Today we’d like to introduce you to Josh Graber.
Josh, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
Dynamic Sports Training (DST) was founded in September 2008 by Lee Fiocchi (now the Head Strength & Conditioning Coach for the Los Angeles Angels of the MLB). Lee started DST with just one personal training client who he trained at a public park. Through a series of persistent phone calls and e-mails, Lee got connected to long-time Houston baseball icon, Ron Mathis (then-head coach of Houston Christian High School). Over time, Lee went from part-time strength coach of HCHS’s baseball team to full-time strength coach of their entire athletics department.
DST got its first professional client later in 2008 when Lee got connected with Tampa Bay Rays All-Star, Carl Crawford. Crawford played the ’08 season battling nagging injuries and was looking for a better way to prepare for the off-season. Fiocchi and Crawford made a great team that off-season and beyond as Crawford was invited to back-to-back All-Star games in the 2009 and 2010 seasons. That strong start was the beginning of a steady growth for DST. The team grew from one to three to six to now eleven employees. Over the course of the past 9+ years, we’ve been blessed to work with Olympians, NFL, NBA and MLB athletes; High School and College All-Americans; Lee served four years as the Head Strength Coach for the University of Houston’s baseball program – notably the second-best four-year span of the program’s history – and has just finished his first full season with the Los Angeles Angels.
DST is bigger than Fiocchi, though, he’ll tell you. Kevin Poppe (now part-owner) began his journey with DST in 2009 as a collegiate athlete who trained under Fiocchi before his final college baseball season. After graduation, Poppe turned down offers to play professional baseball to start his apprenticeship as a Sports Performance Coach. In the years following, Fiocchi and Poppe continued to build the team and transform DST into what it is today.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
With any small business, there are a lot of bumps along the way. There’s a learning curve and you start to realize there’s so much more to running a company than just the service you offer or the product you sell. The biggest two obstacles that come to mind have been:
A) Opening our second location — taking our lead trainer, Kevin Poppe and having him start a new location created a ripple effect in which everyone was forced to step up in many facets.
B) This past off-season, our owner, Lee Fiocchi, was offered and accepted the Head Strength & Conditioning job for the LA Angels of the MLB. With his transition, that once again forced the entire staff to step up – from Poppe and myself to the rest of our coaches, staff and even interns.
Dynamic Sports Training – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
DST is an athletic development and sports performance company. We work with athletes of all ages and all sports to help them achieve their goals.
Our vision is to challenge and maximize every athlete’s genetic potential in their sport(s) and to do this with integrity.
I tell people to think of us as a regular gym — except most of our clients are athletes (several of which are elite at their level) and instead of having average personal trainers, we have some of the smartest, most driven, and hardest working strength coaches in the industry.
What sets us apart from others is our assessment process. We firmly believe that no two athletes are the same. Because of this, we believe no two athletes should have the same training program. So, we create 100% customized training programs for each and every athlete we work with based on their assessment. There are a few main parts of our assessment.
1) Athlete Goals – During our assessment process, we have our athletes put pen to paper to tell us what their goals are — both in their sport and what they want to accomplish athletically by working with us. 2) Nutrition Evaluation – Most people know that they “need to eat healthy”, but they don’t have an action plan in place. We’re able to provide them with a plan after we get them to do a self-evaluation of their current nutritional habits and after performing a body composition reading on them (muscle mass, body fat %, etc.) 3) Bio-mechanical Assessment – This is just a fancy way of saying we’re looking how the athlete’s body moves. We look at joint mobility and stability, balance in the body, flexibility, range of motion and much more. We’re evaluating these things to identify any deficiencies or red flags — things that could either lead to injury down the road if left unaddressed. or simply things that are keeping the athlete from being the best they can possibly be. 4) Long-Term Athletic Development – This is a well-established model that highlights important developmental stages for athletes.
In recent years, we’ve been more well known for our baseball off-season training. We’ve been blessed to work with four current Houston Astros as well as over 40 other MLB and MiLB athletes the past two off-seasons. While we’re known for pro baseball, we also train over 200 high school/youth athletes annually both during the school year and through our summer camps (think SAQ camp but more specific for athletes for their age/sport).
The last thing I’d say sets us apart is the people we work with. Our staff has become like a family as we’ve grown. Other than work, we do things together and genuinely want the best for each other and the greater good of the company. It’s a fun environment to work in and an even better one for athletes to train in.
What is “success” or “successful” for you?
I believe success is closely tied with contentment and peace. You can – and should – set goals, but the reality is you won’t be able to attain them all. Success can’t simply be measured by meeting your goals, because then you may be setting the bar too low for yourself. Success is looking back and knowing you gave it your best shot.
For DST, success is tied directly to our relationships with our athletes. It’s no secret that the majority of the youth athletes we train won’t play their sport professionally – even though that’s the end goal for almost all of them. So we can’t get caught up in all of that. We’ve had success with one of our athletes if we can have a positive impact on their life. It’s not uncommon to hear someone here say, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care” — we want our athletes to know we care about them and have their absolute best interest in mind. Anything we can do to better their lives is a marked success.
Pricing:
- Youth/High School Training — packages starting at $200/month
- Full Assessment — $199
Contact Info:
- Address: DST West (at Houston Christian High School)
2700 W. Sam Houston Pkwy N. Houston, Texas77043 DST North (at Premier Baseball of Texas)20230 Cypress Rosehill Road
Tomball, Texas 77377 - Website: www.dynamicsportstraining.com
- Phone: (713) 899-2114
- Email: josh@dynamicsportstraining.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/dst_houston/
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/DynamicSportsTraining/
- Twitter: www.twitter.com/dst_houston/
Image Credit:
Rachel Owens, Josh Graber
Getting in touch: VoyageHouston is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
