14 Years.
No Shortcuts.
I coach 1-to-1 in Edinburgh at Hanuman Muay Thai and deliver online coaching to clients worldwide, from complete beginners to competitive athletes preparing for competition.
Callan Headrick is a personal trainer, strength and conditioning coach and nutritionist with 14 years of experience, based at Hanuman Muay Thai in Leith, Edinburgh. He holds a Level 3 Diploma in Personal Training, is CIMSPA registered and fully insured, and works with a deliberately small number of in-person and online clients at a time.
The work splits into two halves. One is body composition and performance: helping people build the physique and the physical capacity to match their ambitions, whether that means dropping significant body fat, building serious strength, or performing better in their sport. The other is the harder end of the job, coaching people whose bodies do not cooperate with a standard programme, whether because of injury, a long layoff, or a competition schedule that dictates everything.
Callan trains alongside his clients. He competes in Muay Thai and BJJ, lifts regularly, and applies the same standards to his own training that he brings to his coaching. That matters more than it sounds. A coach who has managed their own weight cut, trained around their own injury and had their own programme collapse under a bad month gives different advice from one who has only read about it.
Over 14 years he has worked with hundreds of clients, from people stepping into a gym for the first time to competitive combat sports athletes managing body composition and performance at the same time. Most arrive having already tried the generic routes. The common thread in what brings them is not a lack of effort, it is that nobody ever built them a plan that fitted the life they actually have.
Qualifications and credentials
- Level 3 Diploma in Personal Training. The recognised UK standard for coaches writing individual programmes, above the Level 2 gym instructor qualification.
- CIMSPA registered. Registered with the Chartered Institute for the Management of Sport and Physical Activity, the professional body for the sector in the UK.
- Fully insured. Public liability and professional indemnity cover in place.
- Nutritionist. Nutrition coaching is built into every programme rather than sold as an add-on. Callan is not a registered dietitian, so anything requiring medical diagnosis or a therapeutic diet for a diagnosed condition is referred to your GP or a dietitian.
- 14 years coaching experience across body composition, strength and conditioning, combat sports performance, weight cut management and return to training after injury.
14
Years Experience
Nutrition
Included
CIMSPA
Registered
Edinburgh
& Online
Bespoke Programming.
Performance First.
Bespoke programming. Performance first, aesthetics follow. No generic plans. No cookie-cutter templates. Coaching that's built around you and adjusted every single week based on what's actually happening, not what a spreadsheet says should happen.
What that actually means in practice
Every coach claims bespoke programming. Very few can describe what it changes. Here is what it changes here.
Assessment before prescription
Nothing gets written until there is something to write from: training history, injuries and limitations, what equipment and time you genuinely have, what you currently eat across a real week including the weekend, how you sleep, and what you have already tried and abandoned. A programme produced before any of that is a template with your name on the front.
Performance first, appearance second
This is not a slogan, it is a sequencing decision. Programmes are built to make you stronger and more capable, and the way you look follows from that. It works in that order because strength and capacity are measurable week to week, which means progress can be verified and the plan corrected. Chasing appearance directly gives you almost nothing to steer by, which is why so many people spend six months working hard with no idea whether any of it is functioning.
One variable at a time
When progress stalls, the temptation is to change everything at once: cut calories, add cardio, switch the whole programme. Do that and you learn nothing, because you cannot tell which change did what. Adjustments here are made one at a time, for a stated reason, and the effect is watched before the next one.
Measured on more than the scales
Bodyweight moves with hydration, food volume and hormonal cycles, and a genuinely good three months can barely shift it. Strength progression, measurements, photos under consistent conditions, how clothes fit, energy and sleep all get tracked, because any one of them alone will eventually tell you a lie.
Built to survive a bad week
Every plan meets a week where work explodes, someone gets ill or nothing goes as intended. A plan with no answer for that week does not merely lose a week, it usually ends there. Programming includes what to do with the reduced version, so a bad week stays a bad week instead of becoming the end of the whole thing.
Aiming at your independence
The intention is that you leave understanding why the plan worked, not just that it did. Good coaching should gradually make itself less necessary. A coach who needs you dependent on them forever has an incentive that is not aligned with yours.
Who this suits, and who it does not
Coaching is a poor purchase when it is mis-sold, so it is worth being direct about both sides.
It works well for people who want to be told the truth rather than flattered, who are prepared to be consistent for months rather than intense for a fortnight, and who want to understand the reasoning rather than just be handed instructions. Complete beginners are genuinely welcome: you do not need to get in shape before you start, and the private facility removes most of what puts people off beginning. It also suits combat sports athletes who want their strength work to support their sport rather than compete with it, and people rebuilding after injury who have been told to simply rest and want a route back.
It is a poor fit if you want a guaranteed outcome by a fixed date, because nobody can honestly promise that. It is also the wrong service if you are looking for a quick crash diet, since the entire approach is built around not doing that. And anything that needs medical diagnosis or treatment, a therapeutic diet for a diagnosed condition, or support with disordered eating belongs with your GP or a registered dietitian. If something in that territory comes up, you will be told so rather than coached through it.
Client numbers are kept deliberately small, which is the constraint that makes individual programming possible at all. It also means places are not always available immediately.
Rates at a Glance
In-Person (Hanuman Muay Thai, Edinburgh)
Single session: £50
Block of 4 sessions: £180
Block of 8 sessions: £320
Each session is one hour
Online Coaching
£120/month
Rolling monthly contract, no minimum term
Full breakdown on the personal training prices page.