CERRY HILL, NJ – If this question were to be asked on the TV show Jeopardy, the correct answer would be, “Who is Maria Mountain?”.
OK, if you say so…Maria Mountain…I believe you…but just who is she?
She’s the best man for the job; now let me tell you why.
With a belief that her training methods would one day become mainstream as her one and only source of encouragement, Maria plugged away in the shadows of a large Ontario gym with only the slightest bit of recognition.
Combining her knowledge of human bio-mechanics with her passion for hockey, she did have her share of successes, but remained one of the best kept secrets in the world of competitive sports.
Then Maria happened to create a customized training program for a client, and he happened to become an NHL player…then she implemented another personalized plan for an NHL goalie…and then, in a spectacular event that 
one would expect only in a Hollywood movie, one of those Maria Mountain clients made that famous ‘dream come true’ lap around the ice – you know, the one that involves hoisting the Stanly Cup.
Presto! Recognition!
Only getting warmed up though, she took on a slightly different type of skater – with strikingly similar results. So let it be known that a Maria Mountain patron has just hung an Olympic Gold Medal above the fireplace in his den.
That’s “Gold Medal” as in “best on the entire planet medal”. Not a bad honor; and not such a bad client to have – especially since he acknowledges that he would NOT have won without Maria.
Stanley Cup winner. Gold Medal winner. Still not sure who Maria is?
You need not be of the athletic rich and famous to know her. If your heart starts racing as you make your way into the arena parking lot, if you have that ‘home at last’ feeling upon entering the lobby, and if you sense that you have been selected as one of ‘the chosen’ when sitting in a pre-game locker room, then in fact you do know Maria Mountain.
I assure you, that if you love to compete, if you live only to bask in the exhilaration that is uniquely tied to ‘the great game’, and if the very basis of your existence is centered on your athletic performance, then you know her quite well.
Should you comprehend that those desires to win are miniscule in comparison to an on-going willingness to prepare, then you know Maria firsthand – and in possessing such knowledge you are probably, like myself, one of her website members.
I suspect that that all of Maria’s beloved athletes-in-training and all of her coaches who seek learning, have come to recognize that the will to win is a fairly common trait among those of us who love this sport.
Read the body of Maria’s work and you will discover that the readiness to get up at 5:00am to do stretches and squats is a far more uncommon element – yet it is clearly a habit of those who have reached out and taken hold of the unreachable goals.
Just for the record, Maria Mountain is in bed by 9:00pm – every night – so that she may be properly prepared for those ‘oh so lucky’ participants who are close enough, geographically, to actually frequent her gym.
If you are a part of the rapidly growing herd of athletes who flock to her Hockeytrainingpro web site, you will soon know her too. You see, Maria conducts ‘person to person’ phone calls with members of her Elite Strength & Conditioning program on a monthly basis.
In that process, she will work her magic and get you to view your physical imbalance as a chance to do some fine tuning. Maria will guide you in such a way that dealing with your injured area becomes a golden opportunity to transform that body part into one of your strongest properties.
While her membership numbers are growing, I always find comfort in the fact that Maria knows us too.
She will also help you establish your own home gym, all well within the boundaries of routine expense. Need we list the benefits of doing so?
At this point you can not help but recognize that Maria is largely compassionate, and you will surely see that she is always going to place her emphasis on your performance…and not on her personal fame. She will consistently prove her passion for assisting others while assuring that they reach their full physical potential.
If you happen to be an athlete, you can watch her leg squat videos and become a better and more balanced skater. If you happen to be a coach, you will not be burdened with an entirely new field of study that needs to be mastered – instead you will find that your load has actually been lightened. 
Maria has emphasized to me that, as a coach, I do not need to know everything in order to be a decent teacher of the game – I only need to be smart enough to go out and get a good Strength Coach for our squad. We all play hard and, invariably, we all get injured. Very few of us, though, have a coach who can turn that potential disaster into future glory. Getting a conditioning coach like Maria appears to be sound advice.
She also told me that the desire to create core strength from one or more dysfunctional body parts is a characteristic that top coaches and athletes share.
‘This core strength practice is common among world champions – those who did win Gold Medals and those who did win Hockey Championships.”
Maria said it with certainty – and I believed it with absolute faith. You will too.
I wondered how Maria developed such keen insights, asked how long a process that may have been and in so doing suggested that it may take a full decade or so to become an ‘overnight sensation’.
Her actual process extended my estimate by five years. In large part, her debut was delayed by a decision to take a much less traveled road to success. Shortly after reaching her goal of being the Head Coach at a well known athletic training center, Maria – with a degree in Kinesiology – was introduced to an entirely new subject matter. Economics.
“I realized that the standard Gym Manual was just not working for enough of our members. My vision was more along the lines of selling performance and creating training programs that met specific individual needs.”
I knew what was coming next; but hoped that I would be wrong. There was no surprise forthcoming.
“The owner told me that my job was to sell memberships. I disagreed and said that it was actually to increase performance while decreasing the chance of injury. Guess who won the argument?”
Trainers who focus on your body’s needs, center on your goals, and create a program that works for you are suddenly growing in popularity and in number. Along with fellow icons, Kevin Neeld, Pat Rigsby, and Mike Boyle, Maria has proved to be one of the elite trend setters in this field. So in truth, I think that she won the argument.
So does Andy McDonald, a member of the Anaheim Ducks Stanley Cup winning team…and a long time member of Maria’s Revolution Conditioning.
Others taking her side would include clients like Steve Rucchin, a 10 year NHL veteran, and Jeff Hackett, the former Montreal Canadians netminder who took Maria’s program so seriously that he became a Goalie Coach for the Colorado Avalanche when his playing days came to an end.
However, the crown jewel in the Maria Mountain showcase just may be Scott Moir. Not only is Scott a Canadian ice skating champion, he is now a universally acknowledged super star, that by virtue of winning the Olympic Gold Medal at the 2010 Vancouver games.
Think about the task of helping a guy become part of a successful twenty man team. Now contrast that with the development of an Olympic athlete who stands alone while performing in front of millions around the world. OK, now think ‘crown jewel’.
In summation, these individuals are an amazing cast of supporting characters, are they not? The fact that they have entrusted their entire career to Maria Mountain tells us one thing…that she is a caring /competent professional expert and they, the undisputed world class athletes, know it full well.
They already knew the answer to our original question; “Who is the Best Man for the Job?”
Sometimes it’s really hard to find a good trainer.
So here’s a great one: Maria Mountain – for God knew that only this woman would easily the best man for the job. Contact Pops.Ryan@prohockeynews.com
You must be logged in to post a comment.