SIH's Free Coaches Clinic draws big crowd, rave reviews

MARION - Close to 100 local high school coaches were in attendance Friday at Rent One Park's Diamond Club to listen to four diverse subjects on how to do their job better in making their athletes and teams succeed. Southern Illinois Healthcare hosted the second annual event, which started before 8 a.m. and ran until noon.

"This is the first time I've attended this clinic and it's been very beneficial," said Goreville girls basketball coach Mike Helton. "Last year, I missed the deadline because we were in school testing - sometimes leaving the building is somewhat a challenge - but this year it was a day before break, so it gives me an opportunity to come out and acquire a little more knowledge and get updated on things I already know. A good example is I took a taping class at SIU about 25 years ago, and since then, there's been slight adjustments, so I picked up a couple of new techniques."

The event is the brainchild of the SIH Administrative Director for Occupational Medicine & Rehabilitation Services, Dena Kirk, and after a nutritious breakfast that included scrambled eggs, bacon, honey ham, fruit and yogurt, she got the event started by welcoming the participants and introducing the experts that would talk about taping, nutrition, stress and goal setting.

"This event is not only one where we bring in experts, but we utilize our experts within SIH to talk about the health and wellness of athletes, which really aligns well with the mission of SIH," Kirk said. "Every year, we have a workers' comp symposium, and last January, I literally had this epiphany, 'Let's do a coaches clinic.' It kind of came out of nowhere.

"My thinking was that we have our trainers in the schools, but we needed to have something where the coaches can have continuing education to learn from the experts," Kirk said. "Last year, we had only six weeks to pull it all together. We had such a great response, we thought, 'Let's do it again'."

The coaches in attendance were representative of most high school sports in the region, including basketball, softball, baseball, track and football.

"It's nice to get together at a coaches clinic where you're not talking X's and O's, but instead talking about the holistic idea of an athlete," said Carbondale football coach Bryan Lee. "We had a lot of topics today everything from what athletes should eat to how to deal with athletes who are having anxiety and those kind of things. It was just really nice to go into a room where you aren't worried about what plays are going to win games for you, but you are really worrying about what you can do to make your players healthier and better overall, which is going to help your program."

Sarai Yates, the Coordinator for SIH Sports Rehabilitation and the head athletic trainer for Herrin High School, offered a course called Taping 101, which was practical demonstration about taping an athlete.

"This is our second annual clinic after it being our dream for a couple years since I've been the coordinator," Yates said. "After the response from last year, we knew it might work again and being able to have this clinic in this beautiful facility again ... we were able to put it all together. We're hoping this will now become an annual event."

The diverse program moved to food when Dr. Chris Ketter, an SIU School of Medicine Sports Medicine Fellow, talked about nutrition in general and specifically for the athlete, and in this case, the young and growing athlete.

"We emphasize calorie counting - know how many calories your athlete is burning and what they need to take in," Ketter said. "I also talked about possible diet modifications if they get hurt or if they need to reduce inflammation. This is a year 'round program, which is constantly adjusting based on the athlete's goals at any particular time."

The program continued with the well-being of the athlete and added the well-being of the coaches and athletic staff when Associate Dean of Institutional Effectiveness at McKendree University, Dr. Tami Eggleston, gave an illuminating presentation about recognizing stress and what can been done to alleviate stress in her first time being a contributor.

"Anytime I get a chance to talk to coaches, I do so," Eggleston said. "There is a quote that says, 'Coaches touch more people's lives in one day than most people do in a lifetime' and I really believe that. So I want them to think about how to help their athletes handle stress and anxiety in sports, and if they can do that, they will be able to do so in their lives. I like to remind them that it's awesome to be a coach."

Eggleston noted the first step is to recognize that stress is in whatever situation they are experiencing.

"Stress and anxiety is normal, so they have to realize it's there and they can use techniques to handle it," Eggleston said. "In athletics, we can prepare for stress differently because we know what to expect in a game, so I emphasize mental routines and visualizing what they're going to do.

"One question I get all the time is what if they miss the winning shot. I tell them if it was a team sport, then it was the team that should take the blame. It's March Madness, so let's talk basketball. I emphasize that there were many other people who missed shots and if they made theirs, you wouldn't be in the situation to miss yours, so don't get stressed about it."

Finally, SIU Football Coach Nick Hill brought the four and a half-hour program to a practical end discussing goal setting and how to achieve both long-term and short-term goals as they pertain to the program, the coaches and the athletes.

"Everybody has goals in mind whether they are a coach or not," Hill said. "If you are a coach, you have to have a vision of where you're trying to take your team and you have to have that personally for yourself, as well. You have to have systems in place to be able to accomplish that goal and vision."

The former Du Quoin, SIU and professional football player, who was also making his first appearance as a presenter, wrapped up his power point presentation with an interesting quote from a recent book he read called, "Atomic Habits" by James Clear.

The quote reads, "Fall in love with the boring," which means pay attention to the small details during your daily routine, and if a person does that, their goals will be easier to achieve.

"This is my first year attending this event," said West Frankfort boys basketball coach Evan Wyllie. "It's always good to learn. No matter what you're doing you have to keep growing as a professional. They had some good topics and it was free and that always helps. And there's food and it gets you out of school. What's not to like? It was good to listen to Nick and there was the psychology side of sports, which is always a good thing to have your head wrapped around. It was a good day."