Carl Macdonald

• Personal Trainer and Training Director at Alive
• NSCA - Certified Personal Trainer, 1997
• Registered Massage Therapist - Mount Royal College, 1993

My experience in this industry has brought virtually every imaginable situation before me: an individual rehabilitating while waiting for a heart transplant, an 81 year old who just wanted to tie his own shoes again, another who planned to climb Kilimanjaro, an adamant coot who wasn't quite ready to follow the Dr.'s orders to give up playing hockey. Almost every situation can be improved upon. I specialize and enjoy working with busy and terribly demanding executives and business professionals who want to get back to feeling (and looking) strong and healthy again. Acute and chronic joint and movement disorders are successfully addressed so as to minimize or eliminate their damaging limitations on my client's lives. Please feel free to review my testimonials from very long-term, kinda long-term clients as well as some relative newbies.

As Training Director I have the satisfaction of being able to pass on the knowledge and experience I have accumulated to other strength and conditioning professionals. I am now happy to be implementing the vision of bringing together the premiere individuals of the training community under one roof, Alive Personal Training.

testimonials

"I started with Carl in the fall of 2009.  I used to work out with "the best" personal trainer.  After being asked by a friend to try Carl I came to the realization that there was more to personal training than throwing medicine balls around and doing burpees.  Carl's experience and technical style helped me get my money's worth out of the personal training experience and not some one-on-one boot camp.  Whether we are building muscle, conditioning or the coined physical "terror"py, I enjoy ever second of it....sort of."

"If it wasn’t for Carl Macdonald, I might be dead. Carl helped to change my life around. He is more than just a personal trainer; he is a motivator of life. As a senior executive, he understands my busy life, and works around my schedule. When I would drop the ball and not come regularly, he would encourage me. He is disciplined, flexible and knowledgeable."

Almost 12 years ago, I was facing a second knee surgery on both knees and was looking at ending a great deal of my sporting activities. I started working with Carl who not only rehabilitated my knee, he made me stronger and quicker than I had ever been before. Since that time I have been working with Carl on a regular basis and he has seen me through many seasons of old-timer hockey and summer recreation. In 2007 I required a quadruple bypass due mainly to genetics. My doctor informed me that if I hadn?t been in the excellent condition I was, I would probably have died or at least had a severe heart attack long before my surgery. Since my surgery I have continued to work with Carl and am still in excellent shape, still playing hockey competitively, and still enjoying life to the fullest. I am not exaggerating when I say Carl saved my life.

When I started training with Carl it was to rehabilitate an arm that had been injured several months prior resulting in a severe case of frozen shoulder. Under Carl's watchful guidance I regained full range of motion in my shoulder as well as strength and muscle definition in my entire body that I had never had before.

Carl's ability to adapt my workouts to accommodate or relieve whatever joint or muscle ache or pain I might present with - and at my age there are a few - and to make each session fun, innovative and rewarding has kept me coming back. Working out three times weekly has now become an absolute priority for me.