Inside the Room with Coach John Martin

Welcome to the first edition Output Sports’ “Inside the Room” series. The high school level has vastness to the daily lives of their coaches and student-athletes, and we want to highlight those programs that are doing something slightly different, while also showing that their coaches are real people, too. 

As a young performance professional, I spent too much time letting my job define me. I would get upset and uncomfortable in conversations with people who did not understand what a strength and conditioning coach was. It became my identity and my well being was hanging in the balance of how well my groups did that day or how my performance metrics were progressing. 

But I quickly realized something: the conversations I was having that were not about my job were helping me just as much if not more than the conversations that were. It was then when I wanted to learn more from people, whether their title was ‘Coach’ or not. 

Every coach has a circle, or better yet a group text of their friends in the field, that they rely on to answer questions and banter about the random things. I have been lucky to have a person like John Martin in that circle. 

John Martin is the current Sports Performance Coordinator and Assistant Athletic Director at Queensbury High School in New York, while also serving as New York State Director for the NHSSCA. If you know John, you know his energy is infectious and what he has built (literally) at Queensbury has been special to watch over these last few years. His work was recently recognized by the NHSSCA with his appointment as 2024 Northeast Region Coach of the Year.

But my number one thing I like about John is his realness. There’s no sugar coating, whether it’s in coaching or in his personal life. 

He became an Output user in 2023 and you can see the uses of the devices across the program’s Instagram page @qbystrength and Twitter page @QBYCoachMartin.

But what you may not know about John is that he comes from a family with extremely successful coaches and those who held high positions in education. Being the youngest in the family, he caught the coaching bug young and has not looked back. 

The depth of his education and experience has certainly led him to a successful career, but the habits that he saw as a child has helped to define his personal life at home. Martin is consistently working on house projects on his property just north of Saratoga, NY, and if you’re in the area, I can confirm his detail oriented focus at work absolutely reaches into his home. 

A good rule of thumb that I have followed in gaining good friends in my adult life is you can either break a sweat with them or eat a meal with them. But with John, you may have to get your ticket onto a rollercoaster. 

We finish with some quick hit questions to stir some pots in the social media world. 

We thank Coach Martin for being the first feature of this series and we are excited to go ‘Inside the Room’ with more people around the world. 

Be sure to check out the full length interview below!