Episode 3 of our College Salute breaks down the triple header in the SEC which featured two nail biter down to the last routine finales. We also got some background stories on a few of our alums during the broadcasts including a unbreakable bond between a Gator and a Tiger. Lots of of talk on our Region 5 alums in week 3 and our Alum Athlete of the Week conversation with Illini junior Karen Howell. 

In this episode of the College Salute Podcast we look at week 2 in the NCAA for 2019. This week featured a "Tiger" takeover with 3 teams all having the Tiger as their mascot with one surprisingly taking down the higher ranked opponent. We highlight some of the meets around the country with our region 5 alums, spotlight 2 of our Division 3 alums and breakdown the NCAA qualifying procedures. Our Alumni of the week conversation is with Western Michigan Senior Rachel Underwood after their win against NIU in week 2. 

In our first episode of our College Salute podcast we review the first weekend of the 2019 college season and highlight some the top performances from around the country and from our Region 5 Alums. We also talked to Michigan seniors Olivia Karas and Emma Mclean as well as SEMO freshman Anna Kaziska and got their reactions to their individual and team performances in the opening weekend. 

Our guest today is a Region 5 Alum who has done it all when it comes to gymnastics. From struggling with fears as a young athlete to competing with one good foot at the Olympic games, Samantha Peszek had a successful gymnastics career while learning life lessons that have continue to impact her after the sport. We take a journey through her career as she shares insights and stories along the way. 

Is your head preventing you from achieving your goals in competition? In this episode we are talking everything you need to be Mental Tough. Mental toughness is the key to success and as with skills in gymnastics you need to develop the skills to create a tough mind. Joining us today is the owner of Head Games, creating an unshakable mind through mental toughness training, Dr. Alison Arnold, Doc Ali as she is known, gives us some great tools to use to get yourself mentally tough.

Houry was a scholarship athlete at the University of Iowa between 2008-2011 and won a Big Ten Beam Title. She has a great story on how she began to compete for Armenia at the world championships and ultimately becoming the first armenian gymnast to compete at the Olympic games. She has now moved onto coaching both club and future armenian gymnasts along with helping aspiring collegiate gymnasts with the recruiting process. She has done it all and is on our show today to give us her story of drive and determination to achieve her dreams. We welcome back Houry Gebeshian to the show.

In this episode we look at one of the most important aspects of sport performance and participation.... Motivation. We talk about strategies to help set up a culture in your gym to drive and sustain motivation through the training year. There are many different motivational strategies and each athlete is motivated differently. We discuss many different ways to enhance motivation and make the daily grind of training and competition fun. Creating a culture of excellence in your gym and develop a plan for keeping the energy and excitement toward your goals both individual and team helps to keep motivation high. 

In this episode we break down the art of Periodization in order to prepare a season plan to peak at the right moments of the season. This can be a very scientific process but as we discuss on this show, you can make it a much simpler process that still addresses your needs for all aspects of the gymnasts training during the year. Enrique Trabanino owner of Perfection Gymnastics joins us to give his years of knowledge and success with this type of planning and preparation. 

On this episode we are talking college recruiting, how to start, what’s important during the process, what do you say to coaches and how to approach it all. Full out Recruiting joins us to break it all down. 

It's about that time again for the JO competition season to begin and on this episode we break down all the new event requirement/compositional changes for the 2019 season. We talk about each change and give some examples of what could be done to meet that requirement. We also look back on the 2018 USA Championships and how Region 5 did along with our highlights of the competition. This year in USA Gymnastics hasn't been tough to say the least and we discuss the current situation and give our thoughts on safe sport and a new president.