It’s been a great week in Indianapolis at the MLB Trade Show. As we wind down the final day of the show, we are giving out the last of our samples. This product has been in high demand. Whether attendees have been sitting in meetings or on their feet working all day, Speed Gel has provided pain relief to the attendees here and a buzz has been created in the professional baseball community.

“I’ve gotta try this stuff!”
“I heard about ya’ll and had to come hear what this is all about.”
“I heard you all could give me some relief.”
“This stuff really works!”

All of these things have given us great feedback about the gel. More specifically, we had a guy named Bob Neal who visited our booth on the first day of the show. He has rheumatoid arthritis, two blocked arteries, and severe neck pain. On the spot, he put Speed Gel on his neck to relieve some of his aches and increase his range of motion. He was a little bit skeptical at first but after 20 minutes, he was a Speed Gel fan for life. He said, “My neck hasn’t felt this good in years. This is a great product.” Thus, for the past couple of days, Bob has been one of the many people spreading the word about Speed Gel and talking about he is personally feeling relief from this amazing anti-inflammatory.

Have you tried Speed Gel? Found relief from its anti-inflammatory ingredients? Share your story with us by commenting below!

We are Floridians in Indianapolis. Yesterday, for the 2nd time in my life, I saw snow! Yes, ladies and gentleman, being from Florida, I have only spent my winters in the Sunshine State. This week, however, we are in Indianapolis, Indiana for the Major League Baseball Annual Trade Show and Winter Meetings.

Once a year, all professional baseball executives converge on one city to discuss free agents and make off-season trades. Every Major and Minor League team is represented to participate in these important conversations and decisions. Additionally, at the trade show, executives and team buyers cruise around the exhibit hall to check out the latest and greatest baseball products on the market. Vendors showcase all types of products from mascot costumes to wooden bats to new sports medicine products (Speed Gel!). It’s the only time of the year when all of professional baseball is in one place.

This year, we are debuting Speed Gel to these important teams, athletes, and executives. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow, we are giving out samples of Speed Gel and explaining the benefits of using Speed Gel in providing pain relief and treatment.

Got pain? That’s what we have been asking people as they come to our booth to learn about Speed Gel. Let’s be honest – who doesn’t? Unfortunately, our bodies are imperfect and most of us have some ailment that continues to bother and impair our daily activities.

Thus, people are constantly looking for a way to decrease their inflammation, increase their range of motion, and get them back to feeling 100%. Speed Gel is the answer. I know I may be a little biased but the response that we have gotten from attendees here has been enormous. Yesterday, we challenged people to try and last night and give us feedback today. I can’t wait to hear some of the new testimonials that we receive.

More to come from Indianapolis!

Great news Heat fans! The Miami Heat is now using Speed Gel. Yesterday, I introduced the product and explained all of the advantages of using our gel. The trainers and players were so excited about Speed Gel that they began using it last night when they played the Atlanta Hawks. Unfortunately, the Heat didn’t win but that, of course, had nothing to do with Speed Gel. I know that Speed Gel will help these guys recover from their vigorous athletic schedule and relieve their aches and pains. The head trainer Jay Sabol was excited to try it and give it to the players to use on such injuries as ankle sprains, shoulder stiffness, and knee pain.

I also visited the University of Miami. Thank you to the athletic trainers who were so welcoming and made me feel right at home. Being that Miami is such an international city, the University is the same. Head trainer, Scott McGonagle, told me that some of his European players were already using a cream that claimed to have similar effects. However, the cream they have been using doesn’t have the transdermal agent that makes Speed Gel so unique. Speed Gel’s patented transdermal gel is what drives the active healing ingredients directly to the source of a person’s pain. It is the avenue in which Speed Gel is able to stop your pain. Thus, Scott was excited to have his athletes try something that actually treated the pain instead of masking it. He is going to hand it out to the Football, Baseball, Track, and all other sports this coming week.

I also had the opportunity to hang out with Jim Morris, the head baseball coach. Before practice, I talked to the whole team in the dug out about what it takes to become a Major League player and also gave some tips about how to improve their game. It was fun to hang out with them. It brought back a ton of memories since that’s the College that recruited me and I signed a full scholarship to attend. This was my first trip back in 12 years.

Finally, Jim wanted one of his pitchers to begin using Speed Gel immediately. In a practice game about a week and a half ago, the pitcher took a line drive directly to his ankle and has been out of play ever since. His ankle was still swollen and had a lot of inflammation. However, they are having a Pro Scouting Day on Saturday and Jim wants the pitcher healthy. So, the pitcher put Speed Gel on his ankle immediately to help get the swelling down and heal the bruised tissue so he can workout and be healthy again.

Jim also asked for a few extra samples to take to his parents for their arthritis. He noted that Speed Gel isn’t just an athlete product but can be used for any aches and pains and on a person of any age. Which is true, every one should use Speed Gel.

It’s professional team week here at Speed Gel! This week we are visiting the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the Tampa Bay Lighting and the Miami Heat. Along with talking to the athletes and trainers about the benefits of Speed Gel, we are leaving behind some cool Speed Gel gear. Each player is receiving a Speed Gel hat, samples, and a Speed Gel bag to tote their gear. Be on the lookout for your favorite athlete to be sporting Speed Gel gear at their next practice or game. More to come later this week from the road with Jason Romano!

Yes, that’s right, folks, you read it here first! Last week, I traveled to Orlando to visit Disney’s Wide World of Sports which hosts 47 different sports and their athletes, year around. Disney’s Wide World of Sports is home to the Amateur Athletic Union, the spring training site of the Atlanta Braves, and ESPN. Every year, this facility hosts thousand and thousands of teams through tournaments, special events, and other sports and athletic training opportunities.

The thing that was most unique compared to my other visits, thus far, was that Disney hosts athletes anywhere from 5 years old to 65 years old. This is a very diverse place! Thus, the athletic training and sports medicine department is also charged with the responsibility of treating and ensuring the health and safety of all of those athletes as well.

Last week, I met with Jyl O’Brien, the head trainer, and 8 of her fall interns. Jyl took the opportunity to teach her interns about new sports medicine applications and what questions to ask when being introduced to a new product. I’ve got to hand it to those interns, they asked excellent questions and really put me to the test on behalf of their athletes.

They loved the transdermal aspect of Speed Gel – as there hasn’t been an over-the-counter transdermal gel before now – and they like the all-natural ingredients as well.

It was interesting to talk to them because of their huge demographic range of athlete that they treat. For example, they noted that Speed Gel would be good for their senior athletes. One intern noted that seniors tend to go out and play hard but then can’t move very well after their work out. When they become stiff and sore, they lather on stinky creams and gels to mask their pain and the whole complex starts to stink like menthol. Yuck! They were excited to try and switch those athletes to a product that actually helped heal their aches and pains and that didn’t stink as badly.

One of the interns also noted that they are currently treating a large number of ankle injuries thanks to basketball, volleyball, and football season. They thought that Speed Gel would be great for application on the ankle joints as well as other joints because of the ease application of treatment and the quick anti-inflammatory relief that Speed Gel provides.

This was great feedback that applies to all ages – not just professional or collegiate athletes but for teenagers and seniors as well!

To round out the week, I went to the University of Central Florida that is also located in Orlando. UCF is the 3rd largest college in America with 53,000 students! That is huge! I met with head trainer, Jenn Perez, and baseball trainer, Garrett DeGroot, about Speed Gel.

Though I am hearing a lot of consistent feedback and messages, trainers keep telling me how excited they are about an over-the-counter transdermal product. For those of you who don’t know, transdermal technology is relatively new in the medical industry and its capabilities are just being realized and put to use. Thus, Speed Gel really is a revolutionary product in the sports medicine field.

These trainers were enthused to have a new product that would treat pain and would be easy to use and apply. They did tell me that the only other product out there like Speed Gel was a prescription transdermal patch. However, being that the transdermal patch is a prescription, it is harder to use and gain access to. Additionally, the patch’s medicine also goes into the body’s blood stream and can create contraindications with other oral medications. Not so with Speed Gel. Only 2% of Speed Gel is absorbed into the body’s blood stream thus creating no contraindications or side effects. These are all huge benefits to the patient and anyone who is trying to gain relief from their aches and pains.

Suffice it to say, another great week talking about Speed Gel!

Last week continued to be another productive week for Speed Gel. As I continue to travel the state of Florida, I’m learning more and more about the need for a topical anti-inflammatory on the market for the treatment of sports injuries. I’m continually learning about the need for a treatment that allows for the healing of injured athletes while also removing the possibility of addiction and other side effects.

I started the week off with a trip to the University of Florida to meet with John Barrett, the baseball athletic trainer. He said that most of his players come in and ask for oral meds and then get dependent on them. The meds also cause stomach issues. He noted that by introducing Speed Gel to his athletes it would allow him to treat their pain with natural ingredients that didn’t have those effects on them.

After our meeting, Barrett walked me through the new UF baseball complex and introduced me to the new baseball coach, Kevin O’Sullivan. I hadn’t seen the complex since high school and it is truly amazing the technological advances that have been made in 12 years. I’d almost even go as far to say that athletes in college get a little spoiled at all of the equipment and technology that is at their disposal. UF has a great baseball complex.

We also ran into assistant baseball coach, Brad Weitzel, who is also a former professional scout for the Minnesota Twins. I knew Weitzel from his days as a Scout when I was recruited out of high school.

On a personal note, Weitzel showed me to his office where he pulled up the scouting report that he had written on me 12 years before. It was incredibly exciting for me, as a player, to see what he had written and observed about me. Normally, we don’t get to see those documents and aren’t exactly sure what scouts are reporting about us. This was truly a rare inside look for a player into the scouting world. Most of the stuff that he had observed about me were right on and even compared me to a few outstanding former and current MLB players. It was truly an honor to read those insights.

Finally, to round out the day I gave a 30-minute hitting talk in front of 10 of the UF baseball players. It was cool to talk to these guys about the game today and techniques that have helped me through the years. I’ll be going back in a few weeks to speak with the whole team about more hitting techniques.

For all of you tennis and golf fans, I also visited IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida. This academy is nationally known for training the most elite athletes. IMG houses over 1,000 students who go to school full time while training and hosts professional athletes who are training in the off season or are prepping for upcoming tournaments. My first pro-agent that I signed with was with IMG and thus, I trained there for 2 years while working on my strength, conditioning, speed, and agility.

I had the pleasure of meeting with IMG’s Head Trainer and Physical Therapist Graeme Lauriston. Graeme loved the idea of an over-the-counter transdermal cream. IMG, he said, treats a lot of patella tendinitis, shoulder and elbow problems from tennis serves, and rotator cuff injuries.

While Graeme and I were chatting, a colleague of his came over and said that she had been looking for something on her patients that didn’t smell. As a sports medicine professional, she’s allergic to menthol so the hot/cold creams irritate her eyes and body. Thus, she was interested to learn about the benefits of Speed Gel since it doesn’t contain any menthol and would both benefit herself and her patients.

Finally to round out this busy week, I made a quick visit to the State of Florida College, formerly Manatee Community College. There I gave out Speed Gel samples to the volleyball and basketball players who were in training for their season. They were super excited to hear about the new product and I can’t wait to get their feedback!

Yesterday, with Georgia (our PR chick) who was in town, we took the greater Tampa Bay community by storm to talk about Speed Gel and pass out samples.

We met first with Steve Walz, the director of Sports Medicine and assistant athletic director, at the University of South Florida.  Go Bulls!  It was interesting to talk to Steve about the void in the marketplace for postgame treatment.   All of the other gels on the market currently are used for numbing and relief before a work out or game.  However, he was excited about the anti-inflammatory agents inside the gel.   He was pumped up to give the samples out and  see how his athletes felt about this new revolutionary treatment.

We also, of course, stopped by the baseball offices to see Head Coach Lelo Prado and Pitching Coach Lazor Collazo. Lazor, who recruited me out of high school to attend the University of Miami, recently had surgery on his ACL.  It was interesting to talk to him about his knee injury and what things he is doing to reduce swelling and get back in shape so we gave him about 10 samples to reduce the inflammation in his knee.  Lelo also had a stiff and sore elbow from throwing in batting practice everyday.  As I told both of them about the product, Lelo ripped open the Speed Gel packaging and immediately put it on his elbow.  Both coaches were excited to get their athletes on this product to help reduce pain before and after games.

Next, it was off to Avila Golf and Country Club.  Georgia hasn’t spent a lot of time in Tampa, as she lives in Washington, D.C., so I wanted her to visit my little playground and see where some of our hometown athletes live and play golf in the offseason. We also took this opportunity to also visit the Golf Pro Shop and the Tennis Pro Shop to drop off some additional samples of Speed Gel for their members to try.  The great thing about Speed Gel is that it’s not just for college or professional athletes. It can be used for everyone’s pain from a retiree who twisted the wrong way on their golf swing to a kid who’s sore from tennis lessons.  Speed Gel works on everyone with aches and pains.

Next, we headed to Formulated Solutions, Inc., our manufacturing plant, to get some video footage of where and how Speed Gel is made.  We are currently working on a couple of videos to tell the story behind Speed Gel and how the new transdermal technology was created. Keep on the look out here and on our Facebook page for those videos in the weeks to come!

Our last stop of the day was Eckerd College in St. Petersburg.  We visited with the head trainer Travis Irwin about his athletes and sports injuries that he is seeing on a daily basis.  For example, as basketball season is getting ready to start, he is treating lots of shin splints and twisted ankles.  He was thrilled to have a product that he could send home with his athletes. Travis also gave us a great lead for a chiropractor in the area that had already heard of Speed Gel and was interested in learning more about Speed Gel and it’s applications.  I’ll be sure to follow up with him in the coming days!

Finally, as we headed to take Georgia to the airport, I called in to JP Peterson’s Sports Radio Show on 1010 AM here in Tampa.  Even though JP whined about the supposed boring MLB playoffs this season, he likes to ask me questions about some of my former teammates and coaches.  We talked about the World Series, the Phillies run to through the playoffs, and the new hiring and coaching changes of the Tampa Bay Rays.  Finally, JP shared with his audience that he is currently using Speed Gel in the recovery of his recent rotator cuff surgery.  Nothing like a plug from JP to end a great day of promoting Speed Gel!

This morning, I hit the road and ventured up to Tallahassee to meet with the Director of Sports Medicine at Florida State University, Randy Oravetz. A friend of mine, Brett Groves, was an All American shortstop at FSU and I have listened to him for years talk about the aches and pains that he and his teammates suffered while playing collegiate ball.  What a great opportunity to talk to FSU’s athletic department about a new treatment for pain relief after workouts and games!

Randy Oravetz is also the head athletic trainer at Florida State so I was interested to get his feedback on our new product.  The first thing that Randy said was that there was definitely a void in the pain relief market for postgame treatments.  There are currently many pre-workout treatments but nothing besides ice that helps to reduce inflammation afterwards.  Speed Gel does just that with out athletes having to pop a lot of pills or rub stinky menthol gels all over their bodies.

Randy was confident that his athletes would benefit from receiving Speed Gel along with ice after a workout which would allow them to self treat their inflammation. This is huge!  Not to mention much more convenient for athletes.  How many times have I spilled meds all over my bag and gear or not been able to treat myself because the trainers had to administer my treatments?  This is not the case anymore!

I also learned today that the main injuries at FSU are ankle and shoulder strains.  Today’s athlete is putting even more pressure on their muscles and joints as they train.  Thus, finding help in treating those strains is vital to an athlete’s success.  All 10 trainers at FSU are now going to use Speed Gel when treating their athletes.  All of the athletes in all of the sports can take advantage of the relief that Speed Gel provides.

As I was leaving, I also ran into Jamie Shouppe, the assistant head coach of the Seminoles baseball team.  Jamie is also the head recruiter for baseball who tried to recruit me out of high school before I was drafted by the Texas Rangers.  It was great running into him, 12 years later, and talking to him about my experiences in professional baseball.  He couldn’t believe that I played for so long and was interested to hear what brought me back to campus.  It was yet another great opportunity to talk about Speed Gel!