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Three days in Los Angeles covering the conversations reshaping fitness in 2026
The Connected Health and Fitness Summit ran February 18 through 20 in Los Angeles, its seventh year and still one of the few industry gatherings that earns its own momentum. The event brought together coaches, studio operators, investors, and technology founders under a theme that matched where the most pressing industry conversations actually live: uniting fitness, health, and technology for club and community success.
What the Summit does well is create space for both the formal session and the conversation it generates. A Networking Zone, Expo Hall, and Movement Zone ran throughout a packed but paced schedule, so attendees weren’t choosing between a panel and a meaningful introduction. That design is harder to get right than it looks, and it’s a large part of why the people who show up here tend to come back.
Here’s what coaches and studio operators should take from three days in Los Angeles.
The Summit assembled voices from across the operational range of the wellness industry, from boutique operators to enterprise brands to emerging technology. Each brought a perspective shaped by a different set of pressures, which made the programming more useful than a room full of agreement.
Hal Hargrave | The Perfect Step
Adaptive fitness and community-driven programming, relevant for coaches building inclusive client rosters and operators expanding their programming reach.
Charles Rosenblatt | Butter Payments
Payment infrastructure and revenue optimization for fitness businesses, directly applicable to studio operators managing subscription and membership models.
Jeff Zwiefel | Life Time MIORA Longevity and Performance
High-performance longevity programming at scale, relevant for coaches positioned at the premium health optimization end of the market.
Laura Wilson | Natural Pilates
Boutique studio growth and retention philosophy in a competitive urban market.
Ruth Sylvia | VP of Product Management, MyFitnessPal
Consumer behavior data and digital health integration, with implications for coaches managing client tracking and engagement outside the gym.
Steve Padis | CFO and EVP of Strategy, Barry’s
Financial strategy and brand expansion at franchise scale, with lessons applicable to any operator thinking about sustainable growth rather than fast growth.
A virtual keynote featuring Anthony Geisler and Gary Brecka extended the programming to remote attendees and added perspective on where the fitness and wellness industries are converging at the ownership and investment level.
The Summit’s panel programming covered four areas that map directly to decisions coaches and studio operators are making in 2026. Below is each topic with the practical implication that matters for the Coach360 audience.
| Panel | What It Means for Coaches and Operators |
| Designing Desire: The Next Evolution of Prestige in Fitness | Premium experience is being redefined beyond equipment and square footage. Coaches operating in the boutique or high-touch space need to understand what clients are willing to pay for now, and what they are comparing you against. |
| Adapting Your Offerings for the GLP Era | GLP-1 medications are already in your client roster, whether you know it or not. This session addressed how to program, communicate, and structure training for clients whose body composition is changing through pharmaceutical intervention alongside exercise. |
| The Business of Women’s Health: What Will Define 2026 | Women’s health is the fastest-growing programming conversation in fitness. Coaches who understand hormonal periodization, perimenopause programming, and life-stage-specific training are positioned ahead of a market that is actively looking for this expertise. |
| The Community Catalyst: How Connection Drives Retention, Revenue and Reach | The retention data is consistent: clients who feel connected to a community cancel less and refer more. This session examined what building that connection actually requires operationally, not just philosophically. |
GLP-1 medications have moved from a niche topic to a mainstream coaching reality in the past 18 months. The Summit dedicated a full session to it because the clients are already there. Coaches who have not developed a framework for programming alongside GLP-1 use are behind conversations their clients are already having with their doctors.
Coach360 will publish a dedicated GLP-1 programming guide in the coming weeks. If this is a gap in your current practice, it is worth addressing before clients bring it to you.
The Innovation Showcase is one of the most useful segments of Connected each year. Emerging companies pitch directly to a room of decision-makers and investors. For coaches and operators, it is a preview of the tools that will be part of standard conversations within two to three years.
Coach360 won the Innovation Showcase at the 2025 Summit, a recognition that validated FitHire and the Coach360 media platform as a meaningful development in how the fitness industry approaches staffing and talent. Watching the next round of companies step up carries specific weight when you have been in that position.
Related: Career Lab by Coach360 and FitHire by Coach360 built on the foundation that earned that recognition.
Jim Crowell, Eloiza Tecson, Eric Bormel, Nate Kline, and Alex Alimanestianu reviewed the presenting lineup, which brought five distinct approaches to the near future of fitness technology.
| Presenter | Company | Relevance for Coaches and Operators |
| Ivan Tchatchouwo | The Zone | Performance analytics and zone-based training protocols for group fitness environments. |
| Meridith Cass | Nix Biosensors | Real-time sweat biomarker monitoring for hydration and physiological load. Relevant for coaches managing high-output training populations. |
| Raj Sareen | Styku | 3D body composition scanning and data visualization. Directly applicable for coaches doing body recomposition work with GLP-1 and non-GLP-1 clients. |
| Scott Dickens | FORM Swim | Smart swim goggles with real-time performance metrics, expanding data-driven coaching into a significantly undertapped modality. This year’s Showcase winner. |
| Sukemasa Kabayama | Uplift Labs | AI-powered movement analysis for identifying compensation patterns and injury risk, with applications across performance and rehabilitation coaching. |
FORM Swim · Presented by Scott Dickens, VP of Global Sales Channels and Partnerships
FORM Swim’s win is worth examining beyond the recognition. Swim is the most underserved modality in coaching technology. The gap between data tools available for strength, conditioning, and cycling versus what exists for swimming has been significant for years. A wearable that delivers real-time metrics inside the water, without disrupting the session, closes part of that gap and opens the coaching conversation in a pool environment that has largely operated on feel and stopwatch timing.
For coaches who program multi-sport or triathlon clients, and for facilities with pool access, FORM Swim is worth evaluating before wider adoption makes it a standard expectation.
Three themes from Connected 2026 carry enough weight that they will show up in coaching conversations, hiring decisions, and facility programming decisions over the next year. None of them are speculative. Each reflects work already underway in the rooms that were in Los Angeles.
The Summit surfaces conversations that are already happening in the rooms most coaches and operators do not have access to. These three themes were not predictions. They were observations from the people building businesses around them right now.
Identify one of these three themes that applies to your current client roster. Spend 30 minutes this week mapping what you already know, what you need to learn, and what you would tell a client if they asked about it tomorrow.
FAQ · CONNECTED HEALTH AND FITNESS SUMMIT 2026
The Connected Health and Fitness Summit is an annual conference bringing together fitness coaches, studio operators, investors, and technology companies. The 2026 event was the seventh annual Summit, held February 18 through 20 in Los Angeles under the theme “Uniting Fitness, Health and Tech for Club and Community Success.”
FORM Swim, presented by Scott Dickens, VP of Global Sales Channels and Partnerships, won the 2026 Innovation Showcase. The selection committee included Jim Crowell, Eloiza Tecson, Eric Bormel, Nate Kline, and Alex Alimanestianu. Coach360 won the Innovation Showcase at the 2025 Summit.
The 2026 Summit covered prestige experience design in fitness, GLP-1 programming adaptation, women’s health as a business category, and community-driven retention strategy. The Innovation Showcase featured five technology companies presenting tools across performance analytics, biomarker monitoring, body composition scanning, swim coaching, and AI movement analysis.
GLP-1 medications are already present in active training populations. Coaches who have not developed a programming framework for clients using these medications are behind a conversation that is accelerating quickly. The Connected Summit dedicated a full panel session to GLP-1 adaptation, reflecting how central it has become to fitness business planning in 2026.
About Elisa Edelstein
Elisa is a curious and versatile writer, carving her niche in the health and wellness industry since 2015. Her lens is rooted in real world experience as a personal trainer and competitive bodybuilder and extended out of the gym and on to the page as a writer where she is able to combine her passions for empowering others, promoting wellness, and the power of the written word.
How Brandon Cullen and Kirk Dewaele built a strength franchise on the quality of who teaches it
MAD = Momentum Anaerobic Durability
Co-Founders: Brandon Cullen and Kirk Dewaele · Former professional hockey players
Headquarters: Charlotte, NC · Website: madabolic.com · LinkedIn: @madabolic
A good coach can hold a room. A great one makes someone move better six months later because of what they taught in a single session. MADabolic has built an entire hiring philosophy around that gap, and it shows in how the brand screens, onboards, and retains its training staff.
MADabolic was founded in Charlotte, North Carolina in 2011 by Brandon Cullen and Kirk Dewaele, both former professional hockey players who saw a specific gap in the group fitness market. There were no high-quality training systems built for people who prioritize strength, value structure, and demand results. The brand they built around that observation is now in 35-plus locations with more than 60 in development nationwide.
The approach that drives both the programming and the coaching standard is simple on paper and demanding in practice: structure over chaos, consistency over variety, qualified trainers over cheerleaders.
MADabolic describes itself as the industry’s strength gym, and the programming supports the claim. Every workout interval is built at the Charlotte flagship by Cullen and Dewaele, then distributed to every location through an internal platform that calls out points of performance, common movement flaws, and coaching cues for each exercise. The session a client takes in Denver is the same session running in Philadelphia or Atlanta on the same day.
That centralized program design is a deliberate structural choice. It frees coaches to put full attention on the room rather than the whiteboard, on watching how people move rather than thinking about what comes next. The programming is already solved. The coaching is the job.
Clients have also changed in what they want from training. People want to feel capable and durable, not wrecked. MADabolic’s 50-minute, four-times-per-week model was built around longevity and movement quality over intensity for its own sake, and the coaches the brand develops are expected to understand that distinction and hold it in every session.
MADabolic’s tagline is the training floor’s operating principle: 50 minutes. 4x/week. Unmatched results. The coaching staff is what turns that formula into something a client can actually feel six weeks in.
The brand’s first preference is internal. Most of MADabolic’s coaching staff started as clients. Training inside the system and experiencing the program firsthand builds a level of belief that credentials alone do not produce. A coach who has done the reps inside MADabolic’s own methodology communicates it differently than one who learned it on an intake sheet.
For external candidates, the profile is specific: former athletes who are outgoing, coachable, and drawn to structure. Strength and conditioning credentials carry weight in the evaluation, but coachability ranks above almost everything else on the list.
Every prospective trainer at MADabolic, regardless of experience level or prior credentials, goes through the same process before they coach a single class. There are no shortcuts based on resume.
| Stage | What Happens and Why It Matters |
| Two-Day Training Camp | An in-house intensive covering the MADabolic system, methodology, and coaching expectations. This is where the brand communicates its standard directly, not through a handbook but through the work itself. |
| Movement Test-Outs | Prospective coaches must demonstrate competency in the movement patterns they will teach. This is not a certification audit. It is a practical standard applied specifically to the MADabolic program. |
| 4 to 6 Week On-Ramp | Coaches train inside the system as participants before they lead anything. The goal is internalization, not surface-level performance. MADabolic wants coaches who have earned the cues through their own reps, not coaches reading them off a sheet. |
| Ongoing Training as Clients | After joining staff, coaches continue training as members of the program. This is not standard across boutique gym concepts. MADabolic credits it with both high trainer participation and retention rates that are notably above industry norms. |
The onboarding process is thorough by design. Arriving with strength and conditioning credentials is a starting point, not a pass. Every coach goes through the same evaluation, and the standard being measured is MADabolic’s own system, not a generalized fitness competency.
Compensation varies by location, which is standard across franchise models, but MADabolic’s structure includes several components that move beyond base-rate hourly pay. For coaches evaluating roles in boutique fitness, the full picture matters.
| Compensation Component | Detail |
| Class Attendance Bonus | Bonus pay tied to class attendance thresholds, meaning coaches benefit directly from the strength of the member community they help build. |
| Sales Commission | Commission tied to membership sales goals, connecting coaching performance to broader studio health. |
| Continuing Education | Access to ongoing education opportunities, supporting coaches who treat their development as a long-term investment rather than a one-time credential. |
| Healthcare Stipend | Available to full-time team members at participating locations, a benefit that is uncommon at independent boutique gyms and still rare across franchise models. |
Coaching careers in fitness have a known shelf life. Physical toll, erratic hours, and the kind of fatigue that builds quietly under the surface while chasing something meaningful take out a lot of good people before they want to leave. What MADabolic has figured out, at least in part, is that a program worth studying gives coaches a reason to stay. And a reason to stay has been in short supply across the industry for a long time.
The coaches who build lasting careers at MADabolic share a consistent set of traits. They are coachable. They hold to fundamentals when it would be easier to improvise. They are focused on improving client movement mechanics because they understand that the result of a great coaching session often shows up four weeks later, not that afternoon.
The culture of continuing to train inside the program, as a participant rather than just an instructor, changes how instruction lands. There is a difference between a coach who reads cues off a sheet and one who earned those cues through their own work inside the system. MADabolic structures its coaching environment to produce the second kind.
Coaches interested in exploring opportunities with MADabolic can find current openings through FitHire by Coach360, the marketplace that connects fitness professionals with roles at leading brands nationwide. MADabolic positions are listed directly on the platform, which makes the application process straightforward for coaches who already know the brand and the standard it operates under.
MADabolic coaching roles are listed on FitHire by Coach360. Find current openings at the FitHire marketplace and apply directly. If you are a former athlete, have a strength and conditioning background, and are drawn to working inside a structured program rather than building your own, this is worth exploring.
FAQ · MADABOLIC COACHING STANDARD AND HIRING
MADabolic prioritizes movement knowledge, coachability, and the ability to communicate effectively during a live session. The brand specifically values former athletes who are drawn to structure and have the ability to internalize a system rather than override it with personal preference. Strength and conditioning credentials carry weight, but coachability ranks above most other factors in the evaluation. Many MADabolic coaches started as clients, which gives them a level of program belief that external candidates need to build through the onboarding process.
MADabolic’s Training Camp is a two-day in-house intensive every prospective coach must complete, regardless of prior experience or credentials. It is followed by movement test-outs specific to the MADabolic program and a four to six week on-ramp period in which coaches train inside the system as participants before leading any class. The process is designed to ensure coaches have internalized the methodology, not just learned to perform it on the surface.
Compensation varies by location and franchise ownership. Common components include base pay, bonus tied to class attendance thresholds, commission connected to sales goals, continuing education access, and healthcare stipends for full-time team members at eligible locations. The compensation structure is designed to connect coaching performance to studio health rather than limiting coaches to an hourly rate disconnected from outcomes.
MADabolic was founded in Charlotte, North Carolina in 2011 by Brandon Cullen and Kirk Dewaele, both former professional hockey players. MAD stands for Momentum Anaerobic Durability. The brand’s training philosophy is built on structure over chaos, consistency over variety, and a 50-minute, four-times-per-week model designed for longevity and movement quality rather than intensity for its own sake. Every workout is programmed centrally at the Charlotte headquarters and distributed to all locations, so coaches can focus on the room rather than the design.
About Elisa Edelstein
Elisa is a curious and versatile writer, carving her niche in the health and wellness industry since 2015. Her lens is rooted in real world experience as a personal trainer and competitive bodybuilder and extended out of the gym and on to the page as a writer where she is able to combine her passions for empowering others, promoting wellness, and the power of the written word.
Powering the Business of Health, Fitness, and Wellness Coaching