ABOUT THIS EPISODE
Sam McGriff has been the Head Strength and Conditioning Coach at Pembroke Hill School since 2013. He came into the field through a nontraditional path, earning his degree at Mizzou on an ROTC scholarship before serving in the Navy, then working as a personal trainer before Pembroke Hill hired him to supervise the weight room after school.
McGriff describes those early years plainly. There was no set culture, no established standards, and attendance was entirely voluntary. Rather than trying to overhaul the room on day one, he built trust first, with athletes, then with sport coaches, and let structure follow. Each season he picked one change to implement fully instead of stacking several half-finished ideas on top of each other.
That approach produced a record board, then a PR bell that started as a wall-mounted piece of gym equipment and is now a fixture wheeled out for campus-wide events. It produced "fuzz up," Pembroke Hill's plate-return standard, and a color-coded block system (red, white, blue, silver) that gives voluntary lifters something concrete to chase even with zero mandatory attendance. McGriff also built an Exercise Science class into the school day, giving him room to teach nutrition and recovery in real depth instead of squeezing it into the last five minutes of a session.
Thirteen years in, McGriff's advice for younger coaches is straightforward: stop chasing the next job before you've proven what you can build at the one you have.
Key Takeaways
Change happens one standard at a time. McGriff rolled out a record board, then a PR bell, then the "fuzz up" standard, then a block system, letting each one take hold before introducing the next.
Trust comes before culture. He built buy-in with athletes first, then sport coaches, before anything got labeled a rule.
The color-coded block system (red, white, blue, silver) gives voluntary lifters a real standard to chase even with zero mandatory attendance.
A dedicated Exercise Science class does more for nutrition and recovery education than anything said between sets during a session.
Playing the long game means measuring impact by what you build where you are, not by chasing the next job.
Quote
"If I can't have an impact here, at this level, then how am I going to have an impact at the next level?"
- Sam McGriff, Head Strength and Conditioning Coach, Pembroke Hill School
Connect with Sam McGriff:
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/coachmcgriff/
Pembroke Hill School - https://www.pembrokehill.org/athletics/strength-and-conditioning
