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#30 Jacob Ross Pt. 1 | NFL, NBA, MLB Performance Coach
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Jacob Ross is an elite level strength and sport performance coach with a track record of coaching all starts from the NFL, NBA and MLB. He is the co-founder of Smart Strenght and the Strenght & Conditioning Coach of the South Sudanese basketball team. We get into his story, from growing up on a ranch in Texas, going to TCU, his time at coaching pro athletes at EFT Sports Performance, almost dying from an inflamed heart, to creating his own company. There are plenty of wild and unreal stories from pro athletes and their strenght accomplishments.
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SEBASTIAN ENGSTROM
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Transcript
Introduction to Jacob Ross
00:00:06
Speaker
Welcome to episode number 30. I am your host Sebastian Engstrom and today Jacob Ross joins me. He is an elite level strength and conditioning coach. He is the co-founder of Smart Strength where they coach regular athletes up to elite level athletes and power lifters.
00:00:22
Speaker
Hit them up if you want to check out customized programming why you should listen to this episode. Well, Jacob is a powerhouse of knowledge. He has coached some of the best athletes out there from the MLB to the NBA to the NFL.
Jacob Ross's Coaching Journey
00:00:37
Speaker
We go into his story and what is it really like to coach these top level athletes?
00:00:42
Speaker
What does it take to perform at such a high level? What are their habits? What are his habits? And this is just part one. We go into part two. Deeper on training, deeper on nutrition. Enjoy this first part. And if this show is phenomenal in your eyes, even if you want to help the show out, if you're an apple, scroll down, hit five stars. That helps us reach more people. This is a contributing message to the community. So
00:01:09
Speaker
That is a massive favor. Please do this if you're on another platform, let's say Spotify Google whatever it is hit subscribe like and Or even hit up a review Takes you a few mean 30 seconds a minute at most and this makes a massive difference It's a good deed of the day and I appreciate you
Sebastian's Programs and Promotions
00:01:28
Speaker
for doing that. Thank you and I
00:01:32
Speaker
If you haven't checked it out, we have some phenomenal programs ourselves. Calisthenics being the main one and you can check out all the content on modernathlete.com. So we just switched the name to modernathlete.com. So modern with an E at the end. So modernathlete.com and you can get the direct access to my coaching, the program that I'm doing and all the tips and tricks that go into it and phenomenal community as well.
00:02:01
Speaker
See you on the other side and enjoy the conversation with Jacob.
Jacob's Daily Routine
00:02:05
Speaker
Jacob Ross, it's amazing to have you here, brother. Well, thank you for being here. Oh, happy to be here. Just had to get up same time I normally get up. What is that time? It's gone back as I've gotten older. I'm usually up
00:02:23
Speaker
5am, 5.30am, something like that. Back in the day, it was 315 for a long time. Holy shit. Wow. We'll get into that right now for listeners who are tuning in. It's 6am central time in Jacob, you're in Illinois, right outside of Chicago, right? Yep. Yep. Far west suburbs of Chicago. Okay.
00:02:48
Speaker
So before jumping into 315, Jacob, how would you introduce
Jacob's Role and Family
00:02:54
Speaker
yourself? Like who are you? What the hell do you do? And, uh, yeah, it's, it's a, uh, it's a complicated story, which makes for a good podcast. Um, I, I would say if I met somebody today that I didn't know, I would say my,
00:03:12
Speaker
Most of my job was or has been an elite sports performance coach. I traditionally have worked with professional athletes, high-level collegiate high school athletes on sports performance. And then I also recently have co-founded a business with Tom Callis called Smart Strength Official. And it's a customized online training platform. And that's the basics of me. Everything else gets complicated.
00:03:42
Speaker
In short, how would you describe the complicated? What do you do outside? Like who, like your father, your husband, right? Like what? Yeah. What else? Sure. Yeah. So I've been married, um, nine years to my wife, Alicia. Uh, we have three kids. We have two daughters and a son. They are respectively six, five and one, but soon to be seven, five and two. Um, I'm from Texas originally born and raised on a farm.
00:04:10
Speaker
you know, grew up on like 80 something acres. There was only 4,000 people in my town, which I lived outside of and moved to Chicago around 11 years ago now, something like that. And yeah, I play three instruments. I play at my local church in our church band. What do you play? I play drums, piano and bass guitar.
00:04:38
Speaker
decently. Not great, but decently. Good enough not to mess anything up. So where in Texas are you from?
Jacob's Hometown and Early Influences
00:04:50
Speaker
Yeah, it's a town called Pittsburgh. There's no H on the end of it. We don't do silent letters. So a lot of people think it's like Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but it's not. And we are famous in Pittsburgh for several things, actually. It's an incredibly famous place that you've never heard of. But it's very famous. We have
00:05:09
Speaker
world famous hot links. And if you don't know what those are, you'll just have to look up Pittsburgh hot links. It's very difficult to explain. Um, we had pilgrims chicken, which at one point was the second largest poultry producer in the nation. It was started in Pittsburgh, Texas. And, uh, we also were the first in flight. It was not the Wright brothers. Um, it was the Ezekiel airship in Pittsburgh, Texas. You can Google that as well if you're really interested, but we did it before the Wright brothers.
00:05:39
Speaker
Okay. So the main reason these are fascinating things I think this will make for a great story. You know, especially in Tom's words, this guy knows more than anyone else when it comes to high performance and training top level athletes. Like you've trained some
00:05:58
Speaker
Some very cool people everything from Olympians NFL players NBA players like top level D1 players It's it's a it's across the board. There's secret sauce into it.
Concussions and Career Decisions
00:06:08
Speaker
So the secret sauce will get into it Maybe that's sprinkled in but let's let's start with the methodology. How did this all get started? We're talking about Texas ranch farm days. Yeah
00:06:20
Speaker
Right. Yeah. So, um, my dad is probably the person who got me most interested into shrink the conditioning. Um, he bought a Joe Wieder set. Oh my gosh. It would have been back in the sixties, uh, just a barbell set. And, uh, my whole life he worked shift work in a power plant, 12 hour shifts nights, days, didn't matter, you know, swing, whatever. But I always remember he would work out before or after.
00:06:49
Speaker
, and
00:07:19
Speaker
just to be in interest and in strength and conditioning because some people don't see it. You know, they just, unless they play a sport, they just never see it. That was, it was different for me. I saw it my whole life. And then of course I played sports and you're in Texas, you play football. I wasn't, I was a good football player. I got recruited to some big schools, but I had seven concussions my senior year of high school football. So I,
00:07:43
Speaker
decided. Hold on. You said 17 concussions is seven. Okay, seven is one season in one season. Yeah, it was a I mean, back then, you know, concussions were like known. They weren't what they are now. It was kind of on the edge of they were figuring out it probably wasn't the best thing to do.
00:08:06
Speaker
Um, one of mine was really bad. I was out, I don't know how long on the field, probably a minute or so. And, you know, I had a headache for several weeks. Um, and you know, you just keep playing like in Texas, like back then, you know, we didn't even have, we didn't even have a, uh, like a trainer, um, of any kind. So like.
00:08:27
Speaker
You know, the coaches would kind of run into the sideline, do the smelling salt and ask you some really basic questions like, you know, what day is it? Well, in Texas, you only play on Friday night. That's it. So like, of course it's Friday. Like, you know, the questions I want you to know the answer to so that you can go play. I mean, it wasn't anything like, you know, they weren't like scheming to get me out there. It's just like, you know, as long as everything, you know, isn't broken and you just go out there and play.
00:08:53
Speaker
But, you know, they just started stacking up for me. And I think a lot of it for me too, was I started playing Barstee as a freshman in high school. So I was 14 played Barstee football because I was just a bigger kid. And so I've gotten hit a lot. And, you know, also we did all these stupid drills where, you know, you just line up and basically smash each other in the head. Um, anyway, so yeah. And I had, I mean, I had good numbers. I was strong back then. I was fast. Um, I was squatting like 500 pounds. I ran like a four, seven 40.
00:09:23
Speaker
Um, and then I graduated, uh, first in my high school class as well. And so, I mean, it's only, it's only 110 people in my class, you know, but somebody's got to do it. Right. So, um, usually that's not the combo, but yeah, 500 pounds. Like that's unheard of for a high school student. I mean, but the thing that was different about me from a lot of other, um,
00:09:49
Speaker
you know, I would say kids was, well, I was getting up at 6 AM and training before, before, as soon as I had, as soon as I turned 16, my parents bought me a Ford Bronco and I got up, I would drive to the gym, I would lift, I would go to school, go to practice. We would do a crappy, I thought the lifts in school were terrible. And then at night I would go to community college,
00:10:17
Speaker
to take even more classes because you just kind of help me get ahead or whatever. So I just, I had a very like different understanding of the world as a high school athlete. I didn't drink. I never had to drink until I was 22 in my life. Didn't party. I just didn't care about any of that. I would go to a bookstore, which people don't know what those are anymore, but, and I would buy like training books. I didn't care what it was like Arnold's, you know, Arnold's encyclopedia, modern bodybuilding, uh, Joe leaders books. Um, at the time,
00:10:47
Speaker
Um, men's, um, man, Muslim, no, not Muslim fitness, men's help. Sorry. Men's help was publishing books actually. And there's actually some really good books back then that men's help was publishing by, by stream conditioning coaches, not bodybuilders. And I would just read all this stuff. Cause again, the internet was still in its early days at that point. You can find stuff online, but there wasn't anything close to what it is now you had to read. And so I would read and just train myself.
00:11:14
Speaker
And that's, I think what helped me more than anything was just having a little bit more, you
Education and Early Career at TCU
00:11:20
Speaker
know, knowledge and probably motivation than most kids. Yeah. So it brings me back to my high school. Well, my first year in high school here in the United States, Minnesota, my strength coach, small Italian guy, uh, known for his, uh, would you call it the wedge? No, not, yeah, something like that. He, he would, um,
00:11:41
Speaker
We were terrible. I'm glad that I got my first shot at playing high school football there. It's called, shout out to Mount West Tonka. We lost every single game. I've done that for many seasons in a row. But that made me able to play on a varsity team because they were not that good.
00:12:00
Speaker
The he his methodology was to he gave me this old Mac his magazine like you do one set as many reps or you should do a 10 rep max and That's all you do. So Yeah, I mean we did circuit training and we did like and then he got me into this methodology like hey you need to do the squat little did I know because I'd never really
00:12:22
Speaker
Started working out was when I was 15, but I didn't start doing any necessarily leg lifts There were compound lifts until I was maybe 19 20 my Achilles tendons my entire like my flexibility was awful so
00:12:39
Speaker
Long story short, why I'm getting into that, it's fascinating to hear someone else getting it. I mean, I was not even close to the dedication who did like read books of that nature and that young of an age, but it's interesting to hear your story. Like where are there any people around you that did the same thing? No, it was just me. I had a really, really good friend who played football with me.
00:13:02
Speaker
Um, but he was like, he, he would train with me, but he wasn't into it. Like I was like, he wasn't meeting me at the gym at six 30. He wasn't reading books. Um, like in the summer, absolutely. Look at me, like we studied together, like great friend. It's just, yeah, I was just a weird, weird kid. I mean, you know, back then too, in high school, you know, at the cafeteria, they had like the, they called it a snack line. So there's like the, there's like the meals that they gave you. And then there was like the snack line where if you had some cash to buy like chips and
00:13:31
Speaker
You know, soda, whatever. And like, I remember, I think I was 17 and I stopped drinking soda. I was like, no, it's not good for me. Like I'm like, what a weird little kid. Um, yeah, just strange. Um, but you know, to bring me back to how I got to where I am now.
00:13:50
Speaker
I turned down all those scholarship offers. I think I've kind of grown to hate football in a way. I played basketball as well. It was actually my favorite sport to play. I wasn't as good at basketball, but it was my favorite sport to play. Would you say, one quick side note, did you eat as any other regular kid or did you already tune in your diet early on?
00:14:13
Speaker
I was working on it, you know, um, like I said, like, I remember when I stopped drinking, you know, we call it Coke in Texas, like, and then everything is a, everything is a Coke. Like you say you go to a restaurant and I want a Coke and it's okay. What kind? I want a Dr. Pepper. All right, cool. Like, you know, that's just this language up here is pop in the Midwest, but, um, yeah, like I stopped drinking it. Um, I stopped eating chips.
00:14:34
Speaker
um clearly like I couldn't go to the grocery store and just buy whatever I wanted but also in like small town Texas the food just inherently if you're eating at home which back then you know most people did and we didn't have the restaurants anyway you know I think I remember when we got McDonald's it was like a big deal like it was like one of three restaurants in the whole town so like like like home cooking down south is generally some sort of protein and vegetables I mean it's you know cream of corn and green beans and
00:15:01
Speaker
You know, um, we, we had about an acre and a half that we farmed for food on our land. So my grandparents would go out and dig up fresh vegetables and stuff. So, I mean, you know, like just cutting out junk basically and eating kind of what was provided to me was not bad, not a bad start. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Continue, please. You're saying the scholarships and so forth with that, that you turned out. Yeah. I just, I just, you know, the colleges don't want you as much a when you're, when you're hurt.
00:15:31
Speaker
Um, and then be a lot of like TCU was one of the schools that was looking at me. They wanted, uh, they said, you know, you could sit out a year like red shirt and then play, which for sure I could have done. But, um, because I finished first in Texas at the time, I don't know if it's still the case, you could go to any public school for free. If you graduated first in your class in Texas high school. Wow. And.
00:15:56
Speaker
TCU had already recruited me so hard. And even though they were private school, they didn't want to kind of be left out of this in general, not just because of me, because of any, you know, person valedictorian. So they would, they would kind of do a price match scholarship thing on the academic side. Now I didn't cover all the TCU because it's an expensive place to go, which I didn't care anything about that. They had a really good exercise physiology program, which is what I cared about. And
00:16:22
Speaker
Um, between that, I ended up, uh, being an RA. So that helped pay for housing, um, you know, whatever. And I decided to go to TCU and I just got very lucky, very blessed at TCU to meet a guy named David Upton. Who was, uh, had just started teaching. He had his PhD, but, uh, Dr. Upton did.
00:16:46
Speaker
what I ended up doing, which was he trained professional athletes. He flew around the country at one point in time. He was, uh, voted the number one trainer in America by USA today in like 1991 or something. He had the magazine thing on his wall. He trained like James Fonda when she was doing those workout tapes, Mike Singletary. Um, he also, um, had, uh, a time where he was helping author Arthur Jones design knowledge equipment in Florida, like just
00:17:16
Speaker
crazy background. And he just kind of gotten older and said, I want to stay put. And I want to, you know, he had a PhD, I want to teach. And it actually says, you know, in the States, it's changed now. But back then, it was very, very rare to find a college where you could study strength and conditioning. Back then, exercise is was, you know, it was if you had some sort of strength training emphasis, it was Olympic lifting.
00:17:40
Speaker
or it was all like the standard cardiovascular intertwined medical you know stuff so like let's look at endurance cycling or running or you know rowing in an environment chamber how does this affect diabetes and how does this affect you know muscle mass like you know like it's just it's just very endurance focused activity with a medical outcome that's where most of the research was and
00:18:08
Speaker
It's very strange to have a professor come in and teach, you know, uh, Jim design. That was a class three college credit on Jim design. Like we had a whole book. We went through code. Like, how do you lay it out?
00:18:20
Speaker
you know, etc, etc. I went to the wrong university there. No, I mean, it was amazing. And I don't even think it's still there because he retired. And I'm sure no one picked that up because you know, you have to have the experience to teach it. And that's something we can get into later. But there's not a lot of academic professionals who have real enough world what experience to teach this as well. That's part of the problem. So anyway, just lucky, blessed to get to work with him.
00:18:48
Speaker
And I met a guy at TCU who used to play football there. Uh, he's a little bit older than me by a few years. He also coached on the Chicago Bears. He was my receiver coach. His name was Andrew Hayes Stoker. And we just met playing basketball, like in the summer, he would come back down to TCU because, you know, he's from there. Go to the, we had a really nice rec center that had just been built. So, you know, everybody wanted to come use it. And I wasn't going to do string conditioning at all. Um, I got to, I graduated.
00:19:19
Speaker
And I just said, you know, I don't want to go work at like a normal gym. I did not, I despise the internship route. Um, most, um, you know, uh, young adults were subject to at the time where you had to, yeah, no, I mean, like at TCU, we had a really decently well-known street conditioning coach. And, but the internship is like, you go in there.
00:19:48
Speaker
You sit down, you shut up, you work crazy hours and it's just like grunt work. Like there's nothing, there's no, you're not part of the process. It's like observe and learn. And, um, I just thought they were doing it wrong. Hey, I just didn't see the point in going and learning more about why I thought they were doing it incorrectly. So what was it that you saw that this is off? It was that old school Texas mentality. It was, um, you know, basically.
00:20:18
Speaker
powerlifting and then conditioning without purpose. You know, that's essentially what it was. It was a mix of that. You know, you would basically get as strong as you could in the summer. They would kind of culminate with this big, you know, one rep squat night right before the season and let's, you know, everybody break records and they were terrible squats. You know, people spotting and picking the bars up.
00:20:40
Speaker
you know, then the conditioning would say, you know, well, what numbers make sense? Well, let's do, you know, 200 pushups, 200 yards of sprints and two, like just the thematic, you know, kind of like a, like a CrossFit style. So it's like CrossFit. You just pick, you just pick themes, like there's no logic or anything behind it. And I just think, you know, that's really dumb for, uh, you know, collegiate sports or,
00:21:06
Speaker
just a small step away from professional, you know, especially for football, like a very, I mean, some of those professionals are those, you know, collegiate teams are probably worth more than some professional teams in terms of the actual value that they bring. So I just thought it was really poor. And I ended up going to grad school there, because they offered me a scholarship. And I said, well, you know, free school is probably not a bad thing, because I didn't really know what I wanted to do.
00:21:32
Speaker
And I started studying neuroscience and I was actually going to do a PhD in neuroscience. The professor who was in charge of the program at TCU, him and I were close and he wanted to put exercise into some neuroscience research because there's so much, you know, even still we don't know about how does exercise affect the brain.
00:21:54
Speaker
And, um, that's what I was going to, that's what I was going to do. Now, during this time, I decided that I would train anybody for free anybody, because if you're training for free, you can kind of skip a legal side of it because you can write it off as like academic. Like I don't need to have a certification. I don't need to have insurance. I'm just learning, right? Like it's at a school. Um, and TCU was behind that because I was part of the program.
00:22:19
Speaker
You know, and you lower the barrier for people to like kind of work with you because you're not asking them for anything. And I'm like, I'm in school anyway. So it's literally just my time, right? Like I'm taking care of, I have a place to live. It's literally just my time. So the word kind of got around that I would train anybody for free.
00:22:35
Speaker
And I trained a ton of athletes. You know, athletes, you just felt underserved. You know, if there's, you know, collegiate strength conditioning back then, there was maybe three or four coaches and there's, you know, 90 or a hundred athletes. I mean, there's going to be a couple of guys who just don't feel taken care of, right? Same thing on the basketball team. We actually took over the women's, um,
00:22:57
Speaker
stream conditioning program, our department ran it, we ran a longitudinal study on it, because they were so unhappy with the stream conditioning, they were getting they were just getting an intern thrown at them. Oh, and there was no sort of professionalism to it or whatever. We said, well, shoot, we'll do like, blood work and, you know, sleep studies, like all this cool stuff. And we actually helped help them reduce their non contact ACLs tremendously or whatever. But
00:23:22
Speaker
The point is that I spent a lot of time training people for free. And it wasn't just athletes. I trained regular peers of mine. I trained professors. I trained some police officers who were on force there. And it wasn't like I was in the gym these set hours. It was like, hey, I heard that you're a great guy to take. Yeah, I'll take you through a workout. Let's do two or three or maybe get you going. And some people I trained on a regular basis. It just depended on the person.
00:23:51
Speaker
Yeah. So I got to our grads program was really tough for masters. You know, you're supposed to graduate in two years. Our average graduation rate was like 3.9 because the guy who ran it, who I, who I actually have a lot of respect for, but he just ran a really tough program. Your thesis are like our average thesis link for people in our department was like,
00:24:15
Speaker
Oh, 140 something pages, something like that. Like if I, you know, when you're in it, you don't understand it. But like, when you start talking to other people, they're like, what the hell were you guys doing over there? Like, it's like doctoral level research, right? And so I had finished all my coursework. I was going into the summer after my second year, I still had my lab work to do. So I had done my actual study. I had about a year's worth of lab work to do to graduate.
00:24:44
Speaker
And I got this call because this guy, Andrew, who coached on the Bears introduced me to this guy named Elias who had a gym
Training NBA Players and Work at EFT
00:24:52
Speaker
in Chicago. It's called EFT sports performance. And he called me and said, Hey, I heard that you're a really good string coach that you're young. You want to work. You're just kind of sitting around chilling. I say, yeah. Um, he said, would you come up for the summer? Well, you know, college world, right? Summer is like free for all. You can kind of do whatever you want as long as you're back by, you know, September. So I was like, yeah, why not? So I literally flew up there.
00:25:15
Speaker
, and
00:25:42
Speaker
And, um, he said, could you take him through some core and stretching regardless of how you feel about foreign stretching? Again, we can do podcasts on podcasts on any of this stuff, you know, but you know, I'm like, yeah, sure. No problem. So I took Lou through some stuff that he had just never done some concepts. He hadn't really been exposed to. And then I trained like seven division one, um, college football players, like five of them were Notre Dame starters.
00:26:09
Speaker
Like we had a lot of Notre Dame guys at the time and I took them to this, they had this pedestrian overpass ramp. They had like a really nice incline on it. We call it the ramp. And that was like how they would start their conditioning on this day of week. So I took them to the ramp. I had to win all sorts of stuff up the ramp. When they got back, they were just like done. They were just like, Oh my gosh, like this is, this guy's nuts. He's lots of mine. And really quick, Lou all day for those who don't know who that is.
00:26:38
Speaker
How would you describe Lou? Well, he's a two-time NBA All-Star. He should have been a three-time, but he got traded that last year. He was having the best fiscal year of his career, the year that he got traded to Cleveland. So I'm just saying, assuming he had stayed in Chicago based on the previous two years that he was having a better year. I don't know how he's not a three-time All-Star, but two-time All-Star, for sure,
00:27:06
Speaker
the best basketball player if you're British at all, the best basketball player in British history, hands down. He's actually on.
00:27:14
Speaker
the five pound note in Brixton, when the Olympics were in London, they did special notes, they were actually are usable currency. And his face was on the five pound note in Brixton. To this day, as far as I know, the only athlete who's had their face on real money, like usable money, not like fake, you know, like commemorative, like actual in circulation, legitimate money, the only basketball player to do that.
00:27:39
Speaker
That's a big deal to train him the first. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, you were saying more about him. He also has an OBE, which a lot of people don't know, for service to sport in the UK specifically. And so again, I'm just assuming, you know, you probably have some European listeners. And if so, you know, and they're British, they'll be like, Oh, wow, that's actually kind of random. You said OBE, I'm not familiar.
00:28:03
Speaker
It's order the designation is order the British Empire. So every year the Queen gives out or you know, the King depending on you know, it's been the Queen for a long time, but they give out. There's different levels of designation that are basically like right under knighthood. So people get knighted. And then there's like two or three tiers beneath that and one of them is an OBE.
00:28:25
Speaker
the the
00:28:45
Speaker
you know, meeting with the president and they give you like a specific medal, you know, like there's like the medal of freedom and the medal of this. Like I think Arnold Schwarzenegger one time got, uh, I forget the award, but basically like for his service to physical fitness and you know, it's just a, it's a, it's a cool designation. You know, Lou doesn't care about any of that stuff at all. That's just not him, but it is, it is a cool to recognize what he's given back to the sport of basketball, not just to his playing, but through his foundation work. But anyway, again, another stuff. Um,
00:29:13
Speaker
And I would also say, like, he's probably the modern, you know, godfather of basketball from Africa, I would say. You know, you have, for sure, like, Pakeem, obviously. You have Manubol, you know, who sounds Sudanese, like, Luwald is. Like, you have those greats. But, like, in terms of Luwald's generation, he was the first person within that span of time to be that level of a player. Now it's completely different, right? You have so many players who are from Africa, you know, Joel and Beeth and
00:29:43
Speaker
Um, Oh my gosh, Pascal Ciaco, like you just keep going on and on and on, you know, players who are from Africa who are playing really at a high level in the NBA or, you know, the best players in the NBA in some cases, but again, the wall was in this kind of span where he was, uh, you know, a lot of African kids who are growing up and maybe in their early teens or twenties now, like they know the wall. So like, and then in the U S.
00:30:09
Speaker
he just wasn't a very talkative guy. So he didn't get the press, but like, you know, coming out of high school, LeBron was number one, the wall was number two. Like a lot of people don't know that, you know, the wall went to Duke went to the final four his first year, you know, like, um, the guy was an incredible, incredible player. And even at the Bulls, he's top two, three, or four in every category. So it's like Jordan Pippen blue in almost every single category, statistical category for the Chicago Bulls. So, um, yeah, that's a little background, more background on the wall.
00:30:38
Speaker
I didn't even know that. Yeah. Yeah. There's a ton of, ton of stuff about him. Um, but anyway, I digress. Uh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I trained a lot of people that first day. And, um, at the end of the day, the guy was like, I'd like to bring you up for the summer. You know, if it works out, you know, we'll talk about you staying long-term and, um, the, the athletes and stuff were like, you know, man, this guy's really good. Like he's, he knows the stuff. It's different than what we've been doing in a good way.
00:31:08
Speaker
whatever. So I moved up for the summer. I lived in a house, oh my gosh, with some swingers. This is a true story. I rented a room from them. It was me, a truck driver, and another guy who was trying to make an NFL and then they lived downstairs. And yeah, they're
00:31:29
Speaker
Like their wifi was called lover land. Like, of course it was not password protected, like legit, like they've been, Hey, you know, whatever cranks your tractor. But I'm just saying, it's a strange thing for a kid from a small town in Texas, like move into, right. Um, there's some interesting parties there, I assume. Well, they, they, there were a lot of parties and they had them usually in the basement. And, um, yeah.
00:31:53
Speaker
Yeah, it was a strange, strange summer for sure. Okay. So I'll tell you what that ties us into the 315. All right. So at EFC,
00:32:03
Speaker
the first clients were at 5am. And it was this group of guys, and actually a couple of women who called themselves the RFG club, which stood for the rich fat guy club. And because our gym was private, it was not public at all, you had to have an appointment to walk in there. Nobody trained himself, you were always with a coach. And these RFGs, they wanted to train at our gym because we were training the best athletes in Chicago.
00:32:29
Speaker
You know, we were training a lot of the Bears players and training the wall, you know, best player on the Bulls at the time, etc, etc. So.
00:32:36
Speaker
they associated that elitism within their business with like how they should be trained, even though they were not obviously like high level athletes. But they respected the process and what we went through and they like to see these guys come in and out, etc. But they started finding them. I mean, some of these guys are, you know, on calls at 630 in the morning, you know, they're getting ready for the stock market to open whatever the case may be. And when I say like high net worth, like, you know, one of these one of the guys I trained had been on the cover of Forbes twice.
00:33:01
Speaker
Like that's, that's some real money. Like, you know, it's like, again, a small kid from Texas, like you think, you know, what money is. And then you start training professional athletes and you're like, okay, they have some money. And then I started training these RFGs and I'm like, wow, like, you know, like two or $3 billion is very different than, you know, somebody who's making 15 million a year.
High-profile Athlete Training
00:33:21
Speaker
Um, but because they would start training at five, um, I would have to wake up at three 15. I would drive to the gym, 20, 30 minute drive.
00:33:32
Speaker
get there at 3.45, turn the lights on, turn the music on, open up all the doors. And then I had to train myself because I would work from 5 a.m. till 8 or 9 at night, something like that. Because the schedule was RFGs 5 to 10 a.m., pros 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
00:33:53
Speaker
you have like an hour break and then at 3 p.m. high school kids will start coming in and you train high school kids from 3 to 8, 3 to 9, you know, depending on the time of year. And that's just the way that you had to run your business. And when you're 20, you know, 23, whatever it was, 22,
00:34:08
Speaker
Um, and you want to see if this is really what you want to do. I didn't move to Chicago to party. I didn't move to Chicago because I knew somebody I moved to Chicago to see if this is really what I want to do or not. So in my mind, I'm like, what else do I have to do? If I'm sitting at home, I'm wasting time. I might as well work. And so, uh, there were some nights where I would sleep at the gym because if you just worked from, you know, I got there at three 45, it's nine 30, 10 o'clock at night. They gotta be back at three 45. What's the point?
00:34:38
Speaker
going back to the swinger house. Like, you know, like, I would just sleep on the couch, wake up and, you know, take a shower and go right back to it. So that's what I did for that first summer. And obviously, I loved it. And I think, you know what, what's the point of finishing a master's degree for something I don't even want to degree for the point of going to school was to do this. So I'm doing it.
00:35:06
Speaker
So I kept doing it. And that takes me back to, you know, what we're talking about with the intern thing. If you go work for a collegiate team or professional team, there's this whole ladder of internships and this and that other stuff. They're, yes, I was like the new guy, but I was able to make an impact quickly. Because if you're in the private sector, if you're good at what you do, people notice, right? athletes notice, clients notice, customers notice, and that you start getting requests to work with more and more and more. So by like,
00:35:35
Speaker
maybe a year I'd been there a little over. Um, I was promoted general manager. So I ran the whole gym. I did all the programming and ever did everything for it. Now, like, you know, people, um, when I've told people this story before, they're like, man, that was like a big sacrifice. And I'm like, Nope, it wasn't. Um, the sacrifice means that you're giving up something you'd rather be doing. There was literally nothing I would have rather been doing.
00:36:02
Speaker
So I can't call it a sacrifice. Like I can call it difficult for sure. Like I was tired, you know, I worked my butt off, but it wasn't like sacrificial. That's a different thing. Like you and I both have kids now, right? So like when we, when we go to work or we choose maybe to take on a project, there's some sacrifice there because you're like, like, this is good for my family because I'm making money. It's a good business move, but I'm taking time away from something I'd rather be doing, like spending time with my family, you know, my kids, like,
00:36:31
Speaker
That's sacrifice. Like at that time, 22, 23, I mean, this was like a dream come true to me. You know, I was working with the best athletes in the world at the time. I mean, you know, I trained eight NFL Pro Bowlers during my time there. I mean, how many people get to train eight people who make it to the Pro Bowl? One of them was Devin Hester, who was named to the top hundred all-time NFL team last year. Top hundred all-time. I got to train that guy.
00:36:55
Speaker
Um, you know, as you kind of said at the beginning of the podcast, I got to work with a lot of high level, uh, collegiate athletes. And at one point I had somebody like in the track and field national championship and a college football national championship and the basketball final floor, um, in the baseball world series for college, like all within the same year, because once the gym kind of gets the name for being the place and the bears are really good at the time. And we trained a lot of those guys. That's where every high school kid wants to go. So like.
00:37:23
Speaker
It's cool that I got to do it, but I don't want to sit here and say, oh, you know, my training magically transformed all these people. A big part of like your resume and training is doing a good enough job to get other elite athletes to want to come work with you too. So there's a difference between developing athletes and training athletes. Again, we can do another podcast on that.
00:37:44
Speaker
Real quick before moving into the next, what was your experience like overall, like training with these top level athletes? What stands out to you when you work with these athletes? Man, I wish Instagram was around back then. It was towards the end of my time there because it would have blown people's minds what these athletes can do. I mean,
00:38:06
Speaker
Tommy Harris, who was a two time, I think a two time pro bowler defensive tackle played Oklahoma. He spent some time there. Um, he, um, used to do barbell lunges with four Oh five on the back. Um, Bruce Gaston, who by all means, and I love Bruce to death, um, was not a great NFL player. He barely a blip in the radar. He played for a couple seasons, um, went to Purdue.
00:38:35
Speaker
But like Bruce used to come in the gym after a couple months off and just bench like 560 pounds. Just like, no problem. Just like, you know, Devin, um, Devin Hester is one of the most athletic people I've ever seen. We did this drill where you would take a bed ball and squeeze it in between your feet. And at the end of our gym, we had like 25 yards of turf. And then we had these circles that said EFT, cause that was the gym's name, right? And there was like this circle, E circle, F circle T.
00:39:04
Speaker
So he was standing like 20 yards out from the wall with like a 10 pound med ball squeezed in between his feet and he would say, I'm going to jump, throw the med ball with my feet.
00:39:14
Speaker
And I'm going to put it in the middle of that E circle or the middle of that T circle or whatever circle he picked. And he could do it time after time. So think about this. Can you jump and throw a 10 pound medicine ball 20 yards a like, could you actually do that period? Just could you do it with your feet only? And then second of all, could you do it precise enough to get it, you know, five feet up off the floor within a circle that's, I don't know, you know, three feet wide or something like that. Like this is just a football player. He's not, he's not a soccer player. Like this is insane. Yeah.
00:40:01
Speaker
a a a a
00:40:12
Speaker
The most disciplined athlete I ever trained in terms of his work ethic, you know, he was a multiple time crow bowler. Um, you know, I think he should be considered for sure. Retirement for the bears. Um, maybe even, you know, borderline Hall of Famer in terms of he lived a lead from scrimmage for like eight seasons in a row or something like that yards. But anyway, like Matt, Matt used to come to the gym.
00:40:35
Speaker
we'd start lifting at like 6 15 he would have already went to the bears practice facility and done all of his front work all of it and then he would drive to me by 6 15 like sweating like ready to lift like i mean just you just see some really really cool stuff some really cool stuff and then Asia Evans who i've still trained she's getting ready for the bobsled um olympics right now she um she's medal in her first olympics this will be her third um
00:41:04
Speaker
She, you know, she used to lift with the NFL guys because she would do a, she would do a seated box jump. I'm trying to remember her record. It's around 56 inches seated box jump. And there was only a couple of NFL guys who could jump with her. Um, you know, she would go, she would go, she would go box squat four or five, you know, um, and she's like 160 pounds. You know what I mean? Like, yes.
00:41:31
Speaker
It's insane. Like that's what people don't, people don't understand. And you said it when you said it about your story about Minnesota, right? Like when you came over to play basketball and you saw this kid do this crazy dunk and you're like, wow, like he's not even probably going to like barely make me one until you work with these athletes on a consistent basis. You don't understand the genetic differences between what somebody that good and like somebody like even like me, I would say like, I was a really good athlete. I wasn't that level of an athlete.
00:42:01
Speaker
Now, had I not got hurt, could I have maybe played an NFL or even had a good career? I think it could have, but I'm not that level. So like we talked about my squat. Okay. I squatted 500 pounds in high school. Well, Tom Callis, who also on this podcast, what if I have been in the pounds in high school too, the difference is I was 220 pounds and Tom was like 140.
00:42:21
Speaker
Right. Like Tom has always been squatting four times as body weight since he was in high school four times. Yes. No, he didn't, you know, 14, 15, 16, it doesn't matter if you're the best training coach in the world to squat four times. Your body weight is inherent. God gives it. And people, they just have a hard time getting that through their mind that there's a humongous discrepancy between where somebody starts genetically. Now that doesn't mean that it's not hard work.
00:42:50
Speaker
That doesn't mean that it's not a lot of discipline involved. I've seen so many guys who are so, so gifted genetically and they didn't put in the work and they didn't make it anywhere. Like literally nowhere. It's, it's, it's a combination of the two where you get the really like long term, like high level success. Even the wall, I would say was not the most gifted athlete. I mean, he was strong.
00:43:12
Speaker
He wasn't crazy strong. He was fast. He wasn't crazy fast. You know, he could jump. He's six nine, but he wasn't like, you know, putting his arm through the rim, but the guy was so consistent. I mean, we trained together, you know, while he was playing for 10 years of his career together. I don't think we ever went longer than.
00:43:32
Speaker
maybe two weeks without training in 10 years, maybe two weeks. Like the guy was a machine every time if we had to train, it didn't matter if they flew, cause you know, at MBA, you fly at night. You don't fly there. People don't understand that either. You finish a game at 10 30, you shower, you do your press conference, you eat. They are, they have food catered back there. And then you take your, uh, you know, private bus to the private FBO. You get on your plane and fly because they want the MBA once you there just in case, you know, there's a travel delay or whatever.
00:44:02
Speaker
So a lot of times like these guys are landing at two 30 at three o'clock in the morning. Well, if Lou's got practice at 10 and he's going to eat breakfast, he's going to get to the arena for practice. That means we're training at seven 30 or eight. He was up ready to go. You know what I mean? Like for decades, like that's the kind of dedication that it takes to be a consistent high level athlete.
00:44:26
Speaker
One thing that is unique is being, I mean, it's called smart strength for a reason, your business. It's easy just to put on weight and have athletes just do the old school way. Hey, just go nuts and squat as much as you can, run as much as you can. Like for example, Central Oklahoma, I mean, it was a D2 school where I went, but
00:44:47
Speaker
the basketball coach pulled Oliver's players. He was like, no, I want my, my players fresh. I don't want them squatting. I don't want them doing anything because I want them to be just agile and fresh on the court every single day. Like what, what's your response to that? What's smart training to you? Yeah. Well, I would say, um, something I've been a fan of for a very long time.
00:45:10
Speaker
in terms of training thinking about training is the right way to train somebody is 100% dependent on the outcome that you're looking for.
Tailored Training Methods
00:45:19
Speaker
Right. So it's I really have a hard time with people who say something is right or wrong in training. I think there's optimal or less optimal is a better way to put it. I think right and wrong is a very low level way of thinking about it.
00:45:33
Speaker
Because to say something is wrong, basically means like it should never be used. Right. And I just don't think that's the case in training. I think there's a lot of nuance and a lot of room for it, depending on so many factors, so many factors. You know, what's the training age of the person? How many minutes they playing? What sport are they playing? You know, what's their foundation in the offseason? You know, so to answer your question, I would say what you can do in season is completely dependent on what you got done in the offseason.
00:45:59
Speaker
Right. So if you were squatting, you know, once or twice a week in the off season with some decent volume and decent weight, it's not a big deal for you to squat in season because your body's used to it acclimated towards it. Doesn't care. You know, again, just to use example, Matt Forte, you know, we would, we would always lift on Monday or Tuesday because you know, you play on Sunday and he would squat.
00:46:22
Speaker
you know, 500 pounds, five sets of five, like in season, because in the off season, we were doing 600 pounds. To him, it's like, oh, this is a break. Like, it's no problem. So it's always depending on what you're used to. Would he actually do 600 times five?
00:46:37
Speaker
Yeah. Oh yeah. To a box. Like, like, yeah. I mean, if NFL players ever decide to power lift, it would be over. You get, you get a few, you get a few of these people like Tom, who, who are going to be a five time road record holder regardless. It doesn't matter if NFL player comes in or not, but for the bigger weights,
00:46:58
Speaker
Um, you know, again, Dan Bell is a friend of mine. Like Dan Bell is an all time world record holder and powerlifting right now. You know, uh, he's squatted 1108 or 1116. I forget what 1100 and something, but you know, like I said, when you would see a guy come in like Bruce and bench 560, just two months layoff, you know what I mean? Like smooth. Holy crap. If that guy actually trained for it, you know, like what could he bench anyway? Um, I digress again, but, um, it's like,
00:47:27
Speaker
What, what you could do in season, depending on what you get done off season. So like in season for you as a collegiate athlete, what your coach is saying.
00:47:33
Speaker
What I hear him saying is I don't want my players so fatigued from their training. They're lifting that they can't perform on the court. That's how I interpret that. Now in his mind, he's associating squatting with that problem of fatigue on the court, which I would say is really dumb because your muscles don't know what a squat is. They have no clue. They know what load is. They know what fatigue is. They don't know what a squat is. So whether it was a, you know, if I took you in there with one 25 pound dumbbell, I can make you tired enough where you can't even take a step. Right? So like.
00:48:03
Speaker
It's, you can't blame it on squats. I get it because you know, you know what you know, right? And you don't know what you don't know. So I get it. But the point is, is basically he should have been competing to a stream conditioning coach. I want you to put my players in the best position possible to perform, whatever that is. That's your job. Figure it out. That would be the right way to say it. Well, I just say this, like Lou and I trained three, three, three, four times a week in season. We trained after games. There was a, there was one year.
00:48:33
Speaker
his all-star year where he led the league in minutes. So he played more minutes than anybody else. He also at the time, I don't know if it's still true. He ran the most distance ever in a league. This is when they were starting to track the distance, you know, using technology, right? And how many miles he ran was still, it was the most ever in the history of the NBA since they've been recording it. How many miles and when they ran and he was an all-star.
00:48:55
Speaker
And I think that year he was second all defensive team or something. So he's talking about a guy who like, it's like, wait a second. He played more minutes than anybody. And this is Kobe in his prime. This is LeBron in his prime. This is Dwayne Wade in his prime. This is Carmelo in his prime. This is every person you can think of in their prime. He played more minutes than them. A, he scored enough to make it all-star. He played defense ball and he couldn't make a defensive team. Like, and we would lift after games. People like, this is like blowing their mind. Like how can you do that? Because we had an amazing off season in every off season.
00:49:25
Speaker
And the way that I thought about it was if you lived after a game, now I get two nights of sleep, right? If I lived the next day, I only get one night of sleep to recover and everybody knows that you recover the most when you sleep. So, you know, I'm not talking about when you're going to gym doing crazy workouts, but if you, if you're already played an entire game and you're, you're warmed up, you're ready to go. You're not sleepy. Like after an NBA game, holy smokes, you're adrenaline is through the roof. So like, Hey, let's go take 30, 40 minutes.
00:49:52
Speaker
do a lifting session and just be done with it. So you don't have to think about it. You can just sleep and recover. So anyway, you know, you can train in season purely based on what you've got done in the off season. I would say a hundred percent. What would it work out with such an intense schedule look like for Lou? It was pretty simple. Um, it was a lot of single leg work, unilateral work. Um, a lot of tempo work. You know, I'm trying to get intensity instead of volume at that point and get enough volume on the court.
00:50:22
Speaker
Um, and it was always full body. We didn't break stuff down into upper lower, any of that kind of stuff, because again, let's stimulate the fiber. We need to stimulate and let's like, let's get you rested. Um, it was always, you know, stuff that, that was trying to address whatever his issues were. So if he had some knee tendonitis, which had a lot of, when we first started working together and as he got further in his career, he got to the point where it just really wasn't a problem at all.
00:50:49
Speaker
But we might do a Bulgarian split squat, you know, rear foot elevated split squat, depending on your terminology, where, you know, yes, you're strengthening the glute on the leg this forward and the leg musculature in general, but the leg is backwards. You're actually getting mobility work, right? Because you're getting a stretch on that back leg as you go down every time.
00:51:07
Speaker
So it's like, okay, how can we find exercise like that, that are kind of combining two things at the same time? Because again, I can't stack volume on volume and volume on volume on this guy who just played in and behaving. So how can I get the most bang for your buck? What are exercises to do more than one thing? You know, again, another example, we would never do like a crunch. Again, I'm not saying you can't do crunches. I'm just saying if that's place in time, and again, back to what I said, the right thing depends on the outcome that I'm looking for. I'm looking for an effective workout.
00:51:36
Speaker
in a brief period of time for this guy. So I need to pick something that's going to be like, uh, you know, maybe a half Turkish get up, you know, maybe a dumbbell windmill, something where we're getting core work, we're getting stability work in, but we're also getting some other musculature involved, maybe with some mobility work as well so that we can, again, just maximize that time.
00:51:54
Speaker
Hmm. Hmm. Okay. So this is jumping back on just the topic of your story. So you've been training these top level athletes, but eventually something shifted. Like now they're smart strength. What, where's the gap there and how did that all come about? Yeah, I'm happy to talk about that too. Um, so, you know, I was an EFT, I forget how many years I was there, um, but you get to a point
00:52:22
Speaker
even in the private world, where you're working all these hours, and you don't own the business, right?
Leaving EFT and Independent Work
00:52:28
Speaker
Like, I just, I don't own it. So I can't pay myself more money, even though the business is doing well. You know, while I was there, we started our first year, my first year there, we were doing like 400,000 in revenue. When I left, we were doing 1.8 million.
00:52:45
Speaker
Nice. And I would never ever sit here and say, Oh, that was all me. I ran the gym during that time. And I think I hired the right staff, but it was for sure a team. But the point is, is like, you know, if you're running the business and you're responsible for, for helping that, that success come along and help, you know, kind of architect it, you know, you, you get to a point where you're like, why am I doing this for this amount of money? You know what I mean? So then you have that conversation.
00:53:11
Speaker
And look, it's not a right or wrong with, with, uh, you know, Elias guy on the gym. It's, you know, he thought his value was X. He thought, he thought my value was Y. And I thought it was the other way around. And, um, there was also like, this was a tough time for sure, because I was flying to train Lou. He's been traded and he signed with Miami. And Lou all was paying our gym, um, for me to come down and train him, not me directly, like our gym. That's just the way that we did our business model.
00:53:40
Speaker
And there was a local high school, private high school that wanted us to take over the extreme condition, like our gym in general, but the boosters, you know, which are the parents, they knew that I was like the guy. So they wanted me to do it. Well, I can't do it if I'm in Miami, right? Like, doesn't make sense. Well, like he kind of said, you know, I would do it, even though I hadn't talked to you about it at all. And it just kind of got to a place where I'm like,
00:54:05
Speaker
Why am I letting someone else like dictate everything about my life? Like how much money I make, what hours I work, where I work, et cetera. It doesn't make sense anymore. Um, cause he basically told me like you can't keep training a little and that just, that was just really, really hard for me because Lou and I were so close. Um, and I felt like Lou had helped build that business so much. I mean, he had done such a good job, you know, as a pro player.
00:54:29
Speaker
He had really brought a lot of recognition to that business, a lot of legitimacy to that business. And I just didn't think that was the right thing to do. And it's not like he was paying our business, like, you know, not paying as well. He was compensating our business well for it. Again, not be our business, right? So it's not like there was a money issue either.
00:54:47
Speaker
I just didn't feel like it was the right thing to do. Um, and I'm a loyal guy and I'd like to say that I try to do things, you know, the right way. Um, and I just didn't feel like that was right, um, at all. And that was probably like the biggest thing that was like, okay, I got to get out of this. Um, and so I did, um, you know, the wall ended up signing with the Lakers that summer and he called me and said, Hey, like you guys basically fired me as a client. Like, I don't mind asking you to come work with me.
00:55:16
Speaker
I said, yeah, I don't mind it either. So he's like, I don't even care what you do. Like you can stay in Chicago. You can move to Texas. You can, you know, whatever float your boat, uh, you can go for it, but, um, just train me. I'm like, all right, cool. So I started flying to LA when he had home games, I was there obviously in the off season, we worked together. Um,
00:55:37
Speaker
I started working out at barbed over day, which I don't know if you're familiar with them at all, but they're, you know, decent sized brand, small gym in LA, but decent sized brand. Um, I started working out there. I got to know Barton geo really well. And it just kind of, my life just kind of shifted drastically from this, like up at three 15, you know, um, work.
Balancing Career and Family Life
00:56:01
Speaker
six, seven hours before you eat, you know, slug or protein shake stuff should pull it down your face. Go work another six, seven hours to a guy who like flew. And I was sitting in a box at the Lakers game and like, just a very like different lifestyle. It was crazy. And, you know, people look at that too. And they say, Oh, that was so cool. Like one time I had a cone and Brian Shaw in the walls box, the Lakers game together. Um,
00:56:28
Speaker
you know, and they were like, that's so cool. I'm like, yeah, it is cool. But that was where it was starting to get sacrificial for me. Because by being in LA for two weeks at a time, I'm not with my family for two weeks at a time. Oh, yeah. Because if he had a home stretch, I was there. Yeah, I just I just wouldn't travel with him on the road because it didn't make sense. They're flying private. I can't I can't like a physical can't keep up unless you're flying private like the math doesn't work out. So and my thing was,
00:56:58
Speaker
That's the time for me to go home. Like it worked out great. Like we could do all of our training in person. And then when he's on the road, the way those trips work, you're not training as much in terms of overall sessions because
00:57:12
Speaker
They have to give you time off before you go. And they have to give you time off when you get back to some extent. So like I could basically like, we would train right before he left and right when he got back. So it basically would decrease that window. Like while he was put on, go gone that we actually needed to train. But anyway, um, you know, that was, that was tough. Like so people are like, yeah, it's cool. You got to go do that. I'm like, yeah, but I'm not with my family. Like I love Lou. Oh my gosh. I love him. Like he is, he is a brother to me, but that's not your kids. You know what I mean? Like that's not your wife.
00:57:41
Speaker
But you know, I'm going to these games and you know, I lived five minutes from the beach and like all this stuff is like it's cool, but it's not it's not your family and the thing that you can never ever ever replace is your family. And it doesn't matter what you do and where you go and how much money you make and all that stuff. But what pushed through it for me was I knew that there was an expiration date on it.
00:58:09
Speaker
Like I knew Lou was going to retire at some point, you know, like the guy, you can't play forever. He played for 16 years, you know, but like you can't play forever. There's going to be a retire. There's going to be a date on that. And that's the only reason that I signed up to even do that. If, if, if Lou always would have been 21 and you know, a couple of years in the league and we had met, even if we were still great friends, I don't think I could have signed up for that because the life over time just gets really, really, um,
00:58:37
Speaker
really, really, I mean, lonely, probably is the best way to put it. You know, like even the wall and him and I being close. I mean, the guy's playing, we're hanging out all day. You know, he's a professional athlete. He's at the arena. He's doing this and doing that. Like there's just a lot of alone time. Um, and I wouldn't trade it for anything. I mean, don't get me wrong. I don't regret it. It's just, it's not as easy and glamorous. I think as people think.
00:58:59
Speaker
for sure. Yeah. And then eventually you worked with him until he retired and smart strength. How did, how did that, yeah. How did that transition happen? Yeah. So Lou retired. We, he was in LA and there's a whole nother podcast we could do about LA and, and what happened, what happened in basketball wise there, but he ended up going to Minnesota for a year.
00:59:27
Speaker
And so I lived in Minneapolis for a year with Lou. And that was my Minnesota experience is I enjoy quite a bit actually, I would drive because from where I live in Chicago, it's like a four hour drive. And so people like, Oh, why don't you just fly? I'm like, well, it's what 40 minutes to the airport, you got to get there an hour early, an hour flight, like you start adding it up at the same time. If you drive, you can just leave whenever you want. So I would drive and then he retired.
00:59:54
Speaker
And Lou knew he always wanted to continue to work with me in some capacity. We just weren't sure how or what we were going to do. Um, and then COVID hit. So he retired his retirement party with the bulls was October or November of 2019. I don't remember which one.
Health Scare and Recovery
01:00:17
Speaker
Well, so let me take a step back. And then in January, I went to the LA fit expo bar of upper gate had me out.
01:00:25
Speaker
And our son was born in January 3rd. I went out there like January 17th or something like that. And I almost died. I had a pericardial effusion, which if you don't know what that is, I'll save you the Google. Basically, your heart gets inflamed. You have fluid that builds up in between your heart and the pericardium, which is a sheath of tissue that surrounds your heart that keeps it from rubbing up against your lungs at the beat.
01:00:55
Speaker
that tissue is designed to hold millimeters of space, millimeters of fluid. If it gets swollen and fluid builds up, that tissue is really thick. It's not designed to expand that much. So the more fluid that builds up in there, you get two things that happen to you. One is your heart is literally being choked from the fluid like it can't properly be. So that's a problem. And the other problem is your chest cavity doesn't have a lot of room
01:01:23
Speaker
And as I said, the person tissues to keep it from growing up against the lungs. So as it starts to expand now, my lungs can move. And so both of my lungs were collapsed. Neither one was inflated and they pulled a leader and a half of fluid off my heart. So, you know, heart.
01:01:41
Speaker
But for the Americans who don't know leaders that well, um, think about a smart water bottle, one and a half of those was pulled off in my heart the first time. That's not all of it. That's just the first time. And the other thing about that particular condition is you don't really know what happened. It's not like a heart attack where it like hits you. It's like a slow process, right? The fluid has to build up slowly and then it starts pushing on everything. And you just like, I felt uncomfortable.
01:02:07
Speaker
I had some shoulder pain. I couldn't quite breathe right, but it wasn't like overnight. It was slowly, slowly. And like, we had just had our third child. So I'm thinking, you know, like the nights are different and I've seen a lot, like I'm just tired. Like I felt like in hindsight, it makes sense. But, and then I flew out there for this expo and I barbell wanted to be there and I loved them so much. I wanted to do a good job for them. I felt terrible. Like every night they were like, do you want to go to dinner? And I'm like, I just need to sleep. Like I didn't, I didn't know, I didn't understand what's going on with me.
01:02:36
Speaker
And I filmed this YouTube video with Bart, the owner, uh, coldener barbell. And as I was filming the video, I couldn't even bend over to pick up a weight. Like I physically couldn't do it. A friend of mine at the gym stand. I was like, Hey, this sounds really strange, but like, would you mind picking on that weight for me? I physically can't do it. And the other crazy thing is on that same trip, um, I walked out and pause squatted six, 47 in wraps.
01:03:05
Speaker
the same the very same trip which is so dumb like in hindsight like it's so dumb like i felt terrible but i just i felt like hey they flew me all the way out here like i need to do something you know like that's that's just a dumb athlete mentality but anyway um so i filmed that youtube video and then bart was like dude i think you need to go to the doctor and i'm like i thought it was nerve pain because it tends amount of pain in my shoulder i thought i'd pinched the nerve you know like lifting heavy something like that well
01:03:34
Speaker
So we were going to go see this like really good chiropractor like works on all these people in LA. And on the way there. I couldn't drive. I was starting to be able not to breathe. I really couldn't speak in every bump we would hit. And we're writing this Tesla like super nice car like every bump we would hit.
01:03:52
Speaker
It felt like somebody was like, just stabbing me like in the shoulder, every little bump. And I'm like, I think when you go to the hospital, he's like, I agree. So Bart took me to the hospital and I think there's something in your mind. Like once you decide that you're, you're messed up, you're like, your mind like let you feel it. Actually, have you ever experienced that? Sure. Yeah. You know, like you get hurt. Oh, here's a better analogy. You're on a road trip. You have to go to the bathroom.
01:04:16
Speaker
And you're like, you could put it off, put it off, put it off. And then you see like, there's a perfect gas station. You know, they have the Taco Bell inside there. You're like, yes, I can get Taco Bell. I can get gas. I can build a bathroom. It's like once you decide that that's the place you're going to stop. Like the urge goes like through the roof. It's like your mind knows like it's like, that's how it is with, with something like this. So like once I decided I need to go to the hospital, like I felt everything. So like when I got there, they had to get a wheelchair for me. I couldn't walk.
01:04:43
Speaker
They push me like, you know, pushing me every bump. Like I seriously, I felt like I was, I mean, I was, I was dying and you were so dumb. We get in the hospital and they're like, you know, um, you know, I'm like, it's a nerve thing. I can't breathe. I'm like, it's a nerve thing to like chill out buddy. You know, and they, they go into a CAT scan and they're like, uh, we gotta do surgery right now. You're about to die.
01:05:07
Speaker
Yeah. And so the surgery, thank goodness, wasn't like crazy. They didn't have to like cut open my chest or anything. They just run a catheter. They were going to go through my abs, but I had too much muscle. So they had to go through my ribs and I was awake for it all. It was strange because they had a monitor next to my bed.
01:05:30
Speaker
And again, I couldn't breathe hardly. Like literally I was like, and I'm watching it and the doctor goes in through my ribs and he's watching it. If the other doctors holding the ultrasound or whatever it was so that they could see, and I see, I see it go to like the edge of my heart.
01:05:45
Speaker
and his needle stops like, like so cold from my heart. It's crazy, like crazy, the precision. And then he takes like a big like turkey baster, you know, like a big syringe and he hooks it to the catheter he had just done. And he's slow, like really slowly starts pulling. And you see this like, like reddish, whitish fluid, like just shoot through that too. Like, like as soon as he hit the spot and started to get a little backwards pressure, like,
01:06:13
Speaker
And he just pulled it out, poured it in the bag, pulled it out, poured it, kept going. And every time he would fill up a syringe, I could breathe better and better and better and better. And we got done with it. It's on my Instagram. If you scroll way back, he pulled a liter and a half of fluid off of me. And the doctor said, I've never seen somebody survive that much fluid. Never. My entire year. And he was an older guy. He's like, I've never seen it. He said, you were probably a day away from dying. I would go.
01:06:43
Speaker
He's like, even with as strong as you are, and all that, he said, that's the only reason you survived is because of your strength, like the shape that you're in, how strong you are, your lungs, your heart, like that's the only reason you survive. He said, but even with that, another day, I don't think you would have made it. So, and then keep in mind, my wife is back home with our son who's what, two weeks old, three weeks old, our other two kids.
01:07:05
Speaker
she can't come see me because what are you gonna do with the baby babies can't go into the you know, I was nice to you babies can't go nice to you. You know, it was just crazy. It was crazy. And they said I've been in the hospital for two weeks, I was out in two days. And again, I just attributed to just being in shape. I lifted for 2021 years in a row now. And just being in shape, your body recovers so much faster. And
01:07:32
Speaker
Um, I stayed at my friend, Barton Gio's house for a few days. They didn't want me to fly right away. They wanted to make sure I was okay. And then I flew back home. So that would have been like early February. And then we got shut down what a month later for COVID. Right? Like this is, you can't make this stuff up. So, you know, I almost died.
01:07:53
Speaker
COVID hits. Do you know the reason behind it? Like why? They ran every test under the sun that they had available to them. They tested me for some like random fungus that appears in the Midwest. And like maybe it was that like nothing came back. And the only thing they can say is that sometimes it happens to people, perfectly healthy people. They said it's rare, but it does happen. It wasn't like it's not like, you know, they've never seen it before. And they said sometimes even like a cold
01:08:24
Speaker
if the right virus particle gets stuck in that particular area, and, you know, your immune system attacks it, like that little bit of inflammation, because there's not a lot of space, can cause more inflammation, and it just kind of grows. And they said, you know, if you maybe had been sleeping, you know, like, again, we just had to do baby, like maybe your body was just bought into it and done, but for some reason, you had accumulated to that point. So they never knew. Yeah, they never knew. And how's it been since that surgery?
01:08:55
Speaker
I didn't, I didn't lift. It's the longest breakup taken since I was 14. I didn't lift for six weeks. Um, I think I probably could have it four weeks to be honest, but I'm like, you know, when you almost die, you just want to listen to your doctors, even if they don't quite know everything about lifting and that's fine. Um, I just wasn't in a hurry and actually that brings us a smart strength. So when I was in the hospital, Tom had competed at, uh, the hybrid power that you need in Florida.
Tom's Rehabilitation Journey
01:09:24
Speaker
while I was in the hospital. And he, I don't know what he tore in his knee and he tore his pec in the same knee. He was squat. He was squatting eight, I don't know eight 16 or something like that tore something in his knee. He's like, screw it. I'm going to finish him. He went to bench, you know, four oh seven, whatever the kilogram is towards back. He's still dead lifted six 50, which is crazy. And, um, so by the time I get back to Illinois,
01:09:54
Speaker
you know, he's back and he's limping around. He can't do anything. And I said, you know, Tom, I'm not a physical therapist, but I trained enough NFL players that they're always hurt, beat up something like, you know, if you're not going to go get treated, which he wasn't going to, because the treatment options are this, you go and get x-rayed, nothing's broken. Okay. You go get MRI. Something's torn. If it's attached, right? Like not fully detached muscles, then they're not going to do anything.
01:10:24
Speaker
they're gonna send you on your way, right? If you're if your hamstring is attached, clearly, they're going to go in and reattach it. But from what I could tell and what he could tell everything was attached, like even his pack, which was really bad for tear, it wasn't completely detached. So what are you gonna do? The doctor just consider physical therapy. I'm like, if that's the ultimate outcome, anyway, let me take you through some stuff. And we had trained together some at that point. But we hadn't like he was still kind of doing his own thing. And
01:10:51
Speaker
I took him through a lot of the rehab stuff that I used to do with my NFL players and he started getting better. And then we started talking about training and theory and, and why, why did you end up in this situation? Right. Like some power lifters say like, Oh, it's just the nature of the sport. And for sure, when you're looking at heavy weight stuff happens, but I think there's a lot that you can do to avoid if it's different from like normal power lifting, you know, mentality. Um, and.
01:11:16
Speaker
We just started talking about it. He started getting better. And the things that we're talking about made sense to him. And he was sharing his piloting experience with me and like things that he thought that made sense to me. And then COVID hit everybody stuck at home. You know, Tom had a garage gym, which was what we trained out of. And then I started building one and we said, you know what? We always get asked to be trained for people to train us.
01:11:38
Speaker
I'm just sitting at home anyway. Let's do it the right way. We did not want to do spreadsheets. I thought that was a really crappy way to train people online. So we found this app where you could kind of like, they do all the hosting. They do the platform. They do all the stuff that I don't know how to do. But you can still put your label on it. You can upload your own videos. As far as your client is concerned, outside of the actual app name, everything else is you.
01:12:06
Speaker
And I'm like, that's perfect solution for us. We just pay them a fee, whatever. And that's when we started smart stream because Tom was like, he was tired of, you know, basically like literally like not being able to walk out of needs. Right. And I was tired of people providing online training without like great ways of doing it and great tools of doing it.
01:12:27
Speaker
And
Founding Smart Strength During COVID
01:12:28
Speaker
we just kind of said, well, if that's the case, then we need to be the solution, right? We just don't even sit and complain about, we need to be the solution. So we started smart string. And I think it was, it would have been April of 2020. So right after, but all these things had to happen for us to get to that point where it made sense. If COVID hadn't happened, I don't think either one of us would have took a step back and said, had the time to like, to figure it out, right? If Tom wouldn't have ripped his knee and his peck off, I don't think he would have been as like, willing to like,
01:12:56
Speaker
hey, let's, let's figure this out together. You know, if I wouldn't have had my heart stuff, I wouldn't have stopped traveling, probably even during COVID to be honest, but I couldn't travel because of my heart stuff for like three months with the doctor said, and then on top of the pandemic. So all these things kind of wrapped together for us to start smart strength and you know, it's doing well. We want to keep growing it for sure, but we've really been able to help people, um, in a lot of different ways, not just in powerlifting, we've been able to help people who
01:13:24
Speaker
had back pain for eight or nine years and they never got out of it. And now they're pain-free. I had one guy who couldn't lift his arm past his ear in terms of the shoulder mobility. He's like in his fifties. And now he's doing full dumbbell overhead press, like everything, right? Like squatting with the bar behind his back, which I don't care if he does that or not, but he wanted to do it. So, okay, let's train for it then. So it's fulfilling a lot of things for us in that we're actually able to really legitimately help people. And that was a big deal for us. We didn't want to just take somebody's money and like,
01:13:54
Speaker
send them on their way, so to speak, like we really want to legitimately make a difference in people's lives. And we've been able to do that so far. Nice. And you're part of the company is strictly is it coaching online as a coaching a person, maybe a combination? It's all online. Because because of, you know, starting during COVID, it wasn't a choice. So our clients are used to that. And for Tom and I, like, you know, he has a
01:14:22
Speaker
full time job outside of that, right? So he can't be in person. I have no desire to go back to being in person. I did that for a long time. I don't I don't desire that life again. And that brings me to,
Social Impact of Sports in South Sudan
01:14:34
Speaker
you know, a good segue into what else I do. So I can still work for Luol. This year, I was able to be the
01:14:43
Speaker
Street conditioning coach for the South Sudanese men's basketball team. They competed in tournament called Afro Basket, which is like the biggest tournament for national basketball in Africa. And it's like a precursor to the World Cup and the Olympic qualifying.
01:14:59
Speaker
And you know, the wall is South Sudanese. South Sudan is the youngest country in the world. They split from Sudan. A lot of people get that they think they're the same country. They're not anymore. They were for a long time. They split around 11 years ago. And the wall is South Sudanese. And there's I'm trying to remember my numbers, but there's something around
01:15:22
Speaker
27 million South Sudanese around the world who were displaced because of the fighting in South Sudan. And the walls part of his mission as a human being is to how can he help rebuild this country? After all those years of fighting all that long running war, how can he help rebuild it? So he knows basketball, he's seen what basketball can do basketball, sport in general can develop nations that can develop communities. There's real research on
01:15:53
Speaker
just tensions in countries going down during the Olympics, like ethnic tensions, religious tensions, racial tensions, they all go down during the Olympics, because there's something about seeing diverse groups of people come together and compete for a common cause. So luau has seen what basketball has done in his life. It's what it's been able to do for him and his family. And he wants to give that back to that. And so with his foundation,
01:16:16
Speaker
He's been doing a lot of that in camps in the US. He does the camp in the UK. All this stuff is free. But he wanted to start the national team because South Sudan, the average height of the Binka tribe for a male is 6'6". That's the average height. No. And that there's a lot of tribes in South Sudan, for sure. But in terms of the physical traits, even tribe to tribe, there's some tribes that are very similar. So like, there's just a lot of tall guys and women in South Sudan.
01:16:46
Speaker
And he's like, you know, we can harness that we can we can really like make a difference here. So he funded the national team. That's very rare, like, right, like your government's supposed to fund it. Well, the government's so new and sounds to Dan, they don't have all their stuff together yet. It's hard for me to do it. So the laws like fine, I'll fund it. I don't care. And we competed in Afro basket. And the team, you know, basically, the team was started a year ago. And we finished this in the whole country. You know, I mean, the whole continent, the whole continent,
01:17:15
Speaker
Right. And so if you know your Africa, um, geography, there's 54 countries. So for us to finish fifth, only being a year in is pretty big deal. And had that been an Olympic qualifying tournament, uh, we'd be qualified for, um, sorry, we'd be an alternate, uh,
01:17:32
Speaker
No, I think five teams go from Africa. So I think we would have actually barely snuck in, which is amazing. Yeah. So, um, that's one of the things that I will continue to do is serve in that capacity. I also am going to continue to help Lou with his foundation and that mission. And there's a lot of things that I do during the day over here.
01:17:50
Speaker
Uh, where I'm working with other nonprofit partners that we have, um, I'm trying to get things sorted out so that we continue to do more work in South Sudan. And that's a really hard job description to like give a lot of detail on because it's so random and it's so like different, but basically because I'm known to offer so long, um, you know, he needs somebody that he could trust in somebody that, um, understands the dynamics and what's going on. And.
01:18:15
Speaker
Um, me with a team, a big team of other people, I'm a very small part in that very small part, but I'm able to do my part to continue to help with that. So I kind of do a hodgepodge of things at this point. Um, but it makes for interesting days and I'm very grateful for it. Wow. If you look at yourself 10 years from now, what do you think advice would be that the person 10 years from now would give you see yourself in 10 years?
01:18:46
Speaker
10 years from now or 10 years like to myself 10 years ago. Yeah. So Jacob, Jacob 10 years from now, what would he tell you now? Holy smokes. Um, man, Jacob 10 years from now, I hope he would tell me, um, to do an even better job of locking in time with, uh, my family, being intentional about that, being focused about that. It's really easy when your business is online.
01:19:15
Speaker
even the work I do with the wall, the vast majority of it's online, remote. It's really easy to get in the cycle of like, need to be on your phone, checking this email, responding to this person. But that's always a choice, right? Like, there's to some extent, there is set rules, but there's, it's always a choice, because you could choose to schedule your day in such a way that people know that you just say, I'm not available during this time, right? So
01:19:41
Speaker
I would hope that that's something I would tell myself. Um, and I would hope that's something that I've grown in even more. So I think I've done an okay job, but I haven't done a great job. Um, you know, I would also hopefully, um, tell myself to continue to invest in things that really matter. Um, like smart strength is, is cool for me because we're, we're helping people solve specific problems and it brings me a lot of joy.
01:20:09
Speaker
I love training those pro athletes. I loved it. It was so much fun. There's such good people. But at the end of the day, you're helping somebody who makes a lot of money, just make more money. And not that there's anything wrong with that. But there's something different about when I was in South Sioux, when I was in Rwanda for that tournament with South Sudan. And when we won, the crowd who was able to be there who was actually South Sioux needs
01:20:36
Speaker
Like they were crying, like tears down their face, like crying, because for their country, they had never seen a national team win. They had never seen people from different tribes play together. They had never seen or had something really to be proud of in that way. And to play a small role in helping that happen, it's huge. And like some of the stuff that Luol is
Legacy and Humanitarian Efforts
01:20:58
Speaker
doing that people don't even know about in South Sudan, you know, schools, hospitals, surgeries for people, like,
01:21:05
Speaker
A lot of this stuff sounds like very canned and like, oh, that's what every like, you know, that's what every like NGO does or public charity. And it's like, the difference is that the wall isn't waiting for someone else to come along and do it. He's doing it. There's been times where drought or famine has hit an area and they need food. The wall isn't calling the fricking UN and this and that. He goes and gets a shipping container, fills it with food, shifts it to his family.
01:21:31
Speaker
They put it on a truck and they've literally dug it out of the mud to get it to help people like to being able to facilitate a person like luau who has that much passion and that much empathy and humanity to be able to help facilitate what he's trying to do. And again, a small part in it just to play that role. It's very gratifying. And if I'm grateful to be in that position. And so like I would hope 10 years from now I've looked back and seen myself grow in that area. Like I would love to always want to be involved in training.
01:22:00
Speaker
Um, there's always going to be a heart. Like, I mean, clearly I continue to lift, you know, almost every day I go work out with crazy Tom and cam and, you know, I still have some goals with myself. I want to hit lifting wise, but, um, and I still want to train, you know, high level athletes as it makes sense. So, but the difference is be that the goal of my life, I think is shifted to where, um, I want to be more about, um, helping people than maybe helping, uh, athletes. Hmm. Hmm.
01:22:29
Speaker
Wow. I think if you're open to this, a part two is just much needed because I have so many questions we got through, I don't know, not even the first handful that I have. So yeah, you have some incredible stories. Jacob, I appreciate the heck out of you. Uh, so thank you for jumping on and joining us and sharing all this.
01:22:49
Speaker
I would love to do a part two. Um, I don't know if Tom told you this when you guys spoke, but I am not short on, uh, stories. And I, and I told you when you first got on, I enjoyed talking about this stuff. Um, because, and I think this is a good place probably to wrap it up for this one. When I was younger, um, I had my dad who passed away last year from Alzheimer's. It had nothing to do with COVID. It was just, it was a terrible time though.
01:23:17
Speaker
I had him as inspiration, and then I had books that I read. But when I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do in life, I didn't have anybody I could call. I didn't have any resources. There was no YouTube videos, no podcasts. There was none of that stuff. So for me, this is why I think what you're doing is so important. For you to provide a resource for people who are willing to look to not just learn about how to treat someone, that's such an infinitely difficult question anyway.
01:23:45
Speaker
for you to provide resources for people who really want to get to know what other people in the industry are doing. What are their struggles? What is it about? How did you get there?
01:23:55
Speaker
I think it's such an invaluable thing because this is the new book. This is the new knowledge what you're doing. It's giving people the opportunity to grow from other people's experiences. And if you're not taking the time to set it up and ask the questions and get the mics and upload like that's a lot of work. And so like, I'm always grateful when someone comes to me and asks me to do this, because I want some kid, you know, like me a long time ago, to stumble upon this and have a resource and maybe a path or even a way to reach out and say,
01:24:24
Speaker
you know, hey, this helped me along my journey. Because if we're not helping other people, then what the heck are we doing, right? Like, what the heck are we doing if we're not helping other people? So thank you, I'm grateful for it. And if you would like to have me back, I would love to come back.
01:24:38
Speaker
Absolutely. And one last question. If your dad was still around, he sounds like just a stand up man. So much respect and honor to him in his life. What do you think he would tell you now seeing that you've grown into the man that you are and doing what you're doing? And that's, um, that's, um, I would, uh, it is funeral, um,
01:25:09
Speaker
I said that I hope that I grow up to be like him, even though I was 34, as you know. Because in a lot of ways, I don't feel like I've grown up yet, which is strange for someone with three kids and, you know, whatever, but I just, you know, I don't feel like I'm, I'm whatever that place in life is that you need to get there. And so I would hope that
01:25:38
Speaker
him look it back would say like that you're on that path. I hope that he would would say that I'm honoring his memory and how I'm raising my kids and my family and how I'm taking care of mom. And I hope he would, you know, also say that like to say he was just proud of the work that I'm doing in the way that I was doing it, because that's the thing about my dad.
01:26:07
Speaker
you know, like I said, he worked 12 hour shifts. And then he would still like, drive the bus to pick people up for church. Like he would still, you know, if a neighbor tree fell down, or Cal got out, like he would go and help them. Like, there was there was not a short amount of stories when he passed with people saying things that my dad had done for them, that my dad never spoke about, that I never knew about. He didn't ask for anything for it. He just did it.
01:26:32
Speaker
And the way that he went about his life, I would hope that he would be proud of the way that I'm going about my life and making those things. And I'll say this, there was a time when my dad first got diagnosed that I really felt hard about moving back to Texas because with Alzheimer's, there's no cure. You already know the ending. It's going to be terrible. There's no way around it. That's just how it's going to be, especially when you're diagnosed younger, which my dad was diagnosed at 55. So that's pretty young. And my dad told me.
01:27:01
Speaker
Like I didn't go in the military. I didn't work all those shift work. So you could go and do what you felt like you were supposed to do. I wanted you to go and do what you wanted to do. And you wanted to train athletes. So you need to stay in Chicago and do it. That, that's what would make me happy. And that's when his mind was still there, obviously. And so like, that was really influential for me because, um,
01:27:28
Speaker
It's what gave me the ability to stay put. It's what gave me the ability to stay here and work because I was passionate about it. I still am, but I was so passionate about what I really wanted to do. And I just think even today, like looking down, like you would be so proud of the fact that I did that. I think had I gone home, he would have been so pissed that I came to take care of him seriously, like so pissed. Like what the hell is wrong with you? I'm fine. I'm glad that you did what you, what I worked on, but also for you to be able to do.
01:27:59
Speaker
I think that's the best way that I could honor him. So just continuing to do that. Jacob, I am
01:28:09
Speaker
Just humble, and I'm inspired, I'm motivated, and I see a light in my own life, just seeing what you're doing and the change that you're making, like, be the change that you want to see in this world. I mean, that's just, I mean, you're doing it. You're doing a damn thing, Jacob. And I've been asking myself, like, how do I make an impact?
01:28:33
Speaker
putting in those hours, knowing what you love and getting after it. Thank you. Thank you, Jacob. Well, like I said, thank you. And I'm also humbled that you take time out of your day to set up and do all this and speak for me. So I'm grateful.
01:28:53
Speaker
Jacob Ross is just a humble warrior as well as with... Jacob is just a humble gritty end of it. Jacob is just one amazing person, athlete, coach, human being who has grit, who is humble, who has faith and he's giving back.
01:29:17
Speaker
I mean that guy
Conclusion and Call to Action
01:29:18
Speaker
is a true genuine change and I just want to say thank you if you tuned in hope this inspired you as much as it did for me and if you want to give back if you want to hook us up scroll down on Apple hit five stars takes you five seconds good deed of the day I appreciate the heck out of you for doing that if you're on another platform hit subscribe like
01:29:46
Speaker
leave a review this helps us reach more people so if you think this is a great show thank you for doing that hit those likes that subscribe that review it's a good deed of the day and it does make a difference so thank you for doing such
01:30:03
Speaker
If you haven't done so, check out the calisthenics programming. I do it. I personally program it alongside my partner where you can see that. You can find that on modernathlete.com. You have video instructions. It's easy to follow. I do it. You will be coached by me as well.
01:30:19
Speaker
I mean, hey, it's a steal and it's incredible value for what you get as well. I couldn't found it out there, find it out there, so we created it ourselves and we put it out there ourselves. Enjoy to get stronger, to get more skilled and just become a beast. Until next time, much love.