The Work Never Stops, Part III

There’re three main reasons.

 

First, strength and conditioning training is an ongoing process. Athletes can take breaks, of course, but just because they may enjoy a three-month hiatus between the spring and fall seasons doesn’t mean they can slack on their preparation.

 

Summer, in fact, is a time that they can improve, sometimes incrementally, sometimes in leaps and bounds. If they want to realize their dreams and make an impact, summer is an interlude without school-sponsored competitive events that gives them time to do just that.

 

Second, since the departure of his colleague Chris Peoples in late June, Brown has been holding forth in the Kathy Watkinson Ivins Sports Performance Center and on the Karen Doxey Field on the Robins Campus by himself, so his days have been full and active.

 

Third, Brown simply likes what he does. He brings energy, enthusiasm, and dedication to his job of encouraging athletes to push through what some might call “the grind.”

 

So, yes, for Brown, the work never stops, but, talking to the Meadowbrook High School and Virginia Commonwealth University graduate, you get the feeling that he really doesn’t consider his job to be work at all.

 

One day recently, he was catching his breath between sessions and spoke of what he considers a calling.

 

“During the summer, the hours might be shorter and there’re fewer kids,” I offered, “but it doesn’t seem like you’re broken stride since school ended, especially since Chris left.”

 

“Our athletic director, Andrew Stanley, came to me one day and said, ‘Justin, you let me know what you need,’” Brown replied. “You were telling the kids one day, ‘Ask if you need help. Justin, take your own advice. Ask if you need help.’”

 

“So did you?” I asked.

 

“This has been a summer where we’ve had much more participation,” he said. “Girls attendance is up from our Upper School sessions. We’ve gone from maybe one or two girls at each training session to at least five or six, as many as eight.

 

“Before, we had sessions where we struggled to get 10 to 15 Upper Schoolers. I’ve had sessions where I’ve had 25 to 30. We have speed training sessions where our Middle Schoolers and Upper Schoolers come together. Just this past Tuesday, I had 42 kids.

 

“I say all that because when you can wake up and do everything that you love and see the kids’ faces when they get better, it’s not work. Is managing a bigger group by yourself hard?  Absolutely, but life is hard. Stuff comes up. It’s not work when you love what you do.”

“You mix demanding and positive very well,” I said. “The kids really respond to that. It seems like you take ownership for their performance and success.”

 

“Once again,” he responded, “I’m going to give a plug to my Andrew Stanley. We were having a conversation one day and I said, ‘Sports performance is my baby. I always want to make sure everything sports performance-wise is taken care of, put into the best light. Elevate it when I can.

 

“Stan challenged me, and it was a good challenge. He said, ‘Think about what you said, Justin. Do you really love the lifting of weights, or do you love the look on the kids’ faces when they see progress and when they get stronger and when they get faster and when they jump higher?”

 

“How did you respond to that?” I asked.

 

“I had this revelation, this epiphany, that it’s not the weights moving up and down,” Brown said. “It’s the kids being able to move the weights up and down. Sports performance…you’re not there to see weights go up and down. You’re there to see people get better. At the end of the day, we’re here to teach. We’re taking people who have no idea what they’re doing when they first come into a room, and you’re able to see their growth.”

 

“Your work is very much behind the scenes,” I commented. “You often labor in anonymity. They play the games. They’re in the public eye. You might be on the sideline, but not everybody understands that you played a role in preparing them for competition.”

 

“I love attention,” Brown said. “I’m an attention hog. I’m a showman at heart, but most people would never know by just seeing me. It feels good to not take the credit. Everything we do in this room, in sports performance, is to make the athlete shine.”

 

Brown mentioned that part of his job description includes training students in all three divisions.

 

“When I came in summer of 2021, shout out to Karen Doxey,” he said, referencing Stanley’s predecessor. “She said, ‘Justin, we can’t make you full time right now, but how would you feel about coming in an hour or two earlier and working with our Lower School kids?’

 

“I originally imagined, Oh, yeah. I’ll go out there and play football with the kids. I’ll play basketball. I’ll be the big fun teddy bear kind of guy.

 

“What I’ve taken from it is another chance to see growth. My first group of 4th graders are now 7th graders training with me this summer. I see kids who couldn’t do body weight squats and pushups in 4th grade who are now able to do goblet squats and dumbbell bench press, and I feel like I had a big part in that, and that makes me feel good.

 

“I’m seeing kids improve, seeing the growth in kids across the years. I’m seeing what I helped build, but I’m not making these kids. They’re making themselves.”

 

“Sounds like you’re still just as excited and passionate as you were when you began,” I said.

 

“Absolutely,” Brown replied. “It always goes back to my experience in high school. I wasn’t the best athlete. It wasn’t until I was able to get into a weight room and work on myself, get stronger, get better, get faster, that I saw the benefits that it brought, and I’m all about giving those benefits back.

 

“Not every kid is going to be a five-star athlete or a great varsity level athlete, but every child can improve. Being able to help these kids improve is what makes this job fun.”

 

He smiled, as he frequently does, then chuckled, then added, “Even when they get on my nerves a little bit, it’s always worth coming back the next day.”

~Weldon Bradshaw