Coaches are critical to achieving top performance from individual athletes and teams. Coach profiles the 150 most successful of them—in every major sport—providing ample biographical background but lasering-in on their most teachable ideas and methods. Rich in quotations, each profile ends with a list of lessons that readers can apply not only to the sports they love but also to their own lives and careers.


Profiles range from Béla Károlyi (who coached 9 Olympic and 15 world champion gymnasts), to Bill Belichick (the take-no prisoners coach of the Boston Patriots), to Pat Summitt (who racked up 1,098 wins as coach of the University of Tennessee Lady Vols basketball team from 1974 to 2012), to Marian Vajda (the coach behind tennis phenom Novak Djokovic).


Guided by the numbers—for all competitive sports keep score—this book finds the teachable moments, settling some arguments while starting others, in delineating the lives and careers of coaches who win with brains, heart, and the force of character.