I have just come back from the finest professional educational event of my 20+ year career.  I was fortunate enough to be accepted into Vern Gambetta’s GAIN Apprentorship/Mentorship program earlier this year and last week ventured to Florida a 6-days extravaganza; to say it was a learning experience would be a massive understatement.

There is no way the events of GAIN can be summed up in a single post. At GAIN there were less than 20 new attendees, about a dozen returnees and 10 fantastic faculty members. The days were long but exhilarating. I was honored to be among Athletic Development Coaches, Physical Therapists and Athletic Trainers that work on the international, professional, collegiate and Olympic stages. I learned from, and with, some of the best men and women in the business, and will pass on this knowledge to you in the coming weeks and months. My clients have already started to reap the benefits of my GAIN experience.

As best I can, I will help you to learn how important it is to follow the functional path on your way to living a healthier life.  The info, videos and pictures on HealthAndFitnessAdvice.com, even on old posts, will reflect my desire to offer the best functional training guidance possible.

For years I, and many of my colleagues, have been disappointed with the term personal trainer.  Over 20 years ago when I got started in the business the term meant something more than it does today. Actually, the term really doesn’t mean anything.

Inspired by the events of GAIN, I have decided from now on to use the term Fitness Development Coach rather than Personal Trainer.  It’s time for a change and frankly, someone who is doing their job correctly is developing their clients’ fitness through coaching. I haven’t called myself a personal trainer for more years than I can remember, except on the web where the term “personal trainer” gets eyeballs to the site.  And just as Strength and Conditioning is being replaced by Athletic Development, Fitness Development Coach is replacing Personal Trainer.

Even though I’ve been following the functional path for the better part of 2 decades, going to GAIN was an invigorating experience and I’m excited to bring to you more of the things that will make your workouts better.

Functional training is the most effective method of training that strength coaches and personal trainers can employ with all clients, athletes and non-athletes alike.

The most natural – and obvious – way to train for an activity is to perform the activity itself.  Using a sport as an example, playing lacrosse is functional training/sports specific training in its purest form.  All other methods of functional training as it relates to lacrosse, or any other sport, result from the sport.

Athletes who train in a functional environment will be better able to handle the rigors of their sport.  Distance runners must run long distances; baseball players need to sprint at full effort in different directions and be able to do so from a variety of starting positions and running speeds; basketball players must be able to sprint, jump, recover and repeat, and so on.

Football players should not be going on long jogs and marathon runners don’t need to spend a lot of time running 20-yard sprints, shuttle runs or performing tackling drills.  It’s ridiculous to have a marathon runner hit a blocking sled, but it’s just as ridiculous for a football athlete to perform distance runs.

Of course there are times where athletes can cross-train and have fun trying methods of training that aren’t a major component of their competitive lives, but certainly not a lot of time should be spent on this kind of training, and it isn’t done in preparation for competition.  Members of the regular gym-going public can benefit from adopting the methods of preparation used by athletes, as well.

While the strength coach/personal trainer should strive to make the training environment as functional as possible – for all clients – the goal should NOT be to try to replicate in the gym the exact conditions encountered during competition.  For instance, working rotational movements in the gym using lighter weights is a good idea for baseball and lacrosse players, but trying to recreate the swing of a bat or shooting motion using a heavy implement is bad.  Athletes get enough skill work during their sport – the purest form of functional training – and don’t need to mimic these actions in the gym.

Functional training should be a major part of the training programs of athletes and non-athletes alike.