Good Neighbor Podcast: Tri-Cities
Bringing together local businesses and neighbor of the Tri-Cities region. Good Neighbor Podcast hosted by Skip Mauney helps residents discover and connect with your local business owners in and around The Tri-Cities.
Is your business serving the residents of Tri-Cities? Then, we need to talk! Visit gnpTri-Cities.com to schedule your free interview.
Good Neighbor Podcast: Tri-Cities
EP# 263: Empowering Seniors Through Movement: 30 Years of Training Partners Inc.
What makes Charlene Reeves with Training Partners Inc. a good neighbor?
Every fitness journey tells a story, but Charlene Reeves of Training Partners Inc. is writing an entirely different narrative about aging and strength. With clients averaging 72 years old, her North Asheville personal training studio has spent nearly three decades proving that our later years can be some of our strongest.
"Seniors can't build muscle after 70" is perhaps the most damaging myth Charlene encounters. The reality? Scientific studies confirm adults can continue gaining strength and improving functionality well into their 90s. As Americans face the troubling gap between lifespan (82 years) and health span (just 63-64 years), Training Partners Inc. focuses on closing this gap through accessible, effective fitness approaches. The goal isn't complicated – Charlene advocates for simple, consistent movement rather than intimidating gym routines. Standing on one leg while brushing teeth, walking during TV commercials, or committing to 30-minute neighborhood strolls can transform health outcomes for older adults.
When COVID forced a nine-month closure and claimed the lives of twelve clients, Charlene pivoted within just four days. She personally taught her senior clients – including a class of 80-year-old women – how to use Zoom, creating a virtual community that outlasted the pandemic. Today, clients who've moved away or can no longer drive remain connected to their fitness community online. More recently, Hurricane Helene devastated Western North Carolina, leaving Training Partners without utilities for nearly a month and forever changing Asheville's tree-covered landscape. Yet through these challenges, Charlene witnessed remarkable resilience as neighbors helped neighbors recover and rebuild.
Interested in writing your own strength story, regardless of age? Connect with Training Partners Inc. at trainingpartnersinc.com or call 828-252-0920 to learn how movement can expand your world instead of letting it shrink as you age.
To learn more about Training Partners Inc. go to:
https://trainingpartnersinc.com/
Training Partners Inc.
(828) 252-0920
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Skip Monning.
Speaker 2:Well, hello everyone and welcome to the Good Neighbor Podcast. So I hope everybody's doing well today and is as excited as I am to meet a very special guest that we've got in the studio with us today, because and I'm sure you'll be just as excited, because today I have the pleasure of introducing your good neighbor, ms Charlene Reeves, who is the owner-operator of Training Partners Inc. Charlene, welcome to the show.
Speaker 3:Thank you, I'm glad to be here.
Speaker 2:Well, we're thrilled to have you, Like I said, excited to learn all about you and what you do so, if you don't mind, why don't you kick us off by telling us about your business?
Speaker 3:Okay, we're a small personal training studio in North Asheville and we've been here 30 years next April and we primarily work with the 50 plus age population. The average age of our client is probably 72. So, yeah, so we work with the upper end of the population.
Speaker 2:Average of 72. Very good Well, charlene. How did you get involved in this? Started in this business.
Speaker 3:You know, I played sports all through high school and in college and I just it's funny I always knew that I would own a gym In my mind, though it was much bigger and it had, you know, really fancy stuff in it. And we're small, we're only five thousand square feet and the older I've gotten I'm 63 now so the older I've gotten I've decided the smaller studio was really what I wanted all along. I just didn't know it and I love it. We've got about five or 600 clients and you know, getting to know all of them and watch them have their accomplishments and watch kids get married and grandkids born, it's pretty exciting Good stuff. I enjoy what I do.
Speaker 2:Wow, five to 600 clients. That's incredible.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's pretty sweet.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and how long did you say you'd been in business? 30 years next April 30 years, wow, congratulations, that is nothing to sneeze at 30 years.
Speaker 3:It doesn't seem that long Most of the time. Some days it seems really long, but most of the time it doesn't seem like 30 years has been that long of a time.
Speaker 2:I get that. I'm right behind you, sam, I totally understand that.
Speaker 3:I kind of feel like I get paid to play for a living, so it's a pretty sweet deal.
Speaker 2:Very nice, very nice. Well, what are some myths or misconceptions in your industry?
Speaker 3:I think one is that seniors can't grow muscle or can't get stronger.
Speaker 3:You know, when they hit 70, it's all a downhill climb, a decline, from there, and that's not necessarily true. There's tons of studies that have said, you know, up until 90, 95, you can still gain muscle, you can get stronger, you can be more functional, and so I think that's probably one of the big misconceptions, or that it takes a lot of time, that you have to lift heavy weights. And, granted, you do need to lift some weights that are going to challenge the system, but it doesn't take a lot of time. You know, 30 minutes three times a week or four times a week, or even just going out and walking your neighborhood every day for 30 minutes, has big, big health benefits, and we tend to treat our seniors as they get older like they're declining, and that's just not necessarily the case. I had grandparents that their worlds got very small when they got in their 70s and 80s, and I don't want my world to be that way, and we really work hard to make sure our clients' worlds aren't that way either.
Speaker 2:Very good. Well, you know you got to move. You know that's what I tell my wife. You do.
Speaker 3:And it's not hard. I mean it's just, it's little stuff. I mean you know you can do simple things like when you're brushing your teeth, stand on one leg, or you know, just move. If you're watching TV, get up and walk around during the commercials or do some air squats or you know, just little teeny things have really big health benefits, especially the older that you get.
Speaker 3:I was just watching a conference thing this weekend from the Functional Aging Institute and they were talking about how Americans lifespans have kind of leveled off since COVID but our health span is decreasing. So even though a lifespan might be 82, the health span is like 63 or 64, which means basically the last 15 to 20 years of your life you're in poor health and that's as a person who does what I do, that's just not okay. I want everybody's health spans to last pretty much as long as their lifespan does so that they can be really healthy. I mean, in retirement you've got the money, you can travel, you can do whatever you want spend time with your grandkids. So I think it's really important to keep working out and doing stuff that's going to keep you functional and moving.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Well outside of work, charlene, what do you like to do for fun?
Speaker 3:I like to hike. I like hiking. I play basketball, I garden, I read a lot of books. Anything that puts me outdoors I'm totally happy doing. I have a pool business on the side so that kind of keeps me busy playing in pools during the summer. That's kind of fun. So, yeah, anything that keeps me outdoors and moving, I'm doing it.
Speaker 2:Well, you live in a beautiful place for that.
Speaker 3:Yes, it is. We suffered a lot during Helene, but we're slowly making some recoveries and we're getting there.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Speaking of Helene, could you describe a hardship or a lot, and that doesn't have to be about the hurricane, but can you describe a hardship or life challenge that you've overcome and how it made you stronger in the end. But can you describe a?
Speaker 3:hardship or life challenge that you've overcome and how it made you stronger in the end. You know, I think for us, I mean, or for me, covid was really hard. We had 12 clients that ended up dying when they got COVID. We were closed for nine months and it just totally even though we went virtual pretty quickly, within four days actually, of us being closed. You know, when a personal training studio or anybody gets closed as a small business, you take a pretty big financial hit and we were kind of lumped in with bars, which was just kind of interesting to me. But we were closed for seven months and you know so that that that was a challenge and there for about a year we weren't sure that we were going to make it but we were fortunate to have a lot of members and clients that supported us during that time and they went virtual and you know, one of our, our senior classes it's basically 12 to 13 year old, 80, 12 to 13, 80 year old women and to try and teach them all how to use the Zoom, that for the first month.
Speaker 3:That pretty much kept my mind busy and me busy. You know, I knew I was in trouble. When the first one goes download. What do you mean? Download? What's upload? Okay, well, so I went to everybody's house. We all sit on the porch. I taught them how to use their computer and how to get onto Zoom, and they're still Zooming. So it's a good thing.
Speaker 2:Oh wow, so you've still got folks that have just continued, yeah.
Speaker 3:Cause, you know, interestingly, some of our older people have moved away so they they couldn't talk to their friends, but when we went to Zoom they could. So now we've got people in Tennessee, we've got some in Florida that are Zooming and they're all back together and a lot of them can't drive anymore so they still get to exercise with their friends that they've been together with for 20 years even though they can't drive, because they've stayed on Zoom. We've kept classes in person and virtual, so they're doing both. Wow, very good, that's wonderful. Yeah, it's pretty fun.
Speaker 2:Yeah, open new doors.
Speaker 3:Actually it really did, because a couple of our clients have moved away and we have them back. Like I have a client in New Zealand now and I've got some clients that live on the other side of town that didn't want to drive over here anymore, and I've got a client that moved to actually Tennessee and so I still train them virtually. So it's it's kind of nice that we have our in-person people and our local people, but then some of the people who left us actually came back during COVID.
Speaker 2:Very nice, very nice. Well, and, and speaking of hardships with Helene, hopefully your facilities weren't damaged.
Speaker 3:No, actually, you know we were without power and water for almost a month. Other than that, we're in a big shopping center building, so that was fine and most of our clients and members some of them had property damage and we had a lot of trees down. I would say probably Asheville lost half of our trees. We used to have mountains or canopies and forest everywhere and we have a lot better views, which I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing, because we did lose a lot of trees. But um and down at the River Arts District, we're slowly coming back, but you know we're getting there, but it was a pretty big hit and I don't think anybody truly expected just how bad it was going to be.
Speaker 2:No, no, absolutely not. And River Arts District really got hammered.
Speaker 3:I've talked to a lot of folks down there, yeah, they really did and it's just so interesting how some parts of town just got hit really hard and then not even a quarter mile away, they're totally fine. And then you go another mile and somebody got hit really hard and then they did. So, yeah, it's just kind of interesting how Mother Nature took over. So yeah, it's just kind of interesting how Mother Nature took over.
Speaker 2:Well, the good thing coming out of this is it's shown how resilient the residents of Western North Carolina are and how neighbors are helping neighbors. I've seen a lot of that and that's been heartwarming.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it really has, and I was at the beach when it happened and I was driving home two days later and it was to this day. It still just brings tears to my eyes because there were so many people coming up 26 that were just that I mean, they had like toilet paper and stuff taped to their cars just coming to help us and it was it kind of restored your faith in humanity.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, absolutely. Well, charlene, if you could think of one thing that you would like our listeners to remember about Training Partners Inc. What would that be?
Speaker 3:I think it wouldn't necessarily just be about the business, it would be overall and that when you get older, that you can still be strong and vibrant and healthy and live the lives you want to live, and that it's never too late to make your health span equal your lifespan. And you know life. If we get to get older, then that's a privilege, because not everybody does get to get older. And just because we do get older doesn't mean that we have to be less healthy to get older. And just because we do get older doesn't mean that we have to be less healthy, that we can be healthy and that we're here to help you. And there's lots of trainers now that are into the older age population, so there's a lot of people to get help from.
Speaker 3:Very good to know Good thing to remember.
Speaker 2:So, if any of our listeners are intrigued and would be interested in potentially attending a class, whether virtual or in person, how can we learn more?
Speaker 3:You can just go to our website trainingpartnersinccom, or you can also give us a call at 828-252-0920.
Speaker 2:And can you book on your website?
Speaker 3:No, but just because there's eight personal trainers and we all handle our own schedule. So you'd have to call. You'd have to call, or you can send us an email through our website as well, and then I usually we all get back to you within 24 hours.
Speaker 2:Very good, very good, all right. Well, charlene, I can't thank you enough for taking time out of your busy schedule to spend some time with us and our listeners and telling us all about Training Partners Inc and what you're doing for the senior community, which I am a member of.
Speaker 3:I think we're all getting there.
Speaker 2:Yep, yep and health is so important. So thank you for what you do and thank you for having me Absolutely and we wish you and your business and your clients all the best moving forward.
Speaker 3:Great. Thank you, I appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gnptry-citiescom. That's gnptry-citiescom, or call 423-719-5873.