Jeremy Purifoy Journey Fitness Corning
Jeremy Purifoy has been coaching and training friends since high school in his hometown of Elmira, NY. As a personal trainer his unofficial career really started in high school when a friend of his tore her ACL playing basketball. Without a formal education he knew she needed to keep moving and he helped her do squats and lay up drills. He did not have certification yet, but he did have passion! He was created to do this work. Also during this time Jeremy had another friend who needed help after being diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. The challenge for this friend was that he played baseball and as a teenager with MS, his life could have taken a very different turn. But not with Jeremy in the picture. Jeremy worked with this friend and helped him keep up with his agility, balance and strength routines. His friend went on to win several awards for baseball. To say Jeremy Purifoy has a gift is an understatement.
Being able to train and coach these two friends, drove his passion for personal training. Now the real beauty in Jeremy’s story came when he stated, “In college I weighed 270 pounds... I hid in my clothes and always wore sixe XXXL. I never wore jeans, only sweats and hoodies”. Then one day he stepped on the scale and couldn’t believe the number. Jeremy was getting ready to graduate with a Bachelor of Arts in Health Science from SUNY Brockport, and he was overweight!
After college he moved back to Elmira and searched for jobs in the fitness industry. During this time there were not many jobs in the fitness industry. He even asked a local gym if he could work the front desk in exchange for gym membership just to get some experience. They passed on his offer.
Jeremy then began his own transformation and brought physical activities and a weight room to his place of employment, the Glove House in Elmira, New York. The transformational work he did on himself and with the young people at Glove House is yet another amazing story to be told.
In 2013 a new gym called Journey Fitness opened in Elmira, New York and Jeremy, reached out to the owner Travis Barnes for a job. Unfortunately Travis didn’t have work, but said they would keep him in mind. In January of 2014 Jeremy started a job at Grand Central Fitness. Unfortunately, in February of 2014 a fire caused that gym to shut down. At this point Jeremy was discouraged and even questioned if he was in the right industry. As luck would have it he was eventually was hired to work at Journey Fitness. However, his story doesn’t end there. He was hired to learn the front desk systems so the team could go to a conference. But God had other plans and Jeremy also went to the conference. Following that conference Jeremy spearheaded the opening of a 2nd Journey Fitness location.
In March of 2019, fueled by his passion and love for his team and community, Jeremy became the proud owner of Journey Fitness in Corning, New York. Since then Jeremy has had several speaking engagements at industry conferences such as IDEA and SCW. Jeremy is involved in an active board member of his local Chamber of Commerce. He has a diverse staff and wants to inspire young people of color to go into the fitness industry. In Jeremy’s words, “there is money to be made if you work at it”. There is so much more to this story but I’ll let Jeremy tell it for himself. If you really want to be inspired, check out Journey Fitness in Corning, New York!
And finally, Jeremy’s words to live by is a quote by Maya Angelou - “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” And believe me when I tell you that once you meet Jeremy, you will ALWAYS remember how he made you feel.
