CategoriesFemale Training Motivational

Female Fitness Marketing: Why Performance Matters

I like training women. I think it’s easier in many ways.

Women listen.[footnote]I’m marrying a psychologist, so my perspective on this point may be a bit skewed.[/footnote]

Women tend to be more patient. In the gym that is. Lets not get carried away here….LOL.

They’re patient in that they’re less likely to add 50 lbs to the barbell when I’m not looking and performing a set with atrocious technique.

Women tend to take constructive criticism more lightly and won’t interpret it as me judging them.

And women tend to have less ego compared to their male counterparts.

And less BO.

These are all loose observations, of course, and by no means should be taken as concrete. Some of my best clients have been men; but I have found throughout the years, as a whole, women tend to be easier to coach.

I know many of my fellow Y-chromosome’d colleagues would agree – Bret Contreras, John Gaglione, Mike Robertson, to name a few.

I have to assume my female coaching friends will agree?

We’ve seen a shift in mindset with women within the last decade when it comes to lifting weights, and more to the point, strength training. I’d be remiss not to give a tip of the hat to CrossFit for leading the charge.

Nothing (so long as I can remember) can be attributed to the tsunami of interest and enthusiasm of people getting excited to lift weights than CrossFit – men and women both. But mostly women.

Tracy Anderson and the Thigh Master can suck it!

Before I get flak for going soft on CrossFit- there’s still much of it that drives me batshit crazy. Funnily enough, the quality of CrossFit is getting better. More and more boxes are recognizing the importance of assessments, ramping people properly (regressions and progressions), having some semblance of periodization/programming, and understanding that not everyone can walk in on Day #1 and perform 100 reps of wall balls, box jumps, and 400m sprints……on their hands.

What’s funny about it is I hear all these CrossFit coaches waxing poetic about how much better CrossFit is now, and how it’s “changing.”

Exactly!

Because most of the boxes who are quote on quote “doing it well” aren’t doing CrossFit anymore. They’re, you know, having their clients perform smart, progressive, sensible programming without all the high-rep/WOD bologna that makes a small part of my soul die.

But that’s neither here nor there, way off-topic, and something I don’t want to get into at this point. Besides, I’m hangry right now and feel like I may cut someone.

But even with the shift of more and more women turning their backs to the elliptical trainer and gravitating towards the iron, there’s still a massive gap to bridge between what the mainstream media is relaying to women and what people like myself are trying to do.

Not a week goes by where I don’t shake my head in disbelief or come close to punching a wall from something I read or watch from the mainstream media on the topic of women and fitness.

All I have to do is walk through my local CVS and be slapped in the face with magazine cover after magazine cover telling the reader how to “lose 10 lbs in 1 month,” or how to “tone this” get a “sleek that,” all while following a detox diet that has you drinking nothing but grapefruit juice and unicorn tears for 47 days.

Which is all BS because 1) everyone knows unicorn tears are only effective after 49 days and 2) each magazine cover is plastered with a celebrity who’s been photoshopped beyond recognition and to a point that’s unattainable or with a model or figure competitor who spent the last three months dieting and prepping to look that way for ONE day.

Check out THIS post by Kelsey Reed on more of the shadiness behind the scenes with fitness marketing towards women.

And none of this speaks to the eye wash that I constantly come across on shows like Dr. Oz, Ellen, and The Biggest Loser.

It’s frustrating at times, if not 100% nauseating.

Which is why I love working with women. I love “de-programming” them (for lack of a better term) and helping them to pull the blanket from over the eyes.

In a lot of ways it’s similar to that new show on Netflix, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.

Kimmy’s been trapped in a Dooms-Day bunker for 15 years and is finally released into the “real world.” She’s been programmed to think one thing (many things, actually), only to find out that everything she knew was wrong. Or, slightly off.

She’s still living in the 90s with an out dated mentality about the world and how it now operates.

NOTE: the show is hilarious. Co-created by Tina Fey, so if you like that type of humor this show will be right up your alley.

I find that many (not all) women fall in line with Kimmy.

They’ve been told that lifting weights will make them bulky, that if they’re going to indulge, light weight (high reps) is the best way to go, and that to get toned and lean (buzz words!) they should perform copious amounts of cardio. And eat 1200 kcals per day.

I’m not going to begrudge someone’s goals. If “toned” and “lean” is what they’re after….cool. Lets do it!

But Lets Focus On Performance

Whenever I start working with a new female client – particularly if she’s not a competitive athlete – I always try to refrain from buzz words like toned, lean, etc.

I’ll let them use those words, and I’ll play along, but I’m almost always going to entice them to go down a path they thought they’d never go down. Similar to Alice going down the rabbit hole. Except with less opium involved.

Rather than have them focus on more superfluous goals like losing 10 lbs (it’s always 10 lbs) or more aesthetic goals like how their arms look in a certain dress….I’ll try to get them to buy into more of the performance side of things.

Things like:

1. Finally being able to perform an un-assisted, full ROM, chin-up.

2. Performing 10 clean push-ups. Not girl push-ups. I hate that term. Push-ups.

3. Deadlifting their bodyweight for reps. Deadlifting 1.5 bodyweight for reps. Hell, why not go for 2x bodyweight?

At first there may be a little push back. “Tony, I don’t care about my deadlift.” It’s to be expected. But I always say, “give me 60 days.”

“Do what I tell you to do for 60 days, and we’ll re-assess things.”

It’s amazing what happens after only a handful of weeks.

More often than not they find they’re doing things they never thought they’d be able to do. What was a challenging weight two weeks ago is now easy. Okay Tony, deadlifts aren’t so bad after all.

“OMG, I can do a chin-up!”

 

Something clicks or switches on, and many become addicted to pushing themselves in the gym. There’s a fire that’s ignited.

What’s more, many find that those goals they’ve been working so hard to achieve – toned arms, losing that 10 lbs – just kinda, happen. On it’s own.

It’s magical. Sans the Unicorns.

Women can lift weights. They should lift weights. And while many people are under the assumption that Eric Cressey’s High Performance Handbook is geared toward athletes or only men…they couldn’t be more wrong.

I’ve seen many women follow this program at Cressey Sports Performance with amazing results. And for those who feel a bit skeptical about following a program completely off the internet, check out these results from Stacey R, 38 (she said I could use her age!) from New Jersey.

Stacey Before

Stacey After

Stacey came to SUNY Cortland last weekend to listen to me speak. A day later she sent me an email thanking me not only for the workshop, but for being someone who tries to empower and encourage women to lift weights.

She mentioned that she had always been into fitness but had never focused on a structured strength training program. She decided to give Eric’s HPH a try because she wanted to get stronger, and to help with her recreational volleyball.

It’s obvious Stacey was in good shape prior to starting the program. But you can clearly see she made some amazing progress. She noted that, despite putting on 8-10 lbs, she was still able to maintain the same level of body-fat.

She also added…

My overall game, vertical and responsiveness have improved, I’ve found an absolute passion that’s helped me through some difficult personal stuff in recent years, and I’m challenging myself to go completely out of my comfort zone by shooting for a figure competition in June…which is conceptually ridiculous for me on multiple levels, but is proving to be a great focal point.

Now, this certainly doesn’t mean everyone will get the same results as Stacey. But if someone with Stacey’s background and experience can make this much of an improvement….imagine what YOU could do.

All she did was follow the program, focused on strength and performance for a change, and stayed consistent with it.

And good things happened.

It’s magical. Sans the Unicorns.

High Performance Handbook is on sale this week at $50 OFF the regular price. It’s not just a program for men.

CategoriesFemale Training

Fitness Marketing to Females: Don’t Be a Victim!

Note from TG: Today’s guest post comes courtesy of friend and strength coach Kelsey Reed. I’ve known Kelsey (and her husband Steve) for a few years now (they actually got engaged on my blog and came to Cressey Sports Performance for their honeymoon!)

You can check out those shenanigans HERE (<– the actual sneaky engagement post) and HERE (<– my follow-up post). 

I have a ton of respect for Kelsey not only as a fantastic strength coach, but as someone I feel is a true “champion” for fostering the sentiment that women aren’t these delicate flowers who should appease themselves to the regurgitated BS that the mainstream media tosses their way.

Here she dives into fitness marketing towards women and some of the shadiness that goes down. Enjoy!

Before I dive into the meat and potatoes of the post, I want to thank Tony for allowing me to write a post for the blog (I might have done a happy dance when I began this post).

Today I will focus on the devious, misleading, and body-centric phrases that magazines, fitness products, and various other media outlets use to lure women into reading or purchasing their products. These schemes are birthed out of the intent to deliver what every woman wants: the perfect body, as dictated by their marketing.

Don’t check out yet, fellas!

I assume, since you read this blog, that you are either a fitness professional, an individual of higher enlightenment than the rest of America, or both. And we need you to help rebuke these, I think, demeaning claims and spread the good news of iron. Claims and “promises” such as:

“Lose a dress size in a week!”

“Torch those calories!”

“Flatten your belly!”

“Lengthening muscles and tone that tush!”

“Get rid of that jiggle!”

* and other such claims that are so asinine they make my cats take out their rage upon us poor humans.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ka0vPcMVAl8&index=5

Ladies and gents, we are barraged with headlines and marketing techniques designed to a) make a woman feel inadequate about her current body shape and b) continue to ingrain in her that her worth is based on her looks.

Not only do they fail to encourage, but they even discourage, the pursuit of process-oriented goals. Both a) and b) lead to repeated cycles of short bursts of motivation and hard work, followed by despair at her failures (typically because the claims above set her up for nothing but failure), and ending in a return back to her starting point.

Do this for me, Google image “women dumbbell exercises.” 99% of the images are with 5 lbs or less (and for some reason are performing bicep curls. I thought that was a guy thing?). These portrayals are ubiquitous in women’s magazines and, subliminally, tell women they can’t, or worse shouldn’t, lift heavy things.

This is what our friends, coworkers, and clients see on a daily basis.

Now, there has been a movement, “Strong is the new skinny,” which, I’ll admit, is definitely a step up.

In word, at least, it encourages women to try heavier weights and strive for strength. However, have you Googled that phrase? Do so, I’ll be right here when you get back.

What did you see?

Images of muscular (more so than usual) women who are still lean (thin) and long-legged and busty. Not that I think those attributes are wrong to possess, those models can’t help their genetic lot, and power to the women who can rock it, but those are the traits that seem to be highlighted almost exclusively.

I don’t think it’s ignoble to strive for the body of a Greek goddess, especially for women who compete in physique sports; I used to be one!

Despite the words of the message, there is still the expectation that women should look like Wonder Woman or any of the other female superheroes from old DC comics, and that simply is not a realistic goal for most women.

(I’m rather short, un-curvy, un-busty, and will never be any of those things.)

Photo Credit: Jeff Chapman

PLEASE NOTE: this is NOT me disagreeing with this new mentality that is permeating the fitness world. I DO believe that being strong is better than being skinny. After my battle with anorexia, I know better than most how damaging focusing on body image can be and whole-heartedly agree with the shift in thinking away from looks and towards performance.

The focus of our message should be to the non-physique competitors, the women who want to be strong and healthy but are still inundated with the images of busty, tiny-waisted women with a visible 6-pack.

And even though these women are more muscular than the general model to grace the cover of women magazines, there’s still the subliminal expectation that to be “healthy” or “strong” a woman’s physique must contain less than 12% body fat.

We must remind our friends, family, and clients that lifting weights alone will NOT MAKE SOMEONE LOOK LIKE THAT.  More importantly: To not let the fact that they don’t discourage them or frustrate them. 

We must communicate that diet and genetics play a large role in how these idealized women look; if you’re 5’1” and have the curves of a pre-pubescent boy (like me)…striving to meet these ideals will only cause frustration and disappointment.

We must live in our realities; not in the fantastical world of internet models and Photoshop.

Unfortunately, the women who most need to hear this message are not regularly exposed to resources, such as blogs like Tony’s, which encourage women to step away from the grocery store magazines. Therefore, as fitness professionals (females and males) and enlightened individuals we must do 3 things:

  1. Reset our expectations for ourselves (ladies) and set goals that are both attainable and realistic. We’re not immune from this either and we cannot hope to inspire change in others if we have not first done so ourselves. I also challenge the guys to examine how you personally view the women you either work with or who are in your life, and see if these arbitrary standards have crept into your subconscious.
  2. Encourage other women – be it friends or clients – to set and strive for goals that aren’t based upon an idolized “ideal” woman. Note that you can accomplish this not only through words, but also through your actions; it’s often the latter that is more effective.
  3. Educate and continually remind those women that their goals will be accomplished through consistent hard work, patience, and embracing a process-oriented approach. The world will continually try to sell them short cuts and inflame their impatience for results. We must be the voice of unvarnished reason amidst the din.

 “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.” – my dad

I’m personally encouraged that there is an increasing number of women ditching the magazines in favor of a more reasonable and healthy training approach. Our job is to foster and encourage this trend.

We’re not going to change the world overnight, but we can change it one woman at a time.

Note from TG: for more on this topic you can check out my Training Jane from Joe webinar on Mike Reinold’s Rehab Webinar’s website (you get access to my webinar and HUNDREDS of others).

In addition, for more female-specific fitness resources I stand behind check out Neghar Fonooni’s Lean & Lovely, Nia Shanks’ Lift Like a Girl Guide, and Molly Galbraith’s Modern Women’s Guide to Strength Training.

Author’s Bio

Kelsey Reed is head strength coach at SAPT Strength & Performance located in Fairfax, VA. Bitten by the iron bug at 16, Kelsey has been lifting ever since. Her love for picking up heavy things spurred her to pursue a degree in the Science of Exercise and Nutrition at Virginia Tech.

Now she spends her days teaching and coaching others in the iron game. In her down time, she lives life on the wild side by not following recipes when she cooks, fighting battles through characters fantasy fiction novels, and attempting to make her cats love her.