more ABOUT ME
I joined the Army as a 16 year old Apprentice. two years of telecoms theory, six months of practical equipment training - all whilst doing the usual soldier stuff - which back then did include cleaning toilets with a toothbrush (if you're smart, then NOT THE ONE you intend to brush your teeth with!)
That apprenticeship led to quick promotions, and I ended my time in the Army teaching digital telecoms theory at the Royal School of Signals.
This set me up for a great career as a Telecoms consultant travelling the world, working for many companies, growing teams to perform Field Testing of mobile phone products, finishing in telecoms as a Training Manager working to ISO 17025.
Sometimes it's not any of the qualifications you have, so much as the experience.
I went to lots of schools as my Dad was in the Army. One of the schools, Carterton County Primary School had it's own swimming pool. Whilst this sounds grand, especially in the 1970's, it was more like a large 10 metre x 5 metre indoor paddling pool, you had to climb up steps from ground level to get higher than the sides, then climb down steps to get into it.
At that school I attained the only swimming qualifications I ever achieved. 5 metre and 10 metre certificates.
But that shouldn't detract from my ability to swim. When I was serving in the Falkland Islands, if I was off shift I would often use the swimming pool and just because I had never done it before in my life, I would swim 1 mile - just to confirm to myself that I could. (I hated it because I always feel my head gets far too hot in indoor swimming pools, but at least I knew I could swim one mile if I needed to).
Those two little certificates provided a great foundation to build on.
It doesn't matter what other people think of your achievements as long as you can see the benefit.
In 2008 whilst contracting out in Germany, I was diagnosed with two lots of spinal damage and arthritis of the spine
I didn't move into the fitness industry until 2016, first as a Personal Trainer, then group fitness instructor, Nutrition Coach, Yoga Teacher and then Sports Massage Therapist
I find that, in my opinion, sometimes not having always been a PT or a yoga teacher helps - because I can commiserate with people that can't naturally do splits of handstands, or have back issues etc.
That lived experience helps me to relate to the client and think more about how to adapt movement patterns to get the most out of them
So this is me, an ex-soldier, that now tries to help others to improve their health and fitness.
People have different goals, but its a great feeling of satisfaction seeing clients achieve them!
Whilst I didn't start out with a view to having any sort of specialism, it just happened that I now have a lot of experience working with people with all sorts of medical issues, illnesses and injuries - rehab and pre-has work.
Any PT can tell you to do 10 press ups, a great trainer will realise what is going wrong and figure out how to adapt it to work for you.
This works for yoga poses and skills too.
Why the different background colours?
Well "you can take the man out of the army, but you can't take the army out of the man" From "more About Me" down to this text section, these three background colours form the colours of my former corps. The Royal Corps of Signals.
Light blue - the air
Green - land
Dark blue - the sea
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