Weights and Plates Podcast - #90 - From Crossfit To Starting Strength Coach | Gretchen Geist SSC

Episode Date: January 17, 2025

In this episode, Robert Santana sits down with Gretchen Geist to talk about her fitness journey, how she went from doing Crossfit to Starting Strength, becoming a coach, and exaggerated expectations in the fitness industry.   https://weightsandplates.com/online-coaching/   Follow Weights & Plates YouTube: https://youtube.com/@weights_and_plates?si=ebAS8sRtzsPmFQf-    Instagram: @the_robert_santana    Rumble: https://rumble.com/user/weightsandplates Web: https://weightsandplates.com   Follow Gretchen on Instagram: @sofechsogretch    

Welcome to the Weights and Plates podcast. I am Robert Santana. I am your host. And today I have a guest. And this is also my first episode on my own. As you heard in our final episode of 2024, Trent has moved on to much greener pastures, I'm sure. So I thought I'd kick the year off by bringing on a guest. Today, we have a fellow starting strength coach from the Detroit area. Would you like to introduce yourself? Sure. My name is Gretchen Geist. I live in a suburb of Detroit, Bloomfield Hills. And I've been a starting strength coach since July of 2023. Started the program in 2020. Kind of knew about it beforehand, but didn't take the

plunge until the lockdowns kind of changed the course in my life, which I'm sure it did to a lot of people. And yeah, been to a couple different starting strength gyms and came back to Michigan. And here I am, excited to train people. And it's been fun connecting with everybody in the community. And yeah, love it. Well, welcome to the show. Welcome to Phoenix. I love Phoenix.

Yeah, we just met a couple weeks ago. Yeah. What was that? I to the show. Welcome to Phoenix. I love Phoenix. Yeah, we just met a couple weeks ago. Yeah. What was that? I love the sun. I love being able to buy raw milk. I'm one of those people. I've been just drinking it straight from the half gallon.

It's great. You can't buy raw milk in Michigan? No. No. But like, it's illegal. But like people do like the herd shares. So it's like a loophole in the law of some sort. Kind of. Cause technically you own like part of the cow. Okay.

And then if you own the cow, you can drink it however you want to. So that's how people kind of get around that. Interesting. Yeah. But I haven't found one that I can do yet. So I'm still researching. So did you drink your raw milk before you came here today? It was the first thing I had when I woke up this morning. Look at that. Breaking my fast with some raw milk.

We don't bring hypocrites on this show. Do you drink a gallon of it a day? I need to. I really do. You sure do. You're a little under it a day. I need to. I really do. You sure do. You're a little underweight right now. Like withering away. So talk to us.

How did you get into barbell training and how long you've been doing this? Kind of give us a background. Let us know who you are. I mean, I know I have a good idea. We've been talking for a few days now. Yes. But the audience would really like to know. We don't get many guests here.

I think you are the third female I've had on here in the five years the show's been on. And one of the comments I get from Social Media Land is that we,

not even touch, we tap on women's issues and then go. Yeah. Are you going to vouch for that? Yeah yeah she's a fan too yeah i've been listening to the podcast for i think since you started it i'd have to go back and look but i've been it's like i feel like i've known you for a long time but yeah 2020 that's when we started it yeah um so i've been told by you now also that we tap on women's issues with like our fingertip. And then we just go back and talk about skinny fat males again.

So I decided, you know, it'll be a whole lot easier to talk about a woman if I have a woman on the show. I am a woman. She is a woman. Our first guest was early on in the show. We had a chef come on and explain things about the restaurant business. Oh, I remember that. Yeah. And my favorite line from that episode was when she said, well, if you're going to eat out and you care about calories, you should just drink because they definitely measure how much alcohol you're getting.

Yeah. That was a good episode. I like that one. Then the second one was Steph, Dr. Bradford. We had two episodes with her over the last five years. And now we're bringing you on. Bringing me on. I want the audience to hear. And now we're bringing you on. Bringing me on? I want the audience to hear all the wonderful things that I've heard.

Okay. So you asked how I got into barbell training, right? Okay. Yeah. So I've been like an athlete my whole life. I did. My main sport was diving. It's like springboard diving,

flips and twists and stuff, not scuba diving. And I did it for two years in college. I went to Hillsdale College Division Two School and I was like a walk on and I got really burned out, so I ended up actually not finishing as a student athlete. But I started exercising in the off-season to stay in shape for diving. And I actually had asked the swim coach to write me my own strength program because I thought I needed like something specific to divers so I started lifting in the off season it was we did do some barbell stuff we did a lot of machines 10 8 to 12 reps that whole thing but it got me exposed to the weight room and then after I quit diving I I still wanted to go to the gym. I'd kind of gotten in that habit. And I went on bodybuilding.com and just wrote something that I

thought would help me for diving. And I started going to the gym on a regular basis. And then I just became like that gym girl. And I had sorority sisters that kind of liked working out and kind of taught me. So just kind of like kept inching closer and closer to being a full blown gym rat. Graduated college, still was like in the habit. And then I'll skip over some stuff. i got into the fitness industry in 2016 i actually found out about starting strength in 2016 from a co-worker i read the black the book was black back then the program practical programming thing was the first edition i think we where are we on the gray one's third yeah i think black was second i don't know what the first edition looked like yeah yeah anyway so i read it had

co-worker at the time had done it i didn't really i was so new i had like my crossfit phase for a while it was kind of like the body part split then crossFit and then skip ahead to 2020 government decided we were optional, got shut down. I was working for a big box gym and I'd wanted to go to a seminar for a long time and, uh, had the blue book, read it, really liked it. And then I decided to go down the road to become a coach. And that's a whole long story. But basically had to leave Michigan in order to be under coaches more experienced than I. So visited a bunch of different gyms, met a lot of people, trained a lot of different clients and was in memphis for three years and now i'm back in michigan and that's the short version shorter version of the story yeah but yeah basically started barbell training well i didn't really i would argue i didn't train until 2020, but started exercising with barbells in college.

Very cool. Yeah. Did you ever think that you'd be doing this for a living in the way that you're doing it? People in college would be like, hey, you should think about being a personal trainer. And I'm like, well, you should think about being a personal trainer. And I'm like, well, I don't want to do sales, but I like the idea of like being at a gym all day and helping people achieve things that they never thought they could. And I don't know, ever since I found, ever since I went to that first seminar, like everything felt like this is what I've been looking for the entire time. Like these, this model based on first principles that like you can't, you can't argue with any.

Well, there are some things you could argue with starting strength, but there's 90% of it that you can't argue with. And the level of coaching was very appealing to me. I mean, it's the top tier. It's, it's the cream of the crop. I've done all the fitness things, and this is the thing that gets you the best results,

most sustainable. And I liked the, I could, I mean academic, in a sense, challenge of learning the methodology. And there was a lot of parts that were very challenging for me to learn, but I got it. But I liked that because my college was very difficult. I know Rip and Steph have mentioned hillsdale before it was tough you'd work your butt off and get like a c and you're like i'm doing okay if i'm getting a c yeah whereas like in high school if i got a c it was like i failed right but anyway so um anyway it felt like hillsdale but with the fitness industry, like this very challenging thing.

But like, if you work hard, like you will earn, you will earn it. So that was appealing to me. So you like hard work. Yeah. You know, things are more fun when they're challenging, you know, like if it's, if it's too easy, I felt like i've come to that conclusion multiple times on like even like doing a dive like if you're just doing like i don't know the most basic dives like they're easy and it's easy to make them look really good and get good

scores but it's fun like when you do something challenging and then nail it, right. Cause you got to work for it. And if it's just given to you, it's like anybody could do this. Yeah. So, yeah.

So what was your linear progression? Like how strong were you going in? And where has that taken you today? Okay. Tell us about your lifting. Okay. Well, first of all, I want to tell the audience, keep a paper logbook because the whole thing like, oh, if it's digital, you're going to lose it is 100% true.

So that happened to me. 100% true. So that happened to me. So I don't have all my original numbers, but I scaled everything way back because I was a recovering CrossFitter. So I was working, I was used to working out five, six days a week and just going to three was a big adjustment and confession. I was doing short wads on the off days. But that did not last long because I had to recover. I started my squat at 155 for fives. I think I started my press at 65, my bench at 75, my deadlift at 185. And when I started power cleans, I think I started like 85 or 95. So that's where I started my numbers. Started in July of 2020.

I ran it till November, I think. And I ended, I didn't also like definitely hire a coach because you think you know what you're doing and you don't. I wish I hired a coach. So like the end of my LP was, it wasn't like a well like run smooth, but the highest weight I hit on my squat was 247 and a half. I remember squatting 225 for the first time. It was in my garage and I'd gone to triples. And I just remember, I don't know, it was this thing like, oh my gosh, it's two plates. And I never thought I'd get there. Well, I thought it was gonna be harder to get there than it actually was right

and it was really cool squatting 225 um and then I'm not gonna lie I don't remember where my other lifts like ended up I think I deadlift like 285 or 290 for five. So it wasn't a very smooth LP. And then I had my mentor coach in the prep course start coaching me online. Shout out to Pete. But yeah, it wasn't as smooth. Yeah, definitely would recommend like get a coach, even if you think you're like, I can figure this out. No, just get a coach. Like, you really don't know what you don't know it would have been. I think I could have run it out for longer, for sure. But we all, I'm sure we all made that mistake, I'm sure.

Yeah, I fucked myself up two times trying to run it out. Tore two adductors. Oh, yeah, I was going to say, are you going to talk about your adductors? Again? Yeah. Yeah, you know, you tend to talk and you repeat yourself over time but um what was i gonna say about that your lp was not that smooth no not at all in my you know i don't know about how much time you spent on each of the lifts prior to running it i didn't spend a whole

lot of time pressing and dead lifting before that oh right, right. Yeah, yeah. So I squatted, I benched, and I did pull-ups. And I did dips, too. Then the rest of the stuff was just silly bullshit in the gym. So what I'm curious to hear, because I'm always, you know, I talk to people that have not necessarily gotten super competitive with it. And have been in the weight room and have probably consumed a lot of the same silly shit I did. You know, I'm 40. When I was getting out of high school in 2002, I had access to message boards and forums as well as bodybuilding magazines that you'd buy at the checkout. And then the fitness magazines were just starting to circulate in.

You had men's fitness, men's health. Because in the 80s and 90s, a lot of it was bodybuilding, if you looked at any gym-type magazine. If you go way back to Rip's era, they had Strength and Health magazine, which was actually more about the sports, which I think would have been cool, but that was long gone by the time I was consuming content, which is very different to how things are now. which I think would have been cool, but that was long gone by the time I was consuming content, which is very different to how things are now. And the problem was we were all getting the same silly shit, following it, and largely getting nowhere. The thing that jumped out at me, and this is kind of why I'm bringing this up. I want to hear the contrast because you're from a

different era. You are a woman and you have a different up. I want to hear the contrast because you're from a different era. You are a woman and you have a different background. I was just a young boy that wanted to look better to try and pick up young girls when I was 18, 19 years old. And I've said this many times in other episodes. You grow up at some point and you realize that you don't have to look like a steroid guy in a fitness or bodybuilding magazine to do that there are other things that are more important and you know character is important yeah and you know you don't want to be a big fat sloppy mess like you know we always say can confirm don't be sloppy yeah see i'm not just saying it people um but uh that's what drew me in and in doing that health

had started to become something that was talked about, especially in the fitness magazines, more so than the bodybuilding magazines. The bodybuilding magazines, they believe they're on the healthiest diet ever because at the time it was low in fat. Now I think it's more low in carbs when they're cutting. I don't participate in that. I don't coach competitors that do contest bodybuilding or physique. So I'm not sure. But I know low carb is popular now in that era. bodybuilding or physique. So I'm not sure, but I know low carb is popular now in that era. It was low fat, fruits and vegetables, which, you know, things I still

generally recommend, but we've since learned that the fat thing has been taken way out of context. And that's a whole nother episode. But, you know, at the time, health became part of the recipe that you were getting in these magazines on these websites. It's like, how do you do this and maintain good health? And I never ran in circles with people that were super extreme with it or competitive with it. I didn't know anybody that wanted to get on stage and do a show. I didn't know anybody willing to take steroids to change the way their body looked. I knew of people, but nobody in my inner circle. And the guys that were doing that at the gym, I didn't talk about that. We talked about lifting, programming, diet. So my mentality at that age was, how do I do this and maintain good health and continue to make progress, look better, feel better, move better? So what I want to know is, you know, what was your experience like walking into this sea of bullshit? Because even when you started, still a lot of bullshit out there. There's a lot of bullshit out there today that is repackaged bullshit from the 70s, 80s,

and 90s that now has a peer-reviewed citation on it and maybe a few new buzzwords that weren't around back then. So I had some familiarity with exercise just like from my friends introducing it to me in college and the you know prepping for swim dive season so it was my first exposure um and it seemed like ever like all the exercises were kind of placed. There was no hierarchy of like this exercise better than that exercise. But I kind of started to figure that out before I went full blown CrossFit. I kind of I had some friends in college that were total like CrossFit bros that were like weights. Like, I mean, I became like that eventually too. I'm not going to lie.

We had our phase, but I was kind of like interested in like, okay, this makes more sense. This whole, hey, let's do exercises that move multiple joints at once. So that seemed to me. And then at that point I had been exposed to starting strength. And then at that point, I had been exposed to starting strength. And the idea of that strength is the basis of every physical interaction. And the most important thing made sense to me. I'm like, yeah, that makes sense. But I was kind of getting, I was about to get into my CrossFit phase. I was still doing like body part splits. And I did like this, like I was doing like an arm day and I was super setting. It was like curls, triceps, something, and then like burpees, which ew, don't, don't do burpees. Those are silly. But I could tell, I'm like, when I did the arm exercises, I'm like, these are not nearly as taxing as these burpees or like as squats or deadlifts.

So I felt, I had this sense of, okay, these exercises aren't as productive as the other ones. So in my mind, I kind of started to put this together and then I entered my CrossFit phase. And obviously all of those are compound movements. I mean, you're, you're not training, you're exercising. Although I will shout out the box I went to. He, the, the owner who would do all the programming, he would do like strength. They call it like strength bias programming. So we do like, yeah, you're laughing. Another fancy word.

Yeah. Strength bias programming. Yeah. So we would do squat five sets of five. And then we'd follow it with a wad. And he'd have like a squat day, a deadlift day, an Olympic lift day.

We actually did, most CrossFit gyms don't have benches. We would bench press. So I did get exposed to that. He had a lot of equipment. It was a big facility. Shout out New Species CrossFit. So that was good.

Overhead stuff was mostly like push press or push jerk kind of very crossfit oh i'm well aware i'm always fixing that when i get ex crossfitters yes yes so once i got into that phase there was now like technique wasn't really coached. But I did get exposed to barbell lifts and he did encourage us to track our progress. Now with the five by five, the warmups were kind of included in that. Anyway, it was the heaviest I'd ever lifted in my life. And it was a more competitive sort of box. So there were a lot of people that were pretty decently strong, like for CrossFitters. Yeah. So, and then three years later I found starting strength and then made the full commitment. So I think based on personal experience and research, you know, online i was a big do you remember that

website t nation oh yeah yeah yeah when i started first reading rips material yes a lot of it popped up on t nation yes i think that was when i first got exposed to rip also i remember coming across that deadlift article which one well it's the one where he's like warning caffeine. Like this is a dry technical article. You might need caffeine to get through it. And I remember reading it and I'm like, wow, this is a,

I love this breakdown of this lift. Like I was, I was eating it up. Like, this is amazing. So, but yeah, through my own reading, my own experience, kind of cycling through

different sorts of workout trends, then I kind of came to the conclusion by myself. I was never really like a magazine. I don't think that's really my era. Although, you know what? No, I did do, I forget which magazine it was in, but there was some sort of like pull-up program and I don't know. I was able to achieve, I was kind of training that. Anyway, that was a big goal of mine. But I'm like, I remember I snipped it out and I taped it into my logbook and it was hard, but I did it like every single back day. So, but yeah, I didn't, I wasn't really like a magazine girly from that perspective. What about boards? Were there boards when you were doing this? I think there were, but I wasn't like into that. I wasn't like an online forum girly.

So would you say you're from the YouTube era? How would you, what do you mean by that? Where were you finding all this information like bodybuilding.com okay nation okay okay so websites were still a primary source of content yeah youtube because yeah we're thinking like gen z is finding i mean i found rip on youtube but youtube wasn't then what it is now i did find some starting strength videos early on it wasn't like it is now like oh there's all these influencers i'm gonna watch every single video yeah it wasn't like that i found old crossfit videos of rip instructing on the lifts i I liked the way he explained it.

It was technical but practical at the same time, which is not something everybody can do. In fact, a lot of teachers at the highest levels fail to do this. They tend to be horrible at teaching something that's very technical in a practical way. So that's what I liked about Rip. And I found him on YouTube. I had no idea that there was a book. I didn't know he had his own website. I'm just like, well, it's the Texan that teaches all the lifts for CrossFit, I guess. I had no CrossFit background.

You didn't have that phase? Never. I skipped over that. You don't want to do burpees? No. Kipping pull-ups? What about handstand push-ups? It would be cool, I think, to do a handstand pushup on a chin-up bar. So you're going all the way down like you would on a press. Oh, like a deficit handstand pushup.

Yeah. Yeah. Or a body weight press in the technical. You know, those, I always, gymnastics was kind of my downfall. I just, it didn't. You need to lose about five inches in height. I know. Yeah.

I was, arguably, I was a really tall diver too, because that sport obviously favors. I didn't know that either. Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of ex-gymnasts that dive. Yeah. I remember when I swam. I don't remember the divers being particularly short, but it makes sense. So, you come from a more athletic

background then you did this for performance to push yourself, uh, and have something to, I guess, pursue in the weight room. Does that sound accurate? Um, like starting strength. Wait, what are you talking about? Like how you ended up in a gym beyond. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Definitely. Yeah, super athletic my whole life. And I actually had a lacrosse coach in high school.

She was also a personal trainer and we would do like these summer workouts. And I just remember like, I like this. This is fun. I want to do more of this. I've always been drawn to like working out and exercising. You know, looking back, it makes a lot of sense that I'm doing what I'm doing now because I've always been so drawn to like doing physical things that are difficult.

And yeah. So yeah, definitely athletic background background do you know your vertical jump yes i can jump a 21 inch vertical jump that was measured in 2021 which is actually the same as ray gillenwater shout out to ray she just sold you out brother brother. Sorry, Ray. He would say that too. Yeah, I think he said it publicly probably. Yes. So what is, I haven't looked this up. I should know this.

So shame on me. What is average for a woman? 14, I believe. Okay. And 21 is actually an average man. So my genetics are of an average man. You hear that people? This is an important thing to know because we talk about this a lot on this show.

How genetics plays into this. So that being said, what are your current PRs? Okay. Lifetime PRs or current? How many years? Lifetime PRs. You can date them too and remind the audience when you started doing this. Sure.

And what is the most you've lifted and what year did it take place? And just go by each lift. Okay. So I've squatted 300 pounds. That was in April of 2022. And I'd only been lifting for like a little under two years actually um I was a little heavier but not that I mean I probably was like 158 when I did that and you're how tall I am five six five seven so squatted 300 press I've done 145. That was in February of 2022.

So, that's getting close to a body weight press. Oh, I want that. That would be amazing. Bench, 177 and a half for a single. That was in, I think that was in 2023, like the fall. I think I'd have to look. Deadlift, 350 for a single I hit that for the first time uh day of the deadlift October of 2021 I was in Boise that was fun and I've hit that I hit that

in 2022 so it wasn't like a new PR but i whatever power clean i've done 80 kilos that was at wichita falls in 2020 no no no 2022 i think which is what 170 something like that 176 176 176 for us yankees yeah yeah so those are my those are my lifetime prs i'm not really close to the i mean not super close to those right now i've lost a little bit of body weight i'm trying to get it back on. It's been a struggle. But when do you ever hear that? Like, I'm a woman and I want to gain weight. I need to gain about 10, 15 pounds. It's just a different mentality. Like my clients are like, why do you have milk in your Stanley? Well, I'm trying to gain weight. Like, what are you talking about? You look milk in your Stanley? Well, I'm trying to gain weight.

Like, what are you talking about? You look great. And like, it's a totally different mentality when you're trying to chase numbers. Like I'm not trying to like get fat. I don't think anybody's trying to do that. Not really super stressed about that. I mean, I'm competitive, but I also have been learning to give myself some grace when necessary. So now you've been coaching people for a few years now on how to do this. Would you say that what you've accomplished is the norm?

From the standpoint of percentage increase, I essentially doubled my squat. I essentially doubled my squat. But so I started my squat at 155. Most women have to work to get up there. So I would say from a numerical standpoint, the loads, not something I've personally seen because I've been training mostly older clients because at the gyms excuse a little older and especially the the times I was training people was mostly like people in their 50s or beyond so I didn't see those sorts of loads with the clients I was training. But from standpoint of taking like doubling your deadlift or adding 40, 50 pounds to the upper body lifts, that's typical. I've gotten several women like their first chin ups before.

So that's definitely seen that. But from like my numbers, haven't seen that out of a female personally. Not that it can't happen. And again, I have a somewhat limited experience based on the demographics of the clients I've trained. So most people aren't walking in squatting close to two and pulling close to three, most women. Definitely not walking. And pressing 90, 100 pounds, right? Yeah.

I mean, I don't think there's no women at our gym that pressed 100. I think the top press was mid-80s. Yeah. Actually, that's not true. I did train a lady that was pretty strong, but she was a little bit like thicker and she had had a CrossFit background. She had a high training drive too. Yeah. Anyway, go on.

So yeah, neither you or I are going to win any power lifting meets. So in that world, we're not considered strong. And this is something that comes up a lot when I'm putting out content, right? Yeah. What would you be in the 158 weight class? I think that's USA powerlifting. Yes. I went and watched a meet once and I was looking at all the girls lifting and I was like, man, I could probably compete, but it was not like a high level meet at all.

And that pause on the bench press, that would totally get me. It's silly. Pause is stupid. But yeah, at a local meet, you'll probably win one. Sure. But when you start going up to state, national, international, women that are your body weight are several inches shorter than you sometimes. Yeah. your body weight are several inches shorter than you sometimes. And they might be pulling five, squatting over four, benching into the twos. I know one personally that's benched in the mid twos.

I trained a girl here, her squat and her deadlift were similar to yours. She was about a couple inches shorter than you, but she was a 158 or she walked into a meet and set a bench press state record at 210. Wow. With a pause. With a pause. Wow record to two 10, uh, with a pause, with a pause. Wow. But if she went to, let's say they, they gave her the golden cup award,

by the way, which means you piss in a cup because they're testing her for drugs. Oh yeah. That's what the meat director told her. Golden cup award. Yeah. The meat director told her, congratulations. You have won the golden cup award,

which meant that she got to pee in a cup and that was her very first meet that was cool um but uh that was one woman that i trained that was able to excel to that point you've come in here and done similar numbers um on the uh squat deadlift um i think she listens her deadlifts a sack of shit and i will never let her live it down oh this girl i thought you're talking about mine you know she's pulled in the upper threes I think she listens. Her dad lives a sack of shit and we'll never let her live it down. Oh, this girl. I thought you were talking about my dad. She's pulled in the upper threes, but then she's also squatted in the upper threes. Oh, okay. Because her training drive disappears when she has to pick something up off the floor.

So if you're listening, you know who you are. But these numbers aren't casual, you know. I think women's strength and power lifting is a rather new thing when you think about how long the sports have been around. So, and I don't know how much it happens on the female side. On the male side, you know, if you pull five, say, oh, congratulations, it's baseline, you know. Then if you pull five for five, congratulations, that's baseline. And if you pull six, guess what? That's baseline too. congratulations, that's baseline. And if you pull six, guess what? That's baseline too. It seems everything's baseline until you get to a- Baseline for powerlifting or baseline for starting strength?

No, powerlifting. This is what powerlifters and people in the weight room that don't work with regular people will say. Okay, okay. The number's never high enough unless you are a world record holder, right? Which is absolutely absurd. I had one guy say, how dare you compare this to the NBA? Because I'm like, you're not telling people who like to play basketball, they need to play as good as Michael Jordan. 500 is not the

NBA. 700 is the NBA. That's what some dick bag on the internet center and uh it just highlights that this guy has not trained a normal rank and file person in the middle of the fucking bell curve yeah um and you have mentioned the term training drive which i like a lot because i got that from you did i say that yeah yeah you talked about like the deadlift like that'll show your training drive like are you willing to just push until it breaks off the ground? I think I just called it drive, but I like that. I think I just called it drive, but I like that. Should I trademark that?

Sure. And I, you know, it's true. You have to have a lot of drive to get that fucking thing moving. And if it's not there, it's not there. You know, most normal clients, their training drive is very limited they just want to get a little stronger look better naked be able to play with their grandkids climb up the stairs easier but they're not push they're not shooting for big numbers they don't really care about the numbers and And our job is to communicate, hey, the benefits that you want come from putting more weight on the bar.

But for normal people, it's going to be at a more conservative pace that's sustainable versus powerlifting. Yeah, like your competitor, that training drive is there to hit those numbers. And you're trying to win. Yes. And you're trying to win. Yes. Yeah, you like to win. That's why I'm already aware if I ever coach you, you're going to be a pain in the ass. Wait, why do you say that? Because the thing about competitors is you have problem holding yourself back.

And when things don't go well, you get really fucking pissed off. And I know this because that's what I do. I used to throw a few temper tantrums when i'd miss you've thrown some things haven't you i mean yes i'd be lying if i said i hadn't but these days i've you get better yeah it's better able to give myself i've pushed myself too hard and then really paid for it yeah like my nervous system's like cool you're not gonna sleep tonight and then really paid for it. Yeah. Like my nervous system's like, cool, you're not going to sleep tonight. And then that feels terrible. So I've learned to give myself more grace and know when to push and when to not.

If you were 10 years younger, it wouldn't even be an option. I won't deal with it. What do you mean? Young female athletes are very difficult to train. Because they won't gain weight? Training drives out there? What we're talking about, the getting pissed off thing. Now, young men manifest it differently, too, I've seen, just working with both demographics.

But the outbursts that you and I are talking about, like you said, you said you used to be worse. You also used to be younger. That's true. Yeah. And. I think life just, I don't know. I mean, certain life experiences kind of temper that sort of reaction. You know what I mean?

I trained an athletic young female. She was in her early 20s. Love her to death. She did not do well with things not going as planned to put it lightly you understand what i'm talking about yeah women like to control things really yes we do you hear that fuckers i didn't say that um it's true uh well we parted ways um it's like a breakup it kind of was it kind of is no she's not from this state you know she's a good friend of mine love her to death i think she listens you know and she knows i like her and she knows i understand um but she emailed me years later and apologized and said she was

uh that she was wrong you know uh which you know i wish i can hang something like that up on the wall but like can you put that in writing? Yeah, can you put that in writing? Can you send a video? I think she might've put it in writing. She's sweet, but she just said, yeah, I was. Screenshot. She said I was young and out of control and, you know, expected too much.

You know, she wanted to do everything at once and improve at everything. And when something didn't go well, you know, she kind of melted down, you know? And I handled, you know, I deal with this, you know? But after that, you know, that's where this, you know, but after that, you know, that's where I, that's where my comment comes from. If you were 10 years younger, I'd probably turn the business away at this stage of my career. That's fair. I think people that are drawn to lifting and specifically starting strength. I know for me, there's been several times in my life where I've come up against

something difficult and like, I am going to, I'm going to make this happen. Like I'm going to work as hard as I need to, to get the outcome that I want. And so, yeah, you get mad when you exert all your effort and then it doesn't go your way. So, and again, life has shown me like, Hey, sometimes you can exert all the effort you want and then you're not going to get what you want. Amen to that. Yeah. Yeah. Woo. Yes. And so we didn't mention this earlier, but Gretchen has GloboGym experience a lot more than me. We've actually worked at the same one, but I was there for three months and she was there much longer. Three years, yeah.

Yeah, a different state, different location, but same company. So you get a lot of these people that go in there and aren't necessarily going to push the way you and I push. I think that's fair to say. Yes. However, most of these commercial gyms, they will take a genetic outlier. I don't know what that one does anymore, but they will take a genetic outlier and show the peak result that anybody could possibly want. I guess if it's physique, you're going to see a very lean, muscular person. If it's performance, and a lot of these places don't advertise performance, it's usually more visual, but you might see somebody that's lifting something very heavy or doing something very

impressive like a gymnastics movement, right? And they will market that as, hey, you come here, do our thing, you're going to do that too. And you could probably speak more to that than I can, because you're somewhat still involved in that industry. I've been removed from it now for about almost 15 years, 14 years less. Yeah, 14 years I've been removed from it now for about almost 15 years, 14 years less. Yeah, 14 years I've been removed from it. And tell me about that because people are coming in there, they're seeing these things, these visuals of these amazing bodies, and that's drawing them in. But then when they hire you and have to do the work and achieve what they can achieve, what actually happens in practice most of the time, because this is a problem that we keep getting in the comments from the haters, is that our results

are just, they're not that impressive. 500 for five on the deadlift's not that heavy. And if I cared and was a competitive power lifter, yeah, you're right, man. It's not. It's not heavy. There's guys that do 700 for five. But I'm not competing in power lifting. I'm merely pushing my own body to see how far I can takelifting. I'm merely pushing my own body to see how far I can take this. I'm closer to these commercial gym people. The only difference between myself and them, and I think you can extend this to yourself, is I will adjust my lifestyle to keep progressing. Lifestyle is typically the limiting factor that I've seen with most rank and file personal training clients. 100%. And that's what will limit them in the end.

So when you're doing this for a living, you're working with more of them than that half a percent of people that power lift. And we always say individual results vary. And you and I can talk about what we generally seen working with a more gen pop demographic. And it's not five, six, 700 pound squats and deadlifts. We're not really seeing that in men or three, four, 500 pound deadlifts in women.

So, okay, hold on. So tell me the question one more time. Succinctly, please. So the marketing at these big box commercial gyms is that here's this visual. Yep. If you show up here and, you know. Do this program. You're going to look like this person.

Yes. So that's still happening, right? Yes. I would say in the marketing material, they're putting up the hotties, you know, people with the long muscle bellies and they're super lean. So do most clients that you end up working with, A, do they expect it? And B, what actually happens? You know, do they get anywhere close to that?

And the ones that do, how much effort is required, excluding those that were just out of shape people that were athletic and just, you know, they got chubby, they didn't do shit. Then they start and they, boom, results, right? We're excluding them from that pool. The average personal training client at a commercial gym, what do they expect and what do they achieve? What actually happens? I think most of the people that I've trained don't expect to come in and look like the people on the marketing video. They just need

accountability. That's really a big thing. People know they need to, I mean, we know that training is better than exercise, but most people aren't doing anything. So they need to do something and they need accountability to show up to their appointments. So most of the people are not expecting to look like a fitness model. Now, I have seen an interesting phenomenon where normal people, you have to think of, there's not only like training stress, but then there's life stress too that can make it very difficult to recover from like a normal like LP novice sort of program people have a hard time recovering and that after you know the first couple weeks obviously you're starting them at a point where you can have a long runway teach technique people have a hard time recovering i mean i gotta start

modifying things sooner than i would like to but i would the longer i do this the more i program like pretty conservatively like let's make this work out i'm gonna push you. I'm going to push your limits. You're going to see higher numbers than you did last time, but you're going to get all your sets. You have to focus, but it's not going to be like a grinder for every single lift because that people, it's not sustainable. And people, again, don't normal people don't have high training drives like us. They're not trying to compete.

They're not trying to. Whatever. But no, I don't. I mean, I think the people that want to look like fitness models, they. I think I repel them, which is great. I definitely do. Yeah. Yeah.

I've never seen sidebar. I've never seen anything positive coming out of prepping for a bodybuilding show. I think that's just not, it's totally, I think you automatically will get body dysmorphia. For the most part, you know, obviously the top five, they don't have the same challenges as the people you and I probably meet. So like Ronnie Coleman, right? He was Mr. Olympia in the late 90s, early 2000s. I don't know. I'm familiar.

You are with bodybuilding. I think our audience knows who he is. Yeah, of course. Ain't nothing but a peanut. There you go. Yeah. So he was already big, strong, you know, like he was just built for that. And then people encouraged him to do it because there was a economic opportunity for him there.

And he was making like a million dollars a year when he was Mr. Olympia. Oh, wow. I didn't know that. So for that guy, I don't think he ever developed body dysmorphia. And then when he stopped, you know, he ended up unfortunately having botched surgeries that messed up his back. Poor guy. That's so sad. But long story short, he didn't have to do that anymore.

You know, same with Dorian Yates. As soon as he got hurt, he tore something, his shoulder, I think. He said that, okay, I was done. I don't need to be that big anymore. But I think it's the people that are way down lower that aren't going to make money off of it and are competing in it that develop some of that. So, yeah. Yeah. I repel them.

You repel them. They don't want to work with us. That's fine. I wouldn't even know what to do with someone like that. Most people don't stumble into a gym though and achieve big, like, no, a lot of people don't end their NLP with big, impressive numbers, you know? Very true. Yeah.

Or end up with visible abs, you know, on the other side of a otherwise healthy training and diet program, you know? Mm-hmm. And, you know, we've talked about it. Lifestyle is a limiting factor, you know, on the other side of a otherwise healthy training and diet program, you know? And, you know, we've talked about it. Lifestyle is a limiting factor, you know? Yeah. People won't, it's, I, again, I think it's the total stress in someone's life really takes a toll on people are too, they pack their lives with too many things they don't have time to cook they get to bed too late those things really do add up and matter um in the context of yeah like lifting you gotta recover recovery is is everything you're like yeah yeah you can just like not sleep a lot just eat no like that's not a thing no you

can maybe a young person can get away with that for a while but y'all you'll literally die if you don't sleep for what is it like three days yeah something like that yeah um i think that tends to be like the importance of that tends to be like downplayed in our community. I don't know if you've. But got to sleep. Yeah, the lifts are taxing. They are very taxing. And that's I mean, it's it's a feature, not a bug, but that comes with implications for training. Yeah.

for training. Yeah. So there's lots of problems that people, everyday people encounter when they're trying to include exercise, training especially, and dietary and other lifestyle changes. It's not compatible with modern life for most people. 100%. Sometimes you get guys that stumble in and their numbers go way up with little effort, and that's great. It's just not what happens all the time. And the goal of this show is just to kind of bring it back down to earth because a lot of the marketing materials that people receive when they start looking for fitness or health information tends to go to the extreme, you know, whether it be diet, exercise, drugs, and, you know, I mean, drugs that you've, that are legal drugs, you get prescribed from the doctor, you know, if you're going down that rabbit hole, supplements, it gets exaggerated. The results get exaggerated.

And, you know, while it's not sexy to talk about, you know, modest results that most people achieve, you know, it's reality and you're better off than you were not doing any of this shit, but just trying to bring it back down. So, you know, to kind of tie this all up, because, you know, we've talked for almost an hour now, and you and I can go on for two, three, four hours if we wanted to. We have, y'all. We have.

We have in person. We have in person. That's why she's here. And I want to bring her back because we want to talk more about women's topics with a woman present. I am a woman. That way, I can't gloss over it

and have Trent or some other dude go down a rabbit hole with me on a side tangent about biceps or something else that, you know, young boys in my- I'm going to rein you in. Yeah, exactly. So I'm going to have several guests on this year

and I'll probably do a lot of solo episodes, but I think that I want to at least include women's topics with Gretchen every so often to make sure that we actually dive deep into them and you get the information you want. So when this gets released, make sure you post your questions. I'll explain where to find us at the end, but post your questions that you have for her, and that'll give her ideas and me ideas on what we want to talk about. Ask me anything. AMA.

So I think we've done a good job of getting to know your background, kind of discuss the things that we care about here, and the audience knows about me pretty well. I think they've gotten a little sense of where you're at, similar but different in a few different ways. And we're just going to build off this. And I think it'll be real good. Let's build it. Yeah. So I'm going to close out here. Thank you for tuning in to the Weights and Plates podcast. You can find me at weightsandplates.com or if you're Metro Phoenix at Weights and Plates Gym, just south of Sky Harbor Airport, I'm on Instagram at the underscore Robert underscore Santana. The gym is Weights double underscore and double underscore plates.

And I got to make the comment that everybody makes. If you liked what you heard today, click subscribe now on YouTube. YouTube.com slash at Weights underscore and underscore plates. Where can we find you, Gretchen? And I'm on Instagram at so fetch. So Gretch. And I'm not on any other platforms right now. So find me there.

Cool. This was fun. I thought so. Yeah. Well, thank you for joining us and I will see you all later.