{"id":853,"date":"2019-11-14T20:59:20","date_gmt":"2019-11-15T01:59:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/?p=853"},"modified":"2022-01-27T11:41:35","modified_gmt":"2022-01-27T16:41:35","slug":"advisory-team-spotlight-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/advisory-team-spotlight-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Advisory Team Spotlight"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

CSCA \u2013 How did you get\nstarted in the industry? <\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1994, I was attending Simon Fraser University,\ntaking Forensic Psychology courses hoping to be the next Jodie Foster (referencing\nher role in the movie Silence of the Lambs). But in all honesty, like most\nyoung adults, I was not sure what to study and where my true aptitudes\nlay.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In second year, I ended up taking a Kinesiology\ncourse which I found both intriguing and refreshing, plus I earned my first\ndecent mark. I was always a sporty girl and grew up playing everything like\nmost kids in the 80\u2019s so the subject matter seemed to suit me.  Shortly\nafter I got a job at a local gym teaching weight training. Now, mind you, this\nwas back in 1996 where my life was school, softball, working, and Tupac. It was\nalso a time when I began to lift weights with some of the football players at\nSFU.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kids in my era didn\u2019t strength train much until\nafter high school, so I was new to all of it. Looking back though, I can\nhonestly say I wasn\u2019t really \u2018following my passion\u2019 or anything that \u2018deep and\nspiritual.\u2019 I kind of fell into it.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Training people just seemed to suit me. I enjoyed\nthe teaching aspects and empowering people, but I also quickly realized that\nthe culture of fitness wasn\u2019t quite the right fit. Let me just say that I\u2019m\njust a wee bit intense. \ud83d\ude09 So, in 1998, I\napproached a college-level basketball coach to see if he needed help with his\nwomen\u2019s basketball team. He agreed to take me on, with no experience working\nwith athletes. I had played basketball in high school though and new the game\nwell enough and had taken a few more Kinesiology classes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

From there, things snowballed. I began to read and\nattend conferences. I read Supertraining cover to cover, not once, but thrice.\nI took a weightlifting certification and studied track and field with local\ncoaches. Back then, S&C was a new field and it was all very exciting. After\na season with the college team, I decided to transfer my academic preparation\nto the University of British Columbia where they had a Physical Education\ndegree stream.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also landed a role as the S&C coach for the\nwomen\u2019s basketball team. That began a 6 year position with a basketball program\nthat ended up winning 2 National Titles and the start of a great career. I also\nfinished my undergraduate degree and my master\u2019s degree where I shifted more\ntowards sports physiology and sports medicine. I did a load monitoring study\nbefore it even became in vogue, using the old RPE models, pen and paper! \nWow, the stats on that were miserable.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was fortunate to work with some keen and\nhard-working athletes and a coaching staff that trusted me at such a young age.\nI ran workouts all year round for the athletes, developed a monitoring system\nand collaborated with the therapy team. It all sounds clich\u00e9, but this was back\nin 1998-2005, a time where sport performance training was just being\nborn.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the summer months, I worked for a local\ntraining company that attracted many amateur and professional ice hockey\nplayers to Vancouver. I had opportunities to work with some world-class players\nand enjoyed that population too.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2004, during grad school, I also started my\nconsulting company. Well, let me re-phrase that: A friend of mine started it\nand asked me to join him. We worked together on a few athlete developmental\nprojects and he ended up handing the business over to me. I remember thinking \u2013\nwhat am I supposed to do with this?  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I had never run a company before, but like a good\n80\u2019s kid, I just went for it. I spent a lot of time building relationships with\nsport clubs, coaches, councils and other trainers. After a while, I found\nmyself too busy to handle my client load, so I hired a few contractors to help\nme out. I always leased space from gym owners so that gave me the freedom to\nexplore other opportunities too, like a 6 month stint in Malaysia training\nNational Team athletes, a year-long contract at EA Sports building a fitness\nvideo game and my other love \u2013 teaching at the university and college\nlevel.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I began teaching at the age of 28, which, looking\nback is quite young, but I was really into it and loved to share what I had\nlearned with future coaches.   I ran my company for a good 12 years\nand then dissolved it as a corporation when I decided to move away from the\ncity. At that time, my son was 2 years old and I was ready to go back to\nconsulting on my own and teaching versus having staff and a huge client roster\nto try and manage. It was simply too much and I knew if I were to be fully\npresent in my day today, I had to let that go.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the past 7 years or so, I have had many\nterrific opportunities to work with some very high-level athletes, now\nspecializing in American Football and Combat sport, particularly Freestyle\nWrestling. Currently, I have about 6-10 athletes on my active roster (local or\ninternational) at any given time and no longer work \u2018hourly\u2019 as most trainers\nmight. Instead, I offer a specialized consulting service to the kids under my\nwing and have realized that coaching is not a 9-5 job. Some sessions might be\nin person on the field, some might be in the weight-room, some might be with a\ntherapist and some might be on the phone. Service, I have realized can take on\nmany forms.    <\/p>\n\n\n\n

CSCA \u2013 What have been\nsome of the challenges you have faced? <\/strong>  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oh boy! Where do I start!  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

First, let me say that if I faced the same\nchallenge twice, that is on me. Challenge is part of life and part of working\nwith people. I do try to be self-aware and see how I may have contributed to a\nchallenging situation, but I am also wise enough now to know when someone is\nbehaving in a way that is undermining and non-transparent. Sometimes challenges\ncan be easily boiled down to a miscommunication which is easily solved,\nespecially when parties are accountable for their actions. I like to give\npeople the benefit of the doubt initially and form my opinion over time, and\nvaried context.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m not going to pull the female card on this\nquestion because I\u2019m confident in my abilities and if someone does not like me\nor does not want to work with me because I am a woman, that is on them. They\nhave lost out. Many times, I get asked what it is like being a female strength\ncoach and my answer is always the same: \u201cI have never been a male.\u201d I really\ncannot say if it is better or worse, or if I face more or less challenges. It\nis a poor hypothesis. I have been recruited for many top-level jobs and have\nworked alongside some great men. I have also worked with some very insecure men\n(and women). Is it a challenge? Sure, it is, but I have learned to not make it\nabout me. I have also learned it is okay to walk away from bad energy.\nSometimes enough is enough.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another key part of facing a challenge is that I\nhave learned to take my job very seriously, but not to take myself seriously.\nIt\u2019s important to be able to laugh at yourself and call yourself a dummy now\nand then. I think when we get too in our heads and start thinking we are some\ntype of X factor, then the ego takes over. I have good people around me that\nwould quickly put me in my place if I behaved as such. I\u2019m a coach. I help athletes.\nThe athletes do the job, not me.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

CSCA \u2013 Where do you\nsee S&C going in the next 10 years? <\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have no idea; I\u2019m a bit of a surfer when it comes\nto things like this. Meaning, I like to try and be as present as possible in\nlife and not worry or think about the future. Maybe it\u2019s because of my\nage.  However, I can share with you, my wish for the future! I wish that\nmore S&C coaches would \u2018learn it all\u2019 \u2013 sprints, plyos, the lifts, testing,\nmonitoring, etc. etc. etc. I am seeing too much specializing in one biomotor\nability. And too much influence of one methodology area like track or\npowerlifting.      <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are here to develop athletes physically in all\ntrainable qualities. It is insufficient to only be a weight room guy or a\nlinear speed girl when you are prescribing exercise for most athlete\npopulations. I love what David Epstein writes about in his new book, Range<\/em>.\nHe talks about how we all need to \u2018sample widely\u2019 and why generalists will rule\nover specialists in most professions. I think all S&C coaches should be\nable to train all components of fitness for the non-specializing athlete. For\nexample, I feel I know enough about prescribing and coaching Olympic\nweightlifting for the non-Olympic lifter. I know enough about coaching linear\nspeed for the non-track athlete. I see the value in having these skills, but\nthose with them are a dying breed.    <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019d love to see more S&C coaches with a breadth of knowledge and to have read-only 4-6 books. Instead of spending their time learning hands-on, making mistakes and getting back to the drawing board. I\u2019d love to see more of them asking questions to willing mentors who have the wisdom and experience to quickly sift through the BS. We are in an age where information is too accessible, and it seems that reading Instagram posts trumps coaching humans.    <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The next generation needs to value the investment of time. With that acceptance of the long game, comes more wisdom in our young profession.  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CSCA \u2013 How did you get started in the industry?   […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":2460,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/853"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=853"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/853\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":868,"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/853\/revisions\/868"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2460"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianstrengthca.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}