Just back in from the Perform Better Summit in Providence, RI and it was an amazing weekend! It was 3 days of lectures and hands-on seminars taught by the best coaches in the nation. All the information provided was cutting edge for the state of training and performance enhancement today. I feel as if I have just updated everything I have been doing!
First of all, Providence ROCKS! The food was great, the people were friendly, and it is a small good old slice of New England American culture. You could literally feel the history in the city itself. It was great to be able to see a beautiful place like that only a couple of hours from home. I would definitely go up for another weekend, just to try the lobster and shrimp again!
Special Thank You’s
Special thanks to Perform Better for putting on an awesome seminar weekend! It was very organized, the workers were very helpful with everything, and the entire weekend was smooth. It is hard to do a seminar of this caliber, and it is evident that to get all of the high-level speakers to attend this seminar under the same roof took quite an effort! You could tell that they put in a ton of work to make this happen. It was totally worth it!
Also a very special thanks to StrengthCoach.com for really bringing the trainers, coaches and the rest of the online-community together. A BIG, BIG THANKS to Mike Boyle and Anthony Renna for setting up and putting on the great social on Friday night at Trinity that really kicked the weekend off for everyone.
Thomas Plummer said that we as an industry are very isolated as workers, we work in our own world but do not get to interact very much with each other. Just because of the nature of this business, we have very little camaraderie. I felt as if after this weekend we are more tightly knit as a community than ever before. This was something that was truly needed in the industry, to get to know one another, to see each other face-to-face and share one, two . . a few drinks and laughs! You guys are awesome and thanks for the love! It was a pleasure to finally meet and chat with everyone!
Review of the Seminar
I almost filled up an entire notebook with notes, trying to write furiously fast in between sets of burpees and some new TRX exercises I have never seen. Just so you get an idea of the caliber of the coaches who were presenting and what they spoke about, here is a review of just a handful of what went on! –
1. Al Vermeil – “Speed: The Ultimate Weapon”– He did a killer presentation and hands-on segment about spoke about speed development. If you do not know who he is, he is the ONLY strength coach to have championship rings in BOTH the NBA and NFL.
2. Mike Boyle – “Preparing to Workout”– He is currently the strength coach to the Boston Bruins, and Boston University’s hockey team. It was an honor to have him there and see his lecture and hands-on about “Preparing to Workout”, he literally put us through the same warm up of his high level athletes – needless to say,but I took a lot away from this one!
3. Martin Rooney – “The Art of Exceptional Training” – excellent lecture, he is highly motivating and really makes you put in that extra effort. Rooney has over 20 NFL football players that have run under a 4.3 in the 40-yd dash for their combines. He knows how to get that level of effort out of the people he works with.
One thing I got from him was – “Are you in it? Or are you INTO it?” – In other words, stop with the BS and start giving your best at everything you do. The results will show at the end, but only if you put in your best effort always!
4. Todd Durkin – “3-D Approach to Program Design” – Todd has to be one of the greatest motivators I have ever seen! His hands on was Saturday morning, although everyone was tired, he really got us going and drove everyone to do their best. He mentioned how it is all mental, as he starts screaming to “GET YOUR MIND RIGHT!” the group just lit up and went to town on the workout.
This workout was a tough 6 station circuit with 3-minute periods at each station. He literally put the 200 trainers and coaches in that room through the WALL! When we left he had us all fired up, I was ready to go to war and felt great the rest of the day!
5. Alwyn Cosgrove – “Designing Effective Semi-Private Programs”
Great stuff from Alwyn as always. He is a great presenter and smart as hell when it comes to designing programs and the set up of the workout. Alwyn writes for various magazines, including Men’s Health, and has various books out including “The New Rules of Lifting” for both men and women. His hands on wrecked us as well, and his lecture definitely gave me some exciting new insights on creating programs for my group classes.
I learned a ton of new concepts and ideas that has kicked up my game to the next level. After I spend some time digesting these thoughts, there will be an onslaught of new techniques for everyone!
Thanks again to all for the excellent experience!
My biggest take away from this weekend to all of you is – We should all be setting ourselves to a higher standard, expect more and be more everyday . . . and everyday be at least 1% better!
Stay strong,
Joey
