. That's not a gut feeling. You need to have those two. When you're coaching, as you get older and you see things, you need to step back and you're like,
00:40:50
Speaker
doesn't feel right. This doesn't look right. Their body language is off. Are they being soft or is this too hard or is it the wrong time? But when you ask people, you need to give them a reason to feel like it's okay for them to be vulnerable.
Personal Insights and Cultural Connections
00:41:00
Speaker
And that's touch points. That's walking with them back to the locker room. That's seeing them in the training room. That's eating breakfast with them. That's, like, Urban Meyer was on the Focus 3 podcast several years ago and he said, how do you spell love, T-I-M-E?
00:41:19
Speaker
right? The only way for these relationships to have any substance is to spend time. I think it's Brian Buffini runs another podcast and he talks about like, there's no such thing as quality time without quantity time.
00:41:36
Speaker
Cause you don't know when your quality time is coming. You can't say I'll spend quality time on a two week vacation, but the rest of the 52 weeks a year, I'm gonna work so hard. You don't know when that quality time is coming.
00:41:48
Speaker
So you need to spend a quantity of time with them. um So we we we harp on making sure we know their names and where they're from. And we try not to ignore anybody and give them our best. Now there's a lot of kids and some kids are quiet and reserved and they don't seek the relationship. And we have to try to, we're not gonna win every one.
00:42:06
Speaker
We're not. um But I think that that is how you get truth from from your players. I love it. So winding down here, some fun questions.
00:42:18
Speaker
We had a WWE star training in your weight room. Yeah. kind of saw Yeah, we did. Braun Breaker. Yeah, that that was cool. i remember you telling me who his dad was and seeing him just be a freak. Yeah. Fullback, of course. Yep.
00:42:32
Speaker
So, I mean, how does it feel to just watch him rise and just become... his own man in his own right. Yeah. Well, what's awesome is that his dad and his uncle who are WWE legends, they told him, get your degree.
00:42:48
Speaker
And if you go get your degree, we'll do whatever we can to help you get in the business. The family business. The family business. Right. Yeah. And so, cause he didn't really want to go to college. He loved football, but he wanted to be a wrestler. So, but he listened to his, to his mentors and to his,
00:43:03
Speaker
He went to school, had a great football experience, got his degree, but we always knew that that's what he wanted to do. So for him to succeed in football, succeed in school,
00:43:14
Speaker
And then to go achieve his life dream makes, you know, it warms my heart for an awesome. Now he plays a heel. He plays a bad guy. He ain't a bad guy. He's awesome. Bronson Rechsteiner is a wonderful human being. He's tough as nails. He'll talk that talk. But I mean, he would do anything for you at any time. But he was a blast to train because he loved to get after it.
00:43:35
Speaker
But he trusted the process about like, hey, today's light and fast. Go get it. and he would go get it. And then on heavy days, it was like, I'm not gonna hold you back, Bronson. This is your thing. Let's rock and roll.
00:43:46
Speaker
Time out. I get two and This one's all about training. I'm talking about my old bull strength conditioning program that I have available on Train Heroic. This is Training with Wisdom. It's the program that I am following. I understand who you are. You don't have a lot of time.
00:44:03
Speaker
You're a busy leader, and you're beat up from years of athletics, years of training. Here in this program, we target hips, ankles, knee, back health with the barbell. We have fun variations of the squat and the programs, sexy Fridays, bodybuilding. It is an amazing time.
00:44:21
Speaker
It will keep you engaged, it will keep you involved, and keep you on a wise program that keeps you coming back for more instead of digging you a hole you can't come out of that affects life outside a training.
00:44:34
Speaker
Come check us out for a seven-day free trial in the Old Bull program, a link in the show notes, or if you're watching on YouTube, just click right here. All right, and now back to the show. Ready, ready, and break.
00:44:47
Speaker
How has being a father changed you for coaching? Oh, awesome. um So
00:44:56
Speaker
I got two kids. I got three-year-old boy, five-year-old girl, and and
00:45:06
Speaker
It's made me a better human in every in every way. um To pivot, I will say that our players and a lot of the backgrounds that they come from um
00:45:23
Speaker
in in certain ways inspire me to be a great parent. Because a lot of our kids, I've gotten to know their parents and they have raised remarkable young men. Remarkable young men who are smart, who are tough, who are dedicated, who loyal, who are hardworking, consistent, willing to sacrifice. And they make me want to do a great job raising my children. And so that's a joy, but how as, you know, if I'm going to talk about like how my life has changed since I've had kids, this is, I'll say number one, I'm lucky to be in a director role where I can delegate and I'm lucky to work for a head coach who allows me to do so.
00:45:59
Speaker
And i promised my wife and myself and ultimately my unborn children at the time that I would never be a deadbeat dad. would never be like my, if I, if I was making the decision to have children, then,
00:46:12
Speaker
I was going to do my best to raise them. That doesn't mean that I'm as present with them as I should be or as often. I mean, I coach in college football. It takes a lot. um They spen spend a lot of time at daycare, but I will never – abandon my children because I'm a coach. And so, and my wife works in in healthcare. care So there's days that she's on call and is working overnight. I will leave practice or I will leave training early to get my kids and bring them home, cook dinner, eat dinner with them, put them to bed. And I will never apologize for being the best father that I can be. Could I be better? Absolutely. um Should I spend more time? Absolutely. But, um you know, there's a great line from Mac Brown says, don't let this be the best thing you ever do.
00:46:54
Speaker
right Don't let being a football player or a football coach be the best thing that you ever do. um And I won't. those those The kids that I raised, the that my wife and I had, they're going to be the number one priority in my life.
00:47:08
Speaker
um But I also think that they're being raised by a passionate, hardworking father and a passionate, hardworking mother. And them being raised in a house... seeing their parents go to work and work hard and care about solving problems and doing work that they're passionate about is going to help them become passionate about something and put that same work into whatever they choose to be passionate about.
00:47:28
Speaker
um So no apologies either way. right um But what I will say is that you need to be way more organized. You have to be way more ahead of schedule.
00:47:39
Speaker
um and And you need to have boundaries and you need to be strong about those things. You need to have open communication. And I'm probably a little bit, I know that I'm very lucky that I have a staff and you know three of my staff members don't have kids. So it's like, I gotta go, you gotta finish this up.
00:47:56
Speaker
and And they do. And I'm lucky to have those people and I don't apologize for it. I'll make it up to them where I can. um But if you wanna be a coach ah but and you wanna be a parent, make sure you know that you wanna be a parent. That's that's number one.
00:48:10
Speaker
That's number one. And you'll learn a lot of lessons about patience and impatience and um and development. And you learn all kinds of stuff. You'll connect it to parenting. But at the end of the day, the the kids that you have are the ones that you owe the most to.
00:48:24
Speaker
um And so I'm grateful to work for a head coach who lets me be flexible as family first, to work with a staff that can support me um so I can be a great dad. Yeah, that's that's awesome.
00:48:35
Speaker
Yeah, but what what how has it made me a better coach? I can't really speak to that because... i mean, you have much better answer to question I didn't ask. It's much bigger picture than how has it made me a better coach. yeah um Really, it's just about understanding your life a little bit better.
00:48:50
Speaker
um and Here's a small little thing. like I used to not worry about planning too far ahead, about... hey, when are we gonna be done training? Cause I'm trying to catch a flight home. i'm like, I don't care, i'll but we'll be done training, well I'll tell you. And now I have a wife and kids who wanna go on vacation, we're planning that flight way ahead. Now I know that I gotta help my players schedule their flights way ahead too. So those little things, you learn things between the lines. Do the kiddos ever to come by the facility? Oh yeah, they're around a bunch. So um our players do awesome. Our Kennesaw kids were great with with with my daughter when she was there.
00:49:26
Speaker
um They walk around, they they run around, they play on the equipment, they give high fives. um They love being around it. And our and our players do a great job like embracing them when they're around. And I'm looking forward to them getting older and like being able to know a little bit more about what's going on. Because they come to the game, but they're just excited to run the field after. yeah um But I'm looking forward to them being raised around it and if they enjoy it engaging in it more intentionally. Yeah.
00:49:54
Speaker
I mean, great for the the young men you're coaching to see that as well. I think so. I think that, you know, I remember one time I say, guys, I got to leave. I expect you to do a great job for Coach Miller and the rest of the staff.
00:50:06
Speaker
But I said, and i and I said, I told my wife and I told myself that I would never be a deadbeat dad. So I got to go. And they all clapped. You know what Like it's it's it's understood that that these things are a priority and I don't feel judged for it, which is which is lucky that I work in this environment that allows me to do that. Yeah.
00:50:22
Speaker
Love it. A big part of coaching is you get to say the same thing over and over again. So you get to have fun with it. How I have fun with it is movie quotes. Yeah. So leaning into that, but now we're seeing this generational gap. it a no saw supertroopers It's brutal. It's brutal.
00:50:39
Speaker
What movies are you leaning into to educate these guys on what a real comedy is? Well, I have failed them, just like you are noticing. It's hard to make this connection. Like, you drop a movie quote from Happy Gilmore, and you're lucky if one in three people have seen it.
00:50:55
Speaker
And it's it's tough. It's tough. um I will tell you that the movie that is the most relatable, Wedding Crashers. Oh, yeah. Wedding Crashers is crossing generational gaps, which is beautiful. um Music.
00:51:08
Speaker
more likely to make the connection through music. Because music, i I don't know if it it stays relevant longer, it's easier to check back to. Now we have a pretty diverse group. We got Country Boys, we got rap, we got all the different stuff.
00:51:21
Speaker
um But music is definitely, and my assistant, Matt Gonzalez, he's in charge of the music. And that's a hard job. pressure That's a hard job because you can't make all 175, 200 guys happy at once. And they'll let him hear it. But he does an awesome job of playing the themes. So if we're playing a Texas team, it's Texas rap for that week. If we're playing in Memphis like we're playing in a couple of weeks, like he's going to play a Tennessee rap or at least trap Southern rap. um And the guys love that. And and he does an awesome job. and But that's how you really, more so the movies, and I've faded from movies since I've had kids. I don't see movies.
00:51:54
Speaker
I don't see them because my kids own the TV. yeah right And then I go to sleep. So i I don't really see them like I used to. I can't even connect. Walked into 94. I can't really connect with what the kids are seeing now.
00:52:05
Speaker
um But the music's a little bit easier. And Matt does an awesome job of that. Yeah. Okay. Noted. Music. Music. Yeah, the movies, I feel, just saying the repeater for me. I can drop these lines and laugh inside my head just to keep me engaged and entertaining from saying the same old thing.
00:52:22
Speaker
Favorite fictional coach of all time? So i you're you might be waiting for Ted Lasso, but I have not watched Ted Lasso. But he's not entirely fictional, but Gene Hackman's character in Hoosiers.
00:52:39
Speaker
um and I love that. In an age when fundamentals is being disrespected around all sport um and AAU and travel ball is killing practice, um you watch everyone's inspired by by that movie, but you know they were just working on practicing and dribbling around chairs and being in great shape. So like I'd say that that's probably an early...
00:53:02
Speaker
um an early influence in like the coaching style and I come from a coaching family but um but then I'd say as I continue to talk through this there's no way that anybody is more impactful than Mick and Rocky. Okay. So not a coach is a trainer but trainers are coaches coaches are trainers. Yeah, Mick. Yeah. Hell yeah. That's it. That's the
Influential Literature and Continuous Learning
00:53:20
Speaker
answer. What's your favorite Rocky?
00:53:22
Speaker
I think that four is my favorite but one is the best movie. Okay. I mean one won best picture. Yes. Four is just iconic. I mean, it's just an, I mean, I tell this with no shame.
00:53:36
Speaker
I saw Rocky for the first time when I was in like seventh or eighth grade. then the next day I went for a run and I got to one of the fire hydrants on Swift Road and I caught a cramp and I walked home.
00:53:47
Speaker
The next day i went for a run again and I made it further and I'm like, oh shit, training works. And so basically for the next six years, I just did whatever Rocky did. And that's how I fell in love with training. And so I would just be on a run through Northbridge, Massachusetts with my Discman and the Rocky IV soundtrack. Oh, for years and years and years, like that's just what inspired me to get into what it is that I do. So it's like the greatest, you know, Rocky is is the best. and And I make references to that all the time to players, to coaches, how this game is going to go. Cause they're all different themes. It's like, I just want to survive. I just want to be the one who i want to make it to the end or this one. I want to be the one standing at the end. This one, I'm going to knock him out because he owes me something. where I'm gonna try to prove myself to this. is like there
00:54:31
Speaker
They're so awesome. and I haven't seen the Creed movies, which I will someday, but um like those first four Rocky movies, we'll forget about Rocky V. I have seen Rocky Balboa.
00:54:42
Speaker
I mean, other than his clean and jerk technique, which is terrible, um it's just they're just the most inspiring thing in the world to me. I love them so much. Yeah, I gotta go with three.
00:54:53
Speaker
yeah Yeah. That's the Eye of the Tiger movie. That is the Eye of the Tiger. And i maybe there's like a Rocky for each stage of life. I think Where like the self-doubt in three and you got to overcome it. Yeah.
00:55:05
Speaker
And you got good people around you that are demanding of you. Demanding of you. But then you have to make the decision. Exactly. I love it. And then, yeah, Rocky VI. ah Yeah, friend of my mentor, he was Antonio Tarver's coach during his heavyweight career so then i got the opportunity to train tarver when i was working with him cool and i mean he's as big as he is in the movies just a monster heavyweight so mason lion dixon met him and worked out with him in real life that's neat cool story Time out. Tex here at Train Heroic headquarters meeting with the team to talk about the coaching experience that I'm able to provide for my athletes. So if you're a coach and want to put your program out there on an app that athletes actually enjoy using, Train Heroics for you. I've been using it since 2014. delivering literally over tens of thousands of workouts to athletes, and Train Heroic allows me to provide the unique coaching experience that I want to. Uploading video, providing coaching feedback, directions, and building a community, that's why I love Train Heroic. And if you want to take your athletes where they can't take themselves, that they want to go, head to trainheroic.com slash captains and check out how you can deliver programming to them.
00:56:20
Speaker
And now, back to the show. Ready, ready, and written.
00:56:25
Speaker
winding, winding down, you're one of the most well-read coaches. I remember the books in the office from Kennesaw, and then I had a moment to just glance over here. What over the past decade has been not necessarily like strength and conditioning book, but influential books that you lean into then you then you pass out? Yeah, I give i give Gates of Fire out to every staff member, which is about you know the Spartans at Thermopylae. Yeah, Steven Press. Yeah, it's my favorite book. I've read it four times. I've listened to it three times.
00:56:57
Speaker
um And I think there's just so much about culture and leadership and attitude and then it's a really good story and it' it's relatable, especially since 300, everyone's seen that. um I'd say some of the most influential coaching books that I've read, i love coaching biographies.
00:57:13
Speaker
um I sum it up, which I read when in probably 2012, which is Pat's summit autobiography slash biography.
00:57:23
Speaker
um She was inspiring to so many and changed the world of women's athletics and athletics in general and how she coached and why she coached and what she did and how she did it as a mom of influence and ah just absolutely, absolutely remarkable.
00:57:39
Speaker
um ah yeah This guy's got a bunch of books about him. um so anything you can read on Tom Osborne, who the longtime coach at Nebraska. Okay. I think that, you know, I read Osborne on leadership. There's one right behind you called more than winning. um And then just like how he goes about, I've listened to him interviewed in some podcasts.
00:57:59
Speaker
um Those are great. you know From X's and O's of the game, that hasn't really changed for me, I think, that reading Tri-Phase It cover to cover, reading Advances of Functional Training by Mike Boyle, whatever one, the newest one, reading that cover to cover, and reading Ultimate MMA Conditioning by Joel Jameson, those are the most important um books to learn strength and conditioning. um there's but you gotta read them, right? Not just go find the pieces that you want, which I struggle with sometimes in other reference books.
00:58:29
Speaker
And then, you know, these books I've tried to find better ones, you know, but it's hard to find the new ones that are more impactful than the ones that like helped you create your identity. But um Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni is remarkable.
00:58:44
Speaker
Good to Great is super influential and and like the hedgehog principle that comes with that. um You know, that along with, no um you know, ah Gates of Fire, all the coaching biographies.
00:59:00
Speaker
um I really like Lou Holtz's coaching biography. I can't remember what it's called, but I get inspired when I read that stuff. And and and you might read 400 pages and and get two things out of it, but it's worth every page. Yeah, it's memorable. And I do enjoy reading... um You know, and then since I've been here, I've gotten into Audible, which helps me consume even more when I
Conclusion and Following Jim Carizzi's Journey
00:59:22
Speaker
when i drive. And it's a little bit easier to consume difficult material, in my opinion.
00:59:27
Speaker
Stuff that you can get bored reading, fall asleep reading, you can listen to it a little bit better. And so that's a great way to consume as well. The store takes care of itself. I listened to from by Bill Walsh. That's an awesome book um on how to build things and sustain things and be creative and work through adversity.
00:59:43
Speaker
um So there's a lot of good ones out there. If reading, you're not... read and you're not you're You're making a mistake. Readers are leaders. Yeah. Have you read the War of Art? I have not. I have not. haven't downloaded it. haven't gotten there yet. No, this one you got to read. Okay. it's It's ah maybe a page.
00:59:59
Speaker
ah Each chapter is one page or one paragraph. Oh, cool. So it's very deliberate and direct with each lesson. I know what I'm getting you for christmas All right. Well, if if people want to continue to follow the Navy football, I'm going to be sure to get this out pre-bowl game. Cool.
01:00:15
Speaker
So we got some momentum going behind you guys. Where should they go to follow you to continue to learn and see what you're building here? Most of my stuff's on Instagram. Um, Navy FB strength. There's an underscore in there somewhere. You'll have to find me. You can search my name. I'm sure you'll attach it.
01:00:28
Speaker
I try to post most of my content comes out in the summer. That's when I feel like i have a little bit more time to have my phone out with interns to film some stuff too and edit stuff. But I try to put good content out for all the reasons we talked about earlier.
01:00:40
Speaker
um So that's where you can follow me. You follow Navy football. um You know, we we try to create something we can all be proud of. Yeah. You're doing a great Thank you. i appreciate it. It's great to be here. Yes, super happy for you, man. Excited for the future and everything you're doing. All right. Thank you very much. Cheers. Awesome. Cheers.