Freakishly frustrated coach

[Adam Carlson]

Hey all, how do you sell your program to people? I've been working at my school for 6 years now, and they just created a strength and conditioning coaching position for me. The athletic director, athletic coordinator, and junior varsity tennis coach all believe in the program and have committed to it. The other coaches, not so much. My school has not had much emphasis on training and conditioning in sports, and I'm trying to sell the idea to people. The people who are somewhat sold on it still want the old-fashioned-bodybuilding-lots-of-machines type routine for their kids. Olympic lifting for volleyball players? Yeah right, nothing a little leg press machine calf raises won't cure. Pull ups? Why pull ups? Forget that kipping is a natural, functional movement that the girls do in the air when they spike, we want strict lat pull downs and triceps push downs.

I'm getting pretty frustrated, but don't want to come across as cocky or know-it-all. How do you sell your programs? I just want my own box someday where people who actually want to train will be there...

[Peter Terry Haas]

Meet with them and try to get on the same page. Reassure them that you are trying to make their job easier, by turning their players into better athletes. Ask them what their opinions are on team/player weaknesses, and possibly outline how you plan to address these. Get on the same page so the sport coach knows (roughly) what is going on and why.

And above all, walk the walk. Making demonstrably better athletes is the best way to sell the training benefit.

[Dennis Jones]

Ask for 3 average athletes to train using your methods and they can keep the rest. When yours start smoking theirs they might agree.

[Jamie J. Skibicki]

^^^^^

for the win

[Ryan Whitley]

Is your goal to train all of your athletes using CF MP WODs, or are you going to do different programs for different sports?

[Adam Carlson]

it will be slightly more focused to the needs of the sport, but our students are so deconditioned that scaled .com WODs would give an amazing improvement in their performance.

I mean, we're talking kids who have never touched a barbell. Weight training as prep for a sport is quite uncommon in Japan, and our coaches especially panic about not having enough time in a season to coach and train They try and cram years of training into 10 weeks And they hope to win tournaments with kids who show up to try outs fully out of shape.

[Eric Montgomery]

What Dennis said.

Show them that you can take a middle of the pack athlete and make him/her a top performer by increasing strength and explosiveness. Use measurable standards that apply to the specific sport--improved vertical jump for volleyball or basketball players, faster shuttle runs and reaction-time drills, home-to-second for baseball players, etc.

[Jamie J. Skibicki]

Adam,

IN "Best Judo", both authors are of the opinion (and state it pretty convincingly) that the reason Japanese judo players lose on the international level is due to their lack of conditioning, specifically strength training. Also, the excersize list int eh back of the book includes the deadlift, squat, power clean and push press (listed as a C&J), bench, etc.

Since judo is fairly big over there, you might use that to gain some sway. Both authors won the All Tokyo Tournament.

[Alex McRobie]

id lean more towards 'saying' it is crosstraining more than a specific program like crossfit, they will understand this more and be more confident.

i recently did a school project on CF its a slideshow, PM me if you want me to send it to you.

[Michael Mayrseidl]

Adam,

How long have you lived in Japan? You should know by now you will NEVER be able to push through rapid changes, or challenge a status quo promoted by more senior employees, ESPECIALLY if you come across as a know it all foreigner.

I have a Kiwi mate who runs an NPO based out of Kobe, who has spent the last 15 YEARS trying to convince Japanese schools and sporting bodies to provide their students with grass playing surfaces for sporting activities rather than the standard gravel. Sounds like a no-brainer but his conversion rate is incredibly slow.

Your best bet is to find a way to give 'ownership' of the idea to the senior Japanese employees. Try to sloooooowly make it 'their' idea. Also, relate the training style to Japan. Tell them why it is such a 'Japanese' way of doing things (I would talk about Japanese athletes who use similar systems.)

Speaking from many similar experiences, I actually think taking a bunch of kids and proving the other Japanese coaches wrong will just cause them to loose face and will be an automatic death knell for your project.

It might be an idea to start a voluntary 'fit-kurabu' in the school first, then get your trainees to compete in an external event and win some accolades for the school.

You also might look at trying to get some of the other teachers involved in a Crossfit style regimen as a hobby?