Monthly Archives: February 2019

Assessment: Can Your Clients Actually Do What You Want Them to Do?

There’s a lot that needs to be taken into consideration when assessing a new client. Their unique injury history (past and present), goal(s), training experience, time constraints, equipment availability, even their favorite 90’s tv teen drama (if it’s not Party of Five we can’t be friends)… …all are taken into account and cross-pollinated with my… Read more

Exercises You Should Be Doing: Reverse Nordic Curl

Anyone who’s visited the Nordic region of the world – generally considered to be Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Iceland – knows they’re known for a few things: Fjords Vikings And that’s pretty much it.   Okay, that’s a bit of dearth representation of all the history, art, food, and culture the region has contributed… Read more

Complete Bench Press Warm-Up

  I think one main reason most (not all) people skip their warm-up is because there’s no rhyme or reason to what they do. They’ll perform some arm circles here, some thingamabobbers there, do the hokey pokey, turn themselves around, and they’re miraculously “warmed up.” While something is better than nothing, I do feel the… Read more

Stuff to Read While You’re Pretending to Work: 2/22/19

BUT FIRST…CHECK THIS STUFF OUT 1. (Even More) Complete Shoulder & Hip Blueprint – 2019 Locations & Dates Philadelphia, PA: April 27-28th (<– EARLY BIRD rate ending soon). Edmonton, Alberta, Canada: May 25-26th Sydney, Australia: July 13-14th Singapore, Republic of Singapore: July 20-21st This workshop will piggyback on the material Dean Somerset and I covered in the original Complete Shoulder & Hip Blueprint…. Read more

Part II: Correcting the Lower Back and Hips

A few weeks ago my good friend and author of Day by Day: The Personal Trainer’s Blueprint to Achieving Ultimate Success, Kevin Mullins, wrote an introduction of sorts to the state of “corrective exercise” in the fitness industry. To summate: Stop it. Just stop. People still need to train in order to get better. He followed that up with… Read more

Boom or Bust: Why You’re Always Hurt

I work with hurt people for a living. It’s not uncommon for people to seek out a coach or trainer because an exercise doesn’t feel right or because something – a shoulder, a knee, lower back, their soul perhaps – routinely hurts and they can’t seem to get out of their own way. That’s where… Read more

Stuff to Read While You’re Pretending to Work: 2/15/19

BUT FIRST…CHECK THIS STUFF OUT 1. (Even More) Complete Shoulder & Hip Blueprint – 2019 Locations & Dates Philadelphia, PA: April 27-28th Edmonton, Alberta, Canada: May 25-26th Sydney, Australia: July 13-14th Singapore, Republic of Singapore: July 20-21st This workshop will piggyback on the material Dean Somerset and I covered in the original Complete Shoulder & Hip Blueprint. With this iteration, though, we’ll be… Read more

Individualizing Your Squat Stance

I’ve often championed the notion that there’s “no such thing as textbook technique.” How we’re taught to execute certain exercises in a textbook often won’t translate to the real world because, well, we don’t live in textbooks. This is a theme that’s hit on several times in The Complete Trainers’ Toolbox. Sam Spinelli, one of… Read more