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SMARTER Team Training Podcast

SMARTER Team Training Podcast

Written by: Coach Taylor | SMARTER Team Training
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The SMARTER Team Training Podcast is where athletes, coaches, and parents come together to learn, grow, and build a better approach to training, competition, and long-term athlete development.

Hosted by Robert Taylor, Jr. (aka Coach Taylor) of SMARTER Team Training, the podcast turns real-world coaching experience, practical training strategies, and current sports science into information you can understand and immediately put into action.

Great sports performance requires more than talent. It takes preparation, consistency, confidence, communication, and people working together toward a common goal. That’s why SMARTER Team Training looks beyond the scoreboard to develop the complete athlete.

Episodes explore strength and conditioning, coaching, youth sports, leadership, team culture, nutrition, recovery, injury prevention, mindset, communication, athleticism, skill development, Game IQ, and the everyday habits that help athletes maximize their potential.

For athletes, we’ll break down what you can control, how to take ownership of your development, how to train with purpose, and how to become the teammate and competitor others can count on.

For coaches, we’ll explore better ways to teach, communicate, develop athletes, build meaningful relationships, create effective training environments, establish standards, and develop a championship-level team culture that reaches far beyond wins and losses.

For parents, we’ll provide practical education to better understand training, competition, nutrition, recovery, injury prevention, expectations, communication, and the important role families play throughout the youth sports experience.

We’ll also take sports-performance research out of the laboratory and bring it into the real world. Episodes will examine current findings and explain what the research may—and may not—mean for athletes, coaches, parents, and performance professionals.

And because SMARTER Team Training has deep roots in a wide range of sports from lacrosse, soccer, basketball, field hockey, volleyball, football, swimming, and more, you’ll find dedicated education covering skill development, athleticism, tactical decision-making, Game IQ, leadership, communication, preparation, and what it takes to become a more complete player.

Whether you’re an athlete chasing your next level, a coach committed to developing people as well as players, or a parent trying to provide better support from the sidelines, there’s a place for you here.

This isn’t about finding shortcuts. It’s about asking better questions, making better decisions, creating better habits, and understanding that development is a process.

Train with purpose. Compete with confidence. Lead by example. Support the team.

Welcome to the SMARTER Team Training Podcast.

Inspire Greatness!

© 2026 SMARTER Team Training. All content and materials protected. All rights reserved.
Episodes
  • Built To Win
    Oct 20 2026

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    Athleticism is the engine that allows a lacrosse player to move faster, react sooner, compete longer, and make a greater impact throughout the game.

    In this episode of the SMARTER Team Training Podcast, Coach Taylor breaks down the five pillars of athleticism: speed, strength, power, agility, and endurance. Athletes will learn how each quality supports separation, balance, physical confidence, explosive movement, change of direction, and sustained performance.

    The episode also explores purposeful approaches to speed development, age-appropriate strength training, plyometrics, conditioning, mobility, and recovery. Athletes will discover why proper warm-ups, sound technique, consistent training habits, sleep, nutrition, and recovery matter just as much as effort.

    Coaches will learn why movement quality should come before training quantity and how clear standards can develop accountable competitors. Parents will hear how positive support, healthy routines, and patience can help young athletes progress safely and consistently.

    Athleticism is earned through focused work—not rushed by shortcuts. Build the body, sharpen the movement, recover with purpose, and translate preparation into confident performance on game day.

    Stronger body. Faster feet. Better player. Built to win.

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    15 mins
  • Why Focusing on Winning Can Get in the Way of Winning
    Oct 18 2026

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    The Process: Why Focusing on Winning Can Get in the Way of Winning. A practical, research-informed conversation for athletes, coaches, and parents about turning high expectations into repeatable behaviors. Includes a seven-day STT challenge and topic-specific training invitation.

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    10 mins
  • The Next Play Huddle
    Oct 16 2026

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    What happens in the few seconds after a mistake can reveal—and reshape—a team's culture. In this coach's clinic, Coach Taylor introduces RESET: recognize what happened, exhale, say one useful cue, engage a teammate, and take the next action. The routine is a practical coaching synthesis grounded in research on psychological safety, sport cohesion, coach-athlete relationships, resilience, and motor learning. The episode shows how coaches can correct without humiliating, how teammates and benches can restore useful information, how parents can protect the ride home, and how consent-aware acknowledgment can include a nod, stick tap, air high five, eye contact, or specific words. RESET is not a guarantee of confidence or wins. It is a repeatable way to keep standards high, connection intact, and attention on the next controllable task.

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    17 mins
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