Category: gym news

 You’ve got a great chance to get some great fitness results in your home or gym if they have kettlebells. We’re starting a kettlebell WOD (workout of the day) project is we can get 50 people to sign up for it over at the Kettlebell Taiwan (our other company) Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Kettlebell-Taiwan/129458670435141

We’re going to post a sample WOD like this one in the pic and all you have to do to participate is let us know you’re willing to follow the workout and post your results and weight used in the comments under each workout on the Facebook page. If you’re willing to do that, you’re in! it’s FREE!

So come join us for some killer workouts! And if you need a kettlebell , let us know!

I put this out over a week ago:

Here we go. The Athena Project starts now:
WANTED! One Taiwanese female!
Do you want to get strong and fit like the picture below? Are you frustrated because you don’t know how to do it?
Hi, I’m Dave Chesser, head trainer and owner of the Formosa Fitness gym in Taipei, and I’m looking for ONE lucky lady that wants to get fit and gain muscle. You will get trained personally by me 3-4 times a week for 3-6 months FOR FREE. Here’s the requirements:
1. You have to join Formosa Fitness, where you will do all your workouts.
2. You have to agree to follow all my instructions about workout and diet, whether in the gym or at home.
3. You have to agree to allow us to take pictures, measurements, and videos of your workouts. The pictures and video will be tasteful, not exploitative.
4. You have to be willing to talk publicly on our Facebook pages about the process.
5. You have to agree to do this for a minimum of three months and up to six months.

In exchange for that, you will receive 3-4 private sessions a week for 3-6 months FOR FREE. The value of this offer is over NT$100,000!

And we had our first meeting of the potential candidates yesterday:

We have a LOT of potential candidates and some couldn’t attend this meeting so we’ll be meeting with more this next week. We’re going to do our best to show how we think women should be trained and try to change the fitness scene in Taiwan forever! Stay tuned for updates!

I passed NASM’s performance enhancement specialist course! It’s their athletic certification. It was a hard test but worth doing. it will take a long time to absorb all the material. The test is just the first step to mastery!

WANTED! One Taiwanese female! Do you want to get strong and fit like the picture below? Are you frustrated because you don’t know how to do it?
Hi, I’m Dave Chesser, head trainer and owner of the Formosa Fitness gym in Taipei, and I’m looking for ONE lucky lady that wants to get fit and gain muscle. You will get trained personally by me 3-4 times a week for 3-6 months FOR FREE. Here’s the requirements:
1. You have to join Formosa Fitness, where you will do all your workouts.
2. You have to agree to follow all my instructions about workout and diet, whether in the gym or at home.
3. You have to agree to allow us to take pictures, measurements, and videos of your workouts. The pictures and video will be tasteful, not exploitative.
4. You have to be willing to talk publicly on our Facebook pages about the process.
5. You have to agree to do this for a minimum of three months and up to six months.

In exchange for that, you will receive 3-4 private sessions a week for 3-6 months FOR FREE. The value of this offer is over NT$100,000!

Please send a brief introduction describing your fitness history, any injuries or pregnancies recently, when you’d be available to train and what time of day is best, etc. along with a picture of yourself to: formosa.fitness”at”msa.hinet.net

I’m getting lots of emails from people that aren’t members of our facility asking if they can come in and film the 13.1 WOD for the Crossfit 2013 Open. The answer is unfortunately going to be no and I’m going to tell you why. When a gym owner and senior trainer takes the time to explain why he isn’t allowing something, I hope the effort is appreciated and I hope you carefully consider what I’m saying.

First, here’s the WOD;
17 minute AMRAP of:
40 Burpees
30 Snatch, 75 / 45 lbs
30 Burpees
30 Snatch, 135 / 75 lbs
20 Burpees
30 Snatch, 165 / 100 lbs
10 burpees
Max rep Snatch, 210 / 120 lbs

Right away we see a bad workout design. You get exhausted with burpees and then the weight on the snatch goes up? So you take a technical movement that tends to degrade with fatigue, pair it with burpees so you fatigue even faster, AND increase the weight on the snatches as the workout progresses. Brilliant. No one will get hurt that way, will they?

Even someone proficient in snatches will see their form degrade right at the point where the weight gets heavier, greatly increasing the likelihood of getting injured. And for what? So you can have your video up on Youtube?

Second, this is the first Open workout, meaning it will be done by the broadest swath of people interested in Crossfit. It will be done by all kinds of people that don’t know how to snatch, that are self-taught from Crossfit videos with no precautions whatsoever, and who are likely to hurt themselves. Seriously, how many novice men will be doing safe snatches with 210lbs. (95kg) after all those burpees? How many novice men will do good snatches without doing burpees? And we’re just gonna pretend this is risk free?

Let’s take a look at an example:

This gentlemen is certainly sincere and I applaud his interest in fitness. But his “snatch” is a rounded back deadlift with an “two hands anyhow” over his head. The last set of snatches is around 16:39. Seriously, who thinks this is a good idea? Thousands of beginners will be doing this all over the world in their basements and globogyms and Crossfit HQ is directly responsible for promoting this nonsense. Chiropractors will rack up booming numbers starting this week.

Also, it’s guests that are asking if they can do this. Guests haven’t been exposed to our rational fitness philosophy, haven’t heard why we think the average “go for broke” Crossfit workout isn’t so smart, haven’t been coached in how we think a reasonable snatch should be done, nor had their burpee form looked at by our staff. The chances of someone coming into our facility and hurting themselves while doing this ill-advised workout is really high, a risk that isn’t worth the day pass fee for me. Telling people that they got hurt in our facility doing something we would NEVER recommend is also a risk I’m not willing to take.

Finally, let me make a personal appeal to you based on personal experience: injuries happen when you least expect them and even to people that think it can’t happen to them. You THINK you’re using good form, you think you’re being careful, but often times people aren’t as careful and correct as they might think, especially when doing a workout that was specifically designed to make your form break down like this one. With dynamic exercises like burpees and snatches, you’re often injured before you even know it. There isn’t always a slow build up of pain showing that something is off. You’re doing a hormonally charged workout that can leave you with a sudden injury because you were doing something that you shouldn’t have been doing in the first place. At that point, it’s too late.

Having to take two months or more off training because you wanted to show how tough you are on Youtube and Facebook isn’t worth it, trust me. Instead, slow things down, study exercise form, constantly work on quality and not just see how fast and hard you can do something, and you will be healthier and fitter for it in the long run. And if you’re really smart you’ll extract yourself from a fitness community that doesn’t care how many people get broken along the way and instead look into joining a program that can get you in great shape while not breaking you — like the one we offer at Formosa Fitness.

Thanks for taking the time to read this and stay safe.

P.S. If you want to test your fitness, please join us for the Tactical Strength Challenge on May 4th or join the TSC nearest you!