The Neuroscience of Resilience in High-Performing Teens | Coach Sean Brosnan’s Mindset Method
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How Coach Sean Brosnan Built the Fastest High School Cross Country Team in History — Mind, Body, and Space
When Sean Brosnan took over the Newbury Park High School cross country program, the team hadn’t won a league championship in 21 years. Within four years, they weren’t just state champions — they were national record-breakers.
In this exclusive MindBodySpace Podcast interview, Coach Brosnan shares the mindset, recovery science, and intentional environment that took his runners from obscurity to dominance. His strategies apply to any high achiever — whether in athletics, academics, or the arts.
The Mindset Shift: “Don’t Hope — Decide”
One of Brosnan’s most powerful lessons: remove hope from your vocabulary.
“Don’t hope. Decide when you’re going to do it, and figure out how.”
By setting clear, ambitious goals and breaking them into actionable steps, Brosnan built an unshakable belief in his athletes. They didn’t wonder if they could win — they planned when they would win.
Key Mindset Strategies:
- Eliminate limiting language (“hope,” “maybe,” “if”)
- Replace with time-bound certainty (“when,” “how”)
- Build trust through honest feedback — never promising an athlete something they can’t achieve
- Celebrate progress but maintain hunger for the next level
The Body: Recovery Is as Important as Training
Brosnan’s athletes didn’t just run harder — they recovered smarter.
Core Recovery Habits:
- Sleep: 8–10 hours per night as a non-negotiable
- Hydration: Drink half your bodyweight in ounces before afternoon practice
- Iron Levels: Monitor and optimize for endurance performance
- Rope Stretching (AIS): Active Isolated Stretching before and after sessions to improve mobility and reduce injury risk
- Balanced Training Cycles: Hard effort days followed by proper recovery to maximize adaptation
Brosnan emphasized that small, controllable habits — like hydration and sleep — can dramatically improve performance without additional physical strain.
The Space: Environment Shapes Performance
Brosnan transformed team culture by making hard work “cool” and creating physical spaces that boosted focus and camaraderie.
How He Did It:
- Morning Practices: Optional 6 a.m. sessions became the “in” thing to attend
- Altitude Camps: 4-week summer trips to Big Bear, CA, for physical and mental benefits
- Event-Day Compounds: Custom tents with rugs, lights, music, and holiday décor to create a professional-level pre-race atmosphere
- Traditions: Team bonding through shared challenges (like cliff jumping) and celebratory rituals
“Why not create an atmosphere for them that’s so amazing they never thought they could reach it?”
Lessons for Parents of High Achievers
Whether your child is an athlete, musician, or scholar, Brosnan’s approach offers universal takeaways:
- Set Bold but Believable Goals — and break them into actionable steps
- Prioritize Recovery — teach sleep, hydration, and nutrition as performance tools
- Create a Positive Culture — make effort and discipline the “cool” thing
- Be Honest and Build Trust — credibility comes from delivering on promises
- Ask “Why Not?” — challenge limitations and expand what feels possible
One Practice You Can Start Today
Brosnan’s parting advice to parents:
Encourage your child to ask “Why not?” in the face of challenges.
“Why not be a state record holder? Why not perform at Carnegie Hall? Why not aim for your personal best? The moment you believe it’s possible, your actions change to match.”
Beyond Running: Applying Brosnan’s Methods Anywhere
Brosnan’s blend of mindset, recovery science, and space design works for any performance domain:
- Athletics: Build resilience, speed recovery, and enhance team cohesion
- Academics: Use recovery and mindset to manage stress and boost focus
- Performing Arts: Create mental and physical readiness through environment and rituals
The through-line? Total preparation in mind, body, and environment.
About the Guest
Sean Brosnan is the former head coach of Newbury Park High School Cross Country, leading the team to multiple national records and producing athletes like Nico Young, a 2024 Paris Olympian. His book, Beyond Fast, shares the journey and philosophy behind the team’s success.
📚 Order the book: Beyond Fast — available September 2 wherever books are sold.
📸 Follow Sean on Instagram: @realSeanBrosnan
Listen to the Full Episode
🎧 MindBodySpace Podcast — Sean Brosnan Episode
Learn the deeper details of Sean’s coaching philosophy, recovery protocols, and how to translate them to your own high-achieving child.
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Podcast transcript: AI Generated may have inconsistency
Once you say you can't do it, you use all that negative energy's there I think that's a big part of our success. We never had that at Newbury Park. We just wouldn't allow it. it wasn't in our vocabulary. it was like, okay, when are we gonna break the record and how are we gonna do it?
Not, oh, I hope we can do it. I always hated using the word hope. I was like, no, no, no. Don't hope. when are we gonna do it? it's a different mentality. I think that's been a big reason why those guys were so successful.
High achieving kids are so amazing, but they're also uniquely vulnerable. As a parent. How do we protect our driven children from anxiety, perfectionism, or even burnout? But more importantly, how can we give them that extra edge That helps 'em to push harder when they need it, but also gives them
the self-awareness that they need so that they can care for themselves for lifelong success and resilience.
Today's guest, Sean Brosnan,
Took a high school team from obscurity to national record performances, D one scholarships, with one alumnus, Nico Young Qualifying for the Paris Olympics in 2024. he says the secret to their record breaking success wasn't talent or relentless training, it was something deeper. So we're gonna dive in,
and today we're gonna share exactly how he built this extraordinary belief, the powerful daily habits, and an intentional environment that allowed these teenagers to thrive, not just as athletes, but as resilient, confident young adults.
Stick around to the end because Coach Brosnan reveals one simple practice.
You can start immediately to shift your child's mindset and improve performance. Whether you're child is an andathlete, a scholar or an artist trying to perform at their best. what you learn today will be applicable in their daily lives. Hi. I am Dr. Juna, a mom board certified physician, specializing in lifestyle medicine, Harvard trained educator, and the creator of Resiliency courses for the Julliard School. on our MINDBODY Space podcast, we always look at high performance through the lens of neuroscience and whole child wellness.
hi Sean. How are you?
I'm doing well.
great to meet you. Thank you so much for being here. And I wanna thank Joanna Pinsker of Simon Schuster for reaching out. And this is like, I think, a perfect fit for our podcast and our listeners.
We're not runners. a lot of the people who listen to my podcast are parents of high achieving kids, whether they're athletes or musicians or scholars, but. your coaching methods have a lot of relevance to what we talk about on this podcast.
and I've created the resilience program at the Julliard School.
Wow. That's great. For high performing
kids. That's, I use a lot of athletic training books for, you know, mental training and yeah. There's a lot of papers written on psychological training for athletes, not so much for classical musicians.
Right. So I borrow from that a lot. So I'm really excited for this conversation we're gonna have today.
Yeah.
And, I would love if you could tell us about how you got to Newberry Park. Then get to that story of what you did once you were there.
Yeah. Well, I was always a runner most of my life. you know, I ran in high school, I ran in college. I went to a smaller school in Colorado called Adams State University, in Alamosa, Colorado, south Colorado.
It was a division two program. Great program, really good history. And to be honest, it's probably one of the most winningest programs in US history. I, I'm probably getting this number wrong, but I think they've won over 60 national titles. so I feel like being there and being around that, I was around a family of runners growing up that it was always a big part of my life.
And then after college, I kind of veered off and did a few different things. You know, I got into sales for a while. I was very successful at that. then when I started, making my path back to running. I just had a different perspective, I think, and I went in at, running and coaching, maybe, I don't wanna say sales, but I just, I had this weird thing where I just didn't wanna set the boundaries.
and I wanted to set the bar really high. I think I was a failed professional runner. I was trying to run professionally on my own, and I couldn't make a living at it, but it was something I was very interested in. And I kind of tested the waters on myself with different training methods.
And, when I ended up in Newbury Park it was kind of by accident really. I made my way into coaching, you know, and I talk about it in my book. I basically saved up some money. And I made my way around the country and just kind of begged my way to hang around with some of the best coaches in the country.
And I knew who they were. And they let me, they kind of let me hang out, take some of the knowledge in. And I was like, if I'm gonna learn. I was a visual learner and I was like, I don't wanna read in a book of how to train. I wanna watch the best people do it.
And everyone thought I was crazy.
that
they thought I was crazy and I packed up my car and, you know, went to Oregon, was in North Carolina, Colorado. I spent times with all these different people on my journey, I met a coach by the name of Scott Simmons at this division two school in Queens University in Charlotte.
I was a volunteer coach there and I just kinda learned from him. And he was one of my bigger mentors when I first started. And then I, moved on and went to Oregon with these professional Nike groups and hung around the coaches there when the opportunity came to, start looking for actual, paying coaching jobs with universities and different opportunities that were coming my way.
my wife, who my girlfriend at the time, was finishing school. She, was getting a master's in hydrogeology and she got a really good job in Southern California, as a hydrogeologist, a engineering geologist. And it was an opportunity she didn't want to pass up. So I was like, well, let's move to this area in Newbury Park, a Thousand Oaks.
And I was like, I don't think high schools for me, but let me just see if I can help out a high school team and see what we can do. it happened quickly. I emailed about 12 different coaches in the area. Nobody got back to me except Newbury Park High School and the head coach was like, Hey, I'm retiring.
Like within like a couple years. We need a new head coach. Let's meet for lunch. And literally that day they pretty much hired me at Newbury Park. And, it started from there and I made a pact to myself and said, listen, I'm either gonna make the best team that ever was, or I'm probably gonna get fired for doing all these crazy things.
And we did, you know, I promised the team in three years, we would win. Oh, I said, in four years we'll win a state title if you do what I say. And we won a state title in three years and we won a national title in four and then went on to being the most winning team in history after that.
And it's kind of how I ended up, I tried to take the untraditional path and I just came in with a mindset like, Hey, I'm gonna take what I learned from some of the best pros. And gear it towards high school kids and stop these limitations that we all put ourselves and everything in life and everything that I look at and.
try to study myself. It's like we have these, boundaries that we set on ourselves and I just didn't wanna do that. So
amazed. it sounds like you're a lifelong curious learner.
Yeah,
definitely. And somebody who would just run around following people that are the best at what they do.
I really admire that. I try to do that myself. I loved this idea kind of had a map of people that you wanted to figure out or learn from them what they were doing. how long did that take you? Like a year.
Yeah, it took, you're
totally frozen, by the way, but it's okay. I can still hear you.
okay. Hopefully, yeah, it went blank on my side.
so yeah, I can hear
you.
Yeah, so I, that was a good, I mean, that journey was, you know, four or five years, honestly. I spent time with numerous coaches. There was another coach I spent time with. he held the American record in the mile for 25 years. He was also a successful coach at a collegiate level.
I spent about a year with him and around his program I just had a different way of going about it. I think I was like, I'm not, I don't wanna be a grad assistant and learn and then move up with one coach, and then eventually I'm coaching there and get a head coaching job or an assistant job.
I wanted to do it. I found my way and I said, you know. Ever since having a child, I learned like, it sounds silly, but visually and like I think, no, I don't
think that's silly at all.
To me, the coaching world and like dealing with people, even in sales, it's like the interactions you have face to face and the delivery and I talk about this all the time and it's like, you know, the cues that you get from watching people and knowing what to do in that moment is something I learned by being around them only that I couldn't read in a book.
And that's why I wanted to do it that way. And I just felt like that was the most important thing for me to do before I got to my own coaching when I was the head coaching successful athletes and stuff.
So did you have in mind that you wanted to be a coach? Was that the end goal or you were just learning for the sake of learning?
You know, it's funny you asked that because I think I had started that journey and I was in Charlotte, North Carolina with coach Scott Simmons, I was on a run myself still training as a semi-pro, I remember on the run, all I thought about was the kid we were coaching and the athletes.
I remember stopping my run after I was done going, yeah, I'm a coach now, not an athlete. I remember the switch happened where I cared more about the outcome of them than my own personal athletic journey. So I knew then that I was gonna coach. I just, tried not to put, an exact, like, I'm going to be in college by this year.
I wanted it to happen organically there was no set plan that might be scary for some people, but I just felt like I wanted to learn as much as I could. when the time came that I was the only coach in charge of the athletes, I wanted to make sure I was ready and comfortable with it.
So it was a little different than most.
no, I love it. you called it dumbing down, but honestly, I agree with you. So, , I know medicine as a physician, and I've learned about, resilience from a scientific background.
But I'm, also trying to simplify it so that I could give it to younger and younger kids, just like you're saying. And, it's not necessarily dumbing down, but it's making it more accessible to a wider age range.
right. I think these kids now are running like in the sport of track and field and cross country.
They're running so fast. the famous story in running is, Roger Banister in 1954 broke the four minute mile, and within that next year, multiple people did it. And I think that's what I saw happening even at Newbury Park. It was like we were breaking national records by a lot.
Like I was just telling someone earlier today, for example, the team average of 15 minutes flat was the national record for the 5K. we averaged 14. 14, I mean, wow. 45 seconds. That's a huge amount. And like, because we just, came in with a different mindset I remember telling the guys we can average under 14, 20.
when you first tell people that they think you're crazy, but once they start actually believing it and act like it's happened things, just become. and I know people get on me and think I can be kind of full of myself for saying that, but it's like.
Once you say you can't do it, you use all that negative energy's there I think that's a big part of our success. We never had that at Newbury Park. We just wouldn't allow it. it wasn't in our vocabulary. it was like, okay, when are we gonna break the record and how are we gonna do it?
Not, oh, I hope we can do it. I always hated using the word hope. I was like, no, no, no. Don't hope. when are we gonna do it? it's a different mentality. I think that's been a big reason why those guys were so successful.
Yeah. And also having those action steps, right.
To make it hope from hope to reality.
Exactly.
Yeah. So when you got there, you said, I'm gonna either make or break this and was it kind of like the bad news bears kind of thing?
Well, it's funny. Yeah. in a way it was so they hadn't won like a, a league championship in 21 years.
I don't think a team had ever gone to the state championship with this one school. so even just going to the state meet, qualifying for the state championship was a goal all in itself for them. But I wanted more. So it was a process.
I knew I couldn't get these guys to be, national champs within a year. Although we did it in four, which was pretty amazing. they had a different mindset. Like running wasn't serious to them. They didn't wanna put the work in. I think when you, when you create that culture that everyone understands, like what the goals are too, it's like mm-hmm.
People, it became cool at Newbury Park to put the work in. Like if you weren't showing up at 6:00 AM practice in the morning, which was optional, you weren't part of the cool crowd. Like, instead of like, other teams are like, I don't want to get up at six, I don't want to do that. it's creating that atmosphere and I think that's the connection that I talk about that I learned from some of the best, coaches in the world.
It was like, you know, it's not the workouts. we all can figure out workouts, but at the end of the day, how can you get this athlete to believe in it? And how do they trust you that they want to do it? and I think that's where like, I don't know if I can give an exact science of it, but I know that it works.
And when your athletes start believing in it, it makes a big difference. When athletes tell me that, like, oh, I have a goal of running this time. It's like, okay, but what are we gonna do to get to that time? I'd rather have the goal of like, day in, day out, I wanna know the hard work and like that's, the movie changed and yeah, it went from like being this team that no one talked about the first year, you know, we got to the state meet and that was like our Olympic moment making it to the state meet.
But we were ninth and I was disappointed that they were excited about being ninth and I wanted them to celebrate and have fun, but there had to be some mindset change after that. And, you know, with the young group of kids coming in that I felt were talented, it's like, you know, within a couple years we were, at the national level.
and that's where I think it changed for us.
Wow. So let's recap. So you get there, And you start to change their mindset around what's cool and what is the in culture Yeah. As far as like hard work and, I guess you made the training fun, right?
You made a difference in some way to encourage them, motivate them.
Yeah. I mean, I think coming in with the knowledge I had and being around a lot of post collegiates, I think they automatically kind of respected, you know, from my background and who I've been around. But I don't know, I don't even know how to put a finger on it.
I think it's cool to win and you wanna be the best at what you do. But there was just a lot of positive atmosphere around the team all the time. And that wasn't just a given. that was hard to create because there's also some pushback, you know?
Some parents were like, well, why do you practice in the morning? Why do you guys want to go to, I mean, we went up to altitude in the summer for a month straight. So that was, wow. No, no other high school teams are doing that now. Now there's other high school teams that do it because we at Newbury Park was famous for doing that.
Yeah. There's, red blood cell enhancement, that is why you want to go there and stuff. But it was the team atmosphere that we created there that said, Hey, if you guys are willing to leave your summer for four weeks to come up to altitude and train with your teammates, that's a big deal.
We had JV guys that weren't making the top traveling team, but they wanted to be good. And they showed up every day and worked just as hard as my top guys. And I think it was just a positive atmosphere. And there's always some, you know, the black sheep in the group and things you have to change and people that didn't fit in maybe and had to choose another sport.
But at the end of the day, I realized they were just high school kids, but it's like. Why not create an atmosphere for them that's like so amazing something that they never thought they could reach. And that's a great thing when you see an athlete like, man, when they get to the pinnacle of the high school running national level and it's like they never thought they can be.
It's a cool thing as a coach to see. So
Is that where you guys were jumping off rocks? 20 to 30 feet high?
Yeah. that's somewhere else. Our famous like, yeah that was part of a little bit of our tradition there, where everyone would jump off the rocks in Big Bear Lake, California, and so we would go up there.
It's roughly 7,000 feet, like 6,900 feet, 7,000 feet. So it's a great place to train where you can get, short-term benefits. Like you go up there for about, they say the 28 to 35 days is like the perfect to get the red blood cells you need to benefit you for months in advance. But, We would go up there and we had a lot of fun too.
Like we'd go out on boats, we would jump off the rocks and yeah, we were training hard and doing a lot of other stuff, they're still kids. I mean, even when you're adults, you still gotta have fun in life and still do these other things it's not just serious running and school every day.
that's so interesting to me. 'cause when I think about running, I don't necessarily think of it as a team sport, but I guess it is,
Cross country's a little more I think because it's like a team.
There's team scoring. You know, you have seven guys that run five score. if you get first place, you get one point. If you get 20th place, you get 20 points. So like the team with the lowest score wins. and that's where we broke, I mean, a lot of different records and like, you know, with our low scores and close to perfect scores at the national championship for one team, we went 1, 2, 3.
Six, we have four at a national championship where everyone in the country is there. my individuals in my team finished first, second, third is Hick's Place, which is amazing. three of those guys broke the individual national record in the same race, you know?
Wow. So it's, stuff like that. But I think, we definitely came in with these goals. Like when people would interview me the year before that, I was like, Hey, we wanna rewrite the history books and we want to change the way people look at, fast times in high school.
And some people didn't take that the good way and some people did. I knew what they were capable of 'cause I was seeing it every day. So I was saying that with confidence, and I am a big thing with my coaching, I never tell an athlete they can do something. They can't. And so when I tell 'em they can do something, I actually do truly believe they can do it.
Otherwise, it's, you're in some muddy waters telling someone they can do something that they can't and I don't wanna do that. but I would tell someone, I was like, you're not ready to do that, but if you do this, this, and this, you will be, and let's get there.
And it's like, they know I'm honest with them and I think that's a good thing too.
yeah. No, that's so important, to have that trust. 'cause you don't wanna just, exaggerate things, right, because then it doesn't come true. and the confidence falls.
Right. And if you have exact, that's exactly it.
Because if once you start telling people they can do something and they do it, then now the belief's even more in you as a coach. Like, they're like, okay, I can do this. Like, he wouldn't tell me this otherwise. But if you don't, I mean, if you start telling a team they can do stuff and they never can, they never accomplish those goals.
Like, I, I just think as a program and a coach are in trouble. So you gotta definitely can't be like that. I think.
So do you think that like some of it was, chicken and the egg, like what came first? So when you started having this elite mindset, do you think that more talented kids joined the track team?
It a little bit.
anywhere like you could do this with any team?
Well, that's funny you asked that. 'cause I actually, I did this clinic once and there was like some high school kids and coaches and they were asking questions like a q and a and, and somebody asked me, this one girl asked me, she's like, if you were at so and so high school, do you think you would win a national title?
And I said, yes, I would. And she was like, well you didn't even hesitate. I was like, well listen, if to me, if you have 1500 kids in a school, like an average size high school in California, 'cause they're fairly big high schools in California. the talent is there.
math, you're just doing the probability of the talent there.
Right. I think everybody can be good. I think it's easy to be good. It's hard to be great, but you don't even to win. I don't even think you need to be great sometimes. everyone needs to be good. we were lucky that we had everyone be great and we did a lot to gear towards that.
But to win a state title, it was no doubt in my mind we would win one in four years. And I didn't even know the talent then. I just walked into this room and was like, we're gonna win it in four years if you do what I say. And some people, I guess a bold statement for a team that's never made it to the state meet.
I'm like, we have 2000 kids in this school. There's no way we don't have talent that can do this. And just being around, like, I know what high school running is. And I just think high school kids weren't running fast. 'cause I don't think they were doing, I didn't believe they had the right mindset or they were doing the right things to run fast.
Mm-hmm. And we're seeing it now, and I'm not saying it's a hundred percent 'cause of Newbury Park that I don't want them to take the claim for that. But even since Newbury Park, the times have just taken off, like what kids are running now in high school.
'cause I think people are seeing it's possible and they know it's possible now.
phenomenon. Like you see somebody do it. Like you were talking about, the 4.0 mile, right?
Yeah.
Once you break that, everybody else, feels like it's possible you can do that.
Yeah. Right. I mean, even one of my athletes, Lex Young, he broke the national record for the 5K and three weeks before he broke it, someone else broke it and he broke it from like, so this guy, that record hadn't been broken in like 15, 20 years,
This one guy breaks it and then Lex breaks it three weeks later then a year later, someone else broke it. It's like, that's Wow.
What's the fastest time now? Um,
Lex ran 1334 for a 5K, in high school.
And it got broken in the 1320s now. I think it's 1325. I mean, those are top collegiate at one point. Those are top professional times. And I think a high school kid is not as developed as a full adult, so it's a little different.
there's a famous saying by, a pro runner, his name's Ryan Hall, and he once said, the human body's capable of a lot more than we think. And that always stuck with me. I think physically it's capable of a lot more than athletes or coaches give it credit for.
And I don't mean you have to kill yourself to do this, I just mean we're capable of more on that day in that race. if you can get in that right, frame of mind, I think you'd be shocked what we can do.
that's a great segue because next I wanna go into the body part, My company is Mind, body Space. Yeah. And I feel like you embodied all of these things in your training and your coaching to get these kids to where they are so we're dealing with mindset. Just to recap, you made them believe that they could do it. You set a culture, you had them bond with each other, and it was kind of fun and exciting, right?
Yeah,
exactly. And
then you all, you probably had, um, over all the time you spent with the elite coaches, you probably came up with new training methods that weren't tried in high school before, like you were saying. So with the body part, did you look into diet or anything, or was it, or sleep or recovery, or was it, the fact that we're running faster and faster now, maybe it has something to do with science and the advances in understanding or human physiology better?
I don't know.
No, I think that all of those things, you know, for instance, when I was in high school, I felt like it was so basic. Like, I mean, I'm dating myself and gonna, you know, say like Doritos and, yeah, in the nineties, right? but even the warmup or you talk about recovery, that's actually.
I used to tell my athletes, I'm like, listen, unfortunately, there's professional athletes out there that cheat, they do illegal things in sports in order to recover. Because if you want to get faster, recovery is key. because if you could work out hard every day, that would be amazing, but you can't because your body can't physically recover.
And that's why you even take a sport like swimming and running, swimming, there's no pounding on the body. So you could actually work harder more often than you could with running where there's more pounding. So recovery was a huge thing with me and these little things sound so silly, but like hydration, you know, it's I read all these studies from MMA fighting and how hydration is so important and it started triggering in my mind, like you spoke about earlier, like when I go into my rabbit holes and start doing research and studies and I look at this stuff and I can't take it as a hundred percent sometimes, but.
It's like hydration was a huge thing with Newbury Park. Recovery was a huge thing. I mean, we used to talk about sleep and hydrating, and it sounds so basic, but so many people don't do it. There's so many high school kids getting five, six hours sleep. That's just not efficient. If you want to be the best in the country and you want to do something that nobody else has done.
I used to always tell my athletes before you showed up for afternoon practice, like, you know, from the time you wake up to the time you show at our 2 30, 3 30 practice in high school, take your body weight and then cut it in half and then drink that in ounces. So if you're 120 pounds, you're drinking 60 ounces of water before practice.
And I used to, they were honest with me and I wanted to know, because it's like, well how serious are you about this recovery process or hydrating process? You know? And those are ways to get faster without actually running harder. And that's the truth. and everyone knows that.
It's like we talk about sleep all the time. But it's still neglected, even on pros. Oh yeah. And, and I don't understand. And it's like, if you can, those are things you can control without having the talent, without having the hard work ethic. It just, if you can just control those things, it's not gonna make you a national champ, but it's gonna make you better, you know?
Amazing. What about, recovery as in stretching or like yoga or Pilates? there's this one technique that I swear by, it's called Active Isolated Stretching. I don't know if you've ever heard of it.
Well, uh, that's, uh, it's a very crazy say that, that's, we do rope stretching and the guys, that's it. A IS rope stretching.
Yeah. Well, well, Jim Wharton and Phil Wharton. Yes. I learned that directly from those guys, and we used that with all my programs and all my athletes. my,
he did my PT for me.
That's so funny. I went
to him, was it Jim? Phil? And I learned it all. It was Phil, the dad.
Yeah.
Well, because his son
was a long distance runner.
Yeah, exactly.
Phil was an architect. Right. And then he switched into PT because he wanted to help his son who has scoliosis. And he was running like a hundred miles a week.
right. he fixed
though
those guys are the reason we rope stretch.
I mean, they, oh my gosh, I can't
believe it. Oh yeah. No,
we, there's a camp that I go to every year. I'm going in about three more weeks back in New York. it's, it's called the Running School in upstate New York. And it has like 550 high school kids.
They don't go anymore. But for years they would go and they would teach this rope stretching stuff to all the kids. And I'll be honest, this was like 20 years ago and I was like. you don't need to do all that. And then as I was going through everything, I said, you know, there's something to this. And then I spent more time with him and I, we do it religiously with, with all my athletes.
and to me, some of the top collegiate coaches went now actually, like, who I consider a friend, Mike Smith, who was one of the top collegiate coaches at Northern Arizona University where some of my athletes from Bury Park went, who's now coaching professionally, he does the same thing. And it's like, we had that in common.
I'm like, oh, the Whartons. He's like, yes. And I think it, it's so important, and I tell everyone, and any, any athlete that like, you know, that stuff is a huge part. Obviously we do it throughout the day, but we have routines. And when you, you do rope stretching, you do your short warmup, then you come back and do dynamic drills.
But it's all part of our routine and those things are so important. And if you ever get into deep conversations with Jim or Phil, it's like they know what they're talking about. And these guys have pretty much like. I don't know. It is funny. I think if you call stretching, they might get mad at, they call it the act of isolation, you know?
Yeah. AIS yeah, exactly. So anyway, that's a big part of our program at Newbury Park. And you know, people would always ask like, what's with those ropes? you see other, I see other teams do it, but a lot of 'em aren't doing it correctly. They just kind of get ropes and swing their legs. But if you do it correctly, it's, a huge benefit.
It's all again, and that helps with recovery too, but it also helps for proper warmup, which was a huge thing that I'm into too. And like I've learned from our full warmup that we do at Newbury Park that I've always taught my athletes, it comes from a lot of different coaches. And part of it is rope rubing.
It's kind of crazy
amazing. This is so cool because nobody ever knows what I'm talking about. I use this with a lot of my students also. 'cause I work with athletes, fencers tennis players, you know, and I've taught it to them. And I also cured. Some of my patients because they had back problems. Right. I learned it from one of my patients. She was a dancer. Wow. She's a pre famous Broadway dancer, teacher, coach, and she fell through floors during Oh my gosh. The construction phase of Brownstone. And she broke her back and that's how she ended up with the Whartons.
And she swore by it. And that's how I found out about it. She used to have DVDs, showing the method.
Yeah. it's funny, I think the Whartons have stuff out there. They have DVDs.
they have actual DVDs.
Like you have to put it in a slot. yes.
It makes it harder.
one guy who has Vimeo videos that I recommend to all my students, and he recently went offline. He was like very old. I don't know. They're very old videos. But they worked.
I have Lex and Leo, we have on a YouTube thing, but it's a private link.
we just never made it public that you should share
it with me.
Yeah, exactly. 'cause a lot of my athletes I'll send it to and I'll say, Hey this. and then when we start working together, at least they have an idea of what we, you know, 'cause it's a good way to tell people, or even when I do clinics or talk at a camp and kids ask me and if I'm not at the running school, I, you know, I'm like, Hey, like here's, a simple form of what we do at Newbury Park.
'cause I'll explain it. Wow. And it just has 'em go through it. And you know what, I always, I love this. Yeah. That's funny. Yeah. I've dug
Into the science of it also. it's basically, getting blood flow rushing into that area. There's like a few papers that I have that I'll send you if you're interested.
That's pretty crazy. I mean, like you said, I love this. When you talk to the Whartons, it's like, why isn't everybody doing this? You know? It's like, it makes sense. It's crazy.
One of the people he cured was my husband. He had a horrible disc. And I gave him the stretches and it cured him.
That's
what, yeah. It, it's amazing. So what else would you recommend what else did you do as far as body when you were at, Newberry?
recovery was a bit again, sleep recovery. What about food? You know, it's hard. it gets a little touchy sometimes.
You know, even when I was coaching in the NCA, like what you could recommend and not recommend. I always tell the story. When I was at I actually got in trouble for telling an athlete not to drink Gatorade all day because of the sugar, They don't want you to tell an athlete not to have any certain type of product.
And I thought, okay, you gotta be really careful. I just meant that why is that? I don't know. I just think they worry about the athlete will have a complex and not do, you know, and not,
oh, take,
I just was recommending just don't drink sugar all day.
Yeah. And also it
has dye in it and
Exactly.
what? Or we, or some schools I know, they would give them like little gummy candies as we're, I'm like, how is this in the gym? but again, like me and my wife eat, we eat very clean and like, we don't have a, I mean everything from like, we don't even do seed oils or dairy and a lot of different stuff, Do you believe in
the vegan recovery?
I, we've never done that. I mean, everyone.
I just wondered.
yeah. No, we do nothing like that. But it's like, I've always tried to walk a,fine line of like with diet, with athletes and kids and like what we recommend. one thing we did though is we really focused on, your iron level and make sure your levels are high.
It was a hard thing to do in high school. Like obviously I'm not taking these kids to get blood tested, but I would talk to their parents. I would share the knowledge that I had and how important it was, you know? 'cause I think a lot of times for an athlete, you know, if you get your levels taken and if people know anything about that who are listening, it's like, you know, a 15 or 20, they might be like, oh, I'm fine.
But an athlete needs, I would say, needs to have a higher level. And I know it differs from women and men and different things like that, but
mm-hmm.
That's something that we always did and we were really into like just if the parents were okay with it, making sure they got a full panel of blood test, and making sure all the levels were correct and good because that's gonna help you recover.
You know, you're gonna have a hard time recovering with low iron levels and like, especially when we went to altitude. So these little things do add up to big things, that was what I learned from Scott Simmons who was at Queens University. his athletes would get tested once a month. And I would, as, as a semi-pro or trying to run as a pro, I would make sure my levels were good. And, you know, I felt like, I thought I had mono at one point and my iron was just super low.
And just getting it back up was unbelievable how I felt. So I take all those things into consideration. we always try. And what
did you eat a lot of spinach or like meat or,
well, I mean, I, I supplemented, I took iron supplements and I just took it with, B12 vitamin C and made sure I didn't take it with any dairy.
So that would, it would help raise it quicker, but that's how we mainly did. And then obviously iron as much as you can. I mean, that would be the best way, but sometimes it's really hard to get it in actual food form all the time. but you're just putting your body through so much as a top athlete.
Even these top high school athletes. I mean, some of the workouts that they're able to do, it beats up on you so you Have to figure that out. and that's what a lot of complaints come in where they think, oh, you're training these high school kids too hard. I never thought we were, I just thought we were training smarter.
You know, everyone's still got one day a week off and we usually didn't run Sundays. Some kids jogged easy on Sunday, but yeah, we just made sure we do all the little things to add up to the big things, and I think that was a big difference too.
And the mind is a big portion of stuff too, recovery the number one thing I don't think people emphasize enough in high school for sure. You know?
But then when you're pushing your body, you wanna push past the limit, right.
And do different, like mix up the workouts. I mean, we're gonna go on to the space soon 'cause I know you do care about the environment that your athletes are in. But I just had that one more question about the body. Like do you push past your limits and then you mix up the workouts or what, what is the latest thing?
Yeah. Well I mean I've been known for like, I feel like my coaching style is like, I always say go to the, well, like I think it's, I think you gotta pick your battles wisely and you gotta figure out those days. 'cause it's all about like callousing the system and like the body gets used to it. You know, there's a big trend nowadays where people are taking the lactate test and the lactate levels are doing little blood, you know, samples as they're running to make sure they're the mill moles or a three or four or whatever they're looking for.
But at the end of the day it's like, you know, a great, one of the most winning coaches of all time once told me, he's like, Sean, and this guy's coach Olympic gold medalist tons of medalists. He's like, Sean, at the end of the day, I gotta teach this athlete how to run the last 400 at this pace.
I don't even care sometimes what the levels are like. Yes, they're a measure, but they can't be the a hundred percent of how you train because I'm big into callousing the system. I guess it would be like a simplistic way of saying it. And like, I, I want my athletes, I like to develop my athletes in training more than I do racing.
I know a lot of coaches think that I didn't race my athletes enough, but I was like, well, we pick our battles wisely when we race. We race. I think you can learn more in training than you can racing at the national level of a high school, like in the beginning stages when you're a freshman, a sophomore and you need to race more and get the feel of things.
I get that. But when my top guys were breaking national records, we just didn't race a lot. but when we raced it, it meant something. And I think for training. I just think, you know, you gotta, it's like, you know, kind of like a, like a balloon in a way. Like you gotta blow it up sometimes and you gotta callous the system and you gotta teach your body to run with that acidity and run with that lactic acid and all that, and then eventually it becomes easier.
to me, that's a simple way of explaining it, but it's like, as a coach, you gotta find those fine lines of when you're training somebody too hard, too little or just right. And that's where I think coaching comes in, where if you read from a book like, okay, follow this program, it's hard because I like to watch my athletes.
Like we would warm up and I'd be like, all right, we're not gonna do this, we're gonna do that. And I would change it and they would trust me just from watching 'em because I could tell, I was like, this isn't gonna be good. or we messed up as coach it. There's times that I've had to stop workouts and I've been like, guys
I got too excited like this. We gotta pull back on this workout. But they trusted me enough to be like, okay, you're right. like they're not gonna question it. 'cause when you get an elite athlete, they're like, no, I wanna finish a workout, I wanna do this, I wanna do that. And sometimes it takes a bigger athlete or more courage to say, Hey, I'm gonna stop.
I don't need to do that much. And that's where you have to find that fine line. You know? And I'm not saying we didn't train hard, 'cause we train hard, but, you just have to find those fine lines.
I love that because everybody's so individual. And even that moment is individual. But I just want, I just remember watching the documentary with Hussein Bolt and he's training until he throws up all it.
Right. I mean, and you have some of those days, you know, we don't have those often, you can't do those too often, like physiologically. No, your body doesn't have enough of those. But, you know, every once in a while I think it's like, you gotta train harder than racing.
And I think that's important. Like, if you wanna break four minutes in the mile, you have to average 60 seconds per quarter mile. Right? So you gotta train faster than that. And some people don't have that philosophy, you know, and it's a combination of everything. you gotta train your aerobic system, you gotta train the speed developmental stuff, you know, as far as like training stuff, like we did speed year round.
And a lot of people don't do that. They do a base phase in the summer, they're not doing much speed. Well, we did fast, fast stuff year round at Newbury Park and a lot of programs do that too. But it's just something that I think, you know, they benefit from because it's all progressive. It's about the body getting used to doing certain stuff
You know, if our season, ended in December, the beginning of December was our end of our cross country season, and it starts in September. it's all progressive. your hardest month of training is October, November. And then you get ready to race your fastest in December.
Mm-hmm. Interesting. Okay. So now space, I saw that story where you went and bought a tent
the national Yeah,
the national championship. So when we went to races at Newbury Park, as we were getting really big, like, this was in the high school world, there'd be kids lined up for pictures, signing stuff, we went to races in New York City at the Armory, which is a famous indoor track.
Mm-hmm. And they would have to get us like, I don't wanna say security, but they would have to put us in a room. Away from everybody else because there'd be too many kids asking for pictures and different things from our athletes and so forth. but when we went to the running lane, the Cross Venture Championship in Alabama in 2021, it was something I probably did for the past two years before that where like I would make sure our compound or our area where we had our team, we had huge tents and we had walls and zip up walls and made sure that we had our own place to just kind of get away and just all that distraction and 'cause to me it's just, that was our focus time.
you know, we came there for business and that, and when we showed up and we wanted to, and that was a race where we, you know, annihilated the national record and did all these great, great things. And that was kind of, that put us on the map as like being the greatest high school team ever in cross country.
at least in cross country, if not other sports. And I think, yeah, creating that space for them was really important. And it may sound like something simple, but it was a big deal. The day before I was kind of freaking out. I was like, man, I gotta figure this out, because they don't have a setup for us where some races have your own little tents.
They didn't. And I was like, we need to figure this out. And we need to make sure they have their own place to set up and, and, and think and, and focus before the race.
The other aspect of it was when we'd go to certain races in high school, there's this race called the Arcadia Invite.
It's like one of the biggest track meets in the country every year for distance runners. And like, I would take two days to set up the tents there because I wanted to create such an atmosphere where we had multiple tents that was in this big area. And then we had a little, like a courtyard in the middle of them.
And it's, I mean, people would walk by and be like, oh my gosh, this is nuts. But I wanted to create a place for the, and we put rugs down, we had lights, and like, it was a big deal to set up. We had to have parent volunteers help. And like I said, I'd go days early to help set it up. And everyone's like, well, why do you do this?
we're only here for five or six hours, a couple days, and that's it. And it's like, you know. I just want this, if you're comfortable and you feel good, it's such a, it's creating an atmosphere that no other team did, and that everyone, they felt so proud to be part of Newbury Park or to have this really cool area to relax before the race that even parents can sit and hang out.
I mean, it was nuts. we had music and I think we even had a battery powered thing with a blender one year where, parents were making smoothies. It's like that we just wanted a, a, we wanted that atmosphere and I think, we were probably a little bit over the top, but that was the point.
if we're willing to do this for you guys, they understand the importance of what they're trying to do.
And now are these things that you just thought up of on the fly or was this something planned from being with those coaches?
Yeah, well, no, that was kind of on the, I don't wanna say on the fly, but like, when I first got to Newbury Park, you know, I talk about this in my book too.
It's like my first year at Newbury, we didn't even have a team 10. We would just like throw a tarp on the ground. None of our uniforms, like, like our warmup, uh, our warmup uniforms, our actual uniforms matched, but like our, our, none of our warm offs matched. They, they just didn't look good. Like we would show up and we'd be wearing like, non-school colors.
I'm like, the kids would be wearing like sandals. They wouldn't even have their running shoes on yet. I'm like, this is a mess. Like thi this is, we're not in the right mindset coming in. So I think I took it to the extreme and I was like, you know what, not only are we gonna get rid of this tarp, I'm gonna make the best tent, I'm gonna have the best atmosphere that any other school had.
I mean, we had a tradition at Newbury Park at the state championship. We would wake up at four o'clock in the morning, we'd go to the meet with the parents and all the coaches and we would set up a Christmas tree because, Thanksgiving weekend was our state championship. We would set up a Christmas tree and garland around our tent and we would hang stockings with all the kids' names on it.
So, and again, it sounds kind of corny, but they would show up and everybody, all the other teams would think it's the coolest thing. I wanted them to be proud of what we had, you know, and if we had to wake up at four in the morning, who cares? But like, some people like, ah, I don't wanna do that. It's like, we just didn't care.
I was like, no, we're gonna do it and we're gonna make this the coolest team intent that you've ever seen. So that was like another reason we did it just for that, that environment.
this is amazing. I think you hit all the spots, the mind, the body, and the space, and you supported them to another level.
And I can understand why you've had so much success, to be honest. Your attention to detail. All of that is just, so validating, you know, with the results that you got.
Yeah, I mean, I always told them, I said, listen, there's gonna be no other coach that's gonna work harder than me.
and I always thought if I worked harder than any other coach that I ever thought of or saw that there's no way we had any choice but to be one of the best teams. And that's what I did when we went to Altitude Camp for a month, up in Big Bear, California, you know, I'm away from my family.
It's hard for me too, but like, you know, I remember one year 'cause all the kids had rooms and beds and I have to stay in the house and obviously make sure they're fine. Like, I slept in a closet 'cause it was the only place for me. and everyone's like, that's crazy. I'm like, I don't think it's that crazy.
Like that's the least I can do to have like, if, if they're, if they're gonna show me the focus and dedication to giving up their summers so they could train with their friends and becoming the best team in history. Then sleeping on the floor in a closet is not a big deal. Like, it's not the end of the world, you know?
And that's how I looked at it. So, wow.
You're giving me a lot of, uh, mom vibes. I mean dad, dad vibes.
Yeah.
Do you have kids?
I don't. I have cats, so, yeah.
like a natural parent.
Amazing. And you don't have to have kids to be an amazing parent. I mean, you're a coach,
right?
So, and I always say you can coach your own brain too, right? A lot of us didn't have great parents. We can end up coaching ourselves,
Well, yeah. I mean, it's like even everything that I created for my team.
at Newbury Park. I was like, it was what I wish I had in high school. Not that I had a bad experience, but it was just a, you know, basic team. we had a really, actually, I went to high school in Long Island, New York, Wantaugh high School. Yeah. And, you know, most people know it Jones Beach in that area, but like, the girls were state champs.
The guys, we weren't a very good team. I was an individual qualifier. I was like the one who would qualify, but the rest of the team wouldn't for the boys. But, so we still had a good program, but I always like was jealous of that team that had everything, you know, and that's what I wanted to create in Newbury.
I wanted it, that, plus I wanted everything, like 10 times better and like, it, you know, if someone, I'd rather someone try to pull me down and say, okay, enough's enough than to be like, wishing I would do more for them. And that's, that's kind of the way I looked at it.
I love it.
if you're gonna leave parents with. Something that they could start doing right now, whether, they're an athlete or a performer or they're just trying to, raise a resilient child, what would you tell them?
Honestly, if I had to say anything, it's like, to stop setting limitations on stuff.
It's like, I think when a kid comes to me and they see that, you have that belief in them. it may sound like I always say this all the time and I overuse the line, but it sounds so cheesy, but it's so true. It's like, I loved as a kid or as a college athlete or even a semi-pro, when you talk to someone and there's that positive reinforcement, as simple as that is that's what you give these kids and that's the only advice I could probably give.
I mean, I'm not technically a parent, but, you wanna, you wanna have them, be able to have them go to you To get positive reinforcement or like encourage 'em to do something out of the norm. Like, it's okay. You don't have to be like everybody else.
Like, why not be great? I always say my big thing is why not? I was doing a talk at a camp last week and I was telling these guys, why not? Why can't you be a state record holder? Why can't you go to the state championship? Why can't you go to the national championship?
Why can't you get faster? Just start asking yourself, why not? And it's like, that's it. It's just, I just really think if people had that to go to or if you could give that advice to someone coming to you, I think it can make a huge difference. You might not think it, but I think sometimes you just need to trigger that one thing and that can change the way they look at things.
So the support and the encouragement and maybe the tools
100%. Yeah, that's what I
think. Okay. tell us about your book now. So this awesome, copy from Simon and Schuster, so thank you. It's great. So tell us when you were launching the book or where people can find you or find more about you.
Yeah, the book is called Beyond Fast. pre-sales are open now, so you can get it anywhere. Books are sold. it's available anywhere online, which is great. this was one of these things where I always joked, I'm like, oh, I'm gonna write a book one day, but I don't want it to be a running book.
I don't want it to be a training book. Although there is training in the book. To me I think to sum it up, it, it really is like, I want, I want people to read this book and, I guess I'll back up when I watch a movie about something that isn't running because running's my thing in coaching it inspires me to be a better coach.
Like, I was like, okay, that was a great movie. So this book, I want people to read it that run, that don't run. And I want it to inspire them like, hey, there shouldn't be any limitations. You should be able to do what you want. it's just a mindset type thing. And I think that's what it is and it's my journey it starts in high school from when, why, and how I started coaching, my influences all the way from my earliest days to my grandfather who was one of my first track coaches, along with my dad.
And then, you know, I went on, passed that into college and. how I landed at Newbury Park and took this team from nothing to one of the best teams that we ever saw in the US ever. And if not, I don't know when these records will, be broken, but probably a long time if ever.
And it's just my journey on that path. And I hopefully people, give it a read and realize, that maybe it'll motivate them to do, something else in their life too.
Well, congratulations on the book and everything you've accomplished. And speaking of movies, have you been watching Stick On Apple?
no, I should would, is that something along those lines or what is it?
It's about this ex golf pro who's coaching this young kid. like a golf prodigy.
Nice.
it's called Stick.
Oh, cool.
It's got Owen Wilson.
I could be wrong on this, but I think he's one of the fastest celebrity runners, meaning he ran in high school and he was like pretty good runner when
he was in high school.
Yeah. I remember there's like a list of like five celebrities that ran in high school and he was one of the better ones. So I was pretty impressed.
okay, so for an old person like me, can I start running?
Yes. Everyone could run at any age.
Absolutely. You know, ironically a lot of people pick it up later in life from the recreational side and they might even do marathons and stuff a little bit different from like, you know, when I was coaching. but yeah, I think that there's a lot that, you know, people can get into running at any point in their life really.
I don't think there's any age on that.
I was looking into that, that running style where you like lean forward a little bit. Is it the Posner? Running
maybe a Chi running. I don't the Yeah, yeah. Chi
running,
yeah. Yeah. This was an amazing conversation. Like I think you're, an amazing coach just from the details that you talk about are something that's extraordinary.
Yeah. Well, I'm super passionate about it, so I really appreciate you saying that.
Yeah. I mean it, understanding the body and physiology and mind body connection. Yeah. I can say that. You hit all the bases.
Yeah. I mean, I, I, I said it earlier too, I think it just happens organically and it's like when you do something, you enjoy so much.
if someone's like, Hey, you gotta go drive five hours and come back the same day because of this, I'm like, okay, let's do it. I don't care. I talked about that in the book too. My grandfather, driving me hours away so I could do a workout because I was from Long Island, New York, and it was snow when I came home for break.
So he would drive me down south to just do a workout and drive me back. And I was like, well, if he's gonna do that, like, why can't I do that with my athletes? You know? we would drive five hours to do certain workouts on certain courses, and why not? You know? And everyone's like, that's crazy.
I'm like, I don't know. I don't think it's crazy. Why not? You know, just, you just, you just do it. So.
Okay. So everybody buy this book, and if they wanna train with you, where do they reach you?
Um, well, I, currently, I don't train individuals or anything like that. I have a, I'm in the process of, hopefully making an announcement pretty soon.
I'm gonna be coaching a professional group, with all professionals coming up. So I'm excited about that. That's to come. But otherwise anyone who has any questions, they always reach out to me on, Instagram or anything like that. I'm actually pretty good about getting back to people that have, real questions and stuff.
yeah, my Instagram is @realSeanBrosnan. it's always cool to hear from people who are either like fans or ordered the book and hopefully when they read the book, when it comes out on September 2nd, they have some good things to say or anything they wanna know,
Okay. So Instagram is the best way to reach you.
Absolutely.
Thank you so much for your time. This was amazing. I really learned so much. thank you.
Yeah. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
Thank you so much for joining me today on the Mind Body Space Podcast. When we strive to achieve at our highest levels, we can be prone to anxiety and perfectionism. That's part of it. Actually. It gives us that push, but we can give ourselves the extra edge with the mind body space method which integrates the whole child ready to get started. Visit mindbody space.com to grab your free guide on brain-based parenting to help your child build emotional and physical resilience for confidence, focus, and lifelong thriving. For deeper support,
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