Showing posts with label determination. Show all posts
Showing posts with label determination. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Pay It Forward

Perhaps it's a little late, but it's worth noting that November was "Inspirational Role Models Month". As I am sitting here contemplating what topic to discuss with you this week, it is no coincidence to me that the Thanksgiving holiday is also in November. In the past couple of months my career has taken another step and of course, I am very thankful for this. But it got me thinking about those who have been very influential to me in my journey and how I attempt and have attempted to pay it forward as I continue.

It goes without saying that my parents have been big influences and role models to me. However, I don't want to turn this article into a mushy dedication. What I would like to do is take you through a somewhat abbreviated tour of how I got to my current place and talk about those who have guided me professionally.

My journey began in high school. I'm not quite sure exactly how I got into it. Perhaps it was because I was a high school athlete who saw the benefits and needs of being in top physical shape to perform my sport and stay healthy. At that time, I worked at a health club which allowed me to trade out my services in exchange for the personal sport coaching that I needed, use of the facility for practice, and eventually personal training and conditioning services. At first, I helped teach group sport lessons and manned the phones and appointment books in the fitness center. Then, I gradually progressed into assisting the fitness professionals and performing personal fitness evaluations. I'm sure it was here that I really began to develop my interest in the fields of sports medicine and sports performance. By my senior year, I had the opportunity to get involved with a personal training and consulting company that, while they made their money on the typical fitness / weight management client, really emphasized the training and conditioning of athletes in the area where I lived. As luck would have it, the company rented a small office at the club and used the fitness center area to train their clients. The owner/president of the company was a man named John Philbin. At the time, he had worked with the Washington Redskins and was currently the Head Coach / Strength and Conditioning Coach for the USA Bobsled Team. He allowed me to shadow him and his staff. They took me completely under their wing and as time went on, I began to be involved much more than just shadowing. It was here that my love for this profession began and grew much more than "What kind of job do I want when I grow up?" It became a passion.

Once I entered college, I was just as determined to learn more about the field. At the time, there were a handful of curriculum education programs. However, the dominant mode of education was the internship or work-study program for athletic trainers. I was relentless. I turned in a resume for application in both the university's athletic weight room and the training room. And for the first month I was on campus, I contacted or visited them almost daily. I was granted a student position in both the weight room and athletic training room. For the remainder of the school year, I proceded to attend class and work. I remember spending an ungodly amount of time at the athletic complex. Needless to say with the stresses of school (obviously there are many adjustments to make your first time away at school) and the stresses of a job, my grades suffered. My superiors in the weight room and athletic training room sent me home for the summer after my freshman year with a decision to make. Having spent the summer returning to my previous mentors from high school, I felt that I had acquired a fairly good background in the strength and conditioning arena. When I returned to school for my second year, I devoted my attention to the sports medicine side. Over the course of the next few years, I was blessed to be taught and mentored by several graduate assistants who came from a variety of backgrounds. As graduate students, they too had very stressful school demands. Yet, they took the time to organize a make shift athletic training curriculum for the student athletic trainers. A couple even went above and beyond to make sure that those of us who were serious about continuing on in the profession received extra attention and mentoring. It was through these young professionals that I really began to see the benefits of a wide range of experiences and began to develop my own philosophy of training.

In the real world (after school), you find mentors everywhere. I've found that the further along I've come to learn that all of my colleagues and co-workers are mentors. Everyone has a different background and set of experiences. It's up to us to take what we can learn from each other, blend what we like and can use, and discard the rest. (Yet, it's important to keep the discarded in the back of your mind - you never know when it might be useful.) This is how we continue to grow, adapt, and mold our professional philosophies. Over the years, I have again been blessed to find individuals and small groups that share my passion. These people have allowed me to continue to enjoy what I do and fuel my desire to get better at it.

How do I pay this type of inspiration forward?

1. Throughout my career I have had the pleasure of corresponding with high school students who are interested in the sports medicine / performance professions. I am always willing to share my story. As an athletic trainer performing high school outreach, I mentored several students and eventually worked with the Health Occupations teacher at the school to develop a pilot High School Sports Medicine Curriculum and team taught this class with the Health Occupations teacher for 2 years.

2. Once I completed my undergraduate degree and became a graduate assistant myself, I made sure that the student athletic trainers that I helped to supervise had the same time of support and learning environment that was provided to me. As the university was looking to maybe one day add an athletic training curriculum and added some of the necessary course work to the catelog, I took it upon myself to help create a clinical learning environment in the athletic training room. We created a clinical competencies program and tried to establish more student oriented learning environment each week when the physicians were around to see injured athletes.

3. Later in my professional career, I have searched for opportunities to present / speak at various conferences and meetings. I try and instigate or spur on informal discussions with individuals / small groups about relevent topics. I have hosted interns. And, it is this desire to "pay it forward" that has led me to co-found BaseballStrengthCoaching.com's web and blog sites.

I know that I have mentioned it before in my blogs, but one mentor of mine in particular - Dr. Jack Hughston - used to say, "If you're green, your still growing. If you're ripe, you're next to rotten." We should never stop trying to learn, grow, and pay it forward.

We should all stop for a moment, take a look at the path we've taken to get to where we are, and remember those who have helped us get there. Then, just as it was important for us to absorb what those mentors taught us, it is important for us to become mentors ourselves and "Pay It Forward". It is only then that we can continue to grow our professions and fuel the fire of those future professionals and leaders.

David Yeager, ATC, CSCS
Co-Founder
BaseballStrengthCoaching.com

Monday, June 20, 2011

Staying In The Moment

It has been a really long baseball season. I hardly remember the first talk coach had at the beginning of the season. I do remember him writing on the board “8/25 - ??.” Those question marks are a symbol of the end of the season.

The nice thing about the beginning of the season is that most everybody has those questions marks that will end of their season. The beginning of the school year means fall baseball, inter squads that seem to never end, six a.m. workouts that make you want to throw up, and what seems to be the endless amount of drills that make you think that the spring season will never arrive.

You take a deep breath and the spring season has finally begins and everyone has a new life. Multiple outings for the bullpen pitchers, high pitch counts for the starters, catchers beaten and bruised, and position players that have legs that feel like lead.

You have put all the work in to make it to this point. The post season has arrived (and probably gone) for some of you. Those endless hours have got you to this point, because not everyone makes it to this point. Although you still have work to be done, stay in the moment. Use those positive experiences of the past (those workouts and endless scrimmages) to guide you through to a positive ending. You might be experiencing some things in the postseason that you have not been through – that’s ok. Guess what – the baseball is still round and the infield is still going to have the same dimensions. You are still going to tie on the cleats and play the game as hard as you can. So sit back for a minute and enjoy the moment. The game is the easy part - dealing with the external activities is what gets everyone.

Sorry to keep this short. My team has a practice to go to in Omaha . Wish me luck.

Chris Ham, MSA, ATC, CES
Athletic Trainer
Vanderbilt University Baseball

Monday, January 31, 2011

Be A Sponge

I am going to piggy back on David’s topic earlier this month.

Dr. Hughston stated “As long as you’re still green, you’re growing. Once you’re ripe, you’re next to rotten.” Although David was speaking about an educational opportunity for those that are in the profession of bettering the overall performance of athletes, you might want to ponder this statement. Think about it for a minute.

As a professional, I live by this statement. As a quasi-athlete (I use the term lightly when I refer to myself as an athlete) I still live by this statement. As a husband, friend, etc. . . . . well, you get the point.

As an athletic trainer, continuing education is extremely important to our day to day activity. If anyone in the medical profession tells you that they have it all figured out – laugh at them, and then listen to what they have to say. I don’t have all the answers, and never intend to have all the answers, but I bet you I can find someone who has a good idea how to help out. I ask my officemate thousands of questions. That being said, I get asked a lot of different questions – a lot of random questions. Every morning that I come to the office, I make sure that I read something that could benefit me as an athletic trainer. I will read journal articles, blog posts, textbooks, etc. You can sort out the B.S. once you finish reading. If something happened at practice or a game the night before and I need to brush up on something – I grab one of my resources on the bookshelf and dive in. I am not ashamed to say that I go back and look to see what the literature says – physicians do the same thing.

As the quasi-athlete, I am the same way. I have been intrigued by triathlons ever since I can remember watching the Ironman World Championship in Hawaii. With the help of a buddy that has completed an ironman himself – yes that is the race that starts with a 2.4 mile swim, 120 mile bike, and a 26.2 mile jog (no big deal) - I am trying to absorb as much information that I can. What kind of training plans do they use? How do they fuel their bodies during their everyday training? How do they fuel their body during a 10 plus hour race? How many days do they train multiple times a day? What do I wear? When do I use the bathroom? When can I re-apply my sunscreen? Alright, it is a little bit of a system overload, but I have enjoyed trying to make myself better. I have a lot to learn when it comes to becoming a triathlete.

The best line that I have heard lately about being a good person - If you surround yourself with dogs, you’re going to end up with fleas.
As an athlete this is easy to do. Ask your coach, ask your teammates, ask those old alumni that come around. Read a book – I know it sounds bad – it’s not the worst thing in the world. I had a professional baseball player tell me that one of the best books he read about hitting was “The Inner Game of Tennis.” Although it was the first couple chapters he was speaking of – they got into more tennis based information later. Write things down – I have worked for the same coaching staff for just about five years now. I carry around a small notebook and take notes when I see fit – always a student. Don Meyer, an NCAA coach amongst the top in his profession before he retired, made his athletes a binder. It contained notes from team meetings, motivational quotes, articles, plays, and anything that Coach Meyer felt they needed to have at their disposal.

There are plenty of people to talk to – don’t be afraid to ask questions and be a sponge to soak up as much information (and double check it) so you can to become better at what you want to do.

Chris Ham, MSA, ATC, CES
Athletic Trainer
Vanderbilt University Baseball

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Don't Blow It!

How important is a first impression? As a baseball player it might be the only time you get to show a coach what you are made of. This is not limited to only your skills on the field but also what you are made of as a person. I have seen and heard many stories of how athletes have blown a great opportunity, and in the last 6 months I have witnessed 3 or 4 missed opportunities because the player doesn’t think it will matter. A word of advice, everything you do matters, from what you eat to how you dress. Let me give you a few stories.

I was at a camp watching a few players. This camp was hosted by a very well known coach at a college is Nebraska, which has a husker as a mascot. During a meeting with the players, the coach was explaining how the recruitment process goes and how it’s hard to see all the players out there. During this meeting the coach explained that while traveling to see players many times they are strapped for time and will only be able to stay a few minutes. During this time everything you do as a player can make or break you. If he saw a player during warm-up messing around, he would pack it up and leave and go to the next game. "Ladies and Gentlemen this is warm-up.", as he said. This might be the only time he has to see a player that day. If that first impression is bad, he may never return. Can you afford to make that impression?

Recently I had a player that had set up a try-out with a college coach. This player had 2 months after the summer season to prepare himself for the try-out. But what did he do instead? He decided to play golf. Don’t get me wrong. Golf is a great game. But, he did not touch a baseball for 2 months. When he returns to me before his try-out we had a week to prepare. Now, he failed to inform me 2 months earlier that he had set up this try-out. So, to my surprise we are trying to get some work done before that try-out. This player went to the try out with a minor sore arm and a weak bat. So how did the try-out go? Not so well. His arm was weak and lacked a lot of power. What will this coach do? We don’t know as of yet. But, did he put his best foot forward?

These are just a few examples and I could go on. But I think I have made the point. Please, if you get nothing else out of this blog this week, know that coaches are always watching. Take the time to prepare. That first impression could be your last impression.

Brian Niswender
Co-Founder Baseball Strength Coaching.com

Friday, May 21, 2010

Use It or Lose It!

This is probably one of my biggest pet peaves and an issue that I spend a lot of time discussing with athletes each year. And, if you've heard this from me on several occasions, I apologize. But, being that we are knee deep into the season, I thought that I would take a minute and review a simple concept.

Deconditioning, also called detraining is simply the effect of losing fitness when you stop training. The Principle of Use / Disuse is one of the main principles of conditioning. The concept is that “if you don’t use it, you lose it”. How quickly you lose fitness depends on how fit you are, how long you have been training, and on how long you stop.

Many people stop exercising at times for many reasons. It is not uncommon for baseball players to train intensely during the winter months and significantly decrease or stop training altogether once the season begins thinking that they will be able to maintain their fitness level throughout the summer. I hear it time and time again, "I really work hard in the off-season so I don't need to now." However, this thought process simply doesn’t work. With the overall length of the baseball season, the day-to-day grind of playing / practicing almost everyday, and the physical stress of throwing / swinging, it is almost impossible to maintain your strength and conditioning levels throughout the entire season without some sort of plan. Studies show that deconditioning begins in about 2 weeks if training is stopped altogether. Once lost, it takes nearly three times as long to recondition as it took to “detrain”. After 3 months following the end of training, researchers have found that athletes lost about ½ of their aerobic condition.

Top Ways to Maintain Your Fitness Level

(1) Don’t quit completely. At a minimum, performing 1-2 high-quality, high-intensity training sessions each week can help maintain your fitness level.

(2) Account for the body’s ability to adapt to training. DO NOT keep doing the same routine over and over. Adjust your training plan to gradually progress the training loads and intensities in order to avoid, detraining, overtraining, and injury.

(3) Using a variety of different exercise techniques, while staying true to the training goals and performance needs, can help to limit overtraining, enhance motivation, and increase training adaptations.

(4) Continue training (well-body conditioning, cross training, etc) through injuries.


David Yeager, ATC, CSCS
Co-Founder, BaseballStrengthCoaching.com

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Preparation = Confidence

I know that the Vancouver Games have been closed for over a week, but one particular athlete’s story stood out in my mind. Immediately after winning the gold medal in the Women’s Moguls event, skier Hannah Kearney was interviewed and she talked about a “special note” that one of her strength coaches had sent her on the morning of the finals. Kearney was known to keep a diary of detailing each of her workouts over the past year. Her coach secretly went through the diary and summed up her work:

- 2,500+ Jumps
- 250 hours on the Bike
- 5,800 stairs climbed in ski boots while jumping into the pool

At the bottom of the note, the coach wrote “You are ready.”

Performance is a test of your training and skills. I know it’s a cliché, but don’t you feel better about taking a test if you’ve studied for it? Preparation for next season begins as soon as this season ends. Preparation for your next outing or game begins as soon as your last one was over. The goal is to maximize recovery, review what went right and what went wrong, develop a game plan, and then execute the plan. Simple right?

Not always. But, Hannah Kearney is on to one trick that can help…keeping a Training Log. Maintaining a log of workouts can help you recognize patterns and better understand when it is time to change movements and adjust the volume and intensities for optimal training benefits. Keeping a diary of previous performances can help you identify successful strategies and prevent falling into predictable patterns.

When you see it on paper, it is easier to recognize that you’ve done everything you can to prepare yourself for. And then you’ll know… “You are ready!”

David Yeager, ATC, CSCS
Co-Founder
BaseballStrengthCoaching.com

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Burn The Ships!

This week I wanted to give you guys a story I came across, one that I hope impacts you as much as it has impacted me.

There was a great warrior that had to make a decision to ensure his success on the battlefield. He was about to send his armies against a powerful foe, whose men outnumbered his own. He loaded his soldiers into boats, sailed to the enemy’s country, unloaded soldiers and equipment, then gave the order to burn the ships that had carried them. Addressing his men before the first battle, he said “You see the boats going up in smoke. That means that we cannot leave these shores alive unless we win! We now have no choice---we win or we perish!” They won. Every person who wins in any undertaking must be willing to burn his ships and cut all sources of retreat. Only by so doing can one be sure of maintaining that state of mind known as "a burning desire to win", essential to success.

As a coach or a player, have you left yourself no way to retreat? Have you made the decision to make whatever your doing a success. Whatever you want, go get it. Cortez used this strategy when he came to the new world.

Brian Niswender, MA, CSCS
Co-Founder, BaseballStrengthCoaching.com
Owner, Warrior Sports Training