Hometown Boy Makes Good

How a Doctor scared an overweight DJ into creating a fitness movement

Paul Glazby the founder of Prime Mover was not always the picture of health he is today.

Before

After

His first career success was as a dance DJ, something he is still involved in but is no longer his main passion.

He began initially exercising purely with weights in order to bulk himself up. His diet consisted of pasta, pizza and ice cream, which combined with the weight training proved very successful at bulking him up; from 12 to 16 stone to be exact.

Then a visit to the Doctor changed his life and the direction it would take.

At a routine check up Paul’s Doctor told him in no uncertain terms that he needed to lose the weight he had ‘forced’ onto his body and begin to exercise and eat in a way that would increase his health and fitness rather than rob him of it. He also told him that if he didn’t he risked heart disease and diabetes.

The message was received loud and clear, a Doctor is a great person to get over the message that you aren’t immortal or indestructible. That there are limits to what your body can take and that you have a responsibility to look after it; if you want to live a long healthy life, and Paul did.

After getting over the shock of the warning Paul began taking action. He altered his diet and increased his cardio vascular work, then never one to do things by halves, decided to qualify as a personal trainer and to study nutrition.

As he increased his expertise in exercise and nutrition Paul became increasingly aware that this was something he was passionate about and would be his ideal career. Paul qualified as a personal trainer in 2006. After qualifying it began to dawn on Paul that there was a gulf between the cutting edge material he was using with clients and what was readily available in the normal big brand gyms. The problems were:-

• Most of the exercises that are done in an ordinary gym are not core exercises and therefore do not maximise fat loss and muscle toning.
• Personal training was an expensive extra rather than the necessity it should be. You can’t show someone how to perform an exercise once and expect them to do it perfectly forever.
• Lack of enjoyment. Exercise is only useful if you can keep it up and if you don’t enjoy it you won’t. TV sets are on the walls of normal gyms so that members can zone out and forget how bored they are.

So although he didn’t start out with intention of revolutionizing the Sheffield fitness industry or becoming a local health Guru, word quickly got out about the results Paul was getting with his one to one clients. With zero advertising, whispers on the underground filled Paul’s one to one diary.

But Sheffield wanted more. With his diary full the phone kept ringing. No-one can hide getting into better shape, and when others notice they want to know how you did it. So although he was happy with a full diary of one to one clients, he wanted to make personal training available to everyone that wanted it.

Prime Mover group personal training was born.

The idea was simple. Work core muscles intensely, under the supervision of a personal trainer to upbeat music and love every minute. Music was a key part of the enjoyment and Paul was able to draw on his skill as a DJ to produce the perfect music to train to.

The response has been so overwhelming that less than a year since the opening of the first gym the second is under construction.

Paul puts the success of Prime Mover down to a simple philosophy.

“We don’t tell people what they should be doing, we respond to they ask for. People want good health and to look and feel good. We just show them the best, most enjoyable way to achieve it”