Curious Cows

In this episode of the Curious Cows podcast I talk to Simon Wheatley, an independent coach education and player development consultant who works worldwide delivering to clubs, county and regional associations, governing bodies and conferences. He also runs a very successful on-line coach development programme with a huge variety of courses and mentoring opportunities. Simon is also an author, with his latest book 'The Sweet Spot - Unleashing potential in tennis coaches, players and parents' b...

Meet Matt Rogan, author of the just published book 'All to Play For - How Sport can reboot our future' and founder and former Executive Chairman of 'Two Circles' (Data Driven Sports Marketing Agency) which was voted one of The Sunday Times Best Companies to Work For, and twice UK Sports Agency of the Year. Matt now spends the majority of his time focused on Board advisory work, principally through Non-Executive Director commitments including the English Institute of Sport - which provid...

Matt Brown - the story of an international standard junior tennis player who shared the court and tour with the likes of Andy Murray and Rafa Nadal, but didn't make it....on the tennis court at least. After a career ending injury whilst at Baylor University, Matt used his academic education and experience from sport to forge a hugely successful career on Wall Street with Goldman Sachs in New York City. Hear his inspiring story in this episode of the Curious Cows podcast.

A number of listeners to this podcast have asked, 'why Curious Cows?', so I thought I'd take the opportunity to tell the story of the 'Curious Cow' as a metaphor for the simple premise that we have a choice in life between being fenced in all our lives by herd wisdom or challenging it and its associated limits and barriers. And that's the main thread of this podcast - talking to people who are approaching life with a 'curious cow' attitude, who are walking to the beat of a different dru...

Meet Ian Cast - Dressage coach, confidante, best friend, and mentor to Olympic gold medalist Charlotte Dujardin. Hear his story from taking Charlotte on as a teenager and their journey together through to Gold at the London Olympics in 2012, Rio in 2016 and hopefully on to Tokyo this summer. Ian has some superb insights into coaching at both a recreational and high performance level, and his passion for his trade and sport shine through.Timeline:2.26 Learning about Dr...

Mike James in conversation with Jemima King.Jemima King is the County Performance Officer for Buckinghamshire Junior Tennis. She is an inspirational coach and role model for girls in sport whilst also being a huge advocate for the female coaching journey. As a player she played U.S College Tennis at Boise State, becoming their most decorated ever doubles player, but also was instrumental in leading Bucks Ladies to their first ever Division 1 'County Week' title. Listen to how ...

Mike James in conversation with Scott Allaway.Scott is a former member of the TeamGB Bobsleigh Team and went on to become its Commercial Director between 2010 and 2014. His work in this role took the team to the Winter Olympics in Sochi where their 4 man crew finished 5th - later upgraded to an Olympic Bronze Medal after the Russian doping scandal which disqualified the two Russian sleds which finished ahead of GB.Throughout this time Scott has, and continues to be, a very successful bu...

Mike James in conversation with John Walker and Nick Leighton about Halton Tennis Centre, then and now, with an emphasis on the last twenty years - the first Curious Cows Podcast.Highlights: 2m03s: Nick recounts a brief history of what went on at Halton through the twentieth century. 9:27 John remembers joining Halton and how he was encouraged to become involved. 13:22 Nick discusses the last 20 years in numbers - finance and people. 23:34 T...