The Great Coaches: Leadership & Life

Our Great Coach on this episode is Dan McKellar  Dan is a former professional Rugby Union Player and now coach. He played more than 150 premier grade games at  Souths Rugby Club  in Brisbane, Australia winning a premiership with them in 2000.   He started coaching as a Player-Coach at Wicklow in Ireland in 2002, before becoming the Head Coach of his old side Souths Rugby Club i...

Today’s episode is focuses on the topic of Turning Points and we are joined for the discussion by Dr David Turner.   Dr David Turner is a Senior Lecturer in Sports Coaching at Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, United Kingdom, where he is a member of the Cambridge Centre for Sport and Exercise Sciences. He has been a sports coach and an educator for around 40 years. His research interests a...

Noeline is a former national team player who is currently head coach of the New Zealand national netball team, the Silver Ferns. As player Noeline won a silver medal 1998 Commonwealth Games and a bronze medal at the 1995 Netball World Championships. From 2002 to 2013 she was the Head Coach of Waikato Bay of Plenty Magic leading them to the Championship in 2005, 2006 and 2012. In 2017 and 2018 she...

Nick Montgomery is a former professional soccer player and now coach. As a player he started his career in England most notable playing 349 games for Sheffield United. In 2012 he moved to Australia and played for the Central Coast Mariners.  In 2018 he started as an Assistant coach at the Mariners before being appointed as Head Coach in 2021. In just his second season he led the team to...

Today’s episode is focuses on the topic of Mindset and we are joined by Mark Zimmerman to talk about Mindset.   Mark is a Mindset coach and works with sporting teams across Australia and his homeland South Africa. His passion is Rugby and he has great energy and some of the things he said that resonated with me were: How he defines mindset as your mental outlook, and how that either helps or...

Jeremy Gunn is a former professional soccer player and now Head Coach.   He grew up in England before moving to American for University. There he attended Cal State and was part of their 1992 Championship team and an All American. He then became an Assistant and Cal State, before becoming a Head Coach at Fort Lewis College. He led that team to 6 Rocky Mountain Championships and the 2006 NCAA...

Today’s episode is focuses on the topic of On being a champion teammate, and we are joined for the conversation by Dr Jerry Lynch and John O’Sullivan. Dr. Jerry LYNCH received his doctorate in psychology from Penn State University, he is the author of 13 books on coaching, leadership, peak performance, and sports psychology. In the past 30 years alone, he has worked with teams that have been...

Our Great Coach on this episode is Joe Gallagher  .   Joe is a former amateur boxer who started coaching in 1993. He has been involved in over 300 professional fights. 100 title fights and his fighters have won world, European,. British and Commonwealth titles. In 2015 he became the USA Ring Magazine 2015 World Trainer of the year. Then became 2018-19 Boxing News trainer of the year...

Today’s episode is on the topic of Strength and Conditioning coaching, and we are joined for the discussion by Dean Benton. Dean has worked with an amazing number of elite sporting clubs such as RUGBY AUSTRALIA, Japan Rugby and England Rugby, The Rugby league teams: Brisbane, Melbourne, Newcastle and Canberra and the Australian Rules Football teams, Essendon, and Adelaide, as well as the Australia...

Rhonda Revelle is an American softball coach and former collegiate pitcher As a player she represented the University of Nebraska and played in the team at the inaugural Women's College World Series . She transitioned into coaching in 1986 and in 1993 became the Head Coach of her  alma mater. She has gone on to record over 1000 career wins across her 31 years as a coach includi...

Today’s episode is something a little different, we are joined by Samantha Rockey to look at the ways psychology, teams and high-performance overlap.   Sam has just co-authored the book: The Social Brain: The Psychology of successful groups.   She is an Associate fellow at the Oxford University said Business school, is one of the co-founds of the consultancy Thompson Harrison, and also c...

Our Great Coach on this episode is Don Showalter.   Don is a basketball coach who over 32 years coached in High Schools in America, in that time he led teams to 601 wins 8 conference titles and 11 district championships.   In 1998 he served as head coach of the youth USA Team at the 1998  Nike Hoop Summit . Then in 2001 he became chair of the USA Basketball Cadet and Youth Comm...

Our Great Coach on this episode is Tom Reeves. Tom is a rodeo rider who won the USA National High School championship twice. Then from 1985 as a pro rider, he qualified for his first National Rodeo finals, going on to win the event in 2001. He was captain of the 2002 of the USA team for the 2002 Olympic Command Performance Rodeo where they won a silver medal. He retired in 2005, and took up coachi...

10 Great Coaches reflect on their lessons on starting with new teams and organisations. These insights will help you prioritise the key tasks when starting with a new team. Key Terms •Leading new teams •First tasks •Taking over successful teams if you would like to listen to the rest of this podcast you can access it here: Starting with New Teams If you would like to send us any feedback or if you...

Our Great Coach on this episode is Matt Thornton. Matt is a Brazilian Ju Jitsu coach, who has coached some of the greatest Mixed Martial Arts fighters in the world. He is the founder of the Straight Blast Gym, where he has developed cross training in several martial arts as well as boxing and wrestling. The gym now has over 50 affiliate academies located around the world. Fighters he has coached i...

Jeff Traylor is an American Football coach. Jeff started his coaching career in 1989 as a High School Assistant coach. He would eventually return to be the Head Coach at his own High School. Gilmer High and would go on to lead the team to 3 state titles. His impact at the school was so profound that they would eventually name the stadium after him. He then took assistant positions at University of...

Today’s episode is on the topic of High Functioning Teams and we are joined for the discussion with one our past guests the Great Coach Hugh McCutcheon who has just written a book called Championship Behaviours Hugh led the USA men's team to an Olympic Gold in 2008 and the USA women in 2012 and is presently an Assistant Athletics Director at the University of Minnesota If you are want to improve y...

Our Great Coach on this episode is Peter Eriksson . Peter is an Athletics coach who was formerly the head coach of the Olympic and Paralympic programs for both British Athletics and Athletics Canada. He started coaching in the early 80’s after a reaching the world championships as a Speed Skater for his native Sweden. Under his leadership as Performance Director and Head Coach, the nations that he...

Our Great Coach on this episode is Gareth Taylor. Gareth played as a professional football player for 18 seasons, playing for Bristol Rovers, Crystal Palace, Manchester City, Burnley and Nottingham Forest among others teams. He retired in 2011 and started coaching youth teams at Manchester City. After 8 years in the City Academy, he was appointed Head Coach of the Women’s team and led them to a FA...

Today’s episode is on the topic of Habits, and we are joined for the discussion by Allistair McCaw, who has just written a terrific new book called Habits that Make a Champion . Allistair is that rare person who excels across disciplines and industries. In addition to being an author who has sold over 300,000 books, his podcast ranks in the top 1% in the world, and for the last 25 years he has als...

Our Great Coach on this episode is Doug Maclean. Doug is a former Ice Hockey Head Coach, GM, and sportscaster. His coaching career started in his hometown of Summerside in 1977 with High School teams. By 1990 he had his first professional job leading the Baltimore Skipjacks. A successful stint there, saw him move to the Detroit Red Wings as an assistant coach, and ultimately to the Head Coach role...

In this podcast we discuss the Mens and Womens Ashes with Michelle Goszko and John Buchanan and in particular the way Leadership has influenced both teams. If you would like to send us any feedback or if you know a great coach, who has a unique story to share, then we would love to hear from you, please contact us at paul@thegreatcoachespodcast.com or contact us through our website thegreatcoaches...

This podcast is on the topic of Competitive excellence, and we are joined for the discussion with one our past guests the Great Coach Hugh McCutcheon who has just written a book called Championship Behaviours. Hugh played Volleyball for New Zealand national Junior and Senior teams before transitioning into coaching. In 2005 he was appointed as Head Coach of the USA mens team who went to win the Go...

Our Great Coach on this episode is rowing’s, Paul Thompson. Paul started coaching in his early 20’s when a hand injury impacted his ability to compete as a rower. He’s coached at the last 8 Olympic Games leading teams from Australia, Britain and China, and at each of these games his teams have won medals. He coached the team of Kate Slatter and Megan Still to Australia's first women's Olympic rowi...

This podcast is on the topic of Energy amd we are joined for the discussion by Dr Gavin Weeks. Gavin is a Doctor of Psychology, an Associate Fellow at Oxford Said Business School and a Partner at the consultancy Thompson Harrison. Gavin can be reached through his company's website:  ⁠https://www.thompsonharrison.com/⁠ If you would like to send us any feedback or if you know a great coach, who...