S P O RT S
PERFORMANCE
did all manner of Squat and Lunge
variations, huge amounts of unilateral
lower body work and loads of
plyometrics. I had two 24 inch quads,
a 25 inch waist and a scrawny upper
body with stick arms.
I also used to have to do a tremen-
dous amount of extra hip flexor work.
When you go through the heats of
a competition, the constant leaning
position along with the angle of the
skates used to leave my hip flexors in
absolute agony. When you’re on the
start line the adrenalin kicks in to
mask the pain but between heats
I would barely be able to lift my legs,
let alone jog to warm up or stand up
if I was sitting down. So I used to do
loads and loads of prehab for that.
If I am completely honest with
myself I’ll admit that I always held
back in the gym a little because I
didn’t want to risk being sore and
affecting my performance on the ice
the next day. I just didn’t care about
the gym sessions as much as I did
about the ice sessions...unless it was
a testing day in the gym of course -
then I wanted to win every time!!
still get that now, especially watching
Elise race. I feel nervous, I have
butterflies in my stomach, my hands
get jittery, I’ll cry if she wins and I’ll
cry if she loses because I know how
much it means to these athletes to win.
much to me as competing I was then
able to watch speed skating and I fell
in love with it all over again.
ML: How much of the Roar Fitness
approach can you share with us
without giving away too many secrets?
SL: The biggest secret which anyone
ML: You retired in 2010 and soon
is welcome to try and copy is the
entered the fitness industry as a coach
quality of the team we have. All of
and gym owner. How much did your
background as an athlete help with the our team members work together
so smoothly and effectively. I’ve
transition?
worked in mainstream facilities where
SL: Initially I struggled because
the personal training team work
as an athlete nothing else matters
ML: What elements did you enjoy
against each other and that’s a pretty
but competing and winning, your
most and least about the training?
standard occurance. But our team
entire life revolves around just that.
SL: Whenever I feel nostalgic and I
work together perfectly. Everything
It was difficult to find that drive and
miss being part of the team I remind
motivation because as an athlete you’re from the movement screening by the
myself that I was cold ALL the time.
physio team, the dietary plan from
My big toes were black for 5 years and used to having so much stimulus,
our nutrition team and the resistance
it hurt just to walk all the time. It was every day is important, and exciting
programming from our training team
and scary at the same tim