By Jody Genessy and Grok
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing health sciences, offering tools to enhance coaching, research, and education. One person who knows that quite well is Adam Whisler. The PhD student at Rocky Mountain University of Health Professions, who’s also a strength and conditioning coach and former Army officer with over a decade of coaching experience, has embraced AI.
In a recent guest appearance on RMU’s new podcast, The Pulse, Whisler shared practical tips and insights to help students, faculty, and professionals integrate AI effectively.
As a thought exercise, this blog was crafted with AI assistance to demonstrate how tools like Grok (xAI’s version of ChatGPT) can refine content while preserving human insight, aligning with Whisler’s goal of fostering “deep connection with humans” through technology.
Craft Specific Prompts for Better Results
“The specificity of your prompt is by far the most important element to improve the quality of the output,” Whisler emphasizes. For example, to have AI help craft a triathlon training program, he advises including age, experience, injuries, and race elevation. “What other details do you need to improve your response?” he suggests asking AI to refine outputs, ensuring tailored plans or research insights for health sciences students and coaches.
Using AI as a Useful Coaching and Training Tool
Whisler leverages AI to enhance his strength and conditioning coaching, including with members of the Space Force in Colorado Springs, Colorado, by automating repetitive tasks and delivering personalized feedback. This allows him to focus on meaningful human interactions.
As a strength coach with over a decade of experience, he programs AI models to adjust workout intensities and volumes — such as sets, reps, or weights — based on client input, effectively replicating decisions he would make in person.
“It’s like having me in your pocket where I can make the decision that I would make already in the first place,” Whisler explains, highlighting how clients receive instant, logical responses after inputting results, feeling as though they have a trainer with them.
This automation has led to notable improvements in strength and endurance among his clients, freeing him to spend more time on face-to-face communication and addressing individual barriers, thus scaling his coaching impact while maintaining a personal touch.
Provide Real-Time Feedback with AI
AI mimics a coach’s guidance: “Someone gets this live, instantaneous feedback and it feels like, I have a trainer with me,” Whisler explains. Automating adjustments like adding weight after an “easy” set scales training. Whisler notes clients have seen “a large degree of improvement in strength, improvement in endurance,” freeing coaches to focus on rapport and measurable results.
Enhance, Don’t Replace, Expertise
AI should amplify skills, not supplant them. “It’s certainly not something that I would recommend someone to use as a replacement for their own abilities,” Whisler cautions. He automates workout progressions to prioritize “human-to-human feedback,” but stresses experts must “filter the data” to ensure quality, balancing efficiency with judgment.
Disclose AI Use Transparently
“You should never use AI without disclosure,” Whisler stresses. Disclosing AI-generated plans or outlines builds trust, and clients should consent to AI’s use with their data, ensuring ethical practice in academic and professional settings.
Leverage AI for Studying and Assignments
Whisler praises Google’s Notebook LM as “the coolest thing ever when it comes to studying.” For his PhD exam, he uploaded 10 articles to Notebook LM, creating notebooks for AI conversations on human performance, and used its podcast feature for deeper insights. Students can upload PDFs, or faculty can assign tasks to “create the best AI essay … that you also 100% agree with,” refining outputs.
Try These Prompts
- Research Paper Outline: “I’m a health sciences undergraduate writing a 2,000-word paper on sleep’s impact on athletic performance. Provide an outline with three body sections, four recent peer-reviewed sources, and suggested journals. Ask for course details if needed.”
- Exam Study Guide: “I’m a kinesiology graduate prepping for a strength training exam. With five periodization articles in Notebook LM, generate a 15-minute study script with definitions, benefits, examples, and three practice questions. Clarify if needed.”
- Essay Draft Refinement: “I’m a student drafting a 1,000-word essay on AI ethics in healthcare. Upload my draft [text] and suggest three improvements (e.g., evidence, transitions). Ask about professor expectations if needed.”
- Presentation Slide Development: “I’m a sports science student making a 10-slide PowerPoint on autoregulation for a 15-minute talk. Create a slide-by-slide outline with key points, one visual per slide, and two references. Clarify audience details if needed.”
- Project Planning: “I’m a PhD student planning a 6-month dissertation on concurrent training. Create a timeline with milestones and suggest three AI tools. Ask about methods or deadlines if needed.”
Conclusion
Whisler’s insights from The Pulse interview — from exam prep to coaching — highlight AI’s power to enhance learning and efficiency. As for the future of AI in healthcare, he’s excited about how it can predict health ailments or reduce injury risks, which, Whisler says, aims to “impact (lives) for the better.”
Prompts Used to Craft This Blog
This blog was shaped by a series of nine prompts to extract Whisler’s AI tips and quotes from his blog interview, draft a 500-word post (later increased to 700 words), incorporate insights and an anecdote, add sample prompts for university audiences, remove time stamps, disclose AI use, detail how Whisler uses AI as a strength and conditioning coach, and summarize the prompt process.
