Head of Strength & Conditioning 

BScKin, MScKin, CSCS

Dono has spent most of his life in Saskatoon, playing soccer, baseball, and track and field as a young kid, then football, wrestling, and track and field in high school at STJ. He played four years of Saskatoon Hilltops Football, two years with the UBC Thunderbirds, and two years with the Sask Huskies football team. He also wrestled for three years at the post-secondary level and has been competing in Olympic Weightlifting since 2020. 

Dono holds both a Bachelor of Science and a Master's Degree in Kinesiology from the University of Saskatchewan (major in Sport and Exercise Science, minor in Psychology). His credentials include CSCS (National Strength and Conditioning Association), and he serves as a Strength and Conditioning Consultant for the Sport Medicine and Science Council of Saskatchewan. 

Dono met Joel during his second year with the Hilltops while they were both coaching a High School Team Sask Football camp. He became one of Joel's first Ignite athletes, along with about eight other people. As he continued his athletic career, he fell in love with exercise science and joined Ignite full-time as the facility was expanding. 

As Head of Strength and Conditioning, Dono runs training groups, provides personal training, designs programs and curricula, oversees strength and conditioning interns, and helps manage the gym in the evenings. He is also the head coach of the Ignite Athletics Weightlifting Club. He

has worked with clients ranging from seven-year-olds to 70-year-olds, including developing youth athletes, police officers, post-secondary athletes, doctors, injured athletes, fitness enthusiasts, CrossFitters, and an Olympic Bobsleigh bronze medalist. His personal specialty is high-level high school and university athletic training, as well as athletes in Olympic Weightlifting. 

Dono's coaching philosophy is simple: relentlessly pursue mastery of the fundamentals that make great athletes. He opts out of flashy social-media hype for what he knows works and always will. To get strong, master compound barbell lifts. To get fast, sprint with great technique and maximum intent. To jump higher, train it directly while building explosive power and rate of force development. Whether working with athletes or people who want to look, feel, and move better, the focus is on doing the basics at the highest level of quality. 

Outside the gym, Dono continues to compete in Olympic Weightlifting as both an athlete and head coach of the club. He's a huge coffee and espresso snob, loves smoking meats and BBQ, and plays bass guitar and sings daily. He and his wife, Charissa, have three kids: Evie, Linus, and Henry. He loves spending time watching his kids thrive in their own activities. His favourite part of the job is getting to hang out and talk with his clients during their sessions.