The Athlete within You Radio Hour is a sports radio show focusing on how it is we achieve excellence in sports, business and life.   Interviews and discussions with coaches, trainers, sports medicine practitioners, nutritionists, and athletes.  We cover it all from the elite or professional athlete to the youth athlete. What is it about sport that brings us in and commits us to competing beyond just showing up to have a good time. We will look at how people train for the Olympics and for High School.  To be the best or to just make a youth football, baseball or soccer team.  Athletes and coaches at all levels will be the main focus. We will look at all of the components of training: fitness, skills, strategy / tactics, nutrition, and yes of course the mental side of things.  
We will interview those that add support to the training process.  Sports medicine practitioners to get the latest's on injury prevention and injury trends. We'll look at nutritional supplements and athlete diet.  What are the latest trends in conditioning, weight training, speed training, plyometrics and more.  And of course we will look at the mental side of things and how motivation, self confidence and focus  and sport psychology are integrated into every sport at every level.  The show will be entertaining and fun for all of us involved in the world of sports.   Come join the fun as we discover the Athlete within You.

Your Host:
Mike Margolies: Sport Psychology Consultants @TheMental-Game.com
Athletes from all over the country have been seeking out Mike Margolies for close to thirty-five years for his expertise in helping them live up to their potential.  He has worked with athletes from professional football to elite level figure skating and every sport in between.  They have sought his counsel and unique teaching style to learn about the game within the game, or what sport psychology and mental training can do to help them become the athlete they want to be.

Athlete/ Coach/ Sport Psychology Consultant
He is a former athlete that when he retired from high level competition knew there had to be more than just natural talent and fitness to make athletes successful.  Mike studied under some of the most successful sport scientists and sport psychologists in the United States. He was training professional and elite athletes before he was twenty-two and has helped guide many to world championships and even the Superbowl. One national champion recently called him after thirty years to thank him again for his help. Mike founded Sport Psychology Consultants in 1983 and has helped almost 2000 athletes over the years.  Mike has taught at five Universities and completed research at the United States Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs.

Passion & Motivation
Mike's passion today is working with high school and college age athletes giving them the mental edge. The quest is not to get to the Olympics or the Pros.  It starts with learning to be the best you can be. Professional sports or the World Championships are only in reach when you are fulfilling your own destiny. When you are the best that you can be, your level of life satisfaction and happiness will lead you to success, and if that is in the competitive arena, then there is little that can hold you back.  He feels it is not his position to inspire or motivate athletes to perform to their potential, rather to help them find what it is that will inspire and motivate them from within.  You must learn that it is more important to be able to push your own button, than to rely on others to do it for you.

Mastering the Business World with Sport Psychology
Mike's work with teams over the years has enabled him to bring his experiences to the corporate world.  He has helped nationally recognized companies build great sales and project teams with the help of the same types of strategies he has used in working with sports teams.

The Book  
His new book, The Athlete within You, will be out in July 2011.  The book is written for athletes, coaches and businesses looking to achieve more by using mental skills training.  Available on Amazon.com or at http://bit.ly/TAWYBook  

Mike visits with Ellen Chow a sports nutritionist.  

Ellen K. Chow, MS, RD, CSSD, CD

Sports and wellness dietitian

A long-time Washingtonian and avid traveler, Ellen developed a passion in nutritional science at the end of her pre-med study at the UW.  Her graduate research included education interventions with middle-school students and the role of family in adolescent nutritional status.  Her experiences in pediatrics, family nutrition, and cardiology result in a unique blend of practicality and family-oriented approach.  At Endgame Nutrition, she combines sports dietetics and evident-based personalized medicine to achieve the highest quality service to our clients.  Ellen was active in track & field and a former member of the Purdue fencing team.  Ellen's strongest strengths are her positive attitudes and honest and trusting relationships with her clients.  Her company is called Endgame:

Endgame: the final stage of a chess game when
few pieces remain, victory is in sight with carefully planned strategies and execution.

What is your endgame? No matter what you visualize - in three months or three years, superior health and fitness allow you the physical, mental, and emotional ability to perform.

Through a combination of Medical Nutrition Therapy (MNT), Therapeutic Counseling, Athletics and Health Education our team is expertly trained to assist you in attaining your goals inside and out. If you want to win, begin with the end.

Since we look at all aspects of the developing athlete this show will look at injury prevention and injury rehabilitation with Vincent Santoro M.D.

Mike will talk with Dr. Santoro.  Vin Santoro is a 20 year veteran orthopedic surgeon in private practice at Orthopedics International in Kirkland and Bellevue WA, He trained at the U of Connecticut, U of Washington and U of Berne Switzerland. He has published in peer reviewed journals, written countless articles and gives frequent talks in our community. His proudest accomplishment was being named Teacher of the Year by the Orthopedic Residents at the University of Connecticut where he was an Associate Professor before he moved to WA in 2002.

An ex-jock with a bum shoulder and knee, his interests gravitate to sports specifically focusing on, you guessed it, shoulder and knee injuries. A member of the Arthroscopy Association of North America, Arthroscopic surgery is his forte. 
 He is a founder of ShoulderWorks, a center of excellence dedicated to improving outcomes in patients with significant shoulder problems. He enjoys treating weekend warriors and teenage athletes and is interested in prevention of injuries in youth. He is the team doctor for a local HS and consults for soccer clubs.

What would you do if you worked hard to reach your dream?  You trained and sweated for around 10 years to get to the Olympics and one day for political reasons** your dream was taken away.  What would you do?  Maybe you would turn your other creative passion for building things into a business. 

My guest this week is Mauricio Bardales.  He is a successful businessman in Orange County CA.  He uses what he learned as a World Class Athlete to help him in his business.  Mauricio won the 1978 NCAA D1 Decathlon. I know him because he was one of my first clients as a sport psychology consultant.  We had not talked with each other since 1980 and reconnected through the power of social media.  I'm really looking forward to this show and I hope you will enjoy it as well. This will be really a great show.

**The United States did not participate in the 1980 Olympics because the Soviet Union was involved militarily in Afganistan.

Mike's guest was Joel Ballezza a 29 year old marketing professional from Seattle.  Joel runs ultra marathons, that is races over 26.2 miles mostly over trails.  He is preparing to be part of a team to help a friend run the Badwater 135 road marathon in Death Valley in July.  The race requires a team approach in order to keep the competitor on track.  The race is about 40 hours and temperatures can reach 130 degrees F.  

Come see what Mike learns about why people do ultra marathons and how they train.  Mike offers advice on how to mentally train for the event based on past experiences training top competitors for the Western States and Badwater events.

Joel blogs about Ultra Marathoning at  TheUltralete.com

Mike's guest this week is the Executive Director of Sports in Schools Will Niccolls.  I have known Will for sometime now and have great respect for him.  He is one of the highest rated referees in the State of Washington.  I know there are some out there that can't believe I said that about a soccer referee, but those in the community of referees know that I am fair in my assessments and very supportive (except for a few knuckelheads out there and they know who they are).  

Will heads an organization as you see below which addresses one of the largest problems in school sports today.  Money.  It is increasingly more difficult for schools to fund these important programs properly.  

SIS funds any school in Washington State and will support any of the 14 WIAA sanctioned sports. Our goal is to ensure kids have the chance to stay connected to their schools during out of school time through positive athletic experiences. The fact that school districts are slashing athletic budgets means kids are facing decreasing opportunities to engage in healthy out of school time experiences. Additionally the recent addition of charging kids “Pay to Play” fees have decreased opportunities while increasing barriers for many kids to participate in school sports. Our goal is to get kids to fill their out of school hours with healthy activity, we do this by helping school districts, schools, athletic directors, and coaches increase opportunities while removing financial barriers for kids.  You can find out more about this program at www.SportsInSchools.org  

So join Mike and let's see what the real issues are when it comes to school sports, so that we can help develop "The Athlete Within You"