A Small to Big Opportunity

It was my junior year in undergrad, and I had no idea what I wanted to do once I graduated. All I knew was that I wanted to stay in or close to athletics in some way.

My Kinesiology professor, Cisco Reyes, was the strength and conditioning coach for some of the teams at Concordia University. I had little knowledge on what strength and conditioning was at the time. Cisco posted on social media, “looking for 2 volunteers to help out with early morning team training.” I had a solid relationship with Cisco so I knew this experience would be valuable. I looked at this as a small learning opportunity to help me find what may be next for me. I reached out, expressed my interest then I was in.

First day on the “job” is coming up and I can’t sleep. I was eager and excited to start. My alarm went off at 5am and I thought to my tired self, “why did I want to volunteer for this?” I quickly eat a snack, sleep-walk across the street and into the weight room. I see Cisco with his shirt tucked in, looking over a sheet, jumping up and down, and absolutely ready to go! I am wide awake now. He is going over the session with me and telling me what to set up, then the team rolls in. They start their warm-up, get into their plyometrics, then lift. The combination of coaching and education to influence an athlete outside of their sport was super fun to watch. It all happened so fast and it was time to clean up the equipment. It was my time to shine. Cisco asked for my thoughts and all I could say was, “it was interesting, thank you!” I didn’t like to say much. I left and waited for the next session.

The next couple of sessions rolled around, and I was a master of setting up and cleaning up. With Cisco’s guidance, I started to apply some knowledge gained through my curriculum to better understand the what and why of the team sessions (lifting and conditioning). I felt like I was learning so much and making great progress. But then I was given the responsibility to help coach some exercises. “Man, I already have to present for class in front of Cisco and now I have to coach in front of him.” I was VERY nervous. I whispered coaching cues and provided too many of them to the athletes. They also could not hear me half the time. I said “good job” about 100 times in one session, which isn’t always the best feedback. I tried to coach so many different things at once. I struggled to find my coaching voice. 

But Cisco continued to hold me to a high standard and gave me feedback. His goal for me was to practice and find competence in what I want to coach within the session. This provided a simple process to being more comfortable. It allowed me to slow down and provide clear and concise feedback to the athletes. My coaching voice was much improved and very different from my first session of coaching. I earned the right to run a full session on my own and Cisco was my assistant for the day. I was ready. I took everything I learned and put it all together to lead a solid training session. It was very rewarding to see my progression because it helped me as a coach and student-athlete.

It started with a social media post, and I stepped into an unknown situation. That can be scary for anyone. I struggled. But I worked hard to be competent to build confidence. I moved on to the University of Portland for another internship then moved to Missouri for my grad school coaching opportunity. Now I am back at the University of Portland as a full-time sports performance coach. Cisco has played a big role in my personal and professional development and continues to do so. He gave a “small” but BIG opportunity which has brought me to where I am today.