WESTWOOD, N.J.—This past summer Diana Laucello-Miguel turned 50 and celebrated the milestone with a trip to Italy. When she retuned home and reviewed the pictures, well, the vacation was over.
“I realized I had really let myself go. I was the heaviest I had been in my adult life and needed to do something about it,” she tells Pascack Press.
She found an ad in our pages for Buff Bull Fitness and called. She felt a strong connection. She checked out the gym.
“When I met [owner and personal trainer] Kevin Witkowski he was friendly and professional. He measured my body fat and muscle index and put me on a diet and exercise plan specific to my age, weight, hormones, etc. We discussed my goals, habits and work schedule,” she says.
A special education therapist in one of Bergen County’s top early intervention agencies and owner of her own busy practice, Laucello-Miguel says she loves her job, though it’s demanding and the hours are long.
She needed more than a gym, more than a trainer: she needed results that could sustain her in the long run. Something that would support her in her work, and in her family life—she and her husband have two children—and for her own growth and happiness.
“In the first week I lost 3 pounds, a huge amount for a person as small as I am. With Kevin’s encouragement, I lost 8% body fat and 14 pounds in just 10 weeks,” she says.
In order to keep her on track Witkowski also suggested Laucello-Miguel enter a bodybuilding competition—something she says she’d always wanted to do.
“I agreed, and in a mere 10 weeks I was competition-ready. I competed in November and took fourth place in my first-ever event,” she tells Pascack Press—and, in a glowing testimonial, on Buff Bull Fitness’s comprehensive website.
She adds, “Kevin is a diet and fitness genius. If he could get me ready to compete in a bodybuilding competition in 10 weeks he can do anything. This man changed my life.”
Buff Bull Fitness, at 160 Tillman St. in Westwood, is a state-of- the-art, 5,000-square-foot, can-do training facility for men and women, open seven days a week.
Fifty pieces of equipment, one-on-one training, and thoughtful accountability power patrons as they transform their bodies, improve their lifestyles, and increase their mobility, flexibility, and power.
With more than 15 years of experience, Witkowski says getting results is easy when you go to the right place and to the right people.
“We also offer the InBody 570 Body Composition Analyzer to learn your body mass, muscle mass, and metabolic rate. With our fitness programs and training what seems impossible today will soon become your warm-up,” Witkowski says online.
We called Witkowski to ask about Laucello-Miguel’s story and to see how business was going after the start of the new year, when many people, frankly, throw themselves into typical gym memberships only to fizzle out.
“Diana is great, she’s motivated. She just wanted to take it to the next level,” he says.
He explains that he offers every new client a private three-session $99 special, which proves its worth when they see that Buff Bull Fitness is not a typical gym.
“I’ve been a trainer for a long time, and if you’re not a gym person you can make a New Year’s resolution and that’s great, and some people stick with it. But on average if you’re not a gym person you’re not a gym person, so maybe the first time you get sore you’re like, screw this, and not come back,” he says.
“Or people just fall off because it’s not routine enough for them yet. So with working with a trainer, it keeps those people accountable for those sessions to come in,” he adds.
Witkowski says the goal is to try to get customers to make training part of their routine, and he’s excited to partner with them to make that happen.
In Laucello-Miguel’s case, the solution was to mentor her in training for her bodybuilding competition. In others’ situations, there may be other factors to tap into for long-term success.
Maybe it’s meeting a health or fitness goal. Maybe it’s getting into shape to enjoy parenting or grandparenting more. Maybe it’s part of a job search regimen—taking care of your body and wearing your clothes better speaks to confidence and competence—or maybe it’s relearning techniques that you thought you knew but that weren’t working.
“A lot of people usually don’t know as much about working out and fitness as they think they might, so once they start learning the reasons why they’re working out and how much it helps them, it helps in so many areas,” Witkowski says.
Witkowski, from Norwood, graduated from Northern Valley-Old Tappan. He got into body building in college and has been going strong—and stronger—ever since.
For more information, including on online coaching, building muscle, correcting posture, improving diet and nutrition, losing weight, and strengthening you core, check out Buff Bull Fitness.
The address is 160 Tillman St., lower level, Westwood. Call Buff Bull Fitness at (201) 497-5432 or call Witkowski directly at (201) 562-9950 to take advantage of his offer of three personal training sessions for $99. Visit buffbullfitness.com.
