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Squatting and benching the Formosa Fitness way

There are no good sources of info on functional fitness in Chinese. So we’re introducing what we do to the public in a series of videos starting with one of the most important exercises you can do — the barbell squat.

No matter what language you speak, I think the video shows the most important points pretty clearly. We wanted to hit the highlights in a short video so folks could take those immediately into their training.

The first thing that should be said is that we do strength training at Formosa Fitness. We aren’t powerlifters or bodybuilders, although those are options after folks get strong. So the method we show in our videos are what I chose to get folks strong — not necessarily what bodybuilders or powerlifters are trying to do.

Bodybuilders object to our form many times because what they’re doing is different. Take our version of the popular barbell bench, for example:

I’ve been told more times than I can count in Taiwan to put my feet up on the bench for a “correct” bench press but that’s one way, not THE way, of doing that. Putting your feet on the bench makes you very unstable and greatly limits your ability to press more weight. It also disengages your entire lower body from the lift, turning a whole body exercise (our version) into an upper body only exercise. Bodybuilders do that because they isolate muscle groups — exactly the reason we don’t do it their way. We want to build whole body strength and power, not just build your “chest.”

Same holds for the squat. We don’t adopt a narrow stance or do quarter squats because our squat is a whole body exercise — not just a quad builder. After all my years of working out here, i can count the number of times I’ve seen a heavy, full range squat in a mainstream gym on a barbell on one hand. I have, however, many times seen a guy stick 200kg on a Smith Machine and do quarter squats like he was actually doing something.

On the squat, the main thing is to initiate the movement with the hips and squat down until your hip goes just below the knee joint. That’s a parallel squat. The problem is, when you’ve got a heavy weight on your back, your body lies to you about how low you think you’re going because of the heavy weight. Hence the shallow knee bends called “squats.”

Hope you find these useful.

When success is a failure

Here’s a story for you. We don’t have many older men (aged 50 or so) but one came in one day and wanted to join. He was pot-bellied and had no visible muscle — like a lot of men I see. Since we don’t have many like him, I was determined to get this guy solid results. Even though he only paid for group class, I worked with him privately before and after group sessions and I coached his movements all the time. I was bound and determined that this man would succeed.

To my surprise, in about three months we had done the impossible — his gut was gone and he had a little visible muscle showing even when he wore regular clothes. I was so proud of him and happy at what we had accomplished, and he seemed happy too. And right at the height of that happiness — he vanished.

He disappeared from group class, didn’t return my calls or emails. I had no idea what happened to him.

Six months later, I bumped into him on the street and not only had he gained all the weight back, he had put on more. But what shocked me was his attitude.

He told me that what we did “to” him was dangerous. He said that lifting weights was dangerous, that “lifting weights over your head will make you short” even in adults. He really believed that BS. When i asked him where he had heard such nonsense, i was told this was common knowledge. He said that the protein we wanted him to eat was bad for his kidneys. And he was actually a little angry at me.

I was just stunned. I tried to offer some half-hearted rebuttals to his BS but I couldn’t believe what i was hearing. Here was a guy that i had gotten good results with in every way. I had gone out of my way to teach him how to squeeze the core so he wouldn’t hurt his back. I had taught him how to improve his posture through correct exercise technique. We had improved his health by getting him to cut carbs. But all of this went against the common nonsense that normal people believe about weight training and fitness. In the end, their arguments were more persuasive to him and he believed their BS because he was weak and it was easier to just agree with the masses than it was to admit our methods had worked.

When you actually care about the job you do and the results you get because it’s more than a job to you, then stuff like this hurts. It hurts bad. I didn’t know what to do or say back then and I still don’t today. I made an emotional investment in fixing this guy and he threw it back in my face because he wasn’t worthy of the gift he had received.

Since then, my outlook has slowly shifted and I’ve become harder as a person and a trainer. i still put myself out there but i make people work for it more than I did in the past. And I spread my efforts a little wider these days so the people that aren’t worthy of what we provide can be dropped in favor of those that are.

So that’s one story. Stay tuned, I have more.

So we’re fascists?

So this week I got told that our approach to fitness is fascist and simple-minded. And then I got told that our Tactical Strength Challenge was nothing but a “dick-waving contest.” Understand that in the mind of the weak general public, you are NOT supposed to succeed in fitness. You’re supposed to announce your grand fitness goals and then fail just like everyone else. If you do succeed, you then separate yourself from the masses that are too weak to make the consistent effort it takes to get fit. And the other crabs will try to pull you back down into the barrel. You MUST resist the mediocre pulling you back down. Surround yourself with people that will help you succeed or fail!

Issues in training women

I really enjoy training women for a variety of reasons. One, it’s great doing strength training with the so-called “weaker gender” and then watching them get stronger than your average man. There’s kind of a thrill in that. Second, women usually do what I tell them to do since they don’t have all their gym-going buddies giving them competing advice. Although it is sometimes hard to argue against the “get a six pack in a week” segment of the industry.

However, it isn’t all roses and there are a few issues to deal with when training women.

First is the lack of body control usually due to women being hyper-flexible and hyper-mobile. Women aren’t as tight as men so they sometimes have a hard time controlling what their bodies are doing in space. This is a big issue for a personal trainer to deal with because this kind of control is crucial to exercise results but takes time to learn — a big detriment when people expect results NOW. Having any kind of exercise background would help but that isn’t present in many cases. Without it, we have to start from scratch with something that was best learned as a child or teen.

Second is the inability to generate muscle tension. I’ve trained some women that found it practically impossible to generate muscle tension, especially in the upper body. In training for pullups, for example, I would give them assisted pullups in which they still had to squeeze the muscles to get their chin over the bar but the feet were on the floor for assistance. But some of these women seemingly couldn’t generate tension with the upper body to pull themselves up. They didn’t struggle or strain to get above the bar — they either could do the movement or not. Feeling their muscles revealed no tension being used.

Third, despite the popularity of Pilates in women’s fitness, some women really struggle with squeezing/activating the core. This is a combination of one and two above, but becomes a real problem when a trainer specifically address the core and the need to activate it for safety reasons when lifting weights. Again, teaching this takes some time and is necessary to proper progression and once it’s learned, the need to do extra abs work diminishes and the total workout time goes down as the weight lifted goes up. I would have thought that the experience of giving birth might increase the ability to control the core since women have to push in labor. But perhaps more women are opting for C-Sections these days? Splitting the abs muscle does change a woman’s lower abs forever.

Fourth is the quad dominance found in women that leads to the knee collapsing in during squats, etc. (knee valgus for the fitness nerds). Quad dominance leads to a lack of posterior chain strength in the glutes and hamstrings, which in turn leads to the knee bowing in during squats. Combine this problem with hyper-mobility and a trainer can have a real problem on their hands. Men who don’t have glutes usually don’t have knees that bow in because they aren’t hyper-mobile. Men’s natural lack of flexibility leads to other issues but the knee moving in isn’t usually one of them. Again, this is correctable but takes precious workout time to fix and most people didn’t come to have their movements corrected.

Taken separately, none of these issues is insurmountable for a good trainer. But combine some or even all of them together into one person that is looking to fit into a bikini next month or who has some other short-term goal, and even the best trainer has their work cut out for them.

Build character through fitness?

This is a must see video that explains what we’re trying to do at Formosa Fitness and why we had the TSC recently. It should be required viewing for anyone interested in true fitness instead of the mere illusion or appearance of fitness. Far too many people miss the building of character and values that goes into a true fitness program. It’s about loyalty, courage, honor, integrity, and a whole bunch of other words that are meaningless in our modern “smart phone” addicted society.

I wanted a place that built character rather than catered to lazy, pampered people who were barely willing to do the absolute minimum required to get fit. That’s nearly every other gym out there. It’s about something more than physical, it’s a transformation of mind, body, and spirit. That transformation often needs a capstone event — a testing of the will and spirit — that provides a challenge above and beyond the normal in order for the transformation to be complete. Events such as the TSC provide that opportunity for normal people to experience what it’s like to be a champion and to reach new heights as people.

Not everyone is qualified for this but for those willing to step away from the ordinary, the possibility exists in Taiwan to do it.