CHENNAI: I ring the bell of a flat on 28th Cross Street, Indira Nagar, Adyar, and enter through a six-foot-tall wooden door. Welcomed by neatly-arranged weights on the left and workout machines on the right, I pass through motivating quotes like ‘Rise Above’, ‘A healthy outside starts from the inside’, ‘Live focussed’, and many others painted on the four walls of the living room. I am at the newly launched LivStack Health and Performance setup for “stacking habits to build a healthier lifestyle”. Started by three college friends passionate about “diet and exercise”, LivStack was launched on July 12 this year.
Soorya Senthilkumar, director of LivStack, and strength and conditioning Coach, gave me a tour of the 2,700-sq ft house transformed into a health and performance space. I was directed to a Nutrition room where Sadhvika Srinivas, director of LivStack and clinical dietitian and sports nutritionist “directly works with the client to optimise their nutrition”.
“Each body is different. Its response to food and exercise is different. I assess my clients on ‘ABCD’ and help them with diet plans,” she shares. A stands for anthropometric measurements (includes height, weight, BMI), B stands for biochemical parameters (blood sample), C, for clinical evaluation (checking for pale eyes or skin), and D stands for dietary evaluation. “An individually tailored diet plan is curated and is to be formed as a habit in four weeks. First week, we look for consistency, followed by sustainability, and maintenance,” she says, adding that the team is result-focussed in their approach. The diet plan includes recipes, guidelines, a shopping list, measuring intake, and tracking.
Sadhvika says, “We want people to look at diet and exercise as a first line of treatment. Food and fitness can reverse medical conditions. In this fast-paced world, people are finding an easy way out, we want to give them a reality check and remind them that food and fitness are the way out.” She suggests that people have to reverse their approach and focus on how they feel rather than how they look.
Talking about fitness, coaches Soorya and Sai Krishna, director, and strength and conditioning coach, enroll limited clients in a batch. “This is a setup where personal training and semi-private coaching are provided. This means a ratio of 1:5 — one coach per five clients — is adhered to. When the number of clients increases, more coaches get on board,” says Soorya.
While clients come in the morning for workouts, the evenings are for training athletes. “In an eco-park nearby, 20-25 athletes are trained. Their programmes include more running and jumping. We are also looking at options where we can train these children and help them with sports quota admissions in colleges and other places,” says Sai Krishna. This training exposure comes from experience. While Sadhvika holds a Masters in Food and Health Sciences, the boys have completed their Masters in Exercise Science. “We are using a method backed by Science here,” he adds.
The locality, Adyar, was chosen because of the population that can get premium services. But, the area also houses families below the poverty level. In the future, the team plans on conducting workshops, seminars, and nutrition classes for free for the economically backward. “I would be teaching the mothers from the community how to pack nutrient-rich lunches and snacks for their children, intake during pregnancy planning and the nine months after,” explains Sadhvika.
As of now, the other vertical that the team is working on is to build an institute to train professionals. “We want to impart our knowledge and experience to the upcoming talent by providing them with internship opportunities,” adds Sai Krishna. Hosting educational workshops for the general public and coaches, being a source for training and placements of trainers at private gyms and personal nutritionists, and raising public awareness is also on their agenda as the team believes that everyone and anyone can be fit.
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