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The way a person exercises is important, especially when it comes to reaching fitness goals. If you are hungry for knowledge and want to learn from the best, Ashley Van Gorp is your go-to fitness guru. Van Gorp works in the Wellness Center at Grand View and teaches a wide variety of fitness classes on and off campus. She also attends classes at GV and is studying kinesiology with a health promotion concentration.

When Van Gorp was in high school, she helped manage a facility owned by Molly Keitges called Real Fitness. Keitges taught a lot of fitness classes at the facility, and Van Gorp took her classes and began shadowing Keitges to learn more. Van Gorp said Keitges really inspired her to help others learn about health and fitness.

She began going to school at GV on a volleyball scholarship and played for a couple years. She was intrigued with the team workouts, the lifting and the cardio, which only furthered her interest in fitness. She was then offered a job as an assistant under GV Wellness Director Mindy Cathcart. She worked with Cathcart for a while and started teaching her own classes at GV. 

Fitness has inspired Van Gorp since she was very young. She was a three-sport athlete in high school in track, volleyball and basketball. She always loved the conditioning, training, weightlifting and the science behind all of it. 

“After a class, I love when people tell me that is the ‘best class I have ever taken,’” Van Gorp said. “That is the best thing to hear and that is what keeps me going.”

Some of the group fitness classes she teaches at GV include total body burn, boot camp, strictly strength and core. After she started teaching classes, she received a job offer from Des Moines University to start teaching classes there. Later, Club Pilates offered her a chance to teach and offered to pay for her certificate in Pilates.

The certification process is a lot of work. According to Van Gorp, she had to become a member of an organization, buy the material or book for certification, study and sign up for a date to go in for learning sessions on the specific area of fitness for the certification.

 She is now certified in 12 forms of Pilates, including bridging techniques, mat work, reformer trapeze combo, springboard, Exo Chair, magic circle, TRX, trigger point, functional standing movement, ladder barrel, spine corrector and special population. As of right now, she is an intern at Club Pilates and plans to move up to working full time eventually. In the future, Van Gorp wants to widen her fitness lens and become certified as a wellness coach, personal trainer and yoga instructor. 

“Ashley is really good at making things tough, and she is good catering to individuals to make sure that everyone gets a good workout,” said Allison Peterson, who attends Van Gorp’s fitness classes every week. 

Peterson has been going to the classes for about a year now, and what keeps her coming back is the fact that Van Gorp shows interest in everyone.

Peterson says that the best part of taking classes with Van Gorp is that she doesn’t just give you a workout; she breaks things down and explains why you are doing each workout and why you are doing each stretch.

“She gives us the science behind each exercise that we are doing,” Peterson said.

Van Gorp has a very busy schedule. She does personal training with a client three times a week starting at 7 a.m. Then, she is in the office with Cathcart at 8 a.m. every day. After the office, she goes to class and then returns to the office to work with Cathcart. She teaches group fitness every day at noon, squeezes in a 30-minute lunch and then has more class. On Wednesdays, she teaches at Des Moines University. On top of all that, four days out of the week she will go observe and/or teach at Club Pilates.

There can be a lot of stress with wanting to begin your fitness journey and start working toward a happier and healthier life. Van Gorp said to start out drinking a lot of water because “60 percent of Americans take in the most calories through fluids.” 

To know exactly how much water you should drink, divide your body weight in half, and that is how many ounces of water you should drink every day. Also, Van Gorp recommends easing into physical activity.

 “Don’t just hop in a gym and max out,” Van Gorp said. “Ease into it; try starting with a couple classes a week and go up from there.” In addition, always take care of your body through stretching and warming up properly. Finally, write down and become more aware of what you are putting into your body.