Funny Training Story: The Art of Seduction

I’ve been training with friends and clients on and off since I was 18.  It’s been a wonderful journey learning about my own training as well as learning how to train and motivate others.  There are always those moments in life that sit fondly in your memories and here’s a few learnings that I’ve collected along the way

Simon Says

In order to ensure proper form and safety, I always spot my clients when they’re doing heavier weights.  It’s also a good way to provide motivation to help them get through that final set.  Now, I’ve learned that there’s an art to spotting and not doing it correctly can result in negative results.  Here’s how I learned what not to say.

I’ve been training this client for about six months whom I’ve developed a pretty good rapport with.  Little did I know that I was about to test this relationship during his next training session.  It’s upper back day and we are starting with chinups.  Seeing that I don’t have an assisted chinup machine at the studio, I’ll have to be the one to provide the assistance.  So he jumps up to the chinup bar and rests his feet on my quads, where he can use his legs to assist if required.  Keep in mind my face is close to his butt at this point.  He does the first three reps without any problems, it’s the fourth and he starts to struggle but manages to pull himself up.  “Good” I say.  Number five. “Gooood” I say again.  Number six.  “Goooooood” comes out once more. 

Buddy lets go of the bar and drops to the ground hysterical in laughter.  He asks if I can stop saying the word good in that tone.  I ask, “What tone?”  He responds “You sound like a creepy pedophile the way you keep saying goooooood”.  I didn’t notice it, but he was right, I did sound like I was trying to coax him like a pedophile would a child. 

Lesson learned: be supportive not seductive.