Brooks Laich - Episode 286 - The Best At Getting Better

We sit down with retired NHL forward Brooks Laich to talk about the moment he decided at thirteen that hockey was no longer just fun, it was a mission. We get real about confidence, leadership, sacrifice, and how he now channels that same competitive drive into World Playground to help people travel for less and collect better memories.

• deciding early what you are willing to trade for a dream 
• kindness and competitiveness under one roof with Kat, plus the daily breakfast routine 
• how small town Saskatchewan builds time on task and toughness 
• what championship leadership looks like away from the spotlight 
• the single sentence from Brooks’ mom that rewired his belief 
• the hidden cost of leaving home young and how he almost quit 
• being addicted to competition and repurposing it after retirement 
• how World Playground removes commissions and markups to cut travel costs 
• why Brooks calls travel a memory company, not a travel company 
• reconciling a long NHL career with not winning the Stanley Cup 
• why kids should play multiple sports and why coaches should obsess over practice 
• being “applied” by using one filter all day, every day 
• choosing your struggle, following your gut, and creating circumstances you want

So if you haven't yet, send me a note on where you would want to go, where you'd want to meet up in person with other like-minded individuals like me, and maybe we can make that happen thanks to World Playground. 
If you use the code AP15 at checkout, you get to save 15%. 

If you folks like this episode, like what Brooks has to say, do me a favor, share this with another athlete individual who would 

Transcript

Choosing The NHL At Thirteen

SPEAKER_03 0:00

I made the conscious decision at the age of thirteen to pursue professional sports. So at the age of thirteen, hockey was no longer about fun, just merely fun. Yes, it was always fun, but it was not just about fun. It was about making the NHL. That was a conscious decision.

SPEAKER_01 0:23

Welcome back, team. This is the 286th episode of the Athletes Podcast today, featuring Brooks Like, a retired NHL hockey player, played 776 games in the show, that being the NHL between the Washington Capitals, Toronto Maple Leafs, Los Angeles Kings, and Ottawa Senators, who was known for his dedication and leadership on and off the ice. You will be able to tell during this conversation. Brooks is one of a kind, someone who I thoroughly appreciated being able to chat with for over an hour. After retiring from hockey, he moved into the business world, messed around in the CrossFit space, kind of got connected with a pretty athletic individual who's now his wife, Kat. We dive into it during the episode. But this conversation is also centered around World Playground and what they're doing to allow people like you and me to go travel around the world for less. So if you haven't yet, send me a note on where you would want to go, where you'd want to meet up in person with other like-minded individuals like me, and maybe we can make that happen thanks to World Playground. Thank you folks for tuning in to this episode. I really appreciate it. We would not be here today, folks, without our sponsors. The first being Perfect Sports Supplements. This is their hydro splash. So for you folks who want to get those electrolytes in in the morning, they have a brand new creatine formula as well that has your creatine and electrolytes all in one. If you use the code AP15 at checkout, you get to save 15%. Why wouldn't you save money? And the other people we got to thank Titanium Ford. I don't know if you guys have seen it on my social media stories, but I'm riding around in a brand new Sand Bronco that I would love for you guys to check out. We're going to be doing episodes in the vehicle with people like Emma Jane Nelson in the future moving forward. So if you folks like this episode, like what Brooks has to say, do me a favor, share this with another athlete individual who would and I want to make sure we appreciate you again for tuning in. This is the 286th episode of the Athletes Podcast today, featuring Brooks like Here We Go.

SPEAKER_00 2:19

You're the most decorated racquetball player in U.S.

SPEAKER_01 2:21

history, world's strongest man, from childhood passion to professional athlete, eight-time Iron Man champion. So, what was it like making your debut in the NHL? What is your biggest piece of advice for the next generation of athletes? From underdogs to national champions. This is the Athletes Podcast, where high performance individuals share their triumphs, defeats, and life lessons to educate, entertain, and inspire the next generation of athletes. Here we go.

Kat’s Fierce Kindness And Breakfast

SPEAKER_01 2:50

But the beautiful part about the athletes podcast here, Brooks, is that we just get to have a conversation over the next 45 minutes, maybe 60 minutes, if I'm lucky here, because we got Brooks Lake on the podcast, founder of World Playground, former NHL hockey player, 14 years in the show, playing primarily with the Caps, a little bit with the LA Kings, Toronto Maple Leafs. Also won a call their cup in Hershey with our boy Bruce Boudreau, who was episode number 100 on the pod. And he's also married to a kind of fit athlete who we might have on the show in the future. But for now, he's taken home the second fittest person in the like residence. Unless I stand corrected, you guys probably have some pretty serious competitions. I don't know how that intro compares to some others, but I figured I'd check you a little bit early. Give you a little stick check just to make sure you know we're uh we're gonna have a fun combo here. I'm making sure you're not gonna be uh too cocky coming into this as you know, 14-year pro, I get it.

SPEAKER_03 3:46

Yeah, but I think you are right. I think in my family I am the second fittest. My fiance, for any the anybody that doesn't know, is Catherine David Stoddard, two-time fittest woman in the world, CrossFit Games champion 2015-2016, six times in the top five, just a phenomenal athlete, and I get the joy and the pleasure to work out alongside her every day. And quite often I'm I'm very humbled in the gym beside her.

SPEAKER_01 4:12

I heard you refer to her as the fiercest competitor you've ever seen. Is that true?

SPEAKER_03 4:18

It is true, which is quite interesting, David. I hope you get to meet, I hope everybody gets to meet my fiance. I just adore her. She's the best woman in the world, she's the best human in the world. I said that when I proposed to her, I said, You are the best of us. You are my hope, you are the best of us, and she's just the best person in the world. And the thing that drew me to her was her kindness. She is the kindest, warmest, happy person that I know. And her kindness was the thing that drew me to her. And she has the most beautiful contrast between being her soul is insanely kind, but when she flips the script, she flips the switch to go compete, she is wildly fierce. And you can see it in her eyes prior to taking the floor for competition. I loved watching her compete. She's my favorite competitor. I've said that over and over again. And I've never in my life seen a beautiful contrast, such a beautiful contrast, as somebody who is so so beautifully kind and wildly fierce as well. She does that better than anybody I've ever seen.

SPEAKER_01 5:25

Crazy to hear coming from someone who shared the ice with guys like Alex Ovechkin, Sidney Crosby, arguably the greatest who've ever stepped on the ice. But you get to live under her roof. What do those breakfasts look like? Because I know they're not cinnamon buns every day, but dang, you guys must be putting some protein on that table for that nine-month-old as well, you know?

SPEAKER_03 5:46

Okay, so you touched on cinnamon buns. There's two reasons I work out. One, to become a more capable human being, two, to eat cinnamon buns. Those are those are the two reasons why I love cinnamon buns. But our breakfast, we eat the same breakfast every day. I'm curious what I want to ask you what you eat for breakfast daily after this, but I'll share what we eat for breakfast every single day. It works for us. We are we train very soon after breakfast each day. We're able to train on this. And Kat brought this to me, and I was like, oh my gosh, this changed my life. So every day I make our breakfast every day, and every day for breakfast, it's a bagel, usually a cinnamon raisin bagel, with cream cheese, honey, and then a fried egg on top of it. And then berries, just an assortment of berries, grapes, blueberry, blackberry, raspberry, whatever assortment of grapes. So bagel, cream cheese, honey, and a fried egg, and then berries with it. And it is an absolute weapon of a breakfast. I am curious. So we eat that six days a week, we'll eat that. And then on Sunday, I'll usually make us a pancake breakfast just as a just as a change up. But curious what you eat if you eat the same breakfast every day, or do you eat a performance breakfast? Do you eat a light breakfast? What do you eat for breakfast?

SPEAKER_01 7:11

Yeah, it fluctuates, depends on the season that I'm in, I'd say, if I'm trying to add on some size or strength or uh reduce it. Like I've I've messed around with not having as much breakfast in the morning, maybe lighter, so that I can train. But yeah, I'm usually eggs, sourdough, avocado, and then berries. I try and put that on the table. It's tough to beat sourdough, butter, berries, and a few good eggs on the table there in the morning. It's just what's worked for me for years. But I heard your cinnamon bagel on empty netters and was like, I gotta get the recipe, I gotta throw some down and see what it's like. Because obviously it's working for you too. I mean, post-NHL career, obviously, you spent and shared the ice with some incredible athletes. You're now sharing a home with

Saskatchewan Hardship Builds Toughness

SPEAKER_01 8:00

one of the best athletes in the world. You are a perfect fit for the athletes podcast, where our goal is to educate, entertain, and inspire the next generation of athletes. But you also come from a town of 600 people in Saskatchewan where your dad was the principal, and you were raised, maybe not with the stereotypical lights camera action that got you to being showcased on a world stage. So I'd love to know how did you do it? How'd you get there? What did you do, bro?

SPEAKER_03 8:32

Very simply, I would say passion and obsession. Very simply. Like my hometown is 600 people in rural Saskatchewan. The nearest city is two hours away. We have winter, six months of the year. So as a Canadian kid, I always tell people for your US listeners, like we're right above North Dakota, so colder and flatter than North Dakota, if you can believe it. That's where I'm from. And we had, but every small town in Canada has a rink. Every small town has a rink. And if you want your kids out of your house, you know, as a parent, if you want your kids out of your house, you put them in hockey in the winter. And every kid grows up wanting to be an NHL player in Canada, and I was no different. And played hockey. I was I was so fortunate to grow up the way I did in a small community that had a rink, and the rink was open seven days a week. And we could skate every single day. I played hockey, I took figure skating, we played shiny, we played organized hockey, we played road hockey, we played roller hockey, we played hockey in the gym in school. Everywhere we went, we just played hockey. And as a kid, you're just doing it out of the passion and the joy. But you spend enough hours through your youth doing that that you're developing the fundamental aspects of the sport, the fundamental skills that can make you excel. And our province, unique fact, our province of Saskatchewan puts out more NHL players per capita than anywhere else in the world. 41 people, 41 NHL players per million residents. That's the highest rate of anywhere in the world. And it is because, in my belief, it's because of two things. One, there's there's so many small towns in Saskatchewan that have a rink that your kids get to spend so many more hours on the ice than the kids in the city, where ice time is few and far between because there's so many people there. So we spend more time on the ice than anybody else. And secondly, the conditions that we spend on the ice are tougher than in bigger centers. The rinks are bloody cold. You have to have sometimes you'd have a toque under your helmet and little mittens under your gloves, and you would drive 70 miles to another hockey game and get your bag out of your dad's pickup truck, and your skates would be frozen and you'd have to put them on and go play a game. And there's just hardship to play the sport where we live. And it just makes for tough kids that turn into tough professionals. And when pursuing something to be the one of the best in the world at it, you are going to run into obstacle every single way. And I think Saskatchewan's prairie kids, Manitoba, Alberta, in Canada as well, are very much looked upon as guys that do not complain. They just show up, they do their work, blue collar, they don't complain. And I think a lot of that comes just from experiencing a lot of hardship in dealing with elements when you are younger.

SPEAKER_01 11:36

And that's why you need at least four North Americans on any championship team up front, right? That's my theory.

SPEAKER_03 11:44

That is my theory. Curious what you like if you were to construct a championship team. What's your favorite sport, David?

SPEAKER_01 11:53

I'm a hockey or golf guy through and through, you know.

SPEAKER_03 11:56

Yeah. Interesting. I was just talking about this yesterday with a

Real Leadership And A Mom’s Belief

SPEAKER_03 12:00

friend. I once heard of this study about leadership and championship teams. So a guy did a study on 400 championship teams over the last 25 years across different, across all kinds of different sports, the four major North American sports, World Cup, FIFA, just championship teams in general. And he was looking for two things. One, who was the leader on the championship team? And two, what were common characteristics of this leader? Why was this guy or girl the leader on a championship team? And what he found across the study was that the leader on the team was rarely, if ever, the best player. The actual leader of the team wasn't the best player, but it was the person that came into the locker room every day. It was like, hey, David, how are you this morning? How are you feeling? How's your knee? Doing okay? Yeah. Oh, what'd you watch last night? Oh, I like that show too. You know, just had a little rapport with you, and then the next teammate and the next teammate, and went through essentially every teammate every day. And every teammate trusted and had a real appreciation and respect for the presence of this person. And that was the leader on the team, regardless of their on-field or on-ice capabilities. They were the leader. And then, even more interesting is the characteristic, the common characteristic found amongst these leaders. I'll let you take a guess at it, although you'll never guess, and I think you're going to be wildly surprised when you find out what it is.

SPEAKER_01 13:33

Well, I'm going to go with like an empathy route because we're guessing me to guess that.

SPEAKER_03 13:42

It's actually it's kind of even less of a characteristic. It's more of just a I don't even know how to classify it. So the common characteristics that he found amongst these 400 leaders, they all had a mother who believed in them. Wow. That was the thing. They grew up with a mother who believed in them. And when I look back at my life, man, my mom was my mom was part of one of the most pivotal moments in my entire life. When I was 12 years old, I was playing in a provincial baseball tournament. I had a really bad first day. I came home, I was sulking in my bedroom. I felt like I left or led our team down. And she came in and she gave me a speech that changed my entire life. And it was so short. And she said, Brooks. Oh no, that was my dad. Good. You're well researched, though, David. I give it to you. You're well researched. My mom said, Brooks, you're hoping to hit the ball. When you go to the plate, you need to know that you are going to hit the ball and you're going to hit it hard. And that's all she said. And I remember her leaving the room, and I just remember the next day going up to the plate. Again, I was 12 years old. I just remember, like, I know that I'm going to drill this thing. Bring it to me. Bring that pitch. I'm going to drill it. And I did. I had a very good day. We ended up winning the provincial championship. From that moment on, I never struggled with belief in myself. Doesn't mean I didn't have struggle in my sports. Of course I did. Every year, there's massive struggle every year. But I didn't, I didn't doubt myself. I knew that I had it within me, stayed convicted with it. Didn't always go my way. That's fine. But at that moment, my mom hardwired personal confidence into me and uh it changed my life at the age of 12.

SPEAKER_01 15:38

I'm just gonna uh let everyone take a moment here, pause the podcast. If your mom's still around, shoot her a text, give her a call, tell her you love her, say thank you for everything they've done because I am in the same boat. Like you, actually, my mom was a principal. I know your dad was, and my mom had a very similar impact on my life in the sense that she told me, you know, the cliche that you could go and achieve whatever you want to do, whether it's going and talking with former athletes on a podcast, or whether it's going pursuing your own athletic achievements, like yeah, it's uh I I wasn't planning on getting emotional less than 15 minutes into the conversation, Brooks, but here you are making me think about my mom and the impact she had. So I I also think

Leaving Home At Sixteen

SPEAKER_01 16:20

that it's important for people to highlight what their parents did for them. You left home at the age of 16 to go play hockey. What did chasing the dream of playing in the NHL make you miss that most people don't necessarily see?

SPEAKER_03 16:35

Oh man, I almost I almost didn't make it. I almost I wrote a it's a great question, Dave. That's a great question. That's a really good question. Because I don't know if I've ever shared this story or not. I left home at 16 because I needed to move to a bigger center to play against against better competition to get to the NHL. And like three weeks into being away from home, I was living with another family, five hours away from home, and I didn't know if I was gonna make it. I was missing my family, my brother, my sister, my mom, and my dad. I was missing being home so much. I remember being in my bedroom and writing a letter to my mom and dad saying, I think I want to come home. I don't know that I can be away. And I wrote this letter, full page letter, and I stuck it. I don't know why I didn't mail it. I don't know. Because at this time I didn't have a cell phone, like this is 2000. What is this? Or this is 1999. This is still the 90s, I think. So it didn't have a cell phone. I wrote a letter and I think I stuck it in the bottom left drawer of this desk that was in my bedroom at my billet's house, my host family's house. For some reason, I don't know why I mailed it. I didn't mail it. I think I was like, well, let me just write this, let me go to practice, and I'll figure it out tomorrow. See what, see what happens tomorrow. Turns out, like three weeks later, I was looking for something in this desk, and I pull out this drawer and there's this letter sitting there. And I'm like, I forgot that I had written this. I read it, and I'm like, oh my gosh, I had forgot that I had written this. In those three weeks, I had progressed, I got to know people, I had felt comfortable on the team, and I had settled into living with a new family. But there was a time, just three quick weeks into it, where I was like, man, I always knew I wanted to be an NHL player, but I don't know if I'm gonna get through being away from my family. Luckily, I did, somehow persisted through it. Otherwise, life would be very different, and certainly we wouldn't be here sitting here talking.

SPEAKER_01 18:33

You'd be just hitting baseballs out of the park because of the confidence your mom instilled to you. Come on now.

SPEAKER_03 18:38

Um my mom also my mom, funny you say that. My mom wanted me to be a professional baseball player because she goes, Brooks, I can sit in the sun and watch you play baseball. Because my mom is perpetually freeze my ass off in a rink. Yes. Because, like I said, the rinks in Canada are cold, man. The rinks in Saskatchewan are cold. They are just bitterly cold. And she's my mom is perpetually cold. And I remember saying, Mom, the rinks I'm gonna play in, you can wear a t-shirt in them. And that concept was just so wild, knowing the rinks that we grew up in, where you had to be in like a jacket and a hoodie and a parka, like just to just sit there and be warm enough to sit and watch this game. So she wanted me to be a baseball player, and David, she was a million percent right. I sh I should have listened. Baseball players, they play in the sun. Baseball players don't break teeth or really break bones, they get paid more than hockey players. I sh, mom, I should have listened to you. I should have been a baseball player. Life turned out great, and yes, I lived my dream playing hockey, but I do think my mom was right.

SPEAKER_01 19:50

It's uh I was gonna say it mainly for me would have to do with the size of the contracts that these guys are signing compared to what you guys were facing a decade ago in the NHL cap era, you know?

SPEAKER_03 20:01

And well, think of golf. Like you said, golf. If you could go pro in a sport, what would you go in? Would you go golf, would you go would you go hockey? Very different.

SPEAKER_01 20:09

Yeah, I mean, I was a goalie too. I don't know if you've been able to tell so far. And based on where I was there now, like a backup goalie seems pretty good role. No, I'm just kidding. The uh yeah, I think golf, because I you know, give you the ability to do things on your own terms, create your own schedule, rely on yourself, maybe not as much of a team. I don't know. Uh yeah,

Competition Addiction After Retirement

SPEAKER_01 20:30

I don't know. I I would love to go pro in every sport, pickleball, man. You name it. Like, I I want to play everything. I I played basketball, I was undersized as a center, but like you know, I I love being able to compete. And I think like I heard you on a podcast talk about like the fact that hockey was the vehicle that allowed you to actually compete, and that's what you truly loved, not just the sport of hockey. And I think similar now hearing you say that, I was actually going through my experiences. I'm like, I just like being able to get out and get after it with people and see how I stack up. Like I, you know, it doesn't matter what I'm doing if it's playing chess or running or unicycling, I don't care.

unknown 21:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:11

Yeah, I it was a really interesting thing when I learned that. Like as an athlete, you love to compete. There's there's people who love to compete, there's people who really like to compete, and then there's those that are addicted to competition. And and it's quite a funny conversation in our house when you ask myself and my fiance when somebody asks us who's the more competitive of the two. We both say ourselves naturally, and I have the most respect for her, but I'll still say myself, and she'll say she has the most respect for me, and she'll still say herself. And yeah, I didn't discover this until after I was retired from hockey that I retired from hockey. I could go play hockey still if I wanted to, just in town, play against other guys. And I'm like, I have no desire to do that because there's no competition with and against the best in the world laced into that hockey. And that That's what I discovered. I I was addicted to within hockey. Now, if I had grown up in Texas, maybe it would have been that I could get that competition through football. Or if I had grown up in Brazil, maybe it's through soccer, or Italy, it could be through volleyball, or whatever it might be. But I think I was a product of my environment. I grew up in Saskatchewan. Hockey was the dominant sport. But then it was the competition laced within the sport that I was addicted to. And I now get that fix in the business that I run in World Playground, in our travel booking platform. I used to want to win a Stanley Cup as the best team in the world. My mission now is to make our booking platform the best travel booking platform in the entire world. So I've repurposed that competition out of a physical thing now into a business skill. But damn, I also miss the physicality of hockey and like the ah. But yeah, I think I have somewhat of an addiction to competition.

SPEAKER_01 23:00

So do you take a swig of OJ straight out of the carton after you tell Catherine that you are the better and more competitive athlete?

SPEAKER_03 23:09

So we're we're we're we are I'm not opposed to like taking a swig of the almond milk from the fridge. She doesn't like it when I do it, but I do it.

SPEAKER_01 23:20

Bachelor life, man. It's tough to get out of it.

SPEAKER_03 23:22

Oh man, it's when I had I used to have a friend, a buddy, he's now in a relationship, but I had I'd have a buddy that come out here, a real good friend named Kyle that would come out here, and I could just tell by all his mannerisms. Obviously, I knew he was single, he's a really good friend, but I could tell by all his mannerisms that there wasn't a lady present in his life. It's so undeniable how how much life improves when you have a partner in it. If you ask Kat and I, we'll both say we're competitive in different manners. We look at the question differently. She wants to win every card game, every board game, every trivia game, every like everything just kind of matters to her. And she gets so David, we'll play like just card games here in the evening. And if she wins, she'll put on the Icelandic national anthem and she'll stand up in her chair, like she's on the podium. And it's become this running joke that now I'll do it, I'll put up the Canadian one, or we have some friends come, they'll put up the American one, whatever. It's become this running joke. It legit means so much to her to win. I do not care about competing in those other things. I care about competing to be the best in the world at one thing which was hockey and which is now my business. Outside of that, playing golf, playing golf is just fun for me. I don't care to be the best golfer. I don't care to be, if I win or don't win the board game, great. I'm just happy to hang out with my fiance. But when I when I enter this office to compete to work on my business, I want to compete to be the best in the world. And I love that pursuit. And I'm gonna fall short a million times. We are so far from it. We are so far from being the best booking platform travel company in the world. Many of your listeners are probably just hearing about World Playground right now. That's fine. You don't make it to the top and then start acting like a champion. You make it to the top because of your skill set, your characteristics, your habits, your behaviors, your application, your conviction, your dedication, your passion, your obsession. Keep going. These things that happen while nobody sees you years before anybody knows your name or your company name, you are doing these things that eventually one day people do take notice. So that's where I like to compete. My fiance, she competes across the board. And that's why we disagree on who is the most competitive.

SPEAKER_01 25:54

I also think

World Playground Without Travel Markups

SPEAKER_01 25:55

that what you're doing without the million billion dollar marketing budget that is associated with those other booking platforms, and also by doing it without making money off of your customers. I think that's two pieces that I think should be highlighted. Obviously, when we talk about world playground, this is giving people the ability to travel around the world for less, simply put. 18%, I believe, is the average that I've been able to acquire over the past little bit of research. But when you think about being able to save, you know, 150 bucks on a two-night stay or you know, 300 plus $3,000 if you're going for a month, like those numbers continue to stack and add up and super impressive. And obviously, something you had to deal with for decades traveling. Now you're like, hey, why don't we all save on this?

SPEAKER_03 26:46

It's kind of a continuation. There's many, there's many motivations behind it. So for anybody that doesn't know, worldplayground.co is our website. And our company, what we do is we remove all commissions and markups from travel products that have inflated the price of travel for decades to give you, the traveler, the lowest possible price on that travel service that we can get it for. So the exact rate that we, the travel agency, get up from a hotel room, we pass it straight through to you without marking up and adding any, not a single cent of commission to it. We are the only company in the world that never adds or keeps a single cent of commission on a travel service on our website ever. So that you, the traveler, can trust that you have a booking platform that is competing on your behalf to bring the cost of your next memory down to as low as possible. I don't even look at ourselves really as a travel company. I look at ourselves as a memory company. I want to get David and his loved ones to their next unforgettable memory because I've climbed Kilimanjaro with my mom. I've taken my dad to Alaska to fly fish, and those are my best memories in life. And they're only because I was able to afford to travel. And I want that for every other person as well, to create the memories that they want in life with the people they love. And our booking platform is just a vessel to make that possible. So it's free for everybody in the world to use. We have 2.2 million hotels on the site. We have 13 cruise lines, we're integrating flights, there's more to come. It's really enjoyable. But the purpose of it is to get families, travelers around the world to their next unforgettable memory, and we don't take a cut of it. And that's my new mission. And this is an extension of what I saw my parents do. There's, as I said, there's many inspirations behind it. Do you remember conversations you had with your parents, or do you more reflect on like what you saw your parents do?

SPEAKER_01 28:38

Yeah, it's how they make people feel. It's the way that they impact others for sure.

SPEAKER_03 28:43

Like I've I told you about the conversation I had with my mom that changed my life. But when I think of what we're doing with World Playground, I remember my dad saying, fun is the last thing that families can afford to spend money on. And my dad is the fairest man on the planet. He genuinely dislikes Christmas Day because he feels for so many kids that go without on Christmas Day because families can't afford gifts that other families can. This is my dad. And he is the fairest man, and he he always said fun is the last thing that families can afford to spend money on. They have mortgage, they have rent, they have bills, healthcare, school supplies, everything. And then maybe they can get fun in after that. So my dad always brought fun to the lower-income families in our town. And he was a principal, and our town was 600 people. He knew who came to school in the same clothes and who had new clothes every other day. And so he would bring kids tubing with us, golfing with us, water skiing, fishing. He would bring kids to our hockey to our hockey games later when I was a professional. And he would always try to introduce fun to families that he knew he could never afford it. That is what our platform is doing on a hopefully bigger scale, just bigger than out than our personal community of WoWoda. And so I saw my parents, my mom would do it with food. She would bring everybody welcome to eat at our house. She would bring baking to anybody, she would do it with food. I saw my parents do this, and they still do it. Both of my parents are still alive, God bless, and I still see them do this. They extend their warmth to those in need very much. And our platform is just in honor of them trying to make travel affordable and available for every traveler and family out there. I'm now a father. I have a nine-month-old daughter that is the love of like my fiance and my daughter are just the best parts of my entire life. And I tell them both every day, I want to take you everywhere. I just want to go around the world and create memories with my fiance and my daughter. And I want that for every other father, every other mother, parent, grandparent, son, daughter to do with your parents, whatever it is. And World Playground just makes that possible for people. It brings memories back within reach. When the world is getting wildly expensive, we make travel more affordable.

SPEAKER_01 31:08

I know a slightly more leisurely trip to Italy was on the docket for you and the fam at some point in the future. That's the dream right now. That's the bucket list. Mine's to get my dad over to Scotland, Ireland, play some golf over there because he was never able to do that with his dad. And then I got to get my mom to Europe. So I'm going to be going to World Playground and getting every single

Safari Stories And Family Memories

SPEAKER_01 31:30

booking I possibly can through there because it's the cheapest way that I can afford to do it. So I might as well do it. But I also wanted to find out from your end those top memories that you've been able to create, whether it's fly fishing with your dad, whether it's climbing Mount Kilimandara with your mom, are there specific safari experiences that I've heard you reference that were ones that people should bookmark, check on their list? I know you've got swimming with humpback whales. Like those are surreal experiences that people never in a million years even dream of being able to take on. But now you've built a community. How cool is that to be able to share that experience with others?

SPEAKER_03 32:12

So much. I played team sports. I love the power of collective. And this is going back to like I asked you, would you want to be a golfer or would you want to be a hockey player? If you win in golf, you celebrate by yourself, a few family members, every other golfer hates you. You win in hockey, you get to celebrate with 23 other guys, and it's so much fun. And so I love the power of a group and I love being part of a group. And the memories that I experienced with my parents, I want others to have those. You mentioned the ones that you want to have with your mom and dad. It's funny when you ask my dad, my dad, when I got called up to the NHL, this is my dream, right? I got called up to the NHL. My parents weren't able to make it for my first game because I got a phone call today and played the next day. But then I was like, a week later or 10 days later, we were coming to Toronto, which is in Canada. And I'm like, Dad, we're coming to Toronto. I want to fly you and mom and our family in to come to my NHL game. And dad goes, I he goes, I have a board meeting that night. And I'm like, who cares, Dad? Who cares? Your son is into NHL. Figure it out. And so I brought them in. I got to take the starting face off against Matt Sunde, who was I was a fan of growing up. And I got to bring my parents there. So my my dad is kind of like level and calm, not that like excitable. And the same thing happened on Safari to answer your question. I was taking my mom over to climb Kilimanjaro. We climbed Kilimanjaro just after her 64th birthday. And when we were planning this, I asked dad, I was like, Dad, do you want to come join us on the back half of Kilimanjaro? And then we can all go on a safari afterwards. And and my dad goes, Oh, Brooks, I've seen the animals. And I'm like, Where? Where have you seen the animals? And he goes, I see them on TV all the time. And I'm like, Dad, this is so far from seeing them in real life. The safari is my favorite thing. For anybody listening, I know safari is expensive. We can help make that more affordable, but safari is a lifelong dream. You just everybody needs to go to Africa on a safari and please let us help assist you with this. But when my dad got on safari, like he was nonchalant. Okay, I'll come. You know, I'm like, dad, it's my treat. Like, I want to take you on safari. So he comes, he joins me and my mom after climbing Kilmanjaro. We go on safari. And then he's in the vehicle and he's just like this. He's looking everywhere. He's just, I've never seen such intensity on my dad, just like looking for the rhino. We're on this quest to find the rhino. And I'm like, oh, I thought you'd seen the animals, dad. You were gonna stay at home instead of coming. Yeah. So it's just like it's these moments that you know that we get to do through travel that connect us with the people we love, and you see a different side of people like my mom. My mom now has this nickname in town, Kilimanjaro Jane, because she summited Kilimanjaro.

SPEAKER_01 34:59

So that's sick.

SPEAKER_03 35:01

Yeah, these are just the best memories, despite everything I've done in hockey. It's the moments we spend together and travel, it's the memories we create there that I'll take with me and remember for the rest of my life. And I still want to do more with my parents. I'd love to hear more about what you want to do with your parents. Is golf a game that you and your dad shared and him and his father shared? Like why Scotland? Why golf?

SPEAKER_01 35:25

Yeah, I I think it was it's more so it's something that he always wanted to do with his dad. Like I said, never was able to do that, but would I think be a really cool experience to do, even just incorporate some other friends, buddies, and their dads. Like I feel like men also in this day and age don't necessarily communicate or connect as well as they could with other men, and it could be a cool way there. I'm also thinking as you're talking, as we're doing the community, I was driving around earlier this morning. I'm like, we should just do a podcast group and go somewhere where we've got listeners from the show. We get a group, a collective. I put a poll up, we find out where people want to go and we we set something up, and then you know, we see who else wants to join from the AP gang. I mean, we've got 280 plus previous guests, obviously, guys like Volps who you played with. Maybe we'll see if Bruce wants to join, drag him out of Hershey there. I don't know. Do you have stories that you obviously have and that you reference all the time, or maybe some that you don't? Like the fact that you were assisting on Neilander's son, father, goal there, like that's cool little piece. Like, I think about like even being able to put on a Leafs jersey growing up in Canada, being a Leafs fan, like some of those areas within your hockey story that maybe weren't shared over the course of your career that you could now having reflected over

Success And The Stanley Cup Hole

SPEAKER_01 36:50

the past few years, come back and say, Yeah, that was really cool. And oh, I was like so glad to be a part of that, but you didn't actually get to feel it in the moment.

SPEAKER_03 37:00

It's always a difficult question for me. Because there's a large part of me that looks at my career as an abject failure. Like there's a large part of me that I never won a Stanley Cup. I lost in I lost the gold medal game in the World Junior Championship. So I won a Calder Cup in the minors. That wasn't with and against the best in the world. There was a level, the NHL is a level higher than that. So like when I get to speak on a show like on a podcast or a show like this about hockey, my hockey career, there's there's part of me that is like, yeah, but there's a massive hole in my heart. I never won what I was set out to do. Like when I think about when I talk to people, like most people would maybe look at my career as a very successful career. And I do believe that, David. I do believe that my career was a very successful career, but there's also a shadow side of that. I spent 30 years of my life. I started playing hockey at the age of two and I retired at the age of 34. I spent 30 years, 30 plus years of my life pursuing one thing, which was the Stanley Cup. Okay, and I never achieved it. So that's 30 years of failure. I mean, really only 15 because I was in the NHL for you know from the age of 20 till 34. How do you deal with that? How do you uh like some people will pursue something for six months and stop because they didn't achieve it? I I per I perceived something for or pursued it for 30 years and didn't achieve it. Does that mean I was a failure on my bad days, on bad like days when I not not thinking so clear about like reflecting on my NGL career? Yeah, it can seem like that. And then but that those are fewer and further between the the more I get out from the game. My days when reflecting on my career now are usually man, I got to play hockey every single day of my life for the first 35 years. I got to play with and against the best in the world. You mentioned Alex Ovechkin previously. He was my teammate for 10 years, great friend. Got to play against him, got to play against Sidney Crosby, arguess, arguably one of the best hockey players of all time. Got to play with some of my childhood idols, Sergei Fedorov, got to take the face off against Matt Sundean, just like I got to live my dream every single day. So that is a wild success. But there's still the other side of like I never achieved my career goal, which is to win the championship. So when you ask me, you know, what was my career like, yeah, there's a lot of highlights. There was also a lot of lowlights. Which way would you like to go with it? I could die, I could dive into either.

SPEAKER_01 40:10

Baby blue band.

SPEAKER_03 40:14

That was that was a highlight and a low light.

SPEAKER_01 40:20

I'm trying to think of any moments like I I guess I'm gonna push back on that because we all have our down days and we all have days where we're not thinking as clearly to use your words. But 700 plus games in the NHL 15 years, I remember you saying the average now is five years in the NHL. So you played 3x that time. Obviously, the Stan Cup can only be won by one team every year, but you only had you know 15, 14 years attempts at that. There are a heck of a lot more names that are not on the cup than there are aren't. Obviously, the end goal is to win the Stanley Cup. I look at a guy like Rod Rindemore right now, who's won it both as a player and a coach. I look at the way you operate. I don't know whether it's on your aspirations, whatever, but like your name could still end up on that cup, right? You are still a young buck in the grand scheme of things. So, all this being said, obviously that dream is probably not something that you've you've come to terms with the fact that you are not gonna win it as a player, at least. I look at what you've done over your career and what you've been able to achieve post-career now. You've got like four incredible lives that you've already lived, and now you're still building with others. And again, I never played in the NHL, so I don't know what it's like to not win the Stanley Cup and be that close with that many teams. But I think how you've been able to impact people, even like stopping on the side of a road to fix someone's tire, it's those little things that day in and day out, people aren't gonna remember stuff, they're gonna remember those little interactions, the safaris that you take them on. And I also think that when people look back at what you've been able to put on the table after your career, they want yeah, you played 14 years in the NHL with some of the best teams in the world. You won the president's trophy. All that being said, Bruce Boudreau was also your coach at one point for a few years. He won the caller cup there, and that is a highlight because it's not the Stanley Cup, but it's the caller cup, and that is the oldest, one of the oldest, one of the oldest trophies in North American history. And that was a pretty solid team there. And getting to hoist that, I'm curious. Do you look back at that 12-year-old baseball swing and say, hey, what other sports should I have been playing? Because I know you're a proponent of other sports during high school. Like, what

Multi Sport Kids And Better Coaching

SPEAKER_01 42:45

how do you play that?

SPEAKER_03 42:47

Oh, yeah. Yes, for it for anybody listening, I think you introduce your kids to as many things as possible. So I have a nine-month-old right now. We're going to introduce her to everything. So I think parents too much get fixated on is my kid gonna go pro in hockey and they need to play only hockey from the age of five? No, we played, man, we played hockey, we played baseball, we played golf, track and field, cross-country, water skied, tubed, badminton, volleyball, tennis. I mean, we got downhill skiing, cross-country skiing, we got touches on everything. Then add in motorsports, like we just got touches on everything. And then, yeah, by the way when I was 15, then I became a one sport athlete. But I had developed athleticism, hand-eye coordination, proprioception, just things across different modalities that just made me a better overall athlete. And so for parents listening to this, get your kids' touches on everything and then let your kids figure out which one they are just obsessed with. Like I wouldn't put a hockey stick down. I should have been a baseball player probably, but I wouldn't put a hockey stick down. I could do it all day long. I could do it for 12 hours a day and I could still obsess over it. And I learned a lot about how my obsession for hockey through. Playing music. When I was in prof when I was a professional hockey player, I'm like, man, I'm home by one o'clock every day. I can't just watch TV for the next eight hours. I need to do something else. So I bought a guitar, started playing guitar, then I bought drums and started playing drums just so I could do something creative, ask like access the creative side of my brain outside of just the competitive side of my brain. And but I could only do it for like an hour a day, David. And then I was like, I'm done, I'm done with this thing, like I'm over this. And it made me think of my friends growing up. I'm like, man, we all grew up in the same environment. Why did I get out of there and pursue hockey? And why did they not? Because after an hour, they were done with it. They just didn't care. And I learned that playing sport by playing music. I just didn't care as deeply as I did with hockey. I was just wildly obsessed. But now with our daughter, yeah, we want to we want to have more kids in the future too. I just want to get them touches on everything, support them along the way, like my parents did, and then let them just follow what they're pulled towards and then support and throw a wind at their back in any manner if they can. If that's hockey, great. Maybe they can be a PWHL player, right?

SPEAKER_01 45:11

Let's go.

SPEAKER_03 45:12

So, but it's going to be such a fun journey just to see what they're interested in, but I will get them touches everywhere. And we call it touches. In pro sports, we we call it touches. It's just repetition and practice, and we're not worried about the scoreboard. Like people think in professional sports, all you think about is a scoreboard. Coaching now is so much about practice and less about the scoreboard. When I got into the NHL in 2004, it was about did you win or lose? Seven, eight years later, like when Bruce Boudreau became our coach and I had Adam Oates, I had other coaches as the sport progressed. The scoreboard tonight is the feedback that we are looking for for practice tomorrow to get better. So even if you lose 3-1, it's like, cool, we found out we can't break out, we're losing faceoffs, and we're not getting traffic around there. Nat awesome. We're going to implement three drills in tomorrow's practice to make us better at these areas, and now we're a better team. And all year long, coaches so much don't really care. Yes, it's measured by wins and losses, but they really just want the feedback from those wins and losses to implement into practice to make you a better team. And it it actually pains me when I see youth sports coaches obsess over the scoreboard and not obsess over making their players better. And that's one thing I look forward to when our kids get older, being a coach for them and try to guide them and improve them in sports year after year.

SPEAKER_01 46:43

What's the definition of an insanity? Doing something over and over again and expecting a different result. When you get a group of individuals together who are searching, striving to achieve a similar goal and who buy in, right? I think you mentioned the 2016 CAPS team or 2016, 2015 CAFS team was like that A1 team that you've ever been a part of. Like it's it's something special when you can get a group that is all moving towards one direction. I know you said it started at the soccer sewer bowl. Where and when I I guess let me rephrase that. You mentioned also like championship teams. You mentioned Los Angeles Kings of Jeff Carter as the captain who's not necessarily like the best player on the team, but who brings in those leadership skills that is the leader that glue guy brings everyone together. Are there specific people who you played with throughout your career that you can reference and say those are the individuals? Like I look at a Tampa Bay Lightning team. They had like 12 former captains on that team when they went on that two-year run. Like, are there individuals that you look back on that were making big impacts? Like again, Glenn Hanlon as a as your coach goalie,

Mentors Who Teach Restraint

SPEAKER_01 48:05

former goalie there, too, you know?

SPEAKER_03 48:07

Yeah. Fun fact about Glenn, he gave up Wayne Gretzky's first NHL goal. I was so fortunate to play with so many good hockey players, leaders, man. Man. Olaf Kolzig when I first got there.

SPEAKER_00 48:22

Let's go. Love that. What a poll.

SPEAKER_03 48:26

Fiery competitor. Fiery competitor.

SPEAKER_00 48:29

You heard crazy stories.

unknown 48:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 48:32

Yeah. Yeah, I could give I could tell you a few as well. There had to be some reconstruction done in some locker rooms with Olaf. Olaf is he is a great competitor, and I have the utmost respect for him as a man. He just a great man. It's so awesome to be around other men that you look at and you just look up to them. They are just uh they are consummate professionals, they're respectful, they compete, they care, good family man. Like I just there's so many people in my life, Dinah Zubris, Chris Clark, Jeff Halpern. When I first got to the NHL, I got to be around some very good professional athletes and high-quality men that really shaped me. And just wonderful to learn from. Brendan Witt was another guy, just hard-nosed, fierce. And it's fun to I'm kind of looking for that in business now. Like in hockey, I got into the NHL as a 20-year-old kid, and there were guys on our team that had played 15 years and they had the scars. They knew the battles, they knew the trenches, and they leaned into it. Like they leaned into it, they knew all about it and they loved it. And here I was a 20-year-old kid, just like getting my feet wet trying to figure this out. And now I think about the same thing with how much I was guided then. Now I think about the same thing with business, where I've I've recently come across somebody who is 20 plus years my senior that has been across the bridge that I'm crossing right now and knows the business world this in this manner. And for anybody listening, the reason I say this is if there's anybody in your industry or your lane or your business or whatever area of life you're looking to improve that you look up to, just spend as much time with them as possible and just soak it in, shadow them, just learn from them. It is so nice to see somebody that has walked this route prior and to see the composure and the experience present in them. For example, uh two of the most powerful things I ever one was in hockey and one was in business by two people. One was in hockey, the one was Sergei Fedorov, legend, NHL player. And in business, there's another gentleman, I don't want to mention his name, but he's kind of mentored us a little bit. The most impressive thing that they've shown me was their restraint. It's not about it's not about going and doing this, it's their restraint in certain moments. Blew my mind. Because I'm a guy that I'm like you, I'm a guy, I'm gonna kick doors down, I'm gonna break in, I'm gonna enter, I'm gonna, I'm gonna create circumstance in the world. And a lot of people are extremely driven to do that. And two of these people that I wildly respect blew my mind based off of their restraint, not their action. And so, yeah, it's just what do you have any mentors? Curious for you, like whether it's in podcasts, whether it's in business, whether it's in life, personal growth, development, any of the things that you uh the areas of your life that you lean into, do you have anybody that are like real profound mentors for you?

SPEAKER_01 51:42

It's a good question. I've I've definitely dabbled with we'll say connecting or working with mentors. I haven't dove as deep as I should. And it's something that I've like been reflecting on how, like, especially when I hear someone like you talking about and the value that it adds. And I think I've done a lot just by trying to absorb listening to others instead of asking those questions directly and being more forward with it. Like, like you said, I'm gonna break down walls. I might as well break down the walls to ask the questions to get the stuff that I need instead of just bull in a China shop getting it done. But I I I think like that's definitely on my priority list is to dive deeper with those individuals and then also spread it. Like I say that I'm also very fortunate to have conversations like this on a weekly basis where I selfishly get to ask Brooksley, you know, an hour's worth of questions. We're sitting down like we're having a coffee. Like for me, you know, I've been doing this for six and a half years now. And again, it's been a you know, bit of a fast track when it comes to communication skills, being able to absorb, soak up as much as I can and selfishly talk to the people that I want to talk to at the end of the day and try and learn from them, apply what I get. I heard you use the word applied athlete growing up a ton, and I loved that term. And I think now, even like you're an applied business individual, but I I thought I would ask you like how that term came about and how you would describe that for younger athletes growing up, how they could become an applied athlete as well, and the difference between an applied athlete versus someone who is not applied, even when they get to the NHL, for instance, and how that could impact you know the longevity of your career, for instance.

The Applied Athlete Daily Filter

SPEAKER_03 53:31

Great question. To answer it very simply, this is the way I looked at my life. I made the conscious decision at the age of 13 to pursue professional sports. So at the age of 13, hockey was no longer about fun, just merely fun. Yes, it was always fun, but it was not just about fun. It was about making the NHL. That was a conscious decision. So now outgo a lot of liberties in life, outgo freedom in life. It's come home from school, work out, wake up the next day, do the same thing. And so my my answer to this question is very simple. For anybody that wants to be applied in whatever, whether it's hockey, tennis, business, acting, dentistry, teacher, whatever it is. Go out the door every single day to be better at the craft and then come back in the door better than you were that morning and do it for 30 years every day. That's it. That is the if you're to ask me, I have no other secret sauce to give you. Every day of my life, I went out the door to be a better hockey player and I came back in. There was no, I didn't go out the door to also become a better baseball player or to this or to also do this. I went out the door to be a better hockey player, and that was my only focus in that day. And every single decision I made the rest of the day applied to that. I need to rest. Do I want to go do this with my friends? Can't. I need to rest because the limit the to where I have to push myself physically tomorrow, I need this rest today. In the summer, from the age of 21, I started going to bed at 9 p.m. at the age of 19. 9 p.m. every single night because rest is a weapon. And I wanted nine plus hours of sleep. And I would wake up at 6 a.m. and I'd be in the gym at 6 45 in this my summer training. I would train from 6 45 to about 10.30. That was my first session of the day. And other hockey players would come into the gym around 10 or so. And I'd be leaving at 10:30. I'm like, you guys are so far behind me. I've already stacked a three and a half hour training session into today, and you're just starting. You're trying to catch me, I'm gone. And I would do that every day during the summer, and I'd do that year after year, decade and a half. And I just left people, not everybody, other people did it as well, but I left most in the dust because I was just applied every single day. And when I hear, I lived in LA for a period of time and I'd hear people say, I want to be an actor. I'm like, Great, did you audition today? They're like, No, I haven't auditioned a couple months. What did you do today to become better at being an actor? Nothing. I'm just waiting for my agent. I'm like, you're waiting for your agent. What are you doing? Get out the door to be a better actor, come back in the door, go anywhere and everywhere. I'd go anywhere on earth to play a hockey game. If there was competition there, I'd go play it. I didn't care if it was cold, rainy, I didn't care if I was sore, if I had broken bones, whatever. I did not care. I'd go and play because I loved it and it mattered that much to me. So to be applied, just do it every single day. And then to be applied to be best in the world, like my fiancee was, every single decision you make in the course of a day, and I mean everyone, is does this make me better or worse at my craft? And that is the only filter you have in life. It's that simple, David. And it's not about happiness. It's not about does this make me happy? It's about what is my goal? How do I get to my goal? Hopefully that goal makes you happy, but there's a lot of cost to that. And every single decision, does this make me better or worse at my craft? And in a constant curiosity about your craft. For you, like as a podcast host, who do you look up to and revere as a podcast host and

Serving The Audience And Building Community

SPEAKER_03 57:25

why?

SPEAKER_01 57:27

I listen to a couple different mind pump media. They're a San Fran Bay Area-based, largest fitness, health, wellness pod in the world. My first million, which is a business one that you may be aware of, Sean Pierre, Sam Parr. That's an excellent one. I'm a big fan of those guys. Obviously, just business in general. I'm also intrigued by what comes from it. But I again like I'm more interested in the stories that those people share that I can selfishly pull from and apply to make this show better, right? Because I ultimately want to make the best podcast in the world for athletes, up-and-coming individuals who want to be high performers. They need to have that applied mentality in whatever it is that they're pursuing. Obviously, I focus these conversations around athletics, nutrition, performance. But I also think those same lessons that we learn at five years old when we skate before school can be applied down the road to every aspect of life. It's just whether you're putting on skates or whether you're doing your tie-out properly, right? Those things matter.

SPEAKER_03 58:29

What's what's one area of your podcasting, like because for for people listening, what David does is a serious skill. You want to you want to guide the listener, you're you're wanting to guide a conversation, you're wanting to pull value. You've done your research on me, you've mentioned a lot of things that like clearly you're very well researched. So preparation, I admire and respect that. But what is like an area of being a podcast host where you're really trying to work on to improve not only your skill set, but also then the product that the listener gets to listen to?

SPEAKER_01 59:06

I would say giving them what they want too. Like I say this like selfishly. I get to ask these questions and I assume other people would want to know those things, but I am not in the minds of the tens of thousands of people who are listening, and I don't necessarily know what they want. So I want to do a better job of getting an understanding of what my community is looking for, hence why I say, hey, put up a poll. Where do you guys want to travel to? How can we make something with world playground work? Right. Like those are the areas where I want to figure out how to provide more value to those people who are spending time trusting me with their time so that I can give them back so that it gives them a reason to keep coming back week over week, month over month, year over year. And hopefully, you know, over the next five, 10 years, I will have progressed physically, mentally, emotionally, and our listeners will as well. And our guests will also be impacted not only by the conversation, but some of the potential conversations that'll come from it afterwards. Like I think it's an ever-evolving wheel. You've hosted a podcast, you know what it's like. I miss the in-person piece too. I've heard you mention that. It's like I want to be able to, you know, actually shake your hand. I want to go be able to train. I want to throw on my pads and have you try and snipe a couple on me, like when I get Pavel Barber out there, right? Like there's fun ways that in person can just not be replicated in any way, shape, or form. But I get to mix in these virtual conversations. And again, hopefully we're able to meet in person sometime next time I'm in Idaho or if you're up in Vancouver, we'll get you to a PWHL game. Make sure your daughter sees what it's like potentially playing for the Golden Eyes or any of the other teams here that Torrent. Yeah, I I mean, you are Mr. Incredible when it comes to the hockey world. Every single person who's interviewed you reviews you or like describes you as the hockey happy evangelist. And it's like, how do people like how can anyone not be appreciative of someone like you who's willing to give up your time to come on a show like this with the career, the pedigree that you have, the conversations that you're continuing to have? Like, you know, you're one of the greats in the sport because of that. And I think, you know, if people haven't told you that, I'll say thank you on behalf of them for doing what you do because it's also inspiring for others to be able to hear that twofold. Hey, I had an amazing career, but I also have failures that I didn't necessarily achieve too. And for you to be open, honest with that, I appreciate, I know the people listening to. I also just like to highlight what people are doing in this world that is good for others, right? And I think that's what the podcast has given me as a platform. I'm really appreciative of that. Like I didn't know starting it in my bedroom at 20 years old after school that it was gonna lead to some of the conversations, working out with the world's strongest man, you know, playing pickleball with the world's best pickleball. There's like stuff like that that just stacks over time and you end up in the right places at the right time. But I think, you know, like you said at one point in some of those interviews, every single day in the NHL gets better. And every single day I have having conversations with people, it gets better. My body keeps getting better because I start learning about cinnamon raisin bagels and eggs and cream cheese on top. So yeah, I mean, I'm very grateful to just be able to have conversations like this, uh, spend an hour chatting with you, Brooks. It means a lot. And I know for those listening, it means a lot too, because they're maybe 13 now applying what you've learned, and they're gonna come on the show seven years from now and say, hey, I listened to that podcast with Brooks. And this is actually the three things that I did, and now this has gotten me to where I am today. Like those kind of stories, it'll only come with time, right? That's what everyone has on our side, at least.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:48

I have I I want to share one thought and then I want to ask you a question. So I hope, I hope there's somebody that's 13 years old that's listening to this, and seven years later they come on your show. I there's nothing that would make me happier than that. For any parent that is listening to this, if you have a son or a daughter that is competing to be in the PWHL, be in the NHL, be in whatever. You might have heard me say this before if you listen to me elsewhere, but I always tell parents there was until I was 16, yeah, I was the best on my heart on the best player on my team. And then after that, I don't think I ever was again. But the one thing that I think I can look back and say, yep, I probably was that on almost every single team I played on was I was the best at getting better. And if I was ever to write a book, it would be called the best at getting better. Also said differently, be the best at improving. I think if your son or daughter gets awarded the most improved player in a year, have them do that year after year after year, and they will leave people in the dust. They will ascend the ranks. And I think that was my superpower. I loved the sport. I was applied, as we spoke about, and I looked every single day for ways to get better. And I believe in my career, the reason I was able to play that long was because I was the best on my team at getting better. And it does not matter if your son or daughter is the best on the team at the age of nine. So much is going to change in the next two years, let alone the next nine years. Just encourage them to improve at a pace that no other player is improving, and then stack years on top of each other, and they will ascend and hopefully end up achieving their goal, playing in the NHL, being an Olympian, graduating college, owning their own practice or business, whatever it may be. That would be my advice to any parent listening. And then I have a question for you. I love asking this question, so I appreciate the opportunity to ask it. I know your mission with the podcast is like educate, inspire, inform, but like unpack that. What is your mission in life? Like David Stark, the human being, as a man walking this earth, what is your mission in this life? What are you hoping to do in this life? If you can make it really concise, what would it be boiled down to?

SPEAKER_01 1:05:23

Connect and inspire with like-minded individuals and pursue out of these out of this world opportunities and try and achieve them.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:37

I love it. You need to do an in-person event.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:41

I was gonna say you need to write that book. So why don't we try and figure out both? Maybe we do an LA stop and we'll get the empty netters on or something like that. No, I I I really appreciate kind of what you've brought to the table to this conversation here. Like I said it before, but I'll say it again like you uh inspired many Brooks. And even the way you sign an autograph to young kids by telling them that the world is their playground. Like those are little things that last a lifetime. I remember going into the Canucks dressing room at like five years old. My dad got whatever access, whatever it was. And I was like shaking, handing a piece of paper to Brendan Morrison. And you know, Brendan Morrison, part of the West Coast Express, like that era. 15 years later, I'm having Brent Sopel on the podcast, who's a D-Man that was at the time. And it's like, this is a full world cycle. And you know, I'm here in this moment starting to shake, thinking about it. And it's like those are the stories, and those that's the impact that I want to have for others as they get older, as they try and achieve their dreams. If I can play even 0.001% into that, like what a cool story to be able to have, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:06:55

I feel that very similar. So mine now is my my mission used to be to win a Stanley Cup, and that was somewhat a very selfish mission. My mission now in life is to inspire people. And yours is very similar. I've boiled mine down to just simply that, to inspire people. And if our booking platform of World Playground can be a small component of the best memories of David's life, the best memories that at the end of his life, he's like, I went on this trip with my mom, or I went to Scotland with my dad, and we golfed. And that was the man, that was the best moment of if we're a small part of that, and by me, a smaller part of that, for me, that's a very fulfilling life. When I asked you the question, what is your mission in life? You said the first word out of your mouth was connect. You need to do an in-person event. There's people listening to this, there's people in your community that would love to like have a moment of your time as you would love to connect with people that you adore. And the thing that I found in like, you want to talk about hockey, David? I could talk all day about hockey because I love hockey. When you ask somebody that you revere or look up to about the thing that you love, you're following them because they love the same thing. And when somebody loves something, they'll sit and talk with you all day long about it. So you have listeners in your community that want to talk with you. You are a thought leader, you are an inspiration and a guiding light for many people in your community listening to your podcast. Give them the opportunity to sit at a table with you, to have dinner with you, to hike with you, work out with you, whatever, and let magic come in that environment. Just put yourself in the same room. So if anybody's listening to this, if they're in David's community, hit them up, say yes, put on an in-person event. Who cares if it's six people, ten people, twenty people? Just get people together, create the circumstance in the world that you want. My challenge for you would be to have something on the calendar. It doesn't have to be in 2026, but in 2026, have a scheduled in-person event for the athletes podcast, your community for people that want to come together around good conversation, fitness, health, nutrition, excitement, inspiration, adventure, whatever it may be. You know, you lead it and then you let the people in the community surround it. And then just magic comes from that. And you don't have to do everything. There's going to be so much strength and power, the quality of human being that this podcast attracts, the quality of people that are going to find it. You also need to leave space for that to do some work as well.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:27

Okay, we both got homework. You got a book to write, I got an in-person event to host, and we'll check in at the end of 2026 where we're both at. Hey, if you're gonna give me work, I'm gonna give it right back. You know, accountability is key, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:09:41

I have no desire to write this book.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:45

You you know, hey, you you the best part is you don't need to write it yourself. You could get a ghostwriter. You know how many people do that? It's still your words, it's still your stories. And I think with the amount that you've accumulated, it would be crazy for you not to because there's a heck of a lot of guys that have those same stories, insights that they never share and it they die with it. And that's why the next generation, guys like me who are trying to build, who are trying to grow, don't get those insights and they lose like that's what I see. When I see people passing away of all sports, greats, legends, that's what pains me is when I can't have a conversation with them before they leave this earth and have their wisdom, insights, knowledge shared with hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people potentially one day, right? Like those are things that they should get. And we don't in the Western culture do a good job, I feel like, really getting those and sharing those stories down. So that's part of my mission that I was thinking about there too. But you're gonna be fired up, Brooks.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:45

Dude, I think it's just so it's so wonderful when you get people together. And the thing that blew me away, like we did we did bucket list trips around the world with World Playground. I actually sent a couple of emails this morning. We're gonna take some people to Tonga to swim with humpback whales, and like you're just gonna meet wild, wonderful, amazing people that you can't even fathom if you put together this like in-person event. Just do it. Community We're gonna use world playground.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:10

We're using world playground. That'll be uh sure.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:12

Let me know where and when, and we'll facilitate it. Like, yeah, it's uh we we've got some experience at that. It's just so fun. It's you also just let the world come to you in a manner, just put yourself in a place and let the world come to you. You know, like you've created a community, people listen to this podcast and they're looking for something. And I think now, more than ever, people are looking for experiential things. They they I think the consumer is less likely to buy a material thing, and people, at least what I'm seeing, are more likely to spend on an experience. That way they get they get relationship, they get communication, they get part of something like you have a community. I always tell this to people like you're part, I'm a part of a family, I'm a part of the community that we live in, I'm a part of the Washington Capitals community, I'm part of the CrossFit community, be part of a church community. People are part of the Athletes Podcast community, and they will travel for that and they will come to be part of that community and just open it up. Yeah, put a poll out to your community. Like, where do we want to go? Here's what I have in mind. This is what it's gonna be. It's gonna be a long weekend, three days, great conversations, exciting. This is what we're gonna build towards. And then, man, once you make that, once you make that commitment, the universe just put a wind at your back, and then who knows where it can go. That's what we did with World Playground. Five years later, we're here. Business is growing. We have people from 47 different countries using our booking platform to book their travel. And it's like, wow, look at this. It's just it's the power of the collective, just give them the opportunity to participate.

Choose Your Struggle And Closing

SPEAKER_01 1:12:51

Kudos to you for doing it, Brooks. I can't thank you enough for coming on the pod. The way we wrap up every episode is we ask our guests their biggest piece of advice. You've given an hour and 11 minutes of pure gold here, but if there's anything else, I want to give you space to share it now.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:08

Great question. So I would generally say when asked this question, my biggest piece of advice would be be the best at getting better. My other piece of advice would be create the circumstance that you want to see in the world. Oh, I'm trying to think of anything else that I could leave people with that would re that they could really take and impact them. Maybe this. I think the greatest success, I've been asked this before, what's the greatest success in my life? And the way I have answered it is not with a single achievement, but the fact that I've followed my gut and my instinct my entire life. My entire life. Everything good that has come in my life has been from following my gut and my instinct and the conviction to stick with it even when it doesn't feel like it's possible. You know, when I was 13 growing up in a small town, I didn't know how I was going to make the NHL, but I knew I wanted it and I knew I could, and I just had to have the conviction to stay applied long enough and I would be there. Same thing with my relationship. I went through a separation previously in my life that threw my life in a totally different direction, and then a wonderful lady found me, and I'm happier than I ever have been, and I have a daughter that is just the light of my life now. So I don't know how I would wrap that up other than just life. Is so amazing. It's so amazing. And be grateful for all of it, and then choose your struggle. This would be the last thing I'd say. Choose your struggle. Don't build an easy life. Choose struggle, but choose the struggle that you want. Like I want to pursue to be the best travel booking platform in the entire world. I wanted to be the best hockey team in the entire world. And maybe I achieve it, maybe I don't. But damn, is it fun along the way? And there's no life that doesn't come with struggle, but you can choose that struggle and then you lean into it. And who says you can't work hard and have fun the entire way? And I always say this, this is maybe the last thing I'll say. Oh, sorry, a long answer there, David, but this is maybe the last thing I'll say. I say it to my fiance all the time. I'm like, what is life if not fun? And we work hard, but man, do we have fun too? And my life has never been in a better place. And I get to have conversations like this with gentlemen like you, and I am just grateful for the last hour and 15 minutes we've spent together. And I look forward to what you're going to do in the world.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:48

And I look forward to reading your book. Brooks, thank you so much. This has been fun. It's a blast, sincerely. But I'm going to hold you to it too. It goes both ways. I really appreciate your time sincerely. You said struggle. I want to wrap up this pod. Do you think Matt Bradley can hit a backhand pass still with that struggle or what?

SPEAKER_03 1:16:04

Matt Bradley, you asked me before Matt Bradley is one of the greatest single teammates I ever had in my entire life. And probably a lot of your listeners, they would know Alex Lovechkin, CD Crosby. They might not know Matt Bradley. He was every single one of our yes, 23 guys. There's 23 guys on the team. Yes, the other 22 guys who their favorite teammate is, they'd say Matt Bradley. 22 out of 22 would say Matt Bradley. One of the best human beings. Great man, great family man. Brads, if you ever listen to this, I love you, man. He's just he's a I sat beside him for years. Respect, admiration, funniest guy. Terrific. If you know, if you know Brads and you see him next, just give him a big hug. He's a great human being.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:40

I had to give him his flowers. The other question craziest goalie you played against or with, other than Kolzik, I guess. Craziest?

SPEAKER_02 1:16:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:50

Goalies are crazy. You guys are crazy. Like you guys, man. Also, you play the hardest sport in the world or the hardest position in the world. Like when I go in net, some dude, sometimes I would go in net, even just in practice or a scrimmage, and I couldn't stop a friggin' thing. Couldn't stop a puck. And I'm like, I should be a 50 goal scorer. I should score on every shot I take. But the goalies, man, you guys are so good. I'm trying to, I'm blanking on his name, but I played with a goalie. Max was his first name. What was his last name? I played with him in the miners. He didn't say a word. He didn't speak. He took his pads on the back of the bus. He like relaced them every day. He just had these these mannerisms and these. I'm like, you are not sane. You are not sane. But you guys are all a little crazy to stand in front of six ounces of frozen rubber that's coming at you 100 miles an hour and your job is to get in the way of it. You guys are crazy.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:43

Yeah, yeah, no doubt. I'm crazy. I'm crazy in definitely more than one ways. But hey, like you said, if life isn't fun, then what the heck are we doing on this earth, right? Any guests you'd recommend for the pod before I let you go here, Brooks?

SPEAKER_03 1:17:58

Oh, yeah. My fiance, my fiance's a I could listen to. Oh, yeah, that's a good one.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:03

Decent two-time fittest world woman. No big deal.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:07

Yeah, just uh like Bruce, you had Bruce on. Bruce Boudreaux was one of the biggest impacts in my life. My life would never be even close to what it was without Bruce Boudreaux. He was incredible. I played with Brendan Morrison. You mentioned that name. I played with B Mo. Uh he was a great human being.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:22

So come up and let's sturgeon fish with him, actually. That's what we're gonna do. That's what we're gonna do. Because I've been working on how to get him on. I that's what we're gonna do. Just want to say thank you for tuning in to the 286th episode of the Athletes Podcast today. Shout out to our sponsors, Perfect Sports Supplements, Birdie Juice, Fairway Co., Titanium Ford. You folks are amazing for tuning in. We'll see you next week for another new episode. Hope you have a great rest of your day. Bye.