Greg found unbreakable fitness through weight training at 47

“I’ve never reached any target or weight loss goal before, so I’m beyond delighted. It’s just been incredible. What has struck me is how consistent the results have been.”

47-year-old Greg learnt the hard way that cardio could not offset bad eating habits.

For years, he had managed to balance out his pizza and pasta calories by running.

It hadn’t made him super fit – but the weight had stayed off…until he hit his 40s.

A few years of sedentary living and careless eating meant he piled on weight. Before long he’d ballooned to 110kg and couldn’t bear to look at his reflection in the mirror.

Self-conscious and generally unhappy about how far his health had slipped, he signed for a full body transformation with his own personal trainer at Ultimate Performance.

Greg is beaming with self-confidence, no longer hides at the back of the room in meetings at work, and feels a great sense of accomplishment following his weight training plan.

Find out all about Greg’s journey here:

What was your motivation for joining U.P.?

So, there were several reasons for wanting to join Ultimate Performance.

I’d always been pretty active in the past. I’d done a lot of running, lots of cardio classes and some weight training on the side.

But during lockdown, the activity stopped but the eating continued. I was in denial about it, even when the jeans and shirt sizes went up.

Then I went to a work function and simply took a candid photo of myself sitting in a chair. And when I saw the picture, I was like, “Oh, that’s what I now look like.” And it was a real shock to the system.

I realised I needed to do something and I couldn’t do it on my own. I was going to need help with this.

What were the biggest changes that you’ve seen in your daily life after U.P.?  

Other people were commenting that I’d become quieter and more withdrawn before U.P. Even when I resumed cardio classes at the gym, I hid at the back.

I didn’t want to see my reflection, which I hadn’t noticed until my self-confidence returned.

That started when people started commenting on my changes in appearance, which I was pretty slow to recognise. I stopped hiding, first in kind of small ways.

I said, like in cardio classes, no longer hiding at the back. But also generally at work, just feeling more self-confident, becoming more vocal, speaking more in meetings. 

Were there any challenges around the training or the diet?  

Surprisingly no!

I had expected two things. One, I would wake up the next day after training in pain, sore and not wanting to move.

And I also thought I was going to be starving all the time. Because that’s how I’ve done diets before.

And neither happened.

Which is why, for the first couple of weeks, I was like, “Is this actually doing anything?” On the other hand, seeing all the stats, I thought, yes, it is! But I’m not hungry. What’s going on? 

Tell us about some of the other physical changes you saw.

One obvious one is that the knee pains have stopped.

When I was so heavy, even just walking caused pain in my left knee. So, the physical pain in my knees is fine now; that’s been great.

I got an email reminder of the Chicago Marathon the same week I joined here. It was supposed to be in 16 weeks.

With the incredible amount of weight loss and the improvements in cardio, I did the Chicago Marathon. It was the first marathon I’ve done where I actually felt confident about it.

Normally I’m halfway through thinking, “Oh, am I going to do this? Can I walk this?” But in this one, I felt surprisingly positive, and I got my second-best time ever in the shortest preparation time to date.

What has been the reaction of people around you to your transformation?

I’ve had loads of positive comments, which I found slightly unnerving at first, and I didn’t know how to take them.

I was just instantly dismissive of it. It’d be like, “Oh, I’m just wearing better clothing. It’s a lighting effort.” Because I just wasn’t used to these positive comments about my appearance.

And then another member of the cardio classes actually came up to me and chatted, saying, “Oh, you’ve lost so much weight. How have you done it? And I said, “Yes, yes, I have.”

I should be proud of this. I worked hard for this to get there. I should own this. My colleagues started noticing as well. So did family members and my partner.

It all started quite rapidly after about eight or nine weeks.

Any final thoughts you want to share that may help someone in the same position?

I remember walking past U.P. and seeing all the before and after photos, being deeply cynical. Thinking, “No, that would never be me. These results aren’t possible.”

And then actually experiencing excellent results in such a short time frame and seeing the before and after photos, it’s like, “Oh, I now look like those after photos”, which I’m still in shock about.

They’re not fake. It is real.

The results are absolutely possible. I would not have believed it in a million years, but it really is.

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