TRX Training Club® Trainer Tara Lyn Emerson is proof that you don’t have to be the best athlete in the room to be a great instructor. A long-time personal trainer in Los Angeles, Tara has been playing sports and working out her whole life—but she’ll be the first to admit that someone else in a class may be faster or stronger. Tara’s superpower isn’t speed or superhuman strength: it’s her ability to guide others to realize their potential.
“Movement is for everybody,” Tara said. “You just need to find your pod or your person that can make you believe that it’s for you.”
Tara’s Fitness Journey
As a teenager, Tara was diagnosed with Charcot-Marie-Tooth, a progressive neuromuscular disease affecting her legs. Doctors told her she would likely need mobility assistance by the time she hit her 30s. “I’d basically gotten a diagnosis that I would be a disabled person. I just couldn’t imagine looking at myself every day in the mirror and thinking of all the things I couldn’t do in life; I was dead-bent on getting up every day, being my strongest self, and figuring out what I could do,” she said.
So Tara hit the gym, determined that even if she lost control of her legs, she could still control her core and her upper body. She became a self-described “gym rat,” and continued competing in sports at whatever level she could.
“I was definitely not the fastest runner on my varsity tennis team, but I was the captain of the team because I always had leadership and a spirit about me that was passionate and enthusiastic and hardworking,” she recalls.
Tara has brought that same passion to training others, first as an indoor cycling instructor and, later, as a TRX Training Club trainer.
Coaching for Progress, Not Perfection
“Part of what I think makes my magic is that I can relate to people on a level of ‘not everything is accessible for you in your unique, one-of-a-kind body,’” Tara said. “I have a unique, one-of-a-kind body. Not everything the teacher gives as an option is an option for me. Sometimes teachers don’t pose it like it’s an option.”
Communicating in a way that welcomes clients of all abilities to participate in a TRX session is incredibly personal for Tara. It’s the same kind of instruction she seeks in a class.
“I need people to say things to me like, ‘Let’s get into a plank posture. I want you to come up on your tiptoes as high as you can go,’ because then it doesn’t make me feel like crap if I can’t come up onto my tiptoes really high, because I don’t have control of my feet.”
Coaching often focuses on achieving the perfect type of movement or the most difficult variation of an exercise. Tara explains her goal is meeting clients where they are at a given moment, and helping them improve. “We want to showcase how cool the TRX can be, but I also want you to see—in your body—how cool you can be first, and then build up to that intensity or that athleticism.”
Game-Changing Training
Make no mistake about it: Tara is fit. And the TRX Suspension Trainer is part of her own routine. In addition to teaching TRX classes live and online, Tara grew a huge Instagram following by demonstrating TRX exercises and answering questions about the Suspension Trainer.
“TRX was a lifesaver in a lot of ways because I was able to hold onto something and not feel like I was going to lose my balance or topple over. With a TRX [Suspension Trainer], I was able to be confident and do some of the lower body stuff that I wouldn’t have been able to do with dumbbells in my hands,” she said.”
Tara’s TRX Training Club classes are tough, but fully accessible regardless of your fitness level. Want to experience it for yourself? Fire up her TRX Training Club On-Demand sessions and discover what your body is capable of doing.