Personal training for people whose back has an opinion

The problem with "just be careful"

You've been told to protect it. Brace, avoid bending, skip the deadlifts, sit up straight. So you did, and the back got weaker along with the rest of you, and now a bag of groceries is a decision. That's not a moral failing. A back that is never loaded loses the capacity to be loaded, and a nervous system that is told the back is fragile starts treating ordinary movement as a threat.

Backs don't get better by being spared. They get better by being convinced.

What I do differently

I'm a personal trainer with a rehab specialist's training in what a back will accept. Cognitive Functional Therapy, trained under Peter O'Sullivan, is how I read your pain system: which movements it's guarding, which of those it will let go of today, and which need to wait. Applied Functional Science, from the Gray Institute, is how I decide where the load goes so the hips and the mid-back do their share instead of leaving it all to the sore bit.

Then we train. Properly. Hinges, carries, squats, presses, at loads that go up. The back is in the program, not around it.

Who this is for

The disc bulge that "showed something" on the MRI and nothing since. The back that goes once a year when you sneeze. The one that's fine until the third hour on the mountain. The one that's been through the PT, the chiro and the injection and is still the reason you don't lift. If you've been cleared, or nobody has ever found anything to clear you of, this page is you.

It is not for you today if the pain came with numbness in both legs, bladder or bowel changes, fever, or a fall. Those need a doctor first, and I'll say so in the assessment.

How a session runs

First visit: a 30-minute assessment, $57. I watch you bend, hinge and load, find the one change that helps most, and you feel it before you leave. You get a plain read on whether I can help.

Then 60 minutes, or 30, one-on-one in the studio at 1800 Glenarm Place in downtown Denver or on Zoom. We warm up the back with the movements it already tolerates, train hard everywhere else, and every few weeks go back and load the thing you were worried about to see whether it's still worth worrying about. Nutrition coaching is included; it matters more for backs than people expect, because a body that isn't recovering doesn't tolerate load.

What clients on camera say

8 of the 23 clients who let me film their sessions came in for a back. Each rates their pain before and after, on camera. Results vary from person to person. Watch the back videos →

"I found Jamie through a recommendation from a coworker after hurting my back after a strenuous backpacking trip and lucky for me we work in the same building! Since being rehabilitated from my back pain, I continue to see Jamie ongoing for regular workouts (since he's the only person i would trust to work me hard but not put me are risk of reinjury) and probably will forever. At Jamie's studio I get a caring, results focused top-tier personal trainer experience paired with the clinical precision of a physical therapist. Why would I go anywhere else?"

Point is this: the goal isn't a back that never hurts. It's a back you stop planning your life around.

The rehab side of back pain, in detail → · Sciatica → · Why pain flares some weeks → · Personal training in downtown Denver →