Forged at Equinox: Jason and Mike

Forged at Equinox is a series highlighting an Equinox member’s foray into a new workout regimen, with help from an expert coach. The following conversation has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

An artist by day, Jason Wallace has always kept himself moving. He played tennis year-round growing up, taking lessons from pros, and cycled around Washington, D.C. and Boston throughout his college years. Throughout his 50 years on Earth, Jason says he’s stayed relatively fit.

But in 2021, a rotator cuff injury took the Chicago native out of the gym for a year and a half. This downtime, combined with his age, left Jason with noticeable muscle atrophy, he says. He wasn’t able to sleep on his right side due to shoulder pain, and he noticed reduced mobility in his affected joint. But he was determined to get back to feeling like himself.

Jason signed up to work with a coach at Equinox DUMBO and ultimately switched to Hudson Yards, a Club conveniently located six blocks away from his studio. There, he paired up with Mike Nicholson, CSCS, CPT, a Tier 3+ Coach at the Club. As Jason puts it, it was “love at first sight.”  

That first meeting, Jason and Mike chatted for two hours — twice as long as the usual initial session. They walked through Jason’s injury and exercise history and bonded over their passion for their careers. Importantly, they connected over their preferred style of communication. 

“A lot of times people get in the gym and it becomes this overly masculine type of expression,” says Jason. “And for me, it was great to have the right relationship with Mike, in terms of conversation, that allowed him to push me in certain areas but also allowed me to be like, ‘Whoa, whoa, too much, too much. I can't do that.’ Whenever I would say that, he would come up with a physical exercise…that would allow me to have some type of progress with the exercise that formerly couldn't do.”

In the last five months, Jason has trained with Mike three times a week, usually showing up early and staying late, always giving 100 percent of his effort, says the coach. 

In the process, he’s made notable improvements in his overall strength and injury rehabilitation. “[With Jason] being from Chicago, I could tell he had that grit, but I could also tell that the shoulder injury he had already started his rehab on was really holding him back,” Mike recalls. Today, Jason’s deadlifting hundreds of pounds and boxing without taking it easy for his shoulder’s sake, he adds.

Here, Jason and Mike open up about the progress they’ve made in their training sessions, as well as how these milestones have positively impacted life outside the Club.