Your Coach

Tennis was my thing growing up. Match days travelling across counties with my mate from the club, that's what I lived for. When I was 14 the club asked if I'd come and help with the kids' summer camp. I said yes, and that week changed me. Watching the kids find joy in something I loved, knowing I had a hand in it, gave me the same satisfaction playing did. That was when I first realised coaching could be it.

School was tough. Not academically, just that I genuinely didn't know what I was meant to be doing. Everyone seemed to have a plan and I felt lost. After school I went straight to college and signed up for a personal training course. I was the skinniest, weakest one in the room. Looked the least like a PT out of anyone there. That fuelled me more than anything else could have.

I worked as a lifeguard at the local leisure centre while I studied. One day in the gym I was trying weighted pull ups and someone told me I'd never be able to do them. I never forgot it. That's when I decided I'd never make anyone feel the way that comment made me feel.

When the course finished I started coaching at the same leisure centre. Took classes, ran sessions, didn't feel like work. The Chief Executive came down one day to hand me an award for service. I still have the photo. What I took from that wasn't the award, it was that making someone feel like the most important person in the room is what I'm here to do.

Lockdown came and I started training people in the park. It blew up. For the next five years I worked from home, took on whoever I could, kept learning, kept refining. Coaching is one of those things where there's always more to figure out. That's part of why I love it.

Now I want to do this properly, in a space built for it. Level Seven is that space. Leighton Buzzard is my hometown, so it had to be here. The aim is simple. Level up the place I love, and give the people in it a real shot at their own fitness.