The Sevan Podcast - The Professional Trainer, Broken Science Event & The Open Ep.4

Episode Date: March 15, 2024

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Let's go seize the night. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash yamex. Benefits vary by car and other conditions apply. I don't know why, but I always get a kick out of reading the comments that are put in before even the show starts. Makes me feel like there's somebody out there ready to rock, which is good. Make sure all my stuff is set up properly so we don't have me coming through the computer

for the first 11 minutes of the show. Hello, everybody. Good afternoon. Welcome back. Hope everybody's doing good today so far. Hope you guys' backs and calves are okay from 24.2. That was a good one. Enjoyed that workout.

But depending on how much double under volume you do throughout the year, that could have torched you. I know a bunch of people who don't do double unders that often. The calves were a serious, serious issue there. Augustus, is this whole series listening to me on my phone? That's weird. Is this the Sousa show? If so, where the heck is the crazy thumbnail?

I know I'm slacking. I just got back from Scottsdale yesterday. As you guys know, you probably watched the review of the Dave Castro Weekend Review. And it was a good time. We went out there for Greg's Broken Science event. It was great. I love being a part Broken Science event. It was great. I love being a part of that stuff. It was so good.

Heidi, this is actually my own show that I do on Tuesdays at 11 or 12, 15 or 10, 45. You guys are a little bit subject to my crazy schedule and the ever-changing and revolving things that happen in my life. Don't talk to me like that. Okay, I apologize. I apologize. I apologize. Sleeky, what's up? Hi, good to see you.

Omar. Ernie, what's going on, my man? Hope you're doing well. Hope you are doing well. What was this one? Jose V. Savon looks different. Did he shave? Yes. and i'm doing the suit

the show shirtless so it'll be like a less buff andrew hiller and a say a shaven seven it'll be a little bit of mixable um your calves can't die if you don't got any dude i will trade you whatever size i have on my calves for a little piece of your shoulders and arms any day of the week but if it's chaos dope hoodie thank you thank you yes hybrid sebon that is me jose hybrid sebon dave is back on his bullshit i know good timing right i put the open in the title because i figured we'd chat a little bit about it's the last week coming up here and dave released one of his clues which are just like nonsensical in my opinion. But fun.

Don't get me wrong. I don't think they have anything to do with the workouts in the sense of like giving you any insights. But I do enjoy the fact that there's some curiosity and he does those. So don't let it sound negative like I don't like them all the time. Asymmetric Ears. Weather is even nicer this week in Phoenix. Are you from Phoenix? those. So don't let it sound negative. Like I don't like them all the time. Uh, asymmetric ears. Weather is even nicer this week in Phoenix. Are you from Phoenix? That's cool. The weather, the weather was good. There was a little bit of rain when I first came in, but after that it was,

it was nice. It was nice. It's kind of crappy here back in the Bay area, a little rain, little overhead clouds and stuff. Um, but I want to start this show today with a discussion that I was having last night with a group of people that have been around CrossFit for a very long time, have had various roles actually working with the company in the past and have been either coaches of gyms or coaches at gyms or own gyms. And I think something that has happened over the last, I would say like five years maybe, is this idea of the professional trainer. And what I mean by that is somebody who coaches CrossFit, trains CrossFit, and dedicates their time to continuing their education. So that way, when they're in the gym, they're constantly looking to do one thing,

improve the people in front of them movement, make them more effective. Of course, make them safer, make them stronger, make them faster. But most importantly, like improve their mechanics. Lately, we've had various coaches that have come into the gym that want to coach at CFL, and everybody kind of runs through. I know I've showed this before in the past, but I'll just show it off again. A couple of you guys have asked me if you could have the PDF to this. You can't. Sorry. Eventually, I'll get something together, but I have no timeline on it,

and I have no plan on sending this to anybody ever. Um, not ever, not ever, but anytime in the near future. And so everybody runs through my variation of what I want to see happen in my gym. So what I'm getting at here is a couple of times when we first start, it's, uh, we have them shadow. So they'll follow me around the gym a little bit. We'll look at some people's movement.

I'll say, Hey, you know, what is, uh, what do you see here? What's going on? And I like to use this example because this has happened several times.

Um, back to, uh, hold on. Some of these comments are funny. Um, Heidi up here said, at least you actually read the comments unlike Siobhan. The problem is I read them too much.

And then I just completely... Somebody will say something either funny or way off the wall. And then I completely lose my train of thought. Corey's harder, better, faster, stronger. Jonathan, what's up, man? Hey, dude. I owe you a text message. I saw your stuff down the list and the offer that you sent out and I'm super into that. And I do think that it would be cool if we got together and did some stuff together referring to what you had texted me. So don't take my no response as a negative thing. It's just on me. Shit got overwhelmed and it kind of got lost in the shuffle. But, um, yeah. Okay. So I using the example of the professional trainer. So someone comes into the gym, they're shadowing me and I'm just walking through because I want to see their perspective on what they see in the class when they're watching the class in front of them do back squats, let's say, or wall balls or something like that. So I'll start picking some people out and we'll say, hey, the person that you're watching over there, let's call him Jenny or something. What do you see what's going on with Jenny?

And they'll look at their squat and I'll pick that person on purpose because they might not be reaching depth, right? And that to me is a test. So if you're ever watching this and you're going to come into the gym and shadow with me, now you kind of know the secret. But I'll ask you, I'll say, what do you see over there? And I purposely pick them out because they're missing depth. And I want to see how they're going to handle that. And they'll most likely say, that person's missing depth. And I'll say, yes. What's going on? And they'll say, they need to get lower. Okay. What's the cue that they're going to use? Get lower. Okay. Why do they need to get lower? And this is what kills me. They'll say, because the rep doesn't count.

What the fuck? The rep doesn't count? That is terrible. Okay, that's a terrible, terrible answer to that. There is no, there is no counting the rep in the class. It is your job as the trainer. And yeah, I'm going to get a little fired up on this one, just because this is something that really pisses me off, but it's your job as the trainer to figure out why this person is missing depth. Are they being lazy? That could be, depth. Are they being lazy? That could be, or is it just like, uh, Mason said it up here already. Um, who clearly he, he's got something, he knows what's going on. Damn it, Mason. I lost your comment. Uh, but he said, um, yes, right here. Uh, that person has shitty hips and ankles that there may be a, some sort of mobility restriction that's happening in there. And it's your job as

the trainer to watch that individual squat and determine why aren't they getting low enough? Why aren't they moving in full range of motion? What is inhibiting that? And again, it could just be the fact that Jenny's just being a little lazy. She's not squatting all the way down. I apologize, Jenny. You're the made up person here, right? Or yeah, Christine said it too. Hip health. That's right. Drop that ass. So too heavy, bad mobility. Exactly. And this is the thing that we need to be focused on as CrossFit trainers. Like if, if we have this issue with, um, uh, people saying CrossFit's not safe, it's our job to make sure that everybody is moving correctly, but also improving in their

movement every single time they come into your class. And I cannot tell you how many times people will focus on this no rep mentality or the, well, they need to do it because of this, or they're not even studying and watching the way that they move to determine what is going on with that person, what needs to be improved in that situation to get them going through full range of motion safely. And maybe due to the limitations in mobility or limitations in the hip, maybe that is the safest range of motion for them right now today. So if you're just basing the fact off like, is the rep good or is the rep bad, as if you're an open judge instead of a CrossFit coach, you are a terrible trainer. And the other thing too is we need to understand that the education just starts at the L1. It's not the end. That's barrier

to entry. You go in, you get your L1, you get the information, and then it is your job to continue to study and learn and study and learn. And you'll realize that if you're somebody who really wants to make a career out of training, or fuck, even if you're doing it part time, you have a full time job, you do two or three hours at your CrossFit gym in exchange for membership, take that shit fucking seriously. And if you're an affiliate owner, then you're doing these value exchange programs, which I do it at my gym too, train your fucking trainers. It is your job to hold them accountable to make sure that they are giving the best possible quality training in your gym. They are not glorified babysitters. And I cannot tell you how frustrating

it is when you go and you visit other CrossFit gyms and the trainer's just fucking standing there in the corner looking around. If you have a class of even just eight people, you need to be running around on that and touching on everybody. Corey, I will not stop yelling. You just have to turn down your volume today. I'm fired up, dude. Because this is how CrossFit elevates. This is how we get better. And so many times I see just this babysit mentality or worse. You're just taking your class and you're just running them through the motions. and you're just running them through the motions. Like you're just there to logistically run people off. And you know what it is? We make this, oh, CrossFit HQ is turning into Orange Theory.

Oh, CrossFit HQ is turning into F45. Because of you, those are the gyms that just run people through the checklist system. The reason why they only have one or two different type of workouts in those facilities is so that way they don't have to really spend time training the trainers, and they can replace them super quickly. The biggest struggle that I have as an affiliate owner is qualified trainers coming into my gym.

That is the biggest, biggest lack of resource that I have. And it gets super frustrating when we want to complain about stuff that HQ is doing, but the responsibility relies on us as the trainers and as the affiliate owners. Slow myself down and take a little sip and read the comments for a minute. Sarah Cooper, I think we had 24 people in class last night. That's tough. It's hard because if you have that many people in your class, I got 26, 28 people that I'm running through the academy right now. And we're just starting

off with like some basic stuff. I'm already bringing in two or three of the trainers and we, we, we will have people that work with the academy, like come in and assist me as well, too. Like the firefighters that are running the academy themselves and what happened, what have you. And they kind of follow my lead on stuff in terms of instruction and making sure it's right. But my job when I bring the firefighters in, for an example, is I'm teaching them in a very small portion to coach each other as well. So we'll bring somebody into the center of the circle. We'll watch them go through a couple of squats. We'll identify a few things. And today we had back squats. All we did was five by five back squat, kind of because it's a time

restriction and logistics, but also too, because I want them to understand that we're taking this seriously and we're going to perfect our squats today. And then I will stand there and watch a couple of them squat. And then I'll turn to the people that are watching them and they're not even being trainers or being firefighters. And I'll say, what went wrong with that? Because I know that if they could start identifying and seeing faults and maybe even give a little feedback that their movement is going to start to get a lot better. But when you got 24 people in a class that gets tough, you are going to have to start bringing in more trainers. RK, Sousa, it's my fault. I ruined CrossFit. I'm sorry. That's okay. At least

you've recognized it. And now we can move on and fix it. You and me together, RK, hand in hand, hand in hand. And I was talking with one of the filmmakers that we were working with and he was saying like, hey, yeah, I'm so disappointed I can't do this open workout. And I was like, oh, why? What's going on? He's like, I'm suffering from sciatica. I'm like, okay, did something happen? Were you always dealing with this? Like, does it just occur? And he's like, oh, it only kind of occurs in like, you know, if I do kettlebell swings or deadlifts and blah, blah, blah. And I said, okay. So I start taking them through the process of figuring out like why that restriction is

occurring. And immediately I was like, dude, you're externally rotating your knees when you're deadlift, it's locking your hip in place. And when you hinge, it's pulling way further from your hip, which is loading up your piriformis and making that super tight. And he was like, oh shit, I've never been told that. This guy's been crossfitting for a long time. And I asked him, I said, hey, as we were going through all that, I said, at the gym that you go to, did they discuss any of that with you? Do you guys go over or break down any of those details? Are you giving a couple of points of performance for each movement? Is the coach giving a couple of points of performance for each, each class? No. Hmm. That's a problem. So now this person might be good, ready to squat,

dealing with some limitations and the hinge and everything else. And then that slowly exacerbates. Now he can't do those two movements. That'll slowly exacerbate. He can't do more movements. And then all of a sudden he's going to be like, yeah, CrossFit's not for me. And that happens quite a bit. Oh, there was a phone call and it was off.

there was a phone call and it was off. And so I just, I wanted to touch base on this because when Greg originally started, he was really adamant about calling it the professional trainer. And there was a really big point where people would say, uh, Hey, you know, if you sold, if you sold Reebok CrossFit shoes in your gym or this or that, you could make X amount of more money per month. And there's a video where Greg says, yeah, but then what ends up happening is my trainer now goes from teaching virtuosity in the squat, the hinge, the overhead press to running over and checking inventory and sizing shoes and saying, oh, let me see if I got a nine in

the back. You might be a nine and a half. And now you're just a shoe salesman. You're not a trainer. So if you own a CrossFit gym, I always ask a couple of questions when I find out with people coach at gyms. I'll usually say,

hey, how often does the owner hold some sort of coaches meeting? Usually the answer is never. I'll say, hey, how much does the owner hold some sort of coaches meeting? Usually the answer is never. I'll say, hey, how much does the affiliate owner give back to you in your continued education? Are they asking you to take the online courses that CrossFit is offering? Are they investing in you in terms of paying for those courses? Are they paying for books?

All that stuff. What's happening? I'm getting all freaked out here. Is everything okay? Is it an echo? Is there an echo? I don't know what happened. So as I... I am on the right show. Yeah. Okay. I'm freaking out. I don't know what's going on. And so that, in my opinion, is one of the absolute biggest things that we could do. Did you turn? What's happening to my show? I didn't press the call number. Is the call number on? I don't know. I could see. You guys can't see, but I could see like, Simone's down in a little box down here, but I can't see or hear him or anything. And so I'm kind of like, I'm kind of freaked out. Threw me off. No echo that I could hear. Okay. All right.

All right. All right. So we need to get back to, um, investing into our trainers. If you are an affiliate owner, when you bring your trainers in, what system are you bringing them through? This needs to be a system that you've created that you're responsible for. You can't just say, okay, come on in. You're good to go. Let's bring this trainer in. You have your L1. No, you need to make sure that you are getting your stuff. Call forwarding is on. Okay, I think we have the live call-in number. That's what just happened. Sorry, guys. This is all over the place.

I was totally distracted. Okay, we have a live call-in number on. Yeah, I know. I saw that too, Jonathan. I was like, it kind of threw me off. I wasn't sure what was going on. If somebody wants to... Hold on.

Let me see if I could connect this now. We'll get back on discussion. I promise I'll pick up that thread of the thought with the responsibility of the affiliate owner here. And this is me saying this. I don't think that CrossFit HQ should enforce this at all, but okay, we're connected. Okay, if anybody wants to call in and give it a try,

that would be awesome. Okay. Yeah, we got it. Sorry. Okay. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. Oh, boy. Hold on. Hold on. Oh, shit. I just hung up on somebody okay hello caller are you there yes oh fantastic wait can you speak again was that your real voice it's my real voice okay all right all right i could have tell it was like hold on shit now somebody's calling back okay all right hi caller how are you what's your name who is this i'm good my name's sleaky hi sleaky i'm great how are you? What's your name? Who is this? I'm good. My name is Sleeky. Hi, Sleeky. I'm great. How are you doing today? I'm good. I'm good. Will you call in to just test the line for me or do you have an opinion on the professional trainer?

I mean, I agree with everything you're saying. Okay. But that's my opinion on the professional trainer. That's it. Okay. Awesome. I won't hold you on here and make you feel more awkward. Thank you. Thank you so much for testing and testing the call line. I appreciate that. Okay. All right. Good day. Good to hear your voice. Okay. Bye. Okay. Awesome. All right. We got the phone line up working. Thank you, Stefan. I appreciate that. And now you guys got to hear Sleeky's voice. Interesting. Does it match the profile pic? voice. Hmm. Interesting. Does it match the profile pic? Okay. Hold on. We got another call now.

Hold on. Hold on. Call her. Hello. You're live. Call her. Hello. You're live on the line. What's up, Matt? Keith, how are you, sir? I'm doing all right. How are you? I'm great. I'm great. Do you, uh, you have an opinion on the professional trainer? I do, man. I have, you know, getting this gym up and running. We've got six coaches that we've brought in and it's, um, wait, do you say six coaches? It's like six coaches. Dude, how'd you find six coaches? Um, I just have really great friends who are interested in taking an L1 if I'm willing to pay for it. I'm willing to pay for it. People come coach at my gym, please. I need people. I'm like, I'm over here saying like, Oh,

I'll get you hooked up with a department within like the first year or so of coaching at my gym and hook you up with a $50,000 a year job that you were three extra hours for. And people are like, Oh, it's crazy. That's crazy. Okay. Anyway, sorry. We've been, um, we've been super lucky to just find people that are, that are like, that want to be, I mean, like, I, I think I've shared this before. Like we were, our community did not have a CrossFit gym for a long time and, um, bringing one back, there's a lot of pent-up demand and energy and people are like very interested in helping so it's been great so you know I've bought a few L1s for some coaches and but that what that means is they're all new not a ton of

floor experience not a ton of I mean they're great people and they're great with relationships but a huge part of what I've been doing, um, given the fact that all my coaches are new is I'm watching every single class for the past three weeks. Um, every single class, every single like brief, every single demo. And I spend a full 15 to 30 minutes after every single class with all the coaches that's awesome and i've done that for three so it's um it's a boatload of my own time yep um but it's created like and i think we've talked about this in the past um you and i have anyway is like i have to establish that as my gym is getting up and running um because like whatever the culture what however we start this thing is how it's going to continue to run. And so I need to make sure that my coaches are holding the standard.

I need to make sure that I'm holding the standard for them. And what that inevitably does, and I actually saw this happen in class yesterday, is like the members are also starting to hold the standard for each other. And that's like, we're only three weeks in. And that's kind of of that's what the expectation is from the members already is like hey you haven't been to class yet and the wall balls go this way yeah yeah right yep that's awesome i think it's i mean it's and so that's like that's a really specific tactic that i've been playing on it's just like having a one-on-one sit-down meeting after the classes with coaches when

i'm watching them coach um but there's so much other stuff too that i think goes into that is like sending out your class plans before the week starts and giving instruction on hey this class is going to get a little bit messy make sure you're comfortable with the layout before you set the rowers up or whatever like there's just a lot of simple stuff that if you've been doing this for a long time comes really naturally if you haven't feels terrifying right yeah i mean i've got one coach that has coached in another gym before where they had tons of equipment tons of space um we have 2 000 square feet and four rowers. So when I have a class of 12 people that all have to use a rower, we've got to get really creative with how do you run heat or waves or like we did FICO on bad last night with 15 people. Um, with we, I brought a rower from home.

So we had five rowers. So we literally had to figure out how to run like waves of people through FICO on bad. Yep. Yep. And so like, I have a pretty good feel for how to run like waves of people through fight going bad yep yep and so like i have a pretty good feel for how to do that a lot of my coaches are like oh my god what's going what's happening right now yeah and it can get overwhelming quick on the stage right like if you're up there and you're a new coach and you're just just trying to get your feet wet and you're already feeling a little bit nervous and all of a sudden your class fills up and you didn't expect that and you're staring at 15 people staring at you there's a real like freeze moment of like oh shit what do i do now you know right right and so and like honestly that like that if they get into that

position where they're freezing then that also we've got a bunch of brand new people that have never done crossfit before so they see the coach freak out and then they're freaking out and they're like oh my god i don't know if I can do this. So as the owner, if somebody is like responsible for making sure that like people are taken care of, coaches are taken care of and members are taken care of. Um, you just gotta like look through things and be thoughtful about, um, how you're preparing, you know, how you're preparing people in your community to, to engage with this beautiful thing we call CrossFit. Yeah. Yeah. And that's a great point. And, uh, and thank you for that because you're right. As a,

as a gym owner, it's just going to take that time and dedication. Like if you're an affiliate owner, like it is going to take the fact of like, yeah, you're going to have to either pay somebody to be in there with, you know, whether you have a value exchange or you're paying them money, right. It's like, yeah, you're going to have to pay them to be there in your location, in your spot to run that class. And then on top of that, you're going to have to sit there for a while and also then coach them to coach the class. That's just, that's the name of the game up until the point that you feel comfortable

and confident enough that they can run it the way that you intended to and that you want it to be ran in your gym. Spot on. Yeah. Yeah. Great feedback, ran in your gym. Spot on. Yeah. Yeah. Great feedback, man. Thank you. Good stuff.

Like you want to call it? That was the only piece I had. All right, man. Appreciate you guys. Thank you, Keith. Appreciate it, man. All right. Bye.

Yeah. Keith, he makes a really good point there. Like when you first are bringing new people in, it's just like so many people will bring in an L1 and they're like, oh, you got your one? Cool. You're good. Are you ready for Thursday at 11? And it's like, sure. And then you just like let them go. Like that's where these bad habits start from. And then what ends up happening is that once that coach is in there and working that way for that period of time, they get settled into it. And all of a sudden you show up and you want to give a bunch of feedback. If you don't have

the relationship built with the coach where they're they're comfortable with the feedback they know that that's part of the process they know that they're learning still and you're and you're helping teaching them then they could get really turned off by that too because you're like dude i've been here for like two months doing it this way and now you're gonna say something like why didn't you say something before so setting that expectation right off the jump when you bring them in is super, super important. And that's why we have them come in and shadow with me or shadow with Albert. And they literally sit side by side with each other and watch.

And we start asking them questions and going through stuff right from the get go. And then we give them feedback after their class that day. And then there's a continuous feedback that continues. It might not be every class every day, especially if you're a more experienced coach and you kind of have a majority of it together. That feedback might be a little bit more spread out, but it's still going to happen. And we're still going to have monthly coaches meetings

where we get everybody together into the same room. Hello, caller. Welcome to the show. What's your name? Susan. Hi, caller. Welcome to the show. hey thank you who is this cory cory what's up man how you doing what's up i'm doing fantastic brother so on the topic of uh so when i first started um we had to start coaching that is we had to shadow either cecil or sarah to be going on place for i don't remember how many classes, but it was enough. You know, three or four just to kind of get used to being, hey, in front of people, and this is how we're going to keep it running and all that good stuff.

Like, there's a whole process that was involved. Oh, man, I was thankful for it because coming out of the L1, you're like, yeah, I'm ready to take on whatever. And you're really not. So it's a whole other thing. And then as far as the rest of the stuff you were saying earlier, we have a coaches meeting about once every other month or so, depending on need. Like if, you know, we had two of them meeting up to the open,

when we had a competition at the gym, we got stuff coming up. We try to have one at least that often because we also try to do stuff um for people in the gym that often we have uh i'm giving a scaling seminar next weekend uh me and one of the other coaches like right after i have one class on saturday morning where we normally have two and then after that it could be me and a Aiden standing up there in front of everybody and going over the benefits of scaling and why do we do it and what's all involved in it. And we were encouraged to do that by Cecil by saying, hey, take a specialty course, whatever one strikes you fancy. And then we will try to, you know, use whoever takes what, we'll look at it and try to push it towards having some sort of seminar.

Like we've had gymnastics ones, weightlifting ones. Um, we actually had a, uh, that's the word I'm looking for. So these are like specialty courses that, that you guys are running for the members at your gym. Correct. Oh, awesome. That's really cool. I mean, trying to add value, you know, trying to provide values to the people that are there. Besides just, hey, you can, you know, you can come to class at whatever the class times are and then move it on from there.

You know, we got an open gym on Sundays. That's fantastic. on from there. Oh, you know, we got an open gym on Sundays. That's fantastic. You know, just trying to provide a little bit of extra value to keep people there and keep people interested. Yeah. Yeah, that's great. That's great. Those are all, those are really good additions and things that you could do to continue to keep the education up in the gym. And I like the idea of specialty courses because you said like you're adding more value to the members because you can really dig in on these movements. But then for the coaching standpoint, it's really fun because you get to spend a whole hour or an hour and a half or something like that just discussing one particular movement, like the kip or the swing on the pull bar or something,

right? Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. We have the whole class broken down into a box, absolutely like we we have we have the whole class broken down into blocks like starting off with the entire you know why do why you know starting off with questions hey why do we scale why do y'all think you scale stuff you know and then kind of going into the why behind it and then different methods of it you know uh scaling monostructural scaling gymnastics scaling weightlifting whatever that whatever that might entail. Right. And then we're going to go bring everybody through a warm-up, and then we're going to make everybody do Helen, and the intention is to get everybody to finish within the time domain that it's supposed to be in. Right.

Like, no matter what your level is, I want you to scale, I want everybody to scale appropriately so we all finish within this timeframe. Totally. If that happens, then we've done it. Then we feel like we've done a good job. Yeah. And the other thing I want to say is that when somebody was talking about having like 24 people in a class or something like that, my fourth week on my own, I had 20 people at a 5 30 class um and it was

fucking outrageous dude like uh my hair was on fire but i didn't know that because like you're running back and forth just trying to like you said touch everybody and kind of hey okay what's going on and there's literally 10 people on one side of the gym and 10 people on the other side of the gym you're try and keep track of everybody and making sure nobody hurts themselves. It's fantastic. I highly recommend it. If you haven't done it, it's exciting as shit.

It's good. That hour flies by, right? When you get like 20 plus people in a class and you have that hour, it's just like you feel like you're racing that clock the whole time to not only get everything done, but still give them a great experience, still give some feedback, like everything, right?

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. That's what kind of, you kind of, you get the, you get the briefs in and then you kind of look at it around and go, anybody got any questions? No. Good. Let's move on. Right.

Right. Yeah, totally. Totally. Well, awesome, man. Thank you so much for, yeah. Thank you, man. Thank you for the call. I appreciate it.

Yeah. yeah thank you man thank you for the call i appreciate it yeah i mean there's lots of different ways that people could skin the cat with this right but the overarching theme is that when you get the l1 and a new coach comes into your gym like their their journey has just begun and there's so much um that's learning that still needs to occur there's so much coaching you still got to get a lot of reps in. And I don't mean this to say that, like, if I bring a brand new coach into the thing, into the, into the gym and start having them put into the hour that we're not still giving them room to like grow and make mistakes. Cause inevitably that's still going to happen. But the question is, is like, do you have safeguards in place? Are you checking in with them? Is there going to be a meeting? Are you going to give one-on-one feedback? Are you going to give an evaluation where you actually document their class and then do a closed room, closed door, kind of like sit down with them and maybe another one of the coach

where you go over with a fine tooth comb, like each piece of the class, because all those things create the culture inside of your gym and the way that the coaches are going to act, behave, and the way that they're going to give the experience to the members that are coming in. And it's so important because when you guys know when someone first walks through the door that are brand new to CrossFit, they can be super intimidated by it. They're going to see all this stuff that's going on that they don't think they could do like rope climbs or heaven forbid they show up on like a handstand push-up day and everybody's like upside down and they're like trying to just run away because they're thinking there's no way I can do this. But you could immediately eliminate that by being

super detailed in how you start coaching them right off the bat. And going back to the whole, oh, well, that's a no rep because they didn't get low enough mentality. That is not coaching. That is not coaching. And you could also, if you're a gym owner, you could also put certain safeguards in place that'll help make sure that your coaches are checking the boxes. And so what I mean by that is for us, we, you have to give some sort of cue to each person in your class. So at the end of the class, if everybody's walking out, I could go up and I could say, well, you will use our girl, Jenny again, as an example. And I'll be like, Hey, Jenny, did Matt give you any cues over there today? Like what, what was the takeaway? And she should be able to be like, Oh, yeah, it really helped out. I had my feet a little too narrow, my squat, it was causing me to tip forward,

I widened out my feet, I was able to sit my hips back and down. And my squats felt so much better today. It was great. I was able to add a little bit more weight. And I felt really comfortable at the bottom. It's like, okay, amazing. Right. Same thing I, um, enforces that we need two points of performance. So if we're teaching a movement and I don't care if you've been in the class for five minutes or five years, like everybody could use a little bit more reminding everybody could use a little bit more tightening up of their, of their movements. And so if you, if you're doing front squat, you know, what are you going to be your two points of performance? And I leave that up to the individuals or the coach to decide because I want thinking shooters. I don't just want them to stare

down at a piece of paper and follow the whole entire lesson plan. Sure, we have notes in there on our coaches' documents for the workouts, and sometimes there'll be questions in the group set, and that's all appropriate. But I still want them to have the freedom to come in and design their own warmups. I still want them to have the freedom to come in and choose their points of performance today. I like that different coaches are going to bring different flavors and different cues and stuff into their classes. And that variety is important to have. So although there's a lot of structure around what I do, I don't want it to also make it sound like the coaches don't have any freedom to be themselves or to operate amongst their own ways. I was kind of looking at through

some of these comments. I'm like super far behind now. But the, why is it nerve-wracking to call in? Isn't that funny? So many people say that and are like afraid to call in. It's just me. Imagine being this guy, staring at the camera and a screen,

talking to the internet, talking about freaking nerve-wracking. And so the point being here with that is that I really want all of us here to focus on that if you're a trainer you're a coach it's your responsibility to make sure that you're continuing your education and figuring out how you could better the coach's experience each time let's go through the uh i liked mason's comments in here he seems as fired up as i am with this which is cool mason uh my gym is so small and intimate that if uh that i

have 20 members i cannot coach a crossfit class like if i wait sorry i fucked that up my gym is so small and intimate that i have 20 members that could coach CrossFit class. I'm guessing that means like you teach them so well that they could become coaches. Madeline, Magalate, Magalate, Magalate. That's for the live call-in shows. Magalate, Sleeky, your voice is beautiful. Yeah, I know, right? Now you guys have a voice to put that to.

So I just wanted to get that point across because it was just it's just so frustrating to see especially to like one of the worst things i also think is people will go through and they'll start they'll start say uh maybe they'll start off strong they'll have a great whiteboard they'll bring everybody in they run a pretty decent warm up and the mechcon starts and all of a sudden, they just kind of like fade away into the background, right? And for me, it's like, no, that's the time that you're cranking up your energy.

I used to use the term, you want the members to feel like you're in the workout with them. And so what I mean by that is you're moving around so much and giving feedback. Hopefully, you're recalling back to the points that you already talked about. The two points of performance that you talked about as you kind of like built up to the warmup and let them up. So that way we're reminding them of, hey, just like we talked about,

keep that chest up as they're tired. And they're kind of giving you the head nod like, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. And being able to still stay as active in that Metcon portion of the class as you were throughout the beginning is also vitally important. We have a, a, one of the other rules that we kind of operate by is that if I walk into the gym and I just stand there at the front of the room, if I don't know within about 15 seconds,

20 seconds of who's coaching that class, that's a problem. That's a problem. I need to get in there and say like, Oh, I could easily tell who this coach is because they have a commanding presence. Like they're in there, they're running the show. Everybody's looking towards them. You could hear their voice. They're very confident in how they're speaking and how they're articulating what needs

to be done. Albert's here. Albert's my dude coaches talk less members move more direct points of performance choose your skills ahead of time that was literally our uh the last meeting that we had with the coaches those are the three things that we worked on uh improving and that's totally right like another thing too is when you dwindle it down to just like two points of performance that you're focusing on for that day as newer coaches they try to like make up for their lack of knowledge by filling it with talking. So all of a sudden they'll start explaining what to do rather than giving you the points of performance and like showing you or telling you how to do it.

What did Jeeze Louise say? I talk a lot, but I do enjoy the conversations I have with members. Yeah, that's different. He's referring to the sense of like when you're running drills or you're going over those points of performance, it needs to be like super concise. Like then once they're lifting, that's another thing that we talk about to like go over and spend some time with them. It doesn't always need to be just about the movements and nor should it like you should invest in them. Like, hey, how are things going? How is life outside of the gym? You know how the kids, Jenny, they're doing good, whatever the case may be, because the more you invest in them and the more that they feel that they, they trust you and everything else, then, um, the, the easier it's going to be to coach

them, the either it's going to be to coach them. So within 15 seconds, you're supposed to know who the, yeah. And yeah, that's a great, that's a great, great statement. And I'm not going to pick on you here, Heidi, but I'm going to pick on you a little bit. Heidi said, so within 15 seconds, you're supposed to know who the coach is, but also less talking. Fuck yeah. Yes, because you could be not talking at all.

And I could, I still should know who the coach is. You should still see their presence. You should see it in the way that they're looking and intentively watching the members. You should see it as in when like somebody finishes a lift and racks the bar up that they're headed over there to give some feedback. You should see in the way that they're stepping back and watching the group outside of just them talking. Yes, that's a good point. You should be able to have a presence without just having to build that presence just around your voice. Just around your voice. Yeah.

Just surround your voice. Just surround your voice. Yeah. So much buildup. Sleeky. So much buildup. And I'm afraid it'll be a severe letdown when and if we meet. That's never meet your heroes, right?

Just stay sleeky in the comments and then you won't have to worry about that. Although, I think I remember who you are and I would disagree. You wouldn't be a disappointment. All right. See? Yeah. Blade knows. He knows how it is money. That's right. That's right. Mason, relationship first, then you can hammer them without getting fed. Exactly. And sometimes if you watch the way that I give feedback and stuff, you'd be like, oh, that seemed like a little rude. But it's 100% right. Once you've built the relationship and you've given them value... This is another Stephen Covey thing, which is a lot of the... If you read The 7 Habits of Highly Successful People, you're going to have the majority of

the relationship building part in this book. I literally just ripped a ton of it off and put it in there, but applied it to the affiliate, applied it to coaching. And once that member knows you have truly their best interest in heart, you can get away with just being like, Jenny, knees out. What the fuck? I just told you that. And then she's like, Oh, sorry. And we'll do it. Because even though that's a harsh example of giving a cue, then the trust that you've already established, they know you're not just like picking on them or being, or being rude or anything like that. Like you're just, you're just being straight to the point and you get away with it because you made a lot of, like, I was going to say the Stephen, the Stephen Covey thing, he made a lot of deposits into their emotional

bank account. So if you make a small withdrawal, it ain't going to break the bank. Heidi's always bringing these funny comments. Only sleep with members, but no talking. Yeah, way to take that one out in the love field there. And so I just want to put that back on us. And if you're inside of a gym, like a lot of the conversations that I've had with, uh, a lot of the conversations I've had with some affiliate owners that have called or like we, we sat down and like talked and stuff, they'll start, um, uh, I'm sorry, not affiliate owners, but coaches, they'll start saying like, Hey, I want to do this, this, this, and this, but it's the affiliate owner says no, or there's a conflict there or they won't let me, or they don't coach this way or something like that. And that goes back to the communication between the team. If you're having opportunities where

you're in meetings or the affiliate owner has made, for lack of better words, an open door policy where you could come in and they accept feedback as well, that's super important. Because if you're telling your coaches, hey, we're going to give you a lot of feedback and we're going to continue your education. And then they come with some feedback with you and you're kind of telling your coaches, Hey, we're going to give you a lot of feedback and we're going to continue your education. And then they come with some feedback with you and you're like, fuck, don't tell me about to do, but it's my gym. Then the whole thing goes out the window. So if you're somebody who is also giving a lot of feedback and building that into your culture, know that you're going to have to accept it too. You're going to have to take some of that feedback as well. And who knows? You never know where great advice and things come from. So if you're closed off to feedback because you're the owner or something like that, you're

missing out on a big opportunity for improvement. And this won't be the first discussion that we'll have on the professional trainer. I just kind of wanted to go over that because just the discussions that I was having a couple of days ago and just thought it was important to talk about. Now I'm going to kind of get together a little bit more points on this in the future, but man, coach your people, coach your people. Like there's always something to improve in your squat. There's always something to improve in your deadlift. There's always something to improve in the overhead position. And it's funny too, because like, I remember we had a coach one time that she was like super timid on giving a lot of feedback. So she would like intently watch the movement. Like you'd have this whole like head turn and she was like super into

it. And like the movement's still all kind of fucked up. And then she would just like nod and be like, and like walk away. And you're like, no, go fix it. Like, don't be afraid to get in there and just like, and fix the movement. Like you can't be timid about it either.

Caller. Welcome to the show. And goodbye. I always wanted to, cause it's coming through my like personal phone. Cause it's a call 40. Like if someone's going to call in, that is made to like call me and has

no idea i'm even like on the show right now and then they just call and they get stuck online um and that's the other thing too i appreciate everybody who was like oh i'd coach for you i'd coach for you it's super expensive to live in california yeah you are not you are not freaking kidding it is very expensive to live out here and i I get that in order to make coaching like a full-time job and career, like in live out here, it's going to be tough. That's going to be tough, but opportunities abundant, especially in my gym in particular, because like I've had to unfortunately like turn down like Hayward SWAT

because the city of Hayward won't like pay me out for two jobs in two different departments and stuff like that. So there's, there's ample opportunity um for for coaches out here in this area to make a living off of it but it's going to take some hustle and you gotta gotta want it you gotta go after it you can't just expect to like have somebody throw it into your lap caller hi welcome to the show yo suza what's up it's seema hi seema how you doing good how are you i am great what's up? It's Seema. Hi, Seema. How are you doing? Good. How are you? I am great. What's up? I have a question for you regarding if you're a member of a gym

and all of the equipment is really getting rusty. Yep. And the rowers air out and the handles are getting loose. How would you approach a gym owner and be like, I'll pay for this. We can't get something like fixed on a gym. Without sounding like you don't take care of your gym. I don't like it here. That is a great question.

So here's where I would start. I would start by first saying a couple things that you really enjoy about the gym. What did Sevan call it? The shit sandwich? Make them kind of the shit sandwich and say like, hey, there's a lot of really... XYZ is awesome, or I love the way you do this. Find a way to naturally bake that into the conversation. And then I would say, hey, I noticed a couple of the barbells just need a little TLC. Did you want me to go ahead and handle that for you? I don't know how to do that other than get some WD-40.

No, but it doesn't matter if you do it or not. You're just opening the door to the conversation, right? So like, or you could say like, um, uh, about the rowers or something like that. Like, Hey, I was on, I was on rower number six, assuming they have them labeled that they probably don't have them numbered, but I was on rower number six and I, I gave like the rail a nice, like wipe down. Um, did you want me to go ahead and wipe down, wipe down all the rails of the, uh, all the rest of the rowers? And then if they're like, yeah, sure. You could do that. And then come they're like, yeah, sure, you could do that and then come back and say, Hey,

after I cleaned off the rails to the rowers, I noticed some of the flywheels and stuff like that were like really sticky. I found this awesome tech that cleans the rowers. Did you want me to give them a call or, or can I assist you with that? So there is like services that will go around the gyms and do that oh yeah yeah and most likely it might even come from just members like we like i had a member um our assault bikes needed some tlc bad and so i had a member of mine when i was looking to find somebody and he was like oh you need somebody for the bikes like i'll take care of it i was like perfect i'll pay you x amount per

bike you do and any uh whatever we need as far as equipment, if you just want to order it, just send me the receipts. I'll just reimburse you everything. I'd love for you to do that. And then he was like, yeah, sure. I'm game. And then boom, a week or so later, majority of my assault bikes and stuff were already getting service.

All right. Shit sandwich and offer to help. Yeah. I mean, here's the thing. If you just point out a problem, right? And you're just like, hey, this sucks or thing. If you just point out a problem, right. And you're just like, Hey, this sucks. Or these are bad. Or like, we should really do something about that. Like most owners are just going to get defensive right away. And most likely they're like, Oh

shit. Like, you know, they probably know that they need to do it. So you're touching on an insecurity most likely. And so that's why usually most of them will get super defensive. But if you come from a place of like especially the example that i gave about like right wiping down the rails of the rowers already that's that doesn't take a talent like you don't need to have a skill set to do that right all you need to do is just google online to make sure you're not using some sort of sanitization that's going to like screw it up in in a way and then just and then just wipe it down so that way when you're going to them you're like, I've already wiped down the rowers.

They just need a little TLC there. Did you want me to go ahead and help with XYZ? And so you've already given. And then you're asking, do you need help with? And so that's just a very different conversation and a way to approach it than just pointing out a problem. Even if you point out a problem and then try to come to a solution afterwards,

like I said, if you tap in on some sort of insecurity, they're just going to get defensive and they might not be able to see past that first statement. Yeah, well, got it. Thank you so much. And you're killing it, Susa. Love having these shows. Oh, thank you. I really appreciate that, Seema. Bye. All right. Bye. Hey, let me know how it goes. If you do it, let me know how it goes. Bye. All right. Bye. Hey, let me know how it goes. If you do it, let me know how it goes. And that's another thing too. If you do, if you are trying to go in and help and stuff like that, just be really strategic in the way that you're offering. Because I know if somebody came to me and was like, Hey, Matt, rower one or two has been like busted in the back over there a little bit. You have a bunch of them. So it hasn't really affected it that much, but those need to be

like fixed. I'd be like, Oh fuck. I know you're right, but I haven't done it. Just literally find a way to... And I don't mean to be passive-aggressive. Sean, the passive-aggressive way is not good. It would be better to say the rows will last longer if they're maintained. How is that different than what I said? You could add that in there, but I like the approach of actually doing the thing first or partly and then backing into

something like that. That might be the better approach too. I don't mean to be a passive-aggressive. I agree. A passive-aggressive is not good, but hopefully that didn't come off too much as passive-aggressive. That was not the intention there. Hello, caller. Welcome to the show. What up, Matt? It's Ernie. Ernie, how you doing, man? Hello, caller. Welcome to the show. What up, Matt?

It's Ernie. Ernie, how you doing, man? Good, man. Yourself? I'm great. I'm great. Just to touch back on what Simo was saying, this is just one of the ways that I started coaching, actually. When I started coaching in Laredo, I remember there was a very limited number of coaches.

And I remember mentioning it to the head coach. Like, hey, man, if you need help, tell me. I'll help out the members there. Or, hey, bud, if there's new people, tell me. I'll help you out. And I did that for probably like a year, dude. And then basically I took my L1. And then from there, they offered me a spot. And that's how I started coaching.

So whether it's uh calling them out on like equipment or if they just need help in general i i usually think just like telling them that you're willing to help is a great way to kind of lean into it or like uh get them to help i guess you help them yeah exactly and uh sleek he said it really well here um which is the same exact theme that you're you're going Ernie. So just kind of emphasizing the point you're making. Sleeky said, you got to come with a solution if you bring a problem to the table. And I cannot agree with you. Yes, exactly. Because if you don't have some sort of solution in place, you're not really contributing. You're just kind of pointing at

something that's wrong and then being like, well, this needs to be fixed. And chances are, depending on the situation, the affiliate owner, like, man, they might be dealing with a lot of other stuff and like I said, know that they need to do these things or they should be doing these things. And they might get super defensive just because you're, you're, you're pushing a button, right? Exactly. Yeah, man.

I mean, uh, it's, it's good. Honestly, this, this show of yours, it's doing great. I really liked how, how many people are calling in how many uh familiar voices i've been hearing and yeah dude i'm really happy to to see that you're being consistent with it hey thanks ernie i really appreciate that man i appreciate it i brought no problem but you have a good day i take it easy too bye um ernie is a shining example of someone that just shows up and adds value to he helped out at at the CrossFit for Health Summit, as I'm sure some of you guys know now. And like you gave him like just a tiny bit of direction. He just took it and ran with it and just like owned the project,

saw it through, immediately finished, and then just kind of was like, hey, what's next? Or would already see the next thing that was coming up and would be like, hey, I just finished this. I moved this over here. Was that okay? Did you guys want? And it's just like, you know, if you show up like that and you're continuing just problem solving and like Sleeky said, like bringing a solution and not just pointing out a problem, like it makes

you so valuable to whatever it is that you're doing, whether it's coaching in the gym or just your job and stuff, uh, in general. Um, Heidi, okay. I'm changing the subject. I think CrossFit HQ's main objective should be to combat the public perception of to CrossFit causes injury. Most people I talked to still have this opinion. Yeah, it's kind of the same thing that I was talking about. We could point at HQ and tell them they should do this, they should do this. But at the end of the day, nobody at CrossFit HQ is selling a membership. Nobody at CrossFit HQ is doing the on-ramp or bringing the new person into your class. Nobody at CrossFit HQ is showing up to the affiliates

and coaching each day. So if we want to start to change that perception of CrossFit and the safety issue, we need to do that by being excellent trainers and continuing to pursue virtuosity in the move in people's movement and, uh, continuing to pursue efficacy in their movements and everything else, because that's, what's going to really keep people safe. The other thing is, is like not rushing. Like so many people get into CrossFit and like, you know, a month or two in

they're showing up, you know, more days a week. And then three months in, they're doing two days a week and then, uh, or two a days. And the next thing you know, they're going to the CrossFit games and like, all of a sudden they have all this volume and they just get burnt out or most likely, um, overuse injury or something like that. And then they leave the gym and then they're the ones that are like, Oh, well, you know, CrossFit hurt me. And you're like, no, it's kind of just, it's kind of just you. But most people won't even walk into the door. That's fine. That's, you're not going to get everybody. And we shouldn't try to sell people that are not, that don't want to be sold. Like, I think if we, if the more you invest into your members that you currently have and give

them just an awesome experience and they start seeing the value, those are going to be the people that'll help convince the people that won't walk through the door. And I don't totally disagree with you either, Heidi. I do believe that CrossFit HQ could be changed? I think that I answered that. I think that question came before I finished my sentence there. Yes, thank you. Stop arguing. Yeah, okay. We were on the same page. I didn't mean to say that I was like pushing back against you. I didn't believe with it. But I think that at the heart of that is going to be a lot of responsibility is going to be on the affiliate owners and the trainers. But I think that CrossFit HQ could be doing a better job.

Today's a relatively short show. I know I kind of got on that rant there and just kind of held it there for the rest of the time. We didn't really get into the broken science thing or the CrossFit Open. And I have to jam out here to head back to my gym to coach my class. And so anyways, guys, I cannot tell you how much I appreciate all the call-ins and the back and forth discussion and everything else. On next week's episode, as I have a little bit more time

to just get a little bit more organized on this, we'll touch base on this conversation. We'll talk a little bit about some of the stuff that's going on at the Broken Science event. And then the Open will be officially over. So we'll break that down and discuss it. We're going to leave here by checking out Dave Castro's clue real quick. And let me know what you guys think.

For me, I thought it was like it is it the obvious thing of like it's going to destroy your legs right like is that what all of us are like kind of going with here it's kind of gross too like it's stuff. It's a little... What do we think about that? I just inhaled that. I thought Tom was going to say something. Is that not there? Okay, a couple of comments. Ariel Lowen, chicken wing equals bar muscle-up.

Dog equals you got to have that dog in you to do good on this workout. Tricky Ricky, it's finally cock push-ups. Overhead squats, interesting. Thruster bar muscle-up. Time to let the big dogs eat. Bring on the heavy barbell. It's funny. Everybody's like interpretations of it.

Travis, sound not necessary. Totally. Yeah, the chicken wing thing with the bar muscle up is interesting. There's a lot of bar muscle up. I definitely thought it was more like it's just going to destroy your legs. I don't really think that they'll put, I think that with the quarterfinals, we'll probably see something like pistols or something heavier. So if I have to throw my hat in the ring on a guess here, I would probably say that it most likely is going to be

something that will destroy your legs. And wall balls constantly destroy your legs. Taylor Self put out a pretty good guess. I just really liked the workout. It was a 10 minute AMRAP and it was 50 wall balls followed by 50 total bar, 35 wall balls followed by 35 chest to bar. And then 20 wall balls followed by 20 bar muscle ups. Um, I liked that. Uh, I liked that workout a lot. If it doesn't show up, I might just steal it and put it in my class workout. I thought that one was cool. Pedro, what's up, dude?

Pedro's been killing it. Have you guys checked out his shows? He's had some really great stuff lately. Okay, gang, I got to run. I got to get back to the gym. Again, thank you guys for hanging out. I really appreciate all of it. We'll the discussions uh next week um i'll put up a uh funny looking thumbnail as i always do um and thank you so much for your participation hanging out and don't forget get your matuthean now go over to docspartan.com and get your matuthean toothpaste powder this show is brought to you by matuthian. Cool commercial to play to come. All right, gang. Be good out there. Treat each other well. See you later. Bye-bye.