#73 - Frank Popolizio - Journeymen Wrestling Visionary - Owner of Homestead Farms & Ranch

Join us as we explore the life and experiences of our guest, Frank Popolizio, the owner of Journeyman Wrestling. Raised in a family of immigrants in upstate New York, Frank found his passion for wrestling in the seventh grade. Though he didn't excel in the sport, he found a knack for coaching and has since built a career around nurturing budding athletes.

From coaching his cousins and brothers, to joining forces with Dave Waring at Springfield Cathedral High School, Frank's coaching journey is laden with insights and lessons.

Now, Frank is heavily involved in the world of wrestling, managing clubs and tournaments with an unwavering commitment to excellence. He's built a culture that pushes athletes to step out of their comfort zones and challenge themselves, all while fostering camaraderie among members. 

All links to Frank's ventures are below!


Journeymen Wrestling Links:

Website
https://www.journeymenwrestling.com/

Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/journeymenwrestling/

Twitter
https://twitter.com/jmenwrestling

Homestead Farms Links:

Website
https://homesteadfarmsny.com/?fbclid=IwAR07eJtqNoC-eQSsPHPcplZlfV5AMxi3hCo97N7AtYrB7cACzvx2Phovbf4

Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064615574707

Email
Frankiepesce@hotmail.com

Transcript

Speaker 1: 1:35

Music.

Speaker 2: 2:21

All right, we are live. We are live with our guest, frank Papalizio. Frank I there's a long list of things you do, so I typically a lot of the guys that we have on. I don't list it off because I could go on forever, but we will list off that you are the owner of Journeyman Wrestling, and not only just Journeyman Wrestling, but several events like Wranglomania. You just did Dame of Thrones. You have that coming up as well. So I mean many, many other events.

Speaker 2: 2:52

So what we do is I kind of explained before is we talk about you from beginning to end, but there's a long story with you. This isn't something where we just have one thing to talk about and we can breeze through it. So this is going to be kind of a part one, part two, and keep you coming back and letting us know. We want to obviously promote the events that you're doing, because they're all number one. We go to one of them at least Journeyman the classic, and that's a phenomenal event, and that's exactly why we go there, because the competition is there. So every year we go, every year it's even better. So here's, here's where we're going to start. We're going to start out from young. You right we're going to. We always start out from the first time. You can remember sport and whatever you were doing in sports and things that got you involved in it. I mean, obviously, your family's in it. So there's probably some good stories to go along with some of the stuff as you grew up. So what's?

Speaker 3: 3:47

let's start with where you were born.

Speaker 2: 3:49

What's what's that?

Speaker 3: 3:50

Probably some bad ones. There's some dysfunction peppered in there. That always adds to the character.

Speaker 2: 3:59

Yeah, I can. I can attest to my own as well, so that's that's fine.

Speaker 3: 4:03

Another row of that.

Speaker 2: 4:04

So what? Where were you born in is in New York, correct? Yeah, it's connected to New York which is upstate, new York.

Speaker 3: 4:11

So in New York we like to say that there's, there's upstate and then downstate, and what you laugh and you're giggling and and and there's. You know, it's kind of funny to say it out loud, but yeah, so much so that the national wrestling hall of fame has an upstate and downstate for okay.

Speaker 2: 4:34

So it matters.

Speaker 3: 4:35

It is really kind of divided. You know, we're upstate and upstate is a little bit more rural country, a lot bit more rural. Actually, the Adirondacks fall in the upstate and the Adirondacks are forever wild. Yeah, there's a huge. There's millions and millions of acres of forever wild land and you could fit all of the national parks inside of the Adirondack park combined. So that puts in perspective how big New York is and how big upstates is. That's big. So we're pretty rural.

Speaker 2: 5:14

Yeah, you guys are real rural so and we've been up that way. Obviously, the tournament this year was in Clifton Park and that's that's where your farm is Now. Let's does that. Are there any ties to family with farming and as you grew up?

Speaker 3: 5:28

My dad had and still does has like a horse farm. He had some cattle back in the day but it raised some dogs, you know, like breeding dogs and stuff. So nobody really from a. I had a cousin also that did some Angus, but it's not like we come from a long list of farming and it was handed down, you know, generationally. It's something that honestly, we moved out to Clifton Park and when we got there the setup was a horse kind of like a horse farm.

Speaker 2: 6:05

Okay, okay.

Speaker 3: 6:07

We didn't have any horses I didn't have anything, you know, at that point, but it looked like a good setup to do something Okay. So it's like the maximize opportunity. That's something that I kind of a roll with, and so, yeah, when I got here, it was my buddy came over. Who is a farmer?

Speaker 2: 6:31

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 6:32

He the farmer, and he came over and said I can bring over a couple of calves for you and they'll eat the grass because it was fenced in, yeah, and when they're done in the fall I'll pick them up, and winter and we'll go from there. And so they got here, they knocked down the field, they did their job and then I became connected with them and didn't leave. They've never left.

Speaker 2: 7:02

They have never, and it's in fact they have multiplied and multiplied and they multiplied and multiplied, and multiplied.

Speaker 3: 7:09

I got to put a do not disturb on here.

Speaker 2: 7:12

Yeah, you're good.

Speaker 3: 7:13

You're good. I don't know, it comes in on my computer. I don't know why, but they messages will come in on here too. Yeah, they try to find me.

Speaker 2: 7:24

So as a young kid, what were the first kind of things you were doing as far as sports? Growing up, what do you remember?

Speaker 3: 7:32

Not much. I wasn't, you know I wasn't. We come from a family of immigrants, so Athletics wasn't a priority, so to speak. Work was overall, just to learn how to work, but not organized sport. We would scrap in the backyard, uncles would fund it, who could take somebody down, and they would give a dollar if whoever won Stupid stuff like that. There was no formal education on wrestling, no formal portion of it, until we got a little bit older and at that point we jumped in and my first introduction to wrestling I was in seventh grade. Okay, okay, I was later, yeah, and then I took it from there and spent a lot of time coaching my cousins and brothers and things like that, from that energy.

Speaker 2: 8:40

Wow, okay, so you started that pretty early then what's that? You started doing that because we talked about the club, but you started coaching aspect pretty early you know I love coaching back, but gotta give credit where credit is due.

Speaker 3: 8:57

I did have cousins that came over in the late 60s, early 70s, late 60s. They came over but they wrestled first, okay, okay, so I have a cousin, pat, not to be confused with my brother Pat, we got eight Pat Papalizios at one point that we're living all at once, in any event. My cousin Pat wrestled and he went on to wrestle at Penn U, penn, and then my cousin Severino wrestled at Boston University. Okay, actually made it. It is the national, but the Boston Athletic Hall of Fame, the U of Athletic Hall of Fame over there. So they started it, they really they had the background and then, because of that, there was a push for us as cousins to be in it.

Speaker 2: 9:56

That next thing yeah.

Speaker 3: 9:58

And then from there there were dozens.

Speaker 2: 10:01

Well, from you guys especially, I mean just kind of, like I said, looking at some of the growth that I mean now even learning more that you started earlier. As far as coaching, so yes, it do, you definitely have a passion for it, and when you were competing, did you find yourself like you weren't interested in the competing part after a while, just coaching?

Speaker 3: 10:21

I was mediocre at best.

Speaker 3: 10:23

Yeah, I wasn't very good at wrestling, right, you know I. But I started today's standards late. Yeah, right, right, and I wasn't as committed as you need to be to be relevant, right, you got to be in, as you know, at this point in the process, yup, I'm not saying it's right, I'm just saying, oh, yeah, for sure you have to dedicate yourself. That's where it is. It is five, six days a week and you know, god forbid, you want to do two sports and you know it's just not a lot of room now there isn't.

Speaker 3: 11:01

And I'm not saying it's right or wrong, no, If you hear a we lived in Right, we're up in, I should say Correct, you just, you know it was more of, it was more relaxed. And again, for the immigrants, yeah, you know it was, nobody even knew this this other way.

Speaker 2: 11:19

So just, really I was. I was playing soccer, baseball and then I was doing wrestling in the. I mean I was doing three, four sports. Back in the day I did golf. So and now, like you said, I mean if they enjoy it and it's something they want to excel at, like they don't have an option because otherwise you're gonna, if you don't like losing, you want to keep growing and getting better. You definitely had to do the one on ones. There's no other high right, there's no other.

Speaker 3: 11:42

In wrestling you're, you are the one going out there. Everyone sees you Right. So we're in team sports. You know you can. You can hide a little bit, not in a bad way, but develop somebody. You put them in a little bit and they start to evolve. You get beat. You get beat right. Exactly, it's on you. It's on you. And the only way to not have that happen is to invest more time, energy, into strength training and dieting and more wrestling and technical skills. So it gets. It gets all consuming.

Speaker 2: 12:19

Yeah, well, in the dedication I mean obviously you saw the aspect on the athlete side, but you also saw the side of the coaching side. I mean it's no, that's no light task either when you're trying to coach a team or even just a team of kids in a room. You know you're trying to grow and I got into that a lot with soccer, with coaching, and that was the part that I liked is watching the development and watching kids. I mean, taking a kid who was afraid of a soccer ball and he, by the end of the season he was the one going after it. You know, like that's the stuff that I like to see, just the little pieces of growth, and I can only imagine what the drive that you had for it, exactly what it.

Speaker 2: 12:57

You know what it was like to be able to see that as well. What type of kids, in what type of environment were you in as an athlete? You know obviously you had your brothers or you know in cousins and stuff like that. But what type of school and environment was wrestling like when you started to wrestle?

Speaker 3: 13:16

So I got recruited to wrestle by Joe Benna. Joe Benna is a legendary coach out this way. Okay, he, you could put him in any discipline of athletics and he would have been great it very. He wasn't super technical about the sport of wrestling, but he was a mastermind at unraveling people, you know so, and getting them to be the best version of themselves. And so that was the guy that pulled me into it. And he knew the name, he knew my family name, so it was, you know something that he he pulled me into he knew the potential was there.

Speaker 3: 14:03

Yeah, yeah, and so that was in seventh grade, Yep, and that started it and from there you know I was a part of a real program and when you're part of a program, obviously you know you, just you can blossom in the right environment for sure for the era that I was in, you know, but you know you're looking at.

Speaker 3: 14:30

You're looking at guys like Jeff Blotnick came through Olympic champ, came through this school. You got Andy Saras. Olympian came through and at that point there were other division one wrestlers that had come through this school. So it was a, it was positive, you know it was a, it was a great experience. And then from there I just, you know, started the process.

Speaker 2: 14:51

What was, what was the big rivalry in high school?

Speaker 3: 14:55

Um, let me, let me kill this. Uh yeah, pounding on me here. Uh yeah, hang on one sec.

Speaker 2: 15:03

Hopefully that's your deer cam.

Speaker 3: 15:05

Well, hopefully no. I got um Uh, and I got. My phone is squared away. Uh, yeah, but it's um. I don't know why it's doing it on uh on my computer, so Hang on there with me one sec.

Speaker 2: 15:23

This is. This is what this like, even when we were just recording audio. This is exactly what we. It's fine, it doesn't matter. We've had episodes where we get up and go to the bathroom quick. We talked that long.

Speaker 3: 15:35

Frank, yeah, this is so. This is the problem. I mean I'm, I'm buried Right, I'm, I am minutes Seconds, I mean just there, these, these are 80 hour, 90 hour weeks. So, yeah, we try to balance it with, you know, going into woods and hunting a little bit for some balance and uh, there's just, there's literally there's no time. Yeah, I mean sorry, but that's uh, and I haven't figured out the technology side and why my computer is in taking the text.

Speaker 2: 16:06

Um, it's a lot. I got a t. Yeah, I I feel, yeah, the phone is not.

Speaker 3: 16:11

They're not coming in on the phone, but they're coming in through my, through my computer. Here's somebody out there quick answer to it. I just haven't figured it out.

Speaker 2: 16:20

It's all and honestly, like a lot of this stuff that I do here, like it took me a while because I wanted it to kind of be right, but it's like I'm sure I could have done it a long time ago. But it's like, yeah, I gotta dial this in, you gotta dial this in. But yeah, I know I feel you about technology. It's a it's just parts of it are cool and the rest of it's going beyond me now. So I can I just do what I can.

Speaker 3: 16:42

You know you seem to figure it out pretty good I.

Speaker 2: 16:45

I hope so. I sure hope so. Frank, I appreciate that. So, as far as the coaching aspect, so I you know you were like me when it came to wrestling. I mean I was okay, I was not, I wasn't even making it out of regionals. Well, yeah, you know, like that's just kind of where I was at when I was in high school when you started to coach where, where were your, um, where were your athletic or not even athletic? But education, like directions, where did you want to? Were you looking at college? I?

Speaker 3: 17:10

was terrible. I mean, I knew nothing, I just like to build people. I like the, the quest. You know you got the journey right. Yeah, the journey quest and the and the train. You know it's the. It was that part of it that I liked. You know, I was a. I was a stereotypical situation. I was bullied. Coming into seventh grade, sixth grade, I got bullied hard. Yeah, and what's that?

Speaker 2: 17:41

I said man, I can't what, yeah hard.

Speaker 3: 17:43

Well, I was, I don't know, I was at 80 pounds, it was stupid, right. So I, I didn't have anything to kind of back it up. And then, you know, I found wrestling, and then that that literally changed my life, right where you, you started to get a backbone, started believing yourself, you're sure to, you know, stand up, um, and be able to kind of just, even proverbially, fight back. Yeah, it wasn't like I had to fight, but I, yeah, fight back. I wasn't afraid, I wasn't talking tail, right, right.

Speaker 2: 18:16

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 18:16

Even if I was small, smaller um, it allowed me to have that mindset, and so that's really what I became, um, you know, enthralled with I. I loved the, the fact that I started to believe.

Speaker 2: 18:30

You know, and I'm not checkers.

Speaker 3: 18:32

Pages.

Speaker 2: 18:33

Yeah, you were playing chess, not checkers with the world. You heard you're ready to play, so when you started coaching, what was your first coaching gig?

Speaker 3: 18:42

Well, I, I again, I was with joe benna and I would find myself, um, I would find myself being mat side with him, even as an eighth, ninth grader, okay. Okay. Strategizing.

Speaker 2: 19:00

Okay.

Speaker 3: 19:02

I love the strategy of if you had to move people, weigh a guy in at a different way and I would be like an assistant to him in that regard. He would bounce things off me. He doesn't know why and I don't know. He had no reason to. It wasn't like I was adding anything at my younger years, but it allowed me the opportunity to be inside.

Speaker 3: 19:26

And from there it became like I was with him all the time and eventually, when I went to college, I went to college at Springfield, springfield, mass, springfield College the first YMCA, by the way, really. Nice Ever.

Speaker 3: 19:47

at the place of basketball. Okay, so we were there, or I went there, and at that point I would come home to coach my brothers and my cousins as part of the team. So I was in, you know, and then I started coaching in Springfield Cathedral High School by the name of Dave Waring, who was local, but he went to Springfield College, he was out there and he said, hey, why don't you assist me? So I would assist him during the week, then I would drive home on the weekend and be with coach, with my brothers and my cousin coach for them. And so I started this game at that point and I never left, I never stopped, and then it went crazy.

Speaker 2: 20:44

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3: 20:46

And then I was all in.

Speaker 2: 20:48

And then you got no time. So with the coaching aspect of the direction you were going and you obviously got your foot in the door your building relationships, things like that were you starting to I don't know take over a head coaching position. Like where was your head coaching position ever, or did you ever get head coached?

Speaker 3: 21:08

For this day. I've always operated in an assistant role, but I have my own club that I coach at, so I'm unique in the sense that I have a foot over in the scholastic world and I have a foot over in the club world. I'm not sure that many people today do that. It's either you're on this side or you're on that side Various reasons. Sure, I'll lose money really by spending time in the scholastic world. I also love that.

Speaker 3: 21:45

That's the rawest, purest form of developing people. You're getting people that have never wrestled a day in their life and they're going through this journey just for whatever it is, whether it's just for why I started it doing it or why you started doing it or I want to be an Olympian. You can get from one end of the spectrum to the other, but in the club environment it's a little bit of a different mentality. You've got people that are so ultra committed that they're dedicating every moment and piece of energy and resource to be great Within reason. There's other people that are on different journeys. Don't get me wrong. I'm not arrogant to believe that everybody wants to be great. But if you're going scholastic and club, it's just different. Your commitment level is different.

Speaker 2: 22:43

You're looking to excel. I mean, you're looking to excel and obviously with the numbers that you have and just the things that you're doing and we'll talk more about those in just a second but, like you're coaching, your club is doing great. So obviously there's a level of things that you are doing that are obviously working. So there's that phrase buy in right. So the people that you have, and obviously the people that are have been coming to you forever. That's the relationships you're building, because they buy into the process that you give them. And to me that's key as a coach and knowing that you have something that's valuable and that's actually it works right. So you know.

Speaker 3: 23:20

Well, from a listen, I don't think we're great from a club standpoint. We're trying to be great. You look at, there's some real foundation clubs that exist out there Aspirin and Wisconsin and you got Young Guns in Pennsylvania, david Taylor in Pennsylvania, and you go through and there's these like the P&L League, those MRT clubs, and we're trying. We've had our time in the sun, no doubt about it, and we continue to produce guys that go on to be Division I wrestlers. We do that. I mean, that has been a consistent theme for us and that's a priority, even D3, d2, it doesn't matter, but continue the journey on from a clean standpoint. But, that being said, we kind of hit a lull at one point, either right before COVID or during COVID, and at that point we really had to kind of double down and reassess and we just brought in Dominic Moyer.

Speaker 3: 24:29

Dom has been at the University of Northern Illinois. He was the head assistant there for about seven years and what I've been, what I was able to do, is I chased and convinced him to come here and I think he's the best kept secret out there. He was with a program that maybe at a Division I level that's a mid major and not a lot of resources. Yeah, you don't know, nobody knows him right? You don't know. I'm just saying like you're hidden to a certain degree. And then we pull him into this environment and boy, can you coach.

Speaker 3: 25:11

And everyone that was at Northern Illinois knew that. You know he could coach and they love him and wanted him. But I think other people that are in the Division I world they know of him but they didn't know how good he was. So now we pull him online and we're starting to, you know, bow up. Yeah, the amount of development that's occurred within the short time period that he's been here about eight months is spectacular. So we're really we're looking forward to the club portion of it and how it's evolving, and that goes it's directly tied to Dom Dom Moyer.

Speaker 2: 25:59

And a great addition. I mean, I've heard of him. I mean, obviously I don't know all the stats, but knowing that you know, again, your vision doesn't end. So I mean, obviously we're talking about, you know the things that you have ideas for and all the events that you're doing. And so, starting with the events like journeyman classic, when did you, when did that brainchild come up? Like, how did that come out?

Speaker 3: 26:24

I stole the idea from Gary Mezacapo at Iron Horse. He was a guy that had a club in New Jersey and he had this idea of doing these four-man round robins of all New Jersey and pepper in a few people from neighboring states. Theoretically it was really cool. I loved it. I loved the idea that you, it was all meat and potatoes. Yeah, there was no nothing soft. Everybody was good. Yeah, they took it and said you know, if we were to just move it around a little bit where it was national? And we got very creative on how elaborate the round robins were.

Speaker 2: 27:16

Yeah, yeah, those are different.

Speaker 3: 27:18

Yeah, yeah, they were probably the only place that does it like at that level. Yeah, and now somebody like yourself. You're looking at spending money, right, there's only so many dollars to go around and you can rest assured that you're gonna come across the United States of America and you're gonna land in New York and you know that you're gonna start at nine and you're gonna be done walk out the door by four.

Speaker 3: 27:50

Yeah, every time, every time, and we don't allow people to come in that, don't you know, that aren't qualified to be in? Yeah, number one, and then I'll be in an arrogant way, but there's a seat for every ass we got. If you are this, there's a division for you. If you're this and earned it, then you're over here and that determines, and that way it's very organized and it's worth your dollars to come in to wrestle like quality and kind and be able to be showcased and not worry about going one and two or own two. You're gonna wrestle on four to five times, correct, and you're gonna wrestle people that are good. Yeah, for all four. You may go on four or on five, but you know that every person that you're strapping with is worthy.

Speaker 2: 28:49

So you guys spell it out right in the registration. What you guys are looking for, like we're, you know this is you're not hiding anything and again, like you said, it's not you're not trying to put anybody down, but this is the type of event that you're trying to bring, you know. So, yes, I mean you still have to hit, you know register quick enough for super 32. So if your parents want you to go, bad enough, you know, but your your event is-.

Speaker 3: 29:10

Let's talk about that for a second. Yeah, yeah, it's perhaps the best tournament in the United States of America.

Speaker 2: 29:16

And Super is down.

Speaker 3: 29:17

Right, everybody. That is great. They're like. You can go through the, the one, through the 25. In a way, they're all there, yeah. However, my argument is I understand there's the, there's been a shift there's been a shift in in wrestling, right.

Speaker 3: 29:41

I think back into the, the heyday right, when you got guys like Pitchinini. You got guys like Soriano Arugia, Yanni Yacma-Hallis, Fix I can go through Colton Schultz, Aaron Brooks, right. I've got guys that have come to my tournament, that Levi Haines, right, They've come to this tournament and some of them have excelled, some of them have lost, but, and then they go to the Super 32. And then, or they go to who's number one, they would do all of them, they would do all of them. Now it seems like people go to the Super 32. That's it. That's it Literally. That is it for 12 months. You know, they do high school, they do the world team trials and we'll do the Super 32.

Speaker 2: 30:39

I didn't know that the that people were being that selective.

Speaker 3: 30:43

It is while the upper Anshela has become that selective. Oh.

Speaker 3: 30:49

So you know, within, yeah, within reason, right, interesting. And then there's certain love like the Super, super high end. Yeah, they come. You know, duke, pj, Duke, yep, you know you'll see guys like Linendoll he's there. Leo Deluca, right, yep, there's certain people that Mike Palazzo's group out of Lake Highland. They always put it on the line and they use it as a prep for the Super 32. Yeah, and it is you. You should have other avenues to be seen that are unique and I know college coaches really like my format. They love it, they love it. They call me up and they talk about it.

Speaker 2: 31:39

Yeah, well, because you think about it. So now the Super 32 brackets are huge. Right, the chances of you getting no, you're gonna get a match or two or whatever, but the chances of you getting to wrestle the guys that you really came to compete against are slim to none. You know, because you bracket spread or whatever. It is a different weight or whatever.

Speaker 3: 32:00

Let's be honest, if you have 25 of the top 25 guys and you're like literally one, two all the way down to 25, there are probably a hundred people that don't belong there in that weight Agreed, I mean, like, if that's the level that is going there. You know there's guys on the cusp don't get me wrong, they'll be in there and the guys that are just about to arrive, they should be there. But then there's a whole bunch of other people that are. You know, it's not meat and potato, but they need a place, that should be developing it and going to that transitional place to be able to get work in.

Speaker 2: 32:44

That's where they started, though.

Speaker 3: 32:45

Don't belong there at all, right that are gonna go tech fault and pinned, you know, and then done, that's a nice spot for that too, yep. So my only argument is let's wrestle like quality and kind, yeah, let's wrestle the same skill set together, and then I think that's a better situation.

Speaker 2: 33:09

I think that shift you're talking about, especially with Super 32, is. I mean because Super 32 used to be selective. You had to be. It was a certain rank, wasn't it? Like it was only 32, you know, in a bracket.

Speaker 3: 33:18

I don't know the hitch. I know it wasn't this gigantic and Sure, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 33:24

It's definitely changed. It has, and I'm pretty sure that's how it started anyways and then it shifted because they didn't have middle school, they didn't have elementary and all of a sudden everything everything and listen.

Speaker 3: 33:36

we do the same thing.

Speaker 2: 33:37

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 33:38

Every year In the spring, we did the same mentality, the same format.

Speaker 2: 33:43

Yep.

Speaker 3: 33:44

And we, we wrestle freestyle, yep, same thing. We want the best guys, and when I say the best guys, I don't mean like we're being exclusive and excluding guys that are developing. I'm just we have spots for everybody. Yeah, you do. You do the best in the world, in the world. Now, maybe that scares people. It may, it may actually say hey, I'm afraid to go here. But my argument is if you're going to the world team trials, then how in hell are you not coming to our event?

Speaker 3: 34:23

you can be here the world classic, to see the same guys that are going to be at the world championship.

Speaker 2: 34:29

It's a good question, you know I mean. So we don't.

Speaker 3: 34:32

I haven't traveled that yet.

Speaker 2: 34:33

We go to your tournament and I can attest to. Like I said, the things that you guys are looking for in the competitors are specific and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. And when we go, you're right.

Speaker 2: 34:44

Like even cause Liam, I think the first year wrestled in the in the overflow, correct, yes, and then he got a chance to get an opportunity, cause he has space. He got the rest of the other one. He did all right and but even at the same point, though, too, is like even if he didn't, there was going to be another spot somewhere else that he could still compete like another two matches. So, yes, correct, and that's why we go. We don't go to get ready for super 32. We go because that's part of the regimen, of what it takes to find out where you're at.

Speaker 2: 35:12

You know, I mean cause you do have some of the best of the best in the country that come to that and it's awesome. I mean, those guys let it fly. It's just like they're at any other tournament and they're just there to to scrap, right. Yeah, I think that's the divider. So that's the big difference between, I think, like the Midwest and the East coast, as far as you guys have that deep tradition, and you guys have that that kind of I call it like wrestling soul, that that kind of sparks a little more than the average, you know, customer in the United States. Where, when, when you're coaching and stuff, do you guys? I mean what? What type of traditions were there that kind of set you aside from any other you know club that you guys do, just the interesting you know things that you guys do. Is there something that sets you apart?

Speaker 3: 35:57

You're talking from a club standpoint.

Speaker 2: 35:59

Club club club club tournaments. We know what sets you apart right now.

Speaker 3: 36:02

I want to tell you right now we have really dove into this. Yep, it's that you're bringing this up, and when I said, we double down and reassessed. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 36:12

Right, you got good coach. We have now really zoned in on a couple of things. Okay, to put us. We hope will separate us. First of all, you know, I really I tipped my hat to Dom Moyer, yep, when we originally talked. But there's other guys in there that really hold the fort down. We have young coaches Johnny Parris, mike Dan down, marino, evan Wallace, sean Miller, jason Little, like, we got these guys. That's awesome, that are real deal. Right, they're real, they're the real, real deal and we bring them in and they're they're supplementing what Dom's doing. So we have the. We have from an educational standpoint, it's pretty, it's rock solid, yep. Then then we get into. You know we need private lessons. Okay, right, you know, we, we locked that down. And we got semi-private groups Okay, we locked that down. And then, and then we're starting to do like team building exercises where we're going on ropes courses or something as stupid as let's go to the rodeo together. You know, you're doing things that build camaraderie. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 37:22

Right, and so these guys become friends, not only friends, but like there's a brotherhood that you're. You're doing some, some things together that are and we do it religiously. We've been doing it monthly right Right along, yeah, and we were looking for community service where we the Logan Strong Foundation Okay yeah, this year we went to Albany Med and dealing with children's cancer and we went in there to to give. Like they have a happy meal day once a month that they allow the patients happy meals and and you know, you're in there, you're you're getting to see people sick.

Speaker 3: 38:06

That's great, You're hurting. You want to talk about mental fortitude and we're getting uncomfortable while they're on. You know, you're building, we're building character on that stuff. So these are, these are things that we are that's awesome Really active in, not just a place to go wrestle. And yeah, you know, we just joined the PNL league. Yes, so we're we're doing things that are separating from the herd. Right, Like you, you got to do things that are making it uncomfortable and evolving. So we've we're creating our own traditions. It's what we're doing and we're getting people to believe in that and once that happens, I think they look at it and say where am I going to go? Yeah, I'm going there.

Speaker 2: 38:57

Right? Yeah, you give them a clear choice. Yeah, yep, I agree. Well, I think what you're doing again and we're going to, we're going to bring you back on because we got we're going to let you go here. You got, you got stuff going on, but I think what you're doing is a great thing. I mean, I've looked at the club a little bit and and obviously, when we want to come out there, we definitely want to have Liam see if he can come up to the room and practice a little bit. So, but hey, you got, you got stuff to do. We're going to, we're going to cut you off here. So I, I appreciate every second that you've that you spent with us. I mean, if there's anything you got going out there, please by all means send me links and I will put them on the episode, especially cause this will be audio as well. I'll get all that out there so that way, you know, people can see it and get to anything you got going on.

Speaker 3: 39:41

So Frank, well, let's make this an annual. You know, like a tradition I should say annual, I'll do it. I'll do it as many times as you want to do it. I'll do it quarterly, if you want yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3: 39:54

Let's, let's you know. That's kind of how I operate, where I have a traditional you know podcast that I get on and do it. I'd love to continue to do that with you. Yeah, also, let's have your son come up and and scrap with us, either maybe before the tournament or after the tournament, you know, if we can, even in the spring. I'm not sure how much freestyle he does, but that's one that you would we're picking it up, he's got to pick it up a little bit more.

Speaker 2: 40:23

You know, cause, coming into college and stuff, he wants to make world teams, so he's got to practice, you know. So we're open to anything. So we appreciate your time, dude, and I'm going to cut us off and then you and I are going to just talk for one second off to the side and then I'm going to let you go, but we're going to tell everybody that we are out.