Russell Wilson (3) of the Denver Broncos jogs off the field after the second half of Denvers 17-7 win over the Dallas Cowboys at Empower Field at Mile High on Saturday, August 13, 2022.
Aaron Ontiveroz/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post via Getty Images
When Russell Wilson steps out onto Empower Field for his first regular-season home game on Sept. 18, he’ll not only be greeted by 76,000 screaming fans — he’ll also be welcomed by high-profile members of Denver’s tech scene who are excited for the Broncos quarterback to bring his proclivity for startup investing to the Mile High City.
Besides earning a spot in the NFL Top 100 rankings and becoming one of the highest paid NFL players of 2022, Wilson has started his own media and production company, founded and sold the sports prediction app Tally, established a fashion startup with his wife, Ciara, and invested in a handful of Seattle-based tech companies while playing for the Seattle Seahawks.
Wilson’s personal team declined an interview, saying the quarterback was fully focused on the upcoming season. Other members of his team didn’t feel comfortable speaking about his investments. However, when asked by Denver Business Journal Managing Editor Alicia Cohn at an event in July whether he intended to get involved in the Denver startup scene in the same way he did in Seattle, Wilson indicated he would.
“Yeah, obviously Ciara and I are always looking to be in the VC world and invest,” Wilson said. “So, super important to us.”
Dan Caruso, the managing director of the Boulder investment firm Caruso Ventures, is among the local investors who are watching to see how Wilson gets involved. In conversations with Wilson’s team, Caruso has also gotten indications that Wilson intends to take part in the local investment community.
“I walked away from conversations with the understanding that he and the people around him do want to engage in the local entrepreneur and tech scene,” Caruso said.
Wilson is joining a cohort of Colorado athletes who have either invested in tech or become startup founders themselves. Olympic skier Ryan Heckman, skier and former NFL player Jeremy Bloom and cyclists Lance Armstrong and Robin Thurston are among that group.
Celebrity athletes can leverage their networks to get better access to deal flow than the average investor, giving them an edge, said Caruso, who’s spent nearly 30 years as an executive in technology companies. As long as they’re disciplined investors and surround themselves with experts, it’s a savvy path for athletes to take, he believes.
“There are prominent athletes who are in Colorado and are very active in the venture community,” Caruso said. “There’s a theme there that Russell will be stepping into.”
Heckman has noticed the theme, too.
“I think there’s a pattern going on, where more athletes are realizing, ‘If I could apply the rigor that I do to my sport to business, then I’d be running circles around the rest of these guys,'” Heckman said. “I think that’s starting to snowball nationally and here, if you zoom into Colorado.”
The field of Colorado tech-savvy sports pros:
Ryan Heckman
In 1991 at the age of 16, Ryan Heckman became the youngest-ever U.S. champion in ski jumping. Six years later, after competing in two Olympic Games and four world championships, he quit the sport and enrolled in college because, in short, he felt stupid.
Heckman’s family moved from Overland Park, Kansas, to Winter Park when he was still a young kid, and by 10 years old he was determined to be an Olympian. He became so immersed in the sport that he didn’t attend high school — at least not diligently, he said.
“I was increasingly feeling stupid,” Heckman said. “There was this juxtaposition because here I was, very accomplished in one regard, but I was just so unlearned. It was this source of great anxiety for me as I thought about the next chapter of my life.”
As Heckman puts it, he didn’t make a decision to quit skiing — the decision was to get educated. Heckman enrolled in the University of Colorado and after a “very difficult” transition from skiing to schooling, he graduated with a business degree and a 3.98 GPA.
One of the first things Heckman did after his graduation was call Colorado business titan George Gillette, the former owner and CEO of Vail Resorts Inc. As a teenager, Heckman had met Gillette, who promised him a job if he ever earned a college degree.
Gillette fulfilled that promise, and Heckman joined his private equity firm, Booth Creek Management Corporation.
Now, Heckman is a managing partner at Rallyday Partners, a Denver-based investment firm that he co-founded. The firm has $350 million under management and has invested in the health care and technology industries.
“I enjoy the bond I get to form with the founders I support, where we’re side by side, building something that might change an entire industry,” Heckman said.
Lance Armstrong
World-renowned road-racing cyclist and cancer survivor Lance Armstrong retired from the sport in 2011 and now splits his time between his homes in Aspen and Austin, Texas, as well as a ranch in the Texas Hill Country.
Armstrong won the Tour de France seven consecutive times between 1999 and 2005 but was stripped of his titles after an investigation found he had used performance-enhancing drugs, which he admitted to in 2013.
Still considered a sports icon but unable to land a broadcasting gig because of the doping scandal, Armstrong started a podcast in 2017 called “The Move,” through which he provided daily coverage of the Tour de France in 2018 and 2019 and continues to discuss endurance sports more generally.
The podcast quickly became popular and hit more than 1.5 million downloads in its first six months. With the popularity came the investment pitches.
“We were getting all this interesting deal flow,” Armstrong said in an interview with The Hustle. “I thought to myself, ‘We should start a fund and invest in some of these companies.'”
In 2018, Armstrong co-founded NEXT Ventures, a venture capital firm that focuses its investments in the sports, fitness, health and wellness markets. The firm launched its first fund in 2019.
NEXT Ventures has invested in 15 companies, including Oura Ring, a wearable health monitor, and Scorched Ice, which provides real-time diagnostics for hockey players.
The firm also invested in Terra, a platform that enables users to integrate all of their health wearables, including those made by Garmin, Fitbit, Apple, Google and others, into a single source. The leaders of Terra interviewed Armstrong on their Youtube Channel earlier this year about his work as an investor.
Armstrong told Terra he thought the market for health startups was growing and would only get stronger. He attributed the health of the market to younger people, who he said are more focused on their wellness than the generations before them.
“It’s inspiring to be around super smart men and women,” Armstrong said. “We’ve made 13 investments so far, and all of them get me excited.”
Jeremy Bloom
Jeremy Bloom distinctly remembers a time when, as both a world-champion skier and an all-American football player, he was concerned about what his future might look like after his athletic career.
An entrepreneurship program at the Wharton Business School eased those worries. While he was still part of the Philadelphia Eagles in 2006, he attended the school through an initiative by the NFL Player’s Association to prepare athletes for a life after sports.
While at Wharton, Peter Linneman, a professor, economist and investor, inspired Bloom to get into the tech industry. Bloom was an intern at Linneman’s private equity firm while still affiliated with the Eagles.
“It was there, in this program, that I began to sharpen my focus on where I wanted to spend the next chapter of my professional career,” Bloom said. “After completing the program, I was convinced I wanted to get into the internet space and eventually build a tech company.”
Bloom remains the only athlete in history to ski in the winter Olympics and be drafted into the NFL.
He grew up in Keystone and at 15 became the youngest male freestyle skier to ever make the U.S. Ski Team. After participating in the 2002 and 2006 Olympics and finishing ninth and sixth, respectively, Bloom turned his attention toward professional football.
The Philadelphia Eagles drafted Bloom in the fifth round of the 2006 NFL draft, but he was placed on injured reserve after injuring a hamstring. He was signed to the Pittsburgh Steelers practice squad in 2007 and was released during the 2008 training camp.
After that, Bloom’s love of sports wasn’t as strong as it once was.
Bloom founded the marketing technology company Integrate in Boulder in 2010. Integrate was acquired in 2021 by the private equity group Audax for a nine-figure sum, Bloom said. He still serves as the CEO of the company, which now has 400 employees worldwide.
While the transition from sports to tech wasn’t easy, Bloom thinks both require a similar stamina.
“Athletes like to shoot for the moon. We love setting big goals and dreams, and we don’t mind putting in the work,” Bloom said. “Tech is the same way. If you execute a great idea well, the sky is the limit to how much success you can have.”
Robin Thurston
While Robin Thurston was a teenager and competing as part of a Swiss cycling team in the early 1990s, his sole focus was being a professional cyclist.
“When I went to Europe, I would say I had no other ambition other than being a cyclist,” Thurston said. “I didn’t wake up and think, ‘I’m going to go into finance,’ or ‘I’m going to start my own business.'”
Thurston grew up near Aspen Park where cycling was part of his daily life. The first race he entered was the Red Zinger Bicycle Classic hosted by the Boulder-based tea company Celestial Seasonings.
After high school, Thurston left for Europe and signed with a Swiss cycling team. But a wreck, during which Thurston smashed face-first through the back of a vehicle’s windshield at 40 miles per hour, ended his professional cycling career and forced him to consider his next move.
Thurston returned from Europe in 1994 at the age of 22. He enrolled in the University of Colorado and graduated with a finance degree. He spent 14 years working in finance with Lipper, American Century Investments and Wellington Management.
In 2012, he founded the digital fitness platform MapMyFitness. The venture was a marriage between Thurston’s business experience and his ongoing love of cycling, he said.
“None of that would have happened if I wasn’t a bike racer,” Thurston said. “I wouldn’t have ever connected any of those dots.”
Under Armour acquired MapMyFitness for $150 million in 2013, and Thurston became Under Armour’s digital officer. After that, he spent a few years as CEO of Helix, a genome sequencing and genetic testing company.
Thurston now runs the Boulder-based media conglomerate Outside Inc., which encompasses 30-plus outdoor lifestyle brands.
His time as a cyclist made it possible for Thurston to try new ventures, he said.
“I felt like I had a lot of failures in cycling. In sports, you’re basically failing more than you’re winning,” Thurston said. “I think it gave me the ability to go into something thinking that it’s OK if I fail, but to just try it and see what happens.”
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