Ryan Trahan has become the latest athlete to get into a dispute with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) over having a monetized YouTube account. Last month UCF kicker Donald De La Haye had a similar issue which ended with him being ruled ineligible and losing his football scholarship over the advertising revenue that his channel generated.

NCAA issue statement on Trahan's Youtube

Ryan Trahan is seeking a NCAA ruling that would let him keep his athletic eligibility at Texas A&M to compete in cross country while continuing to promote his company, Neptune Bottle, via his YouTube account.

The school's athletic department and Trahan are currently working with the NCAA to attempt to come up with a solution to the issue.

Trahan said that he has filed a waiver so he can own and operate his business, still compete in college athletics and re-request his eligibility. The NCAA said the other day that they had still not formally gotten such a request yet.

Trahan hits back at NCAA rules

Ryan Trahan said that he has been told he can not mention his company and athletic status on social media, he has to give one up as he is in violation of NCAA bylaw 12.4.4, which states that an athlete “may establish his or her own business, provided the student-athlete's name, photograph, appearance or athletics reputation are not used to promote the business.”

In an interview with the “Dallas Morning News,” he said “These are the two biggest things in my life.

They're asking me to throw one out the window, essentially.” His personal YouTube account, called “Ryan Trahan” has just over 14,000 subscribers and he has uploaded 92 videos over the course of three years. He uses his YouTube channel to promote his ecologically friendly bottling company, Neptune Bottle and discuss his life as a collegiate cross country runner.

In a recent video post discussing his battle with the NCAA, Trahan said that “I don't understand how I'm allowed to have a job working at McDonald's or something while being a student athlete, but I can't have a company that I'm passionate about.” He said he has been working on Neptune Bottle for more than a year and doesn't understand how it is right that he can't keep his identity as a runner and his company.

Trahan makes his decision

Yesterday, Texas A&M announced that Trahan, the school, and the NCAA had all come to an agreement. Basically, Trahan is allowed to continue to run his business and use his name, pictures and video to do so. However, he cannot make any reference to his status as a student-athlete or his participation in said collegiate athletics. He also must operate his personal and business social media accounts separately and as long as he does this he can keep running his company.
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED