The Early Bird rate for my Coaching Competency workshop in the DC area ends THIS weekend (3/25).
For $99 you get to hang out with me for seven hours and talk about assessment, program design, deadlifts, and LOLCat memes. Price increases to $129 after this weekend.
Registration for this highly competitive certification opens on April 4th. However, I’ve got some good, nay, fucking amazing news.
I’ve negotiated some awesome perks for you:
Early access to enroll on April 3rd (24 hrs before they open to the public), increasing your chances of getting in.
A huge discount (up to 33% off the regular price).
This is without question one of the best certifications any fitness professional can possess, offering incredible value and helps to separate you from the masses.
3. Even More Complete Shoulder & Hip Blueprint – Coming Soon
Dean Somerset and I are currently in the throes of drumming up new content for our staple workshop series.
We’ve presented this workshop all over the world – London, Vancouver, Oslo, Prague, Boston, LA – and even turned it into a popular digital product HERE so everyone can enjoy it.
We’ve already nailed down dates in Slovenia, Houston, and LA this fall (2018) and are also in talks to bring it to Detroit, Philadelphia, Australia, and Singapore in 2019.
If you’re someone who’d like to host this event/participate in a tickle fight please reach out to either Dean or myself.
4. Cobra Kai – This Looks Fucking Awesome
I can’t even begin to tell you how many times I watched The Karate Kid when I was, well, a kid.1
I am PUMPED for this. I am 65% aroused.
Shout out to my boy, Chad Landers, who helped prep star (and 1980’s Movie Douchebag 1st Team All-Star) William Zabka, for this role.
For starters, I can tell you without hesitation that in my 15+ years working with athletes, general population, and the occasional wizard, it’s a rare find when someone shows up on Day #1 and can impress me with their push-up prowess.
Most of the time I end up watching something like this:
Which makes me do stuff like this:
SIDE NOTE: This is also how I react when my wife tells me to make the bed in the morning.
Suffice it to say, the push-up – or rather, someone’s ability to do one without making me go batshit crazy – provides me with a lot of information.
Sure, it gives insight on their upper body strength. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg and not really what I’m after. More importantly it provides valuable data with regards to someone’s lumbo-pelvic-hip control/stability and their ability to 1) maintain a good position and 2) to do so once motion comes into play and fatigue sets in.
Secondly, I’m a firm believer that push-ups are one of the keys to healthy shoulders. On one end of the spectrum it’s standard procedure to cue trainees to lock the shoulder blades in place – retract and depress – during basic strength movements like the bench press, squat, and deadlift.3
In short: In order to “protect” the shoulder and to move appreciable weight you have to be dialed in with scapulae positioning.
And on the other end of the spectrum we take everything I just said and toss it out the window.
Unlike the bench press, push-ups are a closed-chain movement (hands don’t move).
As much time as we spend cuing people to “glue” the shoulder blades in place – especially during bench pressing variations – it’s equally as vital to allow them to experience moving around the ribcage (protraction) and gaining access to their full range of motion.
That’s what the shoulder blades are designed to do….
…to move.
I have a simple approach with most of my lifters:
1. Lock those fuckers down when lifting heavy things.
2. However, do your push-ups. Those shoulder blades need to move.
To that end, one of the other advantages of push-ups is that they can be done anywhere and there’s no shortage of iterations to regress or progress them according to someone’s ability level.
Here’s a variation I think will pique some interest.
What Does It Do? – Here I take away a base of support (an arm) and try to hold a 3-point position without allowing my torso or hips to rotate.
This is a killer core/rotary challenge.
Key Coaching Cues – I’m gonna throw myself under the bus a little and say I should have held my elbow tap a tad longer in the video above. I rush things in an effort to get in a more stable position and not make out with the floor.
The idea here is to keep a controlled tempo.
No rushing.
Slowing things down is paramount to the effectiveness of this exercise.
Any sort of mild elevation will work here: an aerobics stepper, the bar set at the lowest position on a Smith Machine, a medicine ball (if you really want to up the ante), or anything similar.
Feel free to alternate which hand comes off the ground.
Pregnancy can be an arduous and delicate time in a woman’s life. To be a bit more colloquial…shit goes down.
Shit goes down hard.
I’m a firm advocate of strength training during pregnancy. It’s a great way to keep the body healthy and strong during those nine months, and to (hopefully) expedite the recovery process once the little one arrives.
There’s a small sentiment out there that exists where women are told strength training is bad or altogether dangerous during this time, and that it should be avoided at all costs.
Lifting weights during pregnancy dangerous? No.
Lifting weighs during pregnancy different? Yes.
Today’s guest post by Pre and Postnatal Exercise Specialist, Terrell Baldock, helps to shed some light on the issue.
If you’ve been lifting for a while, you know the back squat is essential to any strength training program.
But What If You’re Pregnant?
Squatting will become a way of life in motherhood and you will need all of the squat training you can get during pregnancy. Squats are mostly known for their work in the lower body but they’re fantastic as full body movement as well.
A few years back, “I would have said absolutely no, there is no way you should be back-squatting during pregnancy.”
But I’ve come around a bit since then.
Instead of omitting exercises like the barbell back-squat all together, making modifications and learning how to safely execute a barbell back-squat is far more important.
The barbell back squat is fantastic to do during your pregnancy, but you will need to monitor your pelvic floor for any downward pressure as well as your overall stability.
You may also notice your “butt wink” creeping in. This is typically because as your belly is growing, additional weight is being placed onto the pelvic floor.
As a result, your hip flexors, adductors, and abductors tend to become tight and take on more work, plus your glutes become inactive due to the shift in your alignment.
In this article, I’m going to give you strategies to not only maintain your squat, but keep you back-squatting throughout your entire pregnancy.
Your Core
As your belly grows, your abdomen will begin the separation process known as Diastasis Recti. This is completely normal and there is nothing to fear, but you can minimize the effects and keep your hips more stable.
Diastasis Recti is classified as the unnatural separation of your left and right rectus muscles. This process is different for every woman, but research shows that 100% of women will have diastasis recti by their 35th week of pregnancy (Mota et al 2014).
Yes, you can still train your core during pregnancy, but this looks a little different than traditional core training methods. Personally, I like anti-rotation exercises like the Half-Kneeling Pallof Press because it provides both hip and core stability which is perfect for your entire pregnancy.
Many people commonly think of their core as the “six-pack” abdominal muscles, but it’s a bit more involved. Your “deep core system” is made up of your diaphragm, pelvic floor, multifidus, and your transversus abdominis and they need to work synergistically along with the glutes to provide a stable foundation for all of your movements patterns.
So if you happen to notice some coning, or tenting in your abdomen during your back-squat, you’ll need to address your lifting strategy.
Hip Mobility
Your hips can become tight to compensate for the weight of your growing baby. And this is a biggie for your squat pattern because that “butt wink” will be a result.
Not to worry my friend. If you see that “butt wink” it may not the end of your back-squatting days.
In this video, I’m 26-weeks pregnant and back-squatting 70 lbs in the 12 to 15 rep range. As I go into the eccentric part of the squat, you can see the “butt wink” almost right away.
Note From TG:To toss my keen coaching eye into the foray – and this is NOT to call out Terrell in any way, shape, or form – if you watch how she sets up to squat you’ll notice she starts with an aggressive arch (or anterior pelvic tilt) which means she’s likely running out of hip flexion “room” sooner than she normally has access to. As a result the lumbar spine is going to compensate by going into lumbar flexion (butt wink).
The “fix” may be to cue her to start with a little more posterior pelvic tilt first and then to squat with her hips more underneath her. Or, I can just STFU and recognize she’s 26 weeks pregnant and understand that things are a bit wonky at the moment….;o)
At 26-weeks in my most recent pregnancy, I had a “butt wink” in my back squat almost immediately. This is a good indication that I was dealing with muscle tightness in my hips.
At this point, I switched up my strategy by using goblet and sumo squats with kettlebells or dumbbells as well as incorporating soft tissue release of my hips, quads, hamstrings, glutes, abductors, and adductors.
To be perfectly honest, when I switched up my strategy, I had no intention of improving my back squat. I wanted to begin preparing my pelvis for childbirth by releasing the tightness, which is critical when it comes to labour and delivery.
Note From TG:Viola! Goblet Squat = more of an anterior load = anterior core turns on = posterior tilt = Tony does need to STFU.
However, at 33-weeks pregnant, I attempted a back squat and something pretty cool happened.
After down-training for several weeks, my squat improved. Same load, same rep rage and there was a significant difference in my squatting pattern.
Goodbye butt wink!
This means, you may not have to give up your back squat at all.
But if you notice your hips rolling under during your back-squat, it would be a great time to add some release work into your fitness regime.
Using a foam roller to roll out your hips and glutes are a great way to release the tightness. It may not feel good, so remember to breathe.
Your Breathing
A proper breathing technique can help to balance out the pressure in your core which will ultimately provide better protection to your core and pelvic floor. When you have a core and pelvic floor that is functioning well, you will have a strong and healthy foundation for all movement pattern including your back squat.
The breathing technique that you want to master along with your squat is a diaphragmatic breath with a light pelvic floor engagement or “kegel”.
On the eccentric phase or on your way down, inhale deeply through your nose making sure you have good expansion through your rib cage.
On the bottom of your squat, you’re going to begin your exhale through your mouth like your blowing through a straw, engage your pelvic floor, and then press yourself up. Julie Wiebe calls this “blow before you go” because this signals your brain to engage your core and pelvic floor naturally if your core system is functioning properly.
And there’s a lot more information in my Barbell Training For Pregnancy: Your 3 Step Guide For Maximizing Performance During and After Pregnancy.
It features simple and actionable steps to maximize your core and pelvic floor function, improve performance, and most importantly, avoid the complications that can arise from postnatal exercising.
As your pregnancy progresses, you may find your pelvis starting to anteriorly tilt. Now, you want to nip this in the bud in your first trimester or as soon as possible because this can affect how you squat.
Not only that, but your alignment affects your breathing and your coordination.
Ideally, you need to maintain a neutral posture.
This means your ribs stacked over your hips. This keeps the diaphragm seated directly above the pelvic floor allowing it to work with the multifidus and the transversus abdominis together as a team. A neutral pelvic position will optimize the availability to the pelvic floor making it easier to for the pelvic floor to work in unison with the rest of the system.
You know what else your alignment does?
It keeps your deep core system including your pelvic floor functioning optimally, helping to manage the intra-abdominal pressure. However, if you’re feeling downward pressure in your pelvis and your alignment is spot-on, it may be time to make modifications.
Here’s how to stand in neutral alignment in your back squat.
Stand with your legs just outside hip width apart (or a narrower stance if that’s where you’re comfortable) and toes angled at about 15 degrees and knees slightly bent
Squeeze your shoulder blades together, you don’t want the bar sitting on bone. It won’t feel good!
Stack your ribs over your hips and make sure that your pelvis is in neutral position and not anteriorly tilted.
Load and Range Of Motion
Generally speaking, you can continue to use the same load you were using before pregnancy during the first trimester and early into your second trimester (if you’re feeling up for it, of course!).
However, when your belly begins to grow, you will need to monitor your squat for pressure on your pelvic floor and range of motion.
It’s best at this point to lighten the load.
Let’s say you’re working in the 8-10 rep range. Drop the weight to where you can lift 15 reps comfortably.
The goal isn’t to work to fatigue.
If you find that you feel pressure in the pelvic floor after lightening the load, decrease your range of motion so that you don’t come down as far. If that still isn’t helping with the pressure, it’s time to modify.
Listen To Your Body
This is the most important step to any movement during your pregnancy. If you feel overexerted, fatigued, dizzy, faint, or you need extra support in your belly, it’s best to lighten the load or swap your barbell for kettlebells or dumbbells.
Additionally, pay attention to your pelvic floor. If you’re feeling bulging, heaviness, pain or pressure, or leak a little–or a lot, it’s time to modify. If it doesn’t feel quite right, don’t do it.
Seeing a pelvic health physical therapist (pelvic health physiotherapist if you’re in Canada), is a great defense in your prenatal and postpartum training. They can get an internal perspective of how your pelvic floor is functioning, look for any pelvic organ prolapse, and give you the best possible guidance when it comes to prenatal training when it comes to your pelvic floor.
When troubleshooting your back-squat (pregnant or not) make sure you start off unloaded to train the squatting pattern properly along with all of the strategies listed.
First and foremost is safety.
I suggest not training alone and working or consulting with a coach who is trained in prenatal and postnatal exercise. Pregnancy isn’t the time to set personal records and egos need to be set aside. How you train during pregnancy matters in maximizing your postpartum performance, maintaining a well balanced pelvic floor, and keeping you injury free.
About the Author
Terrell Baldock is a Prenatal and Postnatal Exercise Specialist in London, Ontario, Canada. She specializes in working with women with core and pelvic floor dysfunctions and prepares them for the demands of pregnancy, birth and postpartum recovery.
With over a decade of coaching experience, she trusted by Maternity Doctors and Pelvic Floor Physiotherapists as well as a regular speaker at the University Of Western Ontario.
If you have questions about training during pregnancy, feel free to reach out on Facebook, Instagram, or check out her website.
On Saturday, April 21st I’ll be putting on my Coaching Competency Workshop at Beyond Strength Performance located in Sterling, VA.
I’m using the opportunity to post on my blog today because I’M THE MOST IMPORTANT PERSON IN THE WORLD this week (ending on 3/25) will be your last chance to attend at the Early Bird rate of $99.
I can’t tango, I have zero nunchuck skills, and I haven’t the faintest idea how to make a flambeau dessert.
However, I do know how to coach people in the weight room. And I know how to coach coaches on how to be better coaches.
See…here’s a picture of me coaching:
Coaching Competency Workshop
This will be an immersive and interactive day where I peel back the onion as it relates to my approach to the following topics:
I flew down here yesterday from Boston courtesy of Equinox. I’ll be doing two separate workshops for a bunch of their trainers talking about shoulder assessment and how to turn their clients into a bunch of bench pressing and chin-upping T-1000’s.
I still wanted to make sure I got this week’s list up for your reading pleasure, though.
I’ve got a bevy of speaking engagements lined up for 2018, and next week begins the madness.
I’ll be in NYC speaking at a few Equinox locations on March 16th and 17th, and from there on out I’ve got a place to be at least one weekend every month for the foreseeable future.
It’s a nice feeling to be in demand.
I’d encourage you to click the link above or THIS one for more details/insights into where I’ll be and when.
Events Just Around the Corner
Spurling Spring Seminar – Kennebunk, ME: April 14th
Coaching Competency Workshop – Sterling, VA: April 21st
The Fitness Summit – Kansas City, MO: May 4-5th (Dean Somerset and I are doing a special 4-hour PRE-CON for this event).
Registration for this highly competitive certification opens on April 4th. However, I’ve got some good, nay, fucking amazing news.
I’ve negotiated some awesome perks for you:
Early access to enroll on April 3rd (24 hrs before they open to the public), increasing your chances of getting in.
A huge discount (up to 33% off the regular price).
This is without question one of the best certifications any fitness professional can possess, offering incredible value and helps to separate you from the masses.
3. Even More Complete Shoulder & Hip Blueprint – Coming Soon
Dean Somerset and I are currently in the throes of drumming up new content for our staple workshop series.
We’ve presented this workshop all over the world – London, Vancouver, Oslo, Prague, Boston, LA – and even turned it into a popular digital product HERE so everyone can enjoy it.
We’ve already nailed down dates in Slovenia, Houston, and LA this fall (2018) and are also in talks to bring it to Detroit, Philadelphia, Australia, and Singapore in 2019.
If you’re someone who’d like to host this event/participate in a tickle fight please reach out to either Dean or myself.
Not that I’m biased or anything (my wife wrote this article for Mark Fisher Fitness), but this is the greatest article on the topic of how to punch negative self talk in the dick that’s ever been written.
Hip flexion is kinda like the evil red-headed step child of hip mobility. For some reason it always seems to get a bad rap.
As Ashleigh states in this article:
“That’s the action of pulling your knees to your chest with a neutral spine. You need to be able to put your hips in flexion while under load, with structural integrity, at the bottom of your squat or top of your hinge.”
It must be “gym ownership week” on TG.com this week.
Yesterday’s post on the effect social media has on the perception of gym ownership – everything is seen through rose colored glasses – was a huge hit.
Today I have guest post by another gym owner, Doug Spurling of Spurling Fitness located in Kennebunk, ME, discussing how to best build a team to help your business thrive.
Doug’s done an amazing job building a successful fitness business and he’s someone I respect a ton. Read what he has to say. He’s smart.
NOTE: Next month I’ll speaking alongside Doug (along with his staff, and my wife, Dr. Lisa Lewis) at the Spurling Spring Seminar. It’s going to be a great event and tonight (3/14) at midnight is your last chance to take advantage of the early bird registration of $50 off.
Getting good at marketing, financial statement analysis, strategic planning, holding good meetings, putting out fires, and that you’ll never be able to actually shut it “off.
I’m sure the list could go on and on, but today I want to focus on one particular aspect that I don’t think we spend enough time on as an industry.
HUMAN RESOURCES.
More leads, more clients, and more growth usually means….
More team members.
They are our biggest asset, but can also be our biggest headaches if you don’t know how to lead them.
We thought we got into this business to train people, change some lives, and do it all hanging out in comfy gym clothes.
Now I’m telling you if you want long-term success you need to get really good at human resources.
Today I spend the majority of my time on human resources, team development, holding meetings, and making sure our margins are strong as I run a payroll that exceeds a half a million dollars a year.
I love it, but it’s not what I expected as a gym owner.
I now have seven families I am responsible for, only one of which is mine.
With six full-time team members, that means six people that look up to me, six people that count on me running a successful business so they can get a paycheck next week, six people who live their life mission through my business, and six people who support their families with my business.
That’s a big responsibility when we think about it.
That being said, I’ve made some major mistakes as a leader, but I also feel that I have one of the strongest teams around.
Here are six lessons I’ve learned so far…
1. Hire for Personality, Train for Skill
I want driven, hard-working, value-focused people, I don’t really care if you can coach a squat.
I can’t train a smile, I can train you how to coach a squat.
We aim to hire people that fit our core values, and then have a strong onboarding system that teaches them the technical stuff like how to coach.
2. Have Clear Systems
We have a master folder called “The Spurling Way.”
Every process in our business is documented under that folder.
There’s no questioning how to do things.
We get feedback when we create a new process, but once it’s put into this folder the team has agreed that this is the way we do things.
We don’t want people that want to do it “their way.”
Follow the system.
Run the play.
3. Hold Good Meetings
I think good meetings are totally underutilized.
Every day we have a meeting.
It starts each day with a daily huddle-a quick 5-minute accountability meeting about what each team member is doing that day and what that needs help with.
We have a leadership meeting every Monday, a coaches meeting every Tuesday, individual meetings every Wednesday, and a team meeting every Thursday.
Now, notice above I said, “good meetings are underutilized.”
Read a book like “Death by Meeting” and learn how to hold good meetings.
They can be some of the most productive hours of the week, or if done wrong, they can be the biggest waste of time.
4. Balance Multiple Personalities
We can’t have a universal leadership approach.
Each team member is different.
How you talk to one team member is different than how you talk to another.
One may be motivated by public praise, one may want a small note left on their desk.
We use things like the DISC profiles and the 5 Languages of Appreciation to understand how each of us functions and how each of us gives and receives appreciation.
As your team continues to grow the possible communication flaws, the potential drama, and headaches can quickly multiply if you don’t stay on top of it.
Understanding each team member, what they value, how they tick, treating them as an individual, and not have a universal leadership approach is key.
5. Communication Is Key
Communication is not what’s said, but what is understood.
Nothing drives us crazier than when we tell someone something and they don’t do it or don’t follow through with it the way you wanted it to be done.
Or you tell Coach A how to do something, they nod their head, and then don’t go it the way you taught them.
Or you come in and hear the Coach A hates Coach B but isn’t doing anything about it.
Or Coach A is annoyed because they feel they’re working so much harder than Coach B.
Or Coach A is complaining about something but then isn’t doing anything about it.
I’m sure you can think of a million scenarios that cause you to pull your hair out as the leader.
However, as the leader, you have to take extreme ownership (good book, btw), and take charge of the situation.
Quite often if you hire good people (see number one), most situations come down to poor communication and/or assumptions.
Someone makes an assumption that someone else took care of it.
Someone makes an assumption that the person understood what they just told them.
We need to over-communicate with our team, never make assumptions, and make sure that we understand each personality (see number four) and how they like to receive communication.
6. Treat Them the Way You’d Want To Be Treated
Seriously.
Seems like common sense, but as they say, sometimes common sense is not so common.
I get a lot of questions on why I have an all full-time staff, all salaried, all fully benefited, have unlimited time off, and they all work a “normal” 40ish hour work week.
It’s the culture I’m trying to build.
I don’t want people that want to train “their clients.”
I don’t want people that are just here for a paycheck.
I want people that are going to devote their lives to our mission.
I want people that are here for more than just a job.
In order to do that, I need to treat them really well.
That means a good salary, a good schedule, good benefits, constant leadership, constant appreciation, and a constant pitch of why we’re doing this.
Is it easy?
No.
Most months I shed a few tears when the payroll gets withdrawn.
It’s my biggest expense, but I also know it’s my biggest ROI.
The most common message we get from client always comes back to something along the lines of…
“You have the most cohesive team I’ve ever met. You can tell they are here for the right reasons.”
It all comes back to driving the mission, communicating clearly, leading them, and treating them the way you want to be treated.
We all got into this business to change lives, and depending on what kind of impact you want to make, if you want to change the lives of hundreds of people, you’re going to need a team to support you in your mission.
Hope this helps.
Want More?
Next month Doug will be hosting the Spurling Spring Seminar in Kennebunk, ME alongside myself, my wife, Dr. Lisa Lewis, and the entire Spurling Fitness staff.
There aren’t many events outside Boston that cater to the fitness community, so this will be an awesome opportunity for any personal trainers, strength coaches, gym owners, or anyone interested in assessment, program design, business, and mindset skills to enjoy a day of learning.
Long before I owned CORE, and even now, as a current gym owner, I’ve championed the message that gym ownership is not for everyone, and more to the point that it should not be perceived as the holy grail of the fitness industry.
There’s a running theme – which is nauseatingly prevalent on social media – that owning a gym provides some sort of pinnacle, “I’ve made it!” mentality, and that once it happens it’s nothing but rainbows and kitten kisses for everyone.
Sure, the fairy tale ending can happen.
However the reality is, for many….being a gym owner is fucking brutal.
My friend and colleague, Mike Connelly, who’s a recent former gym owner, took the time to write this beautifully honest guest post today on the trials and tribulations (and general dumpsterfireness) of owning a gym.
What Social Media Isn’t Telling You About Owning a Gym
“I’m so sorry to hear about that. Must be tough, man.”
I’ve heard that line from a lot of people in the past two months. The reason I’m hearing that so much is because after six years I am moving on from owning my business, Rebell Strength and Conditioning, and all I can think about when it comes up is how happy I am about the situation.
I’m not going to sit here and tell you it all went as I planned and that I’m coming out of this footloose and fancy free.
That’s not the case.
But, since being out of the operation of my business for the last two months, my life has changed and only in positive ways. I’m averaging just about twelve more hours of sleep a week, I’ve lost thirty pounds, my mental health is back to being stable (as stable as it will get anyways), and, most importantly, I feel like myself again.
When you own and run a business, it’s easy to get so caught up in things that you don’t even realize what is happening to yourself. You think about bills, timelines, clients, marketing, bills, social media posts, blogs, bills, complaints, finding new clients, keeping current clients, bills, programming, systems, bills, platforms that run your business, networking, bills, finding good employees, keeping good employees, how to manage your revenue, and finally…. bills.
It’s a lot.
It’s nauseating at times. To feel stress at a molecular level (Paul Lyngso hit that description on the head) all the time becomes your new normal.
And it sucks.
But you keep going because you’re “living the dream.”
A mentor of mine once described entrepreneurship to me like this:
“There you are, riding the bull that is business, through town. People are cheering for you and admiring your courage to go out and do it on your own. You are revered and respected at the mere mention that you own a small business. Yet, through all the accolades all you can think about is, “how the fuck do I get off this bull?!”
I know that’s not the case for all business owners.
There are some out there that are owning it through and through. These people are running a business and not just getting paid for their hobby. It took me a long time to realize and then admit it, but I never broke through to that level of ownership.
I never owned my business.
My business owned me.
I could go on vacation whenever I wanted, but I always had to add the cost of people covering my work to the price tag. I didn’t have a boss, but a long client list that could, at times, be much worse than a boss.
I had the opportunity to take as much free time as I wanted, but it always came with the sacrifice of progress. When all that became too much, the progress suffered, and once that ship sails, it’s hard to get it back to shore.
As coaches, we should teach our clients to own movement, not just survive it. Well, for a long time I was merely surviving being a business owner. And that, my friends, is not a path to success or happiness.
I’m not writing this to shit all over your dreams of being a business owner.
Nope, far from it.
Nor am I here to make excuses.
I fucked this whole thing up.
I always had good intentions, but that and a nickel will get you a jaw breaker from a vending machine at your local arcade. I wanted to share this with you because the coach in me wants you to move forward with caution. I want you to realize that before you get on that bull, you better have those ducks in line and know that the glory and freedom that often get put on owning a business rarely become a reality.
I want to share this cautionary tale, because chasing down the dream of business ownership seems to be trending in our industry, and I don’t hear too many people talking about why it might be a bad idea.
I’m not the smartest guy around, but I’m not the dumbest either. I’m intuitive and have a wicked creative side. I’m strong willed and will fight to the death at the drop of a hat.
I’m a Marine.
I once did 177 get ups in one hour with a 24Kg bell for a fundraiser and then drank whiskey and danced the night away at a wedding. I can get shit done – when I want to – and that’s the thing about being a business owner that caught up to me.
The accounting, the marketing, the interviewing, the blah, blah, blah side of business that I didn’t like finally became not as fun anymore, so I just let off the gas and coasted.
That’s how you lose $4,000 in revenue in a month, and that’s the thing about losing business, it always goes much, much quicker than it comes.
It wasn’t over a bad customer experience either. In six years I can count those on one hand.
It’s because people move, lose jobs, get in relationships, and any other reason that has nothing to do with you.
There is no amount of success that can protect you from that and for that reason, you can never let up. Never.
Well, I did.
I knew what I had to do, and I just didn’t want to anymore. It didn’t make me happy like it used to. I know, I know, you’re supposed to delegate and hire out for all those items that you suck at, and that brings me to my next shortcoming.
I mean, I’m good at spending it without thinking, but I really suck at doing the right thing with it.
If you don’t want your business to own you, you better have a fucking stellar plan for every dollar that comes in the door. It seems to me that every successful business has a numbers guy somewhere in the mix.
That’s no coincidence.
Then there’s me, just throwing money at things that won’t do me any good in six months, let alone a year.
I paid my staff too much; I charged too little for my product; I wasn’t patient with purchases, and I got into a lease that put me in a position where I was fighting uphill from day one.
I never gave myself a chance, but I never saw it because I always thought that if I treat people better than they would ever expect, then that would motivate them to produce. I thought that if I was aggressive with purchases and leases that it would pay off overall.
I’m not saying that employees shouldn’t be paid well and that aggressive moves don’t pay off. I’m just saying that you should have a plan for everything, and it better make sense to someone that knows numbers.
Have a numbers person!
In the end, that will make or break your business no matter how good your product is.
There are plenty of shitty gyms out there making a large profit because they have their numbers on lockdown. There are also a lot, and I mean a lot, of unbelievable coaches getting their asses kicked because they are not equally as good of a numbers person.
I’ve learned from the many, many mistakes that I’ve made over the years. I know that I will continue to learn as I sort through and process all of this.
For that, I am grateful.
Any time we can learn from our mistakes it was worth it.
The only thing I’m ashamed of is that I allowed myself to think that my identity and character were defined by a title that I slapped on myself but was never really cut out to live up to.
That kills me a little bit when I think about it.
I let it stress me out and change who I am. It stressed all my relationships and probably none more than the one that I have with my family. My hope is that maybe one or two business owners out there who are feeling alone and completely fucked mentally read this, and it lets them take a breath and realize that they are not bad people or coaches because they are having a hard time with their business.
It’s easy to feel like a failure in that position, but the reality is that you had the guts to take a shot and that’s great. If you’re the type that just cannot go back to working for someone, then I hope this pushes you to get the help you need to right the ship.
But if you’re like me and can be perfectly happy and have a lot to contribute in another arena then I hope this gives you the guts to do the right thing for yourself and the people that you love.
About the Author
Mike Connelly: Former Owner of Rebell Strength and Conditioning for 6 years, current Fitness Director for Fitness Formula Clubs at their Oak Park, Il. location and co-owner/coach at Strength Faction.
Serves as a consultant to the Chicago Blackhawks organization for off-season camps for the past three years.
Can someone please make a legitimate rationale why we don’t just make “Daylight Savings Time” standard time year round?
Granted this is rooted from a selfish place and is all about me being a cantankerous, sleep-deprived parent of a one-year old.
Seriously, why?
Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy?
SIDE NOTE: Lisa and I are finally heading out to go see Black Panther tonight. Up until this point I still feel Winter Soldier is the best Marvel movie yet, but I’m expecting my face to be melted tonight for sure. Can’t wait.
I’ve got a bevy of speaking engagements lined up for 2018, and next week begins the madness.
I’ll be in NYC speaking at a few Equinox locations on March 16th and 17th, and from there on out I’ve got a place to be at least one weekend every month for the foreseeable future.
It’s a nice feeling to be in demand.
I’d encourage you to click the link above or THIS one for more details/insights into where I’ll be and when.
Events Just Around the Corner
Spurling Spring Seminar – Kennebunk, ME: April 14th
Coaching Competency Workshop – Sterling, VA: April 21st
The Fitness Summit – Kansas City, MO: May 4-5th (Dean Somerset and I are doing a special 4-hour PRE-CON for this event).
Registration for this highly competitive certification opens on April 4th. However, I’ve got some good, nay, fucking amazing news.
I’ve negotiated some awesome perks for you:
Early access to enroll on April 3rd (24 hrs before they open to the public), increasing your chances of getting in.
A huge discount (up to 33% off the regular price).
This is without question one of the best certifications any fitness professional can possess, offering incredible value and helps to separate you from the masses.
We all have bad days. Kid’s sick, spouse is angry, your favorite tv character died, whatever. It’s still imperative as a coach to show up and demonstrate to your athletes/clients that you WANT to be there.
All I have to say is that this article would have helped me tremendously if I had access to it the week I started my first personal training gig out of college.
Looking back I was such a mess.
Excellent guest post today by NY-based (Capital district) strength coach Mike Sirani.
As a student or aspiring professional, you’ll often hear that preparation is the key to success. If you put in the hours studying and practicing, you’ll surely reap the rewards later on.
Flash-forward a couple years later: you’ve graduated school and just finished your first session with a personal training client.
Do you still feel like the above statement rings true?
The answer is likely no. Nothing can prepare you for your first time training another human being — not all the anatomy, physiology, chemistry, or Call of Duty you spent hours on in college.
Why’s this the case?
You’re now being asked to combine the science with the art. You can write the perfect program and explain all of the physiological adaptations that will come from it, but what happens when your client steps into the squat rack for their first set and the first five reps look as coordinated as a Charles Barkley golf swing?
What you choose to do next will either make you look like a Jedi genius or make you seem confusing and unhelpful. In the above scenario, you have three choices to improve the client’s technique:
Cue the individual and see if it improves their technique
Regress the exercise and see if the movement improves
Use a corrective exercise to break down the movement and help the client get a better grasp on what they should be doing.
Below, we’re going to review these three choices and discuss when it’s best to use each of them, depending on the individual, their personality, and the setting they’re training in.
Choice #1: Cueing
This should always be your first option to correct an exercise as a strength coach or personal trainer.
Anyone can move around and sweat on their own. It’s your job to coach and educate clients on the correct way to do an exercise in order to help them reach their goals faster and stay healthy while doing so.
Good cueing is something that most clients will take note of and appreciate. A great coach will keep these short and sweet and cater to the client’s learning style, whether that’s:
Auditory
Visual
Kinesthetic
Understanding the client’s personality type can also make cueing more effective.
If a client has a Type A personality, they may want more details about the exercise and why you’re making certain corrections. Someone who’s more laid back may simply want to be told a correction and then left alone.
Remember, this is where the science and the art meet. The more people you train, the better intuition you’ll develop as to what amount of cueing is too much vs. too little, whether to give internal or external cues, or if a specific cue works or not.
Choice #2: Regress the Exercise
What happens when you’re cueing and what you’re trying to convey isn’t registering with your client? This can result in a frustrated client, but hopefully you don’t let it get to this point. If you sense it’s heading in this direction, there’s nothing wrong with regressing an exercise.
Regress the back squat to a front squat, or the push-up to an incline push-up.
When regressing, it’s important to put the regression into context for the client.
This helps keep their confidence up and set the stage for progressing back to the exercise you originally programmed. Let them know why you’re regressing it, how the regression will improve their technique, and what needs to be done to progress back to the original exercise.
Regressing an exercise is also a strategy that may be utilized more quickly in a group setting when you don’t have the same amount of time to cue someone, like you would in a semi-private or one-on-one setting.
Choice #3: Use a Corrective Exercise
Too often, coaches will skip choices one and two and move right into bringing clients through the gamut of corrective exercises.
If you feel like a client needs a laundry list of correctives, it’s more beneficial to refer them out to a physical therapist or another healthcare professional that can better handle their issues. That way, you can use regressions to ensure the client continues getting a training effect when they’re with you, while the physical therapist helps get them back on track towards progressing specific exercises.
I have found using corrective exercises beneficial in certain scenarios, such as speeding up a client’s motor learning of a specific movement via chunking (breaking bigger movement down into component parts).
Let’s say a client is having a hard time learning the deadlift.
You’re giving excellent cues and have regressed the client from the trap bar to a Kettlebell Deadlift. However, their technique still isn’t pretty. Here, I may break down the movement with two corrective exercises.
One is used to teach the client to extend through their thoracic spine, while the other teaches movement at the hips without movement in the lumbar spine.
Thoracic Extension on Foam Roller
Hip Hinge Teaching Tools
In Summary
Unfortunately, there’s not one quick fix to improve someone’s technique on any exercise. There are too many variables in play for it to be that simple.
Appreciate the science of a program and spend time in the coaching trenches making choices from the three options above. The more you’re forced to make that choice, the better artistic instinct you’ll develop, and the better you’ll be at quickly making the best choice with a client.
About the Author
Mike Sirani is the Co-Owner of Capital District Sport and Fitnessin Round Lake, NY. He’s an experienced strength and conditioning coach and massage therapist who has spent the majority of his career in Boston training professional, collegiate, and high school athletes of various sports, as well as helping general fitness clients of all backgrounds learn to move better and get stronger than ever before. He earned his Bachelor of Science Degree in Applied Exercise Science, with a concentration in Sports Performance, from Springfield College and completed a highly sought after six-month internship at Cressey Sports Performance. Mike specializes in teaching athletes and general fitness clients to get the most out of their bodies by enhancing their movement quality and creating exercises programs that allow you to get stronger, faster, and more powerful in a safe and effective manner.
In literature we see it all the time in the form of heroes (Beowulf) vs. villains (Grendel), good (Gryffindor) vs. bad (Slytherin), or real (Milwaukee) vs. imaginary (Minas Tirith).
We see it all the time in real life too:
Democrats vs. Republicans
Science vs. People Who Make a Ham Sandwich Look Intelligent
Autobots vs. Decepticons
The idea behind dichtomy is to demonstrate or showcase a contrast between two things that are represented as being opposed or entirely different.
Who’s right?, who’s wrong?, what’s better?, what’s worse?, bacon is delicious, no, fuck that, you’re going to hell…
The fitness industry sees no shortage of it either.
All you have to do is spend 17 seconds on Twitter before you want to jump into a shark’s mouth you witness people on both sides of the fence – low-carb vs. high-carb, CrossFitters vs. powerlifters, back squats vs. no squats – tear each other to shreds.
Both sides are adamant their position is the right position, “how can you not see it?,” and the dichotomous divide seemingly grows larger and larger.
I’m going to skip the mental gymnastics today, and instead focus my attention on something else that’s a liiitle less dramatic and less of a dumpster fire to talk about…
Training volume.
Disclaimer:This will not to be a deep-dive into the nitty-gritty, nerdtastic world of program design and volume. It’s a rabbit hole to say the least. I’m gonna get into some of the particulars, but not too much. Sorry.
My goal is to just offer a few talking points and ideas.
For a nice amuse-bouche on the topic, however, I’d recommend THIS article by Greg Nuckols.
Training Volume, Defined
For all intents and purpose training volume (as it relates to lifting things) can most easily be calculated as such:
Sets x reps x load
The final number can be labelled as total tonnage (or total amount lifted).
For example if someone performs 3 sets of 5 reps with 225 lbs on the bench press it can be broken down as 15 total reps x 225 lbs = 3,375 lbs.
Congratulations. You just benched a Volkswagen you savage.
The idea, then, is to adopt the concept of progressive overload (via performing more sets, reps, load, or any combination) to do more work in subsequent workouts.
Using the same example, lets say it’s a week later (or tomorrow if you’re a man under the age of 40) and you wanted to bench press again. To increase training volume you’d incorporate one of following scenarios:
Increase All Three: 4 sets of 6 reps @ 230 lbs = 5,520 lbs
Increase CrossFit: 24 sets of 17 @ Scaled # = Can’t feel the left side of your face
That’s a very watered down and simplified explanation, but should get the gist across.
In short: Ensure that you’re doing more work by tracking stuff and good things will inevitably happen.
As an umbrella theme, however, it’s important to understand that this approach does have limitations.
We’re humans, not Kryptonians.
There’s an inevitable “tipping point” that’s bound to take place. Adding more and more training volume (a poor periodization scheme in the long run) will eventually have deleterious effects.
I like what Mike Boyle has to say on the matter:
“Periodization might be the most overstudied subject in the training world. Tens of thousands of pages have been written detailing the complexities of microcycles and mesocycles. And this has only served to confuse what should be a fairly simple concept, as articulated by strength & conditioning legend Charles Poliquin in the 1988 article “Variety in Strength Training”: Phases of high volume (accumulation, extensive loading), high intensity (intensification, intensive loading) and unloading should be modulated within the program.“
In other words:
Higher volume, low load periods should be alternated with higher-intensity, lower-volume periods.
[Smoke bomb, smoke bomb, exit stage right]
To give a brief example I’ve always liked fluctuating training volume on a weekly basis, which is something I gravitated towards from my years as a coach at Cressey Sports Performance:
Lets use the deadlift as an example here with the main goal being to improve strength:
A. Deadlift
Week 1: 1×2 @ 83%
Week 2: 1×2 @ 85%
Week 3: 1×2 @ 87%
Week 4: 1×1 @ 90%
B. Deadlift – Speed(ish)
Week 1 (High Volume): 4×3 @ 70%, 1×5 @ 65%
Week 2 (Medium Volume): 3×3@ 70%, 1×5 @ 60%
Week 3 (High Volume): 5×3 @ 70%, 1×5, @ 60%
Week 4: (Low Volume): 3×3 @ 65%
To reiterate: taking into account sets/reps/load and trying to use any permutations you wish to ensure someone is doing more work is never a bad place to start.
It’s training volume 101. And it works.
HOWEVER
I’d encourage you to heed this Tweet from Eric Cressey from a few days ago:
Volume is one way to achieve overload in a training program. If it is the only progression option you have in your toolbox, though, it’s not going to work out well long-term.
When trainers/coaches place too much emphasis on overall volume and use that as their only metric to measure progress it can be problematic.
It reminds me of something strength coach and physical therapist, Dr. Quinn Henoch, has discussed on numerous occasions. We’re quick to pump the brakes and implement any number of corrective exercises when one of our client’s shoulders starts to hurt.
Okay, not the worst thing in the world. I’m not going to cry afoul if a trainer/coach wants to toss in a bit more soft tissue work on someone’s pecs or lats:
Been playing around with my new toy at CORE, The Ultimate Back Roller, via @ACUMOBILITY. It’s great for rolling the back, but I’ve been using it for other areas as well. Use the coupon code Gentilcore for 10% off. pic.twitter.com/qzh3143Zjq
I’ve even heard of instances where people are encouraged to get blood work done; as if finding out they’re allergic to grass-fed acai berries will miraculously cure their lack of scapular upward rotation.
The fuck?
Instead, what Quinn is quick to point out is this: Maybe you need to audit your program and adjust total training volume?
It could be as simple as you’re prescribing too much training volume compared to what someone is able to recover from.
That’s why they’re hurt.
Not because they need more Ipsilateral Birddog Balloon Breathing.
Which begs the question: What are some ways in which to increase overload that doesn’t entail just increasing volume?
Well, two come to mind.
1. Get People Into Better Positions
I’d argue the reason many trainees are unable to make much progress in the gym to begin with is because they’re unable to get into appropriate positions to express their “true” strength.
Take the squat.
I see something like this:
Any asshat coach or trainer can tack on more volume to the above walking (or, rather, squatting) ball of fail.
Physical Therapist Gray Cook would refer to this as “adding fitness on top of dysfunction,” which isn’t doing anyone any favors.
Rather, taking the time to actually coach someone so they’re in a better position to be successful is what’s going to make a difference.
Trainees are given a massive piece of humble pie when they’re getting sore from a load that’s 50-75% less than their perceived one-rep max.
2. Change the Center of Mass
Bringing a load closer to the ground makes an exercise easier. A prime example is any single leg variation where DBs are held at the side(s):
If I wanted to make this harder and as a result increase overload without necessarily adjusting training volume all I’d have to do is move the DBs to a higher position or maybe revert to something like a Barbell Reverse Lunge w/ Front Squat Grip.
That’s That
Training volume, too, has a very dichotomous vibe to it.
On one end of the spectrum there’s the “do more” mentality (which is a thing, and an important part of strength & conditioning). But on the other end there’s a delicate balance of what amount of volume a particular person can handle as it relates to their ability to recover.
And finally it’s important to have other tricks in your bag other than adding more of it in order to help your clients/athletes get better.
Like I said, I didn’t want to get too far into the weeds on the topic of training volume, but I hope this helped.
Terrell Baldock is a Prenatal and Postnatal Exercise Specialist in London, Ontario, Canada. She specializes in working with women with core and pelvic floor dysfunctions and prepares them for the demands of pregnancy, birth and postpartum recovery.
Mike Sirani is the Co-Owner of 
