When looking for a coach it’s often difficult to find the complete package. For me I feel extremely lucky that’s not true. During the first lockdown Steve was a guest on a live Instagram feed with a Thai fighter that I followed. I can honestly say making the decision to watch that was probably the best decision of my life. Steve was honest, extremely knowledgable and I could have listened to him for hours with his life stories and how he’s overcome challenges in his own life. I started to follow him on insta and the next day he put up a poll asking if anybody wanted to have any more info about training with him. At this time he was based in Dubai and I thought I don’t think online is for me. How would it work ? We can’t train in the gym, I’ve hardly got any equipment at home. I just don’t think it will work. How wrong was I. As the day went on I thought it can’t hurt to have the chat so I clicked yes and the rest is history. Steve messaged me and we had our first on-line Zoom the next day. We’d scheduled 30 minutes but by the time we’d finished it was over an hour. We both laughed and cried and for the first time in a long time I felt happy. That hour was life changing for me. As someone who has been over weight for a long long time I was nervous to open up but Steve changed all that. He totally understood where I was coming from and never once made me feel embarrassed for being over weight or let it stop up doing anything. So the journey began. We planned all my food and our online training sessions started. For me the food planning and the exercising was 50% of what I needed Steve for. He explained how calories in vs calories out and macros worked. It all clicked and I just got it. I stuck to our plan and to my surprise the pounds were just falling off. I was getting fitter and stronger day by day and I was loving it. The other 50% was where it counted for me and what makes Steve different to any other coach I’ve ever met. It was time we spent when he asked me how I was really feeling. Why I thought I’d gained weight and how it made me feel. He taught me that it’s ok to be over weight if you’re happy with it. If you’re not take control and do something about it. So that’s exactly what we did. Within 5 months I’d lost 4 stone without meeting Steve in person. Steve then came back from Dubai and started working in a gym. I was nervous to go to the gym we’d done so well online i didn’t want to change anything. So we met in the middle and said we’d do half online half in the gym. So after 5 months of training online I went to the gym and met Steve in person. It was an emotional day that I will remember forever. After that session we decided that to move forward with my journey we would train in the gym twice a week. Unfortunately due to lockdown it was short lived so we only trained for a month and we were back in lockdown 2. Back to online it was. I was happy I was stronger and fitter and we were getting some great sessions in. Lockdown was lifted for December so back to the gym we went. By this time I had only had 8 face to face sessions with Steve and I was over 5 stone down. I wanted to reach my 6 stone target for Christmas so that’s what we did. January came and we were back in lockdown and back to online training for us. I really struggled during this lockdown. It was a bit of everything, being fed up and also I felt like I needed a break after losing 6 stone in 8 months. So that’s what we did still stuck to my training but maintained my weightloss. April came the gyms opened up and we were back at it. We’re now 14 months in and 7 stone lighter. We’ve about 2 stone left to go to get to a target that I could have only ever dreamed about reaching. The losing weight is amazing but the way I feel is more important. I don’t remember feeling this happy, healthy or fit ever. Without Steve’s support, encouragement, knowledge, non judgemental approach and friendship I know I would still be unhappy and not living my best life.