Items to Peruse Whilst Pretending to Labor

Monday morning edition of stuff to read while pretending to work!

1. http://crissgetsfit.wordpress.com/2012/01/09/ladies-lifting-weights-get-strong-not-toned/
Another article penned by a woman for women, de-bunking the myths that weight training will make you bulky and that lots of reps at low weights are the key for women.  Other myths debunked, personal stories, and overcoming of fears revealed, as well.

2. http://bretcontreras.com/2012/01/considerations-in-athletic-performance-enhancement-training-how-much-strength-do-our-athletes-need/
Rob Panariello is a respected strength coach and physical therapist with decades of experience in the iron game, and a friend of Schafer's (Note to Schafer: it's been 5 months, UPDATE YOUR BLOG!!!   Note #2: Yes, that IS me on the TRX in the big picture on the most recent update (8/22/11)).  Rob writes an article about a very important topic.  We know that increasing an athlete's maximum strength also increases every other important fitness parameter.  But this only goes so far.  Taking a college athlete from a 200 to a 375lb squat will have tremendous effects on every aspect of the kid's performance.  Taking them from a 375 to a 450 squat will have positive effects, but not as extreme.  But when does focusing on Max Strength become more time consuming and too sapping of recovery capacity to be worth focusing as much on?  450 to 500?  500 to 550?  Obviously it depends on the athlete (gender, age, weight, sport, etc...) but Rob takes on this very important (and little studied) topic.

3. http://deansomerset.com/2012/01/20/my-morning-cup-of-what-the-eff-paula-deens-an-idiot/
Paula Deen really is an idiot.  And her actions belie her lack of integrity and the monetary motivations at the expense of the truth.  This is a great article by Dean Somerset, calling Paula D out on her absolute BS.

I suspect this is what Paula would respond,
if she saw Dean's article.

4.http://www.charlespoliquin.com/ArticlesMultimedia/Articles/Article/803/The_Truth_About_Pilates_.aspx
I eagerly await the angry emails and texts from my Pilates-teaching friends about me posting this one.  I don't necessarily agree with every last sentence in this article by Poliquin, but I do agree with a lot of the message.  Something needs to be said.  It's not Pilates, per se, that I have major issues with; it's the grandiose claims about its efficacy by whoever the Pilates marketing machine is.   Pilates won't make your muscles longer and leaner.  How do I know?  Because nothing can.  Your muscle length is determined by  the relative length of muscle belly vs tendon, which is in turn determined 100% by genetics.  Your muscles cannot get leaner.  They are 100% lean.  The perceived "lean" appearance is a function of your bodyfat levels - how much fat is covering the muscle, making it less visible.

As I've written about before, your appearance when fit is entirely a function of your genetics.  Pilates (or Yoga, or Zumba, or whatever) isn't going to magically give you a dancer's body.  Dancer's look that way mostly because they're genetically selected to look that way, along with their training.  Doing similar training without the important 80% of the equation - the genetic profile to look a certain way - will not yield the same results.

Can Pilates help people?  Sure.  Is it all-encompassing fitness?  No.

More is NOT Always Better!

NYT pieces on fitness often miss the mark by a wide margin, but this one, published last week, has merit.  The key point is that more isn't always better.  We know this about virtually everything else in life: there's a proper dose of something - less isn't enough to get the advantage, more doesn't help and may even hurt.  The examples are endless:

1. Taking 2 advil gets rid of your headache, taking 20 advil is dangerous, and 200 will kill you
2. Layering on a cold, 15 degree day: wear just a t-shirt and you'll be freezing; wear a t-shirt + sweatshirt + coat and you're nice and warm; wear a t-shirt + long sleeve t-shirt + polo shirt + flannel + fleece + zip-up hoody + winter coat and you'll be way too hot, if you can even get it all on.
3. A nice cold beer at the ballgame - awesome! 3 nice cold beers - better not drive home.  6 nice cold beers - you're a bit sloppy.  12 nice cold beers - hangover city!  12 nice cold beers at the game + 3 more at the bar afterwards + those 8 shots that you couldn't refuse from the hot bartender - alcohol poisoning.

You get the idea.  But just in case you don't...

...now you do.

Unfortunately, the fact that everyone knows this doesn't prevent them from thinking it doesn't apply to fitness.  The following is a very incomplete list of the ways people I have trained have fallen prey to this fallacy:
1. If running 1/4 mile intervals is good, running 1/2 mile intervals must be better
2. If running 3 miles is good, running 10 (or 26.2) miles must be better
3. If doing 3 sets of 5 is good, doing 3 sets of 10 must be better
4. If doing 3 sets of 5 is good, doing 10 sets of 5 must be better
5. If lifting weights 3 days a week is good, lifting weights 5 days a week must be better
6. If doing a hard conditioning workout twice a week is good, doing so 6 days a week must be better
7. If 2 scoops of protein in my shake is good, 4 must be better.
8. If Squatting is good, doing Squats, Front Squats, Overhead Squats, Goblet Squats, and Zercher Squats all in the same workout must be better.
9. If Bench Pressing is good, doing Bench Press, Incline Bench, Decline Bench, Dumbbell Bench, Dips, and Cable Flyes in the same workout must be better.
10. If working my whole body at once is good, separating it into "body parts" and really hammering each one individually must be better

And so on.  The article in the NYT deals specifically with overtraining and recovery, but let's look at the broader point it's making.  Seeing the forest, not just the trees, for those who enjoy such sophisticated metaphorical meandering.

The idea is that to get the maximum benefit from exercise or fitness, there is a proper dosage.  Less than that proper dosage, and your body is not stimulated enough to require an adaptation to a higher level.  Too much dosage, and you're impeding the recovery process, and thus not allowing the adaptation to occur.  It's not a simple matter of "If X is good, X+10 must be better."  Those examples above about Advil, alcohol, and winter clothes are obvious, yet for some reason many people are not able to see things so clearly when it comes to exercise and fitness.

The basic principle of specific adaptation to imposed demand (SAID principle) does not change, no matter how much we might want it to.  I've discussed adaptation principles before (here and here), and those principles need to be what guides programs and progress for any exercise to work beyond "getting you tired" or "feeling the burn."

So once again, let me reiterate: More is NOT always better.

If 2 are good, 3 MUST be better...FAIL!

Now, to speak specifically about some of the fallacy examples above:


Number 2: If running 3 miles is good, running 10 (or 26.2) miles must be better -
-Over the past few years, I've come to believe that unless you're training for a specific endurance event, ALL your training/running should be in intervals.  i.e. if you want to run 3 miles: instead of JOGGING 3 miles at a slower pace, RUN 1/2 a mile then walk a 1/4 mile, and repeat x 4 to cover your 3 miles.  And so on for any distance.  You can mix up your speeds, work:rest ratios etc...but always do intervals of some sort.   I'll do a whole post on this soon.

That said, many people can safely run 3 miles in the interval style without negatively affecting their strength gains or overal health.  But the same cannot be said for 10 miles, and certainly not for 26.2.   How the hell running 26.2 miles became THE symbol of fitness in the Western World is mysterious to me, and probably an interesting historical study, but the fact is that for most people, running a marathon causes more harm than good.  Marathons are, or SHOULD BE, the provence of a special type of athlete - long distance runners - whose bodies are designed for it, who display a natural aptitude for it, and who can do it successfully without wreaking havoc on their bodies (any more than competing at a high level in anything always does - which is a lot, but that's the price of competing at a high level).  I'll do a whole post on this soon, too.

The musculoskeletal stress that your system goes through, both in the training and the actual race, creates a very good chance that you'll get hurt.  Overuse injuries (often "itises") are so commonly caused by endurance training that it's no wonder doctors and physical therapists specialize in it - you're their best customers!  And not only is there a very high chance of injury and physical breakdown, but the effects of such extreme endurance training are negative hormonally and reduce strength and power.

I'm no genius, but I also know that in any other sport or life activity, we very rarely need to do something very slowly and very easily for 4 hours straight.  Much more often, we need to do something very hard, once, i.e. push a broken down car down the road, carry a full load of groceries inside; or do something relatively hard in repeated bouts with short rest, i.e. move furniture, carry boxes from the basement upstairs, play pickup basketball, etc...

So not only are you likely to get hurt, but you lose strength and power, and aren't doing anything that helps/trains/prepares you for any type of life or sport activity.  Sounds pretty useless to me, unless you're actually an ATHLETE whose event is a long distance race.  No, not a casual exerciser who runs to "get in shape."  An actual athlete.  This is a rough estimate that I'm throwing out off the top of my head, but if you're not finishing the marathon in under 3.5 hours, you probably shouldn't be running it.

Number 3: If doing 3 sets of 5 is good, doing 3 sets of 10 must be better -
-This completely ignores the physiology of adaptation.  Sets of 10 must perforce be done with a significantly lighter weight than sets of 5.  Thus, sets of 5 generate a high strength adaptation, that sets of 10 cannot match.  So 10 is not necessarily better.

Number 5: If lifting weights 3 days a week is good, lifting 5 must be better - 
-How do I say this politely?  Nope.  Have you been listening to anything I've written or said?!  You didn't click on and read the links to earlier posts I conveniently put there for you above, did you?  I'm so nice I'll do it twice.  Read this.  And this.  Then come back to me and tell me why this one is NOT better!

I'll spare you the other 7 fallacies I listed above, plus the hundreds more I've heard.  The principle is usually similar, though, and the answer is as well.

I think the article in the Times is worth reading, both for it's own specific information, as well as for the larger philosophical point it makes.  And it gave me fodder for this long post, so that's gotta be good.  Here is the link, one more time: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/16/personal-best-workouts-have-their-limits-recognized-or-not/?ref=nutrition

Post Workout Soreness: Details and Fixes

A few weeks ago, I posted this piece on post workout soreness.  Last week, I followed it up by referencing a quote from Mark Rippetoe on his forum on StartingStrength.com.

This post by Justin at 70sBig is a great informational resource, both on DOMS/post workout soreness AND on what to do to mitigate it.

Feeling this way after your workouts isn't necessary,
or even desirable.  Really!

The point of my post, and Rip's, is that DOMS isn't something to aim for, and that most of the time, careful, logical planning and progression in your workouts - along with consistency/not missing workouts - will prevent any MAJOR bouts of DOMS.  Though some small soreness will likely sometimes occur, it will be more like "Oh, I worked out yesterday," than "Holy $#^$#%*%#%##^#!!!!  It hurts to get up from my chair or go up stairs!!!"

The 70sBig post elaborates more on the phenomenon, and gives suggestions on what to do if you did something stupid and trained in a way that elicited a massive bout of DOMS.  Or, how to use the Repeated Bout Effect to prevent these huge bouts of DOMS in the first place.  A relatively short, straight-forward post that's well worth the read.

I'll quote first my favorite part, then the part most relevant to my previous posts on the topic (again, linked above if you haven't read them yet).  But go ahead and read the entire thing - you know you want to!

1. Favorite part - Shawn had about a month off from training. You know what that asshole did on squats in his first session back? 135 for 5; 185 for 5; 225 for 5; 275 for 5; 315 for 3; 225 for 10; (next two sets are front squat) 135 for 10; 135 for 6 — that’s a shit-load of work....Sure, it was dumb. But calling Shawn an idiot relentlessly isn’t going to help his crippling soreness. He told me, “Dude, I am so fucking sore. I had to FALL onto the toilet seat to take a shit earlier.”

2. Most relevant to my earlier posts:  DOMS occurs as a result of doing something that the structures aren’t adapted to. This could include a significant change in volume and intensity, or it could occur from performing a new movement using structures through a different range of motion (ROM). For example, a CrossFitter would experience higher levels of soreness if they started squatting 3×5 at heavier weights than they handle in their met-cons. Conversely, a lifter would experience high levels of soreness if they tried a high repetition CrossFit met-con after being adapted to low repetition lifting (even more so since CrossFit will typically include new or different movements from the lifter’s normal training repertoire). 

No Excuses!

We make excuses all the time: I'm tired, I don't have time, I didn't eat anything today, the gym is too far away.  Stop.  Do the work.  Cause somewhere out there, someone is working way harder than you.  And sometimes, that person is an 82 year old woman deadlifting 153lbs.

So you'd better sack up!

(Thanks to my buddy Rudy Bustamante for showing me this picture)

Post Workout Soreness: Corroboration

A few weeks ago, I posted this piece on post-workout soreness, aka DOMS - Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness.  To refresh your memory, in it I argued that soreness is not something to strive for as a response to your workout.  It may sometimes occur, primarily as a response to a lot of eccentric work or a program change (new exercise/movement pattern, or increase in volume), but isn't something to strive for, or in any way important in measuring your progress.  And certainly not a condition without which you should feel like you didn't work hard enough or didn't get a good workout!  If you haven't banished these unproductive thoughts from your head, now's the time.

I saw this quote from Rip this morning up on his Q&A board on Starting Strength.  I'm quoting only a part of it, that's most relevant to this topic:

If you do a program that produces an predictable adaptation, soreness is minimal and the increase in your numbers is the quantitative indicator of progress. You're not supposed to get sore and be sore all the time. Soreness is an indication that a lot of eccentric loading to which you are not adapted has recently occurred. It always happens with infrequently-performed high-rep light-weight exercise that has an eccentric component, the low intensity of which fails to make you stronger and the random nature of the programming which keeps you from becoming adapted.

Very well said, as usual!

Bicep Curls: Useless, Essential, or What? Part 2

In case you missed it, my previous post was dedicated to a review of the major useless forms of bicep curls.  I promised to continue the topic in Part 2, and see if there's any place for bicep curls in a useful strength and conditioning program.

I believe the answer is "Yes, but..." and I'll elaborate in the following post.

Sorry Chic Thompson, I'm totally "Yes, But"-ting today!

First, I will reiterate what I wrote in Part 1: "The curl is not an essential element of any strength program."  I stand by this.  No program needs curls, really, except that of physique competitors.

However, that doesn't mean they can't be useful for certain populations under certain circumstances.  As I alluded to in Part 1, I see two main purposes to curls:

1. Pure aesthetic vanity aka working the "beach muscles" aka sun's out guns out!
2. Working on a weak point in upper body pulling movements (Chins/Pullups or Rows).  The biceps are sometimes a weak/sticking point in some people's improvement of chins and rows, and working them a little extra can help solve the problem.

This is not as valid a reason to do curls as...

...improving this is.  But it's still OK, if you must.

Neither of these is really essential: #1 can be accomplished on its own with enough chinups, pullups, and rows, anyway.  They contain enough volume of bicep work to take care of Da Gunz.
#2 Can, essentially, also be accomplished by doing more chins, pullups, and rows - if your biceps are the weak point in those movements, then they are what will fatigue first.  So if you add more into your program, the biceps will get the extra work while the rest of the muscles involved in the movement don't really get fatigued, thus bringing the biceps along in development, further away from being a weak point.

However, both #1 and #2 may be accomplished a bit faster with dedicated bicep work.

Now that we've established the potentially useful place for curls, non-essential though they are, we can talk about which curls do the job.

Based on the 2 reasons above, there's no good reason to do anything exotic here.  Basic standing barbell curls or dumbbell curls will both do everything you need to fulfill reasons 1 and 2.  No need to do seated incline bench curls, hammer curls, concentration curls, preacher curls, zottman curls, hero curls, and all the others.   Why?  Because they don't let you lift as much weight, thus the muscle receives less stimulus. The success of bodybuilders who use all these variations regularly has more to do with steroids and total bicep workload/volume than the efficacy of any of these specific variations.  And since you read Part 1  you remember that the idea that concentration curls work on "peak" whereas barbell curls work on mass is a myth.  So - CAN you do these variations?  Sure.  Will they help?  Not as much as the basic versions.

But wait, I can already hear you protesting: "But hammer and zottman curls work my forearms!  Surely there's some utility there!"  If you're doing all your big movements, especially deadlifts and chins, you're getting enough forearm work to be getting on with.  Unless you're using straps for these lifts, in which case stop.  Seriously, stop now.

If you're using these to deadlift, no wonder you think you need
to do hammer curls for forearm development.

Another important point is WHEN in the workout to do your curls.  The answer is always always always at the end, after the main lifts have already been performed.  The purpose of any accessory/assistance lift is to improve or drive the main lifts - which are what cause the main adaptation in your body to occur.  So you never want to tire out on assistance lifts, or have them affect your main lifts.  So if you have a day where you're doing Squats, Push Presses, Power Cleans, and Chins, do the curls AFTER all of those.
Another option is to do them on their own, pre or post conditioning work on the day ater the last day of your weekly program, i.e. if you lift on Monday/Wednesday/Friday, then do them on Saturday.

As to how much to do, 3 sets should suffice for almost all trainees.  Rep range is medium - it's a single joint exercise, so you're not going to do heavy singles, or even fives, probably.  3 sets of 8-10 work well.  I know, I know, this sounds very "ACSM-ey," but that's how I like to program bicep curls, if I ever do at all.

The truth is, I very rarely do - neither for myself, nor my clients.  I don't find those two reasons pop up often enough or with enough urgency to spend the limited amount of time we have to train on something so small like bicep curls.  So, for most trainees, they are indeed a waste of time.  For the few who can use them, they are like the cherry on top of the frosting on top of the cake.  Makes for a nice decoration, but hardly worth fussing about if the cake sucks and the frosting looks like it was applied by rabid squirrels.

When not busy wielding his ax with deadly effect, this
little guy might just be messing around with your cake.

Also, it should be noted that this isn't just a matter of "well if I have the time, why shouldn't I just do all the biceps I want, anyway?"  Because if you're doing your other lifting properly, you're taxing your body significantly with your main lifts.  You have only so much recovery capacity, especially if you're not getting 8hrs sleep a night.  And be honest, you're not.  Also if you're not eating properly.  And that's not very likely either, is it?   So doing 9 sets of Bis after your workout 2 or 3 times per week is gonna take a valuable chunk of your recovery capacity away, thus stalling progress in your IMPORTANT LIFTS.  So don't do it, unless you don't like getting better.  In which case, you can go back to eating 6-11 servings of grain with your 60g of daily protein, too.  Just don't complain when, after 6 months of a steady diet of curls and those food intakes, you look like this guy

Bicep Curls: Useless, Essential, or What?

Curls.  No other word in the exercise lexicon engenders such a range of different reactions.  To many gym goers "lifting weights" is essentially synonymous with curls.  To others, they're a complete waste of time and effort that could be better spent on more important lifts.  To settle that debate today, I will be offering my own opinion, which of course, settles ALL important debates in the strength and conditioning world.

I (humbly?) submit that, while the curl is not an absolutely essential element of any strength program, it can have its uses in the proper place and time.  While I don't do them as a regular part of a program myself, they can have value in certain contexts.  Let's explore those contexts a bit.

We must first differentiate between useless curls and possibly useful curls.  Useless curls come in many flavors, and an exhaustive list of examples would be very difficult to make.  However, a few general categories will probably include almost every variation of the useless variety.

The first category is "Pink Dumbbell Curls."  Epitomized by this: 

She looks good...but not because of those Pink Dumbbell Curls.

The dumbbells don't absolutely HAVE to be pink; in fact, they can come in a plethora or colors and materials, even iron!  You see people doing them at the gym all the time.  Usually, but not exclusively women (because they think they'll bulk up or get too big if they lift more than 3lb dumbbells).  Also usually, but not exclusively, in a group fitness format where the teacher either thinks the same way, or cannot give each participant enough attention to ensure they use enough weight, OR because they have to be nice because the gym will cut them off the schedule if their numbers are low, and they're worried about losing women if they demand they lift heavy, because they know many women are fooled by reason #1 above (more than 3lb weights make you bulky etc...).

What these scenarios all have in common is that they suffer from the problem of Pink Dumbbell Curls.  Namely, that the weight is so submaximal, that it essentially elicits no training effect whatsoever.  As discussed several times on this blog, you get better by subjecting your body to an appropriate stress, then recovering from that stress.  Upon recovery, called adaptation, your body is now better suited to handle the demands of the stress you previously put on it.  

The problem with Pink Dumbbell Curls is that they are insufficient to provide any stress to your body whatsoever.  They are already so far below the threshold of what you can do, that these curls are more "activity" than exercise.  They can make you better in the same way carrying your purse, or gardening can - they burn calories and provide some basic activity that might help reduce the risk of heart disease by 0.000000412% if you do them "most days of the week for 20 minutes," but are basically a waste of time.

The next category of useless curls is the "Back and Hip Extension Curl."   You can see some dunderhead doing this at the gym pretty much every time you go.  It's usually a man, and he looks like this:

The problem with this type of curl is that it completely misses the point.  Your program should consist mainly of total body exercises that require systemic coordination and thus produce a systemic response.  The main reason you do curls is either vanity or to work on a weak point in your upper body pulling movements.  Doing the Back and Hip Extension Curl accomplishes neither of these two things.  You use your whole body, which is normally good, but for a bicep curl is stupid.  Because you neither work the weak point enough to get a training effect on the biceps directly (because you use your hips and back) nor get the vanity work (also, because of the distribution of stress across so many muscle and joints).  (Power Curls are a different story altogether; I like them for certain people and programs).

Following that, we have the "Curls in the Squat Rack."  This one is self-explanatory.  You can curl anywhere.  You can take a bar anywhere in the gym you want, pick it up off the floor, and curl it.  Even someone with overdeveloped biceps and no deadlift can still deadlift more than they can curl.  But you can't squat just anywhere.  To do a proper back squat, you need a rack (or squat stands) to take the bar out of.  In the absence of a rack, you're limited by what you can clean, get over your head (press/push press/jerk), then safely lower onto your back.  You squat it and THEN still have to re-lift the weight back over your head and safely lower it off your shoulders to the floor when done.  Needless to say, this significantly reduces what you can squat.  Thus, you need a rack.  So when some douchebag is using a rack to do his all important Curls in the Squat Rack, he should be strung up by his fruits and left there overnight.  Just sayin'.

This is also an appropriate response to someone doing curls
in the squat rack.

This is good, too.

Getting close to the end, is the "Excessive Obsession Curl."  This refers not so much to the type of curl being performed as the emphasis on it in the program (or lack of program).  This Excessive Obsession Curler believes he or she must do 4 sets of Barbell Curls, followed by 3 sets of alternating dumbbell curls for mass.  Then 4 sets of EZ-Curl bar preacher curls for definition, and 3 sets of hammer curls for length.  Ending with 5 sets of concentration curls to develop the all-important "peak," like Arnold says.  This person is, frankly, an idiot.  Or under 22, in which case their idiocy is acceptable as part of the growing pains process.

Seriously though, muscles don't recognize the difference between these different exercices.  All they recognize is how hard they have to contract (how many motor units to activate, based on the all-or-nothing principle of muscle contraction - read these links if you don't already know what I'm talking about!).  If more force is required, more motor units are activated and the muscle contracts hard; if less, less.  Concentration curls no more work on peak than barbell curls or fork-to-mouth curls, for that matter.  The shape of your biceps is determined by genetics: the length of the muscle belly and the length and placement of origin and insertion tendons.  The shape of all your other muscles are determined by the same manner, as well.  Thinking otherwise is a myth; a common myth, especially in bodybuilding circles, but a myth nonetheless.

Bottom line: the biggest issue with Excessive Obsession Curls is it ignores a basic truth: Small muscle = small place in the program.  Simple as that.

The final useless curl category is "Unstable Surface Curls."

These are dumb because they force you to fight once again with the Pink Dumbbell Curls problem - you can't use a significant enough load to cause an adaptation that will make you better in any appreciable way.  And as Eric Cressey and others have written about, doing stuff on an unstable surface during performance training, actually reduces performance!  Unstable surfaces have a valuable place in the toolbox of rehab professionals, but the assumption that they should therefore also be part of a performance enhancement program for an uninjured person is incorrect.

This post has already gotten rather long, but we have uncovered important material.  And all, or almost all, of the useless curl variations can be categorized as one of the types listed above.   I will continue in Part 2 about when bicep curls can be a useful addition to a program.

Stay tuned!

How to Pick a Gym in 2012

Happy New Year to all!

Just a quick link today to a decent article in the Yahoo postgame section.  A number of reputable trainers/coaches are interviewed regarding best choices for a new gym (New Years resolution stuff).  Here's the link: http://www.thepostgame.com/blog/training-day/201112/how-pick-gym-2012

Take note of this quote: "Ignore the stuff you don't use," Schuler says. "Swimming pools, saunas, and basketball courts are nice, but why pay for those amenities if you're only joining to use the weights or the cardio machines?"  And you should be planning to use plenty of free weights.

"Does the gym place a greater emphasis on quality free-weight strength training exercises over machine-based programs?" asks strength coach Jim Smith. "There are limitations associated with strength training on machines. Also, machine-based training is less efficient because it is typically associated with isolation exercises that target one specific muscle group."  (emphasis mine)


Does this sound familiar?  I hope so!  (If not, you need to re-read this, and this.) 

If your gym has lots of these...

And none of these, then you should look elsewhere.

This quote, too, was interesting: "Are the trainers certified through a national fitness organization?" Smith encourages you to ask. "Also, how many years experience do they have training clients? Does the trainer know how to teach basic compound movements to a variety of people at different skill levels? A trainer must gain experience through years of training clients at all skill levels and be knowledgeable across a multitude of different training methodologies."

My experience as a personal trainer for 7 years, observing about five hundred trainers over that time, is that approximately 1 in 25 knows how to teach the fundamental compound movements on a solid, basic level, and about 1 in 75 could be called very good at it.  


The crazy part is that with the widespread use of the internet, this information is so much more widely available than it was even 5 years ago.  When I first began teaching and supervising other trainers as a Fitness Manager for Equinox, back in January, 2007, there was only a small amount of quality information and resources online.  Now, you can go to Mark Rippetoe, Dan John, Eric Cressey, and many others' websites and read quality information, daily.


True, you can't become an accomplished coach or expert in training by simply reading things online - you need real life experience both seeing the lifts, and coaching them.  But the ability to access really good information has just exploded in the last five years.  So there's really no excuse, other than laziness and a willingness to do the least possible to "get by" their job, rather than want to truly master material and EXCEL at it, to explain why such a small % of Personal Trainers don't know how to properly coach the lifts.  

When searching for a gym or trainer, be sure to find these things.  They will be the difference between a waste of time and money, and you getting fit!