personal training

Gymnasticbodies: Foundation One training

November 10, 2016

Simon is one of our coaches who specialises in one-on-one and small group training. Below he shares his experience and thoughts on participating in the Gymnasticbodies method of training.

I have always enjoyed doing bodyweight training. I think we should all be able to control our bodies in space, whether it is in a basic functional way, or by taking it to the next level with acrobatics and fancy movements.

Last year I participated in the Gymnasticbodies (GB) Level 1 Seminar hosted by Coach Christopher Sommers. You can read my review here.

When you sign up for the seminar, you also receive two online programs, Foundation One (F1) and Handstand One (H1).

So with my little boy Ash being roughly two months old at the time, and needing to spend more time at home (with not a lot of sleep), I decided to make the Foundation series my main training focus.

Both programs require only a limited range of equipment, so I could do a lot of it at home, and use the equipment when I was at the gym (gymnastic rings and a pull up bar).

I started the program at week 5 to 9 for each phase, as the earlier phases were very basic. I also knew it would take me nine months to get through all of F1.

One of the good things about the GB website is that it has all the programming set out for you, so you only have to concentrate on the week that you’re up to. It also has a follow along format so you don’t get to confused with all the shorthand.

There are also a range of videos you can watch if you need to remind yourself of the form and technique for both strength and mobility.

The Foundation Series uses strength and mobility in each area of the program, and it always includes strength, followed by mobility/flexibility. So if you skip the mobility you’re technically only doing half the work.

For example: Bent Hollow Body Hold (FL/PE1 60sec) then Cat Cow (FL/PE1>iM 5reps)

Here’s where all the training leads to:

Front Lever (FL)

Straddle Planche (sPL)

Side Lever (SL)

Manna (MN)

Single Leg Squat (SLS)

Hollow Back Press (HBP)

Rope Climb (RC)

While I say that I completed all of F1, I couldn’t do most of the Single Leg Squat section due to partial meniscus tear in my left knee from BJJ, it just wasn’t stable enough for me to trust it.

As I am writing this, I just had a look at the F1 programming again and they have changed the SLS programming to what looks a lot easier or achievable for people who are limited in the use of their lower body.

Now for what I thought about the F1 program. I really enjoyed it, I guess coming from a Capoeira background means that I could pick some things up a little quicker than some other people.

The program is not a quick moving program, by that I mean it’s not a super entertaining program, but it’s not supposed to be, your focus should be on accuracy not intensity.

I like the process of the step-by-step actions that lead from simple to challenging.

Also, each exercise has a ‘Mastery’ part to it. For example: Bent Arm Chin Hang (RC/PE6) which was 5x60sec which was really hard at the start, but now it’s possible (again I checked the site and it’s only 5x30sec…)

Where my mindset differs from what they (GB) are looking for is mastery, and looking for mastery in movements isn’t why I train (but doing cool movements is nice).

When I first started Capoeira, I wanted to be good, I wanted to be able to walk into the Roda and be able to keep up with whoever I was playing, and I feel the same with BJJ.

When it comes to movement it’s always good to think about the bigger picture. Basic movements lead to more complex movements, but it’s up to you how far you take it.

For me, longevity is what keeps me motivated and focused. I want to be in this game for the long haul.

Find out more about training with Simon and his background here.

(Photo credit: Unity Gym)

The return of roadwork: Developing aerobic baseline capacity for athletes

October 11, 2016

A decade or so ago the phrase “roadwork” would have conjured up the image of a tracksuit clad athlete stoically jogging through the early morning mist and up the stairs of the Philadelphia Museum of Art to the inspirational tune “Gonna Fly Now’.

In recent times though, roadwork has fallen out of fashion in the athletic community; now we talk about “conditioning” and flog ourselves stupid with insane high paced workouts that leave us bathing in a puddle of our own puke and sweat.

While I think it is a good thing that we’ve come to understand that running for hours on end is detrimental to the strength, health, and performance of the majority of athletes, we’ve replaced it with something just as stupid.

The majority of “conditioning” training I see people do rarely results in any kind of improved sport performance and, in fact, usually actively interferes with it.

People forget that conditioning is specific. A boxer who is fully capable of doing ten rounds of intense sparring can be left gasping for air like a pack a day smoker after just ten minutes of wrestling practice, simply because they are not yet adapted to the specific conditioning demands of wrestling.

The best kind of sports conditioning is training or playing in the sport itself, and anything that interferes with an athlete’s ability to train or play is a hinderance. That said, it follows though that anything that can increase or enhance an athlete’s ability to train or play is beneficial.

So, aside from developing strength, if “conditioning” is out, what does that leave us with? Aerobic baseline capacity training. Roadwork 2.0 if you will.

Aerobic conditioning is not domain specific so, provided care is taken to keep the level of physical stress low, improvements made allow an athlete to train in their sport longer and more frequently.

The following three methods have each shown excellent results across a variety of sports and activities.

Barry Ross Baseline conditioning

This protocol is probably the easiest and most effective I have ever come across for developing an aerobic baseline for training. The fact that it is so simple and so undemanding is probably the main reason that almost nobody will start or stick with it.

The program was developed by Barry Ross, one of the best sprint coaches in the world, who needed to improve his athletes’ aerobic base without also further fatiguing them or impacting their ability to recover from their intense sprint training sessions.

The solution he came up with was to get his athletes to walk as fast as possible for 15 minutes three times a week with the goal of walking slightly further every week. This was to be repeated for four weeks followed by a two week break before repeating.

Tempo Running

The concept behind tempo running is that as there is little or no barrier to entry to running and only in the most extreme of circumstances do people become unable to take another step. As a result it is extremely easy for athletes (or anyone else for that matter) to run too far and run too fast damaging both sports performance and their bodies. We needed a method of limiting both the pace of the run and the quantity of running performed.

For years I called the following method “Tempo Running”, before I found out that it is essentially a low tech approach to the reasonably well known “Maffetone Running Method”.

This sounds easy, but the first session crushes egos on a regular basis. All the athlete has to do is run for 30 minutes twice a week maintaining a pace which allows them to breath only through their nose. If at any point during the run the athlete breathes through their mouth, they must walk the remaining time even once they are able to resume nose only breathing.

By restricting peoople to only breathing through their nose, it forces them to work at a pace that their body can easily handle.

I got the idea after watching Russian amateur boxers working the pads and even sparring with a mouthful of water, that they were then forced to spit out between rounds to prove they hadn’t swallowed the liquid.

Steady state after high intensity training

While none of these methods are onerous, this approach is the most easily integrated into an existing routine. All that is required is ten minutes of easy, steady state aerobics immediately after an intense sport training session, six days a week.

It is important to take note that in order for this protocol to be effective, it must be performed directly after a high intensity sports training session – not as a separate session, and not after something slower paced.

Interestingly, while it is probably the least effective of these three options for developing your aerobic baseline capacity (it’s still pretty good though) this is the only one that is even remotely likely to result in additional fat loss. While aerobic training is not particularly good at mobilising fat from adipose tissue stores, it is reasonably effective at making use of it once it enters the bloodstream. By performing some steady state aerobic training after high intensity training, which is amazing at mobilising fat from adipose tissue, you are essentially giving yourself some insurance that the fat that was mobilised gets burned.

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You might have noticed that none of the above training protocols are particularly exciting or sexy. That’s the thing about training in an effective, productive manner – sometimes it’s boring.

And that’s what makes this training genuinely hard for people to do.

The long runs and the puke inducing work outs feel hard but almost everybody will do them because they also feel exciting but it’s a willingness to do the rote work, the punch the clock style training sessions, that is the mark of a genuine athlete.

Photograph by Malcolm Murdoch

Why I Never Say ‘Cardio’- Thinking About The Language Of Fitness

January 19, 2016

Specialised language and jargon isn’t just fun, it can be incredibly useful. The words we use define the way that we think about topics, and so it’s worth it to carefully refine the words we use.

Here’s an example that illustrates how obsessive I am about this stuff- the use of the word ‘pull’ when talking about the deadlift. ‘How much do you pull?’ is a common way to ask someone how much weight they can do in this most storied exercise. The very concept of ‘pulling’ evokes the sort of arm-focused back-straining effort that any good deadlifter should be working to avoid. My clients (most of whom have never deadlifted before they start with me) never hear the word ‘pull’ in relation to the deadlift, but they do hear the word ‘stand’ a lot. I judge that this conditions them to think about the lift as a lower-body-driven, body-unfolding-evenly process, as they should.

Am I being over-the-top? All I know is that I want to get better and better at teaching things. It’s no great insight to say that effective communication is at the heart of teaching. Effective use of language comes down to one simple thing- understanding what a word or term means before you use it.

I feel bad picking on a word like ‘cardio’. It’s a word that was useful for a long time. It has a clear and precise meaning (physical exercise of low to high intensity that depends primarily on the aerobic energy-generating process, but of course you knew that). Meanwhile the fitness industry is littered with nightmare words like ‘tone’ and ‘detox’, marketing terms based on fictional premises that lower the common IQ of the fitness community every time they’re uttered or written. Compared to these ‘cardio’ is a fine, worthy term.

That said, modern athletes and trainers talking about ‘cardio’ sessions and ‘cardio’ fitness is a useful illustration of how the finer subtleties of language can limit our approach to our own fitness.

Athletes who start training with me tend to have a basic understanding of Cardio Training vs Strength Training. To most of them ‘cardio’ is the huff-and-puff, lots-of-reps-at-a-time stuff and ‘strength’ is about big scary weights. A cultural aspect to this exists where many athletes think of themselves as either Strength Athletes or Cardio Athletes. This false binary is about as useful as the false binaries prevalent on the political thinkpieces you read on Facebook this morning (ie not useful at all).

If pressed, any person of average intelligence will acknowledge that our muscles AND our lungs are working any time that we exercise. They’ll further acknowledge that a set of five back squats can leave you sucking wind and a long run will make your legs feel like jelly.

Our muscles are devices that we use to move and they are powered by the various substances that fuel our body, which includes oxygen. Our nervous system is as much the generator of strength as our muscles, and these various systems interrelate in subtle and intersectional ways depending on exactly what exercise we’re doing.

Sure sure, I hear you say. That’s all true, but doing cardio still makes you good at cardio and strength makes you good at strength, right?

We had a guy attend our wrestling club several years ago, who had never wrestled before. This guy was a serious athlete, a veteran of triathlons, open water swims and many other punishing endurance events. Despite this, two minutes of wrestling would leave him a melted puddle on the floor. I remember his words at the end of his first class, said with an exasperated laugh- “I thought I was fit!”

This guy thought that he had found an activity that had shown up the limits of his fitness. He was utterly wrong. His fitness was every bit as high -level as he thought it was. It was just the wrong fitness.

This guy wasn’t aware that the body has three energy systems- phosphate, anaerobic and aerobic- and that while all three of them are working every time you exercise, there is always one in primacy. Which energy system you’re using depends on how long and how intense the activity is.

A human body is going to have a different fitness in each system. It’s a pie to be sliced up- to reach an elite level in one requires a trade-off with the other two. You noticed that the third energy system is called aerobic, right? The other term for aerobic is cardiovascular. cardio isn’t part of a binary with strength, it’s part of a ternary with phosphate and anaerobic. (I’ll get a bit deeper into all this in my next column).

Once our trainee wrestler had these simple things explained to him he was much less frustrated. He had clear parameters for what he needed to work on, and a clear sense of reality. If he wanted to perform better at wrestling, he would have to increase his anaerobic fitness and allow his aerobic to be de-emphasized. Getting this right would mostly be a simple matter of adjusting the duration and intensity of his weekly exercise, plus one more important thing.

The more functional strength you have the less effort you need to employ in any individual movement. The less effort the lighter the demands on your energy systems. That means the stronger you are, the fitter you are, at least as far as the conception of fitness that people associate with ‘cardio’ training. There isn’t a physical pursuit on earth that a well-structured strength program won’t heavily assist with.

I aim to turn all of my clients into masters of nerdy fitness jargon. I teach every client about the three energy systems within their first two or three sessions, and work to deepen their understanding of them over time. It’s easy to understand, it helps people understand their own bodies and all truly effective gym training incorporates it. When naming the three systems I use the word ‘aerobic’ instead of ‘cardio’ because it’s relation to the word ‘anaerobic’ makes for clearer explanation. I’m thrilled for you to use the word ‘cardio’ if you still prefer it, but I’d love it of you stopped using it as a catch-all term for any type of huff-and-puff exercise. Consider it a personal favour to me.

There are fitness terms and slang that are clear, useful and elegant. There are other terms that are so counterproductive that I want to remove them from the language entirely. In the middle are a bunch of terms that are just fine but used lazily, by trainers and athletes that would rather repeat buzzwords than learn the basic facts about exercise and training.

If you’re after an effective way to set yourself above the gym-goers around you (and I know you are) then watching your words is a great place to start.

Five stretches – Part 2

January 15, 2016

Following on from my previous post on stretching for Capoeira, I wanted to share five more stretches that we still use in Capoeira and outside the circle of Capoeira, with some variations thrown in.

Pike:

Standard: Keep your legs together. With your knees locked out, try to compress your body at the hips. And yes, you can point your toes if you like to make it pretty.

The Jefferson Curl:

Steve Maxwell first showed this to me, and then again most recently Coach Sommers, it is a fantastic tool for promoting both strength through the spine and flexibility.

Start by standing tall on a flat surface or an elevated surface and with some kind of weight in your hands. This could be a barbell or kettlebells. You’re not looking for the heaviest weight possible, so start light (for example, 5kg) and progress from there.

When performing the movement, lock out your knees so your legs are straight. Then lean forward slowly, and think about “peeling” each vertebrae one at a time, until your arms are hanging down as low as they can. Try not to let your hands rest on your feet or the floor.

If you can touch the floor, move up onto an elevated surface (for example, a box or weight plate). Ultimately you are looking to have your upper body rest against the front of your legs. To return to the top, contract through the backs of your legs, concentrating on your hamstrings, and roll up one vertebrae at a time.

Pigeon:

Active: This particular version of the pigeon stretch has a slight ‘tweak’ to it I guess, I’m taking this version from Ido Portal and it’s more of an active pigeon stretch. It’s fantastic for opening up your hips.

Start on all fours and slide one leg back. Lean forward to place most of your weight on the front leg. Now play around with letting that front knee fall out to the side. Find your sticky spot and hang there for a while.

Example of this would be 10 reps then a hold for 10 seconds on the last rep.

90/90:

For this one, we start with the lead leg directly in front of you, with the knee bent at 90° lining up with the foot. Then the trail leg out to the side and also bent at 90° inline with the heel.

Lean forward to get the deep stretch through the hip and glute minimus.

For the trail leg, try to square yourself off inline with the knee, if you cannot, you can lean back.

Quadratus lumborum:

Sit on the floor in what I guess you would call a typical hamstring stretch position. Turn your upper body towards the bent knee, grabbing it with the opposite hand and lean your upper body towards the foot of the straight leg. The trick with this one is to hold on tightly and think about guiding your head and shoulders towards and beyond the foot!

Cossack stretch:

This is a very common position to be in when playing Capoeira, as a way of escaping (esquiva) attacks. It’s great position to practice to ‘teach’ your hips how to do the splits.

Straighten one leg (again point your toes if you feel like it). Tuck your other leg up towards your butt, trying to keep your heel and glutes nice and close to each other. With that same leg, try to keep your foot flat on the ground, and your knee and toes pointing in the same direction.

Deltoid capsule stretch:

Lie face down (prone) and feed your left arm underneath your chest. Let your left knee fall out to the side. To add more intensity to it, reach forwards with the non-stretching arm.

Scorpion stretch (pec to bicep):

Lie prone on the floor. Reach forward with one arm, then out about 45° (so either 10:30 or 2:30 on a clock). Keep the non-stretching arm close to the body (like a push up position), and use it to create leverage and push the stretching shoulder into the ground.

Reach the opposite leg to the stretching arm backwards over the body and just hang there.

If you’re keen to learn more or want a tailored program to help you move better, you can get in touch with me via www.simonlecoaching.com

My favourite finishing hold

November 26, 2015

A student recently asked me what my favourite finishing hold is.

Without hesitation, I answered, “The rear naked choke. Everything I do is aimed at getting me there.”

The student seemed supremely disappointed with my response. After all, there is a myriad of other significantly more exotic submissions that I could have nominated, many of which I am somewhat known for using. So why would I favour one of the most common, humdrum moves in the game?

Let me attempt to explain the reasoning behind my choice.

When I roll, I endeavour to take whatever opportunities my opponent offers me without presupposition. However, the rear naked choke is effectively my endgame, because it is the one hold that I will never choose to transition out of. This is not a conscious decision that I make because of some aesthetic attraction I have to the move. Rather, it is the logical result of successfully applying what I believe to be a technical Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ) approach to submission grappling.

Over the 13+ years I have studied and practiced BJJ, I have been taught to recognise the importance of the positional hierarchy. In order from worst to best, broadly speaking, we can break down the hierarchy as follows:

Bad positions from which we cannot typically attack submissions safely, e.g. under mount, under side control, or back mounted.
Neutral positions from which both opponents can attack submissions, e.g. guard, neutral leg lock positions, head to head.
Ride positions from which we can safely attack submissions, but from which we must ‘ride’ our opponent to maintain control, e.g. side control, knee-ride, top turtle.
Attacking positions from which we can attack submissions and control our opponent without the need to ride, e.g. mount and back control.

With this hierarchy in mind, it should be clear that moving to mount/back control is the organic result of applying a technical BJJ game. We should typically look to escape bad positions, attack or progress from neutral positions, attack or progress from ride positions, and attack from attacking positions.

So, assuming that things go our way, without really thinking about it, our technical BJJ approach has taken us on an organic path to mount/back control. However, from under mount, our opponent can do one thing that he cannot do when we take his back. That is, he can bridge his hips into us.

The hip bridge is such a powerful movement that our mount attacks may often be thwarted by it. Nevertheless, if we react to our opponent’s movement correctly, their escape will allow us to transition to back control. Therefore, back control is the final destination of a technical BJJ game, and thus, the most obvious staging point for our submission attempts.

So why out of all the attacking options from back is the rear naked choke so special?

It combines spine control with incomparable choking pressure, with or without the gi.

If we lock the rear naked choke properly, then our opponent can no longer move his chin, and thus, no longer turn his spine in order to effectively use his hips to escape. With our opponent now stripped of all strong movement options, we can patiently use the structure of the hold to incrementally increase the pressure of the choke and ‘kill the lion’.

When asked what is best in life, Conan the Barbarian once correctly answered, “To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women.”

Note that there is nothing in this description that involves looking fancy.

The rear naked choke is, in my opinion, the most comprehensive demonstration of domination over an opponent that can be achieved in BJJ, and it is for this reason that it stands as my favourite finishing hold.

Forget About Willpower: Fitness as a Function of Knowledge

June 29, 2015

Nick is truly obsessed with developing technical excellence in everything he does whether he’s writing songs for experimental indi pop groups or lifting ridiculously heavy weights without mussing his hair. Here he reveals the secret to his superpowers: Nerdiness.

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Gym

Noun

A crucible of pain and ordeal in which the worthy temper themselves into elite paragons of achievement and beauty.
A testing environment in which superior character is revealed and your primal worthiness as a human being can be objectively defined .

Is this conception familiar to you?

How about this one:

Personal Trainer

Noun

A combination of army drill sergeant, life mentor, spiritual guide and infallible fitness expert.
An exemplar of physical achievement with a hyper-natural connection to the intangible heart of physical excellence.

If these definitions seem commonplace rather than laughable then there’s a good chance you’ve spent some time in the modern first-world fitness environment.

Now, I’m as much a fan of heroic narrative as the next person, but the deeper I get into my practice as a PT and strength coach, the more the current discourse and language around gym training concerns me.

‘Pain is weakness leaving the body’. ‘Failure is not an option’. ‘Something something Beast Mode etc’. All very pithy and galvanizing. On the other side there’s these, ‘I know what to do, I just don’t do it’. ‘I’m just lazy, I hate exercise’. ‘I don’t have the willpower’.

Willpower.

Noun

An intrinsic ability to work hard and be disciplined under harrowing conditions.
An innate potential to do the things that others won’t or can’t
A trait that can reach full flower via the perfect combination of having a great coach and being a mentally tough athlete.

This is a definition that we’re all very comfortable with, right? Everyone knows that some people are just better than others, right? Some people have ‘the right stuff’, ‘what it takes’, etc.

We also know that drawing out someone’s best performance involves working them under the toughest conditions, right?

Before I take this line any further, I should level with you. I’m not a very tough person. I like living pain-free, in comfortable surrounds and at a pleasant temperature. As a general rule I like to get along with people and make them feel good. I’m not keen on yelling, and I’m naturally suspicious of inspirational quotes or memes. The only time I’m an alpha male is in a karaoke bar. To reiterate, I’m not tough.

On the other hand, the sport that I compete in, freestyle wrestling, is very tough. Just training for it requires high levels of strength, power and endurance, as well as the durability to be smacked against the ground a few hundred times a week.

So how has a non-tough guy like me, low on natural talent and late to the game, managed to compete in such an uncompromising environment?

The answer is nerdiness.

What do I mean? Well just for instance, ask me about the energy systems involved in my sport, the specific breakdown of aerobic, anaerobic and phosphate. Ask me about the bio-mechanics of sound combat sport footwork.

Ask me about optimal recovery envelopes for super-compensation. Ask me about sports-specific strength training. Ask me about macro-cycles and neural adaptation and Prilepin’s Table. Just don’t ask me unless you have at least an hour to kill (probably better just to wait for future columns).

The brain I use for fitness is the same one I’ve always used for cataloging comic books and vintage punk records. When I’m not in the gym (which is often), I’m frequently geeking out on the history, science and modern cultural movements in sports and exercise.

Partly it’s just the way I was made, partly it’s the mentors that I’ve trained under, but most of all it’s that I don’t want to be hurt. I want to spend as much of my life feeling good and having as great a time as possible, and I want my sport to be a part of that for many many years to come. I will use every fact and figure available and ignore any popular ‘wisdom’ I need to to achieve that.

Don’t get me wrong, wrestling for me is a brutal, ego-crushing Everest that I climb a millimeter at a time, and my athletic career is nothing to hang a reputation from (I’m nationally ranked in Australia which means my skills are equivalent to the average Bulgarian 12-year old).

The thing is, I don’t value the sport for it’s toughness or it’s status among sports (good thing too, because it has zero status in this country). I value it for it’s reality.

It’s a sport that can only be won one way, that is, by doing it more correctly than the other guy. Attitude is a huge, essential part, but there’s no sudden underdog victories achieved through determination and believing in yourself. Just correct application of trained strategy and response. Sexy right?

So my sport has influenced my sensibility, but more important still has been my experience with clients. A giant nerd like myself tends to attract nerdy clients, often people who weren’t part of a sports or gym culture before they came to work with me.

That means that I’ve had to be conscious of presenting the gym as an accessible, culturally neutral space in which people can build a knowledge base about their own bodies. In the process I’ve developed some very specific definitions that guide my practice:

Gym

Noun

A classroom environment containing purpose built equipment, in which physical skills can be learned and refined.
A laboratory environment in which principles of physical development can be enacted and tested under safe conditions.

Safe conditions. Here’s where my personal bias becomes obvious.

As an athlete I know that the world of sport is one of risk and unpredictability and I relish that.

In the heat of competition, victory is often achieved by pushing yourself beyond your normal safe operational parameters, and the ability to do that doesn’t appear spontaneously. I encourage my athlete-clients to compete in their sport frequently to help build the capacity and judgment to take it to ‘the place’ when required.

When programming for said athletes, I build specific, deliberate moments into the workouts in which they push their parameters beyond the platonic ideal of technical perfection. But note that I say moments. I expect the vast majority of reps performed in the gym to be as close to perfect as possible.

As a client myself, I still train under my long-term strength coach. I look at the gym as a tool to ensure that the body I take into the ring is as resistant to the unexpected as possible.

I have hours of wrestling technique to learn and practice every week, I need to bring as much mental focus and physical freshness to that process as possible. To that end, my strength and conditioning sessions need to comprise the minimum amount of work necessary for me to get stronger and fitter, no more.

As a gym coach, I know that there is no reasonable scenario in which my client should ever be injured in the gym.

In my six years doing this type of work I’ve had one (minor) client injury occur and it was a direct result of my ignorance and incorrect application of knowledge. I don’t intend for it to ever happen again. People are putting their physical wellbeing in my hands, and that responsibility can’t be overstated.

Safety aside, people are coming to me for results. Not endorphins or a sense of community or improved self-image, although those are all likely side-benefits.

They come to me wanting to transform their bodies in specific ways, and my job is to make sure it happens. Sure, it’s ultimately up to them since it’s their choice to keep showing up, but I need to know that if they do, then they’ll get the results they want. It’s not easy, but it’s not really that difficult either.

My clients will tell you that I’m not a shout-y call-you-to-get-you-out-of-bed trainer. I don’t ‘push’ my clients in the traditional sense. So what’s my actual job, as I see it?

Personal Trainer

Noun

A teacher who specialises in the skills required for physical transformation, relative to athletic performance, injury rehabilitation or general functional movement.
A coach who facilitates the acquisition of specific goals for individuals or groups.

I have a skill set and a knowledge base. The things I know take time to learn, but they can all be learned by a human of average intelligence. You can pay me to teach them to you. That, to me, is the only service that I offer, the only thing I have worth charging for.

Good teaching is my sole product, because the knowledge is free. I have no special secret system, everything I know is already out there. My business lives and dies on my ability to communicate it to people who would otherwise find it cryptic and forbidding. In doing so, I’ve discovered something really cool.

Willpower isn’t a thing. Not the way it’s been sold anyway. While it is absolutely essential to be consistent, do the work, and move outside your comfort zone, the mechanism for doing so is simple and quantifiable.

People do things that they understand. When you can draw a line between an action and a positive outcome, you’ll do that action again. The more clearly you comprehend a process and how it works, the easier it is to invest in it. No faith required.

Stay tuned for Part 2 – Practical Examples!

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Nick is the band you discovered in highschool long before anyone else did. He is available for Personal Training and instructs the Strength & Power and Freestyle Wrestling programs. Check out his personal site Form=Function.