The .02 Percent Club wasn’t born in a high-end wellness clinic or an influencer studio. It was forged over four decades of grit, rotating shift work, and a refusal to let life dictate my physical limits.

Growing up in a rough neighborhood in North County St. Louis, times were tight. As a preteen, I picked up dumbbells for the first time simply to build myself up against a rough environment. When my parents divorced during my high school years, I moved to Troy, Missouri, where I found two constants that would shape my entire life: weight training and my incredible wife, who has been by my side for 32 years.

Traditional school wasn’t my path. I dropped out, secured my GED before my class even graduated, and married my wife at 18. To support our growing family, I went straight into factory work on the off-shifts. For 15 years, through exhausting hours, the iron was my anchor. When that factory sent our jobs overseas, I had to start completely over at 33 as a union refinery worker. If you know refinery life, you know the deal: grueling hours, physical labor, and constantly rotating shifts. But I utilized the on-site gym and kept grinding.

Over the decades, my approach evolved. I adapted my lifting, dialed in my nutrition, and tracked the cutting edge of supplementation. A few years ago, after raising our three children, my wife joined me on this ultimate fitness journey. Today, at 50 years old, we both maintain peak physical health and visible abdominal fitness while working full-time.

We are living proof that you can put your health first, no matter the hours or the age. The .02 Percent Club exists to find the rare few over 50 who have done the same—to swap blueprints, share successes, and build a ladder for the serious individuals who are inches away from joining the elite .02%.