My Fitness Journey: Jeff King

I am a trainer. I am a person who loves to workout and inspire people to reach their health and fitness goals. I am a person who is aware of what I eat and how it affects me. I am a father who wants to inspire my daughter to live a lifestyle where physical, mental, and emotional health is important to her. I am all these things every day. Before I was this, I was something else. This is where my fitness journey begins.

My journey begins as an 8-year old with a butterball face living in Okinawa, Japan. Some call it baby fat (and I did too), but the reality is, I was CHUBBY. I was a kid who could and did eat a six pack of tacos from Taco Bell in one sitting. I was a kid who would drink sodas and eat cookies. Although I don’t blame my parents for my eating, I did not have strict limits as far as the type of foods I ate. This, however, was not my biggest issue. I normally ate balanced meals and would eat fruits and vegetables. My main issue was lack of consistent physical activity. When I moved to Okinawa, the process of meeting new friends took longer than expected. Combine that with the fact that I had no siblings around my age to play with, and I spent a lot of my time inside watching TV and playing video games. My mom and dad, being nurses, identified this and enrolled me in recreation basketball. Little did they know, this would lead me to the world of organized sports.

Over the next 3 years, I participated in organized basketball, football, and baseball. Around the same time, I hit a growth spurt and became taller. Combine these two factors and Jeff was no longer a little butterball. I was actually thinning out in my waist and looking fit. What a concept: move more and you can become thinner. Say it isn’t so? In all honesty, I could tell the difference even at my young age and the compliments I began to receive from the people close to me really boosted my self-esteem. Playing organized sports went from initially being about getting in shape to me playing because I actually loved each sport.

As I entered High School, I continued to play sports and stay active. It was not until the end of my junior year where two things occurred:

1.    I started really care about the quality of food I ate
2.    I wanted my career to be in the health and fitness industry.

I have one man to blame for all of this occurring: Brett Andrew Klika. His guidance and expertise led me to understand the quality of food you eat will impact your performance on and off the court. No more ingesting just Gatorade right before a workout. His passion and commitment towards helping my team and I become the best team in the county led me to want to become a personal trainer and/or strength coach.

The Fall of 2001 is where my career path begins: University of California – Davis. My undergraduate education taught me many lessons. I realized how many people at school had no clue how to work out or how to eat healthy. I realized how much false “crap” there is in magazines and on the internet in regards to health and fitness. Above all, I recognized I was going to be in a position where I could lead many people down the right path for a healthy lifestyle. The thought motivated me to do well in school and learn as much as possible.

It has been nearly nine years since I graduated from UC Davis. The whole time I have been a personal trainer and strength coach. I started out at 24 Hour Fitness and eventually ended up at Fitness Quest 10 where I currently train. Over the years, I have interacted with many people with many different backgrounds. I have worked with people who wanted to lose weight, gain muscle, run a marathon, etc. No matter who I have worked with, they all have had one thing in common: they were all on a journey to get to somewhere. Some were beginning their journey while others had been on their journey for a while. No matter what leg of the journey they were on, my job was and is to enhance their experience.

It is often said that it is the journey not the destination which is the most enjoyable. I have found this to be true whether I have helped someone lose 30 pounds or prepared myself to compete in a power lifting competition (thank you Ryan Burgess). As a trainer and coach, what’s most important is not the type of fitness journey someone is on, it’s the fact they are actually on their journey and that they have chosen me to take part in it.

So as I reflect on my fitness journey and as it continues, here is my biggest takeaway. I started as a kid who exercised because I was TOLD to. Now I am an adult who exercises because I WANT to. Thank you again Brett Klika. Who knows what my fitness journey would have looked like without your “interference!” I will tell you one thing: I would not trade where I am at this point in my journey for anything in the world.