There is a famous (well, famous in my family) photograph of me jumping off a diving board when I was ten years old. It's a black and white photo that catches me in the middle of doing a belly flop or something - the look on my face is priceless - and it's famous because at that age, I had quite the belly for performing belly flops. You see, I was never that much of an athlete growing up. I played youth football, basketball, and soccer throughout my childhood, but I was never anywhere close to being the best player on the team. "Gym" was my worst subject, and I hated every minute of it. Sure, playing dodgeball was kind of fun, but I hated pretty much everything else about gym class. Every year, we were tested for the "President's Physical Fitness" award - I never came close.
For reasons that I don't remember, I signed up for after school intramural sports when I was in fifth and sixth grade. Boy's intramurals were coached by one of the fifth grade teachers, not our gym teacher. He also happened to be the sixth grade basketball coach. To this day, I remember something that he told us when we were going through basketball try-outs, "Every single one of you here is a member of my basketball team. If I see that you are working hard and giving me your best effort, I may move you up to play on the team." It wasn't much, and I doubt that he actually would have moved someone up that wasn't already on the team. What it said mattered an awful lot - he was telling me that "I mattered" and that he cared about each and every one of us. As a result, we gave him everything we had, even if we would never see time during a basketball game.
Fast forward to eighth grade - again, for reasons that I don't remember, I signed up for the cross country team. My father had recently started running, which may have been some of my motivation, but I was still overweight, slow, and incredibly out of shape. But I had another great coach - he pushed all of us to reach our absolute best potential. I was always the last one to finish the race (not just on our team, but the last one on both our team and our opponents). Coach was always there to cheer me on, even long after the rest of my teammates had finished. He even made sure that the rest of the team was there to cheer me on too. And no matter how tired I was, I would sprint towards the finish at the very end of the race. I remember something that has stuck with me - I remember it as if it happened yesterday, even though it actually happened over 30 years ago. It happened at the Fall Sports Banquet. He called each of us up, one at a time, to hand out the team awards and our letters. I was the last one that he called up. Coach looked around, smiled, and then looked at me. He started off by telling everyone there that he was going to give me a letter too. "You may have noticed that, like me, Derek isn't quite built for running cross country. But, I would like to give him this letter because no one tried as hard as he did, and no one improved as much as he did through the season. He was an inspiration to us all." Coach made me feel special. Coach made me feel like I was an important part of the team. And I - we all did - gave him everything that I had that season.
I ended up trying out for the 8th grade wrestling team that year too - I started out the season at one weight class, but ended up losing 20 more pounds and wrestled at a much lower weight class. And, I started getting in shape. All of a sudden, gym class was no longer difficult for me. While I was still not one of the top athletes, I was able to keep up with everyone else. I moved from well below average to slightly above average. I ended up finishing my 8th grade year as a long-distance runner on the track team. The track coach was our cross country coach. I was looking forward to it, until I found out that the long-distance coach was my 7th grade football coach, who wasn't a coach that had motivated me or acted like he cared who I was during football season. But honestly, he ended up being a great coach too. He was also my English teacher, so I think he got to know me both inside the classroom and on the track. I remember that I won some essay contest that spring, and he pulled me aside during practice to tell me that "one of his track runners won the essay" and how proud he was to have me on the team. I remember when I set a PR for the 2400 m run - he was the first one to tell me and I think he was really proud of me. He became a great coach for me that season.
It has been said that leaders must play a number of different roles - manager, mentor, teacher, and coach. I think great leaders have to be great coaches. Take a look through history - the greatest coaches are the ones who motivated their players to give them their best effort. The greatest coaches inspired their players to do things beyond the level of their talents, skills, and expertise. The legendary college football coach, Paul "Bear" Bryant once said, "No coach has ever won a game by what he knows; it's what his players know that counts." And if the players know that their coach is going to be there for them and supporting them, win or lose, through the peaks as well as the valleys, all the better.
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