We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Anthony Cruz a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Anthony, appreciate you joining us today. If you had a defining moment that you feel really changed the trajectory of your career, we’d love to hear the story and details.

The defining moment of my career came from going to a seminar that was hosted by Katie Dabrowski, the knowledge and shift in perspective of my role as a coach was altered and changed my trajectory, but also what had lead up into that moment was the defining portion of my career in the fitness/health space.
I grew up in a Mexican household and there are certain pressures and ideas that come from that in a great way but also not in a great way. What I mean is I learned how to work hard, family values and being persistent. However, being one of the first to in my family to pursue education in the states came with the idea of valuing more of the idea of ” making money to survive ” as oppose to creating myself and finding my passions. Being 15-24.. I mean kind of a tall task to figure out who you are with so little experience in life but having huge life moments.
Further more I went to a 4 year and pursued kinesiology – exercise science, graduated and had my eyes pretty set in stone that I would eventually become a physical therapist, but something about that still did not connect with me (did I also mention I went to undergrad pursuing computer informations technology? haha, again how can I make the most money), and during the time of getting my pre-reqs done I was working at a gym and getting clients so I paused on the pre reqs.
This year I had decided to just focus on ME. What that looked like was seeking mentorship in finance, fitness, business and life. I found Kettlebell Coach University through a mutual and my whole world flipped upside down, I started to realized what my values where, my ” no matter what’s “, what did I want my life to look like, I started to dive deep into what made me and what did I like and answering a simple question/task.
Can I make my life look like this everyday and be successful? If so,,, lets keep going.

Than at Katie seminar, lone and behold who’s there? Hunter crine (founder of kbcu) and other leading experts in the fitness space and my life forever changed in my career as I wasn’t just a ” coach ” , but an individual that can provide guidance and empowerment to elevate/maintain their human qualities in a physical manner and truthfully, the whole psychosocial manner. The seminar and everything that had lead up to that moment was a defining moment in my career and gave me a new excitement for what I am able to do every day.

Anthony, 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?

How I was introduce into this space was by a dear friend (CJ) who was a mentor of mine during undergrad and introduced me into the space of fitness and health.

During my career up until now I have worked in various clinic rehab spaces (physical therapy) and have been a coach since in a physical therapy setting and private gyms and currently work as a coach who currently provides the following services:
– 1 on 1 personal training
– small group training
– 1 on 1 online training
– online programs
– large group classes

The problems I solve for my clients are elevating/maintaining their bio motor qualities (speed, strength, endurance. mobility, power) while meeting where they are currently at in their fitness level while also making them feel confident based on their goal they want to get such a weight loss. What sets me apart is my continuous learning, I continously invest into my. learning to elevate myself as a coach while also my experience in fitness. I believed that the skills I possesed are that I love people, I have a hope for people that they can get to where they want to get to and my second skill is being able to listen, based off of my childhood/adult experience, those were the 2 skills that came natural to me but also where a by product of what I went through.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

A story I don’t mind sharing was funny enough around the same time as Katies seminar.

At this point I had been working 7 day as week, getting up at 3;30am-4:30am and getting home pretty late while working on other endeavors and it came to a point that I did not want to be apart of this world anymore because it became too much.

Happy to say I pushed forward of that but for me that moment was big because it was around the same time of that moment defining career and it was a point for me as a man, a latino man where I had to ask for help and reach out to people about what was going on and talk about these feelings where they were not unusual, but had never gotten to a point like this where the light was very dim.

Putting training and knowledge aside, what else do you think really matters in terms of succeeding in your field?

The most helpful tip for succeeding in this field I think is compassion.

In my field, everything tends to be pretty obvious, when it comes to strength training, progression, power, building up qualities, and general health guidelines.

However, humans are not protocols. If that were the case than why would a coach be needed.

The biggest help in this truly caring about people, because that allows a drive to seek more and continously be better for our clients and be there for them. We might be one of the only people for them who believes them or cheers them on so we play a pivotal role.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @liftswcruz

Image Credits

Brandyn Victorio