Paddington Feature Member:
James Dent

Taking the February spot for BBB Paddington Member of the Month is James Dent. James is an ED doctor and loves to get a surf in when he can. He came to us after seeing a lot of patients injure themselves in the gym or at work and how that impacted other aspects of their lives. 

James has been with us for just over 2 and a half years and we have seen such a change in his mindset in regards to his training in that time. 

The first time I met James our much loved former coach Codie asked me to take him through a PT session. He did not tell me that he usually had to bribe James to do the metcon piece, and as a junior coach I followed the program to a tee. Next thing I know James is refusing to jump on the rower, saying he “didn’t want to get his heart rate up” and attempted haggling to swap the exercise for push-ups.

This is a long way from the athlete he is now, constantly pushing for Rx WODs and ending up sprawled out on his back after giving 100% in every workout!  So what changed? Before starting, James was most nervous about his “appalling lack of fitness being on display. Seeing how fit everyone looked in the classes didn’t help with this, so it actually took 6 months of just doing PTs before my coach eventually forced me to do a group class.”

Sound Familiar?

“I had a great time and although I was slow, everyone was super supportive. I suddenly wondered what I’d been so worried about. My only regret was not jumping in earlier”

Since jumping into class and continuing his Personal Training with Coach Cauchi, James has reassessed his goals from wanting to increase his general physical preparedness to pushing towards more performance oriented goals such as Bar Muscle-ups and Olympic Lifting.

James is improving in leaps and bounds and I am stoked to say those BMU’s are becoming more and more consistent after he attended the Paddington Gymnastics seminar. None of these “What particularly surprised me was that I was able to get PRs in the more basic movements like bench/squats/deadlifts despite spending a fraction of the time on these movements that I used to”.

So what’s next for Dr Dent?  “For now I’m focussed on slowly moving forward with my cardio fitness while also improving my technique in the strength pieces. Keeping injury-free remains my number one priority. And yes Cauchi, I will start/keep stretching to improve my atrocious mobility”.

Congrats James MOTM is well deserved. It’s been awesome seeing your transformation over my time at BBB and I can’t wait to see where it all takes you!