Charlie Packman, popular personal trainer and retired gym owner, has died at 75

Charlie Packman, 75, of Plymouth Meeting, longtime popular personal trainer, retired owner of Charlie Packman’s Personal Fitness Center in Ambler, former strength coach at the University of Pennsylvania, mentor, and volunteer, died Saturday, March 15, of cancer at his home.

At 6-foot-3 and 215 pounds, filled with energy and empathy, Mr. Packman combined his knowledge of bodybuilding, elite athletic ability, and engaging people skills to excel as a popular personal trainer to professional, college, high school, and weekend athletes.

He played high school football and basketball at Chestnut Hill Academy and football at Lafayette College. But injuries curtailed his playing days, so he focused on bodybuilding and strength training in the gym.

At first, he managed Nautilus gyms on the Main Line and in Doylestown. He was mentored in the late 1970s by veteran bodybuilder Roger Schwab at Main Line Health & Fitness in Bryn Mawr, and he mastered the science of weightlifting, and chiseled his own frame into elite bodybuilder status.

He went on to coach strength conditioning to hundreds of private clients, 28 teams at Penn, the men’s basketball team at Villanova University, and mostly football and basketball players at Central Bucks East High School. He favored short intense training sessions twice a week, one set of each exercise until the muscle failed.

“Charlie Packman taught me how to get tough in the weight room and eat well,” former Penn football star Joe Valerio told pennathletics.com when he was inducted into the school‘s Hall of Fame in 2005.

Central Bucks East basketball player Kevin Davis spent the summer between his junior and senior seasons working out with Mr. Packman in Doylestown. He gained 20 pounds of muscle, he told The Inquirer in 1984, and significantly improved his upper body strength and jumping ability.

“Charlie Packman had pretty good abs, too, but they were eclipsed by his outstanding pecs and lats.”

“Basically, I owe it all to Charlie Packman,“ Davis said. Another former client said in an online tribute: “I still use his philosophy.”

Staying healthy, Mr. Packman stressed, was always the main goal. “If you lift weights, you’ll increase athletic potential by getting more speed, size, strength, and flexibility,” he told Inquirer fitness writer Art Carey in 2002. “But the real purpose is to reduce the chance of injury.”

Mr. Packman worked with Penn football teams in the 1980s and ’90s, and his cousin Hedra said: “He always said that the best part of the championship year was that no one got injured.”

He created a personalized weightlifting program for Penn’s Valerio in 1990, and the offensive lineman told The Inquirer that year: “I kind of fell in love with it as soon as I started getting results.” Valerio went on to play five seasons in the NFL.

“He can make his pecs dance under his shirt, which must come in handy when conversation lags on a first date.”

Mr. Packman also coached Franco Harris of the NFL‘s Pittsburgh Steelers, football players on the Eagles and Minnesota Vikings, and several champion bodybuilders.

He opened his own fitness center in Ambler in 2002, and Carey nicknamed him “Charlie Pec-man” in a feature story about his love of bodybuilding. Carey also noted Mr. Packman’s weightlifting injuries over the years: three broken ribs, torn knee ligament, ruptured elbow bursa sac, and wrenched neck and back.

“I busted up myself lifting weights wrong,” Mr. Packman said in 2002, “and I rehabbed myself doing it right.”

He had a heart attack in 2012 and eventually needed heart and kidney transplants. A close friend donated a kidney, and he continued for a time to see clients at his home.

“My strength coach tells me he’s never seen a small gorilla.”

“Charlie was quite a character,” his cousin said “He had personality. He enjoyed being with people, and he could tell a story. He was the best friend you could have.”

Charles John Packman was born Jan. 17, 1950, in Philadelphia. He grew up in Chestnut Hill, started lifting weights in middle school, and spent summers pumping iron behind the baseball dugout at Camp Susquehannock in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

Later, he studied anthropology, sociology, and religion, and earned a bachelor’s degree at Lafayette. He married and divorced, and remained close to his cousins, Hedra and Ira.

Eclectic in his interests, Mr. Packman immersed himself in Native American culture and was active as a barbarian reenactor with the Society for Creative Anachronism. He loved horses and his cat, and volunteered at Main Line Animal Rescue and St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church in Whitemarsh.

He raised funds for organizations and friends in need, and dozens of the people he mentored remained lifelong friends. “Charlie was a wonderful person,” a friend said in a tribute. Another called him “a great athlete and trainer, and an outstanding man.“

Everyone said the party really got going when he showed up. “His presence at family events added excitement, fun, and great storytelling,” Ira Packman said. “He was a favorite cousin for all ages.”

In addition to his cousins, Mr. Packman is survived by other relatives.

A celebration of his life is to be at 1 p.m. Saturday, May 31, at Springside Chestnut Hill Academy, 500 W. Willow Grove Ave., Philadelphia, Pa. 19118.

Donations in his name may be made to Main Line Animal Rescue, 1149 Pike Springs Rd., Chester Springs, Pa. 19425.