StrongPoints Fitness
609 W. Washington St., Ste. 12, Sequim
206-356-9054
Hours: 7 a.m.-7 p.m. by appointment only
Matt Parks is a walking advertisement for his new business StrongPoints Fitness — tall, muscular, hale and hearty, the affable 31-year-old is a personal trainer holding multiple certifications who clearly practices what he preaches. A graduate of Sequim High School, Peninsula College and Seattle Community Center College, he initially elected physical therapy as his field of interest.
“I studied physical therapy because I always wanted to teach and help people. I like seeing people improve in their abilities, especially, but the more and more I got into physical therapy, the less I found I wanted to do it, so I looked for an alternative,” Parks said. “I didn’t want to do it in such a formal atmosphere and I wanted to have a wider range of working with people who were broken but also those that were fit who wanted to improve.”
He worked briefly in Ballard and then spent four years as a trainer in California for Equinox, a high-end gym in California. Gradually, when visiting his parents Liz and Richard Parks in his hometown, he was drawn back and opened StrongPoints Fitness in April. Parks has been a personal trainer for 10 years and is certified as the following: personal trainer, kettlebell coach, Olympic weightlifting coach, strength coach and TRX trainer. He spent three years earning the certifications.
“I’ve done enough basic and continuing education to know how to effectively train people in how their bodies work and I really use a lot of the tools I have with clients,” Parks said. “I’ve got the certifications I have because I believe the more tools, the things you know, the more effective you can be. As a trainer, it’s up to me to use the tools I choose with my clients by getting to know someone else’s body and how they move. That helps me design the best program for them.”
He explained, “My main goal is to design an exercise program around someone’s individual needs and take their goals, personal history and exercise history. I have trained high school athletes, a 65-year-old competitive weightlifter and 80-year-old Parkinson’s patient so there’s a pretty wide range of what I do. I focus on healthy movement, really getting people to move properly — many have limited mobility so I’ll use a lot of different methods to improve their range of motion. The better you’re moving, the better you’ll feel. People kind of resign themselves to how they feel and that’s not how it should be.”
From the novice to the athlete, Parks begins with basic body weight movements, rehabilitation work if needed, and works up to dynamic barbell work with a mandatory warm-up and cool-down.
“It’s important to prime the body for activity so I include body part specific warm-ups as well as individualized attention to anyone’s weak points. Warm-ups definitely are the most important part because if not, you can really injure yourself,” Parks said. “I begin weight lifts with progressively heavier sets to get the body to ramp up. It takes awhile to get your nervous system firing to get up to full speed. I have seen people on their own neglect warm-ups and hurt themselves. This (training) is supposed to be sustainable — if you’re treating it like a sprint, you can’t sustain it for very long.”
Parks said a cool-down period is equally important with stretches for loosening up muscles to prevent cramping.
Parks speaks of the rewards he’s felt in working with clients: a 65-year-old man whose sole goal was to touch his toes for the first time in 40 years and did; a woman who wanted to be able to lift her suitcase into an overhead plane bin — she ended up being able to deadlift 100 pounds.
“More than anything, I enjoy people overcoming obstacles and challenges and that’s probably my favorite part of what I do,” Parks said, adding that Sequim is a great word-of-mouth networking town. “To wrap it up, I give complimentary first sessions, do one-on-one or small groups up to four — anymore than that it’s hard to keep an eye on everybody. I don’t want to compromise my quality of coaching. My ultimate goal it to help people remember their body is supposed to be pain free, healthy and strong.”
