About
Why this practice exists.
Body Ops Coaching LLC is a veteran-owned coaching practice built for the military community and the organizations that serve it, by someone who needed it himself.
The founder
Matt Priess, United States Marine Corps.
Matt Priess is a United States Marine Corps veteran and the owner of Body Ops Coaching LLC. He has spent over a decade coaching military and veteran populations, including nine years as a gym owner.
He built the practice after his own difficult transition out of service. Coming out, he was physically broken, mentally lost, and ashamed of what he saw in the mirror. What helped him was not complicated. It was consistent instruction, safe movement, and someone paying attention to how he was doing week to week.
That is the entire thesis of Body Ops. People do not need more information. They need a structure that holds when pain, disrupted sleep, stress, or isolation starts pulling them off track, and they need it delivered by people who understand the population.
Today the practice runs with a credentialed practitioner team covering strength and conditioning, nutrition, corrective exercise, mindfulness, and lifestyle coaching, with delivery online and on site.
"Coaching should make people feel better in their bodies and function better in their lives. Less pain, more energy, better sleep, and a sense of momentum again."
Matt Priess, Owner and President
How we work
Four principles that shape every engagement.
Meet people where they are
Programming is non-clinical and designed for mixed-ability groups, with seated and supported options and conservative intensity cueing. Participants start at their baseline, not someone else's.
Structure beats motivation
Motivation is unreliable. A weekly plan, a standard, and a person paying attention week to week is what actually holds.
Stay in our lane
We are health education and fitness instruction. We do not diagnose, treat, or prescribe, and we refer back to a participant's care team when something falls outside coaching.
Psychological safety is part of the design
Dedicated veteran and women-veteran cohorts exist because who is in the room changes whether people show up.
Outcomes
What the programs produced.
Hundreds of clients lost 25 to 50 pounds
Several lost 75 pounds
Several more lost 100 pounds or more
All classes moved to live virtual delivery in 2020 and kept running
Body Ops coached three paraplegic military Veterans, each of whom lost between 25 and 50 pounds while improving strength, mobility, confidence and quality of life. That work is the reason every Body Ops class is written with modifications first. A program that only works for the fittest person in the room is not a program.