Our overarching approach at GRIPT is we want to educate, empower and support each member of the GRIPT community to build a healthier, happier and better lifestyle for themselves wherever they are on their health journey – whether that is starting out and wanting to get a consistent routine in place, to wanting to hit personal bests across the three key compound movements.
When GRIPT first opened in South Yarra we offered a single small group training session targeted at women which combined weight training and high intensity training into the one session. Over a period of 12 months, this one style evolved into three unique styles, which included:
- Lower and upper body small group weight training sessions that focused on building and shaping women’s body’s. Today known as ‘Volumize’.
- A men’s hypertrophy program that targets a specific muscle group each session to build strength and muscle. Today known as ‘Hyper’.
- Metabolic Conditioning sessions or ‘Met-Con’ as they were known then, that focus on conditioning the body’s different energy systems. Today known as ‘Energize’.
- We have recently introduced Form, which is resistance based group training where we introduce you to weight training by integrating our philosophies from the black studio into the white studio.
This evolution was on the basis of listening and observing our clients and their needs. We created the training people needed and the frequency they required, to achieve their desired results. Our approach throughout this period of time has been to get you training at the level with execution and intensity that you are capable of, which is also the level required to achieve results. Client feedback was “I thought I had been training, and then I tried GRIPT”.
One of our priorities as coaches is to understand what your goal is and to recommend training that reflects it. This is so that we can ensure you are investing your time, effort and money wisely. We take into consideration that people have different goals, motivation, levels of care and commitment, which can help us determine what will be the most suitable option. What we also seek to understand is where you are at on your health journey, with your training experience, and what has prevented you from achieving the results you desire previously. It’s during these conversations that we come across the stories and the negative experiences you have had in the past, including:
- Being weighed every visit to the gym and criticised when the scales moved in the opposite direction.
- Having a restrictive diet plan forced on you that you are not ready to commit to and then having a trainer get frustrated at you.
- Being made to weigh every meal when you don’t have a good relationship with food to begin with.
- Unnecessary supplements, and unproven remedies being recommended when the basic health fundamentals aren’t in place.
- Injuries occurring due to exercise selection being too advanced for your experience level.
- Trainers only being interested in exchanging money for sessions, and not willing to help understand you beyond this time.
- Trainers being more concerned with the amount of information they can display instead of the help they demonstrate.
A lot of the underlying factors in these scenarios, is the inexperience and insecurities of the trainer being projected onto their clients, when the client isn’t ready or willing to make the same commitments that the trainer is. Instead of this being identified, where you are at on your journey, what you want to achieve, what your level of care and commitment, and as a coach what can I do to support you to get there. This often leads to the trainer becoming frustrated, sessions being cancelled, and the trainer eventually quitting on the client because they are not willing to do the work to get a client where they want to be going. Or worse still, the client putting their health journey on pause.
I believe in hard love, just ask any of my team in their professional development. But hard love should always be based on understanding what the goal is, what someones capability is, and ultimately are they capable of giving more. If the coaches expectations outweigh the reality of the person they are working with, that is the fault of the coach, not the person.
When people come to us, it is often on the basis of trying a series of other options and not seeing or feeling the results they had set out to achieve, or doing it in the type of environment that they were comfortable in. These are the 4 most common reasons I come across:
- Training style doesn’t reflect goal
- Training frequency (how often)
- Training level (execution and intensity)
- Nutrition not reflective of their goal
Training Style
The training styles determine the type of stimulus on the body, or how your body will adapt to it:
- Weight training programmed and executed well will help build and shape your body.
- High Intensity Training has high energy exertion during the session which will help manage or lose weight.
- Cardio training such as running, cycling, or swimming etc. will improve your endurance, and manage weight.
Training Frequency
Training frequency will determine the length of time taken to achieve desired results. Frequency referring to the number of times each week you train a specific style, or even further to this, a muscle group in weight training terms.
Training Level
Your execution and intensity will determine the quality of your work – the greater your quality, the more you will gain out of your training. This is a key reason all programming within the studio is on a 4 week basis to allow you to understand each movement better, and then over the course of the 4 weeks, progressively increase your execution, intensity and the quantity that you complete.
Nutrition
What you consume and how much you consume will determine how your body performs, recovers and adapts. As the old saying goes “you cannot out train a bad diet”, which is why our in house Nutritionist Lane will work with you to understand what your body needs and when your body needs it based on your routine, lifestyle and goal.
Training Plateau
One of the most common barriers people face is when they have exhausted a routine of the same training, at the same frequency, in a format that doesn’t allow for tangible progress (Working Out Vs. Training). I have come across cases where people are training multiple times each day, 6-7 days per week under the recommendation of a trainer. Not only is this not sustainable, but it can compromise someone’s output and performance because their body is never provided with the opportunity to recover. This can lead to small niggling injuries turning into long term injuries that require months of work in a 1-on-1 setting to recover from.
When it comes to exercise, people do it for different reasons. Along with their reason, come different levels of commitment and care. By this I mean some people want to train simply because it makes them feel good and they have a better day because of it. Some people train because it is an outlet for them, and an opportunity to connect in a community. Some people want to get strong and follow the same routine, because this structure and working towards a goal keeps them focused, motivated, and more likely to achieve their goal. Some people want to build self confidence and belief in the gym, so they can take it out into every other factor of their life. Some people want to get themselves into the best shape of their lives, because they want to challenge themselves like they have never done before, and in the process, shed some parts of themselves that they are no longer happy with. Some people want to train, eat, recover, manage stress as well as they possibly can, because that is where they can the greatest satisfaction from and it allows them to enjoy their lives more.
What is important wth any of these goals and outcomes, is to then refer it back to what you are currently doing and asking yourself, “Am I getting what I want from what I am investing my time, effort and money into? Is my current investment getting me closer each week, or further away?”
If you would like to discuss your training and health goals, get in contact to arrange a time for a consultation in the studio.
Drew
GRIPT Owner
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