As many of you have probably noticed or more than likely have given up on, is the fact that my Blogs have been few and far between these days. Reason being, Twitter and Facebook have taken over my life. Business wise, both Twitter and FB are really helpful when it comes to reaching out to potential members. The Blog stuff was fun when it was all that I had, now with the other two websites, I can communicate with 100 times more people.
So, the Blog thing may go by the wayside but I may keep writing some occasional garbage about how some people make me angry. For instance, a lady who is new to the gym and on a free pass of the next couple of weeks, hammered my wife for not having a particular piece of equipment.. it wasn't even a workout piece of equipment. Anyway, seriously you have been given a gift.. a free gift at that, you don't have to sign up for anything so for the sake of being a good person in the world, please let me run my business the way I see fit and perhaps instead of badgering my wife, why not take it out on the workout.
Those of you who are rock star members, thank you for being you and for supporting the business that I love. I would say that it is all of you and I won't let one bad apple ruin for the rest of us.... thank you for letting me vent.. see you all at the gym... oh yeah.. sign up for twitter and type in www.twitter.com/barhybrid... get on board with the rest of us...
Monday, August 24, 2009
Friday, August 7, 2009
Good Hybrid Workout Today.. very special!
Today's workout was extra special. I had the opportunity to show other fitness business owners what Hybrid and our business was all about. For some of you we may be just another place to workout but what you may not be aware of is the fact that The BAR is very unique when it comes to other fitness facilities. You see we approach this business not from a "you have to get results or else" type place but more of a welcome and let's make you workout experience mind blowing and let's make it the best part of your day.
Most trainer guys (not all.. don't get butt hurt guys) only focus on the results that people achieve. We focus on the experience! If your experience is awesome then the results will come.. there is no doubt that it works.. Anyway, the hybrid group today was made up of graduate students from A.T. Still Univeristy (health science school) where Tracie is a professor at. Tracie gave a talk that I was fortunate enough to sit in on, Tuesday. She spoke about trainers putting down the clip board and start focusing on what people really want... A Great Experience!
Long story short, after the talk, numerous trainer graduates came up to (all these people are trainers that own there own facility or want to) Tracie and asked more about our philosophy... after all the Q and A, Tracie finally told everyone to come by and see it for yourself. Well, the school is at least 45 min away so only the ones that were in dire straights for a workout showed up. Two guys missed.. they were from FreeMotion which is a equipment manufacturer (too bad guys, I wanted to look into new equipment.. you could have sold me today!).
Only a few showed up but we gave them everything we offer.. not treating them any different than normal joe shmoe walking through the door.. Ryan was nice enough to put all of us through a Hybrid workout.. I almost puked a little again (i might need to see advice).. anyway, they loved it.. question after question and so forth. We gave them all the sales material that we have and I even told one lady that if she was interested in a Co-Op in Florida.. that I'm in! We'll see what happens there (sometimes change is scary for people).
Well, I have to say and of course I'm biased; judging by the response, we really do have a special place for people to get healthy... Thank you guys for coming today and I hope you incorporate some of the ideas that you saw today into your existing business. Just remember, people are good and they need you to help change there lives! You have to love helping people otherwise don't get into training... it's all about the people..
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Exercise and Intensity
For many of you reading this particular blog, you'll probably get a couple sentences into it and stop right away. Why? Because you are not ready for change in your fitness program. What I've been trying to do with all of our clientele and anyone else who will listen, is to try to get all of you to think outside the box of your regular fitness program and put your focus on intensity of the exercises rather than how many sets and how many reps.
What do I mean? Here we go: For years trainers around the world have always relied on writing down a program based on sets and reps. Yes, sometimes the intensity of one particular exercise may be high, mainly based on the type of exercise, but the rest of the exercises in the program for that day are generally low intensity. What I mean is, if you do a hang clean during the exercise bout your heart rate will be through the roof, if done right. Then your trainer puts you on a seated bicep curl. So now, you've just reached your anaerobic threshold and all of a sudden you drop down to almost resting HR. Then after that curl, you go to a row or whatever it may be, your HR will not come close to what you achieved on that hang clean.
What I would like you to try is this: Approach your workouts like they are your last. Every exercise you do, take your HR to it's max and do it for at least 5-15 seconds and in some cases longer. After you reach it and maintain for a little while, stop the exercise and wait until your HR drop to 65% of your max. For instance, I'm 32 so we'll do a simple equation.. 220-age (32) and I'll add 10 beats per minute because the 220-age isn't really a good indicator. My max is right around 188 +10, so 198 beats per minute (BPM). Granted, I work out already so I can probably reach that number but I'd want to puke after a couple of these. I wouldn't have someone who is new to exercise that has the same age as me try to reach the same Max HR... not a good idea and definitely not safe.
What we want to see happen once you reach your max HR and stop that particular exercise is to check HR again and watch it drop. Once you reach 65% of max, crank up the exercise again. Now the first couple weeks of training this way, you may only last 15 minutes and you'll notice that it takes your HR minutes to drop back down to 65%. But, again after a few weeks of HR training, your HR should drop really fast (recovery). This is how you know that you are starting to get in shape. You know what happens when you start to get in shape? Your body fat drops, your strength increases and thus your power output will increase.
What happens if you continue to workout with sets and reps at low intensities? The same thing that's been happening for the last 20 years of your same program.. nothing! YOU stay the same.
Why all this talk about intensity and HR? I want to make a difference in your life.. I always have, that's why I started doing what I do. No, I don't train anymore.. I sit in this office and continually find ways to motivate not only you guys as clients but my trainers as well.
I've been pumping HYBRID likes it's going out of style. Not to take away from our regular personal training groups or one on ones, they are still on the rise and we continue to make changes in those program to make them better. They HYBRID concept though is really exciting because we can incorporate all that I talked about above without anyone in the class even knowing it. We are able to keep HR at high enough levels to get amazing results... what I would like to do eventually is convince all the members of the gym to take a similar approach to there program.
The next time you walk into the gym, especially those of you who are personal training clients, tell your trainer to "bring it on and there is nothing you can throw at me today that I can't do!" This gets everyone excited because it will allow the trainer to think outside the usual box and get your HR way up and consistent... THIS is how you get in shape!
I've got HR monitors in the studio that are open to anyone. I would suggest getting your own though because of sanitary reasons but by all means, use one of ours if you need. Throw it on before your next workout and let's get rockin' You'll love the results in the end.. I promise!
What do I mean? Here we go: For years trainers around the world have always relied on writing down a program based on sets and reps. Yes, sometimes the intensity of one particular exercise may be high, mainly based on the type of exercise, but the rest of the exercises in the program for that day are generally low intensity. What I mean is, if you do a hang clean during the exercise bout your heart rate will be through the roof, if done right. Then your trainer puts you on a seated bicep curl. So now, you've just reached your anaerobic threshold and all of a sudden you drop down to almost resting HR. Then after that curl, you go to a row or whatever it may be, your HR will not come close to what you achieved on that hang clean.
What I would like you to try is this: Approach your workouts like they are your last. Every exercise you do, take your HR to it's max and do it for at least 5-15 seconds and in some cases longer. After you reach it and maintain for a little while, stop the exercise and wait until your HR drop to 65% of your max. For instance, I'm 32 so we'll do a simple equation.. 220-age (32) and I'll add 10 beats per minute because the 220-age isn't really a good indicator. My max is right around 188 +10, so 198 beats per minute (BPM). Granted, I work out already so I can probably reach that number but I'd want to puke after a couple of these. I wouldn't have someone who is new to exercise that has the same age as me try to reach the same Max HR... not a good idea and definitely not safe.
What we want to see happen once you reach your max HR and stop that particular exercise is to check HR again and watch it drop. Once you reach 65% of max, crank up the exercise again. Now the first couple weeks of training this way, you may only last 15 minutes and you'll notice that it takes your HR minutes to drop back down to 65%. But, again after a few weeks of HR training, your HR should drop really fast (recovery). This is how you know that you are starting to get in shape. You know what happens when you start to get in shape? Your body fat drops, your strength increases and thus your power output will increase.
What happens if you continue to workout with sets and reps at low intensities? The same thing that's been happening for the last 20 years of your same program.. nothing! YOU stay the same.
Why all this talk about intensity and HR? I want to make a difference in your life.. I always have, that's why I started doing what I do. No, I don't train anymore.. I sit in this office and continually find ways to motivate not only you guys as clients but my trainers as well.
I've been pumping HYBRID likes it's going out of style. Not to take away from our regular personal training groups or one on ones, they are still on the rise and we continue to make changes in those program to make them better. They HYBRID concept though is really exciting because we can incorporate all that I talked about above without anyone in the class even knowing it. We are able to keep HR at high enough levels to get amazing results... what I would like to do eventually is convince all the members of the gym to take a similar approach to there program.
The next time you walk into the gym, especially those of you who are personal training clients, tell your trainer to "bring it on and there is nothing you can throw at me today that I can't do!" This gets everyone excited because it will allow the trainer to think outside the usual box and get your HR way up and consistent... THIS is how you get in shape!
I've got HR monitors in the studio that are open to anyone. I would suggest getting your own though because of sanitary reasons but by all means, use one of ours if you need. Throw it on before your next workout and let's get rockin' You'll love the results in the end.. I promise!
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