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Athletes will spend hours chasing improvement, overlooking the one thing that sets the great apart: mindset. Still living his dream as a professional quarterback, Nathan Rourke knows this story firsthand and shares it with us this week on Forged Youth Podcast.

Nathan opens up about his journey from Canadian high school football to NFL hopes, and then to CFL stardom. He shares how he learned to break down his goals into actionable steps, like acting as the athlete he wanted to become before he was there, and how this mindset built the grit that fuels him today. If you’re ready to elevate your confidence, embrace adversity as an advantage, and see performance as a reflection of your mindset, this episode is your playbook for life.

You’ll discover:

• How to reverse-engineering your goals to build discipline
• Why confidence is a byproduct of action, not a feeling to chase
• How routine and preparation create consistency and trust in your abilities
• The importance of separating your identity from your results
• Practical tools for emotional regulation that shift performance in seconds

Nathan reminds us that sport is a laboratory for leadership, resilience, and character... which a foundation for forging your ultimate legacy.

Perfect for young athletes, parents eager to support without pressure, and coaches shaping future leaders, this episode will leave you inspired to think bigger about your potential and more grounded in the core habits that turn dreams into reality.

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What if the thing holding your athlete back is what they're eating, how they're sleeping, and who they're spending time with?

In this episode, Mariel sits down with Coach Elliot Allen, sports performance coach, former college football player, and founder of Eight Six Speed & Athletics, for a conversation packed with practical, no-fluff tools for teen athletes and the parents who support them.

Elliot knows what it's like to have natural talent and still come up short. And he's spent years building the system he wishes he'd had at 16: simplified nutrition, smart training, solid recovery habits, and the mindset to stay consistent when it gets hard. In this episode, he breaks all of it down in a way that actually makes sense for families.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why nutrition is the most undervalued piece of the performance puzzle and what "fueling for a purpose, not for pleasure" actually looks like day-to-day
• How to track your food the same way you track your training (and why it's the most boring, most important habit you can build)
• The truth about hydration: why electrolytes alone won't save you, how much water your muscles actually need, and what happens when you overdo it
• Why sleep is when you actually get stronger and the specific habits (phones, TVs, bedtimes) that are wrecking your recovery
• How your environment and your circle shape your results more than almost anything else, and what to do if you're in a small town with no high-achieving athletes nearby
• The self-talk shift that took Elliot from wanting to quit his freshman year to finishing out and coming back stronger
• The "5-minute rule" for processing hard moments without getting stuck in them

This one is as much for parents as it is for athletes. Practical, honest, and full of real talk from someone who learned most of this the hard way.

About Coach Elliot Allen:

Elliot Allen is a sports performance coach and founder of Eight Six Speed & Athletics, where he mentors teen athletes and their parents on speed, strength, nutrition, and mindset so they can set themselves up with the best chance to play at the next level.

A former college football player, Elliot learned the hard way that talent alone isn't enough — and that experience drives how he coaches today. He helps athletes build the structure and discipline he wishes he'd found at a younger age, combining simplified speed work, progressive strength training, and athlete-focused nutrition to produce measurable performance results.

As a father and coach, Elliot leads by example and stays committed to helping young athletes build the habits that separate them from the rest.

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What does it actually take to perform at your best without burning out, breaking down, or trying to squeeze yourself into a system that was never built for you?

In this episode, Mariel sits down with Dan Mickle, Mental Performance Coach, Head Women's Volleyball Coach at York College of Pennsylvania, founder of Soul Performance Academy, and host of The MentalCast podcast, for a wide-ranging conversation that covers everything from breathwork and journaling to neurodivergent athletes, hustle culture, and why "mental toughness" might be the wrong goal entirely.

Dan brings 30+ years of coaching experience and a deeply personal perspective on what it means to truly know your athletes. As a father of three neurodivergent children, a doctoral student researching coaching considerations for neurodivergent populations, and a former coach who once made his team do burpees during a timeout (his words), Dan keeps it refreshingly real throughout this whole conversation.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• The three mental skills Dan carried from being a player into 34 years of coaching and why breathwork is the foundation of all of them
• Why journaling doesn't have to be a page a day (and what a quick prompt in the parking lot can do for your growth)
• How to build intention into every practice and what deliberate practice really means
• Why neurodivergent athletes are just coping and what coaches can do differently
• The difference between emotional control and emotional suppression, and why fighting your nerves wastes energy you need
• Dan's take on why "mental toughness" misses the mark and what "mental flexibility" gets right
• Why the youth sports system is broken, who's responsible, and what it would actually take to fix it

If you're a coach, a parent, an athlete, or anyone trying to perform with more clarity and less chaos, this one's for you.

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About Dan Mickle:

Dan Mickle is a Mental Performance Coach, Head Women's Volleyball Coach at York College of Pennsylvania, educator, and founder of Soul Performance Academy. With over a decade of experience working with athletes, teams, coaches, and organizations, Dan specializes in helping performers build focus, confidence, emotional control, and sustainable high performance — especially for neurodivergent athletes and those who think and learn differently.

In addition to coaching at the collegiate level, Dan is an adjunct professor in sport behavior and psychology and is currently pursuing his Doctor of Health Science (DHSc) with a research focus on coaching considerations for neurodivergent populations. His work blends science, real-world coaching experience, and practical tools athletes can use immediately.

Dan is also the host of The MentalCast podcast, where he explores mindset, performance, leadership, and growth through conversations with coaches, athletes, and experts across disciplines. He has authored multiple books and created digital programs designed to make mental training simple, effective, and accessible.

Whether on the court, in the classroom, or behind the mic, Dan's mission is to help people perform at their best without burning out, breaking down, or trying to fit into systems that were never built for them.

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What happens when a Swiss national champion swimmer finally gets access to the mental tools that could have changed? That's exactly the question David Karasek sits with, and it's the reason he now dedicates his life to giving young athletes what he didn't have.

David is a former competitive swimmer, Swiss national record holder, and Olympian who spent the final four years of his career swimming for the University of Virginia where he worked with the same sports psychologist who coached Michael Phelps. The mental tools he discovered there didn't just improve his performance; they rewired how he thought about competition, failure, and what it means to be a real athlete.

In this conversation, David and Mariel unpack the mental performance toolkit that transformed his career and how you can start using it right now, whether you're 14 or 40. They cover conscious breathing techniques (including the exact method David used in competition, standing poolside next to Phelps), the right way to visualize before a race, why your brain is not a truth-seeker, and the real reason so many talented young swimmers crack under pressure.

David also gets candid about what it felt like to be a late developer and why that actually became his greatest mental advantage. Plus, Mariel shares her own visualization framework built around skills, senses, and struggle, and both coaches get real about the phone addiction crisis that's quietly sabotaging the next generation of athletes.

About David Karasek

David Karasek is a former Olympic swimmer and Swiss national record holder. At 38, he brings nearly three decades of elite competitive experience to his work as a performance coach and mentor. David is the founder of swimpros.com, where he runs performance camps for competitive swimmers and an online mentoring program on Skool. Most of the mental tools he teaches were learned directly from the sports psychologist of Michael Phelps during his time swimming for the University of Virginia. David is married with one child (and a second on the way), and is based in Zurich, Switzerland.

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What does it take to coach athletes hurtling down an icy track at 140+ km/h and build the mental toughness to match? This week, Mariel sits down with Robert Fegg, Head Coach of the Canadian National Luge Team, for a conversation that goes far beyond sliding sports.

Robert shares why he believes we're rushing youth athletes toward results at the cost of their long-term development, and what he's learned from decades of coaching across Germany, Canada, Korea, and the United States. From the start of his own luge career to guiding Team Canada at the 2026 Cortina Olympics, Robert brings raw honesty and hard-earned wisdom to every topic.

In this episode, you'll hear:

• Why enjoyment is the #1 predictor of athletic success and why we're undermining it
• How trust between coach and athlete has fundamentally shifted with Gen Z, and what coaches need to do differently
• The pre-performance routine story that changed how Robert coaches every athlete individually
• What luge teaches us about learning to crash and why avoiding failure might be the biggest mistake in youth sport
• The mindset shift required when transitioning from athlete to coach
• Why Robert says it will take 8 years to build the Canadian Luge program into what it needs to be

Whether you're a youth athlete, a coach, or a parent navigating the sidelines, this episode is packed with perspective on development, grit, communication, and what it truly means to give sport everything you've got.

About Robert:

Robert Fegg returned to Canada for his second stint with the Canadian Luge Team in the spring of 2022, this time to take the head coaching reins of the national program and guide the nation's best luge athletes into a new era.

The German has lived in the Calgary area with his family since completing his first stretch with the Canadian program from 2003 to 2011. After two seasons as the Junior National Team coach for the United States Luge Association (2018–2020), Robert served as head coach of the American luge program before coming back to Canada, where he guided the team to the Beijing Winter Games.

Coaching has been in Robert's blood since he wrapped up an eight-year career sliding on the German National Team in 2002. He cut his teeth in the coaching ranks the following year when he became the Assistant Coach of the Canadian Luge Team. After playing a key support role in developing Canada's luge athletes into medal winners for seven years, Robert took on head coaching responsibilities of the Junior National Team in Canada from 2010–14.

Robert was recruited as National Team Coach of the Korea Luge Federation in 2014, where he led many new athletes toward their first Olympic Games at home while also building the team's competitive sleds. Following the 2018 Olympic Winter Games, Robert returned to North America for a four-year stint with the Americans.

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What does it take to go from a multi-sport kid in New Brunswick to representing Canada on the international badminton stage, and then channeling everything you learned into helping the next generation of athletes perform at their highest level?

In this episode, Mariel sits down with strength and conditioning coach and former national badminton athlete Luke Couture to talk about the moments that define an athletic career, the mindset tools that separate good athletes from great ones, and the science behind how to actually build a body that performs when it matters most.

Luke shares the story of the one exhibition match that changed the trajectory of his life and what his mental state in that moment taught him about performance under pressure. He unpacks why comfort is the enemy of elite-level growth, how he eventually managed a serious spinal diagnosis through movement, and why the way most youth sports leagues are structured is, in his words, "complete nonsense."

You'll also hear Luke break down:

• Why 90–95% of athletes plateau and the uncomfortable truth about how to break through
• The three biggest life lessons his move 5,000 km from home taught him
• What he found in only 3 out of 100 athletes at one of the largest badminton clubs in the U.S. (and why it alarmed him)
• The difference between peripheral and neural recovery — and why your "off days" might not be doing what you think
• The daily meditation practice he hasn't missed in 3 years, and how it transformed the second half of his workday
• Why "more is better" is one of the most dangerous beliefs an athlete can hold
• How pre-performance journaling rituals prime the nervous system before competition

Whether you're a young athlete figuring out how to train smarter, a parent wondering if your kid is doing too much, or a coach looking for a sharper framework for long-term development, this episode is packed with insight you can apply immediately.


About Luke Couture

Luke Couture consults with Olympic and international level athletes throughout North America and Europe. As a former national level athlete in Badminton, Luke represented Team Canada in over 30 countries, including winning a Pan Am Championship Gold Medal. Luke's hunger for athletic development and coaching led him to pursue several advanced certifications including the Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist (CSCS), an Advanced Coaching Diploma (ACD), and a Graduate Certificate in High Performance Coaching and Technical Leadership (HPC&TL). Luke frequently engages in mentorships and ongoing education with some of the top sport practitioners in the world.

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Jedidiah Collins spent seven seasons in the NFL, but not before being cut 13 times.

In this episode, Jed breaks down what it really takes to stay in the game when everything is telling you you shouldn’t be there. From building a performance identity (“Zilla”) to redefining failure as feedback, this conversation goes far beyond football.

We talk about:

• Why winning has nothing to do with the scoreboard
• How journaling can change your mindset (and your future)
• The difference between being talented vs. being valuable
• What young athletes need to understand about NIL and money
• How to build confidence through self-talk and identity

This is for athletes, parents, and coaches who want more than performance. It's for the ones who want longevity, growth, and real-life success beyond the game.

About Jedidiah

Jedidiah Collins spent seven seasons in the NFL as a fullback, but his journey was anything but secure. Cut 13 times before finally earning his place, Jed learned early that talent might get you noticed, but resilience is what keeps you in the game.

At one point ranked the No. 1 fullback in the world, Jed measured success differently: through journaling, reflection, and growth.

After football, he became a Certified Financial Planner® and founded Money Vehicle, helping athletes and students learn to Speak Money & Act Wealthy. He is also the author of Your Money Vehicle and the upcoming book Fourth and Goal.

Today, Jed travels the country teaching his “Rookie to Veteran” framework to what he calls Business Athletes, those who understand performance extends far beyond the field.

He proudly calls himself a “Great Failure,” redefining failure as First Attempt In Learning.

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What if the skills that make you great in your sport are the exact same ones that unlock success in life and business?

In this episode, we sit down with Rae Irelan, transformational business strategist, speaker, and former professional dancer, to explore how discipline, identity, and creative thinking translate far beyond performance environments.

Rae shares how spending the first two decades of her life in dance shaped the way she approaches growth, pressure, and execution today. From relentless training and high expectations to stepping into the entrepreneurial world, she breaks down the transferable skills athletes often overlook and how to actually use them.

We dive into:

• How performance environments (like sport and dance) build discipline, resilience, and adaptability
• Why so many athletes struggle with identity when they step away—and how to navigate it
• The shift from external validation to internal alignment
• How to think like a creator, not just a performer
• Leveraging your unique story to build authority and impact
• The role of AI and modern tools in expanding opportunities for athletes beyond sport

This episode is a powerful reminder that your your sport may just the beginning. The real advantage comes from how you apply what it taught you.

About Rae Irelan

Rae Irelan is a transformational business strategist, speaker, and #1 international best-selling author. She is the co-founder of Evolved Podcasting and has been featured in Forbes and Entrepreneur Magazine. Rae helps visionary entrepreneurs amplify their authority, expand their impact, and unlock new revenue streams by blending creative leadership with smart AI-driven strategies.

Her foundation was built in the dance studio, where she spent the first two decades of her life as a professional dancer developing the discipline, mindset, and performance skills that now fuel her work today.

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