Question: Give us a quick introduction!
Ryan: My name is Ryan Ribordy. I graduated from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul Minnesota. I graduated with a health promotion degree (It’s exercise science with marketing).
Question: What do you specialize in? What age group do you train?
Ryan: I mostly specialize in sports performance. I help train younger kids and all the way up to college athletes as well – and of course high school athletes around the area too.
Question: What type of athletes do you train?
Ryan: Basically, any type of sports ranging from: hockey, tennis, basketball, basketball, and volleyball as well.
Question: Before you got into personal training, did you play any sports?
Ryan: I played basketball and football. I actually played tennis for a couple years as well. But football was my main sport.
Question: Having played sports in the past, has that helped you with training your clients?
Yes, being an athlete has really helped me with my personal training career. It’s given me more ideas in terms of how to train athletes because I know more about what they need regarding their specific sport. There’s the principle of specificity. You want to train the person to what their sport is and what it requires. So, tennis-wise, they would require more side to side movements – and for football it’s more movement, up and back, and a little more power. So, you’re going to train them differently. Overall, playing in a variety of sports has really helped me help train athletes in a specific way – and accomplish their goals.
Question: How did you meet Will Ko?
I met Will a few summers ago while I started training here at MYBODY Complex. We saw each other training and we both knew we had similar training styles. One day he came up to me and asked [about] my background. We talked and started working together. [I] became his assistant strength and condition coach. It’s really fortunate for me to meet him because he’s definitely a huge name around the area, as everyone really respects him and obviously he knows what he’s doing too! It’s a lot of fun learning from him as well!
Question: How did you get started in the field?
Fitness & nutrition has always been a huge passion of mine. Ever since I was a little kid I started doing push-ups in 3rd grade, [then I] started weight lifting in 6th grade, and it ever escalated since then. I’ve studied this [field] everyday. I plan my day around it. I plan my day around my workouts. I absolutely love helping people too. I get so much satisfaction & fulfillment in getting to help people to reach their goals. There’s nothing I’d rather do!
Questions: What goals do your clients have?
Many of them have the same type of goals, whether [it’s] increasing strength, athletic performance, overall agility, power, and acceleration. I work on those goals for my clients but also with specificity. It depends on their sport and I’ll tailor the workout/training to them.