Ryan "The Fire" Wood is a fighter. Literally—he has boxed against Mr. Oregon among others—and philosophically, transforming a difficult background of family discord and life on the streets into a soon-to-be graduate of Lane Community College and a future business owner.
Ryan, 34, has nearly completed his two-year degree and certificate in Exercise and Movement Science (EXMS) at Lane. He hopes to walk in the commencement ceremonies this June with an entourage of his fellow students dubbed "the flock" by EXMS instructor Jenni Miner.
"They're the best group anyone could imagine," Ryan says of his classmates. "We really clicked, right from the beginning."
Their support, and the challenging and creative instruction he has experienced in the program, gave Ryan a vision of running his own gym. It's a prospect he never imagined when he lived in cardboard boxes on the streets of Eugene.
That's where he learned how to fight, doing whatever he had to do to survive whether it was stealing or dealing. "It was the hand I was dealt," he says with a shrug. His mother died when he was five and his father remarried but the new situation was not a good one for Ryan.
By age 16 he started working in construction and painting and moved up from street life to "couch surfing" from one friend's house to another before finally securing a room of his own. Other challenges arose as well. He spent a few years raising two nephews and two nieces while his brother served a prison term.
When Ryan was 26, his father—a Vietnam veteran—had a heart attack at age 62, the same as his father before him. At the time, both Ryan and his father weighed around 300 pounds. When Ryan saw his father in the ICU, hooked up to lines and beeping machinery, he stopped in his tracks. His dad looked over at him and said, "Son, you better lose that weight before you turn 30." Ryan knew this would be his own end if he stayed on the path he was currently on.
After that Ryan found a mixed martial arts (MMA) gym and began working out three times a week from 5 to 8 p.m. He also stopped drinking alcohol and sodas, stopped using drugs, and stopped eating ice cream and processed foods. In the first three months he lost 30 pounds, and after a year he went from 300 to 185 pounds.
The next challenge was MRSA, a common infection affecting wrestlers and martial arts students. The point of infection was a small break in the skin on his knee. He had two harrowing trips to the emergency room before being admitted and given antibiotics and then undergoing surgery to remove the life-threatening infection. He was hospitalized for a week.
As soon as he could he returned to gym life and this time he met Sarah Jeanes, a graduate of Lane who told him about all about the EXMS program. "She got me fired up," he says. "After learning about it I knew that was the path I wanted to take."
Ryan decided to enroll. First things first, he set about getting his GED since he had never completed high school. It was daunting, but he had lost weight and he had learned the material art of Muay Thai boxing, a physical and mental discipline. "I knew if I could do that, then I could do this too."
He applied to the EXMS program with great energy and enthusiasm—and was declined. Not willing to just walk away, he asked why and was told the program had expected business attire for the interview. Ryan had expected to do some exercises as part of the two-and-one-half hour interview and had dressed in a gym suit. Annoyed at first, he told himself, "Okay Ryan, you have to look into yourself and see what you really want, who you really want to be." He applied a second time, but this time his application essay didn't make the grade. But Ryan is a fighter. He approached a friend who had writing skills and he reworked his essay. The third time he applied, he was accepted. Now he says it was meant to be or he wouldn't have ended up with the class and instructors he has now. "I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be," he says.
Instructor Jenni Miner is an inspiration, Ryan says. He was accustomed to classes being about memorizing materials projected on a screen and filling in the circles on a sheet of paper. Not with Jenni. She constantly challenges her students to be creative and puts them through unanticipated activities. It was exactly what he needed, says Ryan.
The program also uses cooperative education experiences to give students an idea of what's available in the working world beyond the classroom. With co-op, students earn college credit and on-the-job experience at the same time. Ryan interned in Lane's fitness center, and then at the University of Oregon recreational center where he was hired part-time after completing his internship. He's currently teaching a martial arts program at the UO center.
EXMS instructors also introduce students to entrepreneurial options. Ryan heard a guest speaker talk about how to start a business, build a business plan, get financing, and conduct marketing. That presentation gave him more of the tools to have the confidence he needed to open his own gym. He's going to call it "The Burn Athletic Training Facility," building on his fight name. His slogan will be, "It's Your Turn to Feel the Burn with Ryan 'The Fire' Wood." He knows exactly what he will need for financing, facilities, equipment and a workforce.
Ryan encourages others who need to complete their education and explore a future to begin at Lane Community College, to look inward, and to embrace change. He puts it this way: "Change is to give up on what you are so you can become what you might be."
Lane's Exercise and Movement Science Program is endorsed by the American College of Sports Medicine. Students can earn an associate of applied science degree; one-year and two-year certificates in fitness; or a 12-credit group exercise pathway certificate. Some students transfer for a four-year degree. Others enter the workforce or begin their own businesses. Applications are accepted three times a year in April, May and June for programs beginning in the fall.
For more information:http://www.lanecc.edu/healthpe/exercise-and-movement-science-program
Published by Marketing and Public Relations, March 2015. Photo by John Watson. Story by Joan Aschim.