About Us

The mission of the Human Performance Lab is to offer comprehensive yet affordable evidence- based sports, rehabilitation, and personal training to humans of all ages and abilities. We have built a culture of positivity, empowerment, and fun while also fostering strong client-to-coach relationships which in turn maximizes results, accomplishes goals, and creates a tight-knit community of people striving to be the best version of themselves.

Fun, Positive, and Empowering

Relationship and Community-Oriented

Respect, Responsibility, and Integrity

Connor's Career Overview

The Human Performance Lab was founded in February 2026 by Connor Rouse, a certified strength and conditioning specialist who holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in applied exercise science and has accumulated ten years of coaching experience. His vision in creating the Human Performance Lab is to build upon a high-quality personal training product while making it affordable, in a effort to offer services to a greater percentage of the New Hampshire seacoast population.

Connor is opening the Human Performance Lab to fulfill his vision of what a gym should be. A gym should be a safe place, both physically and emotionally, with experienced and educated coaches to ensure results and safety. A gym should be a community where relationships are prioritized, where clients make friends with each other and cheer each other on, as we are all on the same team of self-improvement. And finally, a gym should be affordable so a greater percentage of the population can afford to learn how to move.  

In 2016, Connor found his career path and began coaching under the tutelage of his high school athletic trainer and strength coach, Michelle Hart-Miller. Later that year, he began attending Springfield College to earn his bachelor’s degree in exercise science with a concentration in sport performance. Upon his graduation from Springfield, Connor attended Merrimack College’s one-year accelerated exercise and sport science master’s program to study under Michael Kamal as a graduate fellow strength and conditioning coach. While at Merrimack,  Connor worked for the college as an NCAA strength coach, designing and implementing training programs for three of their NCAA Division 1 athletic teams. Connor also completed internships at Londonderry High School and College of the Holy Cross while earning his degrees.

Connor’s educational path was geared towards working in the NCAA/Professional sport sector of strength and conditioning. After graduating from Merrimack, Connor began working at Skill of Strength, a private gym in Chelmsford, MA, gaining experience in the private/general population sector of strength and conditioning. Still set on his NCAA dream, Connor eventually accepted a job as a strength and conditioning coach at Trinity College in Hartford, CT, for the 2021-22 school year. He was responsible for the design and implementation of programming for eight of their NCAA Division 3 athletic teams and also ran the strength and conditioning internship program. At the end of the 2022 school year, Connor decided to make a change and accept a position as an athletic performance specialist at the Athletic Performance Center of Exeter Hospital in Hampton, NH.

Connor continued to build his career at the Athletic Performance Center from June 2022 to February 2026. He was responsible for the assessment, design, and implementation of training programs for an average of 90 clients per week, the supervision of the internship program, along with other managerial and facility-based tasks. Connor worked alongside physical therapists to provide clients/patients continuity of care in their pre/rehabilitation, allowing Connor to gain valuable experience in the clinical sector of strength and conditioning and in turn, he built a loyal client base full of awesome people.

When he is not coaching, Connor enjoys his hobbies of training, spending time outside hiking, mountain biking, riding his motorcycle, and canoeing, he plays drums and piano, and enjoys being handy and tackling DIY projects.