Episode 765 - Behind the Scenes - Free Training Day Northeast VIP Bundles
In this episode, Andrew and Jeremy talk about the Behind the Scenes of the Free Training Day Northeast VIP Bundles.
Behind the Scenes - Free Training Day Northeast VIP Bundles - Episode 765
If you’ve joined the Free Training Day, you know how much effort the organizers put into the event. You will now see/hear what happens behind the curtain, so to speak. In this episode, Andrew and Jeremy talk about the Behind the Scenes of the Free Training Day Northeast VIP Bundles. Listen to learn more!
After listening to the episode, it would be exciting for us to know your thoughts about it. Don’t forget to drop them in the comment section down below!
Show Transcript
You can read the transcript below.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Hey, what's up everybody? Special Edition of Martial Arts Radio here, this one is going to be kind of interesting, I think so yeah, some of you are gonna hate this, some of you are going to love this. And that's totally fine. We love bringing you different stuff. Of course, I'm here with Andrew. And as if you can't tell, we're in a hotel room, if you're listening, if you're living in a hotel room in a hotel room.
So here's what's going on. We're recording this on Thursday, the 10th. In two days, we have a free training day in the northeast. And special new this year, we have VIP bundles. And we weren't quite sure what those bundles were going to be when we set out to do that. We just said, let's get a bunch of cool stuff and put them in there. And one of the things Andrew did was he reached out and Stacey helped you with us too, right? Stacy helped with this and reached out to as far as we know, every author who's ever been on Martial Arts Radio, said, Hey, we're doing this thing you'd like to donate a book or two. We received a book or two. And so here's what's gonna go on.
We're gonna lay out these bundles from start to finish and record it. And we're gonna point out the book, we're going to show you the book, we're going to tell you who wrote the book. And if some of these books seem cool to you, maybe you'll support the authors. We're trying to give value back, right? Like they donated books, we're hoping maybe they sell some books. And that's what we're doing. If you're watching, and you're like, oh, man, can I get one of those VIP bundles? Sorry. No, because by the time you see this, the event will have already happened. We have a few that we're not committed to. We said 50 Max, we've got 50 that we're going to build tonight. And all of them are going to be sold. They're either already sold or will be sold on Saturday. You know what they could do next? You know what, though? You could get a VIP bundle next or 2023 which could do that might be completely different. We don't know. That's the fun of it. So without further ado…
Andrew Adams:
Alright, so we're starting with a bag. All right, so Whoa, so got our free training day 2022 logo with historic Mount Monadnock profile right there. For those that don't know, map Nanaka is a local mountain here in the Keene area. It is the second most hiked mountain in the world. Oh world, the most high ground in the United States.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Andrew, what's the most hiked mountain in the world?
Andrew Adams:
The most hiked mountain in the world here is Mount Fuji, which is not surprising. It is. Now one of the reasons why Mount Monadnock is the second most hike mountain in the world is it's an incredibly easy hike. It's almost not a mountain. It barely counts. Yeah, basically. So that's okay, though. It's still if I did once.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Just once?
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, just 1,2,3,4. So I got five, we can get five minutes, we can do five up.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Which means we're going to do two runs as well.
Andrew Adams:
Is good at math, but not so much grammar. What do you think?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I’m just thinking about what we want to do if we're doing 50. We can only do 25 at a time. That leaves a few different options for how we're going to lay this out.. Oh, by the way, this is a very behind the scenes episode. If you do not like behind the scenes stuff. You are not gonna like this episode you've probably already tuned out.
Andrew Adams:
Also, I bet a bunch of you are listening and be like, oh, man, I really want to watch what they're doing. Go to YouTube. So I would do it. Alright, so this is 25 bags.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. So it's half. So we're gonna lay out half of these. Okay, we didn't talk about needing to have all 50 laid out to fully have like, here's the redness around. Here's a suggestion. Not sure. We have so many books.
Andrew Adams:
Did most people send more than one book?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I don't even know what the total number of books is.
Andrew Adams:
But did most people when you got the books? Okay, so this is easy.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Nobody said less than one book. All right. So actually, a lot of people said unless that's true, right? A huge number.
Andrew Adams:
So why don't we do this? Why don't we do 25? But whenever we get to the books, if there were four of them, we just put two on the side. And we'll put two of these.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Here's another thought, yeah. If we put books, we can kind of prop them up. They will be rigid enough.
Andrew Adams:
But more than books are going into it.
Jeremy Lesniak:
But if we start with the books, then we can kind of prop them up because a lot of the stuff that's not books We've got so many it's gonna go it's gonna be even. Okay, the books are the main thing we're making decisions on.
Andrew Adams:
Yes, I would agree. All right. I think let's try that. Let's see what happens. All right. All right, so we're almost out over here. Let's start with these because they're big. And those are we'll split those five off. Are these gonna go?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Well. So here's what we got. We've got Angel Lemus. So this is a compendium that comes off of their magazine, Geisha magazine. And it's all issues one through six plus seven. You get this on Amazon, if I remember correctly, this is an Amazon print.
Andrew Adams:
So here's an interesting thing. So I emailed Angel, and, you know, with all of the other authors, and he wrote to me and said, hey, I don't have any books in stock at the house right now. I'll just drop them directly from Amazon. And he was gonna send just a couple of magazines. And I was like, Oh, that's great. That's wonderful. Like, we'd love to have that. And then about an hour later, he sent me a message and said, You know what, actually, I'm gonna send you the full Collector's Edition book. It retails for $80. And I was like, Oh, my gosh, thank you. And he's like, Yeah, I'm gonna send you five of them. And then he sent this and I'm gonna show you guys because you get the sneak peek behind the scenes. So we got five of these books going out. And he put together this himself pretty cool. It says, got the big Asia logo, free training day was so good. Well, well, thanks for supporting the free training day. I hope you enjoyed the lessons and training and we're able to make some new friends and appreciation for your support. Enjoy this copy of the vacation Collector's Edition. Sincerely, Angel Lemus. Which is pretty cool.. And what's the other thing I think is really cool about this is not only is he getting to spread knowledge through one of those didn't have through this book, but was recorded on the show. And so whoever gets this book will be able to go oh, you know what, this is really cool. Let me listen to his episode. And so that's pretty cool.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I agree. That is pretty cool. Andrew.
Andrew Adams:
I don't think we should submit. Here's why. We can't see what's in here. So we didn't know.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So yeah, you're right.
Andrew Adams:
So I don't think we can do it. Okay, because we don't want to accidentally load one bag with all of the best books, you know that you know how there's no such thing as best books.
Jeremy Lesniak:
But you know, the best part about us Angel Lemus? When we have to do it next year, and we're like, what worked really well? Did we do it?
Andrew Adams:
We can listen and we don't think that's gonna make my brain hurt. Okay. All right. We've got it.
Jeremy Lesniak:
All right. I've got my belief that there are six copies showing the stunt woman's workout.
Andrew Adams:
Oh, cool.
Jeremy Lesniak:
That was a fun episode.
Andrew Adams:
She was really fun to listen to.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Full color photos. This is a great book. Yeah. You kind of be able to.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, I agree. So what do you think of my idea of putting these three aside so that we get a better idea of what's out here? For the next batch of 25? Should we put two of those?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yes.
Andrew Adams:
You could do that.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah. Sure. Everything hurts my brain right now. Okay, so I'm gonna defer to you in a sense. We got this pack of stuff. Oh, yeah, that's there. I was when nothing happened, which was a Kickstarter project. A number of people you've heard of are here, including me. I wrote something that was actually really cool.
Andrew Adams:
It's a great book about martial artists or martial arts or, you know, violent, quote, violence professionals on situations that they were in where they could have used their martial arts and actually gotten into an altercation but chose not to. There I was, and nothing happened because they defuse the situation either through verbally, we're getting out of there or some other scenario, which is pretty cool.
Jeremy Lesniak:
We've got seven copies of the order. A gem of master hop kick the first edition book signed by Jenny, including the special oops, we forgot to put a spine on it edition.
Andrew Adams:
That's gonna be a collector's edition right there. So you want to get one more than seven. All right. Here's four. Yeah, so give me one. Oh, there's only one. Okay, so Lee Taylor. autographed episode 410 was Lee's episode. Thanks for supporting me and continuing to push forward. Kata and Bunkai fundamentals that big book also. Kata form and function. Probably autographed as well. Episode 632.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yes, I forgot to look inside that.
Andrew Adams:
Nice. So he has a message as well. Oh, he's got a thing that's going in. Yep. Yep. But I didn't realize he sent 10 copies of the book. Oh, you know, five. I'll print more when I go home tonight. Here's five. Okay, we can do these five. So Doug's message, which is going to be put in there says thank you for supporting free training day. I hope that the training in this book serves you well in health and the martial arts, folks that are episode 692. So I'm gonna just use my scissors, which I made sure to bring, because I knew I would have to do this. I didn't know he sent 10 books though. I was like, Oh, he's maybe sent five books. I'll just print out five of these messages.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I found two more origin master hubs.
Andrew Adams:
Oh my gosh.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So I'm gonna put one there. And one over here. Give a book, take a book, something like that.
Andrew Adams:
So for you guys watching by the way if you're still with us, thank you. Surprise, but thank you. Queen. We have her own worst critics. Nobody's watching this. These VIP bundles. It's going to be our best episode. So these VIP bundles cost $40 This year, which included a shirt.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, and we're selling. So we've done that as a way to build some buzz and get people excited about the event. It's the first time we're doing it. And the ones that we had leftover we sold just just about half the others for 25 bucks. So people who commit early get the best deal and that's something that we always do.
Andrew Adams:
And I think I feel confident saying next year, especially you guys watching, seeing how much stuff is going to win these books, these bags, and I don't think it'd be 40 bucks. No, and I don't think we're gonna sell only half.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, I think people think we're gonna put a limit on how many people buy Yeah, we received a number of books from Dan Millman I forget what episode was Dan's? I don't think he put it in; he did sign I believe all of these. Here's a couple of copies of the last book in the Peaceful Warrior series in school. I actually made copies over there and read it Stacey, good luck, she was it.
Andrew Adams:
Oh, yes.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Stacy purchased one that was like I wanted. Oh, and here are two hardcover copies of the hidden school. And let me tell you why. It hurts a little bit that I'm not keeping one of these.
Andrew Adams:
Oh, it hurts a little bit that I'm keeping one of these applications. We didn't talk about any of this stuff. This is all going out.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Because they didn't send us stuff for us to keep. Yeah, you sent us stuff to put in and so we're integrity matters.
Andrew Adams:
And by the way, these are just the books there's more fun stuff that we don't have that are not books that are getting. I should probably endeavor to stay on camera.
Jeremy Lesniak:
We haven't even opened yet. Oh my goodness this is from so I don't know that there's anybody who's spending more time trying to help martial arts schools at this point than Brandon, Brandon.
Andrew Adams:
Live learn growth. He was an early Tiger who lived his best life. So they're all signed to that. Show the audience here. live, learn and grow. Looks like we got six copies. I'll take three copies.
Jeremy Lesniak:
One, two. Okay. All right, here's three more. Dan Millman books. sacred journey the peaceful warrior, peaceful your spirit, which is the more recent book, this is the one that he came on the show to promote. Yeah, and no ordinary moments.
Andrew Adams:
I'm not going to do drum rolls for everyone. There are too many. Your belly is gonna hurt. And my belly can handle it.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Melanie Gibson. Oh, yeah, coffee making a screaming school. And then she says thanks for supporting whistlekick. Episode 604.
Andrew Adams:
Awesome. This was a fun one. I've been following her on Facebook. She's been doing a lot of really fun stuff. I really like her.
Jeremy Lesniak:
This is one this is one of our both of our favorite people
Andrew Adams:
Who?
Jeremy Lesniak:
And you know why Jean Kanokogi is one of our favorite people because of the episode on how to fight with it. And how that went and just how she approached it and her absolutely zero reluctance. From what you said.
Andrew Adams:
Yep. Absolutely. Well, that is a big book, big book. Mom, get up and fight. And oh, cool. challenge coin, get up and fight the memoir ofJean Kanokogi. That's pretty cool. So I will say Jean Kanokogi is one of the few episodes I've listened to more than once. All right, so here's the question though. Now every every bag has a book
Jeremy Lesniak:
Let's see if anybody can get this. We'll make this a challenge. The return address is Red Dragon. And you know what a red dragon would be? I know instantly what Red Dragon was? Do you know about this red dragon?
Andrew Adams:
Yeah. That's cool. There are a lot of books there.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Bully proof life from Chris Casamassa. All autographed. Be bulletproof. Thank you, actually. Yep, that actually hangs on. There's two books and this is combat. All right. That's just your book. Here's several. Okay, we got three different books here. All right.
Andrew Adams:
They're autographed. Oh, no, they're different. Okay, this one says to your success. The last one I looked at said flawless victory.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Did it really?
Andrew Adams:
Yeah. Ah, that's pretty cool. So I look. That's pretty cool. All right, so I'm gonna just go Chris. The only person I know sort of personally, for whom I have a Funko Pop. Ah, this one says be bulletproof. What's our graphic? Oh, that'd be pretty cool. I think that's why I should turn my phone on silent.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Oh, it's a whole bunch of autographed pictures. We can use cardboard from boxes and stuff. Just I think if you lay them out, now we've got enough stuff that we can Okay. Or you know what else we could do? We could put a tag in that says, claim your this at the whistle pig group. And we can keep them aside. Yeah, that might be the best thing to do.
Andrew Adams:
So this is a private message to Jeremy which I'm going to read loud and clear because it's not that big. Hi, Jeremy. Here's a couple of books. Hope will help keep things going. Okay. All right. And it's autographed.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Pretty cool. Thanks sharp. This is a collection that he contributed something to. So we sent that over so you're getting something he wrote. Cross in the collection Crossbones and crosses. Nice. We're here. Do you see over time now, there's a ton of books like we're starting to get into doubles for everything. And we haven't even started on like the whistlekick.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah. Or the other swag the sponsors swag. That's right. We have sponsors this year. We have sponsors. We're not going to lose money.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Well. Losing money this year, but we're not making much less. That's not a lot. This is the first time free training is not at a loss. All right. Dave brief moments of clarity. One of my favorite people really, really liked what he does.
Andrew Adams:
Nice sign. Oh, I also want to say just because it was an agent, Linus, the very first person that contacted me, when I sent my emails out, he was the first person who was like, yeah, let me do this for you. That's, that's it. That's pretty cool.
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's awesome. And so those of you watching, if you support like, if you make a purchase, if you like, if somehow, you watching or listening to this episode turns into you buying something, or communicating with one of these people. Let them know. Yeah, because we don't want this to be a one and done this is really cool. And we're hoping that this can become an annual thing that next year, they would be also willing to Yeah, and the more that we show them value, the more likely they're going to do that. So shifu Glen Doyle came up again recently in the episode with oh, we're both so tired.
Andrew Adams:
That's embarrassing. So while you do something, I'm going to pull that up. Thanks so much
for supporting whistlekick. Aikido practitioner. So it was really enjoyable to listen to. She was one that I have no problem saying we both said, hey, we should really invite her to come teach her free training days. And I think if she didn't live in the Midwest, I think it wouldn't happen. Yeah. So she donated this book spiral. In fact, it's the black belt edition that has the power to get it done with grace.
Came out with this book. It's called the journal for instant memorization input. He had a great Thursday episode actually wasn't a Monday interview about memorization and how different how the brain works and learns things in different ways. And the thought behind it was it is a notebook that you would take the class writing down, like what you know, who was the teacher that day?
You know, what did you work on, and then a site over here to write drawings or pictures or, you know, whatever. And then one of the cool things in the back that he has is an appendix area where you can put down like, you know, K kicks, and you put a page 12. And you can write it down in the references later, and I dropped the bookmark that came in it. So it's pretty cool.
Jeremy Lesniak:
He also sent over 20 of these bookmarks and the thing I liked the most on it, is the message on the back. And it's not exclusive to us, but it says thank you for supporting the art and science of learning physical movements. The books that are left over there do not come in just for this. As I've mentioned this on the first caller I've talked about it on whistlekick, but because of what we do, we are part of the promotional engine for the world of martial arts. Yeah, people send us books all the time, unsolicited, and I brought a bunch.
Andrew Adams:
Where is he?
Jeremy Lesniak:
He's in Jersey.
Andrew Adams:
Oh, yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So let's look at the extent that we have here. So he wrote this here. Talk about these all to make sure this is something we can read on here.
Andrew Adams:
Kempo. It's yogic practices. He's kind of a cool little, little, little guy. The Unbreakable board, and the red dragon surprise. Oh, that's cool. So again, a little, a little reader here.
Jeremy Lesniak:
This is a little more personal.
Andrew Adams:
I'm gonna hold on. Alright, this looks cool. I don't know what it is.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So this is a game he mentioned. It's a card game he created as an 80s Grandmaster So Andrew, you could buy one of the VIP bags and maybe end up with this? Because oh, by the way, it's all blind. You don't know what you're getting.
Andrew Adams:
And we have no idea who's getting what that one over there to go in another set of 25 not to come home with me. Although I really wanted to. Alright, I'm looking for…
Jeremy Lesniak:
How great is this? This is what we want it right. Absolutely wanted to make it. We wanted this to be painful for people and if it's painful for us, I want this stuff.
Andrew Adams:
I already told those two books we want two more books. Internal and autographed. Thanks for supporting whistlekick, all the best shifu. Internal karate and smart moves are a kid's guide to self defense. Now that's cool.
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's pretty sweet.
Andrew Adams:
You're just curious here. All right, there's a couple that don't have two books yet.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Okay, so a special first edition collector's cover of the martial artist handbook. With all the typos.
Andrew Adams:
Now that he's done a couple of episodes.
Jeremy Lesniak:
He has done a few episodes. his autograph? It's not an autograph. Oh my gosh. You know what? I bet he's gonna be on free training day. He might autograph that maybe holographic. Even the covers got a typo, right. There's no apostrophe and artists. We had a long discussion about whether that should have been. It should have. Yeah, and it is now not covered. And I bought this book, The martial arts teacher from Jonathan Bluestein. I remember this, the episode I did with Jonathan, because we spent the first 20 minutes talking about gardening.
Andrew Adams:
Oh, really?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, it's funny. So there's two books in every pile?
Andrew Adams:
Well, that one and that one.
Jeremy Lesniak:
There's almost two books in everybody.
Andrew Adams:
And some have two books and something else cool. Like, the postcard.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Here is the only hardcover I bought to check it for 12 months to health that I wrote and here's a 12 month, no fee. Here's a copy of the novel that I wrote. All right.
Andrew Adams:
Now, here's what I will say if anything doesn't have to. It's okay, because we've got other special stuff to put on. Everything's got to these only have one, but they have.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I think we can call the…Yeah, the posters are cool enough that I can call it one. So we've got free training day stickers, which everybody will get. There's 100 of these. So let's do two for each shift. And then they're going to keep one and give one to somebody else.
Andrew Adams:
I mean, you hope that they do hope that's what's gonna happen right? To you. These are cool stickers.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So just for anybody out there that does that wants to do this kind of stuff. Sticker mule. If you get on their mailing list, they constantly do these specials where they're like, hey, we'll do 100 stickers for you for like $12 with shipping. You're like, Okay, I'll do 100 stickers. So sure, there were a few times that things like that happened. And we brought those stickers. Let's do it. We got to split on some of this.
Andrew Adams:
Okay, so the gorilla grill is a barbecue that started out as a barbecue food truck here in town, I say started out because they're not just the food truck anymore. They now do all of the food at branch and blade, which is a local brewery here in town. They are our official lunch sponsor for the event. And so they not only are they going to be on site, they're bringing their food truck into the parking lot, which is amazing.
But they also donated some T-shirts with their logo, which is a pretty cool logo. And some hats as well. So that's the gorilla grill on a gorilla head, which is pretty funny. So I'm gonna put two of these hats over here. And one of these T-shirts. So they're one of our sponsors for the event. And we're gonna go, there's a hat. And we'll go, there's a t- shirt. I want to talk about these guys, because they are the coolest. And I'm Yes, I will fully admit that I'm very biased.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You shouldn't be, it’s super cool.
Andrew Adams:
So my wife is a crafter, she crafts and sells at craft fairs and things like that. And she does lots of different things. Just Craft It. She's very crafty. And a few months ago, she often would get in her head like I'm just gonna make this and she made a little chicken. And she's like, you know, I'm gonna make a ninja. And so she made this adorable ninja. And it's melted on a styrofoam egg.
And the eyeballs are the coolest thing ever. Because they're really neat. And so she donated four of these little ninjas of different colors, that was the red one. And this one I wanted to show because she decided I'm going to do something a little different with this one. I'm actually going to give the ninja a bow.
So there's the Ninja. And then he's got a little staff on his back. Which is the average me made from a toothpick covered with felt. And it's pretty cute. And I feel really bad if you're only listening and not watching this episode because you're missing out. So four people are going to get these little ninja guys, which is pretty cool. And I gotta be careful putting it on if I can. There we go.
Jeremy Lesniak:
You couldn't tell I'm throwing in whistlekick stickers and postcards about what we do and everything. Even though people know, you know, we might end up with some people that buy a bundle that is fairly new.
Andrew Adams:
Well, and I'd be willing to bet that there. Actually, this will be funny, because you're not gonna see. So after a free training day, it's true. There are people that went to free training day that have never listened to a whistlekick episode, and maybe now they will. This is their first one. And this is their first one that…
Jeremy Lesniak:
We’ll do tomorrow. Saturday, when we talk about the bundles. We can announce this episode. And if you want to see the making of the bundle.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, that's a great idea.
Jeremy Lesniak:
All right, this is exactly how everything happens at whistlekick, we'd be cool.
Andrew Adams:
I don't remember the episode I spent playing together. While we were doing that episode we put this together and when I say we got like five pieces I put him on yesterday. We crossed the border. And we only got through the border. And it took longer than we thought because it's a 500 piece 520 piece puzzle.
After we were done Putting that episode I took the puzzle home. And because he didn't really want it, I said, You know what, I'm gonna hang on to it. And we're going to put it in one of the bundles. So if somebody is getting a whistlekick puzzle, and it's gonna be this person right here. Okay?
Jeremy Lesniak:
So just as I often order stickers from Sticker mule, just kind of like a bag of random stickers and things here that we give out at events just kind of constantly keep stock. I got an ad, probably because I bought a Sticker mule from a random company called I don't remember what that ones.
And he sent me a proof. And for those of you who don't know, I live in Montpelier, Vermont. And the signature from the person emailing the proof is Burlington, Vermont. So wait, you guys are in Burlington. So we have these cool holographics. Oh, look how cool these come out on the screen. And oh, so we got like 100 of these.
Andrew Adams:
Here's the other thing that everybody's getting. And these are kind of cool, because if you are in the Facebook group for the event, about a week or two ago, Jeremy posted the official event program. I'm gonna say this program, which you could print at home in black and white, but we had custom printed the program in color.
And so everyone will get a copy of the program, which has the schedules and all sponsors on the back. Best which did all of the T-shirts, the gorilla grill, which I mentioned, training for Warriors, which is a gym here in town souls, which is a really cool 1920 bar and twin state Martial Arts Awards.
So everyone's getting a program, anything else everybody's getting? I don't think so. I think it's time to start bagging up. I think you are right. And remember, everybody that purchased one ahead of time, is also getting a t-shirt. We're not putting the t-shirt in the bag because the t-shirt is a specific color and size to each person we want there.
Jeremy Lesniak:
We're not choosing the bag for them. We want them to be randomly chosen.
Andrew Adams:
We are literally going to have 50 bags strewn out and we're anyone on our list that purchased one we're just going to say, here's your T shirt that you ordered size color. And go grab randomly grab a bag, so we have no idea who's gonna get each of these.
Right, which is pretty cool. Pretty cool. All right, and I think I feel pretty confident saying that every single bag has way more than $40 worth of stuff in it.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Well, at this point, it's 25.
Andrew Adams:
Well, yeah but I mean people that purchase people for 40 bucks.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, that was the shirt on and we sold the shirts for 25 bucks. Yeah, so once again, you act early. You get the better deal. Because we will always do that because we want people to incentivize that action. Well, I would imagine that when we release this part. We're probably going to fast over the video that this bag is broken. Well, we have extra bags.
Andrew Adams:
I know. Just putting, you know, we're not giving somebody a broken bag. We've never missed one Okay, so this is the sixth year of free training. It has been six years. What is the most in those other five? This being the sixth? Although we did have one in Portland and Atlanta, I'm thinking strictly here. Yeah, what has been the biggest surprise or unexpected thing that you didn't expect to come on a free training day that has become a free training?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I think it's the amount of what I would call cross talk of the attendees, the sheer number of people who became friends that run in completely different circles, you know, they live in different areas, they train different things, and they just become friends. And I think that is super cool.
Andrew Adams:
There was some chatter in a group text that I and then on Facebook, people were shocked to know and you might as well, that 365 days ago, I did not know Dennis Campo. Hmm. I met Dennis for the very first time on the Friday before free training day, which was the 11th last year.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So what's funny about it is that some of you out there know Dennis has been on the show. He's a great fit friend, and immense supporter. My Dennis story is kind of similar. I just, I don't know what I met Dennis. I just one day I didn't know Dennis and then the next day, he was one of my best friends. And that's just how he is. And actually, that's how a lot of martial artists are, I think when you hang out with people who train for similar reasons. You know, there's just something inherent, you get to figure out what makes other martial artists kick pretty quickly.
Andrew Adams:
I think I'm gonna say something that you will agree with 100%. I just have to find it, because it was about weightings.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Something that you're gonna find offensive.
Andrew Adams:
No, no, no, no. No. It was said by Kelly Thomas. Who knew there were so many like minded people out there. And I think that's so totally true. That once you know, if you're you're stuck with us listening this far. You're pretty much family.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Here's some more books. We didn't talk about any of these books.
Andrew Adams:
I'm going to randomly grab the one on top because I noticed something very random .
Jeremy Lesniak:
Oh, nice. Five Rings, The Five Rings.
Andrew Adams:
Not to be confused with the ring or the Book of Five Rings.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Oh, that would be a great crossover parody. The five the five rings and that's like the sequel to The Ring.
Andrew Adams:
But no, this is a hardcover book. This Miyamoto Musashi is an artist's strategy. The new illustrated edition of the Japanese warrior classic. So this person's getting this book as well because I don't feel like the bag was big enough.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Hey, we're all about the value over here. I think a lot of people are still watching. You know what?
Andrew Adams:
I'm anybody still watching a challenge? When I released this episode on Facebook. I want you to say something on Facebook. I watched to the end.
Jeremy Lesniak:
#stilllistening.
Andrew Adams:
Go on. And check still listening if you actually made it this far.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Because I'm really curious. A friend of mine has a podcast in the fitness space and he would get into episodes. He's like, No, anybody? No way anybody's still listening to the terrible episode. And he'd be on with the guests. Like, what are you doing? He's like, Oh, this is fun for you and I and nobody's gonna enjoy this. They were the best episodes. Yeah, it was just so raw.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah.
Jeremy Lesniak:
And then the leftover bags. We have for anybody who makes a purchase of who knows? Probably $50 Every bag..
Andrew Adams:
That one excludes buying the VIP bag for 25 right?
Jeremy Lesniak:
Do you think people are going to trade books? Do you think I'm gonna end up with a big…
Andrew Adams:
I think it's entirely possible. I mean, I personally wouldn't because of all the books that we're giving out there's only a couple that I already have. So I mean, I do know some people that have the Jimmy book already. So you know those people might not know you might train. We should make sure whoever gets the scorpion posters doesn't get the crisscross Monster Book. Do you think they should get them?
Jeremy Lesniak:
I think everything I think it's all random. I don't believe they did.
Andrew Adams:
No I meant on these ones. Oh, those don't have anything more bookmarks just flipping me so I can tell the transaction books. Which one makes sense
Jeremy Lesniak:
All right, more books. All right, because I don't want to bring these home. All right. Here's a regular copy of a martial arts handbook, value seller Valerie Russell about poetry books. I bought this like a lot of these are coming out of my collection because I want to make sure wow, that's cool. Try to get him on the show. They send the book, fight like a physicist, but he hasn't been on the show.
Andrew Adams:
Wow.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Say, hey, come on the show never happened. I would still love to have him on the show. And some of these I have multiple copies, which is why they're ending up here. Paul's here, and on the show, he did a couple cool books, Project Superhero and Chasing Captain America.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, so we have enough books. That's fine. I have what I had that actually had that one as well.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Someone that we've tried to get on the show and I would still love to have on the show and one of his students sent us that book. Oh nice. Hey, and here's the last pile of cool stuff I believe. Josh says a ton of stuff. Hi Jeremy. I'm actually getting this package ready to go as I get the episode we recorded coming out. came out a couple of weeks ago. Prepared for publication put in a bunch of items for folks if you're training it, there's a book, CD, tape, some masks, hand sanitizer as well as an assortment of cards some are digital download cards with a code to access ebooks and music on the back some have a QR code and music and there's should be about 50 that have a link to a segment of a book called Empty Hands the most martial art rd of the ones I've done that wasn't still in ebook only so this was the best I figured out a way to give away hope you guys have a great training session talk soon Josh. Love Josh. Shout out thank you to Josh Josh did the theme music to first call. He's been such an amazing supporter and yet another person who's like I don't quite remember how we got connected but we got connected.
Andrew Adams:
Yep. And we're so glad we did. That is funny.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I am tempted. Okay, so we get the book. That's fine because I think unless you know the book the music might go what's going So here we go. Boom. Look at all these guys. So you know what? We're gonna have to squeeze these in between those two. Yeah, I must stop on that.
Andrew Adams:
Jeremy…
Jeremy Lesniak:
I know I'm the worst. You're the reason why we came up with the next hashtag while still listening.
Andrew Adams:
I'm gonna be excited when people get these to be like, did you get what you get?
Jeremy Lesniak:
It's it like this?
Andrew Adams:
I don’t know.I don't have kids.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Is this what it's like setting up Christmas presents?
Andrew Adams:
No, because I don't have 50 kids.
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's a great point. Oh, boy All right. Did you get those? I'm just there's so much art here. Can you work those into those bags? I don't think I want to give that away. Okay, you know, if you take a look at the trajectory of free training day, it's definitely grown each year. And that's been something that I've really enjoyed. You know, we're doing way more this year than we did last year. And last year was way more than we'd ever done before. And I liked that. I liked that it continues to evolve. I think that that's important. You know, we talk often on the show about that iterative progress. And you know, we drink our own Kool Aid. Oh, um, we didn't pick anything for this. Let's show this.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, you have to show it just goes on one of those. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's why I put it there so you can remember.
Jeremy Lesniak:
So some of you know, I spent some time experimenting with digital art and artificial intelligence AI art and really like the way this one came out. So this is printed on a metal sign and I signed it and this is the most expensive thing that's going on honestly like the retail on this is more than that even that magazine.
Andrew Adams:
Yeah, I don't know if the Ninja is made by my wife. Those are priceless.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Those are priceless. No, they're super cool and I want to be like her.
Andrew Adams:
Can you imagine how stressed you would be if you had to go to Comic Con last weekend?
Jeremy Lesniak:
That's why I didn't go to Comic.
Andrew Adams:
But I did….
Jeremy Lesniak:
You did go to Comic Con last weekend. For real? If I told you the names of the people that already said yes to come on the show to Andrew talk to a Comic Con.
Andrew Adams:
You lose your mind.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Because I lost my mind.
Andrew Adams:
It is pretty cool. You did an awesome job.
Jeremy Lesniak:
All right. What else has to go? You want to do white square stickers?
Andrew Adams:
White square stickers.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I see that right here.
Andrew Adams:
All right, I think we're good. Yes.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Are we? Well, let's double check, sign up the programs.
Andrew Adams:
Programs are done.
Jeremy Lesniak:
Yeah, I think this is probably a good time to call it. I don't think there's a whole lot left to say. So we can call the episode. It's been half an hour.
Andrew Adams:
Okay, that sounds good. Man, I thought we're gonna be longer.
Jeremy Lesniak:
I want to say thank you for watching and listening. We appreciate you all, if you can never get to a free training day. This spirit like this is the same spirit that goes in everything is a spirit that you see out on the floor from all of the presenters. It's the spirit that you see from the people attending and training. And it's something really special. It's something we're really proud of. And it's something that is very difficult to define.
People come even after listening for years, and they're like this, this is so much more than I expected it to be. And that's why people fly in for a one day free event. So just keep that in mind. Yeah, if you're up for supporting us, we've got the patreon, patreon.com/whistlekick. Okay, two bucks a month is the entry point. And you can know who's coming up on the show when it goes up from there. We've also got consulting if you have a martial arts school. If you have a guest suggestion let us know. Andrew whistlekickmartialartsradio.com, Jeremywhistlekick.com or social media @whistlekick. Until next time, train hard, smile, and have a great day.