Jaz Trained to Teach Reformer Pilates in Cambridge. Now She Owns a Fully Booked Studio.

Every so often a graduate sends me something that stops me for a minute before I reply.

Jaz Goddard was already a qualified Reformer Pilates instructor by the time she found me in Cambridge. She'd trained elsewhere, been assessed, and passed. On paper, she was done.

She still didn't feel ready to teach.

She loved teaching, but had no real sense of how to structure a class, where the method she was teaching actually came from, or why any of the exercises she'd learned went in the order they did.

She described it herself as feeling stuck in a rut, searching everywhere for inspiration because the knowledge underneath the teaching just wasn't there, even with a certificate that said otherwise.

That gap, between being qualified and actually being ready to teach, is a real one, and it's exactly why Jaz trained again, this time with me.

Here's what she told me afterwards.

"I now feel truly confident in my abilities"

Jaz's course covered the history and foundations of the method properly, not just the exercises, and she's said that alone changed the way she plans and delivers every session she teaches. Once she understood why a class is built the way it is, building her own classes stopped being guesswork.

She's since created far more variety in her teaching than she thought she had in her, developed a style that's genuinely hers, and, in her own words, become someone who actually stands behind why she teaches what she teaches, rather than repeating it because that's what she was shown.

Then she did something a lot of newly qualified instructors don't do for years, if ever.

She opened her own studio

Jaz opened The Groove Haus as its sole instructor, and it's now fully booked.

She's been clear that she doesn't think she'd have had the confidence to do that without the knowledge and belief she built during training. It's one thing to qualify. It's another to trust yourself enough to put your name on the door.

She's also told me she wants to move toward teaching and educating other instructors herself one day, the same way she was taught. That's not something I take lightly.

Qualified and ready to teach aren't the same thing

Jaz isn't the only graduate who's told me some version of this. Being able to pass an assessment and being able to walk into a room and build a class that actually works for the people in front of you are two different skills, and plenty of training courses only ever teach the first one.

Jaz trained at R3Form Marleigh, the studio I work from in Cambridge. What she left with the second time wasn't just a repeat of what she already had on paper, it was an actual sense of why she teaches the way she does, and the confidence to build something from that rather than just repeat what she'd been shown the first time round.

That's really the whole aim of training someone properly. Not just handing over the repertoire, but making sure you understand it well enough to make it yours, whether it's your first time training or your second.

Quick answers to what people actually ask

Do I need experience already to train to teach Reformer Pilates in Cambridge? No. Some students, like Jaz, already hold a Reformer qualification from elsewhere and come back to actually build the understanding they didn't get the first time. Others come to it completely fresh. What matters more is whether you're willing to actually understand the method, not just the exercises.

Could I end up running my own studio after training? Some graduates do, Jaz is a direct example, though it's not the only measure of a good outcome. Plenty of graduates build a thriving teaching practice inside an existing studio instead. Either is a genuinely good result.

Where does Reformer Pilates instructor training in Cambridge actually take place? At R3Form Marleigh, a real working Reformer Pilates studio in Cambridge.

If this sounds like where you are

Reformer Pilates instructor training in Cambridge runs over two in-person weekends, 9th–11th October and 13th–15th November 2026, at R3Form Marleigh. Certification is £1,450 in full (or three payments of £550), and the YMCA Level 3 pathway is £1,800 (or three payments of £600).

View Cambridge course dates →

Got a question first? Get in touch, I reply personally.

---

Fearless Fitness Training Academy delivers YMCA Level 3 accredited Pilates instructor training across the UK, in both in-person and live online formats, led by Naomi Di Fabio.