Episode 033 - Dan Brandi on Training Smarter, Not Harder: Speed, Strength & Change of Direction

🔥 In this episode, Coach Ryan Patrick sits down with Dan Brandi to talk all things speed, strength, and agility. 🔥

Topics Covered:
✅ The biggest shifts in youth athlete development
✅ Why less structured training can be more beneficial
✅ The assessment process—what actually matters
✅ Strength training’s role in speed development
✅ Change of direction training: is it overrated?
✅ Best technology & tools for tracking athletic progress

💬 Have questions? Drop them in the comments!

📌 Follow Dan Brandi: @BuildCT on Instagram
📌 Follow Ryan Patrick: @coachryanpatrick

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Transcript

M-2-peakfast: 0:05

Mhm. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm.

Ryan Patrick: 0:55

Hey Dan, welcome to the show. Super excited to have you on. I know we've been trying to set this up for a little bit. I know you through Kieran Halton, who is a guy that I have done some online coaching with both as a trainee and a trainer through Revel performance. Him and I go pretty far back and he has always spoken super highly of you and some of the content that you've had on short form media, Instagram stuff is really awesome. Kind of going back a few years, so. You know, it was definitely something I wanted to do is get you on here and actually chat about sports performance. So if you could, man, for those that don't know you start by giving me, you know, quick background on you. Tell us a little bit about yourself and what got you interested in sports performance.

Dan Brandi: 1:35

Absolutely appreciate you having me on and appreciate sharing as the good words. But so initially, like just kind of going way back what got me into like strength and conditioning, I had started as an intern over at Quinnipiac and this is maybe 15 years ago at this point. But just to, you know, kind of shout out, eSSH Patel over there was great and kind of got me really into the field and kind of everything around it. From there I moved to a couple high schools doing strength conditioning coaching. Eventually came down to a gym down in Darien, Connecticut called Prentice Hockey Performance, where we just worked with a ton of athletes, everybody like general population also, but a lot of athletes, primarily hockey down there in lacrosse. It just tends to be the area and just the gym would've gotten popular over there. So I was there for maybe close to six years left, close to 10 years ago at this point. And started my own gym about, actually five years ago this month. So. From there? Yeah, kind of been same deal. I've been working with a variety of different clients from, you know, the older population trying to stay in shape, general health, avoid injuries to the high school athlete. Couple professional athletes in boxing and hockey and college athletes. So kinda all over the map there as well.

Ryan Patrick: 2:42

That's awesome. So let's start at the beginning. We're gonna, we're gonna kind of hone in on the athletes here. Yep. So who is the average athlete that you are working with these days and more importantly. How are they showing up physically compared to years past?'cause you've been in the game a little while now, and, you know, building off of that, we'll kind of dive into your assessment process. So I'm just curious, again, who are the athletes you're working with? What's the general starting point for a lot of them now compared to, you know, what you were used to getting'em into?

Dan Brandi: 3:11

Sure. So the general athlete tends to be. With some exception, but tends to be, you know, high school's gonna be my primary group. I'll have some middle school generally, and I'll kind of get in what's changed as to why I kind of like avoiding middle school at this point. But some middle school, high school and college athletes will be the main ones. And just'cause of my own background, I'll also have a fair amount of grapplers, jujitsu, judo, pri, judo primarily, and boxers. But biggest chunk there is gonna be high school. Biggest change? I would say physically, I mean physically as far as their own strength development. It's all, I feel like just kind of almost, it's gotten better. I think the, I like personally, especially where I am, it's kind of a wealthier area, so personal training I think has kind of blown up strength and conditioning for athletes. So a lot of'em have kind of shown up already with some sort of background in fitness. But the bigger part of that, I think is not even how they are physically, just the scheduling. The scheduling is absolutely, you know, it's kind of wild now starting with middle school. I'll have kids that are, they're playing and it's, it used to be, you know, hockey was a big one, but now it's every sport. I mean, I don't have anyone from a sport where they're not playing four, you know, four seasons year round, practicing close to daily. It's. It's gotten brutal. So that I think is one of the big reasons where, like with middle school kids, I'm I'd rather you had, you know, some off times to yourself. Parents will call up, they'll try and get'em scheduled. And a big part of me is I'd rather them just have their own time, you know, if they could just hold onto the passion, hold onto love of sport, that's gonna take'em a lot further than seventh, eighth grade training with me. You know, in a lot of ways, and there's exceptions to that, but that's kind of where I've started to change with that part.'cause it used to be, you know, seventh, eighth grade, I was like, perfect, let's get it started before that. If they're really into it. Yeah. If this is something they love and they're into it, sure. I'll still take them and, you know, we can get into kind of when I would take them and reasons for it, but a lot of the times. I would kind of rather they just did their own thing on their own, you know, had some free play time. I think like the biggest difference I see is just that every kid is so overscale, at least where I am and I you know, I'm where this changes depending on geography and where you're at, but the majority of kids are just so over programmed. We're kind of getting back like to a couple of the reasons are a couple of occasions where I will still, you know, take middle school kids is. Give'em a place where, you know, like maybe they are gonna be overscheduled regardless, so maybe we just make the gym more of a fun environment for them, you know, and try and create that. Like what, so kind of even just kind of jumping into the training for a lot of the kids, I have this long-term athletic development kind of model in my head and you know, a lot of it is like building body awareness, building, kind of trying a little bit of everything. A lot of maybe like body weight gymnastics stuff. So that, you know, it'll be a place I'll definitely go having fun. But then also for a lot of these kids, you know, they're doing so much already. Yep. When they come to gym, like of wanna hit, you know, in seventh grade and they're like. They wanna hit arms and they wanna do like bench press. And so a lot of times I'm like, all right, let's go that route first. If this is what's gonna get you onboard.'cause you know, consistency to me and just having the passion right up through high school is gonna do a whole lot more to me than having a perfect workout today in seventh grade. So like a lot of times, you know, we'll do that stuff and just gradually plug in the stuff maybe I think is gonna help them long term. Yep. Three sets of curls and I'm in bench press with this kid'cause he loves it, you know? Yeah. And so, we'll kind of,

Ryan Patrick: 6:33

yeah. I mean, I still want to do arms in bench press, so it's, you know. Right. Gotta keep it in there, you know, and I have a question about that because I think just as another guy who's in the private sector I get the number of emails and requests that I get for. Eight, nine year olds who these parents really want speed and agility training. Like part of it is, I don't wanna necessarily just shut'em down, don't hand to. A coach who's gonna train them like a upper level high school athlete and do all these ridiculous things with them. But at the same time, like I do want it to be fun. I do want to give them a long pathway and foundation for athletic development because I mean, some of these kids. You know, they're, yeah. Johnny be good at baseball, you know, swings the bat 5,000 times in one direction. Mom and dad wanted to work on speed and agility, but the kid walks sideways. So I'm always kind of balancing these conflicting ideas in my head. I just don't know if you have any thoughts on that.

Dan Brandi: 7:34

Yeah, no, a hundred percent. And I kind have the same thought where it's I've said the same exact thing you know, ideally this kid would be out doing something else, but the reality is he's not, you know, he's gonna go somewhere. Something. So, yeah, and it's right. This kid is, you know, maybe he's, and like you said, you know, they're eight or nine, but they're already, you know, he's on this elite team, this whatever. But you watch him move and Yeah. They can't do some of that stuff. So, yeah. So in those instances, you know, I'll take it and then like in my mind I'm like, okay, my primary goal is this kid has to have fun and like he's gotta build his confidence, you know? So yeah. That's really the main things I'm looking for. If we're under, and it goes like you said, all the way up to like my age but the main thing pre high school especially I just want'em to have fun, build, you know, a love for it. And get him a little more confident. So then, yeah, we'll do movement stuff. We'll do, you know, all the skips, crawls, all this body awareness stuff so that he gets that. And then, you know, whatever, the little things that he wants to do. Ideally they could come with a friend and everything to make it a little more fun. Because Yeah, like you said, like regardless, they're probably gonna go somewhere. Like we're not gonna get this ideal world where it's, oh, you can't come. I get it. You know, and the parents are just like, yeah, I'll set'em outside, have some fun. Yeah. That's not, so Right. I'm kind of on the same board where I have these conflicting thoughts of what we should do. Should we even take'em, you know, what's the best route here?

Ryan Patrick: 8:53

Yeah. I've literally tried to send, tell some of their parents okay, you, you know, you wanna bring him here and push a sled? Well. You know, have'em cut yards, cut the lawn this summer, you know, cut the self-propel thing and just have'em push the damn thing up a hill. There's your work. But, you know, they would rather pay. But, you know, it kind of brings me to a bigger thought of this whole assessment process, right? So we've already talked at at least a little bit about some of these differences in terms of these stages of athletic development. So as kids evolve from both a maturity like biological. Maturity standpoint and an emotional and physi and just kind of mental maturity where they can actually handle more intense training. How did your assessment process look? I guess you can start with some of the middle schoolers, but I'm really interested at that high school level for the kids who are ready to start more targeted training. What does that look like?

Dan Brandi: 9:44

Sure. Yeah. And I think just to get the middle school and yeah, whatever, younger outta the way, like I don't really assess, you know, like I'm just a, I want them to right off the bat, have fun, not feel like they're at like another school doctors, whatever, visit. I want them, you know, so I'll ask what's your, you know, do they have injuries? Do they have limitations? What else are you doing outside of here? What are you enjoying? What are your preferences? What would you ideally be doing right now? And then for high school and beyond college. And after that, I think my assessment has changed and it's gotten a lot less. I used to start off with a lot and now I think I've really, and I, you know, have a very minimal assessment process.

Ryan Patrick: 10:21

It kind of

Dan Brandi: 10:22

same exact way. It's you know, I wanna know what's your injury history? Do you have limitations? So it's a lot of questions. It's, you know, are there things you don't like doing? Are there things you enjoy doing? Are there things that you've done in the past that you think have really helped you in your sport?'cause I'm like, you know, what's your sport? What's gonna give them success there? How often do you practice?

Ryan Patrick: 10:42

What else?

Dan Brandi: 10:44

And then I'll do, you know, maybe depending on the sport, I'll generally do a range of motion thing. I'll have'em on the ground. I'll like a hip internal rotation and just hips quick. I'll do the same with shoulders. Yep. From there, I. On, we watch'em move. The other one I'll often do, especially with high school, is, and there's other performance tests. One of the biggest ones I'll do it is a vert test. And the reason I do it is a, it's super simple. I can do it every time they're in basically. It gives me. I'll do it, you know, for two reasons for them, and I'll tell'em it's over the course of this, be very easy. Are you getting strong or weight on the bar easy? The other ones are just performance and athleticism and like kind of an easy proxy. One for power is vertical jump. Yep. Like that better be going up too if we care about that kind of stuff. Speeding power and not just strength. And within that it's, you know, that number, the vertical jump number is gonna, it's gonna oscillate a ton depending on what you do outside of. So it's kind of a good one to give them because this is every kid now where, you know, they'll come in and it'll be low, you know, lower. We'll have one okay day just'cause there's so much they do where, you know, you'll have one week where they went on and they came back and a lot of times they'll tell me, they're like, ah, my t's gonna be ho horrible, I didn't do anything last week. You know, it's gonna be awful. It's their best one by you know, three inches. And it's just a good way to Hey rest. You know, I get. First for if I'm gonna develop skill, yes, repetitions are important, but like physically, if you're gonna get better, you need rest. You know, you need these off days. Like this is the stuff that actually helps, if we're in here and we gotta put out high output, look at all the days we were at 80%, you took a week off, we're here. You know, so this is a good way to get that buy-in as well there. So for me the vert has been, and there's other performance ones we can get into too. Tests that I'll do, but that's just been a big one. A to monitor. I do want progress, but b kind of more importantly is to show them the importance of rest. And I don't know if that was missed, but just, yeah, kind of one of the bigger parts with that is just making sure they understand the importance of rest. So the vert test I could do every time. It doesn't really take anything from their legs. And they could just kind of show them like, not only are they improving, but is there a time when hey, take this week off or whatever, you know? So that's been a big part of the assessment.

Ryan Patrick: 12:49

I'll go ahead and jump in because I do have some thoughts on this, so hopefully I'm coming through clear for you. But one of the things that I found with our assessments as well, now I have to confess, like I, I somewhat just love. Getting new technology, having new toys. And I like the expensive stuff because I know it's very accurate and I want to get, you know, as little estimation, error and algorithm down to some of these imus is as possible. So that's probably my own cross to bear. But inside of all this, the thing that I've found is that. It seems to be when I do simple assessments, but I have more longevity of data. So kind of to your point, I can test this every week. It doesn't really interfere with my training process. I find that the tests become much more. Powerful in that sense because now I have a running representation of how this athlete is responding to training versus just a blip in time of this really expansive test that, you know, maybe five, six weeks down the road, I'm trying to make some informed decisions off of where they were, you know, five or six weeks ago. And it just, it kind of starts to lose some of the validity. So, I kind of echo a lot of these sentiments, so I'm curious what kind of. What things have you really just the thought were like amazing and you had as a huge part of your assessment then you were just man, we're just not really, we're not even using this.

Dan Brandi: 14:22

Right. Yeah, I think initially I had just built out this, you know, this whole like web of, can't even remember everything that was on there, but you know, it was, had range of motion here. You know, vertical power had all these things and I, you know, have this little thing drawn up of like the areas that they need. And it just became like a, it took a long time, you know, B how often am I gonna be retesting this? Where it's am I making improvement here because why am I testing otherwise, you know? And and c it was like everyone kind of fell in the same group, especially if we're talking most high school kids yeah. Qualities and this quality strength, you know, maybe builds up this quality of speed and vice versa probably. So maybe I don't need this huge web of things. I could have a couple from my own mind, you know, so the big ones I'll use for if we're sticking to speed one a lot of'em are just simplicity. So I'll do, yeah, the vert, I'll do GPS speed stuff, just'cause it's easy. Get some speed work and kind of see their top speed. You know, it's an easy number to give them. We'll do treadmill inside top speed on that too. I have timing gates, which we'll use as well, but like those are kind of the four big ones there. I'm trying to think if I, you know, forgotten one.'cause yeah, I could do it all the time. I could do it within training. I could look at, you know, are they getting a new number and what's the rolling average? Are they just getting a little bit better? You know, even their bad ones and they're bad ones, even better. So that's kind of where I've started to go. And it's just numbers that like, you know, it's easy for the kid to be excited about too, which is the other part, you know, like buyin. So if I'm, if I got the GPS thing and they're hitting 20 miles an hour, like every kid knows ah, it's pretty good. You know, like they're just these easy numbers. Burt Mat, am I hitting 30 inches? You know, jump pretty good. So that becomes just an easy one where I can test all the time at a singular number. And like you, like I go back, I love the technology, so I have a 10 80, you know, which I have it with. Can get all the readouts, what's their left foot, the right foot. I use that with zero of the kids, you know, just'cause it doesn't matter to them. 90% of the, so I love it. I Interesting. But like it's, you know, it's not something they've gotta improve. So many other general qualities before we're looking at that stuff. This is me, but I'm not even gonna we're not using it, you know? So, yeah. To echo you, like I love the technology. I love getting like really kind of into the, you know. The weeds with it, but we'll have three numbers for the most part. If it's speed and that's what I'm using, you know?

Ryan Patrick: 18:23

Yeah. I, you know, I secretly aspire to get the 10 80 and you know, I've tried to explain to my athletes, I'm like, man, this thing is just so amazing. They're like, well, how much does it cost? I'm like. See that car out there? They're like, yeah, I'm like about that. Yeah. I don't even, And at the end of the day what's it gonna tell me? This kid's still slow, you know,

Dan Brandi: 18:44

hundred percent. Can't we just use that one? Yeah, you could. Is this one easier to fine tune and does that matter for you? Nah, but I love it. So, you know, like, yeah, but a lot of that stuff too, like I'll use just for my own audit, you know? So even if goal isn't speed, maybe it's, you know, had a kid just throw examples out where hockey player the knock was, you know, he was a little undersized, so it was like we had to put on size, you know? So that was our big thing, put on 20 pounds, but we still needed the speed work. So it was kind of. Okay. We want you to get, you know, stronger in all this, but like some of the drawbacks that occur with size are maybe you get slower. Yeah. So now keeping the speed work in and we're just gonna keep monitoring it. Is it going up or is it staying? Is it maintaining? Because if it's going down, like we're probably doing something wrong. You know? So just that auditing my own kind of programming and make sure Yeah. You know, the goal of that athlete like athleticism is biggest think that's huge in the collision.

Ryan Patrick: 19:42

Those guys almost get flagrant shit with strategies to put size on. If I have a baseball guy who wants to add some muscle, it's pretty easy. You know, they're, they tend to be a little bit leaner. He's not gonna be worried about putting on 60 pounds in the season. Season. He puts on 10 15. We're looking good. One last spot. Some of these guys that are playing, you know, defensive back or on the line, it's we'll sell out at all costs just to put as much weight on as possible. And then it's great, like you made weight, but now you're, you know. 10 slower on a 10 yard dash. Like you ain't getting a nobody.

Dan Brandi: 20:15

Right, right. Yeah. And it's you know, I think there's a, an argument now and like a fair argument like where even speed, is, you know, is speed, the end all be all. Like I also gotta be on the field, able to move and all that. And. But I still regardless think, you know, speed is going to help those things. Control is necessary too. I hope they're getting that in their practice. We'll do a little with me, but also it's like I can only measure so much, you know, like I can't really measure their on field. How smart are they? But you know, I can tell you like, yeah, they got faster. So now, like the other end is the sport itself. Sure that is more important, you know, than what I do. But there's only so much, you know, I could look at. So I'm looking at the one that most associates, associates itself with the sport, so

Ryan Patrick: 20:55

right.

Dan Brandi: 20:56

Yeah. Strength, but speed more so I would say.

Ryan Patrick: 20:58

Yeah. And that kind of segues into the whole speed development conversation, which is an area that I've just absolutely grown to love, probably because I wasn't fast by nature. Like a lot of failed athletes kind of fell into the strength sports in my twenties and then into my thirties. I'm like, man, shit hurts. I can't move. I'm not fast. So it's been a deep dive over the last I'd say probably 10 years now. And I mean, I'm still learning stuff every day, but I. Regarding this conversation about speed, I would love to hear about your big rocks when it comes to planning and developing speed for these athletes.

Dan Brandi: 21:35

Yeah, absolutely. So I think the way I'll generally start it with so if we just take high school for now and this is beyond high school too, but is, I'll start it with kind of three thoughts to. Do this while introducing like a drills just'cause it's an easy way for me to segue and I can get into, you know, talk about those two. But, so I'll talk about, you know, like number one and no particular order here, but I'll say number one, you know, it's force. How much force could I put in the ground? So, and then that I'll have them a marching, you know, and strike the ground hard force, you know, if I can put more force in the ground, I'm gonna go further, right? So. Number two I'll talk about is elasticity. Just bounce and, you know, talk about athletes, like the guy who just seems to effortlessly out sprint. Everyone never looks like he's working hard, like the bounce, you know? So that'll kind of segue into a skips. So now I'm starting to tell them, you know, like, all right, I want this to be easy. You should, you know, feel like you're floating. And then number three I'm saying is just, you know, velocity. How quickly can I move my limbs? How fast can I be? And with that one I'm saying, you know, like a runs. So now we're just kind of moving. So I'll start there and just have those three and kind of talk about, you know, like which ones I think could be affected the most. And to me, they're force and elasticity. I think, you know, sheer velocity. Yes. But I think it's a little harder to develop the other two. I think like you could see noticeable improvements within a, you know, a couple months, like where they could see. Okay. Cool. I think those are the big rocks that I'll start with and kind of expand out from there. Especially just seeing what does this person in front of me need, you know? And like, where does the lead it, like how are we gonna develop that with this person? Yeah, because it, it's, I've had it be different and I'll kinda let you jump in there too, but depending on the athlete I've had it be, you know, much, I've had it kinda be all over the map. So I've had, you know, a lot of, we'll start a lot of boxers who, they run a lot of miles, so maybe the elasticity part, they're pretty good. They jump rope all day. I have a fear of putting on weight. So strength training isn't really there. Yeah. So like for them it's force, but it's keep this other stuff. So like the stuff that they could relate to and that they feel comfortable with, keep it, but now show them what force could do for them, you know? And then the other side is maybe it's the strong, you know, the football guy, lacrosse guy who just, he just lifts all the time. Everything's so heavy, you know? And it's showing him like, Hey, if we can get like maybe a little jump rope in and feeling you bounce, like that's easy energy. You know, like that's putting a little more force into the ground without you even trying. Yeah, I'll let you jump in there as I'm sure more to say there too for you. Also.

Ryan Patrick: 23:58

No, I'm aligned with you here because you always have to finesse these athletes a little bit, right? Because they're gonna have things that they're naturally they just, I. For whatever reason, like you, you said in your assessment, what do you like doing? What do you think is helping you? And so they're gonna have these natural biases towards things they've done or things that they feel like have helped them. And you know, the big strong lineman may not see a need for learning to run at max velocity. And so. That's where I'll have a conversation with them. And you know, nowadays the guys at the 300 pound plus guys at the combine are just absolutely gas. I mean, some of these guys are clearing 20 miles an hour. And so if you look at you know, the Newton meters of how much force. How impactful that collision is going to be between a man of that size and them running at that speed. I mean, a human is literally going to ricochet off of them. And so, you know, for those guys, it's I want them to understand that, you know, I. Again, all of this training is we're filling empty buckets physically. Like this is designed to help you do what you do at a higher level, but in no way is this a replacement for the sport. And so it, it does kind of, you know, you just kind of have to work that a little bit. But I really like the way you introduce this force, ELA elasticity and velocity conversation to athletes because it's just a really appetizing way to deliver this to what can be just a super complex. Topic for kids of just, you know, what do you mean sprint? Don't I just, is run fast, just, is that what I'm supposed to do? Is that it?

Dan Brandi: 25:33

Right, right. No, a hundred percent. And it starts to get, you know, yeah, it starts to get buy-in and then where I could just take it to whichever direction we want to go. Even just kind of introducing some of the run drills you know, we could argue all day are a drills effective or whatever. But yeah, I think for me it's good. Like it starts them from a place of I don't know this athlete yet. I gotta see how they move. I know maybe, you know, getting them a little more front side keeps'em a little more protected from maybe a hamstring injury right now. But also just and maybe I replace that with something else'cause that's the type of person I have in front of me,

Ryan Patrick: 26:01

right? But

Dan Brandi: 26:01

it starts that conversation where now we could say why. And the more I can say why, and the more I can have this athlete think like, all right, there's a reason I'm doing this. And the less he's just kind of going through them all. Ah, shit, we're, do the drills again before we run or whatever. Then I'm like, all right, now at least we have, you know, there's purpose. Because, yeah, like I think I could love the physiology stuff like as much as I want, but I'm the same way. If they're not bought in, then they're not gonna put the output into something and then we're not gonna get like what we want out of it anyway. So yeah, to me it's just what could we say to, you know, get this person to go hard on this exercise, whatever I'm trying to accomplish. So, yeah. And that's been like a good way to start it. Of just, yeah, introducing those topics and then from there, branching off, like, all right, it's forced, you know, let's squat, let's do resistant sprints, let's do whatever.

Ryan Patrick: 26:45

Yeah.

Dan Brandi: 26:45

Yeah. So

Ryan Patrick: 26:47

yeah, it, we get the pendulum's always swinging, right? It's everybody's researching horizontal decremental ratio force, so it's like we need more horizontal force applications. So now everybody's running with sleds that are super heavy, and then it's well, maybe that was too much. And so now they're really light and. Sometimes just being simple, just train and develop and honestly, use your coaching eye. You can tell if something looks athletic or not, if based on what you're trying to get out of it. I think sometimes we intellectualize this whole process too much and it just ends up kind of confusing the athletes, confusing ourselves and just making everything unnecessarily difficult. But, one, one area that I, I do wanna inquire a little bit more, Dan, is change of direction. So, you know, we talk about speed and a lot of us associate straight line speed, but obviously team sport athletes are going to need to move in multiple planes. So I'm curious, how do you approach that? Is this something that you find worth evaluating or do you think that they're getting enough of that in their training currently?

Dan Brandi: 27:45

Right. And this is, yeah, something I kind of go back and forth with a little bit. The last point is especially, and that's the, are they getting enough of it, you know, in their training? And I think the yes and no. They are, I think in a way where. Well, we'll just start to like, how do I assess it? So I would do, I initially, again, this is something where I started doing, you know, maybe it was a five 10 five drill and, you know, would assess that way. And now I've kind of gotten away from that just'cause the setup and the amount of times I was able to repeat it and see am I improving this quality? You know, am I actually able to keep assessing this to see if the improvement's coming wasn't there? I'm like, all right, if this assessment isn't gonna work to, to a problem, whatever, then I'm gonna get rid of it. So, how I assess it now is kind of like you said, it sits the eye like I'm just looking at'em and I don't even, that's, you know, any less valid. I. That and then asking them how they felt are just as valid. So things I'll do a lot of, you know, people I'll borrow from or like the Lee Taft stuff. Tony stuff I. And then the third thing I'll kind of do is I'll build output as well. So maybe that's a lateral resisted sprint or drag, whatever. And then maybe I'm pairing that with something that's a little more creative, like I'm asking them, you know. To maybe juke me, but do it in a way that's, you know, like spin, move, do something, you know, new. Just kind of build that creativity too, and kind of show them the importance of it's not all just, you know, robotic movements. Like you're an athlete, be an athlete. You know, what do you do well? So, yeah. I mean, kind of long-winded answer that, I don't even know I got it. But the way, yeah, the way I assess is I, at this point, like it, it's tough. Just'cause in terms of how often I'm gonna repeat that assessment. How do I build it? Is, yeah, borrowing a lot of their work as far as angles and being able to accomplish these angles from different areas. And then it's build output, potential force layer that with creativity. So they also just keep me engaged, have fun, realize the importance of it. That's kind of my thought. I don't know. Yeah, how you do it. I'd love to hear,

Ryan Patrick: 29:47

I don't think the aspect of spontaneity is talked about enough because. Many of these kids now, and this goes back to an earlier point, you know, they are overscheduled they're playing way too much. There's so much structure to what they're doing now compared to just having free play. So, you know, this is just kind of a drastic example, but we would, I. We would make up random games with random rules and random moves and just things that you had to do. And sometimes just playing with the boys or playing out with the kids in the street, you know, you would have all of this movement, creativity, because, I don't know, maybe there was a sewer at this part of the street or there, park car. So you had to kind of navigate, you know, the spatial constraints that you are under. And so few athletes nowadays, I feel like they're missing. That spontaneity, like we can work on great you know, defensive change of direction mechanics but when they're, you know, when they get possession or they need to you know, attack in a certain way, it's just, it's very robotic and just almost prescripted. So, I love that you're including that into the program. I would like to hear more examples because I'm always. Trying to figure out how to infuse this into what we do.

Dan Brandi: 31:02

Sure. Yeah and I think that's a big part too, right? And I'm probably similar, like somebody could have a ton of output super fast, but then you see'em on a field and it's like they just, they don't know where to go. They can't make quick decisions. So I'm just trying to think of a few off the top of my head. Like one is just a simple mirror drill. I mean, I've got the kids love it. I have professional boxers that love it. You know, like everyone just has fun with that stuff. Different constraints in it of you're just trying to juke the other person. And it's it ends up being, you know, one of the more fun things we do. We'll even, you know, this is agility, but also just kind of movement. We have a, like a mini hoop in the gym, so, you know, maybe we're doing cleans that day, but we're pairing it with a dunk. Okay, you could dunk pretty easy. Show me something else. You know, I want a 180, I want. 60, like stuff like that where it's maybe not exactly, you know, like a field movement, but it is just building this creativity, this ability to think on the fly, do something new, you know? Which I think is just as important for, you know, like you look at the best athletes yeah, they can make a hard cut and go this way, but they also just do something like, oh, where did that come from? You know? So I think it's building that ability and having them not shy away from that ability, you know? So. And then, yeah, do something like new, do something exciting, you know, and we'll try and do that. Yeah. With whether it's competing with each other or just, yeah, some sort of constraint based fun thing, you know? Trying to think of some of the other ones we've done. Like a variation of that, like the gladiator ball where you have a, what we don't know, it's like the Frisbee getting into the the bucket thing. But just, you know, playing defense. You know that even all ages, that's. The most fun, you know? So that's been cool to see.

Ryan Patrick: 32:37

No, definitely. You gotta get him playing more. There was, I can't think of the guy off the top of my head. His name was Michael. His last name started with a z He used to have a gym in, I think Michigan or something, but he had a games book, like an ebook of just games he would play with his athletes. And I mean, some of the stuff that was in there was just absolutely wild. And it's it's these things that like. You just get hyper competitive with it's the dumbest game. There's not a trophy for it, but it's like you're gonna see a certain level of intensity from your athletes that you don't get doing anything else. So,

Dan Brandi: 33:11

yeah. You think it's gonna be stupid? Yeah. Sometimes I'll put it in, I'm like, ah, they might not like it. And it fires the whole, you know, the rest of the day is like that much better. Everything's fired up. It's, yeah, it ends up being the most fun part.

Ryan Patrick: 33:21

Just,

Dan Brandi: 33:22

yeah. So, no, I love hearing

Ryan Patrick: 33:24

that. It totally reinforces something that we need to do in our program. Kind of continuing the conversation, so we're just progressing through I guess, you know, your ideal session or kind of things you're doing. We've talked assessments. We've talked about speed development. This gets a little bit more, I think, pragmatic, kind of straightforward, but what are your thoughts on strength as it relates to speed and performance?

Dan Brandi: 33:48

Sure. Yeah, no, I think it's super important and to different varying degrees, but just thinking of examples we, you know, I'll go through kind of a few that I have in my head right now and where I think it, it matters. And, you know, I've got like the high school track athlete in my head where he had been, you know, he was a hundred meter, 200 meter runner. Decently fast, you know, not nothing like too exceptional, but he hadn't really, he didn't have any strength, you know, so when we started squats it was, you know, legitimately eight kilogram kettlebell, and you're watching him kind of go all over the place. Like a junior, like a little behind the strength curve there. But then, which is also cool about a high schooler, you know, you could watch them gain strength in three months. That's, you know. So, you know, just so in terms of that kid specifically that I have in mind, you know, his times went down, I mean, I think it was nearly half a second, you know, off a hundred, which is pretty damn good. And I, we did do speed work. Yes. But to me he was probably already doing that just, you know, at his track practice. Granted this was off season, I think the thing, the bucket we kind of filled was. His strength is a limiting factor, you know? He couldn't put force around, so, we kind of improved there. So depending on the athlete like kid like that, yeah. Strength is huge. He's gonna need it. And then as we kind of travel up, um, say we have, you know, more of an established, he's got the strengths, I tend to almost all side more of a speed side. Okay. And this myself, where speed tends to hold on to strength really well. So, so yeah, but having said that, I've also noticed so maybe somebody has, let's just use easy numbers. They've got a 500 pound deadlift sprint fairly well. So we're doing a lot of speed work and maybe right now, and then we're just ensuring the strength is there. We're staying a little lighter. Part of that is though we're not interfering with the sprint work.

Ryan Patrick: 35:31

Yep. I

Dan Brandi: 35:32

do think at a certain point we need to recom back and make sure like that 500 pound deadlift is still there because I think you could kind of lose it. And just the body's ability to express that, you know, may need to be revisited. So a little more kind of I don't know, nuanced or like less. So yes, strength is necessary, but it doesn't need to be our, like our main focus. And then who's the yeah. Kind of a last example is just boxers. I have them and I just, I love that population and they tend to shy away from strength. With fear of gaining size. Most of them wanna, you know, they've got weight class they've gotta fight in and they do not wanna gain size for them though. So I'll dose it a little bit differently. You know, I'll dose it with the thought of everything's accelerative, you are moving through. If it's a squat, we are moving through it fast. You. If I'm not, if I'm knowing their outputs high I'll sometimes even hide the weight with Kaiser.

Ryan Patrick: 36:18

Yeah.

Dan Brandi: 36:19

Doesn't get them sore, because I also know, you know, the buy-in again, like if tomorrow they're sparring and their legs are crushed, they're, you know, they're not gonna wanna keep doing it. But what I've noticed to them is the strength is there and they've, you know, said two things. Like one I in a clinch or something, I could push'em back and I feel good and my power is still there. And two, the power itself feels a little better. So I think, you know, to me it's not sprint speed, but it's hand speed and the ability to kind of deliver power, I guess, you know, with them I'll generally, you know, we'll talk about power a lot. It's something everybody can kind of relate to. And I'll say, you know, speed, you guys know like speed, we're gonna do the speed stuff, but if power's here and speed's here, like the other part's gonna bring it up is force. So it's having that conversation, you know? So kind of, yeah, you're going few different examples there. I think strength is huge depending on the sport to build speed. You know, it's not the end all be all. I think speed at a certain level, especially if they've got a high output potential, we'll do a better job of building strength than the other way around.

Ryan Patrick: 37:14

But

Dan Brandi: 37:15

that's, if the potential is high you know, if it's a high school kid, it's probably not that high. So, yeah. I dunno where you kind of fall there.

Ryan Patrick: 37:22

Well, I mean, my, my background is I have extremely overestimated the value of strength. By virtue of having, you know, some power lifting background, some strong man, that said, you know, the pendulum is probably settled somewhere in the middle. A lot of the athletes that I'm working with, like you, especially the early high school kids, they're just forced deficient. And so I want to teach them how to move well, and then just get strong doing that. And it doesn't have to be, you really don't have to rush this process, you know, I see some other gems on Instagram. In my market, in other markets, and it seems to be this like you know, arms race of who can get the strongest, the fastest, and these kids are on their toes on a pendulum squat or, you know, just lifting with technique. Then I'm like, what tissues are we actually loading? You know? So strength can come by pretty easy. And to your point, it doesn't have to be to maximal muscular failure. Like these guys don't need to be rushed from this. So, you know, I think it is valuable. But to your point at some level, I just think that the adaptations start to go in opposite directions, you know? At the extreme end of strength, we kind of don't have a bias of time. I've got an infinite amount of time to produce force. On the other hand, when we're doing speed, especially top, you know, max velocity type of stuff, time is a huge constraint. And so, you know, I find for team sport athletes, like they can probably get away with more strength because a lot of it is short accelerated work and that seems to be very helpful. But if they really wanna raise the ceiling, I think strength has less and less value at those levels.

Dan Brandi: 39:05

Yeah, no, I think I agree with that. Yeah, where to your points, but maybe I'm also getting, you know, strength just for a little bit of resiliency if it's contact support, but, and then your other point. Yeah, I have a lot of kids or people, you know, that their training age isn't that high, like the vast majority, you know, where, and it makes it nice.'cause now I can do stuff where I'm not going as heavy. We're not killing them. Okay. For practice tomorrow. But they're still getting these strength adaptations, these benefits, you know? So it's I'm okay with that population, you know? We don't have to do much here and you're gonna get stronger. You'll see the benefits. We can avoid the drawbacks. So, yeah. No, I'm with you.

Ryan Patrick: 39:42

Absolutely. Kind of building on this we've talked a little bit about like the 10 80, some of the tech, you know, timing gates and stuff like that. I'm curious what other technology is kind of just infused into your practice at large. What are you using these days?

Dan Brandi: 39:58

Sure. So, yeah, kind of going back to. Reiterate the stuff. If I'm doing a performance assessment, I will use, yeah, primarily vertech and then the vert mat, just jumping. I'll use GPS monitors for sprints. I'll use timing gates for sprints. And that, you know, I'm using either, maybe it's a 10 meter fly or 40 yard dash.'cause everybody knows, everybody likes it. So those are kind of the biggies. Treadmill would be the other one. Top speed. Super easy to see, super easy to do often. T treadmill using, I'm using, it's a knockoff skill mill, so it's curved treadmill, but yeah. Gives you, you know, at least an output reading. The other one, actually I haven't, the om runner, have you used that at all? So it's got this isokinetic ability. It's about 25 yards of line and kinda like 10 80. You could sprint with it and do some other stuff, but. High school kids, I'll put it at 10 miles per hour just'cause I've done it with so many of them that there's like a certain wattage number that I know that's pretty good if you could hit it. You know? So that's another one we use often and it's just another thing where they could compete. You know, they like, here's a number, guys, can you hit it? So those have been fun ones a little bit of the velocity based stuff. Honestly, it's more just to ensure they're hitting output like that they're trying, you know? And then as far as some of the other things, I'll use heart rate monitors a little bit if, you know, if that's kind of my goal in the session. We're looking more work capacity. I'll use Moxy monitors a little bit. A lot of that stuff is more like for my own, you know, use my one. But occasionally there's problems within, you know, maybe it's an athlete or something and something's going on. It's okay, let's take a deeper look and we'll look at, you know, oxygenation at a certain tissue and see yeah. Probably the biggest things with technology. I'm trying to think what else. 10 80 that'll, you know, again, that could do so much. Biggest thing I'm looking at it with a lot of them is, you know, maybe it's probably top speed. Like again, just something easy for them to look at. For myself. But for them, yeah, it's try and keep as basic as could be.

Ryan Patrick: 41:52

Yeah. I'm in a pretty similar boat. I think majority of what we're using these days is really looking at the output metrics. The kids are gonna identify with the most, you know, we have force plates and I might look at, you know, average breaking forces, eccentric rate of force development, some of those variables, but they're completely meaningless. To the athlete, they're like, can I jump higher? Right. So, you know, the rest of it is just kind of baked into the whole training process.

Dan Brandi: 42:19

Now, will you change some of your own? Will you use the force plates to kind of dictate your own programming or where you might head with that athlete?

Ryan Patrick: 42:26

Yeah. So we have our athletes jump every week on the force plates. Primarily we're looking for jump height and we're, you know, it's more about trends, so we'll see. Decrements after, you know, a long weekend of tournaments, we recently added a treadmill. So an incline treadmill with some resistance.

Dan Brandi: 42:46

Yeah. How do you I keep,

Ryan Patrick: 42:49

it's I'm really enjoying it and I'll tell you why we got it. I have roughly, I. Maybe 15 yards at the most that we can sprint indoors. And really accelerate. And some of my faster guys, fifteen's like pushing it'cause they gotta slam on the brakes, you know, before they're hitting the wall. And then we have a true form, so curve treadmill, and we would use that for some top speeds. I really found that my athletes were struggling with the transition zone of, you know, building their acceleration into a max velocity run. We have an area in our parking lot that we can go, but it's asphalt so that you know, you can't get a lot of reps. I don't want kids, their shins and ankles and knees to get beat up from running on asphalt and honestly like they we're, the building that I'm in is a physical therapy clinic, so they sought the fuck out of our parking lot. And so we get cracks and falls and what it was two years ago, it's not even, it's not even there's one little lane that we can use. So I'm just less. Eager to get out there and use it. And we just needed something to fill the gap that was going to allow us to get longer runs and get to the level of output that we wanted. And so I was very leery because the hammerless nature of it, or of most of the gears that you use on it, I wasn't sure that it was going to be really effective. That said. Yeah. I'm like, you know, I mean, what are we, like ostriches here? Like we don't, we gotta use our arms. But I found that it's actually not a hindrance. We do enough technical rhythm timing work with like our a series stuff that I. I'm not too concerned about that element of it, and kids seem to be able to transition with it really nicely. So, it, it's turned out really well. We're just now kind of breaking outside and timing some stuff, so I'm seeing some jumps in kids' performance and it's a relatively easy. Thing for us to do. And I don't know that there's, I don't know that there's any magic to it other than we were hitting zones, intensities, and distances we weren't able to before. Now that said, we're still keeping our repetitions under 10 seconds for sure. And when we can help it five seconds or less. So the 40 yard that you can do on that is, is pretty long. Some kids. Can take up to eight seconds. Not that they're running an eight second 40, but again, you don't have hands and you actually have some resistance on the belt. So it's not a true, but that starts to get a little bit long because you just see, like after about 30 yards, it becomes a little bit of a slog, right? Yeah, it's been valuable and it's quick. Because sometimes we have, you know, five or six athletes in a group. One of the other benefits that I found is there's a little bit of downtime, so we've been just kind of sprinkling in some filler work to just help athletes move a little bit better. It's maybe work on some other elements of just, you know, stiffness, coordination, timing that they weren't getting before. Maybe we were just doing so many reps back to back. Felt like they were getting a little fatigued. So for those reasons, I feel like it's been a really good fit for what we do and the space that we have. But I would love to have GPS monitors on these kids. Let's get out, let's run. You know, we could break it into a force velocity profile if we want it. I think it's probably more than we need for a high school athlete, but just for the. Intellectually stimulating me. It sounds like something fun that would, that could break down. So, that's kind of where we're

Dan Brandi: 46:10

right. I'm kind of the same way. A with the parking lot being over salted, but also just, you know, I'm in the Northeast, I'm Connecticut, so it's like, how many months do we really get outside? It's, you know. Start to be able to go out now till whatever, October, November. So yeah, there's just a long time when you know, like indoor is all we have. Where, yeah, the seemed, and I just have limited space also. So the treadmill is something I looked at, like this could be good, you know, curve treadmill, I love, good for, you know, some whatever work capacity, getting some technique work. But

Ryan Patrick: 46:38

yeah, it's been great. It's got a big footprint. We've, you know, I've kind of wedged equipment into the space that I have. We've only got about 4,000 square feet. Yeah. I just had Smith Machine two, and then, you know, we changed our force plates up, so now we've got like A-I-M-T-P rack on it. So it's got these two vertical bars. So they're less portable than they used to be. We kind of have a place for'em. The Proteus takes a huge footprint. Like we are just, we are maxed out. I'm like, we need more space. It's just not available at this point.

Dan Brandi: 47:06

Yeah, kind of same boat. I would love to get a few pieces and I'm like, and maybe this is helping me not get them because yeah, I would just keep filling it up, fill it up. So, you know, I guess something to be said for holding back, having some constraints and working with what you got. But

Ryan Patrick: 47:19

yeah, I would love to get some of those pieces. Yeah. So, man we're coming close to an hour here, so I wanna start to wrap up. I got one more kind of big question for you and then we'll go into the end here. But you know, just for experienced coaches, I think it's valuable to understand. Some of the mistakes that you've made yourself. So, you know, I kind of framed it as what are some of the big mistakes you're seeing in the industry, but more specifically, I'd like you to just maybe touch on your own evolution over the last one to two years. What things have you changed course on or just modified or improved in the past two years?

Dan Brandi: 47:51

Sure. Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, I'm always kind of going back and. Like even before we spoke of just like kind of looking at what I was doing, you know, five years ago and some of which I just kind of forgot about. It's oh, that's, you know, I should get back into that. Just kind of always having a new thought process where it's like, ah, maybe that wasn't so great. But if I could the big one to me is just getting, like we've talked about better and better at, at, you know, looking at the person in front of me versus what I might think is they need you. I'll always, you know, what sport are they playing? Have some primary goals, but what are their goals? You know, cause even my own training, you know, we could do, you know, all the physiological stuff we want, but like my best top speeds are hit when I'm with friends or when I'm with competing, you know, or I just, I'm in a good mood, you know, so like that stuff I have to, you know, kind of consider, so it's getting. And like always just kind of getting better at balancing those two things. What do I think they need? And then who's the person in front of me? What do they want? What's gonna keep them engaged, happy? And I think that's been kind of a constant like progression of realizing, you know, there's no panacea, like what's gonna work for everybody? It's who's the person here? Like, how do we get him to want to be here more?

Ryan Patrick: 49:00

Yep.

Dan Brandi: 49:00

Because it's not consistency gonna be better than anything else I could do. You know, if he's here, whatever, if. We'll improve that way. Yeah. So I think that's a big thing. I think that's the progression over all the years of just kinda getting better at that.

Ryan Patrick: 49:14

Awesome. I love that. That's so true too, because do you try, is it private? Semi-private? What's the model you have?

Dan Brandi: 49:21

Yeah it's all private now with, you know, if it's kids, maybe they'll come in with a group of 2, 3, 4 tops, but

Ryan Patrick: 49:27

yeah, private one-on-one. Similar to us, our athletes, we run five to one. And like just having a couple like buddies there. We had this group of guys they would schedule like about five of'em. They were all baseball players at the same school. Five of'em would go at three o'clock. Five of'em would start at our three 30 spot, and it just kind of became one, like mega session, you know? So we had two coaches trying to police this, but man, they would, I was like, you guys are the only group that can take, you know, two hours to do a 75 minute workout. But. They wanted to be there. They were hanging out. They were goofing between sets. They got the work done. Yeah. Like that. These guys weren't lazy. I'm not insinuating that at all. They trained hard. Right. But the rest time periods may have been some very loose boundaries. But they trained hard. They pushed each other. They got incredible results. And you know, we've had other kids where. You know, maybe their friends come and then all of a sudden they can't be at the same time and they just, they're not there.'cause they, you know, they're not getting the same thing out of it when they're not with their friends.

Dan Brandi: 50:28

Yeah, just the, like the group dynamic just, yeah. Huge. Yeah. I mean, yeah, that's, that to me is, yeah, you're gonna get more out of them and they're gonna come more you know, so that's, I'd rather that

Ryan Patrick: 50:40

a hundred percent with you. I'll be honest, sometimes I just like goofing with the boys.

Dan Brandi: 50:44

Yeah. Oh, for sure. For sure. And yeah, I'm the, I think, you know, we're probably all the same way, whether it's middle school up to 40 or the way beyond. Yeah. It's, I'll get a better workout in I'll, you know, if it's a hard, like cardio, whatever, conditioning, whatever, call. I am not so good at doing'em on my own, but if I'm with some buddies, we're joking around, oh my God. It's, you know, night and day session. Yeah. I actually get it done. So yeah,

Ryan Patrick: 51:08

complete agreement. That's huge. Dan, man, I appreciate you coming on today. It's been like ton of information. I love just chatting with other guys about what they're doing, what's working, what's not working, and obviously I feel like we're pretty aligned on a lot of things, so that makes it easy to. But for people who are trying to find out a little bit more about you and what you're doing, where can we find you?

Dan Brandi: 51:33

Yeah, I'm on Instagram with you know, consistencies slash some breaks between it. But build CT is the Instagram handle. I'm trying to get better at posting more stories. I'll us, I'll have be fairly consistent at points with the stories, but yeah, anybody, if you wanna reach out on there, I, you know, should be able to get back to you and absolutely.

Ryan Patrick: 51:53

All right. And any current projects that you're testing on yourself or others?

Dan Brandi: 51:58

So yes and no. For myself, I'm, you know, competing in in track also, so trying to just get myself faster. Oh, wow. And gonna start volunteering with the the high school track team too, to kind of put a couple of those things in a practice and see how it works in a team setting.

Ryan Patrick: 52:13

Oh, that should be a lot of fun. So what, how old are you? We're, yeah, we're like right around the same age. Yeah. I've looked at it, I'm like, oh, I don't know, man. You know, I see these videos of a hundred year olds running like 13 second hundred or 13 seconds when they're, you know, 70 or 80. I'm like, maybe I could do that. I don't know.

Dan Brandi: 52:33

So, oh yeah, you should. I just met a couple guys at 58 years old and I think he's running like an 11 500, you know, which is fricking moving almost 60, I mean, four meter runner. Oh, Jesus. So yeah, so it's, you know, there's plenty of time. All right,

Ryan Patrick: 52:50

brother.

Dan Brandi: 52:50

Well,

Ryan Patrick: 52:51

hey

Dan Brandi: 52:51

man,

Ryan Patrick: 52:51

I appreciate, it's been an honor. Thanks for carving some time

Dan Brandi: 52:54

yeah, absolutely. Thank you.

Ryan Patrick: 52:55

This was great.