In the last 20 years, I have helped thousands of people make fitness and health a priority. But before I could help anyone find success, I needed to find success for myself. After a near-death car accident in 2001, I had to rehab myself to get back to my athletic pursuits. I had many goals I wanted to attain and I researched methods to help me reach them.  

After visiting a local bookstore in early 2002, I discovered the book “Body For Life” and the Body for Life Challenge. This book had simple nutrition and exercise principles to follow. I bought a journal and started to track my workouts, my meal plan, and my results. 

After the 12-week challenge, I felt great and my body started to get stronger. And, like most 20 something-year-old males I then pursued bodybuilding. I thought that getting muscular and jacked would help me with the ladies 😂.

Too Much Muscle

I quickly found out that adding muscle was challenging and it required me to eat a lot of food, and work out hard almost every day. In the fall of 2004, I was hunting elk in the high mountains of Colorado. I was carrying an extra 40 lbs of muscle and fat which took a toll on my body. I had an extremely hard time trying to keep up with the group that was all 10+ years older than me. 

When I returned to California after the hunt, I evaluated my goals and my cost of staying big. I also met with one of my peers for a fitness consultation, he helped me navigate reducing my body size. His holistic approach had me doing cardio several times per week. I hated to run so I found fun ways to achieve this. I bought my first mountain bike and I took up surfing, mountain biking is still a passion of mine. Over several months, I trimmed down 20 lbs and cycling and surfing became a lot easier, and a lot more fun. This was the birth of “Live Life Beyond the Gym Walls!”

Exercise for All

As a personal trainer in San Diego, I was working with several types of people daily. Each one of these clients had unique and different goals. This was also my first introduction to training more serious athletes. I was fortunate to work with some high school, collegiate, Olympic and professional athletes.  As a young coach, I was pursuing my associate’s degree in exercise science from a local Community College.  I was also speaking to my peers at the facility I worked at.

The 24 Hour Fitness gym I worked at had some of the best personal trainers in the entire company. I was very fortunate to work alongside some of these great trainers. They challenged me to meet my clients where they were starting from and progress them to their goals. This involved a lot of question-asking, since most information was not readily available at my fingertips like it is now. I had to research a lot and communicate with the other trainers.

My first personal training certification had us implementing an overhead squat and single-leg squat assessment. This is very similar to the Functional Movement Screen we use now at the Performance Ranch. This approach led me down a path to adapt my programs to help each individual. I had a lot of help from my peers creating programs for my clients.

While working in a big box gym, I was meeting with prospective clients almost every day for free fitness consultations. In these sessions, we were reviewing goals, exercise history, past injuries, and creating a plan to help them find success. 

Strategy Session and Goal Reviews

To start your journey with the Performance Ranch you must start with a free Strategy Session. After you become a client we meet with you for quarterly Goal Reviews. 

In the free 30-minute strategy session, we sit down with each prospective client and learn about their goals, exercise history, schedule, roadblocks, and we help create a plan to find success. We have found that these free 30 minute sessions are 10x more powerful than showing up for a free workout session. 

Free workouts don’t work because we have no idea what you need. Imagine going to a doctor with shoulder pain and without any diagnostics, they decide to do surgery that day because your shoulder hurts. 

Functional Movement Screen

We feel the same about exercise. We start each one of our programs with a Functional Movement Screen to assess your movement capabilities. This simple screen is something all humans should be capable of doing with some ease. 

In nearly 10 years of experience using the system, I have found that we could bucket most people into a few different categories. Mostly because of lifestyle and work demands. These chronic patterns may make your sport or job easier, but usually, these patterns come back as chronic pain and stiffness. Once we determine your movement patterns, we can then lay out a plan to get you to move more efficiently. 

Like I mentioned previously, we meet our client’s where they are starting from. Our coaches are knowledgeable and address each individual needs of the client. 

If you’re ready to start training to become the ultimate you, we are here to help you get started. Like I am known to say, “Just press Start!”