Jackie Guerra is a visionary leader in the world of fitness and athletic engineering. Her accomplishments as a trailblazing Olympic athlete in women’s soccer, health educator, innovator, and entrepreneur have made her one of the sports and fitness industry’s most sought-after advisors and trainers.
About
Jackie GuerraA Plano, Texas native of Puerto Rican descent, Guerra was a Varsity soccer player at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where she graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Applied Health Sciences. She later earned her Master’s degree in Kinesiology. Guerra’s professional journey began during her years as a competitive collegiate athlete. Responding to the demands of her rigorous sports regimen, she embarked on extensive research to improve her fitness by conducting independent studies on heart rate variability and energy system development in female soccer players. These studies formed the foundation of her methodology: the Theory of Optimal Fitness (TOF).
While still a student, Guerra created specialized conditioning programs for the entire University of Illinois women’s soccer team, an experience that prepared her to design similar programs for the USA U-21 Women’s National Soccer Team prior to the World Cup. As a four-year NCAA letter winner who set the longest winning streak in Illinois history, Guerra led her team to win the Big Ten Conference title.
In 2017, Guerra advanced her TOF methodology by developing empirically-based, position-specific curricula for NBA, MLS, and NWSL players. She continues to mentor collegiate athletes, managing physiological, emotional, and strength development programming for sports teams and universities across Southern California.
Guerra’s elite and loyal client roster includes:
- ONE Championship’s two-sport World Champion Janet Todd
- NBA superstars Blake Griffin, DeAndre Jordan, and James Harden
- West Coast MMA fighters
- Domestic and international tennis, volleyball, and soccer professionals
- Division 1 collegiate athletes from universities including Stanford, Duke, Cal Berkeley, the University of Washington, and Harvard
In 2017, Guerra expanded the West Coast headquarters for Game Ready Performance (GRP), the Athletic Engineering company she founded in 2012. As Founder & Head Physiologist at GRP, Guerra and her team serve over 300 elite youth, collegiate, and professional athletes weekly from their 3,200 sq. ft. indoor/outdoor Athletic Engineering and Recovery Lab in Hermosa Beach, California.
Jackie Guerra’s creativity extends beyond fitness. Her debut poetry collection, From The Eye of Ayahuasca, explores the healing power of the Indigenous practice of Ayahuasca as taught by the Ashaninka people of Peru in the Mayantuyacu lineage of Maestro Juan Flores Salazar.
She is also working on her first music album inspired by the voice of plant medicine. Her singles, “Energia Positiva” and “History in the Making,” speak to the power of positive energy and the importance of coming together to heal the earth and ourselves.
When she’s not training her clients, you can find Guerra spending time with her dog Paula, her bird Sun Szu, and her two tortoises, Luna and Lakshmi. She lives in Hermosa Beach, embracing the Southern California ocean vibes.
