Matthias

My name is Matthias Taeymans (’92). I have been practicing different disciplines within sports from back when I was in kindergarten. During high-school I started getting interested in fitness as a way to quantify progress within physical capabilities. Later on came an interest into how nutrition, supplementation and lifestyle interventions could be used strategically to support this ongoing search for progress.

Being naturally curious into how the act of physical training, nutrition, supplementation and recovery strategies can influence physiology, cognition, behavior and the physical body, I pursued a bachelor’s degree in physical education. During my first year of college, I had an internship in a local gym. Being only 18 years old at the time I was doing nothing more than sweeping floors and re-racking abandoned dumbbells. I had a great mentor during this internship who decided to take the task upon himself to teach me a few practical things and so my love for training grew stronger. After completing my first internship at the gym, I got offered a job at that same gym allowing me to acquire not only theoretical knowledge but also hands on, practical experience as a trainer.

After obtaining a bachelor’s degree in physical education I immediately started working full time in said gym. In 2016 I started working as a strength and conditioning coach for elite ice-hockey players. Fast forward 10 years later, I have never left the fitness industry. During my first few years of working with people I felt the need to expand the information I was exposed to by attending a list of specific fitness and training courses and certifications. To this day I continue to sustain a “learning mindset” by attending seminars, signing up to courses, subscribing to newsletters, listening to podcasts and most importantly… talk to other trainers about training and life in general.

Being influenced by different sources of education and working experiences, I synthesized the knowledge and practical experience attained through these years into my own evidence-based protocol to program design, periodization, exercise execution and nutrition which I now feel the need to pass on to future generations of personal trainers and fitness coaches.