Ian King

How Can I Get More Clients?

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Any service-based business is constantly looking for new clients and being a trainer is no different. If you Google search this subject you will find the usual solutions being promoted, as discussed in ‘What’s holding you back as a personal trainer’ blog article – ‘get more qualifications’, ‘build your CV’, ‘market yourself’ etc. Including the suggestion that if you buy ‘system in a box’ (e.g. email scripts) you can build your online business because ‘online personal training is the next big thing in fitness’.

Let me be straight – if you are incompetent and can’t fill your client list you are still going to be incompetent online.

Let’s talk about real solutions for increasing your client numbers. To begin lets understand why your current clients train with you.

Why do your current clients really train with you?

Here’s a reality check for you – ask yourself why current clients train with you. You can even ask them. Now put aside the answers and consider this.

Firstly, imagine telling them you are moving your training away by say 10 miles. How many are going to say ‘That’s no problems, I will just drive to you each session!’. Now imagine telling them you are moving your training base 20 miles away, then 30 miles away. How many clients do you have left?

Now start the game all over again, and instead of telling them (or imagining telling them!) that you are moving, tell them you have raised your rates by 10%.How many are saying ‘Good on you! You are worth it! I am excited to stay with you at that rate!’ Now imagine telling them you are raising your rates by 20%? Then 30%? How many clients do you have left?

Now you may be the exception to the rule, because when I have run this with most trainers they quickly realize that….people chose to train with you because you are convenient and cheap….

Now understand that if this reason for training you does not change, you are competing with the other 300,000 (or whatever your country numbers are) who are also perceived as convenient and cheap by their clients. Not much of a Unique Marketing Position (UMP)…..

What are some of the common mistakes trainers make that may be holding them back from getting more clients?

In addition to believing they certificate, CV or market themselves beyond their level of competence, here are some of the common mistakes trainers make in their attempts to raise their client numbers.

1. Talking features not benefits – the training profession is on that loves to associate with science, facts and figures, and big multi-syllable words. Very few clients share this love. Most of this infatuation with with science, facts and figures, and big multi-syllable words comes from the desire to and misguided belief in the importance of impressive colleagues. There’s some significant differences between impressing your colleagues and impressing your clients. For starters, your colleague is not hiring you – your client it.

There are on the other hand massive benefits of sharing the benefits for the individual of whatever you are talking about, as opposed to sharing the features. They have less interest in what happened to a group of under-graduate students in the research sample during an 8 week period, and a lot more interest in what it might do to them over years.

2. Buying into prescription not process – there is an academic and western-world belief that ‘we know’ how to train someone. This is called a prescriptive approach That if you do x, y will occur. How do we know? Because that is what the research said….. or because EVERYONE is using that training method/equipment/exercise (read trend) at the moment…

There are cultures fortunately that have promoted the ‘process’ approach to training. That a training plan is an educated guess that needs to be tweaked daily in response to lessons we learn about the cause-effect relationship of that protocol on that person. It is not assumptive, rather it is focused on objectively assessing the training effect and being willing to change direction.

Clients are not stupid. They can work out if you are treating them like an individual and applying the ‘process’ approach or if you are treating them just like an average and applying the ‘prescriptive’ approach.

3. Failing communication 101 – If you are going to go down the process path you need information. Information comes from the client – the words they say, the body they present, their history etc. The communication goal is to have them provide that information, initially through a series of well-constructed intentional questions.

This art of communication takes time and guidance to develop. What a competent coach can ascertain in a very short period of time will shock the average trainer – if they ever got into a position to hear the dialogue.

Once the questions are asked, the next challenge is to listen. To ultimately speak less than the client. To fulfill the saying  …you have 2 ears and 1 mouth – there’s a reason for that!

4. Generic programming instead of individualized programming – every person is unique, different. They know that. So why do trainers give everyone the same workouts when they should have totally unique programs? Now changing the name on the top of the program sheet does not qualify for individualization! Nor does changing the sequence of the exercises or even substituting one or more exercises out or in.

Programming is the plan your client will follow. It will shape their training effects. Will your ability to individualize programs be enhanced by higher qualifications? It would be nice if it did, but in four decades of professional observation that has not been what I’ve seen. Will building your CV help you individualize your programs? No. Will marketing yourself or marketing yourself more effectively enhance your ability to individualize programs? No.

So how do you get more clients?

Here’s my answer for you, and it’s got nothing to do with more qualifications, more marketing or CV building.

Without going out of your way, in the organic movements of your life, you will come upon people who have physical challenges, and who are looking to solve those physical challenges. Using your newfound focus on listening and communication, upon identifying these people you ask them if they would like you to help them.

No, you are not soliciting them as a client, so don’t get this confused!

If they agree work within their time frame. In a social setting you may have 5 minutes. In a more one on one chat you may have 15 minutes. Whatever you have, this is your time frame to do what I call a ‘show and tell’.

A show and tell is a window of opportunity you have to show a person how much value can add to their life by solving their challenges, by providing an effective solution. By giving them the clear impression of increase that you are able to do things no-one else can. That you are the only game in town.

Then you walk away. Figuratively, at least. You are not going to, I repeat, solicit them or look to ‘close’ the deal’.

If you are effective however, they will chase you, step over the line towards you. Now you have the foundations of a great client relationship because they have discovered your value. They are looking to hire you because of the value you an add, not because you are cheap and convenient!

Let’s say you go and do ten of these ‘show and tell’s’. And let’s say you get no or little client sign ups. There’s a message in that – you need to get better. Not get more qualifications, not get a better CV, not get better at marketing – get better at adding value in very short period of time. Get better at demonstrating the value you bring to the market place.

Conclusion

The ‘show and tell’ strategy is not only the NUMBER ONE client-recruiting tool; it is also the number one diagnostic tool on your progress in value added

So lets say six months ago you were converting one out of 10 of your show and tells. Now you are converting three out of ten. That’s progress!

So where are you going to learn how to master the art of adding real value in a short period of time? In addition to practice, the fastest way is to learn from someone who has mastered it and willing to teach it!

How many clients do you need to grow an incredible training business? One. Provided the value you add is so significant that this one person is compelled to refer their friends, family and colleagues to you. This is the power of the most powerful marketing method in service-based professions – world of mouth or referral-based marketing. Not only is referral-based marketing the best way to grow a business, it is the best way to qualify clients.

You just need two things – the willingness to identify people who are looking for solutions, and the competency to impress upon them that you are the one to provide the solution. And until you achieve the second item – the willingness to embrace any lack of competency and a willingness to find a way to change, to improve your competence.

Ian King

The Personal Trainers Challenge “How to Stand Out in a Crowded Market”

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This article is written for those personal trainers who want to stand out in the market place, who want to get ahead, rise above the masses, and reap the rewards from doing so.  It’s not an easy task. At least, not if you apply the solutions that most go to in attempts to create their Unique Marketing Position (UMP). It get’s a lot easier if you understand one key thing!

In the US alone, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics,[1] there are over 300,000 personal trainers and gym instructors. And that’s not including the other disciplines within physical preparation e.g. strength and conditioning coaches.

After all, the role of a personal trainer (PT) is the current go-to for anyone not sure of what to do with their life, or waiting for that big acting breakthrough!

So how do you stand out in this incredibly crowded market? And do many succeed?

 

If we were to equate higher income with successfully standing out, you would have to say that few achieve this. Again according to the US BLS[2] only the highest 10 percent earned more than $72,980. That’s not much money, and not many people earning it.

So what are Personal Trainers doing that for the most part is contributing to their failure to stand out in the market, contributing to their inability to rise above their competition.

To sum it up simply – they are failing because their solution is to copy what the majority are doing!!

 

There is a saying in the Australian military about ‘monkey see, monkey do’. In other words, the average ‘grunt’ (infantry soldier) is conditioned to mimic whatever they see their instructors or leaders do.  Safe solution in war preparation, but how does it work out in a competitive capitalistic environment – when every a soldier, every step you take isn’t necessarily the last one you might take on two legs!

In other words whilst we owe so much to the military for it’s contribution to the physical preparation industry (ever wonder why the shoulder press is called a military press?) we are not bound to operate on their solutions. We can and SHOULD look to be different – especially if we want a different outcome!!!

 

Look at it this way. If you do it the way everyone else is doing it – all things being equal, how are you going to be better than everyone else?  Realistically changes do occur (albeit slowly) in sport training – because someone dared to do it differently.  These people gain the advantage, are at the cutting edge.  The sheep follow.  Which do you want to be? [3]

 

So what exactly are the majority doing?

 

Monkey-see Monkey-do Step #1 – Abandon Individualized Program Design

What happens on day one for most personal training clients? They get a workout done.  How does that happen so fast? I mean at the longest most clients are into a workout within an hour.  At most a canned assessment, a generic program (or the more common go to – just make up the exercises as you go!)

I know, some of you want to debate this with me. You claim you and ALL the trainers in your facility go through an extensive program design session with each client! Let me ask it this way and see how respond – how much are and your colleagues being paid for your program design services? Now an honest response for the majority would be nothing, zero, nada. Say no more….

If you were highly competent and experienced (and that’s an if…) it should take you between one to three hours of interview, assessment and program design – all paid for by the client – BEFORE they got near a workout!

 

Monkey-see Monkey-do Step #2 – The 60 minute workout

Now I know there is a program on TV called ’60 minutes’, but why do the majority of personal training client workouts globally take 60 minutes? Is it possible that 99.9% of the clients have the same needs? Ah, I don’t think so!

So why are you using 60 minute workouts? I can only conclude that you are doing this because that is what everyone else is doing (and that is where the monkey see-monkey do cuts in!

And the other reason is because it is convenient for you to plan your billable hours. However it is in the best interests of the client? And how is it possible that all of them have such similar needs that they all end up doing a 60 minute workout?

In the KSI way, we take whatever time is needed for each individual on any given day!

 

Monkey-see Monkey-do Step #3 – The 7 Step Workout! 

Now in addition to every client coincidentally finding  a 60 minute workout ‘optimal’, how amazing it that the majority of the clients have such similar needs that they all end up on the latest dominant trend pumped out in the latest round of fitness industry seminars!

Lately it’s been the 7-step workout! Isn’t it amazing that everyone has the same needs? Now imagine if you as a trainer were to discover that everyone is different, and you were to break out (some would suggest break down!) and provide unique workout components to different clients!

In the KSI Coaching Program we teach you how to do this – train individuals as, well, individuals!

 

Monkey-see Monkey-do Step #4 – Multi-planar, multi-joint, closed kinetic chain exercises

Simplistic thinking where concepts such as ‘all your exercises need to be multi-planar and compound (multi-joint) and closed kinetic chain (feet on the ground) and killing the results for your clients! This subject is worth an article on itself – or maybe more than one!

Leave this simplistic brain dead thinking to the masses. You can and should think for yourself. It’s pretty scary to think that after we released this spoof we actually had viewers contacting us who took the skit seriously!

Now we recognize it may not be easy. After all, the commercial interests that pull the strings in this industry (e.g. equipment manufacturers and distributors) have some strong conforming measures in place!

The KSI Coaching Program aims to teach you to think for yourself!

 

Monkey-see Monkey-do Step #5 – Ban the good stuff!

 Its hard to fathom how anyone who exercised their ability to assess the cause-effect relationship of a certain type of training such as stretching would reach the current dominant paradigm that is so negative about this training method.

It’s no wonder injuries are skyrocketing!

 

But that is what EVERYONE else is doing!  Which makes it so simple for you to get superior results with your clients. Now thankfully they suffer less from conformity than you and the physical preparation community does!

This same ‘brain-dead’ conformity leads trainers to give band exercises out – which provide a form of resistance that outside of someone on a Himalayan trek really shouldn’t be doing!!!

That’s right – ban the good stuff, give them the crappy stuff! That’s how you stay ordinary and maintain the statistical average!

Our goal is to help you use your God given grey matter resulting in greater outcomes for your clients!

It’s so simple, so easy, to rise above your 300,000 colleagues!

 

Your Unique Marketing Position (UMP) or Unique Sales Position (USP)

Many in sales and marketing talk about your UMP or USP, basically what is it about you that stands you out in the market places, allows you to out-perform your competition.

It’s pretty tough to have a UMP (or USP) when you service your clients just like everyone else does!

 

Give you a hint – if what I teach is what the majority do, I would be very concerned. I want to do what few do, to get a competitive advantage. [4]

 

And no, getting your hair dyed, getting more ink, or getting more body piercings is not my idea of a successful UMP!

In the higher levels of the KSI Coaching Program we focus extensively on helping you develop your USP, and tracking the success of this over a multi-year period through markers such as hourly rate, client numbers etc.

One of the key personal development lessons we provide is the willingness to be different, to withstand the peer pressures to conform!

 

Resist the temptation in program design to conform to mainstream paradigms simply for the sake of conforming, no matter how dogmatically they are presented, or how much you may be ridiculed or ostracized for trusting your intuition over conformity. Make our own minds up based on a combination of respect for your intuition, the athlete/client’s intuition, the results, and in respect of the body of knowledge available. [5]

 

Conclusion

I would have liked to have called this article ‘If you want to stop getting paid peanuts, stop acting like a monkey’, but I wasn’t sure if the message would be lost by expressions ‘that’s offensive!’ in this politically correct world!

So if you want to rise above the other 300,000 plus of your colleagues (or whatever the number in your country) then you need to understand this simple concept – the majority receive what the majority receive because they are training their clients just like the majority.

Which is like what exactly? Brain dead. No thinking. Just blind imitation and a burning desire to be like everyone else.

And the importance of this theory? Quite simply, that if you do so little as be different – think for yourself, treat your clients like individuals, make up your own mind about what to do and what is best – you will succeed in rising above the masses, in standing out from your competition!

 

 

[1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/personal-care-and-service/fitness-trainers-and-instructors.htm

[2] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/personal-care-and-service/fitness-trainers-and-instructors.htm#tab-5

[3] King, I., 1997, Winning and Losing, p. 30

[4] King, I., 2003, Ask the Master, (book) p. 32

[5] King, I.., 2005, The way of the physical preparation coach (book), p. 17

Ian King

Huddle #29 – Chat with Mike Pimentel, KSI’s longest serving Coach

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Ian King

What’s holding YOU back as a trainer?

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Even been in a place in your career where you wonder why you are not getting where you wanted to go as a trainer? If any of the following apply, you probably should be asking this question – I don’t have enough clients; I don’t get paid enough; I am not sure or confident of my future in this industry, etc. Now if you’ve had the courage to recognize the limitations and ask the question ‘What’s holding me back?’ the next challenge is finding the answer!

Not sure where the weakness is? Is it my qualifications? Do I lack experience? Is it the city I live in? Am I not buffed enough? If you have ever had these questions you are not alone! Should I get more ink? If so arm or leg? Left or right side? (Yes, the last question – the one about the ‘ink’ – or tattoos – is my Aussie humor!)

Ever since getting paid to train another person became a reality (generally speaking during the 1980s) I’ve been helping trainers, instructors, coaches – whatever your job title – find the answers. As I entered the industry in 1980 I was in a position where I became established before anyone knew what I was doing. (Which gave me the experience to write my professional guidance books after some 20 years experience, ‘So You want to Become a….’.)

Take this question for example that I got from a struggling Los Angeles based trainer in the late 1990s:

I have read “So you want to become…” [book] thoroughly. While I agree with your statements it is easier for you with an established record to attract new clients than it is for an “outsider” like me to break in. The reason I’m asking is to see where my weaknesses are – what is holding me back in other words as I’m failing to identify it somehow. I don’t think it is qualifications – I have a bundle – and I don’t think its training experience – I have lots of that…..

I believe just about everyone has this question at some stage of his or her career.

So what are the most commonly looked at solutions? What are the most common mistakes? And what are some of my suggestions for you?

‘GO-TO’ SOLUTIONS

From what I have seen the top 3 most common ‘go-to’ solutions in our industry include:

#1 – Get higher-level qualifications or more certifications

If you have a diploma, get a bachelors degree. If you have a degree, get your masters degree. If you have your maters degree, get your PhD. Or do more short courses with more and different people. Add letters to your name.

Does this work? Yes, it can if you are looking for a job. If you are self-employed, potential clients don’t pay much if any attention to it. I could count on one hand the number of athletes who in four decades have asked what qualifications I have!

I say ‘it can’, in relation to ‘does it work’, because I have seen it work. I have also seen it not work. In my opinion it doesn’t make you a better coach – but it can get you a job.

#2 – Build your C-V

Building your C-V is another popular and potentially effective way to get more work. Provided you are after a job. Here’s how it works. You target a team or job, and hang around there. You get to know the people, you become liked, and you suck up to the decision makers. You exploit the reality that most appointments are decided upon before they are advertised, and it’s someone’s friend. ‘You’ be that person.

Then you take that C-V with that team/athletes name on it, and you leverage it into a higher profile team or individual. And you keep going until you have the best C-V in the market!

Does this work? Absolutely! At least in the short term. Can they coach? That’s pretty irrelevant in this strategy!

#3 – Market Yourself Better

A lot of new entrants into the industry are keen to learn how to market themselves, including on the internet. This is an option, however there are a few things to consider before going down this road.

One of the challenges I suggest you consider before choosing to play in this ‘sandpit’ is the need to understand you are marketing in a profession where the cultural values are that its okay and normal to tell lies to sell yourself. Here’s an example:

The reality is that the lies in fitness far outweigh the truths. …Here’s my premise. It’s OK to tell a lie if you know that it’s a lie… Once a personal trainer or performance specialist knows the truth then, they can tell a little white lie to make the sale or to get the client on board.

Now let me be clear – I don’t agree with or endorse the belief expressed above. It’s not my paradigm or values, however it is  from a productive marketer in the industry and therefore it would have had some influence on integrity in the industry.

How are you going to compete in that stinky pond? Tell bigger lies? Get more insights on this challenge in my recent blog ‘Coaching in the Fakebook Era’.

SO WHERE ARE TRAINERS GOING WRONG? (The most common mistakes)

There are two key mistakes made by trainers looking to get past sticking points in their career. Firstly, the point I call ‘jamming a square post in a round hole’. The second is missing the key ingredient.

#1 Jamming a square post in a round hole

Remember the struggling LA based trainer who couldn’t work out what was holding him back? His stated (and yes it was even in writing!) goal was:

To gain a full time professional strength and conditioning position with a professional sports organization or high level training facility.

What were the chances of him attracting athletes? Ah, let me think about that for a moment….Ah…none!

Let’s get this clear – athletes are no better than anyone else, and training athlete’s doesn’t make you any better than anyone else. It’s a common error for so many to want to train athletes because this role has been incorrectly placed on a pedestal!

This trainer was far more suited to the general population, including the fat loss market, where the rules are loose and people are more likely to buy into a ‘story’ – in other words the goals are subjective and the methods to achieve them many.

Why do I say this trainer was more suited to general population? Every market segment has unique traits. Athletes, for example – and especially elite athletes – value discipline, delayed gratification, focus, effort, determination and so on. How much of these qualities did this trainer have? Ah….not much.

Ask yourself – is the target client I am chasing one that resonates with me? Be authentic! Take a path congruent with who you really are and the kind of person that you might inspire. Be yourself. What client sub-group wants more of who and what you are, stand for and have? Any short term ‘success’ from faking or forcing yourself (the post) into an environment (the post hole) will quickly dissolve and those faking it are more than they are ultimately end back at their competence level.

#2 Missing the key ingredient

In about the 1960s a young man said to his mentor ‘Look, this is all the company pays!’, complaining about his paycheck.

To which the mentor replied: “No that is all the company pays YOU!’

The message shared by the late Jim Rohn about his interactions with his mentor Earl Shoaff (in addition to the power of having a mentor!) tell us that what you are getting paid is not what your industry pays. It is simply what your industry pays you!

This applies to all aspects of typical frustration – your client numbers, your client cancellations, your clients reliance on you to be their motivator, your income….

So what’s the missing ingredient? Value. You get paid for the VALUE you bring to the market. Value is measured in the amount of help you give and the number of people you give this amount of value to.

Yes, something is holding you back. Remember – in the words of the wise Jim Rohn:

Don’t take your needs to the market place. Bring your value instead.

…because…

Service to many leads to greatness – great respect, great satisfaction!

The question is….how exactly do you ‘bring your value’ to the market?

 

Author’s note

The training concepts I developed were developed on athletes, however during the last four decades it’s become very clear that they are equally effective on all humans. In fact I suggest that the elite athlete arena is an excellent testing ground for training theories and concepts. Coaches in the KSI Coaching Program come from all walks of life and apply the KSI way to all types of clients. The KSI way is not limited to athletes, nor are our coaches limited to working with athletes.

Ian King

Huddle #28 – Lets Talk Training Question & Answer

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Ian King

There is a better way – Part 6: For whose benefit

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The coach said to the team –

‘Now I want you to win. Because it makes me look better.’

A few weeks later, in a different sport but with the same athlete, a coach said to the team –

‘Now if some of you are wondering why you didn’t get any game time, I want to remind you – we are playing to win.’

The sample group in reference was 15-17 year olds, playing in late specialization sports. They were a decade away from the potential career peak.

Was this coincidental or reflective of the extent of this value set? I have my thoughts on this.

The concept of ‘long term athlete development’ is now widely known. Few know about the people behind the concept, due to the low level of ethical referencing in this industry, but most will be able to share with you their understanding of ‘LTAD’, in a hip kind of trendy term way.

That’s great, but something is missing, because the talk of long term athlete development is nothing more than lip service.

Either the masses of coaches who claim they are familiar with the concept are not, or they simply don’t respect it.

Because when the coach is ‘playing to win’ with 16 year olds in a late specialization sport, or when the coach is calling upon the athletes to win to boost their coaching credentials, it raises the question – whose benefit is this for?

There was a time when the concept of long term athlete development was known by few. That was not that long ago, as the popularity of this concept has been a post 2000 phenomenon. Yet during this period of ‘ignorance’ I believe coaches and coaching was more enlightening, with a greater chance of the athletes needs coming first.

So how did we get to a point when everyone knows the words, but few demonstrate a true knowledge or respect of the concept?

In the late 1980s and early 1990s one the groups I was working with was the Canadian ski team. The locations we would go into camp were varied, but one thing remained constant – the team Sports Science Director would visit with me multiple times a day, excitedly showing me his latest conceptual development or research discovery, including a concept he was working on at that time – a model for long term athletic development.

His name was Istvan Balyi, a former Hungarian Olympian turned Canadian sports scientist. The work he developed went on to be the most influential model of long-term periodization in the western world during the last two decades.

In essence, and in the simpler earlier version, the model suggested a number of stages in the career of the athlete, and only in the final or latter stage was ‘playing to win’ the priority!

  1. FUNdamentals – where fun based activities developed the fundamentals of athleticism
  2. Training to train – where the athlete trained for the primary purpose of developing the qualities that are derived from training and getting used to training.
  3. Training to Compete – where the athletes training and competition focus was on getting used to competing.
  4. Training to Win – the final stage, at the peak of their career, where the athletes training and games were focused primarily on what needs to be done to win – in the now.

The first three phases of this simplistic interpretation reinforce that all is being done for the delayed gratification of winning at the peak of the athletes career. Despite most coaches of age groups ‘knowing’ this concept, most are implementing the final stage where the primary focus is to win, at the three earlier stages! Even educational institutions who provide a long term athlete development plan in writing fail to do what they say they are doing.

You can learn more about Istvan’s works in his book ‘Long Term Athlete Development’ available on various online websites.   Istvan deserves to have his work learnt from the source, and the publisher, Human Kinetics, deserves credit for being the only North American publisher to my knowledge who has made an effort to reference and credit my material in their publication

I say to the coach who told his players to win for his benefit (to enhance his coaching resume), and to the coach who told his mid-teens that some of them would not step off the reserve bench because they were ‘playing to win’, and all coaches who recognize they may share similar values or habits – to reflect upon and review their coaching strategy.

And if they cannot embrace alternatives where the needs of the athlete come first, consider another pursuit other than sports coaching.

Because there is a better way, and athletes deserve to be given every opportunity to fulfill their athletic potential.

 

Note:

For those athletes and coaches who are concerned about the direction of training and want to believe there is a better way – congratulations. There is a better way. We have spend the last four decades discovering better ways to train, and we teach these better ways when we work with athletes or coaches. The KSI Coaching Program aims to provide you with the tools to train athletes and others in their highest and best interests, with no interest in what the dominant trend is or will be in the future. Learn more about KSI Coach Education here https://kingsports.net/courses/

Ian King

There is a better way – Part 5: There’s more to athlete preparation than ‘strength & conditioning’

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Physical preparation in athlete preparation is over-rated.

Its obvious that few share my belief, considering the amount of focus and effort going into physical development globally. I learnt from my professional experience in North America in the late 1980’s and early 1990s that their culture placed a (potentially excessive) premium on physical development. That cultural value is now global, courtesy of the internet.

The model I ascribe to – and teach – for athlete development states there are four (4) components – technical (skill), tactical (tactics), psychological and physical. After based on my four decades of professional experience, I have concluded that (generally speaking) physical development is the least important of them all.

Only in junior sport will a physical advantage at the expense of the development of the other three athlete preparation qualities provide a superior, temporary sport performance advantage. And the athlete in their long-term success, which will be reduced for doing so, pays the price for this.

Now saying ‘physical development is over-rated’ is a tough thing for me to say, especially as doing just that – physical development – has put food on my table for the bulk of my adult life. However I came into this profession to help athletes be successful in sport, not to help them become physical successful per se.

Put simply athletes are spending too much time in the gym and not enough time in skill (technical) and tactical (tactics) development.

Now to make things worse…

The model I ascribe to (and teach) for physical development states there are four (4) components – flexibility, strength, speed and endurance. After based on my four decades of professional experience, I have concluded that (generally speaking) strength is NOT the most important of them all.

But you would not know that, because an increasing percent of physical training time globally in sport is being dedicated to strength development.

So how did we get to this point? In the 1960s strength training in sports was virtually non-existent. In the 1970s it began to raise its head in sport, especially in strength sports such as US college (American) football (gridiron).

One of the leading western world physical preparation professional bodies, the National Strength Coaches Association (NSCA), grew out of this growing movement – football strength coaches at US colleges.

A study of history shows the limits of this association. Strength training was missing, and that is what the NSCA provided. By the time they realized they have overlooked other physical qualities, all they could do was substitute the word ‘conditioning’ for the word ‘coach’, and have to change the acronym NSCA. To this day, their content is reflective of the origin – a heavy bias towards strength training with very little focus on the other physical qualities .

By the 1980s, whilst not as popular as fitness training in the broader society, strength training was being sought out by a growing number of sports (which I where I got my start in sport).

During the 1990s strength training gained acceptance globally – both in sport and the general population.

By now the void had been filled. Strength training was no longer deficient. However in true human ‘over-reaction’ style, we just kept going. In the post 2000 period too much emphasis is being placed on strength.

Now, to drill deeper, not only are we seeing an over-emphasis on strength training, the strength training being conduced is significantly flawed. More on this another day….

So what gave way to allow the extra time for strength training? Playing the sport (skill development), and flexibility training – which ironically (for myself and the values I teach) are THE MOST important athletic and physical qualities respectively….

I was introduced to stretching in high school sport. Half a century later, at the same school, I would be now exposed to less stretching.

Half a century ago I engaged in a sporadic self-driven participation in the strength training gym. It wasn’t organized, and few attended.

Now, at the same school, the strength program is compulsory for all athletes in all sports. If a student athlete does not attend the strength training program for that team, the young athlete is denied selection.

At high school half a century ago my spare time was used up playing kids-organized pick up games. Now, I would not have time to engage in this unstructured, skill-based training. I would instead be at the gym meeting and exceeding the new expectations that athleticism is more effectively developed in the weight room.

So I am not speaking hypothetically. I am speaking as I see it, including a very personal case study using the same high school half a century apart.

So we have potentially given up the two most important qualities of athletic and physical preparation for one quality that is not the most important….

How is that serving us athletically or health wise?

Is this situation likely to reverse? Not in the foreseeable future. Not whilst the trend is towards every high school in the western world having their own full-time ‘strength & conditioning’ coach. Not while the dominant belief is that all there is to athlete preparation is ‘strength & conditioning’.

Hopefully, one day….the world will realize again – that this is more to athlete preparation than ‘strength & conditioning’….

 

Note:

For those athletes and coaches who are concerned about the direction of training and want to believe there is a better way – congratulations. There is a better way. We have spend the last four decades discovering better ways to train, and we teach these better ways when we work with athletes or coaches. The KSI Coaching Program aims to provide you with the tools to train athletes and others in their highest and best interests, with no interest in what the dominant trend is or will be in the future. Learn more about KSI Coach Education here https://kingsports.net/courses/