Eric Niles

I have over 15 years experience in the population health and fitness coaching industry. These include:

* MS in clinical exercise physiology (Springfield College, Massachusetts).

* BS in health and nutritional sciences (SUNY Buffalo, New York).

MS thesis " The effect of a carbohydrate-protein drink on recovery from endurance exercise" has been published in Triathlete, Bicycling and Runners World and physique related publications . Professional journal publication at www.asep.org, January 2001 edition.

* CEP (Certified Exercise Physiologist) eligible via ACSM certification.

*Intrinsic health coach (www.isintl.com).

* Well Coaches health coach (www.wellcoachesschool.com). Completed module one in 2022. Current student toward course completion and certification.

*Personal fitness certs with NASM and NSCA, and ACLS and pulmonary function technology certification taken early in my career.

*Taken classes at a top Pilates studio in Franklin TN, SMARTCoreMethod.

*Current emphasis of nutritional self study is for those with autoimmune, autism spectrum, anxiety, depression and cell damage such as mitochondrial disruption or toxicity, and drug nutrient depletion for those over medicated for lifestyle related illness. Many integrative function medicine clinics around the country utilize either registered dieticians or CNS (Certified Nutritional Specialists) who tend to have more biochemistry and lab testing knowledge to get to root chemical issues.

I have a interest in functional nutrition and if time and money allowed more focused study I would pursue a Certified Nutrition Specialist license (CNS). CNS and RD are the two main nutrition national licenses. For now I refer clients needing further service, to these cutting edge functional or precision medicine, and nutritional providers.

Some of my history

I still remember doing exercise physiology testing with the University of Buffalo track and swim teams with Dr David Pendergast, Dr Harold Burton, Dr Debbie Muio (now Duke University molecular physiology dept), and Bud Termin (swim coach). They conducted human performance studies on athletes complete with full blood work for standard blood chemistry and specific nutrient testing, respiratory gas analysis, ultrasound, and bio mechanical analysis.

Animal model studies were also part of the learning with muscle tissue analysis of injuries, cell health, and nutritional therapies for healing such as why Vit E, C, bromelain, sulfur, fatty acid therapy, and other micronutrients are powerful in their fight against oxidation of the cell or detoxification pathways, and useful for all kinds of cellular healing.

Grad school dealt with more medical physiology & chronic disease cases (cardiac and pulmonary rehab), metabolic and ultrasound exercise testing, advanced biochemistry of nutrition, supplement therapies, and research methods so it was a well rounded start to my career before I left New England and moved to Nashville.

All of those days spent studying made me smile in 2013 when I was approached by the owners of Franklin TN based (Ebars.com) a 100% certified organic plant based whole food meal bar company. I became responsible for developing the science content and graphs for the GOLF and RUN bar and later performed some science projects, sales and stay involved as a contractor, making recipes, working on side nutrition projects.

My experiences have included:

*Clinical lung function and metabolic exercise stress testing/rehabilitation.
*Lifestyle health coaching (now generally referred to as holistic health coaching).
* Endurance sport coaching for runners, cyclists, triathletes and resistance training taking into account biomechanics to offload joint strain for those with injuries or pain.
*Nutritional meal and supplement planning to help complement your current medical treatment.

Keep in mind that DO's, DC's(Doctors of Chiropractic) and PT's (Doctors of Physical Therapy) are the most qualified with natural therapies for those with structural conditions such as neurological , musculoskeletal, orthopedic and systemic pain. Some DC's venture into the arena of holistic nutrition like those who are part of the Maximized Living business model.

MDs band DO's branding themselves as precision, antiaging, or Lifestyle medicine, can do it all beyond the structural assessment and treatment, and would be the top trained physician I would recommend for anyone struggling with severe chronic conditions.

Exercise Physiologists at the MS or PhD graduate level are well trained in the conditioning and evaluation for those with cardiac and pulmonary limitations (verses structural as mentioned above) and use cellular and whole food nutrition planning, and exercise conditioning techniques to help their clients.

Registered Dieticians (RD) however have the legal rights in Tennessee with licensure protection to perform the nutritional services in government and clinical settings.

Therefore my services are not legally protected nor marketed with intent to treat anything but simply to get one healthier to complement your treatment & advice from your primary care physician. Send them my health plan and have them sign off on it .

Beyond the biological sciences of health what is most soul satisfying for me is to serve those who are having to endure life because they are not getting their way in life(chronic dissapointment)

All their effort may not be producing the return it used too. They may be losing energy, having to do what they don't want to do for work after a layoff, dealing with life obstacles thrown at them, reduction in income, enduring singleness and not even being touched for years or mass rejection leading to that disconnected lonely feeling that never gets restored. Or maybe you are living far from family or any real community that knows you, and suffering health issues as a result. You can see it when their eyes are tired and dark, shoulders slumped because all the passion and fire for living has gone out due to excessive energy spent coping from loss, without comparable energy of someone outside yourself helping to refill your tank. People need someone who has walked that trail and whose circumstantial comforts do not create dissonance in their professional coaching relationship.

In these cases my spirit comes alive to minister to those who need empathy, not instruction, to pour passion into them to once again begin

HOPING....DREAMING.....THRIVING.

And that is where a good health coach who uses motivational interviewing, intrinsic thinking and an insightful lines of questions to build trust, express empathy ,listen reflectively, and restore hope can be of great benefit to a client.

I was an overactive multi sport kid growing up in central NY state, with some good motor skills and did have one heck of a curve ball as a little baseball star. By junior high school it was apparent I had the build, discipline, and pain tolerance to become a distance runner. I ran track and field and cross country from that point until age 27. Sauquoit Valley High School has a long tradition of excellence in distance running and the hills were incredible in my old hometown but also led to overtraining cause it always seemed you were running uphill, as if you were living in Colorado, Utah, or Northern Arizona at altitude, and dealing with less atmospheric pressure of oxygen

I competed at the NCAA Division I level,(SUNY Buffalo) was a conference champion in cross country (regularly ran upper 24 minute to mid 25 minute range for 5 miles in cross country), and secured a shoe sponsorship at age 23 with Team Etonic Shoe Company while in graduate school (Springfield College, Massachusetts) where I ran upwards of 100-140 miles a week during my base building phase. I even got to the point in workouts where I could run 4 repeat one mile intervals in 4:35 and under which were about the same speed I raced it at in high school so by that point my cellular horsepower had seriously improved.

I even remember running a 27 mile run the day after Christmas at 530 am in Sauquoit NY when I was visiting my parents. It was 5 degrees outside. What was I thinking. I couldn't get myself to stop this obsessiveness of endurance training. That my friends is a sign of addiction, not discipline. But at the time I thought I was healthy, and just super focused. Much of health coaching for fitness, athletic performance or reversing diseases is identifying root issues of obsessions, compulsions, and anchors in life (faulty thoughts, beliefs, emotional wounds, wrong priorities) and obviously the basics of poor nutrition, specific nutrition therapies, lack of sleep, over training, all of which hold you back.

I ran in upstate NY a place with a rich heritage of fast runners, like Kevin Collins and none more than Jerry Lawson who was a distance running icon (sub 2:10 marathon best) long before the breakthroughs in performance in recent years with various IV nutritional therapies, hormone replacement and other wellbeing advances like certain medical device recovery therapies, and high tech training shoes Jerry would show up with his Mohawk haircut, 6 earring studs, orange socks and Brooks shoes (His professional sponsor for a time), and would blow most people away within the first half mile unless it was a national level race like the with top African runners. I once ran 47 min range at the Schenectedy NY stockadeathon 15k race when I was a graduate student and I remember Jerry at the starting line looking like a race horse ready to bust out of the gate.

He took over and ran a 425 first mile going into the beginning of a significant hill and that was it. Of course he was well ahead of me and I was thinking de he really just run this first mile faster than my mile time in high school. Geez. I wouldn't see him till the post race party.

What I have learned over the years is that genetics, and the physiology of the body must near 100% along with other life factors all lining up to allow for peak performance.

Therefore if you give any current elite endurance athlete compromised cardiac, pulmonary, or metabolic function, or take away their performance enhancing drugs and or ergogenic aids, they will suddenly appear very average with heart rate and breathing rate efforts, and racing times.
I therefore became the classic over trained, undernourished young student, couldn't afford the supplements I knew about but did learn to slow down on my easy runs under 70% of max heart rate with my first heart rate monitor.

Considering my overzealous training methods, growing up around second hand smoke my entire childhood, and later conducting pulmonary function and metabolic stress tests on myself for work, I found out I had mild obstructive lung disorder (asthma) and I never had the training staff, coach or athletic trainers smart enough in college to have a clue and realize many of their student athletes like me may have been low in testosterone, or breathing second hand smoke their whole childhood or needed performance enhancing aids like an altitude tent to improve red blood cell content. I had none of this when I was a runner which is why you see modern college and professional endurance athletes racing very fast times, and ts mostly artificially enhanced physiology, not just harder training methods.

If left certain conditions like mild to moderate asthma are left untreated as in my case this will lead to increases in blood carbon dioxide levels and slower middle distance times and VO2 max, and anaerobic threshold.

I had a VO2 max tested at 72 ml/kg/min and still have the printouts to show for it. To increase your aerobic capacity you need a thick left ventricle, stronger cardiac contractions, more red blood cells to carry oxygen, bronchioles whose smooth muscle dilate well and cells that covert food and nutrients into energy quickly and remove waste products of metabolism.
So looking back I did my best with what I had considering I wasn't injecting EPO, blood doping, or ingesting other performance enhancing agents or even hormone replacement into my body like many top athletes now.

Looking back in my late 20s into my 30s what I needed was healing and restoration found with many current medical devices including red light and infrared therapy, different IV nutrition cocktails, organic produce, bioidentical hormone replacement and many other current technologies.

Obviously as a non primary care provider I depend on experts above me (MD, DO, DC, PT, NP,) in these disciplines so they can give their treatment plan. A coaches job is to be aware of drugs, nutrients, environmental chemicals, life stress and emotional blockages, sleep issues, structure imbalances etc that can impact any of these components but perhaps more than that, to simply listen to your life story to regain hope in bite size amounts to restore health and vitality.

Which leads me to ask the questions:

What do you need. Has life left you lifeless and you need some seasons of healing to start over again.

What do you desire at this point in your life?

Have you had experiences before in life when you said you desired or valued something but your mind and heart had so much clutter you didn't follow through with prioritizing this so called "DESIRE"?

How has your best thinking up to this point led you to where your at?

With this in mind are you now ready to do whatever it takes to clear the clutter and make 1st things 1st in your life and direct your energy toward what is most important.

What is it that you value anyway?

Ask yourself these questions as they will give me great insight into your background and desires.

We will discuss this on a case by case basis to suit your needs. Typically clients fall into one of these categories
1. Food and supplement plan for fat loss,or improved cell health(diabetes control, autoimmune disorders, nutrition assistance for anxiety/depression ) to complement your medical treatment plan.
2. Fitness plan for endurance training, physique development or those with chronic injuries needing expertise so you can live life fully without pain.