Alan Arlt built the largest recreational basketball league in North America out of a six-team rec league in Minneapolis. He speaks about what it actually takes to build something people refuse to quit.

Founder of Ultimate Hoops. Managing Partner of Arlt Sports Ventures. Writer of Ultimate Sessions. He brings twenty years of operating, selling, and scaling to the stage, and he tells the truth about all of it.

Alan Arlt / Top Public Speaker on the Sports Business

What He Speaks About

The Belonging Machine — Ultimate Hoops was never a basketball league. It was a belonging machine that happened to keep score. Arlt breaks down how community becomes a business engine, why retention is an emotional outcome before it is a metric, and what most brands get wrong when they say "community" and mean "audience."

The Bedroom Floor — Every builder starts somewhere small and private. Arlt's origin is a kid organizing basketball cards on a bedroom floor, arranging the world the way he wanted it. This talk is the honest anatomy of starting from nothing: the first six teams, the first bad night, and the decisions that only look inevitable in hindsight.

The Second Game — The final whistle is not the end of the event. It is the start of the revenue. Arlt shows how live sports generate data, media, and commercial value long after the gym empties, and how operators can turn a weekend tournament into a year-round business.

Software Doesn't Sweat — Sports tech is built in offices and used in gyms, and the gap between the two is where products die. Arlt gives the operator's view: what technology actually survives contact with athletes, parents, and coaches, and why the best sports products are built by people who have run the event.

What the Deck Doesn't Say — Every founder has two stories, the one in the pitch deck and the one that is true. Arlt tells the second one: the grief of losing his parents he carried into the founding years, the near misses, the cost of growth, and what remained when everything unnecessary was stripped away.

Formats

Keynotes. A full talk built around one of the themes above, tailored to the room. Sports business conferences, leadership summits, and company offsites.

Guest Lectures. University classrooms in sports management, entrepreneurship, and media. Arlt teaches from the operator's seat, with real numbers and real decisions, and stays for the hard questions.

Fireside Chats and Panels. Conversation formats where the honesty travels furthest.

Podcasts. Long-form conversation on founding, community, sports business, and writing.

Why Rooms Invite Him

Arlt founded Ultimate Hoops and grew it into the largest recreational basketball league in North America, with more than 150 clubs across 30 markets under Life Time.

Before that he led the integrated Ad Sales, Sponsorship, and Product Placement team at Discovery Networks in New York City, generating more than $120 million in annual ad revenue across on-air, online, and retail. His work has been featured in SLAM, Men's Health, and other national publications.