I was born in a small town called San Antonio, Texas. This is a place few people ever heard of until the San Antonio Spurs won their first championship in 1999. After this, some people knew of my small town of San Antonio as a city, but it will always be a small town to me. I learned at a young age that if you want to succeed in this great country I personally call home, the great state of Texas, no one was going to give me anything and I needed to work for my successes. When I decided to leave the great state of Texas, I chose to enter the Marine Corps as a fat and  overweight youth, so exercise became my life for my time in the Marines. I was taught nutrition and exercise as part of my standards to stay fit. I was told I had to do gym exercises properly with good form in order for to be healthy and fit. If you know anything about Marines, you tell us to be an expert in a subject, and we proceed to learn it inside and out. So I worked out with people of all ages and learned everything I could from them. I went to the library to check out books/ VHS tapes and injected everything I could about working out. I was a complete gym rat and it showed, as I had the fitness most people dreamed of and looked like what most people wanted in their personal lives. As I went from duty station to duty station, deployment to deployment in my career, I continued to seek out knowledge of how to improve my fitness. 

Then a tragic accident occurred. I was in a HUMMWV accident (civilians call it a Humvee), where I was paralyzed from the waist down. It was a lonely feeling and a hopeless one as well, as the doctors said because of my accident they didn’t know if I would walk again. I eventually regained the use of my legs, but also gained back-pain and knee pain as my permanent companions in life. This started my journey to help minimize pain, as I don’t like taking medication, even over the counter, because I saw how it affected people I knew. They would become addicted and belike zombies because of their condition and addiction to pain relief. I read all the books I could and discovered that, in general when a body has been injured, the area becomes weaker and the muscles along with surrounding bones have to pick up the slack for the area lacking in support. So I had the crazy idea to make surrounding tissue (muscles) stronger so the area recovering can recover started. 

This idea really came into play in 2016 when I had a full Achilles rupture in my left leg from the calf, as I was told by the doctors that I will never squat again and shouldn’t squat ever again. I asked when I can put weight on it and when I could be sure it would not rupture again. Surprisingly the doctors said I can probably put weight on it in six weeks, but highly recommended that I not do that. When six weeks was over and the doctor was happy with my leg, he set up a physical therapy session four weeks later. During the weeks leading up to the appointment, I read about a place called Westside Barbell in Columbus, Ohio. This is a gym where acts of strength surpassed anything seen elsewhere in United States. Here a 60 year old was still squatting 500 lbs, deadlifting 700 lbs and benching 400 lbs. It was amazing story! As I read Coach Louie’s story, I realized it sounded quite similar to my previous injuries, as he broke his back TWICE, recovered and started exercising the way the former Soviet Union trained their Olympic athletes, with some slight variations. But they were the same principles I was following and believed in before he put his personal twist on them. Basically you train, using the Russian conjugate system (which changes the exercise program constantly based on the needs and goals of the athlete), at 50% or higher from the athlete’s maximum weight (or personal record, PR) depending on what your target goal is and adding speed along with the heavy days. It was a breakthrough for me, and I couldn’t wait to try it out on my newly cleared leg. 

I applied this program and went from a 90 pound back squat to a 420 lb back squat in only three months. People were amazed to see me do this, and my physical therapist couldn’t and wouldn’t believe me that I had a full rupture 10 to 12 weeks prior. She need to review my chart and confirm my medical history was real. But she confirmed this was real and said I didn’t need to come back because there was nothing for her to fix. After this point I really wanted to teach and help others who have been told that they could never or shouldn’t do exercise because of an injury. The majority of doctors mean well and often prescribe extreme caution in the firm belief they are helping their patients to the best of their abilities. Unfortunately, this is not always the best answer as they are allowing stagnant behavior to win over an active behavior. Many reoccurring injuries happen because the area affected never regained strength and neither did the surrounding areas that support it. This causes more breakdown, leading to more injuries along with additional medication to mask pain. I want to help others and pass on my proven knowledge, as I know not everyone is the same. But that is what makes a conjugate system work so beautifully for all the athletes. It’s why CrossFit works when the proper principles are applied just like Coach Glassman is trying to instill in the mindset of people all over the world. That constantly varied high intensity workouts can work in the benefit of your life if applied correctly. I’ve taken the CrossFit level one class, a Gymnastic training class and an Olympic training class. I took the information from these classes and many other sources to craft and hone what I know about fitness. I plan to continue to attend classes to grow and refine my knowledge and coaching skills from what experts from their fields have to say. I’ve studied more coaches but I feel these individuals influenced me the most:  Coach Louie, Coach Glassman, Coach Rippetoe, Coach Burgener and hopefully, future others I have yet to discover. I have years of reading books, watching videos and applying fitness concepts to my own life and proved how they helped me. I now want to use all of this…to help you.