Facts Over Hacks: How One Mount Olive Man is Focusing on Fitness Coaching with Get Big in the 973

We’ve all seen the questionable ads that tempt us to believe in fitness shortcuts. Try our thirty-second workout and grow muscle in a week or less! Lose thirty pounds in thirty days with this one weird trick!

Lucas Kaelin, currently a junior at Rutgers University, recalls the struggle to find accurate fitness information as a high school athlete competing in football, basketball, and lacrosse. “There’s a lot of misinformation about natural supplements,” he says, summarizing the now-familiar claims of products that supposedly promote big muscle growth fast. “And, you know, it's never the case. It's just a bunch of influencers trying to make people believe that so they buy their product.”

In 2021 Kaelin established his own fitness coaching business, which he named Get Big in the 973, as a trustworthy alternative. He was inspired by the memory of obstacles in his own fitness journey and the flood of inaccurate information online.

But beyond dedication to fitness itself, he draws on a deeper drive. “Deep down, I have a passion for fitness,” Kaelin says. “And then I think I have a deeper passion for helping people achieve things that they think are just unthinkable.”

That element of connection was vital to his own personal growth as an athlete. As a high school football player in a position that required bulk, Kaelin enjoyed the sport itself but disliked how he felt in his body. For a while, he struggled to achieve his goals even while he undertook rigorous workout routines that saw him lifting weights at 5 AM.

Then he found guidance from more experienced athletes. “When I spoke to people in the industry,” Kaelin says, “I met people that actually helped me out to learn the ins and outs of the fitness industry and what actual health is.” Three people in particular helped Kaelin adopt a healthier and better informed approach to fitness: John Hack, Head Coach for the Morris Catholic football team, Andrew Decicco, Morris Catholic’s lacrosse coach, and an Instagram fitness coach named Patrick Wilson.

Their help proved transformative. Kaelin explains: “It really made that personal connection and made me think wow, I really want to help other people go down this journey in the same way and feel actually cared [for] and appreciated while going down their fitness journey.”

Indeed, care and appreciation are cornerstones of Kaelin’s approach. When a new client calls him, Kaelin designs an individualized workout program and a meal plan customized to their goals. On average, he sees clients in-person about twice a week and stays in touch through text and calls to see how they’re doing day to day.

That’s the difference between a personal trainer and a fitness coach, Kaelin explains: a deeper level of personal involvement and encouragement. “If you see somebody saying that they’re a personal trainer, you're just going to see that somebody's ordering you to work out and they only care about money,” he says. “While as a fitness coach… they're there to help you through your struggles.”

One past client, Ryan Ciolek, age 20, recalls how Kaelin’s level of involvement helped him achieve his fitness goals. “I did a bunch of research on my own, and I made progress,” Ciolek says, “but Lucas really helped me to get a better understanding of everything overall.” After working with Kaelin, Ciolek was able to apply Kaelin’s methods on his own, ultimately gaining about twenty pounds of muscle.

As one might guess, one of the biggest struggles that Kaelin helps his clients overcome is flagging motivation. Thanks to a flood of online misinformation claiming that people can lose weight and gain muscle overnight, some clients expect shortcuts and get discouraged when results aren’t instantaneous. “In reality, when it comes down to it, you're always going to have to put in that work,” he says. “But if you continue on this path day to day, eventually we'll get to the point that you wanted to get.”

Sometimes, Kaelin might text a client throughout the morning as he motivates them to remember their goals and stick to the workout program. On the other hand, some clients are almost too motivated, spending hours at a time in the gym and taking too few rest days. In that case, Kaelin helps his clients know when enough is enough. “You’ve got to be like, listen, calm down,” he says. “You’ve got to give your body time to recover and relax and keep going.”

That’s because fitness isn’t limited to physical wellness, in Kaelin’s view. “There’s the physical notion where [exercise] is attached to your weight, how your cardiovascular health is, how you breathe, its long-term effects,” Kaelin says. “It also affects your mental health, right?”

 Ciolek found this to be true for himself. “Being in better shape, it’ll help you be in a better mood,” he says. “Being able to apply the things that [Kaelin]’s taught me to my daily life, I just feel more confident and better about myself in general.”

With the world still recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic, it makes sense to include the whole self in our discussions about health and wellness. There may be no quick fix for physical or mental health, but with sensible strategies and a little encouragement, we can get there.

For more information about Get Big in the 973, visit www.getbiginthe973.com