What if fitness were less about how you look and more about how well you live? In this episode, Dr. Roberto Garcia welcomes Marie Merritt, founder of Momentum Fitness, to explore the shift from appearance-focused training to fitness for longevity. They discuss injury prevention, foundational movement, the role of nutrition and sleep, and how purposeful, sustainable habits help people stay active and independent as they age.
The conversation also looks at youth sports and overuse injuries, setting healthy examples at home, the emotional side of physical change, and why long-term progress matters more than quick transformations. Dr. Garcia closes with a personal reflection on his father’s advice about success, failure, and the importance of purpose.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: You're listening to the Confident Choice podcast with me, Dr. Roberto Garcia, a double board-certified facial plastic and reconstructive surgeon. Honest conversations and expert advice about the decisions that make you feel your best. welcome, everybody, to season two, episode seven of the Confident Choice. technically, it's episode 19. we're going to keep going, and then we're going to be like those, religious things, like, "We're on chapter 148," you know? So, we have a special guest today, Marie Merritt. and anybody who's anybody in the Ponte Vedra, Jacksonville area knows who Marie Merritt is.
Marie Merritt: Thank you.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: She is the owner, the proprietor, the founder of Momentum Fitness.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Changed the way fitness is done in North Florida.
Marie Merritt: Trying.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: It was so nice to meet your parents the other day.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: They're so sweet.
Marie Merritt: I just realized you haven't met them. We've known each other for so long. so that was-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: It's crazy.
Marie Merritt: … going to be a big one.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: I know. And I know your mom was … When I came to hug her, she was probably, "Who is this guy coming to hug me right now?".
Marie Merritt: Oh, yeah.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And I felt like I've known her-.
Marie Merritt: -huh.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … for almost what, 15 years?
Marie Merritt: Easily.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: My gosh.
Marie Merritt: At least 15.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: So I met you-.
Marie Merritt: Mm-hmm.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … in … I'm going to tell you what year it was. It was 2012, around there, when you were at the small place.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And, I met … I went to talk with Mindy.
Marie Merritt: Yeah.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yep. And, you were there, and you're like, "All right. Yeah, we need to start training you." And I had never had a trainer. Well, I had like this … I had a trainer who was into, … What's that thing where they beat the crap out of you, and you're always injured?
Marie Merritt: The MMA stuff?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: No, no, no.
Marie Merritt: Or CrossFit?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: It was, -.
Marie Merritt: CrossFit?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … CrossFit.
Marie Merritt: Okay.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And I was always injured, okay? I had torn my abdominals. I had, I had a hip thing.
Marie Merritt: Hamstring.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Hamstring was injured. And then you said, "Yeah, you shouldn't be doing that." And-.
Marie Merritt: No.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … and so one of the things that I kind of want to talk about today is, you know, the topic is what to expect emotionally and physically from-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … the stuff that we do, right? But I want to touch on … First of all, I want to get into your history.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And then, I want to know what drives your business model 'cause it's highly successful, you guys. I can tell you that in the 15 years of my knowing you, it's, it has like mushroomed in success. It really has. And people don't get injured.
Marie Merritt: We try not to injure people, very actively. There are sometimes people will come in and say … I would say lately, the most of the injuries that we've seen are pickleball. they go out. They go a little bit too hard. But we try to help people prevent injuries, more than anything. But in our space, I would say if there's an injury, it's so random or occasionally somebody might pull something if they're not listening.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yep.
Marie Merritt: -.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: So I'm going to get to that because there's an important tie that your industry and mine have.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And that's in aging mitigation.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Right? And so, you know, I'm doing it maybe on an es- aesthetic external level, but you're so important with … Well, let's go ahead and dive into that, actually. Tell me how it is that your model has changed throughout the years, where you went from, "Okay, I want to get this person bulked up. I want to get them in shape. They got to lose weight," or whatever it is, to now, "I want this person's survival and functionality to increase.".
Marie Merritt: Okay. So I would say that's a little bit of a two-part answer. on the front end of my business, I worked with a decent amount of pro athletes, and then I worked with retired extremely wealthy people. And earlier on in the business, and I was very young, people would come in, and they would tell me what they wanted. And so I was constantly trying to meet the demands other people were placing while also trying to keep them safe. And whenever somebody comes in and they say, "I want to lose 10 pounds or 20 pounds," there's a part of me at this stage of my career that says, "Okay, and? But why is that important? What is that going to do for you? How is it going to help you live better, not just longer? How is it going to help you live better and give you access to more?" I think the biggest catalyst on my side was also having the injury, that kind of reframed my thinking on what fitness allows me to do. It gives me the capability of doing so much outside of the aesthetic piece because, quite frankly, our industry is marketed as just aesthetics-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah.
Marie Merritt: … similar to yours. Whereas, what am I actually giving somebody access to that they didn't have before, that can help them, improve the quality of their life, that can help them have access to the things that they enjoy for longer periods of time? But the aesthetics are still there. I can't say that vanity doesn't exist. I have a, I have a decent level of it myself. So we play with that, and I help people kind of take a little bit of a deeper dive on their why, their purpose for doing it.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: But I've noticed when I see individuals in your gym, it's more of a physical longevity.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Right? It's not like your typical buff meathead, you know, that comes in there. He wants to bench 300 pounds, right? I mean, you guys are … The model has really changed.
Marie Merritt: Yeah. It's the … A, we can be a little bit more selective on the clientele that we accept. Because of how long I've been in business. And so if somebody comes in and they just want to be, like, the buff meathead, I might tell them that we probably are not the best fit for them, and then I can make a recommendation. and then the other side of it is all in our intake. I ask people very hard questions, and I've started teaching my team how to ask the hard questions. Because if somebody comes in and they just want to change their appearance or be buff and, you know, like the super ripped meathead guys, and they can't get past that, I, we're, we won't take them.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah, but there's-.
Marie Merritt: It's, it's a very … I know, like, from a client perspective, but from our side, if you came in and you told me that you wanted to get super jacked and you wanted to bench 300 pounds, I would sit you down and ask you why that's important.
Marie Merritt: What is it going to do for you 10 years from now?
Marie Merritt: And that's how we train people.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Well, and that's probably the same thing if you were to equate in our business. It's that person that comes in and says, "I want to be the best looking person in my, at my, high school reunion.".
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Right? And so I spend so much of my consultation with getting to the why.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Right? What is it that prompted you to want to, A, have this level of honest introspection, right? And a little bit of, you know, you got to have a little bit of self-deprecation when you're looking at yourself-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … and saying, "I got to change something," right? And, but the idea that a person's just coming for, to improve something that others are going to notice, and it's not going to make an emotional impact. And more importantly, and I think we also have this other parallel, Marie, is what is it going to do long-term for that person, right? How is it going to improve? For us, it's more of an emotional thing. For you, it's more of a physical thing, right?
Marie Merritt: And it's emotional.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And emotional, right.
Marie Merritt: If somebody can't, let's say they have grandkids. If they can't get down on the floor and play with their grandkids, they look at all of the life they're missing out on, they get sad, and then the self-deprecation really sets in on the, "Well, I can't do this anymore.".
Marie Merritt: "I used to be able to do this." The amount of conversations that I have with people, or a woman going through perimenopause and her body starts changing, and she doesn't like what she sees in the mirror, and she goes, "Well, whenever I was … " And the comparison trap comes in. "When I s- when I was X age, when I was able to do this, when I looked in the mirror and I liked the way that I looked, this is where I was. This is wh- and then here I am now." They miss all of the behaviors in between. They miss everything else. And so it's our job, yours and mine, to get to the why. What is it going to give you access to? What will getting back to this state do?
Marie Merritt: Or, how do I help you, as a health and wellness coach and a trainer, how do I help you actually feel like you're connected to yourself again?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: So do you think the push is to getting involved in people's lives earlier?
Marie Merritt: Yes. Or getting people to disconnect from the trends that are constantly changing, because I've seen trends go in and out now multiple times in my industry because I've been in it so long.
Marie Merritt: And so if I can get somebody to disconnect from the, what the society structure, what Hollywood is telling you should do, should look like, should be like, should feel like, should act like. If I can get you away from that, back to who you are, what you enjoy, what your health is and what it will give you, then I'm doing my job right.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: It seems like kids are a lot more involved, especially this generation, it seems like. The, what generation are the kids now? Are they Gen X?
Marie Merritt: Z.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: No, we're Gen X.
Marie Merritt: Gen Z.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Gen Z. Right?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Gen Z.
Marie Merritt: Well, and then there's even, like, Gen Alphas and all of this other, like, new things.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah. And these kids are like, you t- you hear them ta- I hear my son talking about it, how important health and wellness is to these kids.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Like, we never really talked about that stuff. You know, we would go to the gym. We'd lift. You know, we, every once in a while, we … But it wasn't like, "Hey, what are you eating? How many proteins are you getting? How many macros are you get … " If I would've brought up macros to some of my friends in high school, I'd have gotten laughed out of the room.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And to that point, has training changed at the high school level?
Marie Merritt: Depending on how affluent the area is, yes.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: What do you mean?
Marie Merritt: Money. If there's somebody in a lower income area, that may not be as important to them. they may see certain things online. But training has changed at a high school level in communities who can afford it the most.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Well, no. Well, okay. No, granted.
Marie Merritt: I mean-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: I understand that.
Marie Merritt: … that aside, I mean, that's-.
Marie Merritt: … just a fact.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: But what I'm trying to get at is if you were to look at how … When I was in high school and I played football, it was all lifting.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Now, there's more, is it isometric? Or what is-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … they're doing different now?
Marie Merritt: So there's a little bit more of the focus on injury prevention, not just making them big, primarily because whenever you were in high school, whenever I was in high school, we had proper off-seasons. These kids do not have off-seasons.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Right.
Marie Merritt: They were in an area where it's on to the next, on to the next, on to the next. Kids are going single sport. Usually at this point, I would say kids are single sport at age nine, 10, 11.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: That's crazy.
Marie Merritt: Whereas I was multi-sport even in college.
Marie Merritt: And so the landscape of sports have changed. Now I'm looking at it going, training has to adapt to it because our job is to keep kids from getting hurt and to keep them involved in their sport longer.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And so do you guys have this- … recipe of, okay, I don't want to subject a kid to this type of lifting at before a certain age so that, you know, I don't cause those kind of injuries too early?
Marie Merritt: I would say it's more about the foundation building. just like if you build a house, you're going to lay a really solid foundation, you're going to build a nice house. whenever you started lifting, you probably didn't have the foundation, but you were also probably a little bit more developed, whereas kids now are starting tr- strength and conditioning, so it's motor proprioception, how are we keeping them mobile, so, like, conditioning their tendons and their ligaments and their response time-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Okay.
Marie Merritt: … to keep them from developing overuse injuries.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Well, do you think, … Well, and that's, that was my next point, is do you think that getting these kids involved earlier, are we seeing less injuries in the long run?
Marie Merritt: I think that we could. I think we're seeing actually more injuries because the kids don't have off-seasons, and they're being overbooked.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Oh, I see.
Marie Merritt: Yeah. It's, it's, it's a very weird- Oh, it is … so everything that we're doing-.
Marie Merritt: … you have kids who are practicing, some of them are practicing, like, 20 hours a week. It's a part-time job. And I look at it and I go, "Okay, well, wait." The parents are pressured to get their kids to practices. A lot of kids stop training while they're in season because there's no extra hour in a day.
Marie Merritt: And so we're actually seeing more overuse injuries, but it's, it's a combination. Over-practicing, not having off-seasons, kids not having time to be kids and go and run around and jump around and play in the park. -.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And are you guys kind of coaching these kids while you're doing it, "Hey, listen. You're doing all these things. You're li- you're, you're doing all these great exercises. What are we doing with your nutritional plans?" I mean, you got to, you got to be talking to these kids about that, right?
Marie Merritt: Nutrition, sleep.
Marie Merritt: The amount of people, and I'm just going to blanket people, who are so ready to jump on a supplement train before they even focus on having their sleep hygiene dialed in.
Marie Merritt: And that one's free.
Marie Merritt: I- we try to educate as much as we can, and then we still have the parents come in, and, "What supplement can my kid take to make them shave 2/10 of a second off of … " I mean-.
Marie Merritt: … it's wild.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: I remember when I was coaching, the kids, particularly my son, in baseball back when he was a two-sport kid for a long time, and you'd have these kids that were up all night playing video games.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And you just saw the horrible performance-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … the next day because of lack of sleep, you know? And the parents would laugh about it and, "Oh, g- he's so funny. He was playing Minecraft till 3:00 in the morning.".
Marie Merritt: Who is allowing the kid to do that?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Have you lost your mind, he's doing that. Right? You're a parent. I mean, you're, at-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … some point you got to ha- you got to put a little bit of structure in the kid's life.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: But, I think there's so much that goes into our specialty, and I just got back from our national meeting in Las Vegas. By the way, I can't stand that city. All right? Have you been to Las Vegas previously?
Marie Merritt: I have not.
Marie Merritt: Me either.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: So we went to the Sp- Sphere, the Sphere? Sphere.
Marie Merritt: Sphere.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Not the Spear.
Marie Merritt: The Sphere.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: We went to the Sphere and we saw, we saw-.
Marie Merritt: Wizard of Oz.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … we saw Wizard of Oz. They get the movie and they shrink it down.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Okay? Do you remember the Alexander Brest Planetarium here in Jacksonville?
Marie Merritt: No. Yes.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: You never went to that, like the laser show?
Marie Merritt: Absolutely. Yes.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: That's kind of what it is.
Marie Merritt: Oh, okay. Like-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: It's small like that.
Marie Merritt: It used to be at-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: You'd think it's big.
Marie Merritt: … what's it called? I remember Mosh. Okay. Nevermind. So they're rebuilding Mosh. Okay. Okay.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Oh, all right. So cool.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: We used to go for the laser show-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … in high school.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Anyway, and then, we went to this, Michael Jackson Cirque du Soleil show.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: So good.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: I mean, it's Michael Jackson, right?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And then you had all these guys bouncing around the stage, throwing things, throwing themselves, trampolines all over the place.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And I was in the first row, and I wanted so much to video it, but the first thing they said was, "No cameras, no videos." And I was like this, fighting myself the whole time, and I could tell those guys were just staring right at me. But anyway, the point is, so I was at this meeting in Vegas, and I realized the, the m- the movement now in our field is getting individuals involved earlier.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And it's that kind of that, "I want to do something before it becomes a problem. I want to get involved with kids' skincare." I mean, you guys have been … Isabella, you've been doing something to your skin since you were a teenager, right?
Marie Merritt: Yeah. Since I was a kid.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: When we were kids, that was unheard of. Right? I mean, we, our, my, I remember my mom fighting with my sister just to wash her face. And so now these kids, we have teen facials, teen acne treatments. And so the idea of getting ahead of the problem before it becomes one, right? And you know, when my wife and I really got serious training at your place with Claudie, it was more of, "All right. I want to be able to get up on a ladder, not a tall one, but I want to be able to get up on a ladder and do something when I'm in my 70s.".
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Right? "I want to be able to fix things in my house. I want to be able to hang out with my grandkids.".
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And so it's kind of that, okay, the problem isn't here yet, but we're really getting ahead of it. And I think you guys, I mean, y- I think you guys got that.
Marie Merritt: We try our best. I would say what is one of the most heartbreaking, having the conversations with parents who will get their kids started, and then they think it's our job to fix their kids versus health starts in the home.
Marie Merritt: And if mom and dad work out and set a good example, kids will.
Marie Merritt: And that's the thing, I know I didn't grow up with it. and then the amount of people that I see in my career who start training at 50, 60, 70 years old after something is broken, and we're trying to undo it, but also trying to give them more freedom moving forward. When we get the kids, my job and what I tell parents is I want them to like it.
Marie Merritt: I do not want them carrying into adulthood all of this baggage, because also, they, when we were in high school, they used exercise as punishment.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Right Hey, go run five laps.
Marie Merritt: Yeah. You're, you're five minutes late to practice.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: You know, you got to do 50 jumping jacks.
Marie Merritt: Here's your pushups.
Marie Merritt: And so if we use exercise as something that is fun and motivating and it allows them to do more-.
Marie Merritt: … and they like it, then hopefully, we're not seeing them in adulthood whenever they have all of this exercise history baggage where they hate it, and then we have to try to undo it.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: For sure. Yeah, I absolutely agree that get, getting a person to like training-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … to like ph- physical activity, to like proper nutrition, to like taking care of their skin, to being involved in the betterment of themselves in whatever capacity it is-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … starts early.
Marie Merritt: It has to.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: You know? Otherwise, you can't expect every person to have this major metamorphosis in their-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … 30s and 40s, you know?
Marie Merritt: So many people come in and they expect the transformations, which I never do, the before and after photos, and here's how much they changed in six weeks. Because really, if you think about it, if somebody comes in and say they're 40, they've had a life of behavior leading up to that time that they come in and they finally admit or tell somebody, "I'm sick of being where I am.".
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Mm-hmm.
Marie Merritt: And then they want it to change fast because everything else is so easy to a- access. and then I talk to people and say, "Hey, this is a process. Our job is to help you get where you want to go, but it's not going to be six weeks from now.".
Marie Merritt: Because if it happens that fast, A, I can injure you. the rebound on, if you watch people yo-yo diet, somebody loses 10 pounds really quickly, all of a sudden they've gained 23 on the other side of losing that 10 pounds, and you watch them go like this. It's like, how can we, how can we kind of slowly progress you?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: For sure.
Marie Merritt: So that it sticks.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah. Well, thanks for coming. This has been awesome. I've, I've-.
Marie Merritt: It was fun.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … wanted to get you here for so long. and, I kind of felt like you were avoiding me actually for-.
Marie Merritt: I wasn't.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … the longest time, but, -.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … that's okay. I don't take things personal. we do something really cool at, … Okay, this is a good one. This is a really good one. We do something really cool at the end of every podcast.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And my dad, you never got to meet him.
Marie Merritt: I did not.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: But my dad was cool. He was a awesome guy. he died, June of last year.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And so I always try to, do a little homage to him at every podcast.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And my dad was, he was a teacher, okay?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Very smart guy. he was first an engineer when he came from Cuba. He became an engineer, then ultimately became a doctor, so he was a real studied and learned man, right? But he also studied humans.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And he really understood human tendencies, and he could read people really well. And I've never told you this one, Isabelle, but this is a good one.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: I remember him telling me, and I'm not going to, I'm not going to say it in Spanish, but I'll say it in English. "Success has many authors. Failure is an orphan." You ever heard that?
Marie Merritt: I heard it in Spanish.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: "El éxito tiene muchos autores. El fracaso es huérfano.".
Marie Merritt: Wow.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Okay?
Marie Merritt: That's.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: You remember him, you never remember him saying that?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Anyways.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: But the truth is, when you have any accolade in your life, there, you will be surrounded by people who want to take part in that success.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Right? And as a business owner, and as a business owner, we've had a lot more failures than we've had successes.
Marie Merritt: Oh my gosh, yes.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Right?
Marie Merritt: Yes.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: And when we had those failures, there weren't a bunch of people around here saying, "Oh, I'm sorry it went bad. I'm sorry I gave you that idea." No.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: But when you've had successes, you've had a bunch of people around you that have said, "Man, I'm so glad that we worked on that together," right? And that's okay. I, it's, it's, as a business owner, you don't take that to heart. That's just human nature, right? People always want to be around the winner. And the, and I've talked about this before in other podcasts, the importance of failure, the importance of losing, the importance of getting your tail kicked, the importance of skinning your knees. 'Cause all that does, it should, is give you fuel to have a, this perpetual seeking for success, right?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: It's, it's the concept of … You ever been to a dog track?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: A dog race? Okay. Well, there's a rabbit that they're chasing.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: That's how they get the greyhounds to run. They never catch the greyhound, or they never catch the rabbit, but the idea of having it in front of you running faster than you, the idea that maybe I can get it. Maybe if I run two clicks faster, I can grab that rabbit. That's what drives people, and the moment you take that rabbit out of your life, you begin to die. That's why so many individuals when they retire, if they retire too early, you just see them crumble.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: You've seen that in the health field. I know you have.
Marie Merritt: All the time.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: I mean, how do you-.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: … get somebody who's a highly functioning individual and then all of a sudden just sh- shut it off? It's really hard.
Marie Merritt: You give them purpose.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: You got to give them purpose, right?
Dr. Roberto Garcia: Well, there you go. Seek purpose. Yeah, for sure. All right, so I am signing off. Marie, thank you so much for being on our show.
Dr. Roberto Garcia: You have been awesome. And remember, good decisions come from good information. Have a great week, everybody.
Under the direction of visionary double board-certified facial plastic surgeon Dr. Roberto Garcia, Contoura Facial Plastic Surgery offers the latest surgical and non-surgical procedures in a relaxed and serene setting. Schedule a virtual or in-person consultation today to get the first glimpse of your future self.
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