Month: November 2024

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6 Great Health and Wellness Program Tips From 6 All-Time Great NCAA Coaches

There were six teacher-coaches who left an enduring impression on me during my undergraduate years at Indiana University (IU), Bloomington (graduated 1979). I took classes each of them taught, and observed and learned from them as coaches. The only way to describe these people is the best-of-the-best.

Here are their brief bios and six health & wellness program tips from me inspired by them, along with a short story on each person:

1. James “Doc” Counsilman: Swimming, won six consecutive NCAA Division I Championships. Olympic Coach 1964 (Tokyo) and 1976 (Montreal), coach of Mark Spitz both at IU and in the Olympics (seven gold medals). Doc was the first to use underwater video to improve a swimmer’s technique. Doc swam the English Channel at age 58. Coached at IU from 1957 to 1990.

Tip − Visualize. I often feel that a general tip, like “get more streamlined in the water,” pulls all the correct techniques together without the swimmer needing to think about each adjustment. Give people a vision, and they’ll find it easier to incorporate all the skills necessary to achieve that vision.

Story: About dealing with athletes’ parents, Doc once said, “the best coaching job in America would be at an orphanage.” There was also a time Coach Knight (basketball) asked Doc to help an IU basketball player improve his vertical jump. Knight told Doc the guy’s vertical jump was about one inch high. Doc said when he got through helping the basketball player, Knight complained the guy’s vertical jump was only 3 inches high. But Doc pointed out that was a 300% improvement!

2. Sam Bell: Track & Field, Olympic Assistant Coach 1976 (Tokyo). He coached 90 Hoosier All-Americans, including seven who went on to be Olympians. Coached at IU from 1970 to 1998.

Tip − Prepare and Work Together. Keep up on your strength training, always use dynamic stretching before intense effort, cool down gradually, change tempos, and pace one another. It’s OK to have high expectations of improvement from every level. Ease people into it, keep it interesting, and get everyone moving together.

Story: Jim Spivey was a sub-four minute mile runner at IU under Coach Bell. From ground level, a sub-four minute run looks like an average person’s all-out sprint speed, but held for the entire mile. I remember thinking the athletes seemed like human muscle cars.

3. Jerry Yeagley: Soccer, won six NCAA Division I titles from 1973 (when soccer became a varsity sport) to 2003. The all-time winningest coach in college soccer with 544 wins.

Tip − Attack and Defend as a Team. Don’t focus so much on calories, health risks, biometrics, and caloric intake. Instead, think about broader strategies. Play to your strengths, and use your field-of-play (community) to maximum capacity. Think about the best way to get everyone playing a role in building a healthful culture.

Story: Coach Yeagley may be one of the greatest coaches of any sport. We shared a locker room with his team. But my memory of him was that you would think he was the towel guy if you didn’t know him. He led by example, and the players revered him. The last thing IU’s soccer players were going to do is let their coach down.

4. Bob Knight: Basketball, won three NCAA Division I titles. Olympic Coach 1984 (Los Angeles). Won 902 NCAA games, the third all-time best in collegiate basketball. Coached at IU from 1971 to 2000.

Tip − Get Realistic. Quit being Mr. or Ms. Sunshine. Wake up and start preparing for all kinds of things to go wrong. And don’t come whining to me about “lack of engagement.” Get your @#%* out there and engage yourself. Be prepared to overcome every obstacle to success you can imagine. Use a disciplined, moving strategy that can keep everyone in the game regardless of any conceivable set back. Prepare to improvise.

Story: Coach Knight would often critique the questions coming from the press. You may have heard this too because he often said this to reporters, “That’s the stupidest ass question I ever heard, next question!” Coach Knight had some colorful language, but most of the time he was clear in his communication.

5. Doug (Blu) Blubaugh: Wrestling, Doug was (himself) an NCAA Division I Champion (1957), Olympic Champion in 1960 (Rome), and named Most Valuable Wrestler in the world that year. He was the toughest person I ever knew (I wrestled for him at IU and then was his assistant coach 1980 – 82). He was considered one of the best wrestling clinicians of the sport. He coached at IU from 1972 to 1984.

Tip − Stay Close. A wrestler who gets inside control and presses doesn’t have to move far to penetrate. Get your fundamentals down, keep on the attack, and then use your resources efficiently. It’s often the smallest of things that can make the difference between scoring and not scoring. If you stay close to the action you’ll appear quick and agile, but you’ll just be close at the right time.

Story: Coach Blubaugh was an Oklahoma farmer. At a time when he was in his physical prime, he went out into the field to retrieve a horse. The horse would run 50 yards or so and not let Blu grab him. So Blu just decided he’d run after that horse until the horse gave up. That run went on for the next 13 hours. After that the horse never ran from him again. Anyone that knew Blu knows that to be a true story.

6. Lee Corso: Football, you may know him as the popular host of ESPN’s College GameDay program. He’s the guy who puts on the school mascot head based on who he thinks will win the football game. He led IU to a win in the Holiday Bowl (1979). He may be one of the funniest men I’ve ever met. He coached at IU from 1973 to 1982.

Tip − Respect the Media. The media is the most powerful organization on earth. Learn to tell a story, use humor to engage, maximize social media, and realize communication is your most important asset.

Story: Laughter is what follows Coach Corso around. He’s fun to be around. Everybody is happy to be in his company. Not only is he funny, but he’s smart as well. We all learned a lot from him, and not for one minute did it feel like work.

Coaches want people to achieve at the highest levels of human physical capacity. They critique weaknesses, encourage strengths, always push for improvements, and expect a lot from their athletes. It’s natural that we take lessons from the top coaches for our daily lives. Hopefully, you’ll find a gold nugget in the six tips they inspired in me for your program.

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How To Find The Best International Travel Medical Insurance

The typical domestic travel insurance plans are not designed to function well with hospitals and doctors overseas, which can add to your frustration if you have problems while traveling. Your greatest financial risk while traveling outside of your home country is the possibility of having any health or medical problems. And international travel for business or pleasure keeps growing at a fast pace and is not going to change in the near future.

To reiterate, the most serious problem that international travelers face when on the move is the possibility of having a medical problem in a foreign country. The right international travel medical insurance goes a long way in taking care of the problem. International travel health insurance offers temporary medical or health insurance for US citizens and foreign nationals when traveling anywhere outside their home country.

When you get ready to choose a plan, first assess the requirements, the risks involved, the costs and various options that are available, and then make a compromise wherever necessary. When you do eventually travel, in case any emergency medical treatment is needed, have all the expenses listed in itemized bills to make a claim in the US. There are a few group insurance plans that are fairly cheap, and if you’re with a tour group or a visiting business delegation you could save quite a bit of money with group travel health insurance.

The time frame on your insurance policy needs to be restricted to the actual time that you’re out of the country; the shorter duration will certainly reduce the cost. Make sure that the insurance covers hospitalization, doctor bills and medications. When you go with a reputable insurance company, it will take the financial worry of horrendous medical expenses out of your travel.

Many of the international insurance companies have a multi-lingual staff and on-site medical staff that are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week for their policyholders for consultation and medical emergencies. There are international travel medical insurance plans readily available with a wide range of costs and benefits, and with different conditions available through several insurance companies.

Evaluating and treating someone who has met with an accident or become ill in an isolated place can be expensive. Choosing the right plan obviously involves taking some risks, but people who do so are rewarded because the cost of their travel insurance also becomes cheaper. Make sure that the coverage is in place before you go abroad.

Medical costs all around the world are skyrocketing, due mostly to the advances in specialized equipment and the cost of advanced medicines and also training specialists in a number of fields. Make sure to keep handy the addresses and phone numbers of the persons who are to be notified in the event you have to make a claim. Some international travel medical insurance plans don’t accept hazardous trips that include mountain climbing or skating.

If you already have travel insurance, check to make sure that it covers any major medical expenses, most do not. Whether you need coverage for a vacation or your relatives are visiting you from the old country, you want to make sure you have the proper coverage for any unforeseen major medical expenses.

Today you can easily get low cost or cheap international travel medical insurance quotes online. Make sure that evacuation coverage is included in your plan, because that can be a monumental expense. You don’t want to have to get someone out of a difficult location such as a cruise ship, mountain top or African safari without insurance because it can be costly. International travel health insurance is an important travel necessity for individuals and families when they live or travel outside their home country.

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The Pleasures of Adventure Tourism

If you are courageous enough to face dangers and are more than willing to explore new places, adventure tourism is the right choice to spend your vacations. Adventure tourism takes you to places where one is about to come across with the unexpected. One such place that can offer you with historical places, scenic beauty and true adventure would be Cincinnati, a city in the State of Ohio, United States of America. It is an unusual vacationing spot, and you will be able to reside in Cincinnati apartments. Cincinnati apartment rental is very nominal and it provides tourists with good quality service and living.

With several types of tourism prevailing worldwide, adventure tourism has its own niche. It is a fast growing sector of tourism and is making a trend worldwide for adventure traveling. People, especially tourists, prefer it over beach resort holidays. Adventure tourism adds the X-factor to your vacation holiday. Imagine riding a horse or cycling through some wine country or wandering in the deserts or walking through the deepest valleys of the Earth. Whatever experience you plan, it will be more than an adventure; it can be a life long memory to cherish.

The tourists who are willing to put their hands into adventure tourism can proudly become members of adventure camp community. They will get to meet the right people, and the right experienced tourists who will not only guide them around places but also will assist them with their experiences. A new adventure tourist needs to get associated with an organization that will guide him to places and will otherwise help him mature as a tourist. The choices of places and destinations are endless, but the only way one will know which place is the most suitable is through professional experienced guide. They make you look at the world in a different perspective. Your understanding of life becomes clearer and your visions broaden up.

Curiosity plays a very important role in adventure tourism. Until and unless one does not have that urge to explore new places and things, he will not be able to succeed professionally. The other quality which this activity requires is passion. If you lack the necessary passion, you won’t be able to enjoy your trip. One needs to have that determination and persistence to achieve and to win.

There are special vacation services that are usually offered to adventure tourists who wish to explore culture, history, soil and language. Although some tend to confuse adventure tourism with that of extreme tourism – also known as shock tourism as it involves traveling to dangerous destinations or the participation to dangerous events- the adrenaline rush one experiences as an adventurous tourist is of a lower risk level.

Wilderness is something that should not be taken lightly, especially when it risks one’s own life. One need to be physically fit and mentally strong but that does not mean that this is all what it requires. Adventure Tourism can be a lifetime experience to cherish only if properly handled.