Interact Club to host Mental Performance Coaches Clinic on Monday
COEUR d'ALENE — The Interact Club of Coeur d'Alene is inviting all area sports coaches to participate in a free Mental Performance Coaches Clinic from 5-7 p.m. Monday at the Kroc Center.
"While we’ve focused on mental health for the past few years, we really wanted to work to approach it from different angles," Interact Club President Joel Bryan said Tuesday.
He said the club is aware of how much time students spend at school and at home and has hosted past events that cater to those aspects of students' lives. These events have included bringing Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps to Coeur d'Alene in May 2023 to speak about his struggles with depression, as well as bringing parents to listen to a psychologist speak on free expression and creativity.
"We wanted to look for something different, and that’s how we ended up targeting athletes," Bryan said.
"Many athletes spend two-plus hours a day with their team and under their coaches, so we wanted to reinforce the support that athletes may find in their teams, coaches and overall sport," he said.
Speaking at the event will be Elite Minds founder and CEO Ashlee Bradshaw and mental performance coach Brandon Davis. Elite Minds is a Spokane-based company that works with coaches to promote positive mental performance in their athletes.
Interact Club of Coeur d'Alene is a youth service group of Coeur d'Alene Rotary. It presently has nearly 30 students from Lake City and Coeur d'Alene high schools. The club encourages students to engage in their community and to participate in different projects.
Bryan, a Lake City senior, said he stepped into the role of club president hoping to fill the shoes of his predecessor, 2024 Lake City grad Luke Sharon.
"I was super inspired by the work he put in and the community he had to support him," Bryan said.
While Interact Club held successful events last school year, Bryan said those efforts were accomplished with an extremely small team.
"Stepping into it this year, I really focused on overall attendance, as I knew that the more people actively participating, the better I knew that our results would be," he said. "Interact has always been super cool to me, as I knew that a lot of people were able to look up at what we were doing as an example for their work. We’ve been able to accomplish a lot with such a backing behind us, and hope to continue doing so moving forward."
Parents and athletes are welcome to attend the Mental Performance Coaches Clinic.
"We’d love to have as many people at this upcoming event as possible, showing both athletes and their coaches that people truly do support them, both on and off the field," Bryan said.
The Kroc Center is at 1765 W. Golf Course Road, Coeur d'Alene.
Davis