A Rosslander who offers high-performance training in Trail hopes to eventually expand with a Rossland location.
Andrew van der Ham, owner of Elevate Sport & Health, was raised in Rossland and graduated from Rossland Secondary School before starting on the path that would lead him to become a trainer and registered massage therapist (RMT).
Having returned to Rossland, he opened his business in Trail in January of 2016 and now, among other things, he works with local athletes, including the Trail Smoke Eaters, the Beaver Valley Nitehawks, the Major Midget Kootenay Ice and the Seven Summits Gravity Racers (SSGR).
“A lot of people will say, ‘If you’re a mountain biker, get out and ride on the bike and just get better at riding,’ but there is actually a ton of things we can do in [training] where we’re working on core strength, we can work on balance, we can work on power,” van der Ham explains.
The SSGR team is currently in the midst of their competition season, so training is on hold, but van der Ham expects to have them back once the season ends.
As an RMT, van der Ham is also able to help athletes with issues through massage.
“So if someone has a hip issue, I’ll work on the hip and then I will do some exercise with them as well, and then see how their hip is doing,” he explains. “So it’s not a very relaxing massage, I don’t use the oil stuff, it’s more active and specific.”
He also helps clients who need rehab, including handling ICBC claims.
“If someone has an ICBC claim, they will usually get kinesiology services — a lot of people don’t realize that — and that’s covered 100 per cent through ICBC. So they’ll come in for active rehab,” says van der Ham.
He’s also able to design workouts to accommodate their injuries.
“There’s no reason why the rehab clients can’t be doing other exercise,” he says.
And Elevate has a number of “lifestyle clients” — people who want to stay healthy or lose weight. Van der Ham offers not only personal training, but adult group classes as well, and he hopes to expand the number and types of classes in the near future, once he’s found a way to expand his space.
“I really want to add things like yoga or mobility classes,” he says.
In addition to being an RMT, van der Ham has a bachelor’s degree in Human Kinetics from UBC and a business degree from Thompson Rivers University. His one staff member, Christina Daoust, has a bachelor’s degree in Kinesiology and is a nutrition coach.
“It’s not like a registered dietician; we’re not doing anything clinical. It’s more, basically, consulting with an individual and saying like, ‘This is what we could do to change things,’ like within their diet and if their goal is to lose weight then she takes it from a nutritional standpoint,” van der Ham explains.
The Rossland man’s goal is to eventually open a second location in his hometown.
“It’s probably going to be a little while still before that happens, but that’s something that I really want to get to,” he says.
Van der Ham originally considered opening his business in a building his family owns in Rossland, but decided the building’s floors might not stand up well to having heavy weights repeatedly dropped on them. The building Elevate is in now has a concrete base.
“But … that’s where I want to get to because that’s where I live and … my heart is up there,” says van der Ham.
