Quick update. This motherfucker quit on me the other week during a session. Not left, but got 45 min into the session (30 min warmup, of course) and said that he wasn’t doing anything else. This was after 2 sets of lateral raises with 10lb dbs, he wasn’t struggling at all. I wanted to tell him to fuck himself and not waste my time (friday night, 10pm training after a long week of exams, etc).
Anyway, I’ll see if I can work the guy into liking this stuff more, outside of that he’s going to get some shitty training I guess. Thanks again fellas.
[quote]VTTrainer wrote:
Quick update. This motherfucker quit on me the other week during a session. Not left, but got 45 min into the session (30 min warmup, of course) and said that he wasn’t doing anything else. [/quote]
why?
maybe his dog died or he was wrecked after exams or something (can take a while before people can channel that stuff into their lifting. especially when one is learning movements it is quite mentally exhausting)
don’t forget about ankle dorsiflexion for the squats…
Sorry, I’m just bitching. The guy has a piss poor attitude though, shit kills me every session. He has no goals and only seemed to have started bc a friend of his wanted to continue personal training like he used to in india. We have “partner training”, so that’s how we started, but this guy just doesn’t seem to give a shit or put in any effort.
He does all his own reps, and if the weights are “too heavy” he literally grabs lighter ones. He also doesn’t have the motivation outside the gym. As homework I have him starting to eat more meat, since all they eat are carbs. He can’t even put down 1lb of meat a day…
And I have him work the shit out of his mobility, ankle and all that good stuff. I tend to have them work on that 30 min of the hour. I’ll just sneak them into the yoga classes before we are supposed to meet so they are forced to stretch. Theyll go bc of the hot girls, but will stretch bc they would be awkward otherwise…
hmm. i don’t think i’d train with someone who didn’t find some inner motivation / pleasure in the activity. i think that this is something that you can learn (i needed to learn it) and i would train with someone in order to try and foster / encourage that enjoyment in progression… but eventually if they weren’t self motivated i sure as hell wouldn’t want to train with them. the gym is my self improvement ‘me’ time. if others want to play with me they better have something to offer me (someday at least) with respect to helping motivate me on the odd occasion i’m feeling slack, or entertaining me with new exercises and / or prehab / rehab / nutrition ideas, or bloody well paying me.
i started out on machine weights and got hooked on being able to complete the specified number of reps (12) for three sets which meant next time i could put the weight up (so long as i could get at least 8 reps for three sets with it).
when i moved to free weights my motivation took a hit as i needed to try and learn to squat and lunge and deadlift etc and basically discovered i had a crap load of mobility work to do before it would ever be safe for me to load these exercises. that was really hard because progress was more qualitative then quantitative. it also felt like subtle differences in the way i held myself (slightly cheaty) made a whole heap of difference in what weight i could move and i lost sight of progress for a bit.
but eventually things came right enough for me to feel like i could track progress again. for me that is most motivating.
when i started i could barely do 3x 15 second plank. but then next time i had to beat that (because the aim is to be better than the you you were before). so next time i bloody well would do 3x 20 seconds. and so on… can you set him little (realistic and definately small achievable) goals for each session? to do just that little bit more or better than before. to make a big deal of that so he gets a sense of pride and accomplishment from the activity? i think you can learn this. some people figure it themselves but others seem to need others getting excited for them or proud of them in order to get sucked in.
He doesn’t care to record a training log. I’ve asked countless times for that nutrition log he said that he was keeping. No dice, of course.
I only train him because I need the cash, sad truth really.
There’s zero internal/external motivation. He won’t even bust his ass next to his co-worker, come the fuck on, what kinda shit is that.
I’ve had clients close to his level of experience, that also may hate working out, but they show up every day and do EVERYTHING I say because they put in a little faith and got results
[quote]VTTrainer wrote:
He doesn’t care to record a training log. I’ve asked countless times for that nutrition log he said that he was keeping. No dice, of course.
[/quote]
okay. then how about keeping a training log for him. maybe just pick one thing each session. be like, ‘so you did 3 15 second planks last time… hmm… i bet you can’t do 3 20 second planks this time…’ or maybe he doesn’t have a ‘fuck you’ response to people saying he can’t do something (because he has been kicked too much by stuff that is overwhelming). maybe he needs encouragement… i don’t know. but somehow or other if he finds some stubborn bloody mindedness to put a lot of effort into it and then experience success and the rush that comes from that…
at least he is paying you, i guess. but still, my commiseration’s on feeling like you have to drag him through it. i’d find that really hard, i think.