First and foremost, I am an advocate for health. Whether it is food, exercise, mental health, or any other form, I want everyone to live healthy, strong, and motivated.
Becoming a Registered Dietitian took 4 years of undergrad, and one year of a Dietetic Internship with tons of real world, hands on experience (and a whole lot of $$$). This experience was invaluable, and I learned a ton from it. Being an RD also allows me to legally give out nutrition advice, “prescribe” nutrition plans, and do anything else I want with nutrition.
I also need to keep up my license with over 70 hours of continuing education per cycle.
I became an ACE Certified Personal Trainer in 2009. What does this mean? It means I sat in a night time class 2 nights per week, studied a book, and did well on a multiple choice exam.
Being certified is only 1/1000th of what makes a trainer. Honestly, I know of people in the industry who are not even certified, and know a ton more than me and do a great job at what they do. I also know people in the industry who have tons of certifications behind their names and they don’t know jack.
I am also a TPI (Titleist Performance Institute) Level 2 Certified Fitness Coach. Working with golfers is much different in some ways than working with general fitness clients. My number one goal from my golfers is to keep them healthy, and playing more golf. My second priority is to help them play better golf. I have worked with numerous golfers who have increased club head speed, shot distance, and cured many swing faults that are directly associated with the human body mechanics surrounding the golf swing.
So what make me different? The CONTINUING education and PASSION. Sure, it is easy to do the occasional online quiz just to keep up with your cert, but by investing in quality continuing education, reading on my own, networking with other professionals in the industry, and staying up to date and passionate about my profession, I have learned infinitely more about the field than any certification course could ever teach me.
The field of exercise science, nutrition, and health is super dynamic and always evolving. It is crucial to stay up to date on what is new, what works, what is fad, what is garbage, what is groundbreaking, etc. It’s not the certification that your trainer got back in 1999, it’s what have they learned since that makes them great.
And now a cheesy story about me:
My fitness and health passion started my freshman year in high school. As a scrawny 14 year old, I could barely bench press the 45 lb. bar more than 3 times, and didn’t even know what a deadlift was.
I saw the older kids lifting more weights, and wanted to be just like them. From reading fitness magazines and reading (less than credible) websites, I began weight training seriously. By my senior year I was bulked up to 230 lbs, and pretty strong. Then I went on to college where I did a semester of track and field (emphasis on the field), and tried to get as big as possible, by eating anything and everything. I eventually got up to 260 lbs. (not solid muscle).
After I had a back surgery to remove a cyst, I realized that I no longer needed to be 260 lbs. and I really started learning about the importance of nutrition in conjunction with exercise when it came to changing my body. After one year of hard work, and learning through the process, I got my butt in shape and have stayed there (aside from a few bumps here and there) ever since.
Gained some weight, (lost some hair), lost some weight, gained a beautiful wife. #WINNING
I hope I can help you the same way that I have helped all my clients. I invest in my clients, not in my own bragging rights. I want all my clients to reach for the stars and accomplish whatever they set their minds to!
