The storm above Interlaken… I was thirteen. My brother was nine. We were floating in the outdoor pool at a campsite in the valley of Interlaken the kind of afternoon that makes you almost forget how unpredictable the mountains can be. Blue sky, warm air, mountains all around. Switzerland doing exactly what it promises.
And then the valley changed. It happened fast. Clouds rolled over the ridge as if they were in a hurry dark, heavy, moving at a speed you couldn’t keep up with. My little brother and I felt the wind pick up and instinctively sprinted back to the tent.
We arrived just in time to grab the poles when the first real gust hit. Luckily our heavy bags were inside for extra ballast, because the pegs had already been pulled from the ground. With the two of us holding on, we managed to keep the tent in place. Around us, other tents weren’t so lucky. Even the caravan next to us lost its awning at the front.
That unpredictability made a huge impression on me as a kid. I’ve thought back to that afternoon many times since not because it was scary, but because of what it left behind. The mountains are breathtakingly beautiful, but their unpredictability is part of who they are.
Growing up at altitude
That holiday wasn’t an exception. Most summers of my childhood looked like some version of it: pack the car and drive to the Alps or another mountain range.
Our family loved nature, and the calm it brings, without ever sitting still for a day. We were always hiking or exploring, always on an adventure.
That feeling of freedom is something I lost as I got older, drawn more to holidays spent lying by a pool because working 60+ hours a week had dulled my imagination and my appetite for adventure.
The years went by. I stopped travelling with my parents and started building my own life. Movement always remained central. I worked in fitness and specialised in strength training and coaching. And I gained the kind of insight you only get when you’ve watched hundreds of bodies and hundreds of minds attempt hard things.
I learned that most people underestimate themselves. That the distance between where someone is and where they could be is almost always smaller than they think and that the gap is usually mental before it becomes physical.
Eventually I decided to go out on my own: self-employed personal trainer. My own clients. My own approach. My own risk. I felt ready.
Six weeks later, the Netherlands entered its second lockdown.
If you want to understand what unpredictability really means, winter 2020 is a good place to start. No gyms. No certainty. No timeline. No one knew how long it would last, what the rules would be next week, or whether the business I’d just started would ever get a real chance to become what I’d imagined. So there was only one option: I adapted.
I trained people outside. In the rain. In hail. In conditions that would have sounded absurd six months earlier. With heavy weights, tires and resistance bands in the back of my car, I drove to clients’ homes and coached them outdoors. Hail, snow, rain it didn’t matter. I showed up, and so did my clients. There was no alternative and frankly, my pride wouldn’t let me quit.
We didn’t just make the best of it we ended up enjoying it, and we got through it. Most of the people who trained with me back then are still training with me five years later.
In English there’s a great word for it: adaptability. An essential skill in the mountains.
COVID ended. Restrictions lifted. Gyms reopened. And I got the chance to build on the foundation I’d laid.
My business didn’t just survive it grew. Today my schedule is full, and what I see in my clients’ lives each week isn’t so different from what I saw in that valley in Interlaken: lives that are truly full with careers, children, ambitions, injuries, and everything else life brings. Each person has a unique situation while trying to create space to be physically strong, to feel capable, and to not go crazy under the pressure of the world we live in.
That’s the real work. Not programming sets and reps. But understanding the whole person in front of you and building something that actually fits their life, not a fantasy version where they can train two hours a day, sleep perfectly, and never experience stress.
The mountain doesn’t give you ideal conditions. Life doesn’t either. The question is always what you do with the conditions you truly have.
Wouter and a return to the mountains
I met Wouter through C-Roy, our physiotherapist. When Wouter called me, he was standing on a mountain in Madeira. He needed someone to help him train. He had mountain goals: trail running adventures and serious alpine objectives. Climbing Mont Blanc was on his list.
Working with Wouter was different from most coaching relationships and I think I understood why pretty quickly. He wasn’t training to look a certain way. He was training for a feeling. A high. An experience his body needed to be truly capable of when the moment came.
We prepared together for multiple adventures. We worked toward Mont Blanc. We succeeded.
And somewhere along the way, another conversation started one that made me think about the mountains again for the first time in a long time.
Wouter had spent a lot of time in the mountains and wanted to share that world with others who dream of experiencing it too. And he kept seeing the same pattern: people who were passionate, motivated, committed to their alpine goals but physically underprepared in ways that had nothing to do with skill or technical ability.
General conditioning. Strength. The physical foundation that makes everything else possible. That foundation needs to be exceptional, because the mountains are exceptional.
He came to me because he needed someone to design that physical layer to build the preparation underneath everything Alpine Hub will offer. Not a side note, but the foundation.
I said yes immediately. Not because it was a calculated decision, but because it felt like a chance to combine my love of training with the same sense of freedom I’d felt as a child in the mountains.
What “more than a trainer” really means
The title of this blog was chosen deliberately. I am a trainer. That title represents years of learning, thousands of sessions, and an understanding of the human body and mind that only comes from showing up every day and doing the work.
What Alpine Hub asks of me is more than writing training programs.
It’s the question of how you build someone who is ready for the mountain not just their legs, and not just their lungs. Adaptability. The mental strength to handle setbacks. The ability to stay calm and capable when conditions change and the plan no longer fits.
That’s not only a fitness question. It’s a life question. Are you ready to develop the skills that keep you standing in any situation?
Alpine Hub is being built for people who take their mountain goals seriously and who understand that serious goals require serious preparation. We’re working on something we’re genuinely excited about, and we want you to be part of it from the beginning.
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Mountain fitness. Mountain spirit. For life.