Steven Thompson rides bareback broncos, ropes, and runs the electrical maintenance shop at a coal-fired power plant in Adrian, Missouri. In 2018 he started training in his own barn because he'd realized he was coming home from work, sitting on the couch, and letting life go by without him.
A few kids came out to join him. He thought he had workout partners.
Then one of them was standing at the rack on his phone, and Steven asked who he was talking to. Oregon State. That was the moment it stopped being a workout and became a program.
This one is for coaches who actually program. Steven breaks down how he adapted Westside for high school athletes who can't squat well yet, why a 10x2 dynamic effort day is worthless for a kid who isn't moving right, what he's known for in his own town, and the training he now looks back on and shakes his head at — rolling round bales for time after a hard session, jumping on whatever would hold their weight.
He also gets into the harder parts. What you do when a kid with real potential quits on himself. Whether the injury was your programming. How you keep your own ego out of a room full of teenagers. And why he's never once sat back and thought he'd made it — because he's already worried about who's coming next.
CHAPTERS
0:00 Cold open
1:24 Westerns, horses, and Lonesome Dove
3:24 What Voodoo Power looks like — and whether it still smells like horses
9:19 Now what: how the barn gym actually started
10:45 The phone call that changed everything
13:35 When a kid quits on himself
16:41 You can't want it more than they do
19:25 Adapting Westside for teenagers who can't squat yet
25:23 The pillars he's known for
29:36 Keeping ego out of the room
33:24 "If a little is good, a lot's better" — what he'd undo
40:12 Trust built in the offseason, spent at the national meet
48:50 What he steals from his own podcast guests
56:33 Modifying for the athlete in front of you
1:00:01 Faith, and why this was never a business
1:12:30 When your friend's kid walks into your barn
1:15:10 Rapid fire: Major League, The Replacements, and the Joker problem
CTA BLOCK
Where is your athlete actually losing ground? Free Athlete Builder Scorecard — six blocks, about ten minutes, a real assessment: athlete-builder.com/assessmenttest
The Two Minute Drill: athlete-builder.com/newsletter
Find Steven: @voodoo4power on Instagram. His podcast is Voodoo Power — and I'm a guest on it in the coming weeks. Be on the lookout.
Mentioned: Matt Wenning · Shane Sweatt and Laura Phelps-Sweatt · Zach Even-Esh · Tom Dorrance, True Unity: Willing Communication Between Horse and Human
