🎙️ Dive deep into the world of collegiate track and field with this exciting episode of the Gil Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast! Join us as we host Mike Turgeon, the dynamic head coach of the Minnesota State Mavericks 🐂. From his formative years influenced by his mother’s wisdom—”My mom taught me to be curious”—to his strategic prowess in athletics administration, Mike shares a journey filled with perseverance, innovation, and leadership.
In this episode, Mike discusses his approach to overcoming resource limitations, his evolution in coaching strategies, and how he transformed these challenges into competitive advantages for his team. Learn how he leverages fundraising, facility upgrades, and staff management to push the boundaries of what’s possible in track and field coaching.
From unathletic beginnings to a national champion discus thrower and a respected coach, Mike’s story is a masterclass in leveraging curiosity and strategic thinking to achieve excellence. Tune in for a rich blend of personal anecdotes, professional insights, and practical tips that illuminate the multifaceted role of a collegiate coach.
Enjoy an engaging discussion that goes beyond the track, exploring how Mike cultivates a high-performing team culture, prioritizes academic support, and navigates the complexities of athletic administration to foster long-term success. 🎓🏅
Get ready to be inspired by a coach who sees every limitation as an opportunity and every small victory as a stepping stone to greater achievements. Whether you’re a budding coach or a seasoned athlete, this episode is packed with valuable lessons on growth, resilience, and the relentless pursuit of excellence in collegiate athletics.
🌟 Explore Our Archive: Dive into over 200 episodes featuring insights from coaching legends like Boo Schexnayder of LSU, Diljeet Taylor of BYU, Petros Kyprianou of Illinois, and many more! Find us on YouTube and Apple Podcasts for your listening pleasure.
📲 Stay Connected: Want to get in touch with our host, Mike Cunningham? Follow him on Twitter (@MikeCunningham), shoot him an email at mcunningham@gillathletics.com, or send a text to 217-898-3038. We love hearing from our listeners! 🎧👍
here we go back on the Gil Athletics track and field connections podcast so grateful that you would join us once again I hope you are enjoying season five which still even though we’re in may now that kind of still boggles me that uh season five I don’t know how long it might last I didn’t know that it would necessarily last this long but we’re having an absolute blast bringing you coaches from around the country uh from all levels and I’m super excited about today’s you’ve already seen the title so you already know who it is so let’s jump into it help me welcome the head coach of Minnesota state the the Mavericks I I might I might have to get corrected on that the wise the wonderful Mr Mike Turon Mike how are you sir good thanks for having me Mike did I nail it the Mavericks yep Mavericks that’s correct good I I really like I’m a a sub nerd on um schools and their mascots like I really enjoy knowing all of them so I I kind of always kind of pay attention I thought thought the Maverick you throw me off with the bull though it’s a bull right yeah it’s technically it’s called our stomper is the actual mascot logo but y so so how does Maverick meet stomper what what is how’s that connected couldn’t really tell you okay good at least I’m not missing like some obvious like oh dude all Stompers are called Maverick or something I have no idea I had a coach tell me one time just work at a school with a cool cool logo kids will remember that nailed it by the way yes very much so that is a cool stomper I love it I love it well Mike let’s uh I’m super excited excited thanks again for being here uh you’re our second Minnesota State coach right so we had uh your assistant coach Chris parno on he he’s a he’s an OG I think he was like episode 30 or 40 he he he he jumped on the bandwagon quick back in the day when uh uh you know we were just a fledgling podcast back then so uh super excited for him and the success he’s had with you guys under your leadership and uh excited to learn about your leadership and and what’s going on there uh at the Mavericks uh so let’s hop into it Mike let’s uh get in our way back machine here you know somewhere track uh had to start for you somehow whether it was in the coaching realm or whether it was as an athlete where does track begin for you track really comes in sixth grade I was uh very very unathletic big kid you know I was taller than my um kindergarten teacher when I started kindergarten and are are you serious yep I’m serious were you seriously taller was she seriously slor or both there cuz holy cow okay wow and I was you know size 15 shoes in fifth grade so kind of Boo the clown right there Mike but uh y so I had uh my physical education teacher uh Mike Peterson was also the head track and field coach at perm um High School where I grow up grew up in Minnesota and he had told me hey you should come out and Throw Shop foot someday and I remember uh so I went out in sixth grade and the first day I was tried shop put really wasn’t what kind of my cup of tea and I picked up a discus and we were in the elementary gym and I tried throwing a discus and never even hit the net that was like 30 ft away and kind of fell in love with throwing that which kind of led me into my career here so hey let me ask so um by the way Mike I am famous for just interrupting but uh I’m curious so because so I’ve got a he’s in seventh grade now so he started track last year now he’s not super tall he’s not short by any means but he’s not super tall and thank God well I was gonna say thank God he’s not wearing size 15s yet but you know I feel like I’m buying new shoes every month so I’m you know how that’s going to go uh but he went out for track and I’m triying very hard not to push you know being the former track coach and track company and all this stuff I’m like yeah you do whatever you want he’s in band and uh scholastic bowl and all this kind of stuff and so he went out and you know God bless the Middle School coaches you know I have a lot of empathy there’s a lot of kids out there we have a pretty good track culture in our community so there’s a lot of kids uh I think he’s not just coaching the owers he’s also coaching you know maybe the sprinters and stuff too so they don’t get a lot of coaching right so they’re kind of just throwing a lot right now they do have a really good kid he’s an eighth grader now was like Middle School state champ or something like that uh but he’s so I’m trying to balance this like you know I know enough for you know basic shot putting like what you know don’t fall back when you throw it and all those kind of stuff but you but he hasn’t grasp into the lovea like you mentioned this is where I’m curious for you you mentioned I didn’t throw very well but I fell in love what what was it because you weren’t very good it’s you know you know typically we hear like oh I threw it really far and I was hooked you’re like I wasn’t actually that good but I was hooked yeah I mean and I tell kids all the time in middle school I got crushed by everybody um I mean just because I I really in reality had to learn how to walk and chew gum at the same time I was so uncoordinated being a 64 275 PB 7th grader you know and so uh it was just something about you know watching a discus fly you know but early on it really wasn’t flying you know dropping right in front of me um but I you know I lucked out with some great Middle School coaches that really kind of encouraged me to just practice and I always think throwing is one of those things that it’s just blue collar work the more you throw the better you get and you just throw a bunch and you get you get pretty good in a short amount of time you know and that kind of so that was kind of kind of my Sport and then um I really really liked football at the time um and then kind of my as I got a little better in track and then football um had a spinal cord injury when I was a junior in high school and then U my neur neurologist and neurosurgeon told me that I could pick between uh three different sports and I could either go out for swimming and play golf or uh since you’re a big guy maybe take throwing really seriously and you know I couldn’t hit a golf ball Saved My Life um there’s no way I was getting this big body into a speedo in front of people and so uh I decided really you know kind of at that point I’m going to get as strong as I can and take the throwing you know as much as I can do and so I kind of went all in with that and so you were doing up to that point you were doing throw you were doing throwing yep then you got hurt and then it became okay I’m going to become a thrower yeah yeah and you know at even when I was a junior I had no aspirations of going to college I mean mine I was kind of you know more on the let’s hopefully let’s graduate high school and you know um I was uh working for a telephone company in town and they were going to pay me to go to college uh or at a tech school to become a telephone cable repair person and that was kind of I had a apprenticeship my senior year with them that I was going to do that was going to go to school in the morning and then work for them in the afternoon and then kind of went through the summer going into my senior year and um told my father I I really don’t want to give up throwing discus and you know that was kind of the first time I think him and I didn’t really see eye to eye um and you know now looking back was the best decision I ever made you know the um and then uh so we uh so then I ended up going to college uh starting out at w Stout um do we they there was only uh two program colleges in the country that had kind of this telecommunication systems this was back you know in the early early 2000s and what I wanted to do is become a computer programmer to program telephone systems oh wow it was very unique Scout had kind of that unique major on part of it and uh that’s kind of what brought me there and dwey Nats who’s now the athletic director there was my longtime was my throws coach for a couple years there and kind of once I went to college and realized you know I’m pract you know practicing you know SE September through May really f even that more in love with throwing and realize kind of after my second year no I think I want to do this as a job you know I was kind of so so hold there because I am curri I love the uniquenesses of individ that’s why I love people so much because there are so much uniquenesses how did you so you had this apprenticeship setup go your senior year in telephone and then you pick your school based off of this very I mean you know computer programmer that’s that’s specific computer programmer for telephone industry that’s really specific what was your why’ you like phones so much Mom or Dad work in the industry uh I had a a networking class in high school and really kind of like the computer stuff uh part of it you know um my mom was a guidance counselor at our school and kind of always talked about you know going after she always really believe and still believes heavily in education and and expanding but you know doing something you like and kind of different basically tests I took and kind of like that kind of you know realm like the aptitude test and those kind of things those different things and I wish I could remember we took something I went to high school in Alabama we took some test I think sophomore year that was supposed to tell us what you know job you know career path we would take I wish I could I would be able to I wish I would have kept that I wish I don’t know if it came out true or not I have no clue what it was that’d be that’d be interesting um and when you junior year when the the injury happens and you decide I’m going to become a thrower how did that change the coaching side of it for you did coaches I don’t want to say they took it more seriously because you know that’s saying that they didn’t take it seriously with you before but did did they also double down with you and and what did that look like yeah I guess really for me it was I took more of the strength and conditioning more seriously um I was told basically I I didn’t get cleared to actually do any physical activity until you know my injured happened in Middle early September and I think I I wasn’t cleared to actually start throwing discus until uh it was right before the track season like the end of March and I was just told okay you need to go get as strong as physically possible you can and so started lifting weights five days a week for two and a half hours and you know you’re young 16y old and you get strong pretty quickly yeah um when you do that we just break down at our age if we tried that yeah yeah that would work from now yeah no I mean I remember you know Mike Peterson and then I had another um she was a thrower um Chris Keel was a uh Olympian for the U for the US team um but her college roommate um was a and teammate at Concordia was a th was a teacher in our area and so um Aaron moer helped me quite a bit too on just learning a little bit more of the technique and um her her husband was a teacher in perm so that’s kind of how I met her and learned a little bit more that that way but they just kind of encourag me to keep throwing and keep going with things and you know as my wife wife would a test I’m very stubborn so it was you know I wasn’t going to let this get in my way at all I love it I love it all right so we go to udub Stout uh partially because I want to keep throwing the discus yeah uh dad maybe didn’t understand uh his your pathway versus what he thought your pathway might be I love that that’s pretty common uh and then pick you up outout because of the Telecommunications major as well and then you mentioned I think you said sophomore year it kind of Switched like oh wait a minute like I I kind of want to be a coach what what what happened why the switch you know I spent my time more in my coach’s office reviewing video than I did wanting to learn about routers and the and the different the different processes on that and just kind of I always then i’ find my spare time too talking you know like with our women’s track and field coach or our head track coach in his office or our athletic director and learning more about Athletics um had a there was a sports psychology Professor that her daughter um was a discus thrower 18 180 foot disco store of Tennessee and talking with her about kind of their different travel schedule and training and just really just really love throwing and um so then when I kind of had a discussion kind of with my M with my parents and uh talked a little bit more on it you know I really think I want to be a college track and field coach and um the issue Stout at that time had 18 majors and the closest they had to education was uh they had Elementary Ed um and that that so I so I looked at uh transfering for some schools that were um and physical education I thought would help me you know get into the coaching and be able to teach that and so I um lacr we competed against lacrosse quite a bit um the funny story I had shared this with ww cla’s throws coach but uh Paul Conan who’s been a long time successful throws coach there and lot of respect and learned quite a bit from over the years and he always had his throwers back in the early 2000s they were head the toe in spandex and I go back to my swimming thing I was like that this big body is not getting in spandex in front of people so I I I had crossed them off right away and then um the the funny thing about that mic he uh when I was started coaching I had told him the story about that he goes you could have worn whatever you wanted if you would have contacted me but so I went on to uh W lacrosse and you know what was so great though uh Chris Hall and Dewey Nats are track and field coaches at Stout I love Stout if they had physical education I would have graduated from there L the school um love my teammates and then but you know when I sat down with them and talked with them what I wanted to get into and both of them you know straight up told me you know yeah we don’t have that you need to look at it a different place and Coach holl graduated from lacrosse and so he reached out to Mark Guthrie oh wanted to know if I had some if they had some interest and then ended up going there and learned um learned from coach sc3 just so much stuff over the years on just kind of how to be a head coach and how to be a college coach and then my event coach Dennis Klein was also a strength conditioning coach there and learned you know so much about technique and training people and so it was uh a great fit for me there and we had a lot of lot of success there I I I have to imagine is Dad on board now or was Dad did he double down he was on board a long I think he just he was on board back when I was in high school I think it just took him as a big shock sure as you know because it’s by way I get it as a dad now you know I think about my kid you know seventh grade he’s a senior and he’s you know he’s doing okay in track and then he says but he’s doing awesome over here and he says yeah but I’m gonna go do track and it’s like yeah trust me no one loves track more than me son but you are really like you got a path over here this is going to be hard I I get the dad side of it 100% absolutely and the the telephone companies are real it’s one of the largest communication companies in Minnesota it’s based out of my hometown in perm and oh gosh yeah uh you know we we’ve talked about too like if I we just last summer we were up at our Lake and him and I were talking about it had been interesting the position I would have there if I spent you know the last five years working in that company where would I where would I have you know grown in that in that company too yeah you know we do that a lot I always like to point this out uh because I knew that’s where you’re gonna go you’re like yeah we sat back like what could have been and and when we do that when we do that in these Forks in the road a lot of times we only think about the good side it’s like oh man you know could have been there and I could have been the the VP of something something and you know making a lot more money than I do as a track coach and we think about those kind of things we we of forget that the other side could also be very bad you could have gone there and been like I am miserable I I thought this is what I wanted to do and you always had you know you’d be going through this career with always with this eye over like what’s going on The discus field what’s going what could what could have been over there you could have been a miserable failed a lot of you know we forget about that you’re on the right path the path you are on is the right path that you are on so I’m glad you chose this path oh I completely agree I used to uh you know personally I enjoyed High School graduation season because my mom would um you know as a high school guidance councelor she would go to so many so many of them and so I’d end up going along with her and I was a very very quiet kid and uh I remember she used to pay me a dollar if I would sit next to people and talk to them because so I can make some little money on the side you know and so so I completely understand if if I didn’t go to college and learn the keys of being able to talk to people create those relationships that more than likely I just would have been I’d probably be a bachelor um working in my hometown and uh you know so my life has changed quite a bit just because I threw a you know a darn discus platter and didn’t want to give that didn’t want to give that up that’s awesome I love it I love it uh all right so Midway through college you realize hey I think I want to go down this coaching route I kind of like the coaches I’m with I’m digging how you know seeing Improvement and things like that I’m putting a few words in your mouth here just a little bit uh but you know okay there’s I can’t believe there’s only 18 majors at Stout uh I assume that’s grown since then so you go you think you need to be in something like phys physical education or something like that so you transfer to Lacrosse I love that uh Mark Guthrie was the head coach there by the way you know what a legend what what an amazing guy and Coach uh he he is just awesome love him and what he’s done in his career so you really got to learn as as now you know fast forward you’re a head coach now you really get to learn what a head coach looks like acts like talks like Etc so I love that you had that as I assume that’ll be a mentor that we’ll talk about here okay so your W lros you you transfer Majors into uh Elementary physical education how does that play out for the rest of your college career as far as Athletics and academics did you graduate in four years Etc yeah so I started out in physical education there physical and health education and you know I the first time I met with our academic adviser you know he is looking at my transcript he goes I’ve never had a PE major with this amount of chemistry physics you know because I had two years of basically on the computer science right you know that realm and then uh so I had so it took me ended up taking me four years um to get my teach with student teaching and so I finished up my undergrad um there on year six I had three I red shirted my first year at Stouts and competed my freshman year there and so I was lucky enough that you know I had three years um on the team there and just we had such a coach Guthrie had put such a successful group of guys together um you know and we had uh lucky enough that in my three years there we won six national team titles and um just hold on you were there for three years and you guys won every indoor and outo outoor title during those three years yep and the year before that group won an indoor National Title too and Outdoors so we’re going to learn you’re very successful here at Minnesota state you’ll never be a success I mean that is I shouldn’t say you never but oh my goodness yeah they were let’s think about that it’s hard to win one it’s unbelievable to win two and it’s impossible to win three they won seven you saying they won the year before seven in a row dude yeah they won eight cuz went indoor and outdoor the year before with thator class I graduated with and uh wow you know I mean it you know my you look at my we’re talking division three you know my senior my senior group that I graduated with we had you know um Andrew Ro Rock who who went on and was you know yeah you know he was a silver medalist at the world championship 2005 um you know and you know so he ran 44 something in the 400 Derek toshner who ran 50 high 50s in the 400 hurdles H Schmidt was an 184 Balter Jim Nelson a a 59 foot shop Hooter um you know I won some national titles in The discus and then Kevin Becker and Phil Whit it were uh both 200 foot Hammer throwers Kevin went on to be a 70 foot weight thrower at the time was the National Record older so I mean it was quite a group of kids all the same age had do you how do you know Looking Back Now how did Mark and the coaches how did you as athlete I mean you’re 18 to 22 year olds you win one especially you know they’d won the year before but you come in it’s your first one when you win that indoor It’s Kind like oh man it’s exciting like oh my God I never would have thought you know you can’t think of a as a 16-year-old kid in uh Prim is that where you grew up per perm perm gr and perm you never would have thought this would have happened you know now you win it’s amazing you go to outdoor you win holy cow uh the next year you wi how how in the world do you keep a group of 18 to 22 year olds hungry to work hard to win the next one when it seems I I’m just putting myself in in the if I’m a 20-year-old and I’ve won three to four titles uh you know as the team titles I just think it’s a given like ah we’re gonna win like you know I I a got to put in that extra practice things like that how did they you know you’re looking back now you got um experience H how did you guys do that that seems that seems to be the hardest part not the athleticism keeping you guys locked in that you will do the things that need to be done to win the next one yeah I think a lot of it it was just a lot of the key group of older kids that were very successful it was we just always talked about we weren’t winning by enough like um you know our goal was in division three you started out on the men’s side our junior year we started out with pull BT weight throw and long jump we wanted to win at oural goal was to win a National Championship after 10:00 first session was done and we did that you know we had three all-americans in the weight that year three all-americans in pult and national champ and I think another All-American in the long jump and you know you know you scor 40 points at the national meet we wanted 40 points before 11:30 dude you know and and that was kind of always our goal on what what can we do and then the depth you know at conference can we go one through eight right um you know and just trying to look at that but I mean it was it was interesting you know how kind of my senior group transitioned through college on all of us were very perfectionist type A people to a large extent and just kind of we were that way and it was straight laced you know and you want you to see all the younger kids kind of fell in line so so I’m hearing two things one is leadership you talked about as the guys got older they stepped into leadership roles of like hey you want to do this you got to do what we did X Y and Z I don’t care how many titles we’ve won and then I I heard you say the way I’m going to put it is um not changing the goalpost but reconfiguring the goalpost so now instead of just we want to at the end of the 4×4 we want to have more points than other people uh challenging yourself to win it on day one or uh uh can we get three people to score in the weight throw instead of two you kind of like I said reconfigure that goal post make different goals is what I’m hearing yeah yep wow was just you know and we were lucky enough too to have the Triple Crown in 2002 and 2004 with our cross country winning national championships and you know it was the real key to how can we be successful across all four event groups how can we have national champions in all four event groups and can we score points in every event you know and that’s amazing did you so you’re now when you transfer to Lacrosse you’re committing yourself professionally at least at that age you know you’re 20ish 20 at that point roughly yep because I’m always amazed that we make kids pick a major and therefore their career path at 18 so even at 20 it’s like you know you don’t know what you want to really do um you kind of meded that out as an 18 to 20 you kind of pro proven that out there a little bit so at 20 though you you know you’re you’re committing enough to to be a future coach a future college track coach that you transfer and change Majors those are those are big things did you looking back again now do you did you see a difference in how you interacted with coaches and interacted with your teammates at that point because before almost like your throwing career you you were you were throwing as a middle schooler and then that junior year you became a thrower it feels like you were on the track team you were you know a thrower and now you’re becoming a coach because your mindset is this is what I want to be did you notice changes of how you interacted with your fellow the teammates and the coaches or were you still like okay I still got to be the best throwers so I’m going to stay athlete focused here a lot of it is I just I spent more of my free time trying to learn as much as possible I mean I remember going to the library and taking every book that was track and field related and reading it and then asking my coaches questions about it the VHS tapes watching those that they had at the library um you know we had a biomechanics professor that later on in his life he went on be the St um strength coach for Valerie vly or Valerie Adams over in New Zealand just learning about more on things from him um you know we had but it was also I I remember having conversations with our swimming coach who is very successful Rich Pine um I I always have this big belief that I don’t waste my time talking with unsuccessful people I always want to surround myself with very successful people and learn as much as I can from them well well well than thank you for being on the show by the way I appreciate that I caught that compliment there thank you thank you thank you and uh so like our swimming coach was very successful and I remember just spending time with him talking just sports psychology stuff on how he did that with his divers and swimmers and learning learning from him our um women’s our uh Pat Healey was the longtime women’s head coach at lacrosse and spent so many hours with him and especially as I transitioned because the men’s and women’s team was completely separate at lacrosse as I transitioned into my first position and was um a women’s only uh program at Winona State learning he helped me so much throughout my career on just kind of the differences you know that’s a pretty mature stance as a 20 21 year old that you were able to understand you it’s pretty obvious uh that you jumped in and it’s not always done but it’s obvious that you would jump in and read a bunch of books about track and field that you would uh talk to your coaches more and a little bit more in depth of like okay give me the next level coach you know because I’m going to be a coach one day but it’s a pretty unique and mature aspect as a 2021 22 year old to understand that I can learn from other sport coaches where does that come from I think just you know I think a lot of it just kind of goes back to my mom on teaching us to be curious with education you know and kind of learning from that and it goes back to uh my father was uh a maintenance repair person at uh or at a health club in town or um and he uh so our family trips always revolved around going to different athletic facilities these community centers and touring them and learning how they operate and you know and so I think you know I I just and it seemed like any family trip we drove somewhere there was also a community center that we were going to go look at the pool mechanical room um and so it was just always the ability to keep being curious and keep learning you know I always look at when you think you know everything then that’s usually kind of one we need to let a coach go or yeah you’re in trouble right so yeah do do you I don’t want to fast forward to today because I still want to climb through this journey but I’m G kind of put you on the spot here do you see yourself still curious today the same level because if you were if you weren’t you’d you know I I kind of feel like you’d weed yourself out like all right man I’m this isn’t my passion anymore I don’t want to learn anymore but you you kind of seem like as a 2021 year old you’ve got that dial turned up to 10 on curiosity specifically around track and and uh coaching are you still driving forward today on that level of curiosity yeah but it’s kind of it’s change like still curious with throwing still love throwing still was excited yesterday when we saw the world record broke it’s crazy right yeah you know you know with that and but it’s it’s also kind of as I’ve involved in my career It’s Curious and like like now in my head coaching role it’s more curious on facility design and building or learning about fundraising and you know creating endowments and you know raising funds that way running track and field meets more efficiently and just different admin it’s more of an administrative stuff because I know that’s kind of more what I need to do here in my current role yeah we we’ll we’ll make sure we come back to that because that is extremely important you know when I say when kids when people initially think about getting into coaching typically they think about I’m going to do air quotes here the fun part of coaching meaning in the circle working with a discus thrower a shot putter Etc uh maybe writing workouts they kind of think about okay that uh they never see the kind of behind the curtain stuff that is as important and is definitely part of coaching uh scheduling budgeting design of facility things like that so I want to talk about that Curiosity when we get to the present that’s that’s really important to to uh to dive into okay uh you kind of started first of all you said did you win a couple of TI in The discus yourself yeah I was uh third my freshman year one my sophomore year second my junior year which I thought I was in first um oh no never would pay attention to other people competing and I thought the guy after me was just the first thrower in the first flight and then uh walked in and best discus wind ever just best discus wind ever and I had in my mind I was going to throw this was the day I was going to break 60 M I was so worried about hitting that and didn’t even think about just competing that day so I think I lost by uh seven centimeters um o everybody else in that flight had great lifetime PRS and you know I threw you know about a meter and a half under mine but still Burns me to this day yeah I can tell Chris Jensen was a better thrower than me that day so um and then I yeah then I was able to win again my senior year wow I I mean that’s amazing I’m hearing this this young kid sixth grade goes out and The discus you know falls out of your hand to winning a national title as an individual obviously as a team too that’s I mean you couldn’t have scripted that you you didn’t tell me as a sixth grader you threw it and you’re like oh man I’m gonna win something I’m Gonna Be A Champion one day that’s probably the farthest thing from your mind and you just consistently Brick by Brick put it together and win no and I don’t think if it wasn’t for Mike Peterson telling me hey let’s move you up to Varsity so what I hated about Middle School track just hated it is they made us do we had to do three events you know like I’m the size I am yeah what did you do okay shot and discus so I had shot and discus so then I did high jump I have never cleared a bar in my life because you were 6’4 yeah they made you high jump you know like okay let’s do the physics on this the amount you’re have to create to get that big a body off the ground so I got sick of landing on the bo everyone so then I thought you know what I’m going to sign up for long jump that’s not going to hurt yeah yeah I go do a long jump in a good old cafeteria style and I remember the guy not making the pit off a long jump board and I remember the guy going hey is that your run through and I was like okay that is never a good thing to hear y never a good thing to hear you know so I’m sorry like that’s oh Oh No Holly Minnesota where that one happened I I remember that vividly say that’s yeah y so I uh I’m so glad things got better for you so then Coach Peterson’s like you know what why don’t you just focus on throwing and got that worked out yeah I always look at eighth grade year when I got moved up to Varsity that was my best year ever because uh in track and field because when the middle school had to run I I would tell our Middle School coaches hey I need to go throw with the varsity and when the varsity would have to do the running I would tell him hey I’m in middle school I need to go I need to go throw with the middle schoolers so I didn’t have to do any running that year that was by far it’s not called gameing system that’s called just being smart they all could have said no you gotta do it at any point and you just kept going that’s good I love it love all right uh you’re at w lacrosse you’re winning team titles like it’s easy uh which we know it’s not uh you’re All-American winning titles in The discus as well you’re going to be a coach what’s what do we do after graduation what’s our first okay I said I did all this work to change majors and change schools I’m gonna be a coach what’s the first action you did uh professionally yeah so I actually still have a year left at undergrad at w lacrosse I finished up my since I had transferred I had finished up my eligibility right and Winona State which is 30 mil um up the road in Minnesota my uh roommate at the my roommate from early on was uh he was the throws coach there and was moving on just a ad junk $4,000 job you know I year and so he goes yeah I’m getting out of it I’m going to graduate and go be a high school teacher in northern Wisconsin and so I so the coach had asked him anybody that would want to take a spot so I went up and met with Kim Bloom who’s now the athletic director at w lacrosse and so she interviewed me and said yeah you’re hired and she goes by the way I’m leaving tomorrow to be the associate ad at UD lacrosse and it’s like okay so wow so got so got hired I I spent more on gas that year um I had a you know that I think I made um but uh it just really was perfect I got great experience you know it was I always look at I think it’s kind of it’s weird when when people on a team when you have uh students go from their teammates to now they’re coaching yeah and that that allowed me to go from you know yes I was similar age to the athletes I was coaching but I wasn’t their teammate and so it kind of gave me a fresh start 100% being able to start coaching them and and kind of learning from that process and you know the coach that I was in 2005 I just kind of laugh at on some of the things I was trying to teach him what I’ve kind of learned you know know now but so couple things to to touch on there we we are so in sync Mike this is really scary actually so first real quick question then I’ll touch on those two points you said you still had a year left did you throw when you went up there too or did you just no I had a year left of undergrad still oh year okay got it of undergrad I got it okay uh so first of all I 1,000% agree with you in regards to the like the ga type you know an athlete who on you know Friday is buddies and boys they’re playing box on the in the dorm rooms and then on Monday they’re the grad assistant or undergrad assistant coach things change and that’s that seems it is impossible to do it correctly I I believe uh so I I right with you I mean we’ have talked about this several times it’s like man how do you do that so I love that separation for you even even with the ages because that makes it tough alone a 22y old talking to a 20-year-old Etc uh that alone makes it tough so I love that um and then two I totally forgot the second point you just talked about something else dang it oh my gosh I’m getting old Mike all right so you’re there and now you’re coaching not peers because you are coaching how did so again another shift has to change because now you don’t have you’re not the athlete anymore you’re the you’re coach coach tjon how did you handle that you know it was and what was funny because I thought everybody in college was just the intensity that I Le you know oops okay good lesson good lesson the the ladies I started coaching with you know I mean this was when I started at WIA State they they had finally their first person to ever make it to a national meet and since they turned division two and so they went I think it was 12 years to get one athlete who was a triple jumper at that time to the division 2 championships and so when I started my first meeting I started talking about how everybody people were going to be all Americans and go to Nationals and they’re they’re like budy at the wrong school yeah what are you talking about um you know and you know and just kind of laid out my vision how we were going to get there and the commitment level was going to take and and then kind of started in you know and you know did you get any push back from that you know not not that they weren’t necessarily striving for Nationals but they weren’t hitting National Mark so a certain culture kind of comes in at that point uh you kind of come in with a little of a like not a little bit you come in with a different culture of like well the expectation is you go to Nationals there can be push back with that and by the way not neither are wrong even the one that says I don’t maybe if you say I don’t want to go to Nationals that could be wrong but you know a cult you can still have a great culture a great um student athlete experience even if no one ever goes to Nationals yep but those are two different cultures two different expectations do you receive any push back no some I remember early on budding heads with an athlete that that you know she and she had told me that hey I threw 40 feet as a sophomore in high school and I’m throwing 40 feet as a junior in high school or college you know like I don’t like her identity was being able to squat 400 pounds in the weight room and I talked with her well if you squat 400 pounds in the weight room only throw 40 feet right that’s not there’s something there that’s not right so how about we squat 200 lb but we squat really fast and then we started throwing a shot a little farther and and uh you know her senior year she at the conference meet throws 43 feet and like immediately starts crying and I’m like hold on you just like be three feet and um that was like the highlight of her career right there and in my mind I was like well you just threw 43 why can’t you throw 45 and we get you to the division 2 National meet you know you know I swear that she just won a national title in Morehead Minnesota you know when she when she threw that but um so it was a what I had was I had some very talented uh Kim had recruited some really good kids with a lot of potential that were all sophomores so I got three years with them and you know on that really that group kind of spearheaded and did well one one of those athletes turned into a four-time All-American national champion in the weight National runner up in the weight the year before her junior year um a couple others went to Nationals and you know really really um kind of in where I figured out okay the stuff is working that we’re kind of doing you know and um my uh throws coach in College college Dennis Klein Jud Logan was his training partner oh wow um and so I kind of had my in with Jud and at the division 2 meet Jud Spence I would just ask him questions after questions and if I saw him sitting in the stands I would he’ll be The Annoying young coach and would never you know he would always give me all the time and I remember one time in Boston sitting there for an hour in the Sands and he was just talking about training me and he’d answer any email I would send and you know and such a great such a great guy and help amazing dude amazing dude you know and so that’s uh so yeah so it just kind of lucked out that I started with some kids that had open minds that were hardworking kids and you know I’ve I always looked at what what where I was successful at Winona State was recruiting kids from towns 5,000 and smaller that had parents and blueco collar jobs and they started a job before they were 16 years old and if I hit those qual tricks with kids those kids turned into all Americans about 95% of the time now that’s interesting too and we’ve we’ve broached this topic a little bit uh here and there on different episodes some people so I when I coached I was known as a a big recruiter that was kind of my you know wasn’t very good coach but I could bring a lot of good people in right uh but you know I’ve heard some people I probably was like this when I was coaching too to be honest with you now that I’m older have more experience I can maybe verbalize it a little differently I would have told you and I think there are coaches out there that have told you that no matter what school I’m at I can recruit good kids without changing themselves or their TCT like it’s just the way I do it they’ll come if I’m at LSU or Minnesota state or uh Loris College it doesn’t matter but it does matter your school makeup the the majors uh the the size rural versus Urban um what you specialize as a program um you know a couple weeks ago we had uh Bruce Jackson from The Academy of Arts uh Artu and uh you know they’re in San Francisco that’s a different when you start so you you honed in kind of early that you said 5,000 blue color job appearance and um had a job at 16 you kind of started seeing like this ideal recruit pretty early in career it sounds like yeah I mean it’s always looking at I think every place is different on what makes them successful and looking at you know early on I mean one of the one of the things I did at wiona and I also did here was I went worked with their programmers on okay let’s look at ad let’s look at kids and let’s come up with the top 10 high schools of each state and then because right to me Winona was a smaller place that didn’t have brand recognition we were recruiting a lot of right we were we were spending our time trying to recruit like okay the Twin Cities is two hours away let’s let’s try to get a lot of kids out the Twin Cities realize very quickly that inside the 494 694 cord or not many students were coming to to WSU at the time especially for athletics in there so that was just a complete waste of time and trying to Target those so when I started here um at Mano like we knew that for example West Salem Wisconsin a small little town was one of the top 10 high schools graduating kids to MSU well let’s see what track athletes are from there and let’s go after those kids um because that they already have brand recognition at that school right they already know and so we kind of looked at that and how we expanded in the Illinois and certain programs into the Milwaukee area with certain programs um and really it was just looking at who’s currently enrolled over the last five years at your school you’re very analytical you would have been a good programmer maybe not in the Telecommunications I don’t know but man computer Pro you are analytical with this stuff so I enjoy I enjoy we always talk you mentioned coach parno and I and I always talk we coach parno and I always talk about he’s Microsoft Word I’m Microsoft Excel and we work very well together it’s all part of the package that’s right yeah what do they call the Microsoft Suite or whatever yeah that’s we’ll have to figure out who’s PowerPoint and who’s uh uh what’s the other one there’s another one in there uh yeah that’s funny I love that I love that okay you’re at uh wot State you’re changing the culture you’re bringing in culture uh you also did Ma I’m gonna ask this a very specific way for you you mentioned you know sitting in the stands finding Jed Logan God love him uh he he was an early um part of our podcast as well I’m so glad that I was able to capture his story his journey uh before he ultimately passed away because um he was special he he really was and and the people that he coached uh the people that he influenced like like yourself Mike um are better fors are much much much better for it so um so the specific way I’m gonna ask you is did Mom pay you a dollar to go talk to coach Logan no that that call I remember my freshman year they came and they had asked what happened to me after they had they had visited me two months after the school cuz I was actually talking with people like wait a minute yeah we’ve been trying forever love it love it love it all right so um what happens at wona how long you were you were there as an undergrad to finish at your undergrad how long were we there and where did we go next still finished at I was finishing my education at w lacrosse I just D 30 miles each day to get my foot in the door coaching okay I thought you were doing like an undergraduate coaching at oh yeah got it so you’re finishing up your degree you’re out of Eligibility there and you go that’s why you’re talking about driving back and forth I’m with you now okay okay okay all right Y and so my uh wife Abby had gotten uh I knew I needed my master’s degree to get into coaching so I was like you know let me work one more year at w or at Winona I can get through um got permission because I thought okay I’m not throwing anymore all I’m doing is I’m just coaching and going to school why in the world do I need to do a two-year master’s program why can’t I just get it down to a a year and so I got um permission to turn that basically take 18 credits in the fall grad school classes and um do a bunch in the summer and then did my internship in the spring and graduated and so I did that at uh Winona and um you know the head coach at the time Mason rear who was a he was a student student coach at at lacrosse when I was there he kept telling the ad hey we should try to get this guy a position um so the athletic director one day I remember I was just walking down the hallway he walks up to me and he goes hey Mike uh you want a job and normally he knew that since I was a bigger guy and people would always contact the athletic department in Winona for help moving when they moved to town I just thought it was bad I’m unloading somebody’s uul I like oh yeah when you know he’s oh goes no I just came from my president’s office and um she said we’re having too many ineligible athletes and we want to start an academic thing so could you like like start some academic stuff I me it was very general yeah and I was like so is this like full-time he goes yeah yeah like full-time job I was like sure and then so uh started that and then I kind of had to go you know then I went way into researching how to how to create that how to fund it I went down to University of Wisconsin and kind of met with their staff and learned how to build an you know their academic support system that they were using and you know and that turned into getting some grants to where at the time I left we had a you know a 5,000 foot facility with a stff of four people um that was Grant funded um and we had looked at there we had increased you know the retention rate of soon athletes by almost 20% um you know and so that really took off and and that was kind of really like that because kind of goes back to my up upbringing Mike that um when I was a freshman in high school I asked my parents to drop out of school because barrel of fun potato chips was um offering uh they were paying pretty well and I thought you know what I could just go work there you know and that was that that s my parents got pretty upset about that one you know I’m literally as a parent of a 13-year-old going oh man just so when’s When’s my son going to do this he’s going to do this I just know it yeah so you know I was never never enjoyed school never enjoyed school until I got kind of into my lacrosse years with looking at what I knew I really wanted to do passion and so I always thought it was great to you know just kind of help kids get through yeah you know and kind of create that academic support program there um dude that that is so cool you know that goes hand inand what I’ll always say about a track coach you know even Mike you know you’re as successful as any of them out there you know 99% of the kids you coach specifically and this is 99% of ever you know all the coaches that are listening right now 99.9% of all your kids uh if you’re in high school 99% are not going to go ronning in college and if you’re in college 99.9% are never going to go pro uh but every single one of them will go on to become moms dads business owners accountants doctors coaches teachers that is your real influence and so you got to like double your influence not only as a track coach but creating and growing this academic center for all of the Athletics at wota that is like that’s that’s Legacy stuff right there yeah I always look at and my shared this with my wife Abby and um Justin Lair was my longtime assistant director at uh Winona State in the academic support I always looked at what we did creating our academic thing was way more beneficial and I’m way more proud of that than what I did as a throws coach there and you know and I had a wonderful you know time there with lucky enough to coach five national champions 40 all-americans and National Record holder in you know 13 years as a women’s throws coach there like we’re successful on the track and field side but how many kids if they didn’t have that probably would have never graduated right college and their lives are so different now that’s right you know now that academics you know and that has stayed you know after I’ve left and so I mean that’s always really like it’s amazing kind of my hanging my hat moment there is actually creating that academic center and absolutely not to go absolutely that’s what say that’s Legacy stuff that’s not just oh he’s a good coach he can take someone from 40 foot to 50 foot in the shop but that’s amazing by the way that’s nothing not poo pooing that at all but to build design grow fight you know I’m sure there were no hurdles in your way to do this right uh to do something that’s going to touch every athlete that goes through that school and by the way perpetuals so even after you’re gone it continues to do good that’s that’s amazing that’s amazing uh interesting you said so when you got to wiona there was not a culture of Nationals and things like that you said when you left wiona you know several all-americans national champs so you obviously changed the culture they’re pretty good athletic you know for the track and field team there’s a lot of people uh listening right now who either are in that situation or will be very much like you joining a situation joining a program that just doesn’t have um the culture of whatever they want to bring in because I don’t want to diminish cultures here but um how did you what was let me ask you two different ways what was the hardest part of doing that so you you took a 180 so we don’t have a culture of Nationals we’ve got all Americans and national champions that’s a 180 what was the hardest part over that you said 12 years 13 years I was that y over that 13 years what was the hardest part to change that culture and vice versa I I always like asking the inverse of it what was the easiest part maybe something you thought was going to be hard but actually ended up not being as hard what were the hardest and easiest parts of changing a culture from not being focused on the Nationals or not having that as a goal set to sounds like that was a goal set for a lot of the athletes at by the time you into you 13 years yeah you know the easiest thing that which was was the facility piece I had um we didn’t we had a high school that I remember the first time I had to work with the high school coach or the High School athletic director about hey could we could I use the discus ring to throw in the fall you know and they agreed as long as yeah you were done before football and indoors um we had one basketball court and right next to the basketball court I mean it was all open it was a gym with basically two basketball courts and the men’s basketball team who was winning a national fidal at that time we were throwing the weight right next to him with no net and that was a little scary Point part for me um but uh you know and you would think about you know how are you going to get people when you don’t have an indoor and outdoor track on your University yeah you know and all that and that really kind of what I thought about was well why in the world would I recruit kids from beautiful High School athletic facilities I need to find the kids that have the don’t have a track or have the dirt tracks and then they’re coming to school and you know I I had um Harold con I was lucky enough to meet Harold Connelly so he’s you know the 1956 Olympic champion in the hammer and I had uh spent a weekend with him learning how to teach the hammer throw um early in my coaching career and I was and it was my I think my second year at Winona State then and I had told him you know athletic facilities and he’s like oh you just need some he goes you need a piece of cement you need people to train with and you need an Implement and that’s all and a coach he’s like those four things you’ll be fine and I received a little post a little little package and it was a little DVD or CD it was like a month later with a just a little sticky posted note on it that says can you pick out or or he said coach can you pick out who’s in this video and it was the worst weight room I’ve ever seen in my life and it was all this just old metal things and I counted seven Olympic medalists in there lifting weights and then throwing in a field with no cage and they’re throwing 80 meters in the hammer and it’s like you know what you don’t need that you know and so so that so that was always the thing I thought how can I be successful without you know was at lacrosse they had we had indoor and outdoor and all these different facilities and right and so I was lucky enough that the coaches I coached with all came from lacrosse and we kind of all had the same concept that I had learned as an athlete there and kind of built uh built a program that we won some conference championships and we’re top 10 of the nation and just kind of kept going and it was just not giving up you know when you get every time we go to our conference meet and you know you might take fourth or third and then it’d be like okay what do we got to do better you know and it was just these teams are beating us how can we beat them um to the point where you know we were going I remember we had a a conference meet at um and we scored 79 points in the women throwing events between shot discus and Hammer and I remember going back and we took second you know at that meet as a team I remember going going back and telling our head coach that if we’re spending you know 50% we had a very limited like at that time you know like 50,000 in scholarship or 60,000 if we’re spending 50% of our money in scholarship on the throwing events we’re not ever going to win conference because pretty much I’m maxing out the amount of points we can score so I need to take less as a throw coach right just develop take more kids on and develop so our other so our other event groups can get better so we can actually win a conference Championship because I there is nothing worse than me Mike than losing I just that’s my daughter gives me a hard time L all the time about that she always ask me what I like best about track and field and it’s like winning winning that drives me everywhere it’s it’s a lot of fun that’s for sure yeah uh and by the way I you know when you go into a conference meet you know it’s very famous most coaching staffs will you know get the Whiteboard and you start estimating all that kind of stuff I can’t imagine doing that with you your analytic side might be too much for me on that one I I I just have this feeling you you have a beautiful mind up there you know seeing all the different well if we put this person here if we put this person here if we do this with the re you you might you might do over me on this one I don’t think I can handle that just to observ I actually leave it up to my event coaches because okay all right all right I want them to now the points how we track it at conference that’s so yeah that’s say that’s a little different there’s no way your analytical mind okay I was say there’s no way your analytical mind is not getting involved in the scenarios there absolutely uh okay so we’re talking about changing the culture of wona State when you were there for 13 years I asked you what was the easiest thing about that something you thought was going to be hard I love your perspective there that coming from a udub lacrosse with good facilities and you go to w know there’s no facilities uh it’s going to be hard for me to attract kids and you found a way to attract the right kids to the situation hand that kind of goes in that recruiting uh convers that we had what was the hardest part what was something that really took a while you had to dig in you had to consult mentors what was something that was just you know frustrated for a while and and how did you unlock that the hardest part for me was the type of kid you needed to win a National [Music] Championship just constantly like I I look at you don’t win division 2 national titles with division 2 athletes you win them with division one athletes who choose to come division two level so it was just not getting frustrated with nonstop going after the kids and they you know I’d have parents tell me well why would you know like stop wasting my kids time why in the world are you recruiting a kid they’re going to go they need to be in a power five school and knowing that that you know that’s where but those are the types of kids I have and I and I always thought early on once I can get one then I’m going to get more and I’m going to get a lot more a lot easier and uh so I kind of in 2000 you know it took me about 5 years to get my first one um Mary Tyson um you know and she came in and was able to win a National Title or sophomore year as a a discus thrower and now she’s gone on and been a very successful weightlifter and broke the American record in the clean and jerk and um but it was just trying to get my first one and I got told no so many times and it was just not giving up on that I mean it’s funny now like I early on my first year coaching getting told no by a 34ot shop putter you know you know and it’s like and now like you know you see a 34ot shot putter come in and you kind of chuckle um but it was just not kind of giving up on that and figuring out what can I do to be more successful with that what I’m trying to figure out how to ask this Mike without being kind of insulting know that I’m not being insulting when ask this way forgive me for my you know I always tell people I’m from Alabama so my vocabulary is a little limited here right uh how did you have the audacity this early you’re still early in your career here at winon estate to not give up I love how you said that you don’t win D2 Nets with D2 kids you win it with D1 kids who choose D2 and and I want to talk about that as well like what what’s the D2 culture I’ve been so blessed to go to the D2 National meet now for the past five I think championships and it’s amaz it’s amazing but how did you have the audacity like to have that attitude and then to run into nose left and right and yet keep just grinding and it and it worked it paid off that that grind that hard work that continuation paid off but how did you not back up and go okay you know you’re right we need to start with this caliber of kid and then build you you were going for the bullseye from the Geto part of it I’m just so stubborn Mark okay fair like I I just feel like I coach parno and then our other jumps coach uh or jumps coach coach Sara and I us three always talk about like we really get annoyed when other top kids in the state pick any other school and it’s like well why would you do that you know um it’s just like we feel we should be coaching those kids and it’s kind of I’ve been right from the start it’s you know I go back back to my time from Guthrie why was Mark Guthrie recruiting a 66 foot high school shop htter right right you know because he can why not you know and so you got Jim Nelson to come to W LaCrosse or or you know all those other athletes that that I was lucky to be teammates with you know to me the level doesn’t really matter you know you know it’s finding the right fit with them I love that you know I said a audacity is typically a a negative word but now that you know as you answer that I’m kind of thinking it’s like you guys all have audacity obviously maybe that’s a positive TR trait a personality trait you know maybe you need to have a little bit of audacity to to be successful I bet if I talk to uh uh Dennis shaver and now AG Krueger at Ashlin and those kind of successful people I bet they have a little bit of audacity with them as well yeah it’s interesting um I have so many questions on Lally spin in my head this is amazing I love this thank you again for for this time it is awesome okay you’re at wown estate you have audacity I love it you haven’t said it this way and I don’t get the sense sometimes we hear that I just kind of thought about this with audacity we hear it sometimes also said chip on our shoulder I’m not I’m not hearing or feeling that from you you weren’t uh coming out of high school you didn’t apply to the big U and got rejected so I’m going to show you I’m not feeling that from you at all no I I mean coming out of high school um I think I actually got like three recruiting letters total you know it was just I had uh the the only one I had sent couple letter I had wrote I Remember mailing we had a one Whatever class it was I remember writing a letter to NDSU trying to see if I could go there um you know and um they were growing up an hour from Fargo that was always the big school that you saw and didn’t have luck um with that but uh so and but at the same time like I wasn’t at all um I was you know I was on the path if I was going to go to higher education it was going to be to a two-year Technical College and so even when I made that change I had to take a 7 a.m. geometry class to try to now start making up some credits that I wasn’t you know in the college prep class was going on so yeah I didn’t really I didn’t really I was a small town kid so I wasn’t like the Twin Cities wasn’t it wasn’t gonna do that yeah it’s big city for me yeah it’s just it’s just inter you know you hear about chip on your shoulder and that’s that’s a lot of times the positive side of if if I’m going to equate audacity and uh and chip on your shoulder the positive side of it and I’m not hearing that from I’m hearing more just like an internal drive of uh when you wanted to be a coach and be and as being a thrower yourself uh being the best you know the study and the analytic side the analytical mind of you as well kind of this mesh of this um of this motivation not the I’m going to prove someone else wrong type of motivation which is not not wrong necessarily it’s just a just difference you know that’s interesting uh it it’s also interesting you talked about you know Guthrie recruiting a you know 66 foot thrower at D3 and uh the kids you were recruiting there at D2 wiona and I don’t know I know I saw a tweet today you know I live on Twitter Mike you know um and so when we’re recording this for you guys that listening you’re hearing this probably in May uh this is Evergreen content so you actually might be listening to this may of 2030 for all I know but in May of 2024 is when you’re when it was published we’re recording this on April 15th and I just saw the D3 girl that set the national record in the triple jump 44 feet or something like that which is you know again doesn’t matter D3 D2 D1 that’s nuts so was 44 feet and you know at D3 last year there’s what a 20o kid and a 10-point kid and those are two different kids and a D2 don’t get me started on you know we had um oh my gosh my herdler from pit State oh my gosh what’s his name well just Denisha Cunningham or sorry Denisha Cartwright which she’s done Denisha cartright she’s amazing the zza Pacific hle what I’m getting at is it is true that it doesn’t matter the level and I and I know we hear about the d1er bus mentality and things like that but I saw a tweet today from I think it was a high school coach pretty sure and she just said something like it’s becoming clear every day that it doesn’t matter the division that you go to it matters about what coach and situation you go to y’all better start you know she was speaking to athletes y’all better start looking at what coach is the best fit for you not the Jersey I’m G paraphrase in there a little bit near the end um now we still got to get this through to 18y olds by the way that’s hard uh but it is amazing all the three you know and we include in and juo in there as well um there is successful there are amazing coaches in every level in it is regardless of whether you you know to your point it when state is regardless of whether you have a a Crystal Palace track facility whether you have a Nike contract for your uniforms um it’s regardless of that people kids and coaches are being extremely successful so I love that you are proving this out very early there at wiona State okay so you said 13 years at WI we’re not at wiona today so where did we go next and why yeah my wife and I always kind of had this um kind of agreement though you know like when we talked about having children is kind of where we were located we were going to stay once we um you know once they started middle school and you know it kind of just happened that uh when Mark shook um had retired uh they had named um Jim Dyan the new head coach right kind of was an assistant and was the new head coach was a 76 high jumper you know for the I’ve got a great story about him I’ll tell you in a second please go please keep keep going yeah but uh he uh you know and I told my wife I was you know when they named Mark retired and they kind of named him right away and I was like you know that might be probably one of the only jobs I would ever leave uh wiona for was uh to to go be a head head coach there you know and I was kind of on a route on you know kind of basically three career paths one do I want to stay on the career path I I am and and just you know work at Winona State for for a long time or two go be an athletic director or three um go be headrack and field coach and I’ve always had like what I really what I really loved at my time at lacrosse was winning the team national championships you know and you know at at Stout we were successful you know as a team but the ability to go to a national meet and know that your team can actually win and what you do matters more than just the trophy that you’re personally going to bring home that that’s what makes College tracking feel special and I knew manc had that ability they you know they had the facilities they had the coaching staff the coaches were full-time they weren’t doing other things you know 75% of my job um at Winona was I was the associate athletic director and doing a lot more stuff other than just coaching right and I wanted to see what could I do if I was just coaching and you know and and so it kind of just my son wasn’t my kids were in elementary school at the time and kind of my wife and I uh you know I always look to before I apply for a job I need to be able to take that job and so my wife and I had kind of came over to mano met with um a few different people over a Friday Saturday I came with a it’s like 120 some different questions that we had and of course you did spent all this time asking all these different people all these different questions and then doing research on all the different people and kind of when we were going home we left like yeah we could see ourselves moving here um and then so we’re like well let’s why don’t I apply and see what happens um and so I was lucky enough to uh be CH you know chosen as the head coach here and um but I just felt everything they had all the things to win and we just needed to put all the pieces of the puzzle together and uh you know I remember I think first year we were 30 on the women’s side we were like 55th at the end of the season you know and then right but you know in the last four years the worst we’ve been at indoor Nationals is third now yeah you know and so it’s really kind of taken off and our men’s team Now is really kind of taken off too and so it’s it’s been a really fun kind of experience kind of leading that leading that and getting all those pieces put together so how many years were you the assistant and how many years have you now been the head so I’ve been I when I when I started at Mano um I was hired as the head coach for both the men’s and women’s team um so this is my seventh year here I was an assistant at Winona for 12 years I I thought Dylan was the head coach Dylan was the head coach um dylian was the head coach and then when he got out of it to go be a firefighter yeah remember that shortlived okay I got hired Mike to be the head coach I thought when Jim became the head coach you came in as a okay so you came in as the head coach yep okay so let me tell my Jim story then uh fascinated learning you’re this is your first head coaching job so I always love knowing more about that aspect so Jim was a athlete there at Minnesota state and I’m at division 2 Nationals I think it might been a senior year out at Johnson C Smith out in North Carolina and somehow uh I’m sitting underneath like the big Scoreboard on the field uh where if someone was taking a super long approach in the high jump they’d be right where I am basically and you remember Jim Dillan he took a super long approach to uh to the high jump and so I don’t know him at all I just know of him because he’s you know he’s really good he’s jumping seven foot plus and all this kind of stuff and I was I was having fun watching and I also heard he was kind of a um you know uh not very he would have been the opposite of you from what I understand on how he did his approach and what step I talked to Cliff rvel about him as well so I believe I’m remember this correctly he was a little bit halfhazard on his approach and where he took off from and you know he just jumped really high as basically of his philosophy so I’m sitting back on the scoreboard you know on the concrete there and he’s walking back towards me and it’s the funniest thing in the world he looks at me he gets about 20 feet from me he looks at me he goes he don’t know who I am he just looks at me goes let’s do this points at me let’s do this turns around and just Sprints at the high jum makes it I was like I was instantly a fan I was like oh it’s the greatest high jumper in the world this is amazing it’s like the Rock and roller of of J it was there was no calculation there was no tape Mark for his uh takeoff Point none of it he just like let’s do this and turn and ran was awesome I was hoping you were his assistant because I was like did he head coach that way I was always curious on when he became a coach how much can you change your personality when just because you go into the coaching seat I don’t know okay now you’re sorry I just love that dude you are firsttime head coach I ask every person on the podcast these same two questions very similar to my question of culture that I asked when you became the head coach at Minnesota state you never know the job until you get the job you can be as prepared I don’t I honestly don’t know I don’t believe that our head coaches I’m doing this in aggregate you may prove me wrong here Mike for you individually but as a collection of head coaches in track and field I don’t believe we’re doing a a good enough job of coaching up our assistant coaches to become head coaches one day I think we talk about it and um I almost use the word gasline gas them up of like you can become a head coach one day sure sure but then we don’t give them responsibilities or teach them budgeting scheduling all the other things that uh I want to make sure we talk about uh as well so you get the head coaching job what was it’s very similar to that culture question what was something that when you became you’re the big dog now you’re sitting in the head coaching chair what was something that you thought was going to be easy you kind of rolled in like I’m used to this this will be fine and it actually turned out to be a little harder because now you’re the head coach and that inverse question what did you think like okay and you know you’re a thinker you’re analytic guy so I feel like you’re going to have a really good answer for this one not to pressure you here but I feel like you’re going to have a really good answer something that you like okay I know I’m deficient in X that I’ll need for head coaching so I’m going to really buckle down but it actually came naturally to you maybe it was a little easier so what do you think was going to be easy end up being maybe a little hard and what did you think was going to be hard and maybe became a little bit easier than you thought as the head coach I think the um what I thought was going to be easy the easy part of the question was really being able to balance the head coaching stuff and the event coaching yeah there’s not a lot of um throw coaches that are head coaches in you know all three levels do you think again I’m sorry I love that you said that do you think that’s because because it’s hard to coach the throws and be a head coach or is it because of bias that we don’t believe throws coaches can become head coaches I think there’s two things with it I think a lot of athletic directors get a two for one and hire a cross country coach who’s also the head coach and it saves them money in the department money sure um the other thing is the amount of time that throws coaches spend coaching I mean like you have a you can’t put 20 shot Putters in a circle and have practice you can’t put 20 sprinters on a track and have you know 400 practice right you know so a lot of it is just time yeah okay with that but so I so I really kind of had to learn and found out really quickly like I really need like a volunteer assistant person that kind of can just help with the stuff that I was used to doing and basically like if a kid was struggling and be able to let’s let’s go have a one-on-one practice and kind of work through those things that that I kind of had to manage and also this was the first time that I started coaching men and you know because I was whenona was a women’s only program and I thought you know that kind of answers your second question I thought that was the the flip side you know I was teammates for so long but it kind of been out of Men’s Track for 13 years that I thought well that would be no not an issue and kind of then kind of learned about okay some of a little bit of training differences that I had to do or or just kind of approaching things or I got I felt I was getting successful on creating relationships and getting you know the women athletes motivated and going and then realized you know trying to use just use all that kind of the same on the men’s side but realized I had to do a little bit some of the changes there it made me think about when you said you got a volunteer coach H how did you how did you lose some of your ego and give up some of that control that makees sense when I say that you know you’ve got control over your throwers you’re writing the programs you’re writing the script uh uh you know throwing is certainly one of the more um marriages between the weight room and and what you’re doing in the track even though all of our coaches should be doing that but uh you know the weight room is or the um throws coaches are usually more in tune there and you get a volunteer to help out with some of that stuff that means you got to you got to lose a little bit of control you got you know the volunteer you got to trust that volunteer and Trust the volunteer is going to do the things that you want them to do how you want them to do them uh when you’re not looking when you’re not there and you’re doing the other activities how did you handle that that control yeah a lot of that was just giving up and like not giving up but like yeah no I having the ability to know that okay I need to put the person in a position and kind of I I always look at it as like an efficiency meter and my kids always make fun of me about efficiency but I always look at what I’m doing should the state of Minnesota’s taxpayers is it cheaper for them to pay somebody else to do that job than me and looking at it’s not a value use of time so then trying to just find people to kind of do those types of things um but it was it was the first time in my life I had to give up you know I I I started writing the weight room stuff you know but as an assistant I was in the weight room with our throwers and and doing all that and realizing to okay how about I just write it but then have the strength coach go through with it to now completely where I have nothing to do with the strength training stuff and it took me a couple years to go and a couple different people to let that go but now 100% love it like it takes so much stuff off my plate um that’s huge the the the weight room specifically and again you know I talked about the marriage of throws coaching in the weight room that that had let me ask you a different way how hard was that for you because that’s a very controlling thing and you you you hear the opposite actually where uh you know hey track coaches you need to be in that weight room you can’t just let the W the the snc coach do it they don’t know what they’re talking about and certainly there are you know I’ve seen both sides of it I’ve seen the very poor snc coach who does not care what you’re doing on the track he’s he or she’s going to do what they want to do uh and I’ve seen the where it’s like hey what are you doing this week because I want to make sure I’m programming the right way you you had that expertise that that experience and you were able to let go of it that seems like that’s the that’s a big uh Lo not loss of control but giving control to someone others yeah I mean it’s kind of odd like when I thought I started coaching here like I thought my track and field coaching was going to prepare me for the head job here you know um but it was actually my associate athletic director and my Administration background actually helped me by far the most right and it was just really understanding that yes coaches are important but they have one p they’re one piece of the puzzle you know but they all these supporting roles that go into it to make these kids successful right you know I mean to the point where you know 200 2020 we had a phenomenal team um set up we thought and then we had a whole bunch of AC I mean we didn’t have the academic support stuff and we had to get that going um cuz you can have the best athletes in the world if they’re ineligible it doesn’t matter it’s just a waste of time you know for everybody um so we’ve spent a lot of time on getting kind of the academic support arm really rolling um and being able to work with some departments on campus to build that up you know the same with where we needed to see athletic training really grow you know and where when I when we started here I was I had a graduate assistant for 20 hours a week and now I have two full-time athletic Trainers for the track and field program you know to where we’re able to grow that and you know it’s just all those little pieces of the puzzle um to get that because you know I look at you know every coach if you coach long enough you’re going to have great athletes you’re you’re going to find somebody that’s just going to all want come out of nowhere and they’re going to do something good um but it’s like you need a System created if you’re going to have a long time and successful teams that keep going right so how many years at Minnesota state now seven so what have what was the I don’t want to ask it that way how have you changed the culture in Minnesota state you have your own culture that’s built from a lot of different experiences in your background so all the way back from W Stout all the way back from high school actually W Stout W lacrosse I know State you’re continually developing your culture because of influences uh on your life you know Jud Logan etc those are all influences Hal Conley those are all influences of your culture your life so when you come to Minnesota state whether they were Ultra successful or not you’re still going to change culture because now you’re the head honcho you drive that culture how have you changed the culture what are maybe some specific things that you’ve done to help build to the success that you guys have today I think our biggest thing is the expect expectations um you know and realistic expectations too like um you know I know that our women’s track team is funded dramatically better than our men’s so like our women’s program like we if we have the resources in place and the Staffing in place we should be a top four program every year you know minimally of a bad year should be still top 10 you know our our men um you know it’s we’re getting through fundraising and all that getting up there but yes our men should be 10th place and I I look back to two years ago or three years ago and we won our our national championship on the women’s side you know our our women were first or second all year and we ended up winning but our men came into the national meet rank 16th and took six and I I felt that I told our men’s team afterwards I thought that was more that was more impressive you know and that’s we’re taking a team that was 25% funded at the NCA level came in and took six in the country you know I mean that that was pretty insane yeah um you know and then what’s so what’s unique with track I mean you think track to win a National Title you need all these people and in reality we won a national title with five with five athletes we had three throwers and uh uh one one that was a sprinter jumper and one Sprinter you know and those five athletes scored the 50 some points we needed to win amazing that’s amazing what so when I was at Mississippi State that’s kind of what we were going for we we couldn’t win the SEC we couldn’t win the conference because of depth uh with some of those other monsters out there but we wanted to win Nationals and to your point we knew was like okay five to eight athletes you still got to hit quote unquote perfect and might need a a baton drop somewhere else but you know a mistake made uh but you could do it so what was it like winning that first title I mean it’s you’ve had the experience as an athlete but it’s different as a coach what was that like it was different because you know the year before we were second you know it’s always the first time you do it it’s really special the first time we won a conference Championship yeah like how special that was and the men we won right away um and the men have pretty have won like 22 conference championships straight now um you know but the first one we won did you say you guys have won 22 conference championships in a row yeah yeah you know you’re just selfish Mike is what I’m starting to figure out here holy cow okay good and we knew once we got our women’s team turned around to where we wanted them that that would start to happen um you know and so we’ve been successful on the women’s side here as recently over the last few years but you know it it’s uh really special the first time and you know but you gotta to keep it going you know but it looks at the first time we were second you thought our team won a national championship the next year we won a national title the following year last year we you know were first all year and we just had a rough National meet and if there’s something that could go wrong it went wrong for us and we want lost the national I mean it was by far the worst meet I’ve had in my college career and we lost the national championship by a point and because we thought we were going to go in and score 80 85 points and you know scored 50 and 50 and Adam State they scored a lot in the distance 51 and one it’s never over with those guys there was not one athlete that wanted to take a photo with h with that trophy nobody touched it you know um I still to this day I don’t think I’ve ever touched our national runnerup trophy um but the two years before the first time we were second I mean that was the most photo isn’t that interesting yeah same place same place and totally different attitude towards it wow yeah and then you know then I look at last year Outdoors you know we we were kind of fourth third or fourth all year ranked or or worked our way up to Fourth I mean every week got a little better four us and then we ended up having a great National meet Team takes second everybody wanted to take a trophy with that or a pitcher with that you know it’s just such a different you’re just the expectation level yeah you know um so that’s interesting the I mean the same thing second place it’s the same thing where it’s 2020 2024 1980 it’s second place second place and yet the difference in Attitude expectations um happiness levels that’s really interesting that’s really interesting uh okay Mike let’s spend some time uh here at the end let’s talk about you’re obviously an accomplished coach so we don’t need to talk about we don’t talk about X’s and O’s so we’re not going to try to figure out why uh you know how you you get all these Americans and national champs and the throws and all those kind of things but you are a it’s it’s evident that you are a very good General you’re a good leader of other people and we’ve been talking a lot about that leadership as it relates to the athletes I’m curious let’s flip it a little bit here when you become a head coach when you’re an assistant coach and I don’t think we realize this when sometimes we do but most of the time I think we don’t realize this when we’re in it and you can be excused for not real when you’re in it being an assistant coach is easy I know there’s a lot of pressures on you because you got your event group and you got to do well and head coaches on you and all those kind of things but when you become a head coach and we talked about this earlier we we hinted at it earlier there’s just so much more in fact when I asked you what was the uh thing that you thought was going to be easy actually became a little hard your your answer right on on point here was yeah I thought it’d be fine to you know coach my kids and still do all the administrative stuff that I have to do and you’re like yep that actually became a little hard right off the bat like I realized oops that was a mistake that’s going to be hard so how do you let’s let’s start first with st uh staff management because you got a great staff there uh including you know good friend Chris parno you know obviously I start with him with things um how do you we talked about culture of the team how do you influence affect coach your staff to have the same or similar you know we can’t we’re not carbon copying here they they are all individuals but how do you how do you raise their level to what to your expectations um I don’t want to get into like specifics like oh you know with Chris one time I had to wag my finger at him I know you didn’t have to deal with Chris but you know what I’m saying like how do you keep the staff on the same page keep the same expectations keep the same motivations to go after D1 athletes so that you can win D2 Nationals how how do you as a staff manager handle that part of the job the biggest thing for me Mike is have great people that are way different than what I am and stay the heck out of their way and just basically support them you know and so that’s the biggest thing we talk about we talk about winning and in reality like I don’t like I don’t know if Chris and I have ever talked about legs of 4 by ones or 4x4s sometimes he’ll just tell me hey I’m going to this is what I’m thinking what do you think you know but it’s 100% I just want him to run his thing like I I look at event coaches should be head coaches and it’s my job to just support them in their position and help them through it or help them work through a problem or or if they need something administrative support wise or logistic wise and help them with that you know and like for example like coach parno coach parno it’s a I am one of my downfalls is I am not a public speaker I don’t like getting in front of people and talking to them Mike it took me some convincing to even do this I oh Mike well thank you for stepping out of your comfort zone then I appreciate way out of my comfort zone I’m not a fan of talking about myself doing excellently let me just say that you really are brother absolutely so um so like our team meeting like a a lot of times like I’ll have our kind of more of the logistical side of things but I’ll let Coach Parnell do more the Rah I’m shocked that he’s so good at that you know he loves that stuff and it works out really well um you know and there so there’s just it’s finding what each of our assistant coaches are passionate about and letting do that and letting them shine um but then you know and just kind of but we all keep talking about winning I mean we we got on the bus back from pit State uh after we won our national championship ship and the whole discussion for the next 3 hours I mean we left at 10:00 at night and the whole discussion the next 3 hours till 1: in the morning was about recruiting and who’s still available out there wow and what can we do and what what are some of the kids that we can get to how can we get our men’s team from six up farther are we doing you know what are we doing right or what went wrong or looking back at the national meet was there things that Trav time or whatever things that we could have improved on um and so it’s really that it’s not I don’t have really any secrets it’s just well you you really nailed a great leadership line there have great people so you hear this a lot have great people and stay out of their way I I’ve heard that a million times and and it’s important I’m not I’m I’m kind of downplaying here a little bit unfortunately but that is really important you added something there that I thought was really unique and important have great people and then you said who are different than you and then get out of their way I I’ve heard a line that you know great leaders like what makes a great leader well all different types of personalities can be a great leader all different types of communication Styles can be great leaders what makes great leaders is people who are hire people that are not good at this that are good at the stuff that they either aren’t good at or don’t like to do and then get out of their way so that’s what I kind of heard the way you said it was that are who are different than you people who have other skill sets whether it’s obviously the coach s so Sprints and hurdles versus throws and then uh you know maybe more extroverted than introverted and then let them say okay good I’m going to bless you to I’m I’m G support you to be as good as you can at that because I’m really good at this part over here and I’m going to be guessing myself up over here to do these things because together we will’ll lift the whole the whole program up yeah and I look at when um Brian SAA is one of uh coach on our staff he’s our uh jumps coach and multi coach and you know and and I really like early on when I got to know him he used to be the former head coach at St Cloud State and just I’m always watching coaches coming up and how they’re interacting with their kids they have no clue that I’m doing that you know but how they’re interacting with their kids at meets how their kids are responding to them you know are they staying put or are they Jumping Ship every year um but then just seeing them do they are they different at a regular meet than a national meet you know some people go to a national meet and once they’re changing everything in the world it’s like well that’s not what got you there right you know and then just kind of then kind of having my lists of people that I have you know if uh coaches change I you know I need to be prepared for all yeah that right there might be you know we have a ton of assistant coaches that listen to the podcast that is really like when you go ask someone how can I get this job or that job or how can I become a head coach one day etc etc that might be the best advice that can be given there Mike is hey someone is always watching so conduct yourself with the high integrity that you have all the time all the time someone’s watching you and that is the be when when there’s a position open and a coach like Mike already has a list and you’re on that list you’re ahead of the game but you only get on that list if you’re doing the right things at at the Dual meet up to the National meet do the right things each time and when you stack you you do the right things you make the right decisions over and over for from little ones to big ones those stack and become huge ones that’s how you end up that’s how you’ve won a national title Mike is you guys have taken a lot of little and medium and bigsize decisions and done the right decision and stacked and stacked and stacked until it ends up with a a national trophy yeah and I mean that’s a simple as you know things that I’m looking for like you know you’re just having a little side conversation with an assistant coach and are they talking about how they could be doing their head job coaches better or their athletes are and you know it’s it’s just all little things that accumulate that uh that you have but then also kind of helps my coaching friends that uh you know like if I can recommend somebody to them i’ be like oh yeah this person at this other school that I really respect you know and kind of help that way you know a big thing has always been for me um you know I’ve had now 12 women that have got 12 women throwers have gone on to be Collegian coaches is that right you know and you know and I always look at what I always there you know there definitely there’s been a huge uptick and the am of women coaches in college track and field but just kind of that’s always been a big kind of passion for mine you know you know started in my earlier coaching days but just also if I see an athlete that I think would be the coach really try to help them where it might be just something as simple as hey why you come I’m once you come you’re at the 3:00 session can you come on at the 1:00 session I have a bunch of freshmen I want you to help me out with the hammer and then kind of help them teach them a little bit on how to do that and kind of Blossom that but the greatest superpower of a coach specifically a track coach is seeing things in other people before they can see it in themselves man that’s awesome you’re not even talking about athleticism of like hey I believe you can be a 50-footer in the shop one day you’re talking about hey you know what like you could be a coach one day like that that’s an amazing amazing ability and trait I I love that that’s that’s really awesome okay we talked about so I told you you know before we hit record you know your journe is important and I love the journey that you’ve uh been up to today and that I love that your journey is continuing by the way this is not even like maybe if we’re going to use a quarter mile as a reference maybe you’re at the 150 Mark you still got a long long pathway in front of your career so I love that uh but I also told you you know the other part that has made this podcast so popular is the value that the Springs and by the way you’re not going to out of the park on that but I’d like to talk about the to continue the conversation of The Well roundness of a coach not just the on the track uh coaching component we talked about staff management uh I asked you earlier in the show about your staying curious and uh has that you know continued to stay cranked at 10 today and you mentioned yeah but differently so maybe not a 10 and and I’m sure you’re still at some level with uh training and things like that but you you said you know out of 10 yeah I am but it’s off the track stuff you mentioned um uh facility design uh budgeting um I’m trying to think of the other things you mentioned talk to us about so we also have a good number of athletes that listen to the podcast they’re typically Junior to senior in college and so they’re thinking about coaching so they’re listening to to coaches like yourself again we get very much into the Trap of we think coaching at any level is oh I’m just in the sand pit coaching long jumpers that’s what the job is that’s and you know what oh sure I’m sure I got to do some paperwork but 80% of the job is on the track and that’s not true at all talk to us about how you are continuing to develop holistically as a coach in think getting better at those those uh items that you mentioned that you might also mention now yeah I mean going back to the kind of the question you brought up about coaching you know I was just at the dentist this morning and the lady asked me what I did and I was a college coach and she goes well what do you do all day like you know you always get those questions yeah yeah um but you know you know as an assistant coach I always look at and I told our assistants when we started that I wanted them to do what they’re good at and that’s coaching and so trying to figure out we were spending so much time with the academics coach Prim spent a lot of time doing academic stuff and I wanted to get that off his plate so he can just spend more time coaching and recruiting you know we’re always trying to make our kids better but then recruit kids better than our current kids and so it’s for me it’s just been learning more things about that you know uh you know I’ve been very curious on I didn’t have much fundraising um experience in my previous role in job and now that’s a big part of it and so I’ve had to really learn how to do that engage you know engage people how can we Market track and field more um and really try to try to build that up you know another big piece you know we we host a lot of track and field meets at MSU um you know it’s almost you know we just we just had uh we you know we just got done with our 14th High School meet um you know we did this year yeah this year 11 indoor days uh indoor College meets you know we have uh just had a huge high school or huge college meet here you know and so it’s just learning every time we have a meet you know and we’ve done this for seven years and Tuesday at 10 is our staff meeting I know it’s cringey for some of our assistant coaches but we go through even we’ve hosted our indoor conference meets seven times we still spent a half hour discussing what things we can improve on and how can we make that better now those meetings were a lot longer early on um but we’ve really been able to make it I mean you know down to it that we always you know we always have a goal that you know as a field event background I always it it was always annoying to me when I’d go to track meets and the track would get done and then there would be field events going on for four hours and we always try to get it where the last throw you know the last pull B the last long jump is also happening during the 4×4 you know and you know can get it down to throws we’re pretty good now we can get it down to within five minutes of predicting when uh when the all the throws are going to be done at the time pull B’s a little bit more trickier but long Jump’s pretty simple different times for different officials um that we have different times for different genders that we have uh yeah but just trying to make that more efficient you know and then U it’s just looking at you know like I knew a few years ago that athletic training you know they changed the um standards that you could used to have a bachelor’s degree for athletic training and now was going to go to a master’s degree saw that as a big hurdle for TR you know for our program here um what we were going to do and then had to learn a lot more about athletic training and figure out okay how can we expand this model you know and it’s kind of looking at taking basically the biggest threats that I have to our program that are preventing us from being more successful taking one and trying to just fix it and then move on to the next one you know and not trying to I think where some people might look at where they look at everything that’s going wrong and then try to fix them all at once and you don’t really fix them it’s like okay let’s let’s like I I knew for our thing that the first thing I had to do is we had to remodel our indoor track because the surface was old and that was going to cut down on some of our you know some of our issues that we were seeing and so it was how to I know I’m jumping all over the place but there’s two types of fundraising there’s internal fundraising at your University and there’s external fundraising oh explain that explain that that’s important internal fundraising is getting your University to come up with the funds and that I’ve had experience with external fundraising to me is the easier portion of it okay um and it’s just trying to get the people that make the decisions to kind of get it your way and what they’re passionate about you know and it’s the other it’s the other flip side I guess for other since this is more for a broader coaching thing you know I look at is it’s not the people you have people in higher ad leadership and VP roles the most important people are the people one step below them that you find that are successful that you know in the next few years are going to be in those roles and you start getting them attached to your program now so that as they move up in their careers they’re already a big believer in your sport especially if you’re at a place that you feel you’re going to be there long term um that’ll help you grow your program you know or a huge portion for us is you know we have our inclusion diversity office is almost basically funding two full-time positions for academic support you know and that’s relationships we built through track and field and helping helping with that but now has kind of really fixed our academic support stuff that I had and now I don’t have ineligible athletes all our athletes are graduating and we’re keeping our higher high academic or our higher basically our higher R risk athletes and know we have the academic support Forum W and they’re gonna they’re going to graduate you know Mike I encourage track coaches to go into Administration you’ve been in administration uh but I encourage our track coaches to go administration because you know a lot of our a lot of decisions a lot of important decisions of our sport are happening in those conference rooms with administrators and so I like for someone who has experience with our sport to to be in those those meetings um so it’s interesting you you’ve I don’t want say you came from the administration but you have a a very large Administration background with the academic side there at WIA wona and stuff and you’re doing an amazing job as a coach and as a head coach um and you know like I said you have still a lot of runway in front of you but man you as an administrator would be really important for our sport uh not only at that school that that might ever happen but also uh in that conference and on the national level as well you have a a great um brain about it just the analytical side of of what it is so I just want to encourage you you know as you continue through your career path of you know that maybe it’s not over that administrative side uh for you so just want to encourage you with with that uh Mike to wrap us up uh what’s got you excited man there’s a lot of things to be excited there as a Maverick uh as you look forward to maybe you get to choose what uh future here is it this season one year five years what’s got you excited about your program there the biggest thing Mike is just kind of the growth all the all the grinding and not giving up that we had over the you know the last uh few years just kind of seeing that all come together seeing our athletes that you know I mean when we when we sit down and start talking about them and then early on in the recruiting that we have chances at you know I mean we’ve really tried to expand our International kind of recruiting um with that and you know and that’s that’s been really gone really well for us and uh one of the big things coach SAR brought to us when with that um and then just the biggest thing is is just growth like we want to keep want to keep growing as a program um we kind of like our roster kind of to stay kind of where it’s at um you know we’ve gone we’re a lot of our coaches believe in a bigger roster we think the depth helps you substain uh conference championships really well you know so we do have a larger roster program on the site you know we we’re this year we were at one we started the year about 194 um 194 y yep so we’re uh you said large roster I’m like oh 100 athletes that’s a lot double it you’re at nearly 200 athletes and you are this is awesome because some people think it’s it’s a it’s inverse proportional that the larger your roster you can’t win Nationals because you can’t focus on the the athletes the five athletes you need things like that you’re able you’re in your staff are able to do both 200 athletes nearly and pushing for national titles wow it’s a lot harder I would I would any I would say that it’s it depends on your coach coaching staff like I’m lucky enough that I have coaches that have been here a long time that are a little older that you know I mean they run their event groups and we have a plethora of volunteer assistants that are trying to get experience to move on um that help out with that but I mean Jerry balus has been out doesn’t know it but a good Mentor of mine since I’ve been in the head coaching role just kind of seeing the success keys he’s built at Grand Valley and you know they’ve done it with a large roster public school like ours a little larger School than ours but just the success he’s had you know so it can’t happen can’t do it I love it growth you’re excited about growth continued growth I love hearing that from a guy who’s won a national title because again it’s easy to sit on our Laurels and be like hey man I’ve done more than 99% of coaches will ever do will ever win a National Title so I love the continued Vision towards growth and growing the program growing yourself yourself and growing your staff yeah appreciate it I love it thank you uh guys we’re going to wrap it up right there uh Mike thank you so much man for you know I I say this to everybody I’m amazed because this is not an easy podcast not an easy podcast to listen to so Always Love You listeners being here all the way to the very end because it is longer than normal podcast uh but that also means it’s not an easy podcast to record for I ask for two hours of your time during offseason that would be extremely hard but right now Mike I’m so grateful for you you’re coming off a hosting a track meet uh you’re staying conference and Nationals in front of you and you’re able to give me your time and that’s one of the most important and valuable things you can ever give me so I’m really really grateful uh for your time uh today and you’ve just really killed it with the value my friend uh it’s amazing at really a you’re still a young part of your coaching career here uh the experiences you had the lessons you’ve learned and uh and you continue to keep that uh that grindstone mentality of growing and getting better every day so I’m just so grateful for you and really thankful for your time appreciate it Mike thanks for everything you do for our support too and promoting it absolutely you deserve it guys thank you for being here uh join us next week we’re I think we’re in the middle of May when when you’re listening to this uh so we’ve got Nationals conference and Nationals coming up um we got the summer track we’re going to keep bringing amazing people like this to the uh podcast every week so join us next week we’ll do it all over again thanks everybody
