About

Your one-stop lifting shop...

I help you get strong while supporting your health, while your career is in full tilt, + without destroying your joints.​

Some of my clients are former CrossFitters, Powerlifters, Strongwomen, & Weightlifters figuring out their lifting life while their competitive careers are on hiatus. Or when they are ready to take a different approach.

Some of my clients want to build a bangin' body without a part-time job in the gym.

ALL of my clients are health-conscious, smart AF, + care deeply about our planet + our people.

Because I don't follow a cookie-cutter method, it's easy to individualize effective strength training principles with your goals, your season of life, & your circumstances. 

My History & Why I Care About Strength

How can I get the best results? In the least amount of time? With the least amount of effort? For the longest staying power?

These four questions have steered my own training & career since 2007. I began as a weight loss coach after solving my own "weight gain" problem doing the exact opposite of what is conventionally touted to lose weight: eating more and moving less.

In 2014 I noticed myself, my clients, and fellow peers experiencing nagging aches, pains, and recurring injuries from training. We basically had three options: Stop doing things that hurt; Use an increasing variety of bands, balls, and "distractions" daily; or spend hundreds and thousands of dollars dulling (yet never resolving) pain at the Chiropractor's, Massage Therapist's, or Physical Therapist's office. After using all three I thought, "WOW, life is way too short to have a part-time job managing pain!" (This is eerily similar to my struggle losing weight... do more, try harder... "it's YOUR fault you aren't losing" messaging)

After returning to my four questions and learning from some pretty smart dudes, I went the opposite way of my peers, rebuilt my coaching practice from the ground up, & practice an assessment-driven programming model that includes everything each and every client needs and nothing they don't. My clients loved it. Word kinda spread.

Join the Strength Circle

Join a circle of likeminded lifters who care about building sustainable strength while supporting their health.

If you're curious about who I learn from & have been shaped by, I'm forever indebted to these folks who I've studied with in-person:

Here are resources I've read, coaches I've worked with and/or been coached by, & who practice philosophies similar to what you will find on this site:

  • Nassim Taleb, Antifragile (book)
  • Phillip & Martina Chubb @the_mindful_mover
  • Kevin Cann @precision_powerlifting_systems

Looking for the education???

My last semester of college I used Amazon for the first time to purchase my textbooks & realized I'm paying thousands of $ each semester to be told what to read. If I could go back in time, I would have spent less time at expensive weekend seminars and would have sought out more high quality coaches to intern under, work with, and learn from on a deeper level.

But here you go if you care about this sort of thing:

  • Spin Instructor @ UTK TRec
  • CrossFit, Level 1 Trainer, 2009-2016
  • CrossFit Knoxville, 2009
  • BA Psychology, University of Tennessee, 2009
  • Started The Vitality Initiative - leading group strength classes out of my mom's basement, small group personal training, and one-on-one personal training 2010-2018
  • NSCA - CSCS, 2011-present
  • Total Performance Sports Internship + Coaching, 2013
  • Gymnastic Bodies, 2014-2017
  • Gymnastics Coach for Iron Force Athletics CrossFit Masters Group 2014
  • Gymnastics Coach for Cambridge Synchronized Swimming Club, 2016-2018
  • Coach at Ethos Fitness + Performance in Boston, 2016-2018
  • StrongFirst, Level 1, 2017 - 2019
  • The Active Life Coach Workshop, 2017
  • Kilo Strength Society, Online Program Design Course, 2018
  • Muscle Nerds Health, Program Design, in progress
>