Early Call Time Episode 25: JT "Just Truth" Service (Founder of Soul Focus Sports & CEO of Silverback) and a Surprise Guest!

In the final episode of an October jam-packed with bonus content Tony and Eli interview a man of many hats, JT "Just Truth" Service, the founder of Soul Focus Sports (parent company of Run Local and the Silicon Valley Half Marathon), the CEO of Silverback, a podcaster extraordinaire, an ex-agent, and one-time running media start-up founder. His audio track isn't the clearest, but we all have a lot to learn from him about how he juggles all these balls--plus finds time to take care of himself by starting every day of with a bit of movement--so listen carefully!

The fastest ECT Pod guest yet, with a strong collegiate career at UCSB and a 2008 Olympic Trials marathon qualifier on his athletic CV, JT went to law school with hopes of becoming the Jerry Maguire of endurance and action sports athletes before realizing "that 15% of very little is even less." While that phase of his career may not have been very remunerative, he did gain some great stories involving Dean Karnazes, whom he represented, and nudity in the desert.

After that chapter, JT started building his empire, which he kindly takes a moment to clarify the many intertwined different arms of to the guys: Soul Focus is his production-for-hire arm, Run Local and the Silicon Valley Half are Sole Focus-owned events, and Silverback is his and Kyle's equipment rental and operations for-hire company. He also talks about having Meb and Merhawi Keflezighi as business partners in the Silicon Valley Half, and how a piece of advice he didn't take from Merhawi has helped his businesses thrive during this time when so many traditional organizations are struggling (Hawi's advice was not "a con starts from the shoes up"--that's a JT original).

A theme that runs throughout this whole interview is the strength of JT's team. Anticipating this like the professional podcasters they are, and also knowing that no one would have better stories, after a brief diversion into JT's newly-discovered Jewish heritage the guys secretly invite Silverback COO and JT's partner in crime Kyle Meyers to join them halfway through the podcast. Kyle doesn't disappoint, sharing stories of JT being "a really good sport" while barely making it through a weekend working the Chicago Marathon, how he regularly cuts his hand while working, and his deep love for a hole-in-the-wall San Francisco karaoke joint. There's one story specifically--that sounds like it involved criminal activity--that Eli can't drag out of him, but he lets Kyle off the hook and lets him finish by saying something nice about JT instead.

Kyle is quite the industry pro himself, so Eli promises to have him back on not just to talk shop but also about Minneapolis (since Kyle was raised in Eli's new home), but everyone agrees he should stick around for the evergreen closer for this episode, too, so the episode wraps with both JT and Kyle talking about their team's post-strike traditions.

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