René Redzepi Brought a Personal Trainer to Noma Mexico for His Staff

© Jason Loucas Photography

René Redzepi is one of the most influential chefs on the planet. When it comes to his restaurant Noma, though, his impact doesn't just include the food and service, he's also working to make the lives of staff healthier, along with his own. According to Redzepi's recent fitness expose in Men's Health, he hired a personal trainer for the entire Noma family, including himself and his wife Nadine, after Redzepi's youngest daughter was born a few years ago. His staff responded so well to the perk that they decided to bring their in-house fitness guru to Tulum when Redzepi and his team set up Noma Mexico this past spring.

Since then, trainer Johan Troels Andersen has installed a regiment of what Redzepi calls, "functional training." As Redzepi puts it, "There are a lot of pushups and pullups and burpees, and sometimes we do weights or yoga. But Johan mixes it up, and there's a playfulness to it."

The training sessions got so popular at Noma that they added a second afternoon session between lunch and dinner shifts and even installed pull-up rings in the Noma office. So when Noma relocated to Tulum, Mexico for a seven-week pop-up, it only made sense to bring Andersen with them so that the Noma team could stay in top shape.

According to Redezpi, the Noma team worked out six days a week during their stay, with 35 to 40 staff members training together every morning. Afterward, they all shared breakfast, which often included fried eggs, avocado, fresh fruit, and homemade sourdough.

Besides keeping everyone feeling good, however, Redzepi says that it also brought the staff much closer as a team. One thing it didn't do, though, was completely convert Redzepi to the "fun" that some experience when working out. "I still wouldn't say I enjoy working out, but now I only hate it about 25 percent of the time."