MUSCATINE, Iowa–In education, teachers and administrators often enjoy coming up with acronyms to make remembering important concepts easier. When Muscatine High School head baseball coach and social studies teacher Grant Pippert created his own non-profit organization to help local baseball and softball players take their training to the next level, it only felt fitting to turn its name, the lighthearted Literally Athletic Building, into an acronym, the LAB. More than just a play on words, it highlights the facility’s approach to helping athletes grow. Pippert explained, “We wanted to call it the LAB because we’ll be using science and technology to inform our training.”
Located in the former JC Penny’s store in the Muscatine Mall (1903 Park Avenue, Suite 001) the LAB has the all the equipment needed for ball players to hone their skills. Each of its batting cages features HitTrax technology. The same equipment used by Major League Baseball teams, HitTrax provides detailed metrics about each hit a player makes, helping them and their coaches pinpoint skills they could work on to enhance their gameplay.
The LAB also offers individual training tailored to each player’s age and abilities, making sure that everyone who participates in it benefits from it. Pippert explained that the LAB will take a very holistic approach, taking into account how factors such as nutrition and good sleep habits can also help athletes play at their best. All athletes taking personal lessons will get 16 hours of training per week, divided into two four hour sessions, to help them work towards their goals at a steady pace. In the future, Pippert plans to add small group lessons, clinics, baseball and softball leagues, and tournaments to the LAB’s offerings as well.
Currently, individual training costs $40 per month, with half of that cost covering working with the instructor and half covering a membership to the LAB. Because Pippert runs the LAB as a non-profit, he can charge athletes a significantly lower fee for personal training than if they took lessons in the Quad Cities or Iowa City. “We’re very fortunate because we’re a non-profit, so we try to keep the prices as low as we can and still pay the bills,” he elaborated.
Though Pippert has only coached baseball in Muscatine for a few seasons, he has grown very fond of all the student athletes he works with and wanted to give them access to the sort of state of the art training facilities kids in bigger cities get to use. “I wanted our kids to have equal facilities as some of our competitors have, he stressed. “It’s really important to me because the program is really important to me and I’ve grown close with the kids.”
As Pippert has gotten started, he has found joining the Greater Muscatine Chamber of Commerce and Industry extremely helpful. “I’m really trying to utilize all the resources in Muscatine,” he said. Through the help of the Chamber and its community partners, Pippert secured grants from HNI, the Howe Foundation, and Musco Lighting, which proved instrumental in making the LAB a reality.
