Official blog of the RKC
Master RKC, Keira Newton guides you through a simple, effective, metabolic workout designed to help you burn some extra calories quickly during the Holidays.
***
Master RKC, Level 3 Z-Health, MCT. Keira first picked up a kettlebell in 2005 when her husband challenged her to stop laughing and start swinging. She stuck with the challenge when she realized that she could get an all-in-one workout in a fraction of the time she spent at the gym. Keira was convinced… Read more here.
When building your personal training business, it’s important to develop a clear business plan. Most business coaches will tell you to pick a specialty then focus your efforts on it—this is generally good advice. You should also know your product, service, and your target client. Then, hone your focus, concentrate your outreach and marketing efforts to make best use of your resources. However, if your focus is too rigid, you risk missing opportunities outside of your original scope. These unforeseen opportunities can potentially lead to fantastic growth. So, it’s important to remain flexible and consider each potential opportunity carefully. How do you come across good opportunities? Opportunities easily present themselves in the presence of effective email marketing and productive, consistent networking.
Although I rely on my business plan for general guidance and a framework for development, much of my business’s growth has happened because of unforeseen opportunities. When I first started my business, ten years ago, I really didn’t have a business plan. I simply took any client willing to pay me for training services. I was disorganized, my resources were depleted, and I didn’t have a clear vision. Eventually, I examined how I was doing business and realized I could be using my time more effectively while maximizing my profits.
My training business, Brian Wright Personal Training (BW-PT), will have over 650 clients with 527 average sessions per month as of third quarter 2013. BW-PT operates in 13 locations, including corporate centers, rehab centers, fitness centers, one leased studio, and in client homes. Our team of 15 includes trainers, accounting and administrative staff. This growth obviously didn’t happen overnight, it took a flexible but focused business plan and a few good opportunities.
The Importance of a Clear Business Plan
Developing a business plan allows you to focus energy and resources on your goal. This focus allows you to provide a better quality product or service, while targeting your client base conserves resources.
I developed a business plan based on who my clients would be, and centralized on where I would train them. First, I narrowed the scope of by geographic location to minimize the distance I would travel for clients. This also allowed me to target my marketing to a smaller area. Then, I began to seize any opportunity to centralize training locations. I transitioned from a scattered in-home and fitness center training model to centralizing my clients in corporate, rehab, and commercial facilities.
Soon, I realized the majority of my clients were 45-55 year old professionals. By narrowing my outreach efforts to this population, I was able to get more bang for my marketing buck than by trying to appeal to a broader market including young professionals or student athletes. I also realized that it’s important to be flexible, if a high school athlete or team contacts me for training, I can do it, but I don’t waste time or money marketing specifically to their population.
The Importance of Considering Opportunities
Always remember to be flexible. Instead of distracting you from your goals or splintering your efforts, good opportunities can compliment your business plan.
Flexibility has been vitally important to the growth of my business. When I was first approached about training in a corporate facility, I hesitated because it was outside of my original business plan. However, I came to see how expanding the locations for my business while continuing to focus on my target population could be beneficial. The potential of training just 10% of the tenants in a building is staggering, so I simply could not turn down the offer. My business plan needed to expand while remaining specific enough to avoid fragmenting target markets and available resources.
I expanded my business plan again when I partnered with Sport & Spine Athletics (SSA). Again, I was worried about stepping outside of my focus, but when I got the opportunity to build a training program with SSA. I saw how this partnership could be a great way to provide quality service to my target population. I could reach more people while training at a finite number of locations instead of aimlessly training anyone who came along—I could manage a team at each clinic.
Where Do Opportunities Come From?
How do you put yourself in a position to discover opportunities? Networking, joining business groups, attending business gatherings, conferences, and by general outreach. The most cost-effective and successful marketing approaches I have found are email marketing and networking. Always work towards creating relationships and partnerships.
BW-PT has trainers in several corporate locations because of networking. At a happy hour event, I met a contact interested in developing a corporate fitness initiative for XM satellite radio. Two months later, I was managing a 6,000 square-foot fitness facility with access to 7,500 corporate tenants.
In that facility along with four other sister corporate facilities, email marketing played a huge role. In my experience, networking creates the contacts, then email marketing transforms this connection into an opportunity.
I was able to develop a mutually beneficial partnership with Sport & Spine Rehab centers after attending a corrective exercise workshop for physical therapists and chiropractors. I was one of three fitness professionals at a workshop of over 60 rehab professionals. This CEO of Sport & Spine Rehab was looking to reinvigorate the company’s Sport Spine Athletics division. Two months later he contracted my company to operate in that division. We now operate out of all seven locations and continue to increase our client numbers.
Business networking is essential for future growth opportunities, as well as expanding your email marketing list. And, a business plan with clear goals is important for businesses of all sizes. Always be open to expansion of your plan as you progress. Partnerships, management opportunities, leveraging potential, and buy outs are all ways to skyrocket your training business if you can recognize them when they may only be diamonds in the rough.
***
About Brian Wright MS, CSCS, RKCII, NSCA-CPT: Brian is the Owner of BW-PT and Director of Sport and Spine Athletics, with 13 Studios in the DC metro area with over 520 average sessions per month. There’s a renewal rate of 83% on our personal training packages and group training packages.
The Pistol (Single Leg Squat): The most difficult and beneficial leg exercise – period. The training enroute a butt to heel Pistol develops balance, trunk stability and incredible leg strength. There are weight lifters that can full squat 500 to 600 pounds, yet they collapse and fall over when attempting the Pistol.
Let me relay a little story to you. I was cornering at a UFC Event in Houston in 2011 and went out for a bit of R & R before the fight, once my fighter was in bed. As a typical occurrence, the supporting fight team trainers and coaches usually run into each other and discuss their “Trade Secrets” and training methods. As it happened, I ran into a couple of other trainers in a local watering hole (that’s another name for a bar incase the younger crowd is wondering what I’m talking about.) So I’m talking to a couple of the other trainers and we strike up a conversation about strength training, what works best, how we train, etc… Our conversation moves onto squats. Now both of these guys were around 30 years old and are built like brick outhouses. They could both squat in excess of 600 lbs, but were not overweight or disproportionate. We started talking about the one-legged squat (Pistol) and I proceeded to demonstrate a few of them. They, of course, had to try and promptly fell over – on every attempt. Not a clean pistol performed between the both of them. I now had their attention.
The balance, core strength and overall athletic development gained from performing the Pistol are incomparable. In most athletic events (even in walking!) you are placing all of your weight on one foot and then the other. When you make a “cut” on the field, quickly hop from one side to the other or have to scale a deep incline, your stabilizers, tendons and and core are continuously firing. Pistols, much more than machines or bilateral, two legged exercises, increase your strength more efficiently.
As far as injury prevention, the development of the synergy with these muscles of the leg – all at once – is incredible. I experienced a trilateral break o my left leg which resulted in 10 screws and a 5″ plate being installed. I used Pistols as part of the rehabilitation process. I realize that whole industries have been built and billions spent on leg muscle “isolation” machines. However, when you walk, perform a task or athletic event – do you ever isolate your gastrocs, quads or hammys? The answer is a resounding “No”. Unless you’ve experienced some type of injury to a specific area, you will be creating asymmetries by muscle isolation. If you have a leg extension/hamstring machine, do yourself favor and sell it for scrap metal and practice your Pistols!
So, how do we achieve the proper execution of this Ultimate Leg Exercise? You need to employ progressions and at times, regressions. This exercise, up to a certain weight, is more easily achieved with a kettlebell. The counter weight aides your downward momentum. One of the best books on the subject is Coach Paul Wade’s Convict Conditioning: http://www.dragondor http://www.dragondoor.com/?apid=4640 & visit products/books. The progressions enroute achieving the Pistol are the best available.
To start your Pistol Training, you must first be able to perform narrow stance squats. Once you are able to do 20 or so, you are ready to attempt shifting the weight from two legs to one. I believe the best methods to improve your Pistol is with both Top Down and Bottom Up motions. Maintaining tension throughout the full range of the movement is tantamount, especially at the bottom of the Pistol. That is the point where most people lose their tension and collapse. Go down into a full narrow stance squat and thrust one foot forward and then go up. Be sure to stomp your Pistol foot into the ground and drive your power through the heel of the unweighted leg. Grunting and focused hissing, especially when you are first learning, is very helpful. Again, creating and maintaining the tension throughout the whole movement is essential. For the Top Down training – employ the use of a bench and once your buttocks touches the bench, EXPLODE Upward. When practicing the Bottom Up training, use a rope or band thrown over a high bar. While you improve, you’ll have to use your arms less and less to help you come out of the bottom position. There are also a variety of steps explained thoroughly in Coach Paul Wades Convict Conditioning book. Once you start to develop the ability to perform the Pistol, do it from a raised platform so that your unweighted leg does not have to be held so high. When you can perform 5 or more on a raised platform, you are ready to try a Pistol from the floor. The actual amount of repetitions before you are ready to move to the next step may vary from individual to individual. However, the numbers listed are good guidelines.
There are more advanced levels of the pistol as well. One or two hands raised in the air adds an element of difficulty and makes the Pistol a truly Elite Movement. You may add weight. It is true that a smaller kettlebell makes performing the movement a bit easier, but once you start increasing the weight or use two kettlebells or a barbell, then you have significantly increased the difficulty of the movement.
***
About Master RKC Phil Ross: Master RKC, 8th Degree Black Belt, Specialist in Bodyweight Strength, PCC and CK-FMS Certified. His name is synonymous with Martial Arts and Fitness. He is known as the area’s Kettlebell King and has successfully competed on the National Level in… Read more here.
I wrote my last blog just over a month ago. I was scared, no terrified of the responses I might get. My biggest fear was that people would not see me as being trainer material, much less an RKC Team Leader. Boy, I was wrong!
I was overwhelmed with positive responses and support. I found that I am certainly not alone in my struggles. I received emails, texts and comments from women and men who shared their own struggles and applauded me for putting it all on the line.
The best response was from a friend who is a Social Worker. She is working with a woman who is suffering from an eating disorder. She shared my blog in a therapy session and had a major breakthrough with her client.
Putting myself out there like I did was worth it. My goal was to help others and start a conversation amongst trainers in dealing with their clients who struggle with eating disorders and food.
I am not one to sit in my problems and I hope you aren’t either. There is no sense in blogging about something so personal without looking for answers. So I went in search of answers and I got them.
Last year, I had the privilege of leading a team through the RKC in San Jose. One of the ladies that was on my team, Traci Hayes, is a registered Dietitian that specializes in eating disorders. I knew she would be a great resource for getting answers not only to help myself, but to help others.
Although I knew many of the things we discussed, it was an eye-opening interview.
First of all and most importantly, she stressed the importance of taking the focus off of calories and instead, focus on your health and strengths. Appreciate your body and what it can and does for you instead of how it looks.
For me, I have many strengths and I have many things my body does for me. At 51 years old, I can still do the splits, backbends and crazy feats of strength including bending nails and flipping tires. I can do so many things that others cannot do. I and you and your clients have strengths that have nothing to do with how they look and how much they weigh. Focus on those things. Celebrate strength gains and performance gains. What are your strengths?
Traci also discussed the scale, saying that there is no number we will be happy with, we always want more. The scale is a horrible indicator of who we are. It’s just a number. It doesn’t know how much of that number is muscle, fat, water, bones etc. It can’t tell you how strong you are, how kind you are or what kind of awesomeness you possess. It won’t tell you how smart you are and it won’t tell you how many successes you have in life. It’s just a number; a number we will never be happy with.
Getting on the scale sets our standard for the day and sets us up for misery.
This just doesn’t happen. Traci emphasizes that we must make a choice to focus on ourselves as a whole, healthy, strong, competent person. I think many of us are not willing to make that simple choice. We may have to do it many times through out the day, day after day before it becomes a habit. Just like any other habit, we must be consistent.
We discussed eating when not hungry and binge eating, one of my biggest struggles.
I don’t know about you, but I find myself standing in front of my refrigerator, looking for something, hoping that something suddenly appeared that will take the edge off. Yes, it’s emotional eating and it needs to be dealt with.
Many of my clients talk about eating when they aren’t hungry. After a satisfying dinner, they continue to eat until bedtime. Maybe it’s during the workday. Things get stressful and next thing you know, you have run to the snack machine or emptied out a co-workers candy dish.
Traci suggests sitting with those feelings, acknowledge them and deal with them. Feelings are just feelings, nothing more and they will pass if we give them enough time. The problem is that many of us just want to medicate our feelings and go for the quick fix, rather then just being ok with them. If you find yourself in this situation; tend to your feelings. Ask yourself if you are really hungry or are you trying to avoid feelings. This may be a good time to journal, take a walk, do some breathing and refocus. Success builds on success. The more you can redirect and deal with feelings without food, the easier it will be the next time.
Think of food as fuel, rather than a coping mechanism. Eat to nourish your body, not to punish it.
Choose health, mental health and strength. Focus on what your body can do for you each day. Our body shows up for us everyday. Give it what it needs to function. Traci promised me that by changing my focus, I will intuitively begin to eat healthier to fuel my body. The key word here is CHOOSE.
We discussed the negative self-talk and self hate. One of the things she asked was would I talk that way to someone I loved or to my own child. The answer is absolutely not! One of the things that hit home for me is that she said, is that the way we talk to ourselves is the way we will treat ourselves.
If you choose to break the cycle of self abuse, take these steps everyday.
Traci says that the diet industry fails us. It makes promises it can’t keep and never teaches us about living healthy and learning about our bodies. Once you place restrictions and rules on your eating, you are setting yourself up for failure and shame and then the cycle begins again.
I received so much great information during our interview but the most important thing I came away with is that I HAVE to make a choice to do things differently or I will never get out of this self destructive cycle.
***
Here’s how Traci can be reached: Traci Haynes, RD, RKC, SFG
Nutrition Therapist Specializing in Eating Disorders, Co-owner of VELOCITY Strength and Fitness, Chico, CA
***
Laurel Blackburn is an RKC Team Leader and owner of Boot Camp Fitness and Training and Tallahassee Kettlebells. Look for Laurel at www.bootcampstogo.com or www.tallahasseekettlebells.com.
At 51, she is out to prove that age is just a number. Her goal is to motivate and inspire people everywhere, both young and old that strength, flexibility and mobility can get better with age. Follow her adventures on her blog: www.SuperStrongNana.com.