Five Seasons Burr Ridge's Director of Fitness Serves Up Nutrition Focus

Growing up, Morgan Fox had dreams of playing professional basketball.

It wasn’t a pie-in-the-sky notion: a quick 5-foot-3 guard, Fox was elevated to the Glenbard West High School varsity as a freshman. But, dating back to the 6th grade, she sustained four ankle breaks in as many years, and then a torn quad muscle effectively derailed her professional aspirations by her sophomore season.

Nearly a decade later, in her mid-20s, she was the top scorer on the women’s basketball team at Liverpool Hope University in England. But by then, through her interest in health and fitness, Fox had already begun carving out a different path as a personal trainer.

Last year, that journey took her back to her hometown of Glen Ellyn and it now finds her serving as Director of Fitness at Five Seasons Family Sports Club in Burr Ridge. After beginning in January as a personal trainer at Five Seasons, 6901 S. Madison, Fox was promoted in June.

In addition to her continued work as a personal trainer, Fox brings a heightened focus on nutrition as she leads the fitness department. Among other initiatives, she is developing a proper-nutrition program that will coincide with personal training.

“This will help drive our members toward a greater understanding of nutrition and applying nutritional knowledge to their everyday lives,” said Fox.

In addition, Fox and Erin Speck, a registered dietitian at the club, will be creating a healthy menu for Five Seasons’ café that will enable members to see what macronutrients they are consuming.

“That heightened awareness will help our members make progress toward more healthy lifestyles,” Fox said.

Five Seasons Chief Club Officer Robert Diamond pointed to Fox’s “vast nutritional knowledge” as a great asset for the club.

“We’re very happy to have her on our team,” Diamond said. “With her background in and passion for the industry, we are confident she will be able to lead our team in helping more members get into top shape.”

“Nutrition is 80 percent of being healthy and being active,” Fox noted. “To lose weight, people think it’s just working out, but it’s extremely important to put the right nutrients in our body. Getting the right nutrition will help prevent and reduce the risk of obesity, cancer, cardiovascular disease and many other long-term illnesses”.

She first visited England in 2007 to see friends she had worked with at Walt Disney World Resort in Florida. Before long, the visit turned into an extended stay, as Fox fell in love with the country and eventually enrolled at Liverpool Hope University.

Building on her associate’s degree in general education from the College of DuPage, Fox spent three years at Liverpool Hope, during which time she lived in an apartment just down the block from the childhood home of rock ‘n’ roll legend Paul McCartney.

There she earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Health, Nutrition and Fitness, as well as a Master’s Degree in Nutrition and Exercise Physiology.

Drawing on her expertise as a nutritionist, she works with Five Seasons members to explore some of the issues around their habits.

“You can work out all you want, but if you go home and consume 1,600 calories in one meal, you’re going to gain weight,” Fox said. “People know what to eat, but they don’t always know how to apply it to their diets.”

“We get deep down,” she added. “Why are we stress eating? Why are we having cravings, even when we are already full? I don’t preach about nutrition. I just want to help people.”

Five Seasons Family Sports Club is at 6901 S. Madison and is online at http://fiveseasonssportsclub.com/burrridge and can be reached at 630-570-5200.