Roberts began professionally coaching in 1993. He has since conducted over 30,000 hours of 1-2-1 sessions. Dan has extensive knowledge, passion, and coaching experience in Body Sculpting Transformations, Weight loss, Strength & Conditioning, Rehabilitation, Athletics, Sports, Holistic Wellness, Sports Nutrition, Life Coaching, High-Performance Coaching, Martial Arts, and Movement Coaching. Dan’s unique ‘athletic living’ philosophy marries a holistic, scientific, and playful approach to facilitate dramatic results for mind and body.
His coaching journey has taken him across the globe, with professional residencies in New York, Sydney, Rio de Janeiro, and now London, where he is currently based. If you’re immensely bored, an ill-informed stalker, or are suffering from a bout of curiosity, then you can read a detailed account of his coaching career below.
Fun Facts
- Born: Manchester, England.
- Home Life: I live in Surrey with my wife (a musician) and our pet (an Iguana).
- Favourite Book: Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson.
- Top 3 Favourite Films: Lost in Translation, Fight Club & Wild at Heart.
- Sporting Hero: Eric Cantona.
- Favourite Artists: Mark Rofko & Marina Abramovic.
- Fave Album: Screamadelica – Primal Scream.
- Fave junk food: Jack in the Box Tacos.
- Fave place to hang out: North Shore, Oahu.
- Fave exercise: Barefoot beach running.
- Exercises he almost never teaches: Burpees
- Exercises he always teaches: Deadlifts, Punching & Sprinting.
- Character Flaws: Far too many to mention.
Career History & Achievements
Livin’ the athletic life: Dan‘s competitive sporting life blossomed while at University. He captained his University’s (Division 1) Tennis 1st Team, captained their Lacrosse Team, set up a Varsity inline-hockey club and was awarded colours for his contribution to Sport.
Throughout his 20s and 30s, Dan continued to live an athletic life; he represented England in Lacrosse, ran Ultra-Marathons, competed in Muay Thai fights, and trekked, skied (& fell) down mountains all over the world. In his 40s, he took up power lifting, gymnastics, and kung fu weapons training and began living a more toxin-free life. Now, as Dan approaches 50, he’s still constantly learning new ways of being healthy and fit. Roberts sees an athletic lifestyle as the foundation to a long, happy and playful life and the most effective way to feel truly connected in mind, body & spirit.
Travelling, Adventures & Self-sufficiency: After graduating with a Business Degree in the 90s, Dan suffered the consequences of reading far too much Hemingway & Kerouac and spent a few years intensely wandering the world. This included working at a cafe in Bora Bora, writing a truly terrible script during a few months in Rarotonga, hanging out in Jazz bars in New Orleans, riding motorbikes in Goa, playing chess in Dahab, bar-hopping in Dakar, trying not to get shot in Caracas, failing to learn Tango in Buenos Aires, getting lost on a solo attempt of the Inca Trail, getting caught up in a civil war in Bolivia, establish a Beach Volleyball league in the Gilli Islands, exploring Tikal in Guatemala, climbing Kilimanjaro, trudging the Venezuelan Jungle to see Angel Falls up close and personal and spending several months working as a General Manager of the Youth Hostel at Lake Taupo in New Zealand.
Dan also spent some time living, working, and studying at a Tibetan Buddhist Monastery. His growing interest in Buddhism led him to visit His Holiness the Dalai Lama at his home at the foot of the Himalayas and, more importantly, to Zen Buddhism, which has subsequently shaped his coaching philosophy.
Dan had many random low-skilled jobs while he travelled the globe, including selling mobile phones, digging wells, cleaning toilets, cleaning windows, working on farms, door-to-door sales, and organising pub crawls for tourists.
Finding His Calling
Dan Roberts’ fitness coaching journey began in 2001, when he qualified as a Personal Trainer with the Australian Institute of Fitness while living in the Gold Coast, Australia. Combining his passion for learning, fitness, and teaching, Dan found the perfect career for him in the world of personal training.
In 2002, Dan moved back to Sydney to launch his coaching brand. He established a running club in Bondi and began training amateur triathletes. His journey then took him to New York, where he secured a contract as Assistant Strength Coach for high school and college-level American football players, fueling his growing passion for coaching athletes.
Dan moved to London and worked for two years as a Sports and exercise Specialist at the LA Fitness Gym in Holborn before venturing out of commercial gyms to train clients in parks, hotels, and their homes. This was when Dan’s career truly began to take off, creating the foundation for what would become a world-renowned and multi-awarded winning personal training business.
Training Professional Athletes: While based in London from 2003 to 2007, Dan specialised in the 1-2-1 physical conditioning of professional/full-time athletes. He helped his clients better compete in all kinds of sports, including American Football, Ski Racing, Basketball, Ballet, Boxing, MMA, wakeboarding, Tennis, Rock Climbing, Surfing and Athletics. He also worked with various teams and sporting organisations, such as India Tennis – where he was flown out to Mumbai to create and install their very first national-level strength and conditioning program to aid their top-ranked ATP Tour Players and Coaches.
Dan’s technical understanding and practical application of elite-level strength & conditioning training principles in various sports/disciplines has since grown considerably and earned him an industry reputation as an innovative & highly effective trainer to professional athletes in a wide array of disciplines. Dan trains more in the entertainment industry nowadays, but he still allocates time for athlete clients. Recent clients include Team GBR 100m Sprinters, World champion BBJ fighters, Stuntmen and individuals working for the MET Police, London Firebriage and British Intelligence.
A life of study: Around 25 years ago, Dan set himself a long-term goal of becoming one of the world’s best trainers – this has focused him ever since. Gaining useful knowledge is the foundation of becoming a great coach and Dan’s technical understanding of exercise, nutrition, wellness, longevity and sports/performance psychology has expanded greatly thanks to actively working with a diverse client base, collaborating with various experts, attending workshops all over the globe and gaining a plethora of specialist highly-regarded coaching qualifications.
As of 2024, Dan has 26+ different coaching qualifications to his name, including the prestigious Certified Strength & Conditioning Specialist (CSCS) award by USA’s National Strength And Conditioning Association, along with various qualifications in Personal Training, Olympic Lifting, Athletics, Nutrition, Massage, Weight loss, Stress Resilience, Lifestyle Coaching and Sports Psychology.
“Dan is one of Europe’s leading Strength & Conditioning Coaches.”
Muscle & Performance USA Magazine – 2020
Educating Personal Trainers (and teaching the educators who teach Personal Trainers): In 2006, Dan was headhunted to be the Head Lecturer & Assessor for a London Coaching Education company, which included teaching students the Active IQ/Premier L2 Fitness Instructor & L3 Personal Trainer qualifications. At this time, Dan also devised, authored and taught advanced nationally accredited coaching qualifications in Kettlebell Training and Muay Thai Fitness. He also taught other Educators – teaching them how to up-skill Personal Trainers.
Dan has also created the nationally accredited Methodology X™ Group Instructor certification and, in recent years, ran business-related workshops and masterclasses to help fellow coaches on the marketing, operational and brand-building side of coaching.
Coaching Supermodels in Brazil: Dan moved to Brazil and lived in Rio de Janeiro in 2007 and 2008. Being a rather sociable kinda guy, he knew a lot of models and soon started personally training Brazil’s top female Fashion Models and became the recommended trainer of Elite (one of the leading Fashion Modeling agencies in Rio). He enjoyed the new challenge of helping non-athlete clients precisely sculpt their bodies while also helping them feel fit and capable. The experience helped him develop a holistic training methodology that got dramatic aesthetic and athletic results.
Working in Brazil, Dan also learned about an international fashion model’s lifestyle and unique needs. He started unifying his various methods and ideas into a cohesive philosophy that considered athletic performance, sculpting the body, mental health and body confidence. Since 2008 Dan has worked closely with several London modelling agencies and has trained over a hundred full-time international fashion models. Thanks to his many hardworking model clients getting amazing results and the popularity of Methodology x™, Roberts is now globally recognised as a leading authority in the physical conditioning of international Catwalk, Editorial & Lingerie models.
A year in Asia living as a full-time Fighter: While also looking after his clients in London, Dan was seeking new challenges, so he began a Master’s Degree in Philosophy and started learning Muay Thai. The latter ended up having a more significant impact. In 2009/2010, Dan moved to the source (Thailand) to study properly. Ex-champion fighters trained him up. He was training six hours a day, six days a week for 11 months.
Dan sparred, trained, fought against locals and lived the life of a full-time Muay Thai Athlete (i.e., he ate a lot of rice, lived in a little hut and was kicked in the face most days). After his last fight, he was flown to Abu Dhabi to work at a Palace and be the full-time Muay Thai & Kickboxing Instructor to a Princess.
Developing a luxury Fitness Concierge service: This Middle Eastern experience kickstarted his work as an international Trainer and Fitness Concierge. Since 2011, Dan has regularly travelled to/with many VIP/UHNW clients to assist with their health, mindset & fitness. This includes Personal Training and assisting in designing home gyms, establishing family-wide wellness initiatives, and interviewing, employing and assisting local coaches, chefs and experts so they can look after his clients in his absence. As a company, Dan Roberts has now looked after four different Royal families’ fitness & wellbeing needs.
In the last 14 years, Dan has also curated and led many fitness 1-2-1 and small group retreats in Miami and across Europe – which have been given rave reviews in How to Spend It and The Times Travel Supplement.
Launching NUK SOO™ – his 2nd workout system: Dan returned to London in 2011 and integrated martial arts into his fitness coaching practice. As a keen student of hand-to-hand combat and movement, Dan has also formally studied Boxing, Wing Chun Kung Fu, Shotokan Karate, Kendo, Qi Gong, Kempo, Tai Chi, and various weapons techniques.
His experience combining martial arts with fitness coaching and his admiration for the traditional Samurai mindset inspired a unique 90-day body & mind transformation program, NUK SOO™ – which he launched in 2019 as an online membership club.
“Dan is the man A-list Actresses call when they come to London”
Elle Magazine
Brand Expansion 2012-2024: By 2012, Dan had eight full-time trainers working under him at his gym in the West End, London. Since then, Dan has pivoted away from running a gym and focused on more fun and scalable ways of sharing his methods. For example, his Methodology X™ and NUK SOO™ workout brands were established pre-pandemic and have coached thousands of people in over 60 countries.
With the help of his management team, Dan’s also been growing his eponymous brand by expanding the scope and depth of his coaching services, Mentoring, and consulting for various wellness brands, developing long-term working relationships with Hollywood production companies, and collaborating with various European luxury hotels for pop-up retreats and comprehensive wellness partnerships.
For example: In London, we partnered with the Four Seasons Residencies & Shangri-La Hotel, where we provide a range of integrated well-being services, including creating healthy menu design, establishing guest running clubs, in-room digital workout classes, gym design and facilitated wellness events.
Global recognition & Awards: For 20+ years, the national & international media have cited Dan as a leading fitness expert and ‘A-list Celebrity Trainer.” He’s been interviewed (or has his advice featured) in over 500 publications and has won numerous accolades and awards, including winning at the Annual Tatler Gym Awards in 2015, 2017 & 2019, “The Most Innovative Fitness Company'” at the 2021 South East Enterprise Awards ‘the most innovative online coaching business of 2022″ and “2023 Body Transformation Expert of the year” at the GHP National Fitness & Nutrition Awards (please see below for a list of awards Dan and the company have won). Dan also serves as one of the Judges at the prestigious TPP Annual Wellness Industry Awards.
“Dan Roberts is the world’s greatest Celebrity Personal Trainer.”
Men’s Health
“Dan Roberts is one of the most important figures in the wellbeing industry.”
The Malestrom Magazine
- The growth of Dan Roberts’ companies: The Dan Roberts Group of companies originated from the self-employed consultancy he ran in Australia in 2002. As his services expanded, so did the corporate structure. As of 2024, the group comprises of three limited companies and has operations online, in London and internationally.
The Dan Roberts Group of companies (a.k.a Dan Roberts) exists to help you love your body by living a healthier, happier and more athletic lifestyle.
As a world-renowned boutique fitness & lifestyle coaching organisation, we provide a range of specialist holistic coaching products, services & experiences to our global clientele.
