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What if the habits that create Olympians could also build a school that runs on rhythm instead of adrenaline? We sit down with Coach Tim Thackeray—seven-time U.S. national team member, Pan Am Games gold medalist, and USA Taekwondo’s Director of Education—to map elite performance onto everyday school ownership. Coach Tim shows how to turn competitive fire into a repeatable operating system.
We explore culture as a competitive advantage, the role of respect in preventing staff split-offs, and how to scale without diluting what makes your dojang special. If you’ve ever tried to outwork burnout, his periodization approach for owners—planned rest, calendar peaks, and energy management—will feel like a breath of fresh air.
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- 10 Must-Do Marketing Events to Explode Your School in 2026!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (02:22):
In this week's episode, we'll discuss the topic
what school owners can learnfrom high-level athletes,
engagement, growth, andretention.
Welcome to Blackville Fancks,the best podcast to help bear
market schools, increaseprofits, and generate
substantial revenue.
I'm Jimmy Hall, and my co-hostis Master Jay Lee.
(02:45):
We are joined by Coach TimThackeray, a seven-time U.S.
national team member ofTaekwondo, Pan American Games
Gold Medalist, and WorldChampionship Brown Medalist, a
former resident athlete at theU.S.
Olympic Training Center.
Tim was named USA Taekwondo'smale athlete of the year in
2006.
Beyond his own competitivecareer, he's become a
(03:06):
sought-after strength andconditioning coach, guiding
Olympians and professionalathletes across multiple sports,
including those who competed inthe 2016 Summer Games.
From the math to the weightroom, Tim's journey is about
resilience, reinvention, andhelping others reach their peak
performance.
Master Jay, Coach Tim, welcometo the show.
(03:29):
Let's start with you, Coach Tim.
You've competed at an elitelevel for many years.
Most of our audience are schoolowners, head instructors, and
pick one of professionals.
Do you see any similaritiesbetween your journey as an
athlete and how school ownersrun their schools or teach their
students today?
SPEAKER_03 (03:49):
Yeah, absolutely.
When I actually retired fromcompeting, I had a meeting with
my coach, Scott Fuji, and wetalked, and he goes, I think
you're going to do really wellin business.
I was opening up a gym at thetime, and I was like, why do you
say that?
And he goes, It's the same.
He goes, That same competitivefire that you have, the same
drive, the same way to want toget up every day and make things
(04:12):
better.
I think you see the successfulschool owners really have that
and they embody it.
You're so obsessed in a healthyway, sometimes maybe
borderlines, right, on whathealthy is to someone, but it's
obsessive.
It makes you want to make everylittle piece of the mat work
good, right?
Every instructor trainingprogram.
It was all those same things.
And we ran our gym very muchlike a martial arts school.
(04:34):
It was a CrossFit gym at thetime, but it was that idea that
no one had this structure.
And we saw it because we grew upin martial arts schools.
And we thought, we know how todo this.
This is missing, and this ismissing, and on the floor, piece
is missing, and all these otherparts.
So we came in and it was verydifferent industry, but it felt
the same.
It was that same drive.
So you go, oh, you're doinggood.
(04:55):
And I think in business it'seasy to say, okay, I'm making
some profit.
That's fine.
That's kind of the equivalent ofsomeone as a fighter, say, or
competitor, saying, I want a fewfights.
And for some people, that mightbe fine.
Most school owners, the reasonyou get up to that level is
because that's the buy-in level.
You I think I can do more.
I think I can have a biggerschool.
(05:16):
I think I can train staff up.
These are all kind of audaciousthings for people who maybe are
just getting started or gettingby, thinking, how am I going to
pay rent this month?
How am I going to do these kindof things?
Where can competing, you stillmight win a couple fights, but
in my head I'd go, I think I canmake the national team.
And you go, that's a crazythought.
So for me, that those werereally congruent, if that makes
(05:37):
sense, of the drive it tookpersonally, that belief, even
without facts.
We talk about facts.
Sometimes you don't have factsat all to support it.
I just go, I think I'm going tobe good at this.
You open a gym and you're brokeor a sport school and you're
broke, and you spend every lastpenny on maths and consulting
and every step of the way.
But you go, I think I'm going tohave five of these.
(05:59):
And people think you're insane,but then years later you go,
Hey, I was wrong.
I have six.
And so that part to me hasalways really been a
competitive, a through line ofthis stuff.
And I think it's why I probablywork with so many martial arts
school owners.
That mindset's the same.
It was never about competition,right?
The competitions with yourself.
(06:20):
You two could have taekwondoschools next to each other, and
you're not in competitionbecause you're just obsessed.
Master J's just obsessed withmaking his so good.
So that's what do you guys thinkabout that?
I know you've been doingtaekwondo a long time and this
stuff too.
So I'm interested to hear also.
SPEAKER_01 (06:34):
But I just to be clear, I wouldn't want to put
him out of business if I wasnext to him, though.
SPEAKER_03 (06:38):
Fair.
I'll try not to give it yes.
Not in the next.
SPEAKER_01 (06:49):
I think what you said is so impactful, right?
People are so driven anddisciplined.
But I think one of the thingsthat people often forget about
is the importance of goalsetting.
And you doing that as an eliteathlete, you had to set up a
number of goals as you wentthrough your journey.
How important do you see thatas, whether it's just your own
training regimen or running amartial arts school or any other
(07:11):
business?
SPEAKER_03 (07:12):
Yeah, that's something that I feel personally
I had to get really good atbecause I wasn't one of the
naturally, I'm just great atTaekwondo.
I wasn't.
I was passionate about it and Iwas your family was obsessed,
but we weren't particularly, oh,let's go watch what they're
doing with Taekwondo.
We're more the ones that wantedto learn everything from you and
do it.
And so with that, I had toreally learn about training.
(07:35):
I had to really learn aboutprogram design.
It was because that was my onlyadvantage I had to survive.
Right.
And you could take that sameanalogy and say, maybe some
people have a thriving businessbecause they're in the right
part of town, they ended upbecoming the popular spot.
And you can that can happen forsure, but is that a systematic
way to now develop a businessand again run multiple schools
or a training program?
(07:56):
Maybe, right?
People can make stuff work, butif I was gonna put my money
somewhere, I'd probably want toinvest on someone with really
good systems and a strategy.
So I went to that with thatidea, not of just the goals, but
to reverse engineer of what typeof training I was doing in
different weeks and stuff,building up the same way we do
for seasons and black belttestings and holidays, the same
(08:16):
idea there, down to I knew thatif we had our national team
selection, say the first week ofJanuary, which was always really
horrible, right?
Everyone's cutting weight overChristmas, not super fun, but I
told myself, if I could bedialed here and I could be good
on January 6th, you can beat meevery other day of the year.
On January 6th, I'm gonna bebetter than you.
(08:38):
I can put that together.
So as far as that, then with abusiness, you go, okay, we have
back to school thing.
It was the same thing.
What are the assets we need toget ready for these timelines
and do it?
And then it's September orAugust, and it's go.
So it really fed thatcompetitive part of me to doing
that.
And I don't know if I would havebeen able to retire one and done
(08:59):
and not come back and oh, wait,we have this big emptiness when
that part of ourselves that welove so much goes away.
Right?
Competition for a decade waseverything for me.
And so luckily, owning a gym,which we thought was gonna be a
martial arts school at first,and the gym still, I had a
little competition taekwondoteam, was how we opened the gym
and had a little extra time.
(09:20):
I thought I'll teach someCrossFit.
So it was just not by design.
I thought I was gonna have alittle crew while I went through
graduate school, but that partfueled me, and I thought I know
how to do this, right?
Even though I didn't have anybusiness experience.
I thought, okay, I can take thisthrough line, I can follow the
goals, I can be there on thisday when I have to.
SPEAKER_00 (09:38):
That was my question is when you say gym, yeah, do
you mean uh Marshall Taekwondogym studio, or do you mean a gym
did you open?
SPEAKER_03 (09:48):
So, like most of the things that I've done in my
life, there wasn't really a planto do it.
I just start doing something andsomething will catch on.
That's just like Master J.
There's no plan.
I I just got lucky.
Sure, I doubt that.
I doubt that.
But it maybe I don't know thestory.
I'm excited to hear how you gotthere.
But for me, it's been as part Ijust get really obsessed with
(10:10):
something and I just follow it,and eventually somehow it turns
into something bigger, and thenI go into there.
So my plan was this, and this ishow the 30-second, maybe 45
second rundown.
I was done fighting, and I gotthe USOC was paying for my
college, which was really neat.
So I thought, okay, I'll go toschool when I was at UCLA.
(10:32):
I got into graduate school and Ididn't want to, and I was done
fighting.
And what's the opposite ofsports?
Political science.
I thought I'm gonna go the otherdirection.
I'm so done with everything.
I you know, you get that partwhere you're broke, like a bad
breakup, and you're like, I'mnever dating again.
That was me in sports.
I'm done with this.
I'll go be a professor, right?
(10:53):
And I'm done.
No one will see me again.
But I didn't want to have tobecome a TA and get the stipend
you get.
I thought I'd not make my ownmoney.
I've been doing seminars andsupporting myself the whole time
doing this.
So instead of that, I'll trainsome kids in Taekwondo.
And I ended up with this reallycool small competition team of a
dozen kids, 10 to 14 years old,that were the top and all of
(11:15):
SoCal, really.
They were really good drivingthree hours to train on my
driveway with no mats and vaneyes to give you how how much
these kids wanted.
It was a crew.
Uh, they fall on the on thecement and no one touched them.
They'll get up.
So it becomes winter, and I'mgonna lose the people.
I'm gonna make it enough just toget through.
Grad school is my only focus,and I'll have this little team.
(11:35):
So, all bad business ideas.
I thought, okay, I'll get aretail spot to support the small
team.
Like it was it was the crazything.
I was okay, so we have a littleextra time.
I'll have the team here.
What should I do?
And I didn't necessarily want tohave a martial arts school just
because I was focused on gradschool.
We'll teach CrossFit one night aweek or one hour a night the
(11:58):
days under Taekwondo.
And that was the plan, right?
The plan, and to give you anidea how bad at numbers I was
for being a numbers guy.
Uh my wife was uh bartender anda cocktail waitress at a at BJ's
brewer brewery, right?
And pizza place.
And she goes, What if we get 30members?
I'm like, if we get 30 peoplefor CrossFit, hey, I think we'll
(12:20):
cover all of this and it'll allwork.
And she goes, What if we get 60?
And I was a little cocky.
I go, if we get 60, you can quityour job.
That's how this is you look atit now, it's crazy.
But I'm 28.
Again, I'm just going and I dothe math.
I don't I don't know thenumbers.
I just think that seems like alot of money to me at 28.
Yeah.
So the CrossFit Gym took off.
(12:40):
We started to bring someTaekwondo in.
Eventually, I had to move thatout.
And my good friend Joseph Salim,who was uh Olympic coach for
Great Britain in 2012, we he hada school, so we combined forces
there and did that.
And then within 18 months, Ithink our CrossFit gym had 330
members.
Whoa.
And yeah, and I I quit gradschool and I went all in on, I
(13:03):
guess I'm gonna have gyms.
And that was like I stoppedcoaching the UC, I was coaching
the UCLA Taekwondo team.
I stopped that.
I gave it to one of my otherbuddies, Richard Lee, who has a
school down in LA.
He's one of my teammates there.
So I thought I was all in, andour plan was this we know the
martial art people, all myfriends.
You guys all own dojongs andmultiple dojongs, and I grew up
(13:23):
in a dojong.
My parents owned the dojong, soit all made sense.
And we thought, we knowinstructor training, we know all
these other parts of running thebusiness from talking to
friends, not like I knew it.
And we're gonna have a dozenCrossFit gyms, was the plan.
SPEAKER_01 (13:39):
But then the plan changed.
SPEAKER_03 (13:41):
The plan changed for two reasons.
The plan changed again for tworeasons.
This you'll just be like, thisguy got here this way.
It's again, it makes sense now,but at the time we're you're
just in go mode.
So we're going, we do that, andthe crossfit model is very
similar.
It was at the time.
The difference is it lacks twothings of why at the core, uh,
(14:02):
three things really.
The core, my wife and I, we ranit together.
I met my wife doing Taekwondo.
She was on Scott Fuji's teamwhen I first moved to LA.
So she was really a good fighterin her own right and stuff.
Uh, so we've always had thatcommon connection of speaking in
Taekwondo terms and what itmeans to train and to beat one,
the lack of respect in that areais a massive disconnect for us.
(14:24):
Massive, to the level of if yougo, oh, yes, I get that Tim
started the gym, he writes allthe stuff, he does everything, I
can lift more than him.
And you go, okay.
They somehow that's or whateveraspect there they do, and not,
oh, I'm grateful for youteaching me how to do this.
It's oh, I'm this fit, I'm gonnahave my own gym now.
(14:45):
So we through our instructortraining program, instead of the
goal was to grow it up, createinstructors, which we did,
satellite gyms, etc.
It's they view it like this thatthe leading cause of new
(15:54):
marriage is divorce.
Does that make sense?
So every time someone getsdivorced, there's two new
marriages.
Does that mean there's really nonew marriages?
But no, that means people aregetting divorced and your
marriages suck.
SPEAKER_00 (16:07):
What about the younger ones getting married?
That's not yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (16:11):
That's also bad too.
But they were getting, they'relike, oh, look at these new
gyms, but they were all justsplit-offs and split-offs.
So we had through our instructortraining program, had trained 12
different gym owners there, butit was easier for them, they
thought, to break off and dotheir own.
Almost all of them failed, ofcourse.
We we know the reason why we tryand take care and development in
(16:33):
the long run of the things wewanted to do were there.
So those really are too.
That's similar to yoga channels.
I'm sure yes.
They lack that respect there,and not that I'm I'm here and
you're there, but there's a waywe can do this that everybody
wins together.
And that's why this is being setup that way.
It's stronger when we do it thisway.
(16:54):
Otherwise, it is okay.
I guess I have to put you out ofbusiness now.
That's a really crappy way togo, but you talk about that
competitive fire again.
It's here we go.
So that was hard.
The second part was just we hadall those people break off that
taekwondo wise things happenwhere at the end of the day, if
someone's oh, I'm gonna do moreburpees than you, I we always
(17:16):
come back to all right, you wantto fight?
We can fight about this too.
That's how my wife and I think.
Like, that's wonderful.
Great job swinging thekettlebell.
Cool.
Can you kick my butt?
No, so those parts are very werehard.
I love martial arts very much.
But at the same time, that wasthe first, I'll dovetail it back
over here and then stoprambling.
Uh Stephen Lambden.
SPEAKER_01 (17:37):
Can I add sorry, sir?
But I think what you said was sofascinating and so impactful is
that you are an elite athlete,and obviously Tekwondo is an
Olympic sport.
It's one of the only martialarts a full Olympic sport.
But yes, what makes Tekwondoschool owners successful and
businesses successful is notonly focusing just the sport,
(17:58):
but to understand thetraditions, the martial art of
Tekwondo, because the culture,the respect, the discipline is
so critical.
You found that.
If I'm reading you, that's whatyou found in running across the
gym, that it's not just aboutthe physical stuff, it's the
cultural, the discipline, thetraditions of martial arts that
is really important.
SPEAKER_03 (18:16):
Sir, that's 100% dead on.
And when it was early we hadthat, we had community, we had a
really thriving instructortraining program.
Even the person we sold our gymto was someone we started
essentially as a white belt whowas coming in for weight loss
and whatever, and then becamesomeone who could run the gym on
his own and a very successfulperson in Hollywood already.
(18:37):
It was not a, hey, I'm down onmy luck, can I take this over?
But very qualified individual inhis own right and stuff.
So again, those ideas that wehad, we loved, and it felt like
there was a period where we go,yes, we see this.
We see the path, we know thepath that everyone, again,
everyone of my friends for themost part, outside of childhood,
(18:57):
are almost all business ownersand martial arts school owners,
right?
Yeah, that that that's our crew.
So those pieces, when theystarted to miss a line, we're
going, this isn't right.
SPEAKER_00 (19:07):
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(20:12):
let's explode your martial artsschool's marketing growth.
I have a question.
Can you explain why uh someathletes that just can perform
at the highest level, whetherit's Olympics or their national
team and so forth?
From my experience, and this isnot just USA, I'm talking about
(20:34):
Koreans as well.
They can compete at the highestlevel, but when they're after
their career ends and they'reopening their own Taekwondo
studio or Marshall's gym,they're just so horrible at it.
It's it's and then you haveaverage above average
physicality school owners whothey competed, but never at the
(20:55):
highest level.
But their school and theirsystems is just the top notch.
And I don't understand thedisconnect there.
Do you have any insight on that?
Or am I off base?
You're always off base, butright.
SPEAKER_01 (21:13):
But in this case, you have some validity to what
you're saying.
SPEAKER_03 (21:16):
Yeah, it's correct.
Yeah, yeah.
We'll try and support them here.
We'll be good.
But I think it does for a couplereasons.
One, if you look at I look atTaekwondo like language, and I
would go and train in Korea,especially the late 90s before I
made the national team, and thenobviously right after it, for
that period from 99 through2002, I spent a good amount of
(21:36):
time there, uh, overalltraining.
And what I learned was the waythat the athletes and teams
communicated was different thanhow I needed to learn Taekwondo.
I had to learn Taekwondo almostlike how do you conjugate every
verb in Spanish?
How do you do it?
What's it very like again?
(21:56):
Where if you learn Spanishgrowing up, what do you do?
You just speak Spanish.
So they learned it at such alevel growing up and going
through the ages where everyelementary team has a team,
every junior high has a team,every high school, where it was
more like they were speaking afluent language to each other,
and the adjustments they madewere different.
It was more innate.
Where I had to, and that's partof why I got into all the stuff
(22:19):
I do, I had to obsess over everysingle piece of your right toe
does this, and at 15 seconds ofthe fight, you got to do this.
And so I had to really becomeprocedural around that.
It's a different type oflearning.
So for some athletes that are sogood and so talented, it doesn't
mean they don't work hard.
They work very hard.
But some of those parts, theyalmost, and just how it is, then
(22:41):
what system do you fall back onto get good at it?
So to support your idea thatmaybe some school owners that
maybe weren't the top, and Iyou're winning the Olympics
rules.
I don't consider myself the top.
I consider myself someone whodid well.
I learned that I had to learn alot, and I wasn't fulfilled at
the end, meaning I didn'taccomplish the big thing I
wanted to do.
So now I have systems.
(23:02):
I'm someone who has to followevery step and be dialed to make
sure I have a chance atanything.
I have to do that.
I can't just show up and play.
I've got to be systems andprocess oriented.
And then two, I'm still fightingfrom that.
Oh my gosh, I did all this stuffand it wasn't good enough.
I better go even harder here.
So I think a lot of schoolowners may have that of they
made it far, they did somethingand it wasn't there.
(23:23):
And now you have this fireinside you versus being, ah, I
did great, the next thing willcome, next thing will come, and
maybe it will, and maybe theystill do.
I'm not saying that there'splenty of Olympic champions that
have great schools, I'd love tohave, but with that idea that
sometimes we get satiated somuch and we're like, there's no
chip on our shoulder anymore.
Now, I don't need a wholemonster behind me, but a little
(23:46):
bit of something that's that'snot quite good enough, I think
that drives us if we can channelit.
I don't know.
Does that make any sense?
Or do you have thoughts on thattoo?
SPEAKER_00 (23:53):
No, absolutely, absolutely.
100% that makes sense.
I don't know, maybe because Iknow a lot of high-level
athletes from Korea, they justwhen they come here, they have
all this aspiration to open up aschool in this huge American
market.
But whether they don'tunderstand the American
consumers, the Americanstudents, or and they're just so
(24:15):
different than a Korean consumerbase, or they're just not
business savvy at all becausethey're just focused on their
own personal training anddevelopment.
I don't know.
SPEAKER_01 (24:25):
But I think I think some of the things that I've
seen is that some of thehigh-level athletes, they are
they have this standard, right,of excellence.
And they expect excellence ofthemselves.
And so when they try to teachtheir students who are not
aspiring to be nationalathletes, Olympic athletes, they
expect those kind of standards.
And that's perhaps where some ofthe disconnect is because they
have these elite athleteexpectations, but yet their
(24:48):
students are doing it, theirkids, their families, they're
doing this recreationally justfor stress relief exercise.
And so maybe that plays intopart of why some of they have a
challenge running a regulardoja.
SPEAKER_03 (25:00):
Yeah, master, yeah.
I I think there's a lot to that.
I think that idea that if youjust make the Taekwondo better,
that everything else willfollow.
And a lot of times as athletes,we can just go, I'll just get
better.
And that works there, wherethere's one that's one part.
It's an important part of thebusiness.
You have to get the on-the-floorstuff right.
The curriculum, the techniquehas to be right.
But there's so much more thanthat.
(25:22):
Right.
And as you ascend up, if youcan't delegate, if you can't
train staff, if you're just goodat doing you, and a lot of
athletes are good at doing themand not asking for help, right?
And not doing the other parts.
So they do it.
How do you grow then?
It's hard to grow if you can'tgo, hey, I'll pass this off to
you, and it's okay if it's 85%.
I'll come in and add the 15% andfill that in.
(25:42):
That was hard for me to learn atthe start because it was I'll do
it all.
And then I delegate and it'dfall apart.
Oh god, this poster stinks.
And it's like, no, this posterstinks, and my job is to tweak
it here and then retrain.
Once I saw that, I thought,okay, here's where my new avenue
is.
So I think with athletes andcoaches, all the floor is
everything, it's just better.
(26:03):
I'm just a better coach.
That's subjective.
That's me saying my Taekwondo isbetter than yours.
And that's a pretty bad way tomark it because it's so easy to
counter.
You go, guess what?
You don't know what you'relooking for, and I say mine's
better.
And I go, he said he won the1987 Olympics.
And we're there was no 87Olympics.
No, he said so.
SPEAKER_01 (26:22):
There's a lot of Olympians out there.
SPEAKER_03 (26:23):
There's a lot of a lot of our joke is our joke
anytime we want to mess withsomeone, we say we won the
cruiser weight of whatevertournament.
Oh, I think he fought cruiserweight there.
SPEAKER_00 (26:33):
I know that this is not just in in Teku, but all
sports.
Professional athletes at highlevel where they're used to are
that attention.
And then able to communicate andteach that to regular students
is they just they can't.
They have they don't have theability to communicate and share
what they've learned in theirtraining to others, but they can
(26:56):
do it themselves really well.
Correct.
But they just can't teach itwell.
Yeah, and if you can't teach it,if you can't teach Taekwondo
after you open up a Taekwondostudio and taekwondo school, it
doesn't matter what systems thatyou have, you're not gonna.
SPEAKER_03 (27:12):
Yes, a hundred percent.
Yeah, and that's back to thatidea, I feel like, of the
language that if you don't knowhow to really do it and break,
because you're just it justbecomes watch me kick, isn't it
great?
And I go, yeah, I can't, that'sawesome.
But it's not about you.
It's can you teach them to dothat?
Can you communicate thateffectively at the core part?
And yeah, they then they openingup the school just because they
don't know what else to do.
That's that's not a great way todo it.
(27:33):
You should open up any businessbecause I feel like you have
some sort of burning desire todo it.
You want to impact yourcommunity for a certain way,
these things you want toaccomplish and help.
And then the systems all supportthat.
But if it's backwards, let'smake some money.
There's a lot simpler ways tomake money than running a
taekwondo school if it's justthat.
But if you want impact and thisstuff and legacy, okay, now it's
(27:55):
actually a lot harder to findsomething better than a
taekwondo school or a martialarts school to do that, in my
opinion.
SPEAKER_00 (28:01):
Right.
100% agree.
Absolutely.
These top-level athletes theytrain for how many years that
longevity, like singular focus.
SPEAKER_02 (28:11):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (28:12):
Do you have any tips to school owners in terms of how
those athletes keep their focusand retention versus how to
explain to the school owners,hey, you gotta use this to keep
your students retention longer,keep them in the school longer.
Is there any similarities inthat, or is that just completely
(28:33):
different?
Because their singular purposeis to individually themselves to
get to the highest level.
The school owners is for a lessselfish reason.
Hey, I want my students tobecome three years, five years,
seven years training inTaekwondo, or am I off base
there?
SPEAKER_03 (28:50):
No, no, you're on base.
It's the same, I think.
And part of what I love comingto Asa and I sit in the seminars
too, that the ones I feel thatare really doing great have such
a wonderful client journey fortheir students.
Every road mark, every littlething, and not just the road
mark, you're gonna be here,we're going from LA to San
Francisco, or we're gonna stopoff in Bakersfield and get some
(29:13):
Starbucks.
We're gonna get here's a everylittle piece.
There's the birthday party,here's your hundred-day
celebration, you've been at allthose things are thought
through.
It's the same for athletes.
But again, it's like I have toknow that not just I need to be
at the team trials on this day,I need to be here.
Worlds are at this time, andhere's the trip.
And I have these roadmarks therethroughout the year that
athletes they know theirschedule there.
(29:35):
So when we get buy-in or we getintent, I'm a big believer that
our purpose has to align withour intent.
unknown (29:43):
Right?
SPEAKER_03 (29:43):
When we get those two, now it becomes who you are,
and it's very effortless.
The first part of my career, Ididn't have that all lined up,
and there was a lot of frictionfor me.
It was hard to get up early,right?
It was hard to be consistent intraining.
Making it through a six-weektraining block was really hard.
And I struggled with a lot ofthat stuff psychologically.
(30:04):
Once I got it there, it was allthe friction in the world was
gone, and I could just gothrough for years at a time, it
felt like.
Look at the school owners thathave maybe no staff and they're
(30:25):
barely getting by and you're onevery weekend.
I remember being there in ourgym where you're you're in
survival, it's hard to do.
I was there as a fighter, too.
You're just okay, I better youfinish the tournament, and what
do you do?
This is this is a bad athletehabit.
It seems good, we give itpraise, but it's maladaptive.
They finish the tournament andmaybe they get third at
nationals or quarterfinal loss.
(30:46):
They don't even medal, so theycan't go to team trials.
Uh uh athlete with a notlong-term view does this.
They get up tomorrow morning andthey try and train for four
hours.
Seems like a good thing, right?
Oh, they want it, they just youhave to have some space to grow
against.
We need to create that space tocome back.
And actually, over the longterm, it was that those athletes
(31:07):
that do it for a long time dotake time off.
They do go here.
I know I need to rest now.
I'm not resting because I'mlazy.
I'm resting because if I don'tstay off my legs today, this
next six-week block is gonna bereally torturous.
Or if I don't chill on Sunday,it's like my dad would always
tell me, he goes, I can'tbelieve for how lazy you are,
you're so consistent intraining.
(31:30):
But what he meant was I had tosit.
I wasn't sitting or being doingthat because whatever.
I knew that was for me, that wastraining.
Right.
And if you ask me to dosomething like, sorry, I can't
do it on Sunday, because mytraining is me sitting on this
couch here.
So I think back with then withschool owners, their longevity,
how can they ebb and flow?
And not because they're lazy,not because they waited too
(31:51):
long, now they gotta go totallyburn out, but date night's
planned, right?
Coach time off is planned.
SPEAKER_00 (31:57):
Coach Tim, if I knew that, if I knew being on the
couch was part of the training,I would have been an Olympian
back in the day.
I mean, exactly.
I would have been a little bitmore than a lot of people.
SPEAKER_01 (32:07):
A champion in that way, yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (32:11):
Yeah, he's going for a record.
He's a three weeks straight.
Yeah, the part of the thing iswe do have to get off the couch
at some stage and train.
But it's like that withstudents.
They do good and they get off alittle bit.
What happens?
They thought they're messing up.
Can I come back in?
And that those pieces are normalfor them.
And it should be becausetaekwondo is probably not their
only thing.
For some it is, and at somestage, like for us all, it
(32:33):
eventually becomes our onlything, but they're juggling
stuff.
And so, how do they understandthat focus and value of
Taekwondo?
I see that part as the same inthe schools.
When I hear the talks and I talkto the school owners at the
events, and they understand howto communicate that and their
staff can communicate that.
I think personally retention isbecause it's who you are now.
(32:54):
Taekwondo is not an activity.
This is, I wrestled more than Idid Taekwondo growing up, but I
was a Taekwondo student.
But that's who I was.
SPEAKER_01 (33:02):
Cook Coach Tim, I think what you said was very
impactful.
I think it's that's an evolutionof Taekwondo and training and
education.
Twenty years ago, people saidyou have to train every single
day, but through education, theyfound that your body needs rest
and recovery.
And I kind of equate it to Umrunning a tech owner school.
I'm a second generation schoolowner.
My my father came with nothing.
(33:23):
And their philosophy was alwayshey, we're going to work seven
days a week.
We're going to be there from 9a.m.
to 9 p.m.
And I think that definitelyworked.
And but I think over time thatschool owners nowadays they're
realizing that you don't have todo it that way to still be
successful.
There has to be a balancebetween personal work.
And I've just noticed there's atrend.
A lot of martial arts schoolowners are closing uh two days a
(33:47):
week now.
Like it used to be six, sevendays a week, but people are
finding that hey, I can give myteam and myself recovery or
students some time forthemselves.
We can operate five days a weekand still be highly successful.
So I think that's kind of theevolution as people get educated
and understand things better.
There's efficient ways to dothings.
SPEAKER_03 (34:07):
Yes, Master J couldn't agree more.
If you're gonna if I'm gonnachoose one side, the part where
you talk about your dad comingover and going seven days a
week, I think that's at thecore.
You have to have I'd rathersomeone have that and then pull
them back than like I reallymaybe twice a week, and this is
hard, right?
So if we're gonna have one, it'sthat part where you're a dog.
(34:29):
You're gonna go do it.
We can channel that, right?
I can teach a fighter strategy,but it's a lot harder to teach a
strategy person how to fight.
Both are possible.
One's just a little easier, myexperience.
So we we do need that.
And yeah, you look at the onestheir staff is fresh, that
they're coming in, they'reexcited, that everyone's ready
to have good purpose, goodintent of their classes, and not
just getting through.
(34:50):
I know when our volume was toohigh in training.
What happens is every athletedownshifts.
So we're gonna go here.
It's my fourth practice of theday.
I'm not gonna bring that.
And now it's junk volume, right?
I I look at activities for mydaughter.
Daughters are nine and four.
And yeah, we because we loveTaekwondo so much, we want them
to do stuff all the time.
They're at the off-wheel.
It's come all the time.
(35:11):
I'd pay more for some activitiesfor her to come less.
How much I'll pay you double foronce a week.
I don't want to be here fourtimes.
But like, but eventually theyget there and it's fine.
But in the start, I didn't wantto do this all the time.
It was just I thought it'd be afun thing to learn to paint
coffee cups once in a while.
I don't need to be on yourunlimited coffee painting plan,
(35:32):
the value there.
SPEAKER_00 (35:33):
Coaching, what's your role with USA Taekwondo?
SPEAKER_03 (35:36):
Yeah, so I'm the director of education there with
USA Taekwondo.
And then I do a lot of otherstuff with specific athlete
groups.
I'm the strength andconditioning coach for the
Paralympic team.
I'm the strength andconditioning coach for the
under-21 team for the WorldChampionships.
So I do that and kind of someone-off special, hey, with this
group, I'm going to work withthem in a certain way.
(35:57):
But my main role is doingeducation and creating courses
around both supporting thecoaching staff.
They have courses on, hey,here's how the modern sport game
is, here's how uh modern Pumseiis, and creating that into
educational content for twopopulations.
One for direct to consumer.
The second one would be thingsthat would work with the schools
(36:19):
as far as staff development.
Not every school owner is gonnalearn every new aspect to
Taekwondo, but your staff mightneed it to implement a new drill
or a new piece there, and notthat you're gonna go full 2028
Olympic training center there,but hey, we want to be able to
do some of this too, or add anew hip drill in for some
mobility or some piece.
So I do a lot of that side ofstuff, which again for me is fun
(36:44):
because I like the education andthought side.
SPEAKER_00 (36:46):
For our audience, the USA Taekwondo, which is
responsible for organizing andoverseeing the Olympic style
taekwondo in the US, meaning theworld taekwondo rule set that's
used in the Olympics.
So it manages every and correctme if I'm wrong, but doesn't it
manage everything from nationalcompetitions and rankings,
athlete development programs,national team selection for
international events, for worldchampionships, pan Ams, and the
(37:09):
Olympics, and the coach andreferee certifications under the
World Taekwondo standards.
Is that correct?
SPEAKER_03 (37:14):
Yeah, 100%.
It's the MGB, it's big, andthere's there's all sorts of
avenues to get to get my fingersin there without really what I
like about it is without havingto step on toes of me saying,
Oh, I think here's how youshould kick in your dojong.
Like that's for you to decide.
That's for you to do.
(37:35):
And I don't want to be becausethen again, we can't work
together.
We battle.
You say, no, my way is right.
I want to talk about it and say,hey, here is a way to fuel your
students, or here's a way towork on mobility around this,
and then we can all worktogether on stuff because you
can take what you need and youcan leave the rest there.
And the umbrella is big to havethose avenues to work with other
(37:55):
people.
SPEAKER_01 (37:56):
And then in the vein of education, and I know Master
Hong, you touched on what thenational governing body is, but
just for our listeners, can youjust, without obviously getting
political, but just to educateour listeners, what is the
difference between USAT, AAU,all these different
organizations that existthroughout Tekwano?
They all obviously want to growTekwano, but maybe for some
(38:16):
people they don't know what thedifference is between these
things.
SPEAKER_03 (38:18):
That's a great question, sir.
I'll try and be as you know uhbroad but clear as I can that
USA Taekwondo is the nationalgoverning body that works
directly with the US OPC, the USOlympic and Paralympic
Committee.
The US Olympic and ParalympicCommittee works directly with
the IOC, right?
With the International OlympicCommittee.
So this is the group with themain task of selecting our
(38:42):
Olympic team and then selectingdifferent teams for, say, like
the world championshipshappening right now in China for
sparring or world championshipsfor PUMSA, the official ones.
So that's the main part.
There's a lot of other thingsthat they do, grassroots, state
championships, etc.
There other groups like Seiu area governing body as well.
The EU initially used to be thenational governing body way back
(39:05):
up in the 70s and before I thinkDr.
Ken Man started that group inthe early 70s, who obviously was
the founder of the UC Berkeleyprogram out there, and then did
a million things for us to nothave to mention through here,
but a legend in that area to it.
But the with the Ted Stevens Actof 1978, I believe, they said
that EU cannot be the nationalgoverning body of sport, just
(39:28):
from not this currentadministration stuff.
But back then, if you watchmovies without limits with about
Steve Prefontaine, the runner.
I watched that, and they hadtrack and field dealing with AU
stuff and these issues, and sothose issues were broad, so they
had to come and bring in athleterepresentation.
So that's about as far down therabbit hole as I'll get on that
part.
So they are a governing body,they can have every group can
(39:48):
have their own nationalchampionships, every group can
have a state, a local, a thing.
You have there.
We were last weekend with uhMaster Amitus in Sacramento, and
she has the Mudo group.
So they have their nationalchampionship, they have their
organization for their schoolsand things.
So everyone's welcome to buildwhatever thing you want, right?
There's no, you can still be aplenty of people there were USA
(40:10):
te members.
Plenty of people weren't.
So it's not a blood-in,blood-out thing.
Say you grew up in Jito Kwan orMudo Kwan, where you're, hey,
this is my this is my click, andwe're gonna show you why our way
is the best.
It's the big group, you can be amember, you cannot be a member,
but if you do want to play onthe official groups, that's the
one that the USOC works directlywith.
(40:31):
So does that make that clear andnot hopefully too too involved?
SPEAKER_01 (40:34):
I think it's very uh very clear, but what we really
want to know is the politicalway how you really feel about
the organization.
Of course not.
I think that'll be the nextepisode, right, Master Hogs?
SPEAKER_03 (40:43):
Perfect.
Next episode, he'll tell us whathe's doing.
I had all my notes on Israel andPalestine.
I wanted to get into also.
Uh, if you guys have a fewminutes, I want to make sure we
get fully canceled on bothsides.
SPEAKER_00 (40:54):
This is a podcast we go for hours.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, right.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (40:59):
So can can I ask you one last question?
SPEAKER_00 (41:01):
Oh, I'm I'm sorry, Master Jay.
Let's do the last question andwe gotta wrap up there.
So Master Jay, go ahead.
SPEAKER_01 (41:06):
Okay, so um we we talk about the training program,
the mindset, but I think thatand the rest and recovery.
But I think what you bring tothe table, correct me if I'm
wrong, but you also help peoplewith nutrition, right?
And I think that's one of thethings that people don't
understand the value andimportance of that.
Like when we were growing up, wedidn't realize all the crap
(41:27):
we're eating, right?
We ate a lot of fast food, butnow 2025, people understand how
bad sugars are and things likethat.
And so when we teach our kids inour schools, we talk about, hey,
you respecting your body is notjust you have to respect is not
just respecting yourself andyour parents and your teachers,
but also your body by what youput in your body.
So nutrition is important.
So can you just speak a littlebit about nutrition, not just
(41:49):
for kids, but for families andfor high-level athletes, how
valuable and important that isas a part of the whole, the
whole part of the trainingprogram.
SPEAKER_03 (41:58):
It's massive, and it's one of those that you're so
right.
When we're younger, I thoughtthat we thought that's real life
is the difference.
When I was living at thetraining center, we know the
dorm's there and there's thattaco bell.
It's not a taco bell anymore,but across the street.
So I'm talking about.
I remember the taco bell.
I used to right.
I used to hop the fence thereall the time and go get Taco
Bell daily.
(42:19):
Like daily.
We had free food at the calf,but I'd go there and jump the
fence, and I thought I wasmagic.
I thought, I literally thought Iwas Wolverine.
Like, I'll just heal and I'll begood and I'll eat Taco Bell and
it'll be great.
But it was, I was 20, right?
And I had no job.
They paid me to train, I hadthree medical, I could, it was
all good, so I could recoverfrom a better side, I could
(42:39):
process things.
As we age, that doesn't reallywork that well.
And was that optimal?
Not at all.
So we look at those piecesyou're talking about there.
That if training is breaking ourbody down, it's the nutrition
that helps send a signal to growback stronger.
Taekwondo part of why I again Inever planned on focusing on
that too much.
(43:00):
Taekwondo, but just it's becomethe thing that strength and
conditioning is a little moreprocedural.
The nutrition part still wrapseveryone's mind a little hard to
wrap around some of those, butit can be a lot more simple
there.
I'll give you an example forschool owners, right?
There, how do we navigateevening fueling?
Right.
(43:20):
And this is one of the biggestones because you have class when
four to eight, three to eight,three to nine, something like
that.
It's hard to eat a sandwich inthe middle of class while you're
doing that stuff.
So, what are fueling strategieswe can use that give people the
optimal energy that gives us theright mind focus?
Means we have mental clarity.
We're not up, we're not down andstarving and snappy and
(43:42):
whatever.
We don't come home at 11 atnight exhausted, having to stuff
our face.
So some of these things therefrom a nutritional standpoint
really do have a big effect onour recovery, our drive, the way
our bodies feel.
And back to the tenants likeyou're talking about, I really
think that stuff is one of theexpressions of self-control.
And I don't mean self-control,you're not gonna eat the cookie.
(44:04):
I eat cookies all the time, butit's can I eat the right, can I
give myself the right fueling atthe right time?
Can I have this meal I'mtraining in 90 minutes as a
high-level athlete?
There are certain things thatmost likely you should eat more
of, right?
You probably need some complexcarbohydrates there.
Protein intake at that time ofday is probably lower because
protein is not a fuel source,right?
Protein is for recovery.
(44:25):
So now we can get into timingand can I get myself to eat the
right meal during this time,during the workout.
Do I need intra-workoutcarbohydrates or fuel during it
to keep my levels up?
Once I'm done, do I have myprotein shake afterwards so I
can help build the repair?
So those pieces, as far as beingconsistent, I think are really
great things to model for ourstudents and show them with
(44:47):
nutrition.
I feel like more is caught thantaught.
So they when they see schoolowners trying again, doesn't
mean we're perfect.
I eat ice cream every singlenight there, and it's by design.
I it's in my plan.
I'm building this for the longone, but every night I have ice
cream because I have with mydaughters.
I want to show them that I'm nota psychopath.
I'm not like, sorry because Iknow this.
(45:07):
I'm measuring every little all.
I'm like, how many is this intohere?
That's a crappy way to look.
That's Master J.
That's what he does.
Do you eat eating ice creamevery day?
SPEAKER_01 (45:16):
Is that what you're talking about?
No, he does uh calorie.
SPEAKER_00 (45:19):
Can I have one more and take it off?
And he has that work, he hasn'thad carbs in five years.
Yeah, they look great.
You gotta talk to him.
SPEAKER_01 (45:28):
No, so go ahead and that's very helpful, and I think
that's something that I woulddefinitely want to improve on as
well is understanding a betternutrition plan.
So I do think it's veryvaluable.
But I know, Master Hong, we'rerunning out of time, but I am
curious back in the day when youhad those 49 said tacos from
Taco Bell, how many could youeat in your heyday in one
sitting?
SPEAKER_03 (45:47):
Gosh, I was never a big eater, I was a real
consistent eater.
So my go-to order was thischeese yogurt.
I was a vegetarian at the time.
I'm not anymore, but this is myorder.
Cheese yogurita crunch withbeans instead of beef, Mexican
pizza when they had it, theydidn't have it, they brought it
back now as wonderful beansinstead of beef, and a bean
burrito with no onions that Inormally didn't eat, but it was
(46:07):
always in there just as a safetyin case I needed it or one of
the other things was messed up.
That was my go-to order.
SPEAKER_01 (46:14):
I hope we're getting sponsorship money from Taco
Bell.
SPEAKER_03 (46:16):
We gotta get Taco Bell to sponsor us.
No joke.
So back when I was competing,this is how deep in the game I
was on that that didn't matter.
I could just out traineverything.
Was remember that movie aboutSupersize Me about the
McDonald's?
So I wanted to do a Taco Bellone, run for the border or
something.
I was gonna eat Taco Bell,nothing for a month, make wait
and win nationals.
(46:38):
That was a great idea.
SPEAKER_01 (46:40):
I think Master Hung wants to volunteer to still be a
part of that experience.
SPEAKER_03 (46:44):
We've been doing it.
SPEAKER_00 (46:48):
The biggest thing I got takeaway is you're saying I
could eat at 11:30 at night andI'll be okay.
That's what I got.
SPEAKER_03 (46:54):
You'll be just fine.
Yeah.
That's definitely the takeawayof this call, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (46:59):
All right, Coach Tim Thackeray.
Thank you so much for joining ustoday and sharing your
incredible insight into highperformance coaching, athlete
mindset, and how those sameprinciples apply to running a
successful Mortar school.
A big shout out to Master Caileyfor co-hosting with me.
And for everyone listening, Ihope you picked up some valuable
(47:20):
lessons on how to build awinning culture, keep your
students engaged long term, andsustain your own passion as a
school owner.
You can learn more about CoachTim and his work by checking out
the links in our show notes orYouTube description below.
As always, thanks for tuning into Black Belt Panther, where we
bring you conversations thathelp you grow your school,
(47:41):
sharpen your leadership, andstay inspired on and off the
mat.
Until next time, keep traininghard and leading with purpose.
Bye, everybody.
In this week's episode, we'll discuss the topic
what school owners can learnfrom high-level athletes,
engagement, growth, andretention.
Welcome to Blackville Fancks,the best podcast to help bear
market schools, increaseprofits, and generate
substantial revenue.
I'm Jimmy Hall, and my co-hostis Master Jay Lee.
(02:45):
We are joined by Coach TimThackeray, a seven-time U.S.
national team member ofTaekwondo, Pan American Games
Gold Medalist, and WorldChampionship Brown Medalist, a
former resident athlete at theU.S.
Olympic Training Center.
Tim was named USA Taekwondo'smale athlete of the year in
2006.
Beyond his own competitivecareer, he's become a
(03:06):
sought-after strength andconditioning coach, guiding
Olympians and professionalathletes across multiple sports,
including those who competed inthe 2016 Summer Games.
From the math to the weightroom, Tim's journey is about
resilience, reinvention, andhelping others reach their peak
performance.
Master Jay, Coach Tim, welcometo the show.
(03:29):
Let's start with you, Coach Tim.
You've competed at an elitelevel for many years.
Most of our audience are schoolowners, head instructors, and
pick one of professionals.
Do you see any similaritiesbetween your journey as an
athlete and how school ownersrun their schools or teach their
students today?
SPEAKER_03 (03:49):
Yeah, absolutely.
When I actually retired fromcompeting, I had a meeting with
my coach, Scott Fuji, and wetalked, and he goes, I think
you're going to do really wellin business.
I was opening up a gym at thetime, and I was like, why do you
say that?
And he goes, It's the same.
He goes, That same competitivefire that you have, the same
drive, the same way to want toget up every day and make things
(04:12):
better.
I think you see the successfulschool owners really have that
and they embody it.
You're so obsessed in a healthyway, sometimes maybe
borderlines, right, on whathealthy is to someone, but it's
obsessive.
It makes you want to make everylittle piece of the mat work
good, right?
Every instructor trainingprogram.
It was all those same things.
And we ran our gym very muchlike a martial arts school.
(04:34):
It was a CrossFit gym at thetime, but it was that idea that
no one had this structure.
And we saw it because we grew upin martial arts schools.
And we thought, we know how todo this.
This is missing, and this ismissing, and on the floor, piece
is missing, and all these otherparts.
So we came in and it was verydifferent industry, but it felt
the same.
It was that same drive.
So you go, oh, you're doinggood.
(04:55):
And I think in business it'seasy to say, okay, I'm making
some profit.
That's fine.
That's kind of the equivalent ofsomeone as a fighter, say, or
competitor, saying, I want a fewfights.
And for some people, that mightbe fine.
Most school owners, the reasonyou get up to that level is
because that's the buy-in level.
You I think I can do more.
I think I can have a biggerschool.
(05:16):
I think I can train staff up.
These are all kind of audaciousthings for people who maybe are
just getting started or gettingby, thinking, how am I going to
pay rent this month?
How am I going to do these kindof things?
Where can competing, you stillmight win a couple fights, but
in my head I'd go, I think I canmake the national team.
And you go, that's a crazythought.
So for me, that those werereally congruent, if that makes
(05:37):
sense, of the drive it tookpersonally, that belief, even
without facts.
We talk about facts.
Sometimes you don't have factsat all to support it.
I just go, I think I'm going tobe good at this.
You open a gym and you're brokeor a sport school and you're
broke, and you spend every lastpenny on maths and consulting
and every step of the way.
But you go, I think I'm going tohave five of these.
(05:59):
And people think you're insane,but then years later you go,
Hey, I was wrong.
I have six.
And so that part to me hasalways really been a
competitive, a through line ofthis stuff.
And I think it's why I probablywork with so many martial arts
school owners.
That mindset's the same.
It was never about competition,right?
The competitions with yourself.
(06:20):
You two could have taekwondoschools next to each other, and
you're not in competitionbecause you're just obsessed.
Master J's just obsessed withmaking his so good.
So that's what do you guys thinkabout that?
I know you've been doingtaekwondo a long time and this
stuff too.
So I'm interested to hear also.
SPEAKER_01 (06:34):
But I just to be clear, I wouldn't want to put
him out of business if I wasnext to him, though.
SPEAKER_03 (06:38):
Fair.
I'll try not to give it yes.
Not in the next.
SPEAKER_01 (06:49):
I think what you said is so impactful, right?
People are so driven anddisciplined.
But I think one of the thingsthat people often forget about
is the importance of goalsetting.
And you doing that as an eliteathlete, you had to set up a
number of goals as you wentthrough your journey.
How important do you see thatas, whether it's just your own
training regimen or running amartial arts school or any other
(07:11):
business?
SPEAKER_03 (07:12):
Yeah, that's something that I feel personally
I had to get really good atbecause I wasn't one of the
naturally, I'm just great atTaekwondo.
I wasn't.
I was passionate about it and Iwas your family was obsessed,
but we weren't particularly, oh,let's go watch what they're
doing with Taekwondo.
We're more the ones that wantedto learn everything from you and
do it.
And so with that, I had toreally learn about training.
(07:35):
I had to really learn aboutprogram design.
It was because that was my onlyadvantage I had to survive.
Right.
And you could take that sameanalogy and say, maybe some
people have a thriving businessbecause they're in the right
part of town, they ended upbecoming the popular spot.
And you can that can happen forsure, but is that a systematic
way to now develop a businessand again run multiple schools
or a training program?
(07:56):
Maybe, right?
People can make stuff work, butif I was gonna put my money
somewhere, I'd probably want toinvest on someone with really
good systems and a strategy.
So I went to that with thatidea, not of just the goals, but
to reverse engineer of what typeof training I was doing in
different weeks and stuff,building up the same way we do
for seasons and black belttestings and holidays, the same
(08:16):
idea there, down to I knew thatif we had our national team
selection, say the first week ofJanuary, which was always really
horrible, right?
Everyone's cutting weight overChristmas, not super fun, but I
told myself, if I could bedialed here and I could be good
on January 6th, you can beat meevery other day of the year.
On January 6th, I'm gonna bebetter than you.
(08:38):
I can put that together.
So as far as that, then with abusiness, you go, okay, we have
back to school thing.
It was the same thing.
What are the assets we need toget ready for these timelines
and do it?
And then it's September orAugust, and it's go.
So it really fed thatcompetitive part of me to doing
that.
And I don't know if I would havebeen able to retire one and done
(08:59):
and not come back and oh, wait,we have this big emptiness when
that part of ourselves that welove so much goes away.
Right?
Competition for a decade waseverything for me.
And so luckily, owning a gym,which we thought was gonna be a
martial arts school at first,and the gym still, I had a
little competition taekwondoteam, was how we opened the gym
and had a little extra time.
(09:20):
I thought I'll teach someCrossFit.
So it was just not by design.
I thought I was gonna have alittle crew while I went through
graduate school, but that partfueled me, and I thought I know
how to do this, right?
Even though I didn't have anybusiness experience.
I thought, okay, I can take thisthrough line, I can follow the
goals, I can be there on thisday when I have to.
SPEAKER_00 (09:38):
That was my question is when you say gym, yeah, do
you mean uh Marshall Taekwondogym studio, or do you mean a gym
did you open?
SPEAKER_03 (09:48):
So, like most of the things that I've done in my
life, there wasn't really a planto do it.
I just start doing something andsomething will catch on.
That's just like Master J.
There's no plan.
I I just got lucky.
Sure, I doubt that.
I doubt that.
But it maybe I don't know thestory.
I'm excited to hear how you gotthere.
But for me, it's been as part Ijust get really obsessed with
(10:10):
something and I just follow it,and eventually somehow it turns
into something bigger, and thenI go into there.
So my plan was this, and this ishow the 30-second, maybe 45
second rundown.
I was done fighting, and I gotthe USOC was paying for my
college, which was really neat.
So I thought, okay, I'll go toschool when I was at UCLA.
(10:32):
I got into graduate school and Ididn't want to, and I was done
fighting.
And what's the opposite ofsports?
Political science.
I thought I'm gonna go the otherdirection.
I'm so done with everything.
I you know, you get that partwhere you're broke, like a bad
breakup, and you're like, I'mnever dating again.
That was me in sports.
I'm done with this.
I'll go be a professor, right?
(10:53):
And I'm done.
No one will see me again.
But I didn't want to have tobecome a TA and get the stipend
you get.
I thought I'd not make my ownmoney.
I've been doing seminars andsupporting myself the whole time
doing this.
So instead of that, I'll trainsome kids in Taekwondo.
And I ended up with this reallycool small competition team of a
dozen kids, 10 to 14 years old,that were the top and all of
(11:15):
SoCal, really.
They were really good drivingthree hours to train on my
driveway with no mats and vaneyes to give you how how much
these kids wanted.
It was a crew.
Uh, they fall on the on thecement and no one touched them.
They'll get up.
So it becomes winter, and I'mgonna lose the people.
I'm gonna make it enough just toget through.
Grad school is my only focus,and I'll have this little team.
(11:35):
So, all bad business ideas.
I thought, okay, I'll get aretail spot to support the small
team.
Like it was it was the crazything.
I was okay, so we have a littleextra time.
I'll have the team here.
What should I do?
And I didn't necessarily want tohave a martial arts school just
because I was focused on gradschool.
We'll teach CrossFit one night aweek or one hour a night the
(11:58):
days under Taekwondo.
And that was the plan, right?
The plan, and to give you anidea how bad at numbers I was
for being a numbers guy.
Uh my wife was uh bartender anda cocktail waitress at a at BJ's
brewer brewery, right?
And pizza place.
And she goes, What if we get 30members?
I'm like, if we get 30 peoplefor CrossFit, hey, I think we'll
(12:20):
cover all of this and it'll allwork.
And she goes, What if we get 60?
And I was a little cocky.
I go, if we get 60, you can quityour job.
That's how this is you look atit now, it's crazy.
But I'm 28.
Again, I'm just going and I dothe math.
I don't I don't know thenumbers.
I just think that seems like alot of money to me at 28.
Yeah.
So the CrossFit Gym took off.
(12:40):
We started to bring someTaekwondo in.
Eventually, I had to move thatout.
And my good friend Joseph Salim,who was uh Olympic coach for
Great Britain in 2012, we he hada school, so we combined forces
there and did that.
And then within 18 months, Ithink our CrossFit gym had 330
members.
Whoa.
And yeah, and I I quit gradschool and I went all in on, I
(13:03):
guess I'm gonna have gyms.
And that was like I stoppedcoaching the UC, I was coaching
the UCLA Taekwondo team.
I stopped that.
I gave it to one of my otherbuddies, Richard Lee, who has a
school down in LA.
He's one of my teammates there.
So I thought I was all in, andour plan was this we know the
martial art people, all myfriends.
You guys all own dojongs andmultiple dojongs, and I grew up
(13:23):
in a dojong.
My parents owned the dojong, soit all made sense.
And we thought, we knowinstructor training, we know all
these other parts of running thebusiness from talking to
friends, not like I knew it.
And we're gonna have a dozenCrossFit gyms, was the plan.
SPEAKER_01 (13:39):
But then the plan changed.
SPEAKER_03 (13:41):
The plan changed for two reasons.
The plan changed again for tworeasons.
This you'll just be like, thisguy got here this way.
It's again, it makes sense now,but at the time we're you're
just in go mode.
So we're going, we do that, andthe crossfit model is very
similar.
It was at the time.
The difference is it lacks twothings of why at the core, uh,
(14:02):
three things really.
The core, my wife and I, we ranit together.
I met my wife doing Taekwondo.
She was on Scott Fuji's teamwhen I first moved to LA.
So she was really a good fighterin her own right and stuff.
Uh, so we've always had thatcommon connection of speaking in
Taekwondo terms and what itmeans to train and to beat one,
the lack of respect in that areais a massive disconnect for us.
(14:24):
Massive, to the level of if yougo, oh, yes, I get that Tim
started the gym, he writes allthe stuff, he does everything, I
can lift more than him.
And you go, okay.
They somehow that's or whateveraspect there they do, and not,
oh, I'm grateful for youteaching me how to do this.
It's oh, I'm this fit, I'm gonnahave my own gym now.
(14:45):
So we through our instructortraining program, instead of the
goal was to grow it up, createinstructors, which we did,
satellite gyms, etc.
It's they view it like this thatthe leading cause of new
(15:54):
marriage is divorce.
Does that make sense?
So every time someone getsdivorced, there's two new
marriages.
Does that mean there's really nonew marriages?
But no, that means people aregetting divorced and your
marriages suck.
SPEAKER_00 (16:07):
What about the younger ones getting married?
That's not yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (16:11):
That's also bad too.
But they were getting, they'relike, oh, look at these new
gyms, but they were all justsplit-offs and split-offs.
So we had through our instructortraining program, had trained 12
different gym owners there, butit was easier for them, they
thought, to break off and dotheir own.
Almost all of them failed, ofcourse.
We we know the reason why we tryand take care and development in
(16:33):
the long run of the things wewanted to do were there.
So those really are too.
That's similar to yoga channels.
I'm sure yes.
They lack that respect there,and not that I'm I'm here and
you're there, but there's a waywe can do this that everybody
wins together.
And that's why this is being setup that way.
It's stronger when we do it thisway.
(16:54):
Otherwise, it is okay.
I guess I have to put you out ofbusiness now.
That's a really crappy way togo, but you talk about that
competitive fire again.
It's here we go.
So that was hard.
The second part was just we hadall those people break off that
taekwondo wise things happenwhere at the end of the day, if
someone's oh, I'm gonna do moreburpees than you, I we always
(17:16):
come back to all right, you wantto fight?
We can fight about this too.
That's how my wife and I think.
Like, that's wonderful.
Great job swinging thekettlebell.
Cool.
Can you kick my butt?
No, so those parts are very werehard.
I love martial arts very much.
But at the same time, that wasthe first, I'll dovetail it back
over here and then stoprambling.
Uh Stephen Lambden.
SPEAKER_01 (17:37):
Can I add sorry, sir?
But I think what you said was sofascinating and so impactful is
that you are an elite athlete,and obviously Tekwondo is an
Olympic sport.
It's one of the only martialarts a full Olympic sport.
But yes, what makes Tekwondoschool owners successful and
businesses successful is notonly focusing just the sport,
(17:58):
but to understand thetraditions, the martial art of
Tekwondo, because the culture,the respect, the discipline is
so critical.
You found that.
If I'm reading you, that's whatyou found in running across the
gym, that it's not just aboutthe physical stuff, it's the
cultural, the discipline, thetraditions of martial arts that
is really important.
SPEAKER_03 (18:16):
Sir, that's 100% dead on.
And when it was early we hadthat, we had community, we had a
really thriving instructortraining program.
Even the person we sold our gymto was someone we started
essentially as a white belt whowas coming in for weight loss
and whatever, and then becamesomeone who could run the gym on
his own and a very successfulperson in Hollywood already.
(18:37):
It was not a, hey, I'm down onmy luck, can I take this over?
But very qualified individual inhis own right and stuff.
So again, those ideas that wehad, we loved, and it felt like
there was a period where we go,yes, we see this.
We see the path, we know thepath that everyone, again,
everyone of my friends for themost part, outside of childhood,
(18:57):
are almost all business ownersand martial arts school owners,
right?
Yeah, that that that's our crew.
So those pieces, when theystarted to miss a line, we're
going, this isn't right.
SPEAKER_00 (19:07):
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I have a question.
Can you explain why uh someathletes that just can perform
at the highest level, whetherit's Olympics or their national
team and so forth?
From my experience, and this isnot just USA, I'm talking about
(20:34):
Koreans as well.
They can compete at the highestlevel, but when they're after
their career ends and they'reopening their own Taekwondo
studio or Marshall's gym,they're just so horrible at it.
It's it's and then you haveaverage above average
physicality school owners whothey competed, but never at the
(20:55):
highest level.
But their school and theirsystems is just the top notch.
And I don't understand thedisconnect there.
Do you have any insight on that?
Or am I off base?
You're always off base, butright.
SPEAKER_01 (21:13):
But in this case, you have some validity to what
you're saying.
SPEAKER_03 (21:16):
Yeah, it's correct.
Yeah, yeah.
We'll try and support them here.
We'll be good.
But I think it does for a couplereasons.
One, if you look at I look atTaekwondo like language, and I
would go and train in Korea,especially the late 90s before I
made the national team, and thenobviously right after it, for
that period from 99 through2002, I spent a good amount of
(21:36):
time there, uh, overalltraining.
And what I learned was the waythat the athletes and teams
communicated was different thanhow I needed to learn Taekwondo.
I had to learn Taekwondo almostlike how do you conjugate every
verb in Spanish?
How do you do it?
What's it very like again?
(21:56):
Where if you learn Spanishgrowing up, what do you do?
You just speak Spanish.
So they learned it at such alevel growing up and going
through the ages where everyelementary team has a team,
every junior high has a team,every high school, where it was
more like they were speaking afluent language to each other,
and the adjustments they madewere different.
It was more innate.
Where I had to, and that's partof why I got into all the stuff
(22:19):
I do, I had to obsess over everysingle piece of your right toe
does this, and at 15 seconds ofthe fight, you got to do this.
And so I had to really becomeprocedural around that.
It's a different type oflearning.
So for some athletes that are sogood and so talented, it doesn't
mean they don't work hard.
They work very hard.
But some of those parts, theyalmost, and just how it is, then
(22:41):
what system do you fall back onto get good at it?
So to support your idea thatmaybe some school owners that
maybe weren't the top, and Iyou're winning the Olympics
rules.
I don't consider myself the top.
I consider myself someone whodid well.
I learned that I had to learn alot, and I wasn't fulfilled at
the end, meaning I didn'taccomplish the big thing I
wanted to do.
So now I have systems.
(23:02):
I'm someone who has to followevery step and be dialed to make
sure I have a chance atanything.
I have to do that.
I can't just show up and play.
I've got to be systems andprocess oriented.
And then two, I'm still fightingfrom that.
Oh my gosh, I did all this stuffand it wasn't good enough.
I better go even harder here.
So I think a lot of schoolowners may have that of they
made it far, they did somethingand it wasn't there.
(23:23):
And now you have this fireinside you versus being, ah, I
did great, the next thing willcome, next thing will come, and
maybe it will, and maybe theystill do.
I'm not saying that there'splenty of Olympic champions that
have great schools, I'd love tohave, but with that idea that
sometimes we get satiated somuch and we're like, there's no
chip on our shoulder anymore.
Now, I don't need a wholemonster behind me, but a little
(23:46):
bit of something that's that'snot quite good enough, I think
that drives us if we can channelit.
I don't know.
Does that make any sense?
Or do you have thoughts on thattoo?
SPEAKER_00 (23:53):
No, absolutely, absolutely.
100% that makes sense.
I don't know, maybe because Iknow a lot of high-level
athletes from Korea, they justwhen they come here, they have
all this aspiration to open up aschool in this huge American
market.
But whether they don'tunderstand the American
consumers, the Americanstudents, or and they're just so
(24:15):
different than a Korean consumerbase, or they're just not
business savvy at all becausethey're just focused on their
own personal training anddevelopment.
I don't know.
SPEAKER_01 (24:25):
But I think I think some of the things that I've
seen is that some of thehigh-level athletes, they are
they have this standard, right,of excellence.
And they expect excellence ofthemselves.
And so when they try to teachtheir students who are not
aspiring to be nationalathletes, Olympic athletes, they
expect those kind of standards.
And that's perhaps where some ofthe disconnect is because they
have these elite athleteexpectations, but yet their
(24:48):
students are doing it, theirkids, their families, they're
doing this recreationally justfor stress relief exercise.
And so maybe that plays intopart of why some of they have a
challenge running a regulardoja.
SPEAKER_03 (25:00):
Yeah, master, yeah.
I I think there's a lot to that.
I think that idea that if youjust make the Taekwondo better,
that everything else willfollow.
And a lot of times as athletes,we can just go, I'll just get
better.
And that works there, wherethere's one that's one part.
It's an important part of thebusiness.
You have to get the on-the-floorstuff right.
The curriculum, the techniquehas to be right.
But there's so much more thanthat.
(25:22):
Right.
And as you ascend up, if youcan't delegate, if you can't
train staff, if you're just goodat doing you, and a lot of
athletes are good at doing themand not asking for help, right?
And not doing the other parts.
So they do it.
How do you grow then?
It's hard to grow if you can'tgo, hey, I'll pass this off to
you, and it's okay if it's 85%.
I'll come in and add the 15% andfill that in.
(25:42):
That was hard for me to learn atthe start because it was I'll do
it all.
And then I delegate and it'dfall apart.
Oh god, this poster stinks.
And it's like, no, this posterstinks, and my job is to tweak
it here and then retrain.
Once I saw that, I thought,okay, here's where my new avenue
is.
So I think with athletes andcoaches, all the floor is
everything, it's just better.
(26:03):
I'm just a better coach.
That's subjective.
That's me saying my Taekwondo isbetter than yours.
And that's a pretty bad way tomark it because it's so easy to
counter.
You go, guess what?
You don't know what you'relooking for, and I say mine's
better.
And I go, he said he won the1987 Olympics.
And we're there was no 87Olympics.
No, he said so.
SPEAKER_01 (26:22):
There's a lot of Olympians out there.
SPEAKER_03 (26:23):
There's a lot of a lot of our joke is our joke
anytime we want to mess withsomeone, we say we won the
cruiser weight of whatevertournament.
Oh, I think he fought cruiserweight there.
SPEAKER_00 (26:33):
I know that this is not just in in Teku, but all
sports.
Professional athletes at highlevel where they're used to are
that attention.
And then able to communicate andteach that to regular students
is they just they can't.
They have they don't have theability to communicate and share
what they've learned in theirtraining to others, but they can
(26:56):
do it themselves really well.
Correct.
But they just can't teach itwell.
Yeah, and if you can't teach it,if you can't teach Taekwondo
after you open up a Taekwondostudio and taekwondo school, it
doesn't matter what systems thatyou have, you're not gonna.
SPEAKER_03 (27:12):
Yes, a hundred percent.
Yeah, and that's back to thatidea, I feel like, of the
language that if you don't knowhow to really do it and break,
because you're just it justbecomes watch me kick, isn't it
great?
And I go, yeah, I can't, that'sawesome.
But it's not about you.
It's can you teach them to dothat?
Can you communicate thateffectively at the core part?
And yeah, they then they openingup the school just because they
don't know what else to do.
That's that's not a great way todo it.
(27:33):
You should open up any businessbecause I feel like you have
some sort of burning desire todo it.
You want to impact yourcommunity for a certain way,
these things you want toaccomplish and help.
And then the systems all supportthat.
But if it's backwards, let'smake some money.
There's a lot simpler ways tomake money than running a
taekwondo school if it's justthat.
But if you want impact and thisstuff and legacy, okay, now it's
(27:55):
actually a lot harder to findsomething better than a
taekwondo school or a martialarts school to do that, in my
opinion.
SPEAKER_00 (28:01):
Right.
100% agree.
Absolutely.
These top-level athletes theytrain for how many years that
longevity, like singular focus.
SPEAKER_02 (28:11):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (28:12):
Do you have any tips to school owners in terms of how
those athletes keep their focusand retention versus how to
explain to the school owners,hey, you gotta use this to keep
your students retention longer,keep them in the school longer.
Is there any similarities inthat, or is that just completely
(28:33):
different?
Because their singular purposeis to individually themselves to
get to the highest level.
The school owners is for a lessselfish reason.
Hey, I want my students tobecome three years, five years,
seven years training inTaekwondo, or am I off base
there?
SPEAKER_03 (28:50):
No, no, you're on base.
It's the same, I think.
And part of what I love comingto Asa and I sit in the seminars
too, that the ones I feel thatare really doing great have such
a wonderful client journey fortheir students.
Every road mark, every littlething, and not just the road
mark, you're gonna be here,we're going from LA to San
Francisco, or we're gonna stopoff in Bakersfield and get some
(29:13):
Starbucks.
We're gonna get here's a everylittle piece.
There's the birthday party,here's your hundred-day
celebration, you've been at allthose things are thought
through.
It's the same for athletes.
But again, it's like I have toknow that not just I need to be
at the team trials on this day,I need to be here.
Worlds are at this time, andhere's the trip.
And I have these roadmarks therethroughout the year that
athletes they know theirschedule there.
(29:35):
So when we get buy-in or we getintent, I'm a big believer that
our purpose has to align withour intent.
unknown (29:43):
Right?
SPEAKER_03 (29:43):
When we get those two, now it becomes who you are,
and it's very effortless.
The first part of my career, Ididn't have that all lined up,
and there was a lot of frictionfor me.
It was hard to get up early,right?
It was hard to be consistent intraining.
Making it through a six-weektraining block was really hard.
And I struggled with a lot ofthat stuff psychologically.
(30:04):
Once I got it there, it was allthe friction in the world was
gone, and I could just gothrough for years at a time, it
felt like.
Look at the school owners thathave maybe no staff and they're
(30:25):
barely getting by and you're onevery weekend.
I remember being there in ourgym where you're you're in
survival, it's hard to do.
I was there as a fighter, too.
You're just okay, I better youfinish the tournament, and what
do you do?
This is this is a bad athletehabit.
It seems good, we give itpraise, but it's maladaptive.
They finish the tournament andmaybe they get third at
nationals or quarterfinal loss.
(30:46):
They don't even medal, so theycan't go to team trials.
Uh uh athlete with a notlong-term view does this.
They get up tomorrow morning andthey try and train for four
hours.
Seems like a good thing, right?
Oh, they want it, they just youhave to have some space to grow
against.
We need to create that space tocome back.
And actually, over the longterm, it was that those athletes
(31:07):
that do it for a long time dotake time off.
They do go here.
I know I need to rest now.
I'm not resting because I'mlazy.
I'm resting because if I don'tstay off my legs today, this
next six-week block is gonna bereally torturous.
Or if I don't chill on Sunday,it's like my dad would always
tell me, he goes, I can'tbelieve for how lazy you are,
you're so consistent intraining.
(31:30):
But what he meant was I had tosit.
I wasn't sitting or being doingthat because whatever.
I knew that was for me, that wastraining.
Right.
And if you ask me to dosomething like, sorry, I can't
do it on Sunday, because mytraining is me sitting on this
couch here.
So I think back with then withschool owners, their longevity,
how can they ebb and flow?
And not because they're lazy,not because they waited too
(31:51):
long, now they gotta go totallyburn out, but date night's
planned, right?
Coach time off is planned.
SPEAKER_00 (31:57):
Coach Tim, if I knew that, if I knew being on the
couch was part of the training,I would have been an Olympian
back in the day.
I mean, exactly.
I would have been a little bitmore than a lot of people.
SPEAKER_01 (32:07):
A champion in that way, yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (32:11):
Yeah, he's going for a record.
He's a three weeks straight.
Yeah, the part of the thing iswe do have to get off the couch
at some stage and train.
But it's like that withstudents.
They do good and they get off alittle bit.
What happens?
They thought they're messing up.
Can I come back in?
And that those pieces are normalfor them.
And it should be becausetaekwondo is probably not their
only thing.
For some it is, and at somestage, like for us all, it
(32:33):
eventually becomes our onlything, but they're juggling
stuff.
And so, how do they understandthat focus and value of
Taekwondo?
I see that part as the same inthe schools.
When I hear the talks and I talkto the school owners at the
events, and they understand howto communicate that and their
staff can communicate that.
I think personally retention isbecause it's who you are now.
(32:54):
Taekwondo is not an activity.
This is, I wrestled more than Idid Taekwondo growing up, but I
was a Taekwondo student.
But that's who I was.
SPEAKER_01 (33:02):
Cook Coach Tim, I think what you said was very
impactful.
I think it's that's an evolutionof Taekwondo and training and
education.
Twenty years ago, people saidyou have to train every single
day, but through education, theyfound that your body needs rest
and recovery.
And I kind of equate it to Umrunning a tech owner school.
I'm a second generation schoolowner.
My my father came with nothing.
(33:23):
And their philosophy was alwayshey, we're going to work seven
days a week.
We're going to be there from 9a.m.
to 9 p.m.
And I think that definitelyworked.
And but I think over time thatschool owners nowadays they're
realizing that you don't have todo it that way to still be
successful.
There has to be a balancebetween personal work.
And I've just noticed there's atrend.
A lot of martial arts schoolowners are closing uh two days a
(33:47):
week now.
Like it used to be six, sevendays a week, but people are
finding that hey, I can give myteam and myself recovery or
students some time forthemselves.
We can operate five days a weekand still be highly successful.
So I think that's kind of theevolution as people get educated
and understand things better.
There's efficient ways to dothings.
SPEAKER_03 (34:07):
Yes, Master J couldn't agree more.
If you're gonna if I'm gonnachoose one side, the part where
you talk about your dad comingover and going seven days a
week, I think that's at thecore.
You have to have I'd rathersomeone have that and then pull
them back than like I reallymaybe twice a week, and this is
hard, right?
So if we're gonna have one, it'sthat part where you're a dog.
(34:29):
You're gonna go do it.
We can channel that, right?
I can teach a fighter strategy,but it's a lot harder to teach a
strategy person how to fight.
Both are possible.
One's just a little easier, myexperience.
So we we do need that.
And yeah, you look at the onestheir staff is fresh, that
they're coming in, they'reexcited, that everyone's ready
to have good purpose, goodintent of their classes, and not
just getting through.
(34:50):
I know when our volume was toohigh in training.
What happens is every athletedownshifts.
So we're gonna go here.
It's my fourth practice of theday.
I'm not gonna bring that.
And now it's junk volume, right?
I I look at activities for mydaughter.
Daughters are nine and four.
And yeah, we because we loveTaekwondo so much, we want them
to do stuff all the time.
They're at the off-wheel.
It's come all the time.
(35:11):
I'd pay more for some activitiesfor her to come less.
How much I'll pay you double foronce a week.
I don't want to be here fourtimes.
But like, but eventually theyget there and it's fine.
But in the start, I didn't wantto do this all the time.
It was just I thought it'd be afun thing to learn to paint
coffee cups once in a while.
I don't need to be on yourunlimited coffee painting plan,
(35:32):
the value there.
SPEAKER_00 (35:33):
Coaching, what's your role with USA Taekwondo?
SPEAKER_03 (35:36):
Yeah, so I'm the director of education there with
USA Taekwondo.
And then I do a lot of otherstuff with specific athlete
groups.
I'm the strength andconditioning coach for the
Paralympic team.
I'm the strength andconditioning coach for the
under-21 team for the WorldChampionships.
So I do that and kind of someone-off special, hey, with this
group, I'm going to work withthem in a certain way.
(35:57):
But my main role is doingeducation and creating courses
around both supporting thecoaching staff.
They have courses on, hey,here's how the modern sport game
is, here's how uh modern Pumseiis, and creating that into
educational content for twopopulations.
One for direct to consumer.
The second one would be thingsthat would work with the schools
(36:19):
as far as staff development.
Not every school owner is gonnalearn every new aspect to
Taekwondo, but your staff mightneed it to implement a new drill
or a new piece there, and notthat you're gonna go full 2028
Olympic training center there,but hey, we want to be able to
do some of this too, or add anew hip drill in for some
mobility or some piece.
So I do a lot of that side ofstuff, which again for me is fun
(36:44):
because I like the education andthought side.
SPEAKER_00 (36:46):
For our audience, the USA Taekwondo, which is
responsible for organizing andoverseeing the Olympic style
taekwondo in the US, meaning theworld taekwondo rule set that's
used in the Olympics.
So it manages every and correctme if I'm wrong, but doesn't it
manage everything from nationalcompetitions and rankings,
athlete development programs,national team selection for
international events, for worldchampionships, pan Ams, and the
(37:09):
Olympics, and the coach andreferee certifications under the
World Taekwondo standards.
Is that correct?
SPEAKER_03 (37:14):
Yeah, 100%.
It's the MGB, it's big, andthere's there's all sorts of
avenues to get to get my fingersin there without really what I
like about it is without havingto step on toes of me saying,
Oh, I think here's how youshould kick in your dojong.
Like that's for you to decide.
That's for you to do.
(37:35):
And I don't want to be becausethen again, we can't work
together.
We battle.
You say, no, my way is right.
I want to talk about it and say,hey, here is a way to fuel your
students, or here's a way towork on mobility around this,
and then we can all worktogether on stuff because you
can take what you need and youcan leave the rest there.
And the umbrella is big to havethose avenues to work with other
(37:55):
people.
SPEAKER_01 (37:56):
And then in the vein of education, and I know Master
Hong, you touched on what thenational governing body is, but
just for our listeners, can youjust, without obviously getting
political, but just to educateour listeners, what is the
difference between USAT, AAU,all these different
organizations that existthroughout Tekwano?
They all obviously want to growTekwano, but maybe for some
(38:16):
people they don't know what thedifference is between these
things.
SPEAKER_03 (38:18):
That's a great question, sir.
I'll try and be as you know uhbroad but clear as I can that
USA Taekwondo is the nationalgoverning body that works
directly with the US OPC, the USOlympic and Paralympic
Committee.
The US Olympic and ParalympicCommittee works directly with
the IOC, right?
With the International OlympicCommittee.
So this is the group with themain task of selecting our
(38:42):
Olympic team and then selectingdifferent teams for, say, like
the world championshipshappening right now in China for
sparring or world championshipsfor PUMSA, the official ones.
So that's the main part.
There's a lot of other thingsthat they do, grassroots, state
championships, etc.
There other groups like Seiu area governing body as well.
The EU initially used to be thenational governing body way back
(39:05):
up in the 70s and before I thinkDr.
Ken Man started that group inthe early 70s, who obviously was
the founder of the UC Berkeleyprogram out there, and then did
a million things for us to nothave to mention through here,
but a legend in that area to it.
But the with the Ted Stevens Actof 1978, I believe, they said
that EU cannot be the nationalgoverning body of sport, just
(39:28):
from not this currentadministration stuff.
But back then, if you watchmovies without limits with about
Steve Prefontaine, the runner.
I watched that, and they hadtrack and field dealing with AU
stuff and these issues, and sothose issues were broad, so they
had to come and bring in athleterepresentation.
So that's about as far down therabbit hole as I'll get on that
part.
So they are a governing body,they can have every group can
(39:48):
have their own nationalchampionships, every group can
have a state, a local, a thing.
You have there.
We were last weekend with uhMaster Amitus in Sacramento, and
she has the Mudo group.
So they have their nationalchampionship, they have their
organization for their schoolsand things.
So everyone's welcome to buildwhatever thing you want, right?
There's no, you can still be aplenty of people there were USA
(40:10):
te members.
Plenty of people weren't.
So it's not a blood-in,blood-out thing.
Say you grew up in Jito Kwan orMudo Kwan, where you're, hey,
this is my this is my click, andwe're gonna show you why our way
is the best.
It's the big group, you can be amember, you cannot be a member,
but if you do want to play onthe official groups, that's the
one that the USOC works directlywith.
(40:31):
So does that make that clear andnot hopefully too too involved?
SPEAKER_01 (40:34):
I think it's very uh very clear, but what we really
want to know is the politicalway how you really feel about
the organization.
Of course not.
I think that'll be the nextepisode, right, Master Hogs?
SPEAKER_03 (40:43):
Perfect.
Next episode, he'll tell us whathe's doing.
I had all my notes on Israel andPalestine.
I wanted to get into also.
Uh, if you guys have a fewminutes, I want to make sure we
get fully canceled on bothsides.
SPEAKER_00 (40:54):
This is a podcast we go for hours.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, right.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (40:59):
So can can I ask you one last question?
SPEAKER_00 (41:01):
Oh, I'm I'm sorry, Master Jay.
Let's do the last question andwe gotta wrap up there.
So Master Jay, go ahead.
SPEAKER_01 (41:06):
Okay, so um we we talk about the training program,
the mindset, but I think thatand the rest and recovery.
But I think what you bring tothe table, correct me if I'm
wrong, but you also help peoplewith nutrition, right?
And I think that's one of thethings that people don't
understand the value andimportance of that.
Like when we were growing up, wedidn't realize all the crap
(41:27):
we're eating, right?
We ate a lot of fast food, butnow 2025, people understand how
bad sugars are and things likethat.
And so when we teach our kids inour schools, we talk about, hey,
you respecting your body is notjust you have to respect is not
just respecting yourself andyour parents and your teachers,
but also your body by what youput in your body.
So nutrition is important.
So can you just speak a littlebit about nutrition, not just
(41:49):
for kids, but for families andfor high-level athletes, how
valuable and important that isas a part of the whole, the
whole part of the trainingprogram.
SPEAKER_03 (41:58):
It's massive, and it's one of those that you're so
right.
When we're younger, I thoughtthat we thought that's real life
is the difference.
When I was living at thetraining center, we know the
dorm's there and there's thattaco bell.
It's not a taco bell anymore,but across the street.
So I'm talking about.
I remember the taco bell.
I used to right.
I used to hop the fence thereall the time and go get Taco
Bell daily.
(42:19):
Like daily.
We had free food at the calf,but I'd go there and jump the
fence, and I thought I wasmagic.
I thought, I literally thought Iwas Wolverine.
Like, I'll just heal and I'll begood and I'll eat Taco Bell and
it'll be great.
But it was, I was 20, right?
And I had no job.
They paid me to train, I hadthree medical, I could, it was
all good, so I could recoverfrom a better side, I could
(42:39):
process things.
As we age, that doesn't reallywork that well.
And was that optimal?
Not at all.
So we look at those piecesyou're talking about there.
That if training is breaking ourbody down, it's the nutrition
that helps send a signal to growback stronger.
Taekwondo part of why I again Inever planned on focusing on
that too much.
(43:00):
Taekwondo, but just it's becomethe thing that strength and
conditioning is a little moreprocedural.
The nutrition part still wrapseveryone's mind a little hard to
wrap around some of those, butit can be a lot more simple
there.
I'll give you an example forschool owners, right?
There, how do we navigateevening fueling?
Right.
(43:20):
And this is one of the biggestones because you have class when
four to eight, three to eight,three to nine, something like
that.
It's hard to eat a sandwich inthe middle of class while you're
doing that stuff.
So, what are fueling strategieswe can use that give people the
optimal energy that gives us theright mind focus?
Means we have mental clarity.
We're not up, we're not down andstarving and snappy and
(43:42):
whatever.
We don't come home at 11 atnight exhausted, having to stuff
our face.
So some of these things therefrom a nutritional standpoint
really do have a big effect onour recovery, our drive, the way
our bodies feel.
And back to the tenants likeyou're talking about, I really
think that stuff is one of theexpressions of self-control.
And I don't mean self-control,you're not gonna eat the cookie.
(44:04):
I eat cookies all the time, butit's can I eat the right, can I
give myself the right fueling atthe right time?
Can I have this meal I'mtraining in 90 minutes as a
high-level athlete?
There are certain things thatmost likely you should eat more
of, right?
You probably need some complexcarbohydrates there.
Protein intake at that time ofday is probably lower because
protein is not a fuel source,right?
Protein is for recovery.
(44:25):
So now we can get into timingand can I get myself to eat the
right meal during this time,during the workout.
Do I need intra-workoutcarbohydrates or fuel during it
to keep my levels up?
Once I'm done, do I have myprotein shake afterwards so I
can help build the repair?
So those pieces, as far as beingconsistent, I think are really
great things to model for ourstudents and show them with
(44:47):
nutrition.
I feel like more is caught thantaught.
So they when they see schoolowners trying again, doesn't
mean we're perfect.
I eat ice cream every singlenight there, and it's by design.
I it's in my plan.
I'm building this for the longone, but every night I have ice
cream because I have with mydaughters.
I want to show them that I'm nota psychopath.
I'm not like, sorry because Iknow this.
(45:07):
I'm measuring every little all.
I'm like, how many is this intohere?
That's a crappy way to look.
That's Master J.
That's what he does.
Do you eat eating ice creamevery day?
SPEAKER_01 (45:16):
Is that what you're talking about?
No, he does uh calorie.
SPEAKER_00 (45:19):
Can I have one more and take it off?
And he has that work, he hasn'thad carbs in five years.
Yeah, they look great.
You gotta talk to him.
SPEAKER_01 (45:28):
No, so go ahead and that's very helpful, and I think
that's something that I woulddefinitely want to improve on as
well is understanding a betternutrition plan.
So I do think it's veryvaluable.
But I know, Master Hong, we'rerunning out of time, but I am
curious back in the day when youhad those 49 said tacos from
Taco Bell, how many could youeat in your heyday in one
sitting?
SPEAKER_03 (45:47):
Gosh, I was never a big eater, I was a real
consistent eater.
So my go-to order was thischeese yogurt.
I was a vegetarian at the time.
I'm not anymore, but this is myorder.
Cheese yogurita crunch withbeans instead of beef, Mexican
pizza when they had it, theydidn't have it, they brought it
back now as wonderful beansinstead of beef, and a bean
burrito with no onions that Inormally didn't eat, but it was
(46:07):
always in there just as a safetyin case I needed it or one of
the other things was messed up.
That was my go-to order.
SPEAKER_01 (46:14):
I hope we're getting sponsorship money from Taco
Bell.
SPEAKER_03 (46:16):
We gotta get Taco Bell to sponsor us.
No joke.
So back when I was competing,this is how deep in the game I
was on that that didn't matter.
I could just out traineverything.
Was remember that movie aboutSupersize Me about the
McDonald's?
So I wanted to do a Taco Bellone, run for the border or
something.
I was gonna eat Taco Bell,nothing for a month, make wait
and win nationals.
(46:38):
That was a great idea.
SPEAKER_01 (46:40):
I think Master Hung wants to volunteer to still be a
part of that experience.
SPEAKER_03 (46:44):
We've been doing it.
SPEAKER_00 (46:48):
The biggest thing I got takeaway is you're saying I
could eat at 11:30 at night andI'll be okay.
That's what I got.
SPEAKER_03 (46:54):
You'll be just fine.
Yeah.
That's definitely the takeawayof this call, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (46:59):
All right, Coach Tim Thackeray.
Thank you so much for joining ustoday and sharing your
incredible insight into highperformance coaching, athlete
mindset, and how those sameprinciples apply to running a
successful Mortar school.
A big shout out to Master Caileyfor co-hosting with me.
And for everyone listening, Ihope you picked up some valuable
(47:20):
lessons on how to build awinning culture, keep your
students engaged long term, andsustain your own passion as a
school owner.
You can learn more about CoachTim and his work by checking out
the links in our show notes orYouTube description below.
As always, thanks for tuning into Black Belt Panther, where we
bring you conversations thathelp you grow your school,
(47:41):
sharpen your leadership, andstay inspired on and off the
mat.
Until next time, keep traininghard and leading with purpose.
Bye, everybody.
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