Today’s podcast guest is Jamie Smith. Jamie is an Australian strength coach, educator, and former owner of Melbourne Strength Culture. After years of coaching and building one of Australia’s better-known strength gyms, he now focuses on mentoring coaches, helping them refine their training systems, businesses, and long-term development in the industry.
On today’s show Jamie joins me to discuss his transition from gym ownership into full-time education and coach mentorship. We dive into client-led exploration, simplifying movement assessment, avoiding nocebo language, and helping athletes discover better movement solutions without overcoaching. Jamie also shares his thoughts on breathing drills, ribcage mechanics, strength technique, sensory versus motor learning, and why good coaching often comes down to creating better environments for athletes to feel, explore, and learn.
Today’s episode is brought to you by Hammer Strength and the Just Fly Sports Online Courses
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Topics
0:00 – Leaving the Gym
2:28 – Moving Into Education
4:39 – Training After Gym Ownership
7:50 – Hybrid Fitness and Hyrox
11:44 – Rethinking Assessments
20:35 – Lessons From Years of Testing
25:44 – Skill Through Exploration
29:02 – Client-Led Coaching
34:31 – Foot Pressure and Coaching Language
37:07 – Exploring Hip Shifts
39:38 – Sensory vs. Motor Learning
46:51 – Runner Case Study
56:03 – Rib Cage and Breathing
1:06:37 – Stability Nocebos
1:10:47 – Better Coaching Language
1:12:26 – Movement Mentorship
Jamie Smith Quotes
“All of my processes are to avoid diagnosing and avoid labeling anything because number one, I can’t do it. But number two, I actually don’t think it’s that helpful for most situations.”
“I much prefer is just client-led exploration.”
“Through COVID, I realized, oh, people can train just fine without all this testing.”
“They get told something 15 years ago and it just, they live with it. They just live with that idea.”
“The first one is you don’t know more about their body than they do.”
“The language that they come back with, I believe, is the language that you should be coaching with initially.”
“It’s just, hey, this is the motion your pelvis has. Let’s learn what these end ranges feel like. Let’s find a good middle point for you and then just apply that into the lift.”
“The context that you deliver and derive from there is what actually then bridges it into the motor end more productively.”
“The narrative will last longer than your relationship with them.”
About Jamie Smith
Jamie Smith is a strength coach, educator, and mentor based in Australia. He founded Melbourne Strength Culture in 2016, building it into a prominent strength and performance gym and coach-development platform. After closing the gym, Jamie shifted his focus toward education and mentorship, helping strength coaches develop better training systems, businesses, and sustainable careers through his Training Model platform. His background includes sports science, high-level strength and conditioning experience in Australia and the U.S., and more than a decade in the coaching industry.
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