About Mike Gillette

Former SWAT Commander and Executive Bodyguard, Mike Gillette is a relentless student of the human factors which allow people to succeed against overwhelming odds. In his line of work, these ‘odds’ have centered on threat management and peak performance training methods. His research and experiences have taken him through many different worlds and disciplines. They have ultimately produced a body of knowledge which has been put to use by clients ranging from armed professionals to ordinary people who must operate in extraordinary circumstances.

Mike's knowledge was first put to the test after he was injured in a climbing accident in 1984. This came just several months after he had left active-duty service as an Army paratrooper to attend the University of Arizona on an ROTC scholarship. With a broken back and screws holding his ankles together, Mike was discharged from military service.

This was all hard to take for someone who had received perfect scores on every one of his Army fitness tests and had run his first marathon on a dare. The next four years were a combination of discipline, experimentation, and disappointments. But through diligent study, pain and hard work, Mike had restored himself physically to the point where he could enter the field of law enforcement. As distinguished graduate of his academy class and with several academy fitness records under his belt, Mike was selected to attend a police fitness-trainer pilot program. Mike excelled as a trainer, and would eventually become one of the most highly credentialed tactical trainers in the United States, with over 25 different Use-of-Force and Weapons Systems instructor designations to his name.

In 1995, concurrent with his law enforcement and training duties, Mike returned to military service in a part-time role. Following a rigorous selection process, he was accepted into the 194th Long-Range Surveillance Detachment and full ‘jump’ status. This was a significant milestone for Mike, who had been told 11 years earlier by an Army surgeon that he would never run again, much less jump out of any more airplanes.

For over 25 years, Mike has been an ardent student of the martial arts. He has traveled extensively to train with some of the world’s foremost instructors, earning black belts in Filipino, Korean and American martial arts styles. Mike has appeared in martial arts magazines, books and videos and has provided performance coaching to competitive martial arts fighters.

Mike has, by necessity, pursued a life-long study of strength and conditioning methods. He served for several years as a Police Academy Fitness Trainer and later as a Physical Training Specialist for the Army National Guard. He has personally trained under such luminaries as Bob Hoffman, former Physical Education Faculty at West Point and former Director of the US Army’s Physical Fitness School; and Ed Thomas, one of the world’s leading physical culture experts.

More recently, Mike began training in the performance of strongman-style feats of strength, studying with such notable practitioners as Dennis Rogers and Jon Bruney. And to better understand the connection between mind and body, Mike has trained with Guy Savelli, best known for introducing unconventional operator enhancement techniques to the US Army Special Forces community and whose unique talents were the basis for the title of the film "The Men Who Stare at Goats".

Mike’s current mission is the sharing of his mind/body improvement methods via speaking, workshops and private coaching.

• Bodyguard to Fortune 100 CEOs, domestically and abroad

• Leading practitioner of Mind / Body power

• Member of Martial Arts Masters Hall-of-Fame

• Counter-Terrorism Subject-Matter Expert for Department of Homeland Security and Transportation Security Administration

• Interviewed by numerous media outlets including Forbes Magazine, CBS-TV, "America’s Most Wanted" and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation

• Developer of the "Savage Strength Training Program" sold in over 20 countries worldwide

• Nutrition consultant to Gina Carano (star of NBC’s "American Gladiators" and the film "Haywire)

• Nutritionist for the cast of reality television show "Fight Girls"

• Developer of the "4-Dimensional Strength" Training Protocol

• Certified Hypnotist - International Certification Board of Clinical Hypnotherapy

• Former Physical Fitness Instructor - US Army

• Former Police Academy Physical Fitness Trainer

• Certified Fitness Trainer - 20+ years

• Former Police Officer, SWAT Commander & Army Paratrooper

• Black Belts in Jiu-Jitsu, American Combat Kempo and Arnis

• Bachelor of Arts, University of Arizona 

Director of Special Projects,  Name Withheld, 2006 -12

• Program management duties for executive protection clients

• Lead instruction and curriculum development for the training of executive protection teams

• Ongoing assignments performing executive protection operations for high net-worth clients

• Lead agent for the research and delivery of Threat Assessments for high-risk clients and organizations

Director of Training,  Institute for Security Studies -- UNLV, 2004 – 2006

• Primary designer / instructor of terrorism prevention program for the Walt Disney Company

• Primary designer / instructor of grant-funded terrorism prevention program for the Department of Homeland Security

• Project Manager for Department of Homeland Security-funded Vulnerability Assessment of the State of Nevada

• Authored the Department of Homeland Security publication Terrorism Awareness: Protecting Soft Targets

Director of Training,  National Law Enforcement & Security Institute, 2001 – 2004

• Primary design, delivery and oversight for all Use-of-Force training programs

• Primary designer / instructor of in-flight terrorism prevention program for United Airlines

• Primary designer of in-flight terrorism prevention program for Air Canada

• Training consultant to JetBlue Airways

• Content development for Crisis Communication Skills DVD series  

MILITARY SERVICE

• 194TH Long Range Surveillance Detachment (Airborne)
   Army National Guard              1995-1996