Terra Fitness is a collaborative effort between long standing members of the Ottawa health and fitness field who share a common interest in the health of our planet and all of its inhabitants. As founders of Terra Fitness, Ray Zahab, John Zahab and Mark Simonson and his team at KineMedics hope to be able to make a difference by bringing to market the first socially and environmentally conscious line of fitness products that combine high quality fitness products with a best practices sustainable business model.
It is the goal of Terra Fitness to continue to grow its product line with innovative health and fitness products and initiatives that help raise awareness for environmental and healths issues as well as helping to promote the initiatives of other quality organizations.
Late in 1998 Ray made a life changing decision to leave a pack a day smoking habit and very unhealthy life choices behind him. New Years day 2000 he went hiking with his brother John and never looked back.
New to the sport of running in 2004, ultra-marathoning took Ray from the cold north of Canada to the Amazon jungle. But it was the Sahara desert that ultimately captured Ray's heart. After racing across Niger, Egypt and Libya the idea was born to cross the entire Sahara out of a love for the terrain and it's people. In 2007, Ray Zahab and two others made history by running 4300 miles across the entire Sahara Desert, raising awareness for clean-water initiatives in Africa. This feat consisted of 111 consecutive 40 - 50 mile days of running in extreme desert conditions through six countries. Ray dreamed of this adventure after a 200 mile foot race in Niger, during which he became very attached to the Sahara and its people, the Tuareg. During this run, Ray met a young Tuareg girl who asked him for his water bottle so that she could drink the remaining drops. Ray later came to understand this interaction as symbolic of the profound clean-water crisis devastating the region. After witnessing and experiencing the water crisis and malaria epidemic in Africa, Ray decided to dedicate his future adventures to raising awareness and funding for causes that he supports and believes in. Ray is a member of the board of Directors of the Ryan's Well Foundation, is the official Athletic Ambassador to the ONExONE organization, and is a representative of SpreadTheNet and the founder of Impossible2Possible. Ray was the recipient of the ONExONE Difference Award in 2007.
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John is a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist through the National Strength and Conditioning Association and a Certified Personal Trainer through the Canadian Society for Exercise Physiology. He has worked full time in the fitness industry for over ten years developing and implementing exercise programs for individuals and teams with varying abilities and needs. John has had the opportunity to work with athletes from a broad spectrum of sports, including those competing and performing at the national and professional levels. Recent career highlights include the development of strength and conditioning programs, which assisted two Canadian athletes to qualify and compete at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. John has developed his training philosophy to provide targeted training for each individual's needs – based on a foundation of stability and control, functional movement ability, and balanced strength.
Over the past sixteen years John has trained for and has competed in a variety of disciplines of endurance sport. John's foray into outdoor athletics began with a passion for rock and ice climbing. For several years John pursued this passion, while implementing supplementary strength and endurance training – to improve fitness for this climbing hobby. As training got more regimented and consistent, it became evident that the endurance type of training started to have a greater draw than the climbing itself. After entering a three-day multi-sport adventure race with his brother and friends, he was hooked. For the next several years John has pushed his endurance limits in a multitude of sports, including: Triathlon (Olympic Distance to Ironman Distance), Bike Racing (Road), Adventure Racing (Multi-Sport), Cross-Country Skiing, Ultra distance running.
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