For those of you who haven't met me before my name is Leon James-Lionel and I am the Head Personal Trainer and founder of LJL Fitness.
In my younger years I was extremely into my sport, I played a lot of football at a good level and eventually moved towards sprint training when I was around 15. I was unfortunate with injuries and by the time I was 20, during my University years I wasn't really able to sprint or play football anymore. Like many who suddenly stop playing sport, I didn't replace the exercise I was missing with anything else and didn't have the knowledge on nutrition to know what was good and bad food. Guess what that meant.. WEIGHT GAIN. I went from weighing around 79kg up to around 96kg. Most of which was body fat. At the time I didn't care.
I graduated, eventually got a job working at a gym in my hometown in Slough and very quickly grew to love it. Much of my time would be spent on the gym floor helping members with exercises and providing motivational support. But at this time I wasn't yet into my training.
So what was the turning point?
After a conversation on food with a gym member he said to me, 'How can you give me advice on food when you have a belly'.
True story.
Stunned, the conversation ended and when I finished work that day I went home and took a long hard look in the mirror and realised he was right. I wasn't practicing what I preached. I wasn't being a role model or leading by example. And I DID have a slight belly!
Now that's not to say that someone overweight doesn't know what they are talking about with regards to health and fitness. But you can't beat a person that practices what they preach. I vowed that no-one would ever be able to say that to me again and thus, was the birth of my gym journey.
I asked for advice from various instructors and did a LOT of research on the internet (MONTHS) to figure out how to eat and train. I stayed consistent with training and made the necessary food changes. Some months later these were the end results.
People that knew me couldn't believe my results. But the reality is, almost anything is possible if you BELIEVE it is and are prepared to make SACRIFICES.
After my own transformation, a passion for helping people burn fat and achieve their goals while educating them along the way was ignited. I wanted to show people more effective ways to train and be held accountable for their own actions. I wanted to utterly dismantle the myths around many diets and industry fads and show people how to master their health and greatly enhance their quality of life. After a year of study I completed my personal training qualification, created LJL Fitness in 2014 and have been helping clients achieve their goals since.
I specialise in helping overweight executives and entrepreneurs lose body fat, so that is what the bulk of the information in this blog will be related to. If that doesn't interest you then this may not be for you. However if fat loss is indeed your primary goal then this blog will likely benefit you.
As a personal trainer I saw fantastic success with many of my clients even in my early days coaching, but I'm forever chasing evolution and progress, continuously learning more efficient ways to further accelerate the results of my clients.
The beauty of being a health coach is that it is always an ongoing learning process. I will never claim to know everything. There will always be new studies and new research emerging and as a client you will benefit from this knowledge as I come across it.
I look forward to assisting you on your fat loss journey!
Leon