CategoriesFemale Training Program Design Strength Training

3 Reasons Your Female Clients Aren’t Seeing Results

Note from TG:  Today’s post comes courtesy of Molly Galbraith. She and the rest of the Girls Gone Strong pack released their new resource, The Modern Women’s Guide to Strength Training, today.

Molly was kind enough to write a little sumthin, sumthin to serve as an adjunct to its release.

Enjoy – it’s a doozy!

If you read Tony’s site much (which obviously you do because you’re reading this) you know that he’s a man that’s passionate about a few things:

  1. Deadlifting
  2. Eating dead animal flesh
  3. Anything that has to do with un-doing the “work” of Tracy Anderson

So obviously, I’m going to talk about all 3 of these things today because Tony promised that if I did, he’d film a video of himself doing an Irish jig while wearing a kilt, fanny pack, fairy wings, and the clogs that he hasn’t got much use out of lately (he’s been busy).

So yes, I’ll be covering these topics today, namely #3.

Today I’ll be telling you the 3 reasons why your female clients aren’t getting the results they’re looking for… (Assuming that those results are that they want to look and feel amazing and strong).

Let’s get started!

1. Your Programming is Poor or Incomplete.

I know what you’re thinking:

“My programming’s awesome!  My female clients squat and deadlift and do push-ups and all kinds of awesome stuff.”

That’s great.  I’m super excited that your clients do those movements.  That’s a great starting point, but there are a few things to ask yourself:

–        Do you asses all of your clients as soon as they come in the door?  Do you observe their posture, their body awareness, and their capability to perform basic movement patterns?

–        Do you start your clients off with the basics of each of those movement?  Do they perform squats and hinge movements with just their body weight at first?  Do they start with incline push-ups so they could really master the movement pattern?  Do you set them up for success at the beginning by building an awesome foundation?  Or did you have them doing Barbell Back Squats on their first day?

–        Is their programming tailored specifically towards what you found in their assessment?  For example, if a female client has an exaggerated anterior pelvic tilt are you including more hip, hamstring, and glute dominant exercises that quad/knee dominant exercises?  Are you doing a lot of anterior core stability and strength work with them?

Hopefully the answer to all of these question is yes.  If it is, you’re *thisclose* to being a Rock Star.  But I have a few more for you.

–        Have you ever talked with your clients about the importance of breathing?  Are there any breathing drills in their workout, even just to cool down at the end?

–        Does your client Foam Roll or do other soft tissue work for at least a couple of minutes before their training session?

–        Does your client perform a solid Dynamic Warm-up before every workout?

–        Does your client do intelligent Energy Systems Training (i.e. cardio)?  Also known as “not dumb shit?”  This is generally a mix of short High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) sessions and Moderate Intensity Cardio (MIC) with their heart rate in the 120-150 beats per minute range 1-2x each throughout the week.

All of these things should be included in your female client’s training programs in order to get them the best results with the least amount of time and effort.  If not, you’re leaving something on the table.

2. You’re pushing your clients in the wrong ways.

Let me start by saying that I have zero problems with training hard and pushing my clients hard.  But it’s important that your client is properly prepared to be pushed, and there are ways to do it, and ways that just don’t make any sense.

Some examples:

A female you’ve been training for a year who has awesome deadlift form and you want to see what she can deadlift for a heavy triple?  Awesome.

Seeing how many Burpees your client can do before they puke, pee, cry, or fire you?  Not awesome.

Helping your client eek out a couple really tough reps on Dumbbell Bench Press and teaching her to “strain” a bit?  Awesome.

Bragging to your friends that your client could hardly walk for four days after being trained by you? Not awesome.

Having your client really push herself on her last couple of prowler trips and try to beat her previous best?  Awesome.

Making your client do 100 Box Jumps or Jump Squats because you think its “cool” to make her legs feel like jelly?  Not awesome.

Prepare your clients to be challenged appropriately, and I won’t come kick you in the shin.

Note from TG (regarding Molly’s “kick you in the shin” comment):  you DO NOT want to make Molly angry.  Trust me.  Look at her in the picture above.  That’s the face she made after being told her boyfriend adopted a kitten for her.

LOL – I’m just kidding.  Molly is a delightful human being.

But seriously, don’t piss her off.

3. Your clients are not recovering properly.

As their trainer, it’s your job to help your clients get the best results possible in the gym.

As an above-average-intelligence-trainer (I mean hey! You’re reading Tony’s blog aren’t you?) I expect you to know that your client’s success is directly correlated to how well they can recover from their overall stress load – meaning not just what they do in the gym with you, but what’s going on in their life, in general.

The more life stress they have, they less they need to be doing in the gym unless they have tons of time to sleep, eat nutrient dense food (like dead animal flesh), and recover.

If you’re not talking to your clients about recovery, you’re doing them a major disservice.  Before they start training with you, it’s important to help them understand that they get better/stronger/fitter when they recover from, and adapt to stressors, not while the stressor is being applied.

Talk with them the importance of these things:

–        Eat nutrient-dense, whole foods 80-90% of the time.

–        Manage their stress effectively.

–        Get moderate amounts of sunshine regularly.

–        Get 7-9 hours of sleep in a cold, dark room every night.

–        Use recovery modalities such as massage or other soft tissue work, Epsom salt baths, low to moderate intensity cardio, contrast showers, etc.

And your female clients will be on their way to looking and feeling better than ever.

Hi, it’s me Tony. So how’d you stack up?  Are you making these mistakes with your clients, or are you absolutely killing it?

I hope you’re killing it, of course.  But on the off chance that you might have been missing a thing or two, you should definitely check out an incredible new resource from Molly and the rest of the Girls Gone Strong crew (you know, The Women’s Fitness Authority) that discusses ALL of these issues, and then some.

The Modern Women’s Guide to Strength Training

I can’t tell you how excited I am to endorse this fantastic resource, as I feel it’s a product that will help a lot of women finally understand the merits of strength training and how strength is a good thing.

More importantly:  it’s a manual designed for women written by women.

I know many of you are wondering what’s included.  Here’s a brief synopsis.

–        The Modern Woman’s Guide To Strength Training Getting Started Guide – this program comes with a LOT of information, but the getting started guide will walk you through it step-by-step.

–        The Modern Woman’s Guide To Strength Training Manual – what is strength training, why is it important, a glossary of terms, and information about recovery, sleep, and stress management.

–        The Modern Woman’s Guide To Strength Training Programs – three 16 weeks training programs for beginners, intermediates, high-level intermediates (with multiple options for every single exercise in case you want to make a substitution).

–        The Modern Woman’s Guide To Strength Training Video Library – 90 minutes of high-definition video with me coaching GGS co-founder Alli McKee through 70 exercises.  I will discuss proper – form, as well as common mistakes and how to correct them.

–        The Modern Woman’s Guide To Strength Training Exercise Glossary – a print version of the video library for quick reference if you forget how a particular exercise is performed.

–        The Modern Woman’s Guide To Strength Training Progress Tracker – a progress tracking guide where you can track measurements, weight (if desired), mood, sleep, stress level, strength level, energy level, etc. so you can get a comprehensive picture of what’s going on with your body.

In addition, for those looking for guidance on the nutrition side of things, The Modern Woman’s Guide To Good Nutrition Package written by Dr. Cassandra Forsythe, PhD, RD, CSCS, gym owner, and co-author of The New Rules Of Lifting For Women, and The Women’s Health Perfect Body Diet will also be available.

Included in this package is:

–        The Modern Woman’s Guide To Good Nutrition Manual – 18 chapter manual with everything you need to know from determining calorie level and macronutrient ratio to recommended food sources and beverages, to what medications may be preventing fat loss.

–        The Modern Woman’s Guide To Good Nutrition Meal Plan – Cassandra recognizes that every woman is different and needs a different nutrition structure to be successful.   She put together done-for-you meal plans for fat loss and maintenance at multiple calorie levels, as well as a FODMAP plan for women with digestive issues, a Paleo meal plan at multiple calorie levels, and outlined multiple If It Fits Your Macros (IIFYM) plans for those who prefer that type of plan.

In a nutshell:  this resource is the bomb-diggidy, and covers every base imaginable.  So what are you waiting for? Click the link below to get started (you only have a few days to take advantage of the introductory offer).

—> The Modern Women’s Guide to Strength Training<—

 About the Author

Molly Galbraith is co-founder of Girls Gone Strong, a movement dedicated to helping women improve their physical strength, mental strength, and strength of character through strength training.

She is also co-founder J&M Strength and Conditioning, a private studio gym in Lexington, Kentucky.

Her mission is to, ”Help women discover and accept what their best body looks and feels like, with minimal time and effort, and once they discover that, help them have grace and compassion about it.”

CategoriesFemale Training Uncategorized

Male vs. Female (Fitness) Double Standards

I just got done watching last night’s episode of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and the opening bit, as always, was hilarious……but there was also an important commentary on societal stereotypes concerning women in politics.

In a nutshell, Chelsea Clinton (Hillary’s daughter) let if be known to the world that she’s expecting her first child.  Congrats to Chelsea (sorry,  I voted against your Mom)! The media followed suit by asking the asinine question: “Will this news somehow affect Hillary’s decision to run for President in 2016?”

They then followed that up with: “Is it sexist to even ask that question?”

Answer: Yes. Yes, it is.

Especially when you consider 2012 Presidential runner-up, Mitt Romney, has enough grandchildren to field an entire football team, yet this was never brought up or became an “issue” during his campaign.

Expounding a bit further, Jon Stewart also took “beef” with how the media portrays female politicians in general, as these emotional, unstable, ready-to-burst-into-tears-at-any-moment-Titanic-watching-misfits.

If a female politician sheds a tear she’s weak and shouldn’t hold public office.  And clearly it’s that time of the month. If a male politician cries, he’s a “man’s man.”

If a female politician debates or fights back she’s clearly an emotional wreck.  Conversely, if a male politician does the same – ALA Chris Christie – he’s considered somewhat of a hero.

It’s a double standard, and it’s unfortunate.

Again, I HIGHLY recommend watching the opening bit HERE.

You find many of these same parallels in other aspects of society too. Hitting a bit closer to home, the fitness industry is no different.

Walk through any magazine aisle at your local CVS and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

Fitness mags geared towards men tend to have some jacked dude on the cover with words like “yoked,” “get ripped,” and “how to gain 10 lbs if 10 minutes” transcribed throughout.

Fitness mags geared towards women, though, paint a different picture.  Here we’ll often (not always) see some petite, likely air-brushed iteration of a woman on the cover with key words like “drop x pounds, fast!,” “burn calories,” and “tank top arms” highlighted.

What’s more, the media doesn’t help.  Women are programmed to think that lifting weights will make them big-n-bulky or that they’ll grow an Adam’s apple if they attempt to lift anything heavier than their purse.

It’s a double standard, and it’s bullshit.

Women CAN lift (appreciable) weight and build a strong, muscular, athletic looking body (which is also lean, sexy and feminine!!). What’s more, why place such a dark tone on women building muscle?  Is that such a bad thing?

Of course there are a handful of unique considerations that differentiate how a woman should train compared to a man (women tend to be more hypermobile for example), but the mainstream media prefers to over sensationalize things and paint women as these delicate flowers who may hurt themselves if they attempt to deadlift. And if they do, they run the risk of adding gross muscle!

Which is why I’m really excited that the Girl’s Gone Strong crew are releasing their new project The Modern Women’s Guide to Strength Training next week.

The ball has been slowly rolling for a while now, women are starting to gravitate towards the squat rack instead of the Zumba studio (not that there’s anything wrong with that!), and understanding that there’s a lot of false information out there.

There’s still a lot of work to be done.  Molly Galbraith and the rest of the Girls Gone Strong team have upped the ante and have produced what I feel is a stellar product that will empower and encourage many women to embrace the barbell.

Like I said, the product itself won’t be available until next week, but in anticipation they’re going to be releasing a series of FREE videos this week leading up to its release.

The first of which is titled The Role of Your Hormones in Training and can be viewed HERE.

It’s a quick video, but dives into some of the more controversial issues surrounding women and fitness – namely how and why most fitness programs geared towards women simply don’t work.

Admittedly, the video is for women-focused-on women, but even if you’re not a woman it’s still great for your girlfriend or wife to watch.

And, if that’s not enticing enough: everyone who views the video will be entered in to win some killer Girls Gone Strong swag.

—-> Free Video <—-

CategoriesFemale Training

The “X-Factor” When It Comes to Convincing Women to Lift Weights?

What an awesome weekend.

Before I get into the meat and potatoes of this post, I first wanted to offer my gratitude to Randy Martin and his staff over at POWER Fargo for not only inviting me to speak but for being amazing hosts during the 3rd Annual Sanford POWER Strength and Conditioning Clinic.

Not only was it an eventful two days filled with top notch training and nutrition information catered towards fitness professionals (there were roughly 200 attendees, mostly strength coaches, personal trainers, physical therapists, with a spattering of Bert Blyleven fans* ), but – and I know this is a random point to bring up  – the food spreads were on point!

You know you’re at a strength and conditioning event when all-you-can-eat deviled eggs and chicken/pineapple skewers are part of the experience.  It was meathead heaven!

The only thing that would have made it more meat-headed was if they included creatine as a condiment or John Cena showed up and started a pig roast.

Note to any future seminar/conference planners:  this needs to happen.

Game time for me was all-day Saturday.  I spoke a total of six times – two presentation (one on squat assessment, and the other on shoulder “stuff”) and four, 30-minute long hands on sessions, where I discussed some of the shoulder care exercises we use at Cressey Performance with the bulk of our overhead athletes.

The latter of which you can learn in more detail HERE.

And by watching this video (my apologies for the lighting, it does get better as the video progresses):

Needless to say by the end of the day Saturday my brain was mush.  Annnnd I lost my voice.

Now I’m sitting here in the lounge area at my hotel Sunday morning writing this blog before I head to POWER to get a quick lift in with a few of the coaches there, and then it’s off to the airport.

So if you’re reading this post on Monday…….I MADE IT HOME!  YAY!!!

Also, as a quick aside:  Can I just take a second to say how lovely, in general, people here in the Mid-West are???

It’s been so refreshing to make eye contact with people, have them smile, and say “good morning.”

Sometimes I feel as if you can do the same thing in Boston (say hello to someone) and you’re more apt to be challenged to a knife fight than someone reciprocating.

Thanks Mid-West, for restoring my faith in humanity!!

The “X-Factor” When It Comes to Convincing Women to Lift Weights?

It’s no secret that I’ve encouraged and longed championed that women can and should lift (appreciable) weights.  I say “appreciable weights,” because pink dumbbells don’t count.  Those are paperweights. Doorstoppers. Bookshelf holders. The things that are relegated to the Tracy Anderson’s and Gwyneth Paltrow’s of the world (when she’s not dissing working moms of course) who are ignorant, prefer to placate into women’s fears about fitness,and/or want to sell DVDs.

NOTE: For those interested, HERE’s a link to a bunch of female-specific blog posts on my website. Stuff that’s actually useful, educational, empowering, and is gluten and botox free.

There’s no shortage of reasons why women should lift weights.  For all intents and purposes they’re the very same reasons why men lift weights:  to improve performance (whether in their respective sport(s), in daily life, or in the bed room.  BOM CHICKA BOM BOM), to improve health markers (increased lean body mass, improved bone density, offset metabolic disease, to name a few). to (hopefully) prevent injury, to look and feel like a million bucks, and/or, simply, because they like it or want to.

I recall several encounters my girlfriend, Lisa, has had at the commercial gym where she trains.  She’s a pretty serious lifter. She deadlifts, squats, performs hip thrusts, push-ups, can crush strict bodyweight chin-ups for reps, and on more than one occasion she’s been approached by both men and women who ask the inevitable question:

Are you, like, training for something?

Her answer:  “Yes, life.”

It’s in that light that I wholeheartedly LOVE it when women just train to train.

The question, though, is why do so many women refrain from hitting the weights in the first place despite knowing the gulf of benefits it provides?

Some of the the battle, I believe, is just getting through the intimidation factor.  I can understand why the bulk of women are reluctant to mosey on over to the free-weight area, what with all those guys grunting and groaning (it’s 40 lbs dude, relax), not to mention the redolent, gaseous, plume of Axe Body Spray one has to contend with.

It’s nasty.  I can’t say I blame them there.

A larger portion of the battle, and something many coaches don’t recognize, is the gender differences between men and women (Quick Refresher: boys have boy down there parts. Girls have girl down there parts.) and how they use the power of comparison, for better or for worse.

This is something that Registered Dietician and strength coach, Dave Ellis, touched on over the weekend during one of his talks at the POWER Fargo Strength Clinic.

He noted that one of the marked differences between men and women is that women are more societal comparitive, and men tend to be more temporal comparitive.

Put another way: women judge their current state against others (women), while men judge their current state to their own past current state.

If that still doesn’t make sense: women (not all) compare themselves to other women, while men (not all) compare themselves to themselves.

It’s uncanny how much this makes sense.

In the weight-room guys are always trying to lift more weight, competing against themselves, judging their progress by what they did in the days, weeks, months, or even years prior.

Conversely, women (again, not always) judge progress by comparing themselves to other women and it’s toxic at times.

I once had an older female client – in her 50s – who would regularly kick-ass in the gym – only to disregard her progress because she didn’t look like the 22 year-old former Division I athlete who trained at the same time as her.

And this was a woman who had a few years of good training under her belt and knew better.

What does this say for those women who have little to no training experience?

Maybe the initial intimidation factor, and what prevents some women from seeing progress, isn’t so much the dudes walking around with their tubs of protein and cut-off shirts, not to mention the learning curve and trying to figure out what the pulldown thingamajiggy does, but rather the notion that many are comparing themselves to other women; some of which are younger or just have more training experience?

It’s human nature to compare – that’s not the issue.  But when it serves as the main litmus test to gauge progress, and it’s done all….the…..time, it can become problematic.

I don’t know the exact answer to this conundrum – I’m a strength coach not a psychologist!! – but maybe if we (as fitness professionals) made a more concerted effort to tweak or “nudge” women’s mentality and to try to get them to compete against themselves, we’d see a bit more of paradigm shift?

It’s something I try to instill in my female clients from day one.  Rather than gauge progress by comparing themselves to what other women are doing or how they look, I try to get them to focus on THEMSELVES. Once they recognize, understand, and accept that any progress is progress, that’s a massive mountain that’s been conquered.

– Maybe they’re doing push-ups from the floor now, whereas four weeks ago they could barely eek out one from an elevated pin position. Win!

– Maybe they’re able to perform a clean looking squat pattern now, whereas before they could barely do it without falling over. You go girl!

– Maybe they added 20 lbs to their deadlift! Baller!

– Maybe they can fit into their favorite pair of jeans now. Holla!

– Maybe they can get through an entire training session without having to take a break, whereas before they had to stop every five minutes. Fantastic!

– Maybe they don’t call you an asshole as much during their training session.  Until you make them push the sled….;o)

All of those accomplishments should celebrated – regardless of how trivial they may seem – and should serve as a way to empower women to see that it isn’t about what other’s are doing and comparing everything to them, but how they’re making themselves better.

It’s about you.  Simple as that.

* For those who have no clue who Bert Blyleven is.  He’s only the Minnesota Twins’ all-time leader in pretty much every pitching category there is, including rocking the high stirrups.  

He was also inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2011.

Since I was speaking in Minnesota I made sure to win the graces of the crowd by giving tribute to my Twins knowledge and not make too many references to the Red Sox.  I busted out a few Kirby Puckett, Gary Gaetti, Kent Hrbek, and Danny Gladden references.

And Tom Brunansky

And Jack Morris

I’ll keep going dammit……………

Chuck Knoblauch, Joe Mauer, Frank Viola, what!

CategoriesFat Loss Female Training

The Conditioning Conundrum: 4 Common Mistakes

Setting the scene:  Jen Sinkler, former USA Rugby player, former fitness editor of Experience Life Magazine, current “free-agent/entrepreneur” fitness junkie, and 100% fashionista was asked a follow-up question when being interviewed by a reporter. When explaining how she prefers to train and not ONCE uttering the words treadmill, elliptical, or Thigh Master, the reporter incredulously asked……“but what do you do for cardio???”

Jen’s now viral answer:  “I lift weights faster!”

I’ve known Jen for coming up on six years now, and outside of being one helluva editor and awesome human being, I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who’s more immersed in “fitness” than her.  You name it, she’s done it.

Powerlifting, Strongman, CrossFit, kettlebells, Tough Mudders, taming Dragons…..she’s done it all.  While never being more than five feet away from some lip gloss.

Told ya:  100% fashionista.

Knowing I was going to be away on vacation this week (it’s 75 degrees at 7:30 AM as I type this. What, what!), and knowing that Jen’s first solo product – Lift Weights Faster – was launching while I was going t be away,  Jen was gracious enough to write a superb guest post for me on common conditioning mistakes that people make.

For those who like short and to the point here are the Cliff Notes:

Forgetting time is money – quick run down on intensity, volume and density…and how people neglect taking into the importance of density and their conditioning.

Not taking a systems approach – the importance of a $2 notebook for training, people throw it to the side during the conditioning, and leave progress on the table.

Workouts Can Be Like Having a Birthday Near Christmas – putting too much stress on an already stressed out body, whether it be from work, relationship, and other chronic stressors.

Variety the Smart Way – last but not lest, forgetting to add variety in different structures, time versus rep-based, and letting mental creep set in and loath the workout.

The Conditioning Conundrum:  4 Common Mistakes

Thanks to a rash of new research, the viral spread of info over the internet (“lift weights faster,” anyone?) and your own common sense stemming from the fact that you can get just as winded doing sets of heavy kettlebell swings as going for a run, the idea that cardio and strength work can be blended is generally more accepted than it used to be.

Thank god, because that elliptical shit is for the birds. (Unless you like it, then yadda yadda yadda, carry on.)

If you are here on this particular website, however, chances are you’ve already bought into the idea that resistance-training circuits are a viable alternative to traditional cardio pursuits (and that when it comes to both performance and body composition changes, they’re superior).

But as the pendulum inevitably swings toward favoritism of metabolic resistance training and everything that falls under that umbrella, some people will naturally either redline the extremes, or simply misinterpret what smart circuit training really is.

Here are four ways you may not be doing it quite right.

Mistake 1: Not Being Dense Enough

Regardless of the type of conditioning you’re doing, there are three variables always at play:

Intensity: This is the how many pounds you’re lifting, or how much resistance you’re using. In the context of exercise, for the sake of precision, it is not how hard you try. It’s just cold, hard weight on the bar (or otherwise in your hands).

Volume: This is the total number of repetitions you complete of a particular movement. Whether you’re talking about one set or your entire workout, volume is the number of repetitions you complete. (To calculate total volume, multiply reps by resistance used, or intensity.)

Density: This is the time it takes to complete a bout of work — essentially, how quickly you get the job done, whether “the job” refers to a set or your entire workout.  (You can calculate it by dividing volume by time.)

If you’ve been strength training for a while, you’re probably inherently familiar with the three and how they play out in your strength program and progress, whether you’re conscious of it or not. You know that if you do much of X (high-volume deadlifts?), you’re wiped out when you try to do Y (Yvette), for example, and by the same token, what leads you to better performance. If you can lift heavier than you did a few weeks ago, you have a working knowledge of these concepts.

As a fitness community, we share a lot of notes about volume and intensity, but the variable that doesn’t get enough love is density.

Outside of CrossFit, people don’t really talk about how quickly they finished their workouts or work sets, but I think, perhaps, that we should — especially when your goal is better conditioning.

Teach your body to crush a circuit, recover quickly and ask for more, and you’ll crack open a new metric by which to measure your progress, both in how you feel and also how you look, if you want to lean out.

Mistake 2: Not Tracking Your Workouts

McDonald’s is one of the most profitable businesses on the planet, not so much because their food is delicious and high quality, but because they’ve taken a systems approach to make everything easier. Easier to produce, easier to measure, easier to manage.

Every piece of that business has a process and system in place, and if you approach your strength and conditioning from the same angle, you, too will be able to more easily measure and produce progress.

Bar none the best piece of strength training equipment in the weight room is the two-dollar training journal you bring in with you. The amount of feedback you can provide yourself, along with the ability to troubleshoot stalled progress, is big. Big. Huge. (Why yes, I am quoting Pretty Woman!)

But time and again, I see people toss their journals by the wayside when it’s time to finish up with a quick circuit. And yet, there is much valuable info to be gleaned, even here.

Track your volume, density and intensity, here, too, and you can figure out new ways to PR. In fact, even in your circuits, try setting your mind to moving the needle on one of those factors every time you train.

Mistake 3: Going Overboard

My rule of thumb: Regardless of your fitness level, if it feels like too much, it probably is.

What may not look difficult on paper will play out very differently while you’re in the gym. A whole lot of plyometric exercise, heavy lifting and hard circuit training can take a toll after some time.

Stress hormones such as cortisol are by no means always the bad guy — in fact, they’re quite useful for saving the day, in whatever form that takes for you. Chronically elevated cortisol levels, however, are a different story, and we would do well to note that our bodies don’t differentiate between types of stress. Piling training stress on top of work stress, relationship stress and money stress on a long-term basis can lead to a pretty major crash and burn.

Research points to lifting weights at maximal velocity spiking cortisol levels when compared to lifting at a lower rep speed, so if you’re piling on elsewhere, it’s probably better to cool it on conditioning. One to two sessions a week is plenty, for many people.

Mistake 4: Joining the Circus

Humans are hardwired to seek novelty — we have a deep-seated tendency to constantly seek out new, different, shiny. It can be good thing, this neophilia, in that it helps us assess risks, to learn new skills, to become more capable.

But new is everywhere now, including the gym. In her book New: Understanding Our Need for Novelty and Change, Winifred Gallagher writes: “We already crunch four times more data — e-mail, tweets, searches, music, video, and traditional media — than we did just thirty years ago, and this deluge shows no signs of slackening. To thrive amid unprecedented amounts of novelty, we must shift from being mere seekers of the new to being connoisseurs of it.”

You know what that means? It means being selective about what is worth your time and what is not, not embracing variety simply for variety’s sake.

If your training time is limited, seek productivity in your conditioning sessions, exploring variations of skills you’re proficient in and finding ways to manipulate volume and work-to-rest ratios.

Changing a circuit of “three sets of 10 repetitions” to “three rounds of 30 seconds of work and 30 seconds of rest” will evoke a different psychological response. New structure, new progress. Win-win.

The Total Package and Then Some A Lot

I get it — it’s easy to feel stagnant or overwhelmed by the prospect of putting together productive conditioning circuits. With that in mind, I compiled 130 grab-and-go workouts in my Lift Weights Faster product (including two guest workouts from Tony G.!).

Complete with a full exercise glossary that includes written descriptions and photographic demonstrations of approximately 225 exercises, from classic moves to more creative ones, I leveraged my background in magazine publishing to create a clear-cut, easy-to-use resource.

Every workout is organized by the equipment you have available and how much time you’ve got, including plenty of effective, hot-n-heavy options that last less than 10 minutes and also over 35 different workouts that require minimal equipment for when you’re traveling or outside the gym.

—–> Lift Weights Faster <—–

About the Author

Jen Sinkler (www.jensinkler.com), RKC, PCC, PM, USAW, is a longtime fitness journalist who writes for national magazines such as Women’s Health and Men’s Health. A former member of the U.S. national women’s rugby team, she currently trains clients at The Movement Minneapolis.

CategoriesFemale Training Motivational

Wearing a Cressey Performance T-Shirt Instantly Improves Strength**

** =  It’s science (video evidence below).  Well that, and I’ll take around 7.3% credit for the kick-ass programming.

I received this video over the weekend and I HAD to share it here. It’s sooooo freaking bad-ass (and mirrors nicely with yesterday’s post on women lifting heavy things.)

A little back story:  Kim was a former colleague of my girlfriend Lisa, and when Lisa and I started dating Kim took a bit more interest in this whole “lifting weights” thing.  As a collegiate coach, she had always been physically active but was looking to take her fitness to the next level.  In particular she wanted to get stronger and attack her deadlift.

She had me at deadlift.  I was down!

When I was interested in sprucing up the website I contacted Kim because she also does a fair bit of freelance photography on the side.  We did a little trade-bartering, and in exchange for her making me look presentable (I’m hands down the most un-photogenic person in history) I wrote some programming for her.

Teaser Alert:  Kim was gracious enough to come down to CP for another photo shoot this past December, so stay tuned for a website face-lift coming soon. There may or may not be some “sexy tiger” poses involved.

Relax – there isn’t.  I don’t think the internet is ready for that.

Anyhoo:  Kim’s goal – back in 2011 – was to nail a 200 lb DL.  Partly because, well, why not? But mostly because some of her family members told her she’d never hit it.

Oh really!?!?!

I forget when she hit it, but she hit.  Since then she and I have been working together on and off for a little over two years. She’s been “recycling” a few of my older programs as well as doing some improvising on her own (more of the latter than the former).

As a “thank you” for coming down for the more recent photoshoot I sent her a Cressey Performance t-shirt.  And this is what followed a few days afterwards:

A few candid thoughts:

1. I love the intensity!  I love to see how Kim psyches herself up for the lift. She’s NOT messing around, and I was half expecting her to punch a wall or something.

2. After smoking 260, how baller was it when she dropped the weight and gave that “don’t eff with me look” into the mirror??

Total boss.

The only way that would have been cooler is if she immediately sprinted over to the woman on the elliptical machine and screamed PROTECT…..THIS…..HOUSE!!!!!!

3. Yeah, 265 wasn’t pretty.  But since when is a max effort lift always going to look pretty?  She hit TWO freakin PRs in one session.  That doesn’t happen too often, for anyone.

Congrats Kim and well done!

PS:  Oh, and ladies, notice how Kim still looks like a woman?  This despite pulling in the ballpark of 2x her bodyweight.  Turn off the Tracy Anderson and lift some weights!  Need a little primer or to be pointed in the right direction? These will definitely help:

The New Rules of Lifting for Women – Lou Schuler, Alwyn Cosgrove, and Cassandra Forsythe

Lift Like a Girl – Nia Shanks

Train to be Awesome Guide – Nia Shanks

Strong Curves – Bret Contreras and Kellie Hart Davis

Shape-Up Shortcuts – Jen Ator (with a cameo appearance by yours truly!)

CategoriesFemale Training Motivational Strength Training

Hey Ladies, Lift Something Heavy!

The term passion is defined as “an intense desire or enthusiasm for something,” or as a “strong and barely controllable emotion.”

Everyone reading (I hope) has a passion for something.  For some it’s their children and loved ones. For others it may be the charity work they’re involved in.  And even for others it may be something more tangible or finite such as their car or their collection of un-opened Star Wars action figurines.

Hey, I’m not here to judge

Passion is a great thing, and we should all be so lucky as to have a little passion in our lives.

I’m passionate about a lot of things:  my family, my girlfriend, movies, deadlifts, caffeine, my ever growing collection of vintage t-shirts.

A bit closer to home, however, and as a coach in particular, I’m passionate about fitness and helping others attain their goals.

I spend a great portion of my day training athletes, but what’s often glossed over is that I also train a fair number of regular “Joes and Janes,” or people who, like many of you reading, aren’t paid to jump higher, throw harder, or run faster. But rather just want to feel better, possibly shave a few lbs off their frame, lift some heavy things, and maybe not think twice about getting nekid with the lights on.

BOM CHICKA BOM BOM.

To that end, I often go on tirades when the topic of women and training pops up.  Speaking a bit more colloquially – and excuse my language – there’s a lot of shit information out there in the mainstream media, and it’s exponentially shitty with regards to women and strength training.

So I guess you could say I’m also passionate about doing my part in dispelling common myths and fallacies that’s regurgitated by the media.

Below is an interview I did for Marco Berardi and the people over at CrossFit LaSalle located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Marco Berardi: Tony, I know it is probably weird to ask one of the top strength and conditioning bloggers on the web to chat about women and lifting heavy things but your opinion on the subject has been one of my favorite parts of your blog. 600 pound deadlifts and big bench presses are great but for a large majority of coaches, we have many more women clients who want to get “toned” rather than athletes, so the topic of women and weight training is a great interest to me. Thanks for agreeing to answer some questions.

I know you just went on vacation and spent some time at a Globo Gym. What was the experience like? Especially when it comes to how women train? I bet you saw lots of isolated bicep and tricep work with those cute pastel colored weights.

TG:  I live in a fairly secluded “bubble,” because in my world – especially in the realm of strength and conditioning – I control every component of training with my clients. I tell them what to do, how to do it, and most important of all….I coach them and make sure that everything (everything) is done correctly.

So, it’s always interesting when I stumble outside of my little bubble and make my way to a commercial gym to train, as I really have to prepare myself for the massive number of epic fails I’m going to see.

Note:  this isn’t a slight against all commercial gyms – just most of them.

If my thought process offends you – particularly if you’re a trainer and you fall into the camp that’s described below – it’s probably because the truth hurts.  Sorry I’m not sorry. 

Now, to be fair:  I’m not some cynical bastard who just likes to poo-poo on people. Who am I to judge what people do in the gym and how they do it?  At the end of the day, at least they’re doing something, and that should be commended.  Wholeheartedly.  All the time.

Whether it’s Zumba, Yoga, CrossFit, Jazzercise, Prancercise (look it up on Youtube), traditional weight training, or mimicking the dance from Napoleon Dynamite, anything is better than sitting on your ass.

But I’d be lying if I said that I don’t walk away a little let down about the industry whenever I happen to train at a commercial gym.

I’m a coach, and as such, it’s really hard for me not to observe what others are doing. Now, with regular patrons I’ll give the benefit of the doubt.  Sure, I can face palm myself and wonder why that woman who is 30 lbs overweight – and woefully de-conditioned – is wasting her time performing bicep curls on a BOSO ball.  She doesn’t know any better.

What really grinds my gears – and, if I may, makes me absolutely bat shit crazy – is when I see a fitness professional (who should know better) has their client perform the same thing.

Really?  She’s paying you $50, $60, $70 $80+ per hour so that she can stand on a BOSU ball and then follow that with tricep kickbacks and arm circles?  I kid you not:  that’s EXACTLY what I saw while I was away on vacation.

Moreover, it was readily apparent that none of the trainers felt the need to “push” their female clients – treating them as if they were these delicate snowflakes that couldn’t (or shouldn’t) lift anything heavier than their Prada handbag.

Not once, in the four days (FOUR days) I was at this gym training with my girlfriend, did I watch a trainer coach his or her client (whether male or female) through a compound, free-weight movement.  Not once.  I did, however, see a lot of poorly done push-ups, lunges, planks, and a bevy of other exercises that made me want to swallow a live grenade.  It was really sad.

MB: On a side note, how the media portrays training to women it is almost not their fault they are so confused. I mean they can look around their Zumba class and see that no one has improved in the last 3 years but I digress.  Is there anyway to change what is being marketed to women as “exercise”?

TG:  Completely true, and it’s something that I do see changing – albeit at a snail’s pace. Walk down any aisle at your local grocery store, and you’re bound to see numerous “women’s” magazines with a teeny-tiny (airbrushed) actress or model on the cover holding a pink dumbbell underneath some innocuous title like “10 Tips for a Bikini Body” or something equally as nauseating.

In reality, it’s not even the title that’s most annoying – it’s the trivial, almost offensive workouts that are attached. Much like to what I described above at the commercial gym, many (not all) of these so-called “workouts” aren’t even remotely challenging.

I mean, come on:  recommending a workout based solely around a can of soup (which I saw one magazine publish) – how to curl with it, squat with it, lunge with it, throw it at the editor’s face who decided this was viable fitness information – is a bit of waste of everyone’s time don’t cha think?

But this is the type of stuff that’s marketed towards women.  As you noted, can you blame women that they curl up in the fetal position whenever you ask them to perform a deadlift?

As far as the mainstream media is concerned, I don’t think their formula is going to change anytime soon.  While it’s changing somewhat – they do still have to sell magazines, and what sells magazines are articles with Kim Kardashian on the cover telling the world that performing strength training with high heels on is the key to badonkadonkness.

Thankfully, we have women out there like Nia Shanks, Molly Galbraith, Jen Comas Keck, Neghar Fonooni, Jen Sinkler, the rest of the Girls Gone Strong crew, as well as many, many others fighting the good fight and trying to empower women on the benefits of (real) strength training and to step away from the elliptical and treadmill.

Likewise, I too try my best to provide information to women that goes against the norm of what they’ve been spoon-fed for decades.

Like THIS one on The Myth of Female Specific Training, or THIS one on Should You Use Scale Weight as a Measure of Success, or THIS one on The Fitness Double Standard.

I try to debunk as many myths as I can – lifting heavy things WILL NOT turn you into The Rock, endless hours of cardio IS NOT the key to fat loss, Yoga WILL NOT make your muscles long and lean, Tracy Anderson IS NOT a credible source of fitness and health information and is about as intelligent as a ham sandwich.

There’s still a very long battle a head, but I do see the tides turning, and it’s a beautiful thing.

MB: Obviously, the women who come to your facility (I’m guessing) are already sold on the Cressey Performance values. They probably want to lift heavy things and achieve a chin up without assistance. How would you convince a woman that is scared to “bulk up” and feel they need endless amounts of cardio to drop their body fat?

TG:  Yes and no. While it’s true that most people who walk through our doors kinda already have an idea of what they’re getting themselves into, there’s still a fair share that need to be “de-programmed.”

The best thing I can do as a coach is listen.  I try to ask as many questions as possible and do a little digging.

– How often do they train?

  – What has their training looked like?

    – Are they happy with their results?     – If not, how come?

    – What is their ideal body type?

    – Why?

    – What do they feel is holding them back?

So on and so forth.  Once I’m done listening, I then go into a little (not a lot) of what I feel would be the best approach to take.  It’s not about me being confrontational, forcing information in their direction, and trying to convince them that what they’ve been doing for the past five years has been a complete time killer (although, for many, that’s exactly what’s happened).

At this stage it’s about comfort zones and showing them success right out of the gate.

Almost inevitably, once I start throwing out words like squats, deadlifts, chin-ups, Prowlers, hell even if I toss out the word strength…….I’ll starting getting a little push-back, and many of the same myths and fallacies I described above – things many of these women have been regurgitating for YEARS, with limited (if any) results mind you – rear their ugly heads.

Once that happens, I have one more question for them:

“How’s that working for you?”

Clearly, if your way is the superior way, and it’s the approach you’ve been using for the past 5-10 years…….why have you seen NO results?  Zilch.  Nada.

To that end, all I ask is that they give me two months.  Give it their all for 60 days and see what happens.  Almost always, after three weeks they’re hooked.

Once they start to see (and feel) the confidence they gain, it’s always a done deal.

Once they realize that putting an extra ten pounds on the bar won’t turn them into a roided out she-man, and they start noticing small, incremental changes to their body, the sky’s the limit. It’s a beautiful thing.

MB: When you begin to train women do you have specific goals you would like to help them achieve? If I can get a woman to do 5-10 proper push ups on their own, a chin-up, and deadlift better than 99% of the men in the gym, it is safe to assume they will achieve their body image goal. Is that an ok thought process?

TG:  Sure.  With any client – whether I’m working with a male or female – it’s usually my job to tell them what they need to do, and not what they want to do.  Big difference.

With any client, it’s about getting them outside their comfort zone.  With women in particular, their Kryptonite is the free-weight area.  Can you blame them?  Who wants to train around a bunch of dudes who reek of Axe body spray and scream as if they’re passing a kidney stone?  Hell, I don’t want to be around that.

That notwithstanding, I think you’re on the right track.  Having clear and defined (not to mention realistic and attainable) goals is an important component many trainees fail to grasp.

As a trainer or coach, I think it’s crucial to sit down with your client and come up with goals to strive for – whether it’s to perform an unassisted, body weight chin-up, “x” number of lbs on the deadlift, or to lose ten lbs of fat by summer.  Having something to work for gives people a sense of purpose and holds them more accountable in the end.

With the women that I train, they’re going to get coached on all the basic movements – squats, deadlifts, push-ups, etc. Much like you, it’s not uncommon for many of the women I train to train on their own “x” number of days per week at the other gym and to boast that someone complimented them on their deadlift form, and I totally dig that!

Even cooler is when they come back with stories about how they were waiting to “jump in” on a certain exercise at their commercial gym, and they warmed-up with the weight that the guy leaving ended with on his last set.

In the end, though, it’s about coaching the basics.  There’s no need to make things more complicated than they have to be. This isn’t NASA.  If your female client can perform ten picture perfect push-ups – despite push-ups being as exciting as watching grass grow – then they’re leaps and bounds a head of 99% of other females out there.

Sadly, this doesn’t happen too often.  Trainers (and trainees) are more concerned with looking cool and doing something unique than mastering the basics.

CategoriesFemale Training

A Simple Way to Increase the Total Number of Push-Ups and Chin-Ups You Can Perform

This post is mostly targeted towards women, but there are plenty of guys who should heed this advice as well.

Whenever I start working with a female athlete or client almost without fail one of their long-standing goals is to be able to perform “x” number of push-ups or pull-ups/chin-ups.

NOTE:  thankfully, one of the advantages of working at the type of facility that I work at is that most people know what they’re getting themselves into when they walk through our doors.

As an example we have one treadmill that’s more or less used as a coatrack.

People know that when they come to Cressey Performance they’re there to train.  As such, we rarely (if ever) have women come in who just want to “tone up,” and the name Tracy Anderson is synonymous with the likes of Gargamel and Voldemort.

And even if we do get someone who walks through our doors who’s been programmed to think that women shouldn’t lift weights – whether it’s because they’ve worked with an uninformed trainer in the past or have read too many issues of Us Weekly – we always try our best to encourage and empower them that strength training is a good thing.

Even though having tank top ready triceps, svelt shoulders, and “toned” legs is the goal for many women…….I always try to instill in them that the effort, total work, and dedication it takes to eventually be able to perform one push-up or one chin-up (by actually doing regressed variations of each, as well as things like squats, deadlifts, rows, presses, or everything that guys do) will get them to their goals a helluva lot faster than anything they could do with a pair of pink dumbbells and Thigh Master.

Much of the time it’s about changing the mindset.  Instead of thinking “tank top triceps” or “I need to lose ten lbs by Spring,” I try to get them to buy into more performance based goals like “I want to deadlift my bodyweight….for multiple reps” or “I want to be able to perform an actual push-up or chin-up.”

That changes E.V.E.R.Y.T.H.I.N.G

It’s an awesome sight when someone flips the switch and buys into this mindset.  It’s amazing what happens not only to their attitude, but their body as well.

Just the other day I was joking around with one of our young female athletes who’s fourteen and has been training with us since she was twelve.  I forgot what it was exactly we were talking about – probably having a heated argument as to why she’s never watched any of the Star Wars movies, or maybe we were discussing the overall douchery of Justin Bieber –  either way at one point I said, “Maddie, I bet you can walk over to that bar right now and bang out a chin-up.”

She looked at me as if I were crazy.

After a bit of cajoling she headed over to the bar and banged out not one, but THREE (and she had more in the tank).

Baller.

How many fourteen year old girls do you think could do that!?!

Which serves as a nice segue to today’s topic:

What’s the Best Way to Increase the Total Number You Can Do?

For many just getting to ONE push-up or chin-up seems insurmountable……but lets just assume that you’re “stuck” in the 1-5 rep range and you’re flummoxed as to how you can increase that number.

It’s not some secret system that involves you following a strict regimen of periodized programming that alternates between accumulation or intensification phases.  You don’t need fancy equipment.  And you can still eat gluten!

It’s called doing more push-ups and chin-ups!

Or what’s called “greasing the groove.”

Weird, right?

Here’s the deal – lets use push-ups as an example.  Lets say you can perform four solid push-ups and no matter what you do, you can’t get past that number.

Cut that number in half, which is two.

Every 1-2 hours, perform two push-ups.  Or at least try.  If your at home it shouldn’t be an issue.  And if you’re lucky enough to have your own office or cubicle or backyard at work it shouldn’t be an issue either.

You’ll have to make an executive decision if you want to bang them out while waiting in line at the grocery store or in the elevator somewhere….;o)

The idea behind cutting the reps in half is that you want to emphasize QUALITY, and you don’t want to fry yourself every time you drop down to perform.

By the end of the day, you would have performed anywhere from 12-24 additional push-ups.  By the end of the week that number jumps to 84-168. By the end of the month.  Well, you do the math.

That’s a shit-load of push-ups.  Not only that, that’s a shit-load of QUALITY push-ups.

Using another quick example, lets say you can perform ONE solid chin-up, which is no small feat.  At this stage one chin-up is basically a maximum effort lift.  The same process could be applied here, except a bit more judiciously.

You want to be fresh for every rep, so shooting for every 1-3 hours would be ideal.  But exceptions will have to be made – not everyone has access to a pull-up bar at work – so even if you had to hold yourself to one every hour while at home that would be fine.

Do the math. That’s anywhere from 6-10 EXTRA, QUALITY chin-ups that you otherwise would have never have done. Per day.

So, to summarize:  if you want to increase the total number of push-ups and chin-ups you can perform:

1.  Take the total number you can perform NOW and divide that in half.

2.  Every 1-2 hours, perform “x” number.  If the above number happens to be one, perform one (but you may have to extend it to every 2-3 hours).

3.  You just earned like, a bazillion-kajillion points for Gryfindor today.

4.  Join my Premium Workout Group on WeightTraining.com, because this is the type of programming and insight I’ll be providing on a monthly basis for all members.

Note:  if you want more info you can go HERE as well.

5.  Enjoy the weekend!

CategoriesFemale Training Strength Training

Train the Same: Women Should Train Like Men

I’ll be honest:  I was thiiiiiiiiiiis close to taking a slight “blogcation” the rest of the week. I figured since I’ll be bit preoccupied with stuffing my face with anything I can get my hands on for the next 48 hours, that most people would be in the same mindset and not really give a second thought to signing onto my site.

– Eating copious amounts of turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and apple pie?  Check.

– Watching football till I can’t feel the right side of my face? Check.

– Check out Tony’s blog?  Come on…..isn’t there more apple pie to eat?

Don’t worry, my feelings aren’t hurt.  I know where I stand in the grand scheme of things.  You know, there was a time when you used to compliment me, tell me I looked nice, and used to be excited to see me. Made me feel special. But now, it’s like….it’s like I don’t even exist anymore.  It’s like I’m a ghost.

*tear rolls down cheek*

LOL – I’m just messing with you.  Thanksgiving is about family, friends, and turkey legs……the last think I expect you to do is check out my blog.  Have fun!  Be safe!  Enjoy!

But seriously, you used to compliment me.

I wasn’t going to write anything today (or tomorrow), but then I realized that Thanksgiving isn’t a universally celebrated holiday and that I’d be a huge jerk-face if I deprived the rest of the world my sage words….(Poop!).

Luckily enough I just had a new article go up on BodyBuilding.com that’s already gaining some steam (and I haven’t even publicized it yet!).

It’s on a topic that write about quite a bit – women and training.  This article has more of a “soap box” feel to it and is more of a rant than anything else, but I feel it sends a great message nevertheless.  Give it a look and let me know what you think.

Train the Same: Women Should Train Like Men (<—- Snaps finger in z-formation, Mmmmm-hmmmm)

PS: And on a (real) serious note:  I just wanted to say THANK YOU to everyone for their support over the past year. TonyGentilcore.com wouldn’t be what it is without the continued support of its readers and fan base and I wish you all a safe and happy Thanksgiving.

CategoriesFemale Training

Should You Use Scale Weight as a Measure of Success? Hint: No

There’s certainly no shortage of articles, blogs, and rants out there in the digital world decreeing, loudly, that using a scale to measure success is kind of pointless.

SPOILER ALERT:  this is going to be one of those rants.

I’ve been working as a trainer and coach for well over a decade now working with various females – short, tall, skinny, overweight, athletic,  blue-collar, white-collar, Team Jacob, Team Edward – helping them achieve “the look.”

What “the look” entails I’m not exactly sure, as different women have different goals and different viewpoints on what they’d prefer to look like.

More often than not, though, for most, it just comes down to feeling and looking better, and not being bashful at rocking a strapless dress whenever the time calls for it.

Or, to put it more succinctly (and a tad less narcissistic):  just becoming the best version of YOU that you can be regardless of sexiness factor or societal standards.

If I had to narrow it down to one celebrity who gets the most “Yeah, I want to look like her” nods it would undoubtedly go towards Mrs. Justin Timberlake (AKA: Jessica Biel), circa whenever it was she did that redunkulous spread in GQ Magazine.

Don’t shoot the messenger!  I’m just stating that in my experience this is “the look” which many women I’ve worked with have gravitated towards.

But again, it’s just one example and doesn’t represent a universal mindset – so please, please, PLEASE don’t mistake this as me saying “hey ladies, this is what you should look like!”

Because at the end of the day, it’s about you, not me.

But here’s the deal: it’s a fairly well known fact that Jessica is a very active person who routinely lifts weights, plays sports, and leads a healthy lifestyle.  Or, at least that’s what all the magazine articles and interviews tells us.

Her celebrity status aside, I look at her and see a full-figured, athletic woman who doesn’t look frail, weak, emaciated, or the second coming of that creepy skeleton looking guy from Tales of the Crypt.

Unfortunately, many (not all) women are under the impression that in order to achieve said look they have to diet for months (if not years on end), do copious amounts of long-duration, steady-state cardio, and avoid lifting weights like the plague.

To justify my point – especially with regards to the dieting side of things – Elizabeth Walling had an amazing guest post over on Nia Shanks’ blog the other day on the stress and damage caused by chronic “dieting.”

To steal a quote:

We’re often given the impression by the diet industry and mainstream media that dieting and metabolic health go together like peas and carrots. But in reality, most diet plans that claim to boost your metabolism are really just low-calorie deprivation diets in disguise. Just a quick internet search reveals a disturbing trend: these diet plans that promise to raise your metabolism often recommend eating as little as 1000-1400 calories a day.

I don’t think it’s wrong for me to say that many women fall into this trap (guys do too, by the way) and often end up stuck in this never ending cycle of dieting, feeling like poop, not getting ideal results, dieting some more, feeling even more like poop,  not getting results, and well, you get the idea.

They’ll hop on the scale – as if that’s somehow the end-all-be-all panacea of health – and see that they’ve made little (if any) headway in terms of the number going down, feel even more desperate and frustrated and repeat the cycle over and over and over again.

Why doesn’t dieting typically work?  To steal another quote from Elizabeth:

Because the body views dieting as a famine (it doesn’t know what a bikini is or why you’d want to starve yourself to wear one). The body detects a lack of energy coming from food, so it turns to alternative energy sources to cope with the shortage. And how does the body access alternative energy sources? By releasing stress hormones.

And while it’s much more complicated than this (I’m going to refrain from going into the actual physiology), the body will go into “preservation mode” and start storing fat to stave off a perceived threat.

As such, many women will continue this perpetual cycle, jump on the scale expecting that all their suffering will somehow lead to weight loss, only to be disappointed, pissed off, frustrated, and thiiiiiiis close to punching a kitten in the mouth.

True story.

On the training side of the equation, we typically have the treadmill/Zumba class/step-aerobics/ avoid lifting weights at all costs camp.

Listen, I’m not here to bash “cardio.” I recognize that it’s part of the equation and that any well-rounded fitness/health routine will include some (key word: some).

That said, 100% of the time I feel it’s drastically overemphasized and could be more deleterious than beneficial.  While I don’t want to go into the semantics here and start WWIII, I’ll just defer to an excellent (albeit controversial) article that John Kiefer wrote a while back titled Women: Running Into Trouble.

With that little song and dance out of the way I’ll admit it:  I’m biased.  I’m a strength coach, so of course I’m going to be adamant that women actually lift weights.  Appreciable weights.  None of this soup can/pink-dumbbell high rep nonsense.

Listen: If you want to change how your body looks – like, in a “holy shit, did I go to high school with you?” kind of way – you actually have to put forth some effort.

You need to actually provide enough of a stress to make it change.

Deep down, do you really think that lifting a weight that weighs less than your purse is going to do anything as far as body composition goes?

Come on, really?

No seriously, really?

You get out of it what you put in. If you lift light weights, your body is going to represent that fact: You’ll look frail and weak.

Maybe that’s what you want.  And if so, more power to you. I guess.  But I doubt that’s the case.

Now I’m not saying women have to lift weights so that they can win a knife fight in a back alley or challenge The Rock to an arm wrestling match, but I can’t stress enough how crucial it is to, you know, actually challenge the body and work.

Only then will you see the fruits of your labor.

Which is why I’d much rather see women focus more on strength/performance based goals rather than the scale to gauge progress/success.

Without getting overly technical, one lb of muscle weighs the same as one lb of fat, albeit takes up 25% less space. This is why you will often see contestants on the television show “The Biggest Loser” weigh the same as many professional athletes, despite being the twice the size.

Following a resistance training program helps build muscle which increases strength and firmness. Aside from that, muscle is also metabolically active tissue which will also helps you burn more fat. In essence, someone might see very little overall weight loss or even GAIN weight in order to achieve “the look.”

The latter is especially true for petite women.

As an example, a 5 foot 4 ,140 lb woman with 25% body fat wants to look leaner and achieve that “toned” look. I just threw up a little in my mouth using the word toned, but I’ll run with it to get my point across.

She wants those flabby arms to go away and she wants to fit into those pair of jeans that she used to wear back in college. To do so, this particular woman feels she should lose weight and get down to 110-115 lbs through restrictive dieting and copious amounts of cardio. If she takes that course, she may look thinner, but at the expense of looking like a smaller, weaker version of her original self.

Conversely, let’s take the right course instead.

Six months later the same 5’4” woman has followed a resistance training program (which is also great for strengthening bones and preventing osteoporosis), changed her diet to include more healthy fats (fish oil, nuts, avocado, olive oil, butter, coconut oil, etc) protein (ie: chicken breast, lean beef, eggs, cottage cheese, whey protein shakes) and less refined carbohydrates (ie: cereal bars, bagels, 100 calorie snack foods), and most importantly, she threw away her scale.

She made more QUALITATIVE goals and challenged herself to work up to being able to do five, un-assisted chin-ups as well as deadlift 200 lbs.

Mind you:  when she started, she wasn’t even close to doing ONE chin-up, and could barely deadlift 100 lbs without shitting a liver.

Now she’s 135 lbs with 18% body fat. She lost eleven lbs of fat and gained six lbs of lean muscle, for a net loss of only five lbs.

But she looks like she lost 15 lbs. She’s not “skinny-fat.” She’s stronger and healthier. And she can fit into those jeans no less!

Using a more real life example, here’s a before/after pic that’s made its way around the internet which I feel gets the message across pretty concretely:

Most women would faint at the notion of GAINING nine lbs, but try to tell me that the after picture doesn’t look like she LOST weight?

You see:  the scale only measure QUANTITATIVE progress.  For some, especially those who are morbidly obese and need to lose weight for health reasons, it makes sense to track weight using the scale.  For everyone else, however, it’s nothing more than mind f***.

Seeing the number on a scale go down doesn’t really tell you the QUALITY of weight being lost. As noted above, many will sacrifice muscle – which I’d argue you want to keep as much of as possible – in lieu of just seeing a loss. Any loss.

Hell, losing weight is easy.

1.  Don’t drink any water for a day.

2.  Go to the bathroom and drop it like it’s hot.

Problem solved.

See what I mean? Seeing a number dip on the scale doesn’t tell you the quality of the weight being lost.

And just to save face, as I noted above, for some, using the scale makes sense. Those who need to lose weight for health reasons would be high on the list.

Likewise, I’d even go so far as to say that those who take more of a Curious George approach and are very inquisitive or “in tune” with their bodies (think: physique athletes) would fall into this camp as well.

For most, they just want to see what variables – following a certain diet plan (low carb/high carb, intermittent fasting, Paleo?) or exercise routine (5/3/1, body part splits)  – will do as far as fluctuations in their body weight.

This even applies to those who don’t compete, too.

As an example, I was having this conversation with one of my female clients, Claudia, who mentioned not too long ago how if she has a heavy salted meal the night prior, it’s not uncommon for her weight to go up 5 lbs (or more) the following day.

She likes to fiddle with “stuff” and see what affects her weight.

But she knows better and won’t jump in front a mack truck if she sees the scale go up a few lbs. She understands that if she gets back on task, the weight will go away after a few days.

To her credit, Claudia, who’s 48, always (and I mean always) stresses performance based goals over the scale.  Here she is crushing an EXTRA set of softball grip pull-ups after performing four sets prior:

And you know what?  I garner a guess that there’s plenty of women HALF her age who would kill to have her body.

Did I mention she’s 48?

She’s 48.

[And yes, I had permission to divulge her age]

Closing Up Shop

Many women make the mistake of equating progress with the number on the scale going down. If they don’t see the number going down on a weekly basis, they feel they’re failing. Let me make this simple. The scale can be very misleading and in a lot of ways, invalid.

How do you know the weight you’re losing is fat and not valuable muscle?

You should be more concerned with what the mirror is telling you. Are you losing inches around the body? Do your clothes fit better?  Are you lifting more weight now compared to two months ago?  Can you bang out ten crisp push-ups whereas before you could barely do one?

Perhaps these results are less quantifiable and harder to notice, however, the sooner you realize that these are better indicators of progress, the better off you will be.

This isn’t to say the above is an all encompassing mentality either.  I realize that there are extenuating circumstances, and that utilizing the scale does have some merit. But for 95% of the women who are reading this post, it doesn’t correlate to much.

Actionable Item

Do yourself a favor:  for TWO months ditch the scale.  Give yourself a goal. It could be squatting “x” weight for “y” reps, improving bench press technique, performing your first chin-up, doing a handstand!  Anything!  Whatever you do, just focus on that instead.

Don’t let the scale dictate your mindset.

Two months. Thats it. (<======= DO IT!!!)

CategoriesFemale Training Miscellaneous Miscellany Nutrition Product Review

Miscellaneous Miscellany Monday: Lots of Catching Up to Do Edition

1. Another busy weekend in the books!  Yesterday I had the pleasure of being invited to speak at the New Hampshire Athletic Trainer’s Association annual symposium.

A few year’s back I remember attending a similar function with Eric at Northeastern University and walking in with jeans on and feeling completely out of place.  Apparently I missed the memo (and it’s an unspoken rule) that athletic trainers have a tendency of wearing nothing but tan khaki pants!  LOLz.

Not that I would ever consider speaking in a pair of jeans (unless I was speaking at Google), but I did make it a point of wearing tan khaki pants yesterday so that I wouldn’t stick out like a sore thumb. Success!

And speaking of success, yesterday was awesome.  First on the docket was Dr. Eric. Berkson (Director, MGH Sports Performance Center, Instructor in Orthopaedic Surgery at Harvard Medical School and team physician to the Boston Red Sox and New England Patriots), who talked at length about common shoulder and elbow injuries seen in pitchers. Many of his thoughts, not surprisingly, mirrored that of ours at Cressey Performance – especially with regards to placing more credence in symmetry of TOTAL range of motion between (IR + ER) between the dominant and non-throwing shoulder.

Expectantly, lack of IR, commonly referred to at GIRD (Glenohumeral Internal Rotation Deficit), is predictive and not quite the “red flag” it was 2-3 years ago.

Additionally he stressed that many of the throwing injuries we see in young(er) baseball players is due to overuse, misuse, and not paying attention to pitch counts.

And then there was me, Tony Gentilcore (who has no affiliation with Harvard what-so-ever other than having a teeny-tiny man crush on one of their alumni, Matt Damon) who spoke more on the performance side of things.  I delved into how we go about managing our overhead athletes, discussed some of the assessment process, spoke to the intricacies of dealing with a population that, unlike everyone else, lives in extension for a good portion of the year, gave the Cliff Notes version to breathing patterns and how we implement them, and maybe had a tip or two on how to improve one’s spin on their curveball….;o)

All in all it was an awesome afternoon and it was truly an honor to be involved in it.

2.  Just a quick reminder that slots are still open for the Elite Training Workshop at Cressey Performance the weekend of April 20th.  The line-up is BALLER, with the likes of Eric Cressey, Mike Roberson, Mike Reinold, Dave Schmitz, myself, Greg Long, and Jared Woolever slated to speak.

For $99 you can’t beat the price.

Go HERE for more details.

3. Last week I wrote a little sumthin sunthin on Strong Curves, the new book by my good friends Bret Contreras and Kellie Davis that I feel is going to be a game changer in the realm of women and fitness.

I won’t continue to sing its praises here (you can read my review HERE), but I do want to give everyone a heads up on another fantastic product by another good friend of mine, Nia Shanks.

Nia has openly discussed her (past) battle with disordered eating routinely on her blog, and I can’t tell you how much I respect her for not only showing how human she is, but that she’s so willing to help others in the process.

I don’t think I have to tell everyone reading that it takes a lot of guts to open yourself up like that to the masses.

Myself, many of my colleagues, as well as Nia have noticed an unfortunate trend in the nutrition world where things have gotten so convoluted and complicated that people have no idea what the hell they should be eating!  This phenomena – thanks in no small part to the likes of the mainstream media and gossip magazines – seems to be hitting its tipping point in the female demographic.

To the point where I overhead a woman talking to her friend not too long ago in Panera explaining that she wasn’t sure if she should have an apple included with her lunch because of the carbs.  Mind you, she was crushing a massive sandwich.

Anyways, Nia felt it was high-time to put an end to the madness so she developed her own answer to the problem.

===> Sane and Simple Nutrition <===

Cue slow cap here.

It’s an ebook, it’s nothing fancy (it doesn’t have to be), but the information is SOLID.  I (along with Nia) don’t ever claim to have all the answers, but sometimes we just need to filter through the stupid and come back to common sense.  And that is exactly what I wholeheartedly encourage anyone interested to check it our for themselves.

This ain’t NASA.  Eat the apple!

4.  Speaking of nutriton, I’m really, really fascinated by the food industry.  More to the point, I’m almost at awe at the food industry’s Jedi-like “mind trick” powers at convincing people that certain foods are “healthy” when they’re clearly anything but.  ORGANIC Toaster Pastries anyone???

Lisa dragged me into a Target yesterday (don’t judge me!), and we happened to walk through the food section and I couldn’t help but drown in the bullshit.  I noticed that General Mills has a new variation of Cheerios out called Multi-Grain Cheerios w/ Peanut Butter!

The kicker is the advertising and how they gloat that the first ingredient is WHOLE GRAIN!!!!!  Like whoa! I should be doing cartwheels down the aisle and kissing every baby I see within a mile radius.

Upon further inspection, the “whole grain” they’re referring to is none other than whole grain corn, followed by sugar. Naturally.

Sigh.

While it’s technically not wrong of them to say the first ingredient is a “whole grain,” I think it’s fairly egregious of them to use that as a selling point of tactic.

Now if you excuse me I need to go throw my face on an ax.

NOTE:  for those interested in food industry shenanigans I’d highly recommend becoming a regular reader of Dr. Yoni Freedhoff’s blog Weighty Matters.

Awesome stuff.

5.  For those looking to kill roughly five minutes, HERE’s a radio interview I did while I was back in my hometown last week prior to speaking at my Alma Mater.

The guy doing the interview LOVED my “abs are made in the kitchen” comment.

6.  If you ever would have told me at some point in my life that I’d see my name in the likes of Forbes, I would have laughed. While I didn’t make the any list such as Most Powerful or Top Five People Most Likely to Be Issued a Restraining Order From Kate Beckinsale World’s Richest People, it was still pretty neat to see my name in print on their site.

Thanks for Greatest.com’s Chief Research Officer and Editor, David Tao, for asking me contribute on THIS article on Interval (or HIIT) training has changed the industry – for better or worse.

7.  In other cameo appearance news, I also helped contribute to another article titled 16 Exercises from the World’s Best Trainers collected by Jon-Erik Kawamoto on Livestrong.com.

And that’s that.