Mind Pump Podcast Story

Sal picked up his first weight at the age of 14. A painfully skinny teenager, he felt insecure about his physique and his lack of muscle and strength. Fitness was a way for him to apply hard work and effort towards changing and re-inventing himself. A natural intellect, Sal devoured every fitness, physiology and nutrition publication he could get his hands on. His appetite for knowledge is voracious and he used his passion for learning to maximize his own body’s potential. 4 years later Sal walked into his local 24 Hour Fitness gym and applied to be a personal trainer. He quickly became a top performer and, at the age of 19 was promoted to the position of general manager with as many as 40 employees working under him. During this period of time Sal learned to master skills of sales, marketing and communication and his gyms broke records in sales and production. At the age of 22, Sal became an entrepreneur. He opened a wellness and personal trainer facility that offered one on one training, massage therapy, nutritional counseling, hormone testing and acupuncture. At the age of 28 Sals health took a bad turn. The years of training his own personal body with excessive amounts of intensity in the pursuit of more muscle combined with the abuse of supplements caused his body to rebel. He lost 15lbs of muscle and at one point believed he may have an autoimmune disorder. This forced Sal to change his personal approach to fitness. He made health a priority and he visited his insecurities that caused him to abuse his body. It took him a full year of study and learning to transform yet again. Sal learned about gut health, hormone health and how to prioritize health over appearance. He healed his body and changed how he communicates fitness and health and was re-invigorated with a new sense of purpose. Although this was a challenging time for him, it is literally what formed his view on health and how he communicates it to this day. At 33 years old Sal met Doug Egge who became his client. They formed a close friendship and together they created the first Maps program. Sal was the designer of the workout plan and Doug created the marketing material behind it. Their goal was to shatter the failed muscle building workout ideas that Sal had personally witnessed as entirely ineffective. They knew that MAPS programming would be vastly superior. Their challenge was how to bring this to the masses. 2 years later Sal met Adam and Justin and together with Doug they started Mind Pump. The goal with Mind Pump was simple...bring quality fitness and health information to the masses with integrity and honesty. Sal wanted to shift the direction of the fitness industry from an aesthetic insecurity based industry to a self love and self care health industry. He knew this could be accomplished with education through entertainment.

Adam had a lot of adversity to overcome as a child. He lost his father to suicide at the age of seven and bounced around to nine different homes by the time he was seventeen. Adam was bullied in school which ultimately led to him being home-schooled. In the midst of his childhood turmoil one constant in Adam’s life was his love for sports. He was a natural athlete who loved snowboarding, water skiing, basketball and anything else sports related. Adam’s love for sports led him down the path of learning about fitness and nutrition. Adam got started with his career in fitness in 2001. His first entrepreneurial venture was as a child of ten so it seemed natural for Adam to become an entrepreneur in fitness. As a part of his ongoing quest to learn and grow in his career Adam has obtained certifications from top fitness training institutions including the International Fitness Professionals Association, the National Academy of Sports Medicine, the National Council on Strength and Fitness, and the National Exercise and Sports Trainers Association. Adam also prioritizes his own fitness and worked diligently to become an IFBB Men's Physique Pro which allows him to compete as a professional bodybuilder. Early in his career Adam discovered that he loved to train and teach others. He has worked with over 1000 people as a trainer and fitness expert and deeply values the lessons he has learned from clients. In addition to training clients one-on-one Adam has also led boot camps, provided nutrition consulting, and helped other trainers improve their sales and leadership skills. Adam has found a way to train and teach even more people through Mind Pump. Adam found that combining his passion and expertise with that of Sal, Justin, and Doug gives him the opportunity to make a big impact on the fitness industry. He hopes to change it for the better and bridge the gap between wellness and performance. Through Mind Pump, Adam wants to offer a media outlet that provides fitness and health education in the most entertaining way possible.

Justin’s interest in the complexities of the human body started when he was a young athlete looking to improve his performance. His drive to be a top athlete piqued his interest in training, biometrics, and nutrition. Once he realized the impact these elements had on his athletic performance he started down a path of learning all he could about fitness and nutrition. Justin’s passionate dedication to maximizing his athletic performance led to him becoming a college athlete and earning a bachelor’s degree in kinesiology. Starting in 2003, Justin made fitness his fulltime career. In addition to his degree in kinesiology Justin has gone on to earn a National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM) certification in personal training, a NASM Performance Enhancement Specialist Certification, a NASM Corrective Exercise Specialist certification, and a Fitness Nutrition Specialist certification. Justin has used his education, certifications, and personal fitness experiences to help his clients get stronger, leaner, and live more healthy and balanced lifestyles. He considers his work with clients to be a learning experience even more valuable than his four year degree. Justin loves working one on one with clients but realized that there are only so many people he could help with that model. In an effort to reach even more people with reliable and unbiased health and fitness information he partnered with fellow fitness enthusiasts Sal, Adam, and Doug to create Mind Pump. Justin’s goal for Mind Pump is to positively impact as many lives as possible through the message of fitness and self-improvement. It is his passion to be unapologetically honest and deliver the Mind Pump message in the most entertaining way possible.

Doug grew up near Seattle and had more interest in art than sports as a child. In elementary school he would stay inside drawing pictures instead of going to recess. His lack of activity resulted in him being one of the most overweight boys in the school. As a junior in high school, Doug received a gym membership as a gift from his dad and began working out. At that same time Rocky III was released and Doug made a goal to build a ripped and symmetrical body like Sylvester Stallone. For over a year Doug worked out consistently and intensely, at times almost to the point of vomiting. Small early gains soon gave way to a plateau that seemed impossible to break. It began to look like building a Stallone-like body was an impossible dream. Hoping to find better answers on building muscle, Doug subscribed to Muscle & Fitness magazine and started following the workouts of pro bodybuilders. He believed their muscular physiques were evidence that the workouts would produce results. Doug also spent his hard-earned savings on the supplements highlighted in the magazine that promised big gains. But, all hope of making significant gains was soon replaced with disappointment and frustration when nothing he tried seemed to work. Doug’s enthusiasm for fitness would come and go over the years. He would go through spurts of working out and then stop for extended periods of time until he saw some new workout or supplement that he hoped would be the answer to his inability to gain muscle. After years of yo-yoing weight and attempts to build an ideal physique through determination and hours at the gym Doug felt frustrated. He was at the point of giving up on having the body he dreamt about since adolescence. A back injury during a business trip would change all of this for Doug. In an effort to relieve his pain from the injury Doug visited a local chiropractor. The treatment helped but the chiropractor identified the root of the problem as a muscle imbalance. He recommended that Doug see a personal trainer who could help him resolve those imbalances. This led Doug to Sal Di Stefano. Doug hired Sal, and soon realized that Sal had a unique philosophy that seemingly ran counter to everything he thought he knew about fitness. Much to his surprise, he started to see real and consistent gains in the gym in spite of working out only twice a week. In his late forties he was seeing better gains than in his twenties! These results re-ignited his interest in working out and led him to think of ways he could work professionally with Sal. Doug realized that his experience in internet marketing, photography, videography, graphic design and more, coupled with Sal’s training knowledge, look, and charisma could create a winning combination. In 2013, Sal developed the first MAPS concept and it was off to the races. The pair spent Sundays filming in Sal’s training studio and evenings building the program online. From the original inception, it took six months to the launch of the first MAPS program. A year after the launch of that first program, Sal and Doug partnered with Adam Schafer and Justin Andrews to create Mind Pump.  Doug is now able to fully immerse himself in the things he loves best… health, fitness, artistic/creative pursuits and the ability to provide life-changing value to people around the world.