MANSFIELD — Sam VanCura always enjoys watching the Olympic swimming competitions, but this year’s broadcast came with an added bonus — free advertising.
VanCura is the president of Total Performance Inc, which manufacturers training equipment for high-level swimmers.
TPI’s sells equipment to high schools, YMCAs and swim clubs, but its primary customer is university swim programs.
TPI products can be found at top swimming schools like Stanford, Princeton and the University of Virginia.
“It’s always interesting during the Olympics and the World Championships, because I follow the swimmers and I know the coaches,” VanCura said.
“If somebody is on the Olympic podium, there is a very good chance that they trained on my stuff.”
VanCura caught a glimpse of TPI equipment on his television screen this week during a news package on the University of Virginia.
“Janet and I are sitting in bed. She’s reading and I’m reading and all once she looks up the TV and she goes, ‘Sam, look!” VanCura recalled.
“It was all of these power racks that I made. My son just went over and serviced them for them in July.”
VanCura started TPI in 1988 with his childhood friend Jim Steen, who came up with the idea for one of the company’s flagship products, the Power Rack.
“He was at my house one summer, and he goes, ‘Sammy, we ought to start a business,'” VanCura recalled. “Then he showed me a picture of this machine that was pretty crude compared to what we have now.”
Steen was an All-American swimmer at Kent State University and coached at Miami University before going to Kenyon College, where he was later inducted into the Athletics Hall of Fame.
VanCura was a high school swim coach and manufacturer’s rep in the electrical industry.
Today, VanCura runs the business with his son (and only other employee) Tim. The pair assemble, sell and service the machines.
“I think of myself more as a salesman than anything,” VanCura said.
“It’s a very small niche in a very small sport. We don’t have the money that football and baseball and basketball has, so I have to fight against other people that are selling things. It’s only a small pot of money that gets divided up.”
