This past weekend, James and I drove down to Phoenix on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday to the Perform Better Meeting of the Minds Summit.  Some of the considered leaders of our industry, including Tom Myers, Don Chu, John Berardi, Mark Verstegan and Mike Boyle presented on their vision of the future of fitness.  Each speaker was given about two hours to discuss what their current practice was, why they thought it was the best (with a little bit of shameless selling and self-promotion thrown in), and where they thought the industry was headed.  Ironically, many of them claimed to be doing now what the industry will consider commonplace in the future.  I highly respect the “alpha” in their personality and their confidence and don’t really feel it is all that shameless to make that claim.  They are only expressing their belief in themselves, and prophesying a future with themselves continuing to lead the pack.  At the end of the seminar, the organizer of the event asked the audience to express their “take-aways” from the weekend.  I sat there silently and listened for a while before I decided that I needed some time away from the speakers to write and figure out what I actually took away from the weekend.  After formalizing my thoughts, I have decided that the future of personal training, preventative health care, strength coaches, soft tissue manipulation therapists, and all the other professions in our community, is split into two distinct categories: general health and elite performance.  Like all great dichotomies, the distinction is quite grey! (thanks to us health nuts trying to maximize our fitness potential)  But I will assume that everyone reading this has an understanding of the difference between those two categories.

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By Jason Lomond

de Witt and Venter claim that repetitive patterns of movement lead to specific patterns in fascia contraction, which, if it exceeds a specific limit, will lead to injury. The ‘Bunkie’ test was developed by de Witt over a period of 12 years to measure the function of the specific fascial lines in athletes.

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"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent.  It takes a touch of genius—and a lot of courage—to move in the opposite direction." -E.F. Schumacker

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By Karyn Schinkel, RMT

Karyn Schinkel, James and Leighanne FitzGerald's massage therapist, talks about the importance of massage for athletic performance and injury prevention.

..."Of all the modules, I believe that the Lifestyle Coaching module is the most important and impactful.  I know that James agrees.  The reason is simple: Coaches fail when their clients fail to comply with their advice." -CJ Martin