We were lucky to catch up with Ryan Nosak recently and have shared our conversation below.

Ryan, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear a story from back when you were an intern or apprentice. What’s a memorable story you can share with us?

During my senior year in college, I worked as a student intern strength and conditioning coach for the Penn State Football Team and a variety of other D1 sports. The typical day in my life was atypical for the average college student. Here is what my schedule looked like:
-4am: wake up, eat a small breakfast, make coffee and out the door by 4:30am
-4:30am: 30 min walk to the football building
-5:15am: the day starts with a meeting about the upcoming workouts and setting up the weight room for workouts
-6am to 10am: help coach the football training sessions
-10am: leave for class and eat a small snack on the way
-10am to 1:30pm: in class
-1:30pm: quick lunch and back to the athletics building
-2pm to 5pm: help coach the athlete training sessions for various D1 sports
-5pm to 6pm: walk to student fitness center and eat dinner upon arrival
-6pm to 10pm: work as a trainer in the student fitness center
-10pm to 11pm: walk home and get ready for bed only to do it all again the next day.

This schedule was extremely difficult to manage as a 22-year old, but it was one of the best lessons I learned on my path to becoming an entrepreneur. If you truly want something, you need to work your ass off to make it happen and I was willing to burn the ships to immerse myself in becoming a coach. Each day was like I was completing a college course on working with humans and I racked up thousands of hours of experience while greatly enjoying it in the process. I learned the value of prioritizing and time blocking my calendar which I still use today to manage my time as an entrepreneur.

Ryan, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Ryan Nosak has lived a life that is anything but ordinary. He lost his mother to cancer when he was 5 years old. 15 months later, his uncle tragically died in a car accident. Death, loss, and despair plagued his family which led Ryan down a path of medicating with an overconsumption of food and a sedentary lifestyle. He struggled with depression and confidence as he became known as the fat kid in school.

It would all change when he stepped foot into a gym for the first time at 13 years old and caught the so called “iron bug”. What transpired led Ryan to pursue a career in fitness. He coached his high school friends through strength training sessions and realized he had a knack for teaching and inspiring others. He transformed himself from the fat kid to being known as the strongest kid in his school. He recognizes strength training as the tool that saved his life.

Ryan attended Penn State University for his undergraduate degree in Kinesiology, where he worked as a student coach for the Penn State Nittany Lions football team, as well as numerous other sports. This led him down the path of working as a Division 1 Strength and Conditioning Coach for 9 years with stops along the way at Tennessee State University, Vanderbilt, Robert Morris University, The University of North Carolina at Charlotte, DePaul University. He has worked at Power 5 universities, aided in the training of multiple professional athletes, and has been mentored by NFL strength and conditioning coaches.

Ryan stepped away from college athletics in 2020 to run RyNo Strength, which is an in-person and online training service. He helps ex-athletes lose weight and boost energy without giving up pizza, alcohol, or their social life. He resides in Chicago with his wife, dog, and daughter.

Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?

I am an avid reader and these books have impacted me the most: What’s In It for Them- Joe Polish, How to Win Friends and Influence People-Dale Carnegie, Dotcom Secrets-Russell Brunson, Expert Secrets-Russell Brunson, Traffic Secrets- Russell Brunson, The Obstacle is the Way-Ryan Holiday, Essentialism-Greg McKeown, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant- Eric Jorgenson, Ignite the Fire-Jonathan Goodman, The Strangest Secret- Earl Nightingale

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

As indicated by my internship, working extremely hard and putting in an insane amount of hours was drilled into me since the start of my career. For me to currently advance my business, I’ve had to learn the lesson to spend less time working in my business versus working on my business. I started viewing myself as the CEO of my company instead of a personal trainer who made his job his business. Viewing myself through the lens of a CEO has forced me to become clear on where and how I am spending my time and what truly matters to continue to advance and scale.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://rynostrength.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ryan.nosak/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ryan.nosak/