If you sit at a desk for fifty hours a week and you're past 35, your body has been adapting to that for a long time. Your hips are tighter than they were. Your thoracic spine has lost some rotation. Your glutes have forgotten how to fire. None of this is dramatic and none of it shows up on an MRI. It just means you can't sit down into a full-depth squat anymore and you don't really know why.
This is what training for tech workers actually is. Not a HIIT class. Not a "burn fat fast" cycle. It's slow, specific work on the parts of you that desk life dulled down.
The pattern I see most often
A founder or engineer comes in. They've trained on and off since college. They lifted heavy in their twenties, dropped off during the early company years, came back to fitness in their thirties via Peloton or CrossFit or just a globo-gym routine, and now in their forties they want something more deliberate. They have money, they have limited time, and they have a body that no longer responds the way it used to.
The first thing we usually do is shorten the program. Most tech operators come in with too much volume in their training plan. They're trying to do hypertrophy, conditioning, mobility, and recovery in the same five hours per week, and they're getting middling returns on all of it.
I cut the program down. Two strength sessions per week, both with me, both heavy and specific. Conditioning becomes something you do on a Peloton or a stair-climber on your own time. Mobility becomes ten minutes a day at home, not a separate gym session. The thing that costs you the most — time in a gym — is the thing we use most carefully.
Why this works for the ICP
The tech operator's training problem is rarely "I'm out of shape." It's usually "I don't have a structure that fits my actual life and my actual body." A coach is a structure. A real coach who watches you for an hour twice a week catches the things that nobody else does — the right knee that drifts in on every fifth squat, the breathing pattern that breaks down at 80% load, the hip pop that's been there since 2019 that no one ever asked you about.
The other thing the coach does is set the ceiling. Most people in this demographic over-train at the wrong intensities and under-train at the right ones. The version of a strength session that actually moves your numbers is rarely the version you'd pick for yourself.
What the 12 weeks looks like
The first month is assessment and re-patterning — usually lighter than you'd expect, because if your hinge is broken from a decade at a desk we're not going to fix it with a 400-pound deadlift in week two.
The second month is when load starts to climb. By week eight most clients are pulling more than they have in a decade, with cleaner positions and lower perceived exertion than they remember.
The third month is when training becomes maintainable on your own. The goal of the 12-week is partly to make you stronger and partly to make you self-sufficient for the next twelve.
FAQ
I travel a lot for work. Can this still work? Yes, but tell me at the consult. Some of my clients are on the road two weeks out of every month. The program adjusts. Travel weeks become bodyweight or hotel-gym work; on-site weeks are heavier and more focused.
Can my company expense this? Some companies' wellness benefits cover personal training. I can provide an itemized invoice. Most don't, in my experience — but worth checking with your benefits team.
Do you train people remotely? Past clients, yes. New clients, no. The first three months really need to be in person.
The next step is the consult. Thirty minutes, in person, in Palo Alto. Send me the calendar invite when it works for you.