Nicole Fowler - NSCA’s Coaching Podcast, Season 7 Episode 10

This episode of the NSCA Coaching Podcast features Nicole Fowler, the Assistant Strength and Conditioning Coach at Phillips Exeter Academy. Fowler connects with the NSCA Coaching and Sport Science Staff, Eric McMahon and Kevin Gregory, about transitioning from collegiate coaching, at Merrimack University and the University of Denver, to now working in a high school. Learn what it means to be “unembarassable” in your coaching and how that helps your strength and conditioning program. The impact of the high school strength and conditioning coach extends far beyond weight room in this episode. Tune in to learn more about programming for high school student-athletes and training insights for youth during the pre-college formative years.

Connect with Nicole on Instagram at @nicolesampson104 and @phillips_exeter_strength | Reach out to Eric and Kevin on Instagram at @ericmcmahoncscs and @coachgregorystrength

“There's about 1,200 students that are on campus here with us. We have grades 9 through 12, but then students can come and join us as a post-graduate as well. The cool thing about Exeter is that it's an extremely diverse campus. We represent about 33 countries and the school itself offers over 450 courses.” 2:25

“I've tried to narrow it down to two things, but the athletes want to have control or elements of control, and they want to enjoy the process.” 10:20

“He said to be successful in this world you have to be unembarrassable, which is funny, because I didn't put that into perspective. And sometimes the kids are dancing and having a good time or whatever it is. And you have to kind be on board with it to a certain extent. Obviously you have your standards. But you have to enjoy it, because otherwise you're going to pull your hair out trying to get all these kids to do exactly what you want them to do.” 10:55

“But role within the community I think is something that I've really enjoyed in my two years that I've been here. I love to see the other side of whatever the campus is working on.” 23:05

“I was able to create systems at Merrimack and create systems at Denver, and I'm able to use those systems, but just figure out a creative way to make it work in my setting that I'm in. And I can honestly say that I'm having the most fun that I've ever had coaching, being in the setting that I'm in. And I feel like I'm making a really big impact.” 27:30

[00:00:00.47] [MUSIC PLAYING]

[00:00:04.20] Welcome to the NSCA Coaching Podcast season seven, episode 10.

[00:00:10.86] My first year that I was at Exeter and it kind of stuck with me, and he said to be successful in this world you have to be unembarrassable, which is funny, because I didn't put that into perspective. And sometimes the kids are dancing and having a good time or whatever it is, and you have to kind of be on board with it to a certain extent. Obviously you have your standards.

[00:00:33.67] But you have to enjoy it, because otherwise you're going to pull your hair out trying to get all these kids to do exactly what you want them to do.

[00:00:42.38] [MUSIC PLAYING]

[00:00:43.63] This is the NSCA's Coaching Podcast, where we talk to strength and conditioning coaches about what you really need to know but probably didn't learn in school. There's strength and conditioning, and then there's everything else.

[00:00:54.61] This is the NSCA Coaching Podcast. I'm Eric McMahon, and today we are joined by a strength and conditioning coach in the Northeast. Nicole Fowler is a high school strength and conditioning coach at Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire. Nicole, welcome.

[00:01:11.67] Hi, thank you. Happy to be here.

[00:01:13.53] Hey, this is your first podcast. It's big time.

[00:01:16.17] Sure is, yeah. Exciting, for sure.

[00:01:19.59] That's awesome, and always great connecting with someone from the Northeast. One state over, I'm a Vermont guy and you're in New Hampshire. And funny coincidence, we both went to Springfield College. So today we also are joined by a co-host, Coach Kevin Gregory, the NSCA's coaching and sports science program coordinator.

[00:01:42.81] He's doing great work with our high school professional development group and is helping us grow further support for high school and scholastic strength and conditioning. Kevin, this is your first time on the NSCA Coaching Podcast since joining our staff at the headquarters in 2022. Let's go, man. Here we go.

[00:02:03.21] I'm excited. I'm excited to talk to Nicole and get this thing rolling.

[00:02:07.62] Awesome, so Phillips Exeter, a little bit of a different kind of high school than maybe we typically hear about here on the podcast. So tell us about where you're at, Nicole, and your role at Phillips Exeter.

[00:02:21.71] Yeah, absolutely. So Phillips Exeter is definitely a little bit different in the idea of high school. It's a boarding school. So a majority of our students live on campus. Some of them are day students as well. So we kind of have a good mix.

[00:02:38.81] There's about 1,200 students that are on campus here with us. We have grades 9 through 12, so a typical high school. But then students can come and join us as a post-graduate as well. So we do have some PG students.

[00:02:53.21] The cool thing about Exeter is that it's an extremely diverse campus. So we represent about 33 countries. And the school itself offers over 450 courses. So I got the course of instruction manual actually recently and my eyes popped out of my head at some of these courses that the students are able to take, because it's run very similar to a college. And they do have a lot of say in the process and what their high school experience is going to be.

[00:03:24.18] It's an extremely high-performing academic school. So the students that do come here, they know what they're getting into in terms of getting pushed academically. And then we do have a great amount of students that are here for athletics as well as academics. So we compare ourselves to a NESCAC school, so a little bit smaller in size, but tons of options for the students and very high-performing academically.

[00:03:56.00] Cool, so let's look at your career. So before Phillips Exeter, you were at the University of Denver, then after getting your master's degree at Merrimack, what were some of your goals in getting in this profession? Did you have your target set at the high school?

[00:04:12.97] Funny enough, I didn't have any sights on the high school world really at all. I got into the field after switching from a physical therapy major my freshman year at Springfield. I was never exposed to a weight room prior to being at Springfield and training with my team. I played soccer there.

[00:04:33.29] And so with that, I quickly fell in love with the weight room and being part of the process and being on that journey, while playing the sport and with my team. So along the same lines as probably everybody that gets into the field of strength and conditioning, I wanted to be a director at a Division I college program, because I guess hindsight now, but because that's really all I thought that I could do with the focus that I was in career-wise.

[00:05:06.97] And most of my experiences in internships and things like that led me down the path of collegiate strength and conditioning. I ended up going to Denver and working there and having an awesome time there. And then different circumstances brought me back home. So I had maintained some of my connections with friends that I met through all of my internships and previous experiences prior to being at Denver.

[00:05:35.66] And I just reached out to one of my friends that works at Phillips Exeter, ironically, and just wanted to pick his brain about high school strength and conditioning and what it entailed, and what the day-to-day was like, and if he liked it basically. And I was going home for some reason over the summer, and he was like, why don't you just come on campus and we can talk in person.

[00:05:57.90] And so when I went on campus he brought me around the building. And my mind was blown, A, at the resources that Exeter does have and the facilities that they have. I had to keep reminding myself that it was a high school and not a college. But I met the athletic director that day. And they were in the works, and at the time I didn't really know this, but they were in the works of creating a full-time role at Exeter as an assistant strength and conditioning coach.

[00:06:22.85] So then the athletic director asked me to come back the next day for an interview. And I ended up getting the job at Exeter and moving back home and starting my career in high school strength and conditioning, and I guess never looked back. I'm loving it here and I'm loving what we're building. And it's definitely a work in progress, but I think we're making some great change and we're developing an awesome system here that I'm excited to be a part of.

[00:06:47.10] You talked about playing college soccer, and that was really a gateway experience for you to learn about strength and conditioning, learn that strength and conditioning is a profession. I do think it's interesting, you kind of had your heart set on maybe collegiate strength and conditioning, like a lot of us. That's probably where most of the jobs are that we see or know about or come across on the different job boards. But at Denver you got exposed to some different sports.

[00:07:20.48] You worked with swimming, gymnastics, golf, and the triathlon teams. That's interesting, triathlon in Denver at the altitude, and--

[00:07:30.29] Oh, yeah.

[00:07:30.86] --the elevation, that's a big-time sport for out this way. But--

[00:07:35.87] Yeah, it was a brand new program when I was there as well. So it was cool to see that unfold and work with the first group of athletes to go through that program.

[00:07:46.17] I think it really speaks to when you get into the field as a strength and conditioning coach, there's a voice for exposing yourself to a lot of different areas of the field. As a college football player, if I only work with football, that doesn't give me a lot of professional options to expand in the profession. And so you really had that experience at Denver working with a lot of different teams.

[00:08:13.02] And now you're at the high school level. What are some of the key differences that you see working with high school athletes versus college athletes a few years later.

[00:08:24.04] There's definitely differences between the two kind of generations, I guess, of athlete and student that I've worked with. But I guess in general, there's-- and I had to go through this process being here for the time that I've been at Exeter, but there's not a ton. And it's nice to know that the work that I've put in prior to being in this high school world, I'm able to mold it into something that works here with these high schoolers.

[00:08:56.29] But I think with the students that I work with, they're-- well, Exeter has 56 sports. So there's JV and there's varsity. And not all of them, and a good majority of them, don't go to play on to the next level, especially like on these JV teams and things like that.

[00:09:15.74] So just quickly I guess to lay out the schedule, so our students need to have a physical education requirement every term. So that could be by playing a sport or it could be by doing a physical education class. So a lot of the students that we work with that are on these JV teams aren't planning on going to that next level to collegiate athletics. I had to mold my thought process and change the way I approached the coaching, definitely the programming as well, as you can imagine.

[00:09:48.74] But the way that I approach the coaching, I had to take a couple steps back to move forward in the way that I approached it. I think especially just being at Denver with all these very high-performing athletes, they want to be pushed, and they want to be held to these really high standards. And I think I'm able to do that at Exeter. And it's just, you have to disguise it, I guess, a little bit, when you're working with these kids. But I've noticed for sure in at least the past two years that I've been here that it comes down to two things.

[00:10:20.93] And I've tried to narrow it down to two things, but the athletes want to have control or elements of control, and they want to enjoy the process. So with that being said, I just changed the way that I approached my sessions and the way that I approached working with teams, A, to make it more fun and to have them enjoy the process. Things that I was pretty tight on prior to being at Exeter I had to let my guard down a little bit.

[00:10:46.79] And Sean Fishel, who is the head strength coach at Exeter, he said one thing on my first year that I was at Exeter, and it kind of stuck with me. And he said to be successful in this world you have to be unembarrassable, which is funny, because I didn't put that into perspective. And sometimes the kids are dancing and having a good time or whatever it is. And you have to kind be on board with it to a certain extent.

[00:11:13.37] Obviously you have your standards. But you have to enjoy it, because otherwise you're going to pull your hair out trying to get all these kids to do exactly what you want them to do. But definitely enjoying the process. And then the element of control, they want to know what's coming next. And I try to just really explain whatever I'm doing in the session. Before the session starts I'll lay out exactly what we're going to be doing, why we're doing it, and then have a system that they know what they're going to get every time that they're working with me.

[00:11:42.60] Yeah, you know, you brought up a great point about programming. And the big difference between college and high school is often you're dealing with multi-sport athletes at the high school level. How do you manage working with the athletes who play multiple sports? Do you have set in-season blocks, off-season blocks, or do you have more of a hybrid model? What's your programming like?

[00:12:05.48] Yeah, the programming piece I think would be the main area that I struggled with in my first year at Exeter, for sure. I do deal with a lot of the female sports in particular, and a lot of the females that come here are multi-sport athletes. So they play either two or three sports within our three terms that we're here. So within the multi-sport athletes specifically, I guess kind of before I dive into that, just again to lay out the schedule and put it into perspective, the students, if you're in-season and you're on a team, you'll work with us in the weight room twice a week for 30 minutes. So either 30 minutes before practice or 30 minutes after practice.

[00:12:51.52] If the student is not playing a sport, they can take a PE credit off once a year. So we call it a choice format, or they can opt out of PE. So for example, we have a fairly successful boys basketball team here. So a lot of them will play basketball in the winter. And then they'll opt in the fall or they'll take that choice format in the fall.

[00:13:14.39] So we're able to make an off-season training group with all those students that aren't playing a sport and they're taking that PE credit off, a lot of times the term before their sport actually happens. So that makes it really nice, because we can run an off-season model where we get a little bit more into the weeds with our programming, with our speed development. We run team speed in the winter and the spring terms typically. So any athlete or any student that wants to come do some speed and agility with us can come on in, and they can work on their speed.

[00:13:47.74] But with the athletes that are in-season all year long, and that's the population that I specifically work with, I'm running, like I have to take a very periodized approach to it and look at it from almost like an annual plan. So it's nice to be able to have that to pull from when I worked in college, but adapting the program from term to term to make it fit and make sure that they are doing what they need to do to maintain their performance all year long.

[00:14:20.38] So I guess with that being said, the first term in the fall is very developmentally focused. So we work on foundational strength. We do a ton of extensive work, especially extensive plyos, just get them ready for the volumes that they're going to have all year long. In the winter, there's a little bit more strength, speed focus.

[00:14:44.06] So we're still developing strength. I mean, they're high schoolers. So we're developing strength all year long with them. But we're touching on some power stuff and developing them in ways that are going to A, make them prepared for their sport in the winter time, but also maintaining whatever they've developed before that and whatever we need to continue to develop by the end of the year.

[00:15:08.71] So then come spring-time, when the athletes are a little beat up and they've had two seasons under their belts and they're going into their third and final season, a lot of times I'll focus-- I call it speed strength, I guess. So we're doing like a ton of contrast work. We're touching up strength. We're not focusing in a ton on it, but we're just essentially making things lighter and faster and making sure that they're feeling good by the end of the term and the end of the year. And then in the summer, we start it all over again.

[00:15:40.56] You touched on progression a little bit there, through a school year. One thing that's interesting about Exeter is having PGs or postgrads on campus. Maybe a great hockey player or basketball player graduates from another high school and comes there for basically an extra senior year. So you have a little bit longer developmental window with some athletes there. And when you're looking at those ages from maybe 14 all the way up to 18, well, a lot's happening there, in terms of changes in the body.

[00:16:16.82] So how do you approach programming from year 1 through years 4 and 5? We talk a lot about long-term athlete development when it comes to the high school ages, mainly around puberty and just those ages that those athletes are really able to put on some strength. You know, what's your approach there? How different does programming look for the upperclassmen versus the lower classmen?

[00:16:45.24] Definitely, and it's funny that you touch on puberty, because that's something I never had to deal with before getting into the high school world, especially when the students leave for the summer and they come back and they're 5 inches taller and they've put on all this weight and their voice is deeper. It's this interesting dynamic.

[00:17:03.18] You look like you're a really great strength coach.

[00:17:05.52] For sure. Yeah, like the best strength coach there, yeah.

[00:17:08.41] [LAUGHTER]

[00:17:09.32] Yeah, one would think, right? But, yeah, I mean it's interesting. So we do have such a spectrum of athlete. And it is funny to see, especially with these JV sports, we have 14-year-old kids in the same facility as a lot of time these 18-year-old PG football players, or basketball players. So it's an interesting dynamic and, again, something I had to adjust to and figure out how to make it work.

[00:17:37.37] The cool thing that we do at Exeter, and I think it works for us, is we have for all of our JV teams, a JV developmental program. So we standardize the approach that we take with our JV sports. In the fall it's super-structural. We're working on just developing movement patterns and time under tension and getting their movement literacy up to where we want it to be. In the winter, it's a little bit more strength-focused, but still continuing to develop.

[00:18:04.76] And then a lot of times, if you're a JV athlete, some of them will be a JV athlete for all three terms. So basically they've been in our system for two of the terms come spring. So we get a little bit more variable with our programming in the spring-time.

[00:18:21.05] But again, another example of me having to let my guard down and understand the realm that I'm working in, I used to have-- I mean I still do have standards with implementing a bench press with a team, for example, being able to do a certain amount of push-ups, adding weight to your push-ups, whatever it may be. But our weight room is a fitness center as well.

[00:18:42.53] So during the day students can come in and they can use the weight room in whatever way they want. And the number one exercise, I'm sure as you can imagine, that we see is bench press, and a lot of times kids failing on bench press or not doing it right and having to grab the bar from their chest or whatever it may be. So when I had JV basketball in the winter-time, I was working through a push-up progression with them and trying to get them all caught up in the way that I want it to be.

[00:19:10.55] And then the last phase that I was programming out for them, I was like what do you guys want to learn how to do in here? And they all collectively said bench press.

[00:19:20.67] Bench press.

[00:19:21.36] Yeah, of course, why wouldn't they, right? And for me, as a coach, like I'd rather them, if they're going to come in here and do it on their own, do it right and understand how to do it, than getting stapled by the bar every time they're in here, or hurting themselves, you know? So I think with our JV program we take a very standardized approach.

[00:19:37.35] And to circle back and actually answer your question, we're trying to develop strength with all of these students, regardless of where they're at in their journey and get them caught up to speed for whatever's next. So if they are going on to play collegiately, we want them to be able to seamlessly integrate into a college weight room. We want a kid that goes to Exeter to not be one of those kids in a college program that's on the developmental phase all four years that they're in college.

[00:20:06.85] And if they are on the developmental program, we want them to understand why and to be able to trust the process that their coach is implementing with them. So programming, I guess it gets a little bit more advanced here and there. But we're trying to develop general strength in their foundational movement patterns, regardless of the sport or gender. I would say the off-season groups is where we get a little bit more advanced with our programs and we auto-regulate and implement different methods that work for the groups that we're with. But it's very dependent on the person that we're working with, for sure.

[00:20:44.62] You know, one thing we're seeing in high schools is that many strength and conditioning coaches in that setting are also teachers or play other roles in the campus community. Do you have any other involvement at the school beyond the weight room? And how does your department work between athletics and academics?

[00:21:07.37] Yeah, definitely involvement. I would say that's another piece of the puzzle that I didn't necessarily know what the high school world entailed, and especially here at Exeter with the way that the school is run academically. You can imagine that there's all of the meetings that are necessary to go to. It's a very tight-knit community, which I'm very thankful for. But there's a ton of meetings.

[00:21:37.05] So but I think that the meetings helped me prepare for whatever's next. If I want to go to an administrative role or whatever it is, I mean, it's necessary to be able to see that side of whatever the field entails. But we have a full faculty meeting once a year, or once a week actually. So our whole entire campus community will talk about whatever we need to talk about. On Mondays we have a PE Department meeting. So my role is within our PE and Athletics Department.

[00:22:11.46] So we have physical education teachers. I am not a physical education teacher. I'm a strength and conditioning coach. But our department-- so Coach Fish and myself, we sit in on the PE meetings as well, because they do have fitness classes in PE and they do have sports science classes and things like that. So we try to keep our hand in that.

[00:22:31.18] And they're open to our input and want to integrate us in as much as we can. Our department, so we have, like I said, Coach Fish, who's our head strength coach and then myself. And we also get some Merrimack graduate students that work with us for the year as well. So we meet once a week and we talk about professional development things that we're working on.

[00:22:55.69] There's a fellowship curriculum that we're implementing in with our Merrimack students as well, working on programming and things like that. But role within the community I think is something that I've really enjoyed in my two years that I've been here. I love to see the other side of whatever the campus is working on. And I don't think I was lucky enough to have a part of that in my previous roles.

[00:23:22.00] We were in an athletic department in one building kind of keeping within our bubble. And it's nice, and especially having our gym be a fitness center. There's teachers and things like that come in and work out all the time. So it's nice to be able to get to know the whole school.

[00:23:38.53] I worked in the dorm last year. So I was on dorm duty, which was an interesting experience as well, as you can imagine. But that was cool because I got to meet the students that aren't athletes and the ones that I'm not seeing every day. I drove a couple of the teams to their games, so just different things that I literally never would have thought that I'd have a role in. There's opportunities to chaperone, things like that.

[00:24:02.33] And I just really enjoy it, because we're working with the students in the community, yes, we're working with these students for four years, but we get to be part of their lives after their time that they're with us. So whatever school they go to, we get to become a fan of that school and we get to watch whatever they're going to do next, if they're playing collegiate sports or whatever journeys they're taking in it. And it's really great to make connections with the faculty and the students, because it's a little bit deeper, I think, than what I've gotten in years past, and I'm enjoying it for sure.

[00:24:36.88] That's awesome.

[00:24:37.87] It's refreshing to hear you're so embedded in the campus community. I think at the college level and professional level in a lot of areas of our field, we can be pretty isolated, you know, in the weight room, the four walls of the weight room.

[00:24:54.57] Oh, yeah.

[00:24:55.24] Or in good situations, we're out on the practice field with the team doing conditioning. But many coaches are just managing weight rooms on the day-to-day, and it is important for us to remember when you work in a scholastic setting that you are part of a campus community that is bigger than just strength and conditioning. Exeter is obviously a place with a lot of history and a lot of core values that come through in every area of their academics and athletics.

[00:25:27.25] And, yeah, you speak to that really well. I thought that was really refreshing to hear. I want to ask, misconceptions about high school strength and conditioning. This is, you started in college. You were a college athlete. You were probably a high school athlete too, but now as a professional in the field, you know, what do you hear out there that's maybe a little off from what your day-to-day looks like?

[00:25:53.94] I think there's definitely misconceptions out there and I'm guilty to it, too. And I think I definitely was guilty to it prior to joining the team here at Exeter and being fully immersed in this world. I think the number one thing, and something that I honestly struggled with when I made the switch from college to high school, is that you're not being utilized to your fullest potential if you go to the high school world, or you didn't quote unquote, "make it" because you're a high school strength coach.

[00:26:27.92] Yes, it's a new world and it's not totally developed to its fullest potential yet. But I think that's what the best part of it is, is that if you get the right people in there, we can really build something pretty cool within the high school world. And I think that I'm being challenged in ways that I never was challenged prior to being at Exeter, in terms of my programming, my coaching, but also my values and where I stand as a person and what I want from a career.

[00:26:57.86] I think that it's an interesting field. And a lot of people think the best people are at the top, right, in the professional world or in these high Division I schools. But I've met some really, really great people and some really smart people, especially in this high school strength and conditioning world, that are using creative ways to create whatever they can with the resources that they do have.

[00:27:26.84] And I'm thankful for the experience that I did have because I'm able to pull from that and I was able to create systems at Merrimack and create systems at Denver, and I'm able to use those systems, but just figure out a creative way to make it work in my setting that I'm in. And I can honestly say that I'm having the most fun that I've ever had coaching, being in the setting that I'm in. And I feel like I'm making a really big impact.

[00:27:50.60] And that's the number one goal. So with all the misconceptions that are out there, it's enjoyable. You get a little bit more time to yourself. I mean, a summer vacation definitely doesn't hurt in that aspect for sure. But I'm loving it. I'm getting a ton out of it and I'm continuing to develop.

[00:28:08.06] And I think that's the other misconception that can be out there is that you can get pretty stagnant when you don't have a big staff or you don't have people to mentor you. But if you're able to keep the connections that you've built and continue to build new connections, I think, like I said, you can do some really, really cool things within this field.

[00:28:27.35] That's awesome. I love the passion you speak about your experience there with. And it's obvious that you are having a great experience there. You think about the developmental window that you have, these athletes and the impact that it has well beyond their four or five years that you have those athletes. It's really a springboard for their whole life, whether they go on to play Division III athletics, Division I professional, or never play their sport competitively again, that positive strength and conditioning experience comes back to the values that we care about at the NSCA, that we all connected with at one point as strength and conditioning coaches.

[00:29:14.81] This was fun today, Nicole. This is your first podcast, big-time, nice job.

[00:29:19.25] Thank you. I appreciate it. And I appreciate you all bringing me on.

[00:29:23.09] And you too, Kevin, your first time on the NSCA Coaching Podcast, long-time listener.

[00:29:28.41] Yeah, oh, yeah, definitely.

[00:29:29.60] What'd you think, man?

[00:29:30.36] Loved it, enjoyed it, looking forward to the next one.

[00:29:33.51] Awesome. Let's wrap this thing up. Nicole, if anyone wants to reach out, pick your brain a little bit more, what's the best way to do that?

[00:29:42.13] Definitely, my Instagram is @NicoleFowler10. Our Phillips Exeter Instagram is definitely one that we're working on. So I highly recommend everybody follows it. We're trying to get some good content out there. It's Phillips_Exeter_strength,

[00:30:01.69] This was great. Thanks again, Nicole. Kevin, awesome job being with us today.

[00:30:06.89] Thank you.

[00:30:07.42] To our listeners, we appreciate you tuning in to the NSCA Coaches Podcast, and Sorinex exercise equipment, we appreciate their support.

[00:30:17.80] I'm Coach Boyd Epley. I'm known as the founder of the NSCA. And you just listened to an episode of the NSCA Coaching Podcast. To learn more about all the NSCA offers, check out NSCA.com and join us at an upcoming event this year. I hope to see you there.

[00:30:36.93] [MUSIC PLAYING]

[00:30:38.24] This was the NSCA's Coaching Podcast. The National Strength and Conditioning Association was founded in 1978 by strength and conditioning coaches to share information, resources, and help advance the profession. Serving coaches for over 40 years, the NSCA is the trusted source for strength and conditioning professionals. Be sure to join us next time.

Reporting Errors: To report errors in a podcast episode requiring correction or clarification, email the editor at publications@nsca.com or write to NSCA, attn: Publications Dept., 1885 Bob Johnson Dr., Colorado Springs, CO 80906. Your letter should be clearly marked as a letter of complaint. Please (a) identify in writing the precise factual errors in the published podcast episode (every false, factual assertion allegedly contained therein), (b) explain with specificity what the true facts are, and (c) include your full name and contact information.