"Often people ask me, ‘Are your feet ever on the floor?’ [Laughs] I am upside down a lot. The longest I’ve gone without working out is probably like three days in a row. Even if I’m on vacation it’s happening. I’m working out. Recently I got concussed, and I still trained people all that day, then the next day I went to Pilates, taught two classes, walked back from Williamsburg, went out that night and danced with my friends... I definitely shouldn’t have done any of that. It’s not great advice, but I just love to move. Like, I get grumpy when I don’t exercise.

I wish I could tell people to stop working out for the wrong reasons. I try and re-route people who are just working out to lose weight. We all do this to ourselves—you know, you’ll be like, ‘I look really fat today,’ or something like that. The moment you say that, you just spoke that into your being, and you’re going to keep seeing yourself that way. Whereas if you have a performance goal, you’re more invested in it. You could be like, ‘I really want to feel fitter when I do that move,’ or ‘I want to be able to do more reps of this,’ or ‘I want to be able to achieve something.’ You’re always aesthetically going to improve—that all happens at the same time. But if you’re too invested in the aesthetic thing, you’re often feeling disappointed, because you’re determining it based on something that changes every day. We all look more fluid-y some days, we all look more bloated some days. Sometimes the days where you actually look leaner are after you had a big night out—there’s no way to make it make sense.

HEALTH
I don't take many supplements. I rely on magnesium for muscle recovery, and winding down at the end of the day. I’ve use the same brand of magnesium for like six years and I swear by it—it’s called Ubermag PX. Everyone’s different, so you kind of have to find the one that works for you. I like to add things into my smoothies—I love a lot of the Moon Juice products. My go to recipe is one scoop of vanilla whey protein isolate, a teaspoon of lacuma, a tablespoon of tocos, a teaspoon of the Sun Potions mix I have called anandamide. Then I like to put in some probiotics from Moon Juice. I like to put glutamine in, which is good for muscle recovery, and then I add bee pollen. That’s all with ice and water, and sometimes a little almond butter. If I want to add fruit I’ll put in frozen blueberries—we don’t want to overdose our bodies with tons of sugar. The more things we’re adding in, the more we’re blocking the actual goodness from getting into us. Everyone should own a Vitamix. I think the special thing about a Vitamix is that it gives you the right texture—you can make a really creamy smoothie without having to have a frozen banana or milk. I guess it’s just the way that it mixes it. The key thing is jamming the prodder thing in it—I sometimes feel like my neighbors must hate me, because it’s five in the morning and I’ve got my Vitamix going, Kanye playing. But I truly think that having a good blender makes a big difference.

I’m addicted to avocado—I’m really into healthy fats. I’m not a vegetarian—I really think you can’t be from New Zealand and be a vegetarian, our meat is so good. For lunch I’ll have some salmon—if I can come home to cook, I love to do that, but if I’m out I’ll just have a healthy salad with salmon and avocado. I love if there could be some seaweed in there. I love ground turkey, I love chicken, I love steak.

BODY
I swear by massage. I have this guy, Mr. Kim—he’s at Black Label Salon in the Financial District. People only talk about massage in two ways—going for a massage, or going for a sports massage. For me, it’s kind of a combination of both. You don’t even need to go in and be like, ‘I’m sore here, here, and here,’ because he just kind of judges you when you come in and he gets it all out. I also swear by acupuncture. I have an acupuncture person back home in New Zealand who I see literally right when I get off a flight. This guy Trevor Montgomery. He’s amazing. There are not many people you can trust to do acupuncture in your groin—let’s be clear about that! He fixes everything. I think with acupuncture, especially dry tissue, deep needle stuff, you’re going straight to the source—you’re getting tension out of your body that shouldn’t be there. I also love sitting in the infrared sauna at Sky Ting—I think a lot of people talk about infrared sauna almost like it’s going to absolve them of their sins, but it’s not like that. [Laughs] You can detox, and it’s similar to when ancient tribes used to sit around a fire, and what that actually does to your blood cells, and how it calms you. That’s why I like to sit in there. To give myself a moment to switch off.

In the shower, I like this C.O. Bigelow Coconut Body Cleanser. Then I have Body Hero, Coco Rose from Herbivore for a scrub, and this Dr. Bronner’s one. La Mer Body Cream is good if you want to be bougie to your body. It’s so fucking good. Lanolips Hand Cream is amazing, and Dove has been my deodorant for years—I wear it when I work out and I never have BO. I try to take a shower after I work out. If I can come home I do, or if I can shower at work, absolutely.

I typically wear men's fragrance. I love Comme des Garcons Black Pepper—that’s my scent. And I love Byredo—Super Cedar, Velvet Haze. I love all their candles—Bohemia and Bibliotheque are my favorite. The Maison Louis Marie ones are so good too, and really affordable. I always get them from The Line. Number 3 is my favorite.

SKINCARE
A huge part of my beauty routine is the fact that I’m moving a lot, and I sweat a lot. Being from the area of the world that I’m from, it’s all about the glow. So, I love oils—I always use an oil as a base instead of moisturizer. At the moment I’m obsessed with mixing this Tata Harper Beautifying Face Oil with her Illuminating Moisturizer as my base.

I don’t cleanse every time I work out, but I always have the Clinique Cleansing Wipes in my bag—those are really good. A lot of people react to cleansing wipes, but these smell really nice—I don’t want to smell like I just poured alcohol on my face, and they don’t make my face all tingly. Often I’m running from a class to a dinner or a meeting, so I can just wipe off with that. I also use this Panacea Skin Cleanser for when I’m washing my face. It’s really buttery—I’m pretty lucky my skin’s not reactive, because I love using that. I have a Dior Cleansing Milk that I like, and then I always moisturize with my oil. If I’ve been traveling a lot, I have some more intense hydrating products that I like. Moisture Surge by Clinique, and I’m obsessed with Giorgio Armani Prima Glow-On Moisturizing Balm and Dior Hydration Rescue. That’s the worst thing when you fly—you get so dehydrated. Even in a lot of places where there’s air conditioning, I always turn the air conditioning off in my hotel or my house. If I have a breakout, Skin Rescue from Kiehl’s is great. If my skin is reacting to something, that’s a big thing for me.

My face mask section is a mess, always. I love Huxley. Their masks always make my skin feel reset. The Glossier masks make me feel fun. There are a lot of Dr. Jart ones I like. My favorite lip masks are from KNC Beauty, and she’s just bought out some eye masks, which I want to try. I love these Shiseido Benefiance Eye Masks, they’re really good. And I love this brand, Erno Laszlo—they make really good masks, especially their black one. It’s so good.

MAKEUP
I started using the Armani Beauty Luminous Silk Foundation, and I’m just obsessed with the glow of it. If I’m going out at night, that would be my choice—whereas if I’m working in the day, I would use the Nars Tinted Radiance, which is the tinted moisturizer I’ve used for years. When I train people, I always wear the Nars Tinted Radiance, brush my brows, and do a little mascara. I always brush my brows—I go to Sania’s Brow Bar, and she grooms them a little bit. Eyes to Kill by Armani is my favorite mascara. One of my clients got me into it.

I love having a glow, so I love highlighters. I have the Becca Shimmering Skin Perfector in Champagne Pop, and then I have this Armani Fluid Sheer Bronzer that’s really great if you’re going out at night. Another bronzer I like is this Nars one, Laguna, or this other Armani one in Neo Nude. I love Glossier Haloscope, and I love Balm Dotcom. The coconut’s my favorite one—I just rage through it. Sometimes I use this Chubby Stick from Clinique in Heaping Hazelnut. I'm boring, but I just like glowy.

Everyone loves Papaw—I used to use it all the time, you get super addicted to it. I have these two balms that I love—this Armani balm, and this Dior Lip Glow too. My favorite thing is this lip mask I use at night by Laneige. Mine’s the vanilla one in the yellow package, and it’s the shit. I love Tatcha Dewy Mist—that’s like, if I finish a workout, I’ll wipe my face with the Clinique stuff and then spritz that on. Or I’ll use the Clinique Workout Face and Body Spray.

HAIR
I have very long hair for working in fitness—it’s dangerous. When it's in a braid, it could take out an eyeball. My friend did my hair last time—I never used to color it, and then he put some blonde in it just for fun. His name is Reece Walker, and he’s in LA. Otherwise Ryan Pearl who lives here has done my hair before. I’m really low-maintenance with hair, but it’s important to me that my hair smells nice. I like the Kiehl’s Amino Acid Shampoo and Conditioner—that always makes it feel good. A lot of the time my hair will be super clean in the ponytail but I just need to freshen up in the roots, so it’s important to have a good dry shampoo. I like Drybar’s, or this new brand called Playa. I like that one a lot—it smells really good. Smell is a big thing for me. When I’m working out generally it’s in a high pony, or I love braids, but I can’t braid my own hair. I love it when I have like four braids—I’m lucky that I shoot with Nike a lot and I’ll generally always have braids done for that. It’s very rare that my hair is actually out. I probably wash it every two or three days. I just don’t sweat much.

NAILS
I have nice nails, except for my busted up boxing knuckle. This is just a regular Essie polish, but I do often like gel. I always have beige or nude colored nails—I say it’s bad and beige-y. I like to have my nails done because most of the time I can’t wear my jewelry when I’m training people. It still makes me feel pretty, and you obviously also have your hands on people, so I think it shows you’re clean. This one is called Spin The Bottle. I have someone paint them for me—I’m really bad at being patient. I can’t sit still. Me and my friend who’s also a trainer always go together, because we’re the same like, ‘I cannot sit still for the life of me to have it done.’ I have really long nail beds, so they’re naturally long. They’re never going to be like claws, because that’s not functional for jumping on a pullup bar, or touching people—I don’t want to scratch someone."

—as told to ITG

Kirsty Godso photographed by Tom Newton on May 9, 2018.