Category Archives: Motivation and Inspiration
Training Partners: Rich And How He Changed From a Healthy Lifestyle to a Healthy Lifestyle
Rich (one of my buddies who has been training with us) tried working out with me and Chase Reynolds (RB – St Louis Rams) a while back and had a big problem hanging with us. We busted his balls every day after that and he refused to try it again. This was after he watched us for weeks and decided that, “Oh that’s not so hard. I can do that.” He actually showed up at the gym and came over to us and says, “I’m going to workout with you today.” We said ok and jumped into a single exercise, which we rarely go with. One solo exercise, not a circuit not a superset. It was a chest bounce exercise with no weight (We are in a plank position – push up position. Workout bands around the hands looped through a squat rack behind us – causing resistance. Hands are on separate platforms. We bounce on hands and feet from one end of the platform to the other. 10 bounces each direction. This is done several times non stop.). Next we did 4 or 5 rounds of a 4 or 5 station circuit, nonstop. Rich didn’t like hearing the words nonstop. When we finished he looked out of it and he said he was going to get some work down. Chase said, “Are you kidding? Are you done?” I said, “Rich, this w as a light workout and we aren’t even a quarter of the way done.” That simple workout was enough to make him decide that it was not for him.
Well I guess it stirred something in the back of his head, because a few months ago, he started working out with me and the other guys. This dude has come a long way. His workouts were pretty similar to what I did before working out the way that we currently train. (Now: No rest, lots of reps, 4 or more rounds, lots of functional movements, and lots of core. We beat down the same muscles over and over again in our workouts. We work a lot with increasing muscle stabilizers and muscle endurance.) (Before – Mixing heavy weights and also adding some High Intensity Interval Training (nothing like the HIIT that we do now). Rich decided that he wanted to challenge himself and has been coming in with us and improving every day. Not bad for another guy in his mid 40’s who never trained this way. It’s not like he has to train this way. When asked why he does it, he said, that he wants to be in better shape (he was already in “good shape” based on what he thought) and he likes challenging himself. Our training has not only gotten him into better shape, but has help him get rid of back, shoulder and elbow pain. I love finding his weak spots, just to make him suffer. His suffering will be gone soon, since he is improving every day.
Like I said he really has no reason to train the way that we do and honestly neither do I. We are around the same age and both of us come from athletic backgrounds. Both of us also went through our own transformations and both of us like helping other people achieve theirs. Since he is one of the owners of Excel Training (the gym where I train), he is involved with changing all kinds of people’s lives. Helping people live healthy lifestyles and kids train to be better athletes. Now that he is one of my training partners, he joins me in putting college and professional athletes who are half of our age in a form of torture that only helps them improve. A big part of our workouts are psychological. Push yourself harder, push yourself further.
Our reason for training this way: We have the satisfaction of being able to compete on a daily basis with professional athletes (our workouts have a competitive nature tied into them). We Challenge ourselves every day. We can prove that if you BELIEVE it, that you can do it. We take pride in being able to do something a lot of people would walk away from. We take more pride when one of those people who does walk away comes back and FINISHES WHAT THEY STARTED!!!
When we train, our entire group is constantly motivating each other, but we also talk a lot of crap to each other. If you come in last in something or you mess up somewhere along the line, you will hear about it. Rich is probably the most fun person to pick on. No matter what, I know it motivates him. I hear my fair share.
Rich doesn’t know how to read, so if you know him, please don’t tell him that I wrote this. I will just deny it.
BELIEVE!!! Show Someone Else The Way
I was out in Colorado on business. I love traveling out there because there are so many cool outdoor things to do. I go out to Red Rocks (an outdoor amphitheater built into the rocks) and workout. The views are amazing and you can get a great workout by going up and down about 100 rows of seats.
I was getting my workout in and it was a really nice day. I had started out with a run. I started at the top and went across each row and when I would get to the end I would drop down a row and run across that one. I did this until I got to the bottom. Next I did some bounding up and down the seats.
There was a group of kids from one of the local YMCA’s. They were all sitting at the top of the amphitheater, checking out the view and watching people workout. Some people come up with some cool things here. If you watch them you can definitely pick some good stuff up. When I passed these kids I heard a couple of them making some comment about having a lot of muscle. The next time I passed, this one kid asks me my name. I said, “Eric. What’s yours?”. He said, “I’m Arnold. Arnold Schwarzenegger.” I left and kept going. I was about to go onto my next exercise. I stopped and went back over to “Arnold”. I said, “hey, do you want to finish my workout with me.” The kid gets this big grin on his face and he says, “Yeah, that would be awesome.” Some other kids jumped up and asked if they could jump in also. I told them that they could. These kids are all between 8 and 12. They asked what we were going to do. “First thing that we will do is dips. 3 dips on each row all the way down.” We would put our hands on the seats of one row and feet on the seats below us. Knock out 3 dips and crawl down to the next level. These kids all lined up and went down the entire thing with me.
As we went I could hear a couple of them saying how hard it was, but they kept going. It wasn’t like they were really complaining, just saying what they felt. We get to the bottom and “Arnold” says, “How are we getting back up?” I said, “push-ups. 3 push ups for every row and then crawl to the next.” He says, “Ok, can we rest first?” I said, “Sure…Ready, let’s go.” I guess he needed more time than that. I gave them a couple of minutes and then we got back to work. We go within 20 seats from the top and I added 2 more push-ups per seat. When we got 10 rows out, I said, “Alright we now have 10 push-ups per row until we finish.” At this point there were at least 50 people at the top of amphitheater watching us. When we got to the top, all these people started to cheer for the kids. We are all high fiving each other. I said, “Do you guys know how many push-ups you just did?” They all said, “No”. My response was, “Over 300”. They all were a little freaked out and excited about that. More than likely they had never come close to that number in a day.
There were probably 20 kids that jumped in and out during the whole workout. 3 of them were there the whole time. These kids jumped into my workout, because it was different and because I invited them into it. It’s amazing what someone can do when they don’t look at as a hurdle. The old me would have ignored these kids. Don’t be a spectator.
With My LUCK….
I have never accomplished something and said, “I am so Lucky.” There were points in my past that I did say, “with my luck…”. Most people don’t end the saying, “with my luck..” with something negative. Are you setting yourself up for failure? Are you expecting things not to workout? Negative thoughts will lead to a negative outcome. Bad things will happen to you at some point and you will probably fail somewhere down the line. I can’t control some of the bad and if I do, than I can learn from my mistakes or I was to stupid not to avoid the situation. I rather fail because I am challenging myself. I can overcome failure. I have the attitude that I need to accomplish my goals. I’m not reaching them to luck. As far as, I am concerned I don’t have any luck and I don’t need it. Life is about taking risks and challenging yourself and having the courage to do it. Prepare yourself and don’t leave things to Luck unless you are playing a slot machine. Life would be pretty boring and pretty stressful if left to luck. I would bet that leading your life by luck, would have 50 to 1 odds of being successful.
Evolve My Life ™ 