Book Description

In Talking to the Team: Inspired Track and Field Coaching, Coach Del Hessel reaches into his personal archives and memories over a long storied career as an athlete and a coach, and has documented a wonderful telling of instances where a coach's conversation with an athlete(s) has resulted in opening the door to additional insight, communication and in many cases, an athlete's breakthrough. Coach Hessel is hoping that this book will fuel in many coaches a desire to learn from those who have gone before them; Hessel he does so in a way that leaves the reader with a really keen understanding of the unbelievable backstories of some very memorable events who were completely or in part shaped by a coach 'talking to the team'. Hessel calls on a rich supporting cast of additional coaches and athletes, to share additional insights on observations, on what works, on what does not, where coaches can offer assistance, how parents can best support their athletes, things coaches can do to enrich the athlete experience and more! As an athlete, Coach Hessel was ranked as one of the top ten 800-meter runners. He competed in the NCAA championships, the USA championships, and in the U.S. Olympic trials. He received the "Nye" award as the most Outstanding Athlete at Colorado State his senior year and later was voted into the Colorado State "Hall of Fame". Coach Hessel coached in the high school ranks for five years before starting a remarkable college coaching career. Coach Hessel has an outstanding grasp of all of the track and field events, and Hessel-coached programs produced over ninety NCAA All-Americans in a wide variety of events. It is his philosophy that the head coach should be able to coach all of the track and field events with accuracy and energy. He has spoken at coaches' clinics in nearly every state in the union covering nearly all events. Coach Hessel coached track and field in the Division 1 ranks for nearly 40 years in three different conferences and been voted "Conference Coach of the Year" sixteen times. Besides his head coaching duties, Hessel served as president of the Coaches Cross-Country Association, was the head coach for the US Olympic Sports Festival southern team held at the Air Force Academy, served on the Olympic development staff for the middle distance events for 10 years, was on the World Cup staff and the USA vs Great Britain staff and has given numerous lectures on training at the US Olympic training center in California. While at CSU he was the first coach in the conference to break BYU's long-time stranglehold on the conference title for both men and women. In 2024, Coach Hessel was inducted into the Colorado Running Hall of Fame. Hessel has written six books. The other five are: Striving for Perfection in Middle Distance Running, The Motivated Coach, The Spirit of a Champion, Instincts in Coaching Track and Field, and Coaching Every Event in Track & Field.