Instructors
Dave Brownley
Hi, I am David Brownley, my story of fitness starts very early.
I started gymnastics at the age of 6 following in my father's footsteps, as he was once English schoolboy champion, and second junior in Europe.
I trained and competed until unfortunately at 14 I broke my ankle, (funny story it was actually the first time I had ever been on a trampoline). At that point I was told not to carry out any impact physical activity, bang went the gymnastics.
Rather than sit around idle for a year I decided to take up Martial Arts and trained myself in many different styles including, Wing Chun, Aikido, Karate, and Judo.
Finally I found the excellent sport of boxing which suited me as I was strong, very fit and had a great aptitude for the sport.
I left school at 15 with 11 GCSE's which allowed me to go to college to study another of my passions, Chemistry. I studied 'A' levels in Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Maths, whilst still keeping up my gruelling training regime.
After this very demanding year I decided to join the army first with the reserves and then with the regular army.
Whilst serving, I went on to complete my first year of a Degree in Chemistry, studying modules in Anatomy and Physiology and Psychology.
Then started my trip round the world!
I served in many countries, Norway, Iraq, Cyprus and Germany to name a few. I accumulated many skills in the army but what I most enjoyed was working in the gym as a Physical Training Instructor. I instructed 1000's of lessons incorporating all aspects of fitness.
As an instructor in the army you had to keep all your lessons varied and interesting, in the gym we worked on developing and carrying out training programs for all levels of fitness and to groups ranging from 1 to 700. We also had the Friday Funnies, a friendly competition between all of the companies in my battalion. This incorporated a variety of equipment including oil drums, land rovers, telegraph poles, and not forgetting the 20ft canoes! In the gym I further developed my knowledge and my own physical fitness and was proud to represent my battalion at Boxing, Orienteering, Cross Country and Triathlon. Due to the operational and time commitments in the army we had to train soldiers very efficiently which helped me develop very unique programs to gain the best possible results in the shortest possible time, enabling soldiers to train and operate effectively and safely. My last 3 years in the army were spent mainly in the gym. I was promoted to Corporal and had a more senior role, teaching specialised techniques of Arrest and Restraint and Hand to Hand Combat to soldiers to ready them for operations throughout the world.
When I left the army I went on to manage a very successful health club. Whilst there I learnt many valuable lessons, and met some great people. But I decided that I wanted to teach my own ethos and philosophies about training, fitness and wellbeing. So I started 'The Fitness Works' .And the rest as they say is history.
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