On any given day in the High Performance Training Centre, you can expect to see the smiling faces of strength and conditioning coaches Cole Scheller and Adam Stevenson. 

For over a decade, the pair of experienced, charismatic staff members have helped countless Bisons student-athletes achieve their goals in the weight room, while providing a welcoming and enthusiastic training environment. Together, they help oversee all facets of physical preparation including warm-up, cool-down, mobility, strength and power training, conditioning workouts, and speed development. 

"I'm a bit of a jokester all of the time. I try to not take any of it far too seriously. Having the kids also understand we're going to try hard, but you can have a good time while you're doing that, I think that's pretty important," smiled Scheller [B.Kin./'15, M.Sc./19'].  

"The thing about S&C and engagement with it, is that there's no instant gratification of any kind. It does not exist in the world. I think we've done a pretty good job of creating an environment where the monotony and drudgery of training like this, is not so monotonous."

"It's a culture where you're going to be heard. You're going to have personal relationships with the people in that space," added Stevenson, who obtained a Bachelor of Kinesiology degree from the University of Regina in 2016, and completed a Postgraduate Diploma in Strength and Conditioning at St. Mary's University, Twickenham in England in 2023. 

"You can do that, and achieve high performance. It's not all about yelling and screaming. That's just not reality. I think that our culture is super positive in that way."
 

Scheller and Stevenson's passions for S&C are rooted in their sports backgrounds. The duo understood early on, the value of functional, optimal training and have parlayed that into an immense knowledge of movement and how the human body works. 

"Competing as an athlete, I always thought that the training aspect of stuff was very interesting. It was very tangible and tactile. You can feel different. When I started training seriously, you'd notice," said Scheller, a former member of the Bisons football team on the offensive line. 

"For me personally and anecdotally, the thing that made me want to get back into training after I was done playing sports, was I had a bass guitar amplifier. And I carried it down to the basement when I was playing football and lifting and it was easy to do that. I stopped playing and training for a year, and I tried to carry it up, and it was really hard. I was like okay, we're not doing that again. We're always going to maintain a certain level of strength and fitness, because it actually matters in daily life."

"Going through high school, I wanted to be a better athlete, specifically for football. At the time where I was entering grade nine, one of our phys ed teachers, who was also one of our football coaches, he had a background with personal training and strength and conditioning. He got us introduced to it. I thought it was super beneficial for myself," echoed Stevenson. 

"As I read and learned more, I realized it's not all about slamming weights. You can be really precise with what you're trying to do. There's a ton of value to be had if you can learn to do it effectively. I developed a passion for it from there."
 

'There's a certain amount of trust'
On a daily and yearly basis, Scheller and Stevenson work to find new, interesting ways to keep student-athletes fit and motivated. The pair see their role as a "passion project."

"You're finding a way to translate a topic that has a huge amount of depth. It's not slamming weights. There is room for that, and it's important at times, but almost all of it is a very detail-oriented process," Scheller noted. 

"You're trying to control for variables that are not very controllable. Being able to think about that and synthesize it and translate it in a way that is applicable and actionable for kids that don't have that background knowledge and skill-set, I think is very interesting."
 

Over the last ten years, the programming provided by Scheller and Stevenson, has helped translate to results in competition.  

Stevenson works quite closely with the track and field programs, whose men's roster won four straight Canada West Championships from 2022-25, while earning either silver or bronze every year at nationals from 2023-25. 

Meanwhile, the women's volleyball team – one of many that Scheller programs for – secured national gold in 2025. 

And while the success is great, it's not what gets the duo up in the morning. Instead, it's the relationships and trust that speak volumes, understanding how to get the most out of each person while keeping things fun and celebrating countless types of success. 

"Seeing people who aren't earning all-star selections or winning medals, whether that's relevant to their sport – they're earning more playing time, they're hitting travel standard – or whether it's hitting a PB, or coming back from injury, that's very rewarding," said Stevenson.

"This is a huge time period for them. It's foundational. Getting to be a part of the fabric of someone's life, knowing we can be a supportive and beneficial part of that period, that's pretty cool."

"Personality-wise, a thing that's good is being able to deliver, while maintaining positive working relationships. Take the women's volleyball team. Their on-court success? Great. But a lot of that comes from their approach and attitude and effort over a long period of time. They don't require negative stimulus to do that," Scheller added. 

"Being able to go in and say how's it going? This is what we're going to do, this is the plan. To have that culture of we're just going to try really hard, because it's an expectation, we want it out of ourselves and these guys are asking us to do it. There's a certain amount of trust, of if you do this thing, the results will come over time."