There’s a picture on the wall of the bathroom at Xceleration Sports Training titled “Teamwork,” with the caption, “There is no such thing as a self made man. You will reach your goals only with the help of others.” While I don’t think this really applies to bathroom activities, it’s 100 percent accurate when it comes to my journey as a strength and conditioning coach.

The state of the fitness industry makes it extremely difficult for up-and-coming coaches to distinguish themselves. There are a lot of lousy coaches out there, so it’s hard to rise above the scammers and weekend-certification warriors. But there are also a TON of amazing coaches who are so smart, so creative and so passionate that it’s downright intimidating to think that someday making a living may depend on clients and athletes choosing YOU over THEM.

That doesn’t make it easy for people like me. Not that it’s easy for anyone, but I’ve got a journalism degree. Yup. Journalism. But in 2008 when I decided that being a strength coach was my true calling, I was too far invested in my liberal arts education and too connected to my college baseball teammates to pack up and transfer (again) to a school with an exercise science program. So from that point on, I made it my mission to fight this uphill battle (an occupational hill sprint, if you will) and absorb as much information about strength and conditioning as humanly possible.

I wasn’t completely unarmed. I loved to write. I was a good public speaker. I had a knack for coaching and technical instruction. And I was not afraid.

Four short years later, I’m a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist through the National Strength and Conditioning Association. I’m two semesters away from earning a Master’s degree in exercise science, and I’m nearly a year into an amazing internship at one of Long Island’s finest training facilities. I’ve met and trained with some of the biggest names in the business. But I’m not done yet. There’s a lot of work to be done to carve out an identity in a field where original ideas are few and far between.

The fitness industry is also a savage, cutthroat place where ideas are often snagged, repackaged and sold without giving due credit. I’m still an infant in the strength and conditioning world and I see this on a daily basis. So what’s the point of this blog post? Consider it my “works cited” of my career so far, giving credit to the sharp minds that have shaped my approach to coaching and training.

In order to be counted among the best, you have to learn from the best. I’ve had a (kind of) long and backwards journey to get to the point where I can even call myself a strength and conditioning coach without it being a white lie, and I would not be half the coach I am today without the influence and guidance of some awesome individuals. Remember Rule #64: No man is an island.

So here’s a list of five people who I consider my biggest influences as a coach and have my never-ending thanks for educating and supporting me. If you’re serious about fitness and strength training, make their books/websites/blogs part of your regular reading material.

1. Jason Ferruggia

If I could be one strength coach, it would be Jason. He is the Metallica of the fitness industry – a rapid rise to fame with ups and downs, legions of followers and haters alike, but even as his views and methods change, he’s still on top of the world and there’s no denying his influence and legacy in the iron game. He’s still the biggest badass around and gets RESULTS with simple, heavy strength training.

I distinctly remember sitting at the computer at my workstudy job in college, surfing the internet thinking about how dumb everyone is on the Bodybuilding.com forums. Then I stumbled upon Jason’s website. Everything made so much sense. Lift heavy, sprint hard and eat like nature intended. In a world where message boards lead to nothing but paralysis-by-analysis, Jason spoke to me with his no-bullshit approach.

Fitness trends come and go (fingers crossed that CrossFit, BOSU balls and Vibram Fivefingers knockoffs all go. Yoga pants can stay.), but the true essence of strength training is not lost on Jason like it is on so many other coaches. Get big and strong with compound barbell lifts, master your own body weight, sprint like the wind and you WILL be a better athlete.

I had the pleasure of meeting Jason at one of his Renegade workshops this year and it was a life changing weekend. Learning and training alongside Jason and the rest of his staff was an experience I’ll never forget. His approach to training, nutrition, mobility, recovery and just getting after it with a group of good training partners will forever leave an impact on me.

2. Eric Cressey

I love baseball and I love Eric Cressey. You can’t talk about strength and conditioning for baseball and not talk about Eric. He has completely dominated the niche of training baseball players and is a true master of his craft. When I grow up, I want to train athletes the way he does – with an effortless blend of brains and brawn. Of nerdy and nerve. Of science and sweat. Of academia and anarchy. And, of course, pissing excellence.

Trying to process all the training information Eric puts out for free on his website is a little intimidating, so I knew I had to meet the man in person. Earlier this summer I headed to Massachusetts to meet Eric and observe at his facility, Cressey Performance. Talk about a game changer. Not only did I learn more in three hours than I had in the previous 24 years of my life, I learned that I knew a lot more than I thought.

I knew the gist of the CP way from reading so much of Eric’s work online, but it wasn’t until I got there that I truly understood why CP pumps out over a dozen MLB draft picks a year. At CP, quality of movement is EVERYTHING. They are huge sticklers for technique, but not to the point where it’s obnoxious. Why? Because they teach it right and effectively the first time. This was a huge eye-opener for me that I had lots of room to improve upon my initial exercise instruction and cut down on my leniency toward sloppy form.

Talking to Eric and his kick-ass staff of coaches and interns affirmed that I was on the right track. It reinforced a lot of what I was doing in terms of programming, exercise selection and warm up routines, and made me realize that I had a decent instinct for coaching. But it also gave me a million ideas and self criticisms. How good are my coaching cues? How good is my eye for subtle changes in body alignment that could be injurious or sub-optimal? How good is my knowledge of anatomy and biomechanics beyond the 101 level?

Not as good as the dudes at CP, that’s for sure. But that’s OK. Just three hours with them helped me step up my coaching game considerably. I was able to bring new knowledge and confidence to the baseball and lacrosse players that I work with every day at XST. And that’s what makes Eric a great coach. Everyone he comes in contact with (other coaches included) get better.

3. Joe DeFranco

When I stumbled across the world of powerlifting, I thought I had it all figured out. I was gonna strap on my Chuck Taylors, box squat wider than the Grand Canyon and hit max effort board presses until I could hit a baseball 500 feet.

It didn’t work (big surprise). But I came across someone who took everything I loved about powerlifting and made it work for athletes. Reading Joe DeFranco’s series on Westside for the Skinny Bastards got me out of a serious training rut. It taught me about the usefulness of the conjugate method without the constant CNS-sapping max effort training. It taught me the importance of developing the posterior chain. And most importantly, it taught me that “sport specific” training (as ugly as that phrase is) doesn’t have to be wimpy.

Interestingly, DeFranco is the only guy on this list who I’ve never met. That speaks to the quality of his writing and his really motivational YouTube videos.

DeFranco’s training philosophy has adapted a lot over the past few years, and I really admire that. It hasn’t so much changed as it has evolved and perfected. Vomit-inducing prowler suicides have given way to tempo work and I’ve seen more jumps and med ball throws lately than the traditional dynamic effort barbell stuff. But that’s because Joe is a pro. And he knows what it takes to make pro athletes. His client list speaks for itself. Much like Ferruggia, DeFranco has created a near perfect balance of traditional strength training, intuitive power training and mobility work, all in an incredibly competitive atmosphere.

4. Fred DiMenna

Hardcore bodybuilding enthusiasts will recognize the name Fred DiMenna as the World Natural Bodybuilding Federation pro who dominated natural stages across the world in the late 90s. I recognize Fred as one of the smartest guys to ever get under a barbell.

That’s an important statement. There are a lot of smart people who get smart from books (notice I didn’t say the internet). But there’s a lot to be learned from a lifetime of training your ass off and dedicating yourself to a sport where science doesn’t always have the answer.

Fred is one of my professors in the Master’s program at Adelphi University. Along with building a gargantuan physique (with arguably the most pronounced sartorius pose of all time), Fred got a PhD in oxygen uptake kinematics from the University of Exeter in England. He’s published dozens of articles in national journals and is making some really interesting discoveries about occlusion training in his current research. He knows a thing or two about how the body works.

He also doesn’t give strength training dogma a second thought. It either works or doesn’t. He lets hard evidence be his guide. When I first asked him what the best chest exercise was, he said incline cable flyes – not even dumbbell flyes, but cable flyes. I had to hold back a laugh. But when he explained the pennation of the pec muscles and their line of pull, and got on about moment arms and some basic physics, it made complete sense why dumbbell flyes suck for isolating the chest. For someone who’s so smart and so academically decorated, his thinking is so damn logical that it makes you realize how much people over think weight training.

Taking courses with Fred in kinesiology and neurological aspects of strength training gave me some really in depth, nitty-gritty knowledge of the human body that I could apply directly to coaching. That can’t be said for 99 percent of all college courses.

5. John Furia/Steve Wilk/Steve Nickel of Xceleration Sports Training

I cheated a bit on this last one and grouped the whole full-time staff at XST into one. It’s impossible to separate them because they’ve all had such a dramatic impact on me as a coach in the short time that I’ve worked with them.

John is the heart and soul of Long Island’s best strength and conditioning facility. As founder and owner, John turned a tiny bare bones industrial space into the one of the biggest, best-equipped and best-staffed facilities on the Island. After spending years grinding through jobs as a personal trainer and collegiate strength coach, John learned under some of the best minds in the industry, including Charles Poliquin and Mike Boyle. He’s taught me more about program design, communication, determination, and most importantly, loyalty, than anyone I’ve ever met.

He also took a huge risk on me. I applied for an internship at XST shortly after getting my CSCS in September 2011. I didn’t have much to go on, other than a carefully crafted cover letter. But John called me in for an interview and hired me on the spot after an hour of chatting about strength training. He noted my passion and firmly stamped it in my head that that’s what it takes to make it in this world – not degrees or certifications or a fancy marketing scheme. He gave me my first gig as a real coach and trusted me with his athletes, which is one of the greatest compliments one coach can give to another.

Steve and Steve, the full time coaches as XST, gave me guidance in the trenches, which I needed terribly when tossed into the mix. I followed them around like a puppy dog with a notebook for weeks, jotting down every tidbit they threw my way. The training floor can be a crazy place, and whenever I felt lost, they were there. Whether it was spotting a technique flaw, subbing an exercise for one that wasn’t working or just learning how to clean up my coaching cues, Steve and Steve never let me down when I needed help. And watching them build trust and confidence with our athletes has been downright inspiring.

So there you have it. Five-plus people who have made me the coach I am today. I am thankful every day that these people came into my life in one way or another.

We all have people who have helped us become who we are. Make sure you thank those people every time you get the chance.

Who inspires you? As a coach, an athlete, a lifter, a person?