Topics:
1. What’s new for you from Diane [2:14]
2. Introducing our guest, Jen Sinkler [6:36]
3. Beginner fitness and ways to get started [9:33]
4. Power lifting, and maintaining motivation [19:57]
5. All about intuitive training and rest and recovery [25:26]
6. Training while recovering from adrenal fatigue [32:25]
7. Weight lifting group classes and Crossfit [41:31]
8. Training and movement before, during, and after pregnancy [45:25]
9. Training and coaching for teens [52:38]
10. Tips for type 1 diabetics [59:31]
11. Thoughts on supplements and fat burners [1:03:09]
12. Lift Weights Faster 2 [1:05:21]
13. Liz’s tip of the week: Postpartum nutrition for healing and milk production [1:14:50]
[smart_track_player url=”http://www.blogtalkradio.com/balancedbites/2015/03/12/episode-182-get-fit-faster-with-jen-sinkler.mp3″ color=”00aeef” title=”#182: Get Fit Faster with Jen Sinkler” artist=”Diane Sanfilippo & Liz Wolfe” ]
Links:
Get Jen’s new program, Lift Weights Faster 2.
Subscribe to Real Food Liz!
Subscribe to DianeSanfilippo.com
The episodes are also available in iTunes, Stitcher & Blog Talk Radio.
Show sponsors:
Liz Wolfe: Hey friends. Welcome to this episode of the Balanced Bites podcast. Let’s get a quick word in from our first episode sponsor.
Diane Sanfilippo: Hey everyone! Welcome to episode 182 of the Balanced Bites podcast. Diane here. I’m definitely going through some withdrawal. My podcasting co-host partner has been on maternity leave for a little while now, and it’s going to be a little while longer. I definitely can’t pressure her into coming back too quickly while she is percolating and birthing a new person. So, we’ll just keep good thoughts for Liz, and hope that she does really awesomely. I’ll be talking to her pretty soon. So there’s that. Let’s check in with out sponsors.
Liz Wolfe: Support for this podcast is provided by Dragonfly Traditions; natural, nourishing skin care with absolutely no unnecessary chemicals. It’s natural nutrition for the skin. I am a huge fan of Dragonfly from their serum, to their night cream, and everything else the owner, Phoebe, has created. Your skin will be soft and happy with Dragonfly Traditions. If you head over to DragonflyTraditions.com and make a purchase of one or more of their skin care products, you can then add Balanced Bites to your shopping cart for 1 penny. Phoebe will not only send you 2 free lip balms with your order, she’ll also send you that penny back. Remember that’s 2 free lip balms with purchase from Dragonfly Traditions.
1. What’s new for you from Diane [2:14]
Diane Sanfilippo: Alright. So, before we get into today’s episode, I have a few updates that are pretty important. The first one, which is probably the most important, if you’re listening to this episode around from the air date and not from the archives, I have two important things about that. The first one is we’re actually moving the hosting of this podcast in the next week or two, so you’ll need to go into iTunes and resubscribe to make sure you don’t miss any new episodes.
The reason for this is that our previous host has recently started putting ads into the show that are not approved by us, and it’s a paid service. We pay for hosting there. I don’t know if it’s just something that has been in their contract for forever and they just recently started to do it, but it’s not cool with us. A bunch of you guys have complained or even sent us a note, saying, hey if you guys need money, we can send money for the podcast, I’ll pay for it. I was like, no, no, we have amazing sponsors. We love our sponsors, we handpicked them, we cherish them. And we don’t want their messages to be diluted by these other sponsors that have just randomly been attached to our show. One recently that I heard was some kind of fat loss supplement or something like that, which is totally not from us. Anything that’s a sponsor that we have approved and have brought on board you’ll hear it within our show, not tacked onto the beginning or the end.
Anyway, all that to say definitely jump into iTunes and resubscribe in the next couple of weeks. I will post about it on Facebook, Instagram, twitter, everywhere in social media. I’ll also be sending an email out, so if you’re on my emailing list, I’ll remind you a few times in there. But, it’s just going to be a big issue if you’re subscribed now and you expect it to update, and we’ve moved the hosting it’s going to change where the show comes from. So even though you’ll still be able to find it in iTunes under the same name, it’s just going to be a little bit different. Just wanted to give you guys a heads up about that, because it is going to be a big shift in where the show is coming from, so you do need to resubscribe to iTunes.
Alright, a couple of other updates. If you didn’t hear, just a quick one that the tour that was supposed to be coming up, kicking off tomorrow if you’re listening live, that was supposed to kick off on Friday the 13th of March, we’re not actually doing that tour. It was a Make it Paleo 2 tour, and Hayley, unfortunately, my good friend is pretty sick right now and just trying to take care of herself. I know, of course, we all want to practice what we preach. We try so hard to work on these books, and you know, everybody handles stress differently, and sometimes the physical burden of it is harder for some than others. She’s just trying to take good care of herself, and really set the example. It’s unfortunate. We really wanted to meet all of you guys, but we’ll see if we can get something scheduled in the future.
You will be able to meet at least myself, and my guest today, who I’ll introduce in just another minute, at PaleoFx in Austin, Texas. That is going to be April 24th to the 26th, right before my birthday, so I’m really excited about that. I’ll be talking about business stuff at this year’s PaleoFx, which I’m actually super excited about. So if you’ve got a business, you’re an entrepreneur, whether you’re a trainer, a nutritionist, or you have some kind of paleo based business or any other nutrition and health related business that you’ve got questions about, how to get started, and how to kind of make it go and make it grow, then definitely check out my talk. I don’t know what day it’s going to be on yet, but you can stay tuned to information on PaleoFx for that.
I’m also going to be on at least one other panel, I think it’s at the very end of the event on Sunday. It’s like a women’s health panel, which I did last year as well. It was super fun, very well attended, really nice way to turn out the event. I just loved that talk.
Last but not least, if you’ve been interested in my 21-Day Sugar Detox coaches program, I want to give you a quick heads up that we do have a Facebook group for anybody who’s interested in it. The one group that we have, anybody can join. We do have a group after folks become certified that’s private and closed only to those who’ve been certified through the program. I’ll be opening up enrollment again for that at the beginning of April. It’s only going to be open for about 2 weeks, and then it will close again until the fall. I want to make sure that you all are ready for it when it comes. If you have any budgeting concerns and you need to plan ahead a little bit, I just want everyone to be aware that that’s coming, and it will only be open for those two weeks. So if it’s something you’re interested in, definitely look out for that and join us in the Facebook group.
2. Introducing our guest, Jen Sinkler[6:36]
Diane Sanfilippo: Alright! So today’s guest I would love to introduce. If you have been listening to the show for a long time, you’ve definitely heard a previous interview with her, but I wanted to bring her back on again today, not only because she’s just awesome and fun to talk to about fitness and all that good stuff, and she has probably the most amazing bangs in the entire fitness industry.
Jen Sinkler: {laughing}
Diane Sanfilippo: So it’s like, high on my list of priorities of who I want to talk to. She’s also got an amazing new program coming out. So Jen Sinkler; she is a long time fitness writer for national magazines such as Women’s Health, and Men’s Health, which is actually how Jen and I first met. She interviewed me for a magazine article. She is a fitness enthusiast and fitness eclectic I would say. She’s a former member of the US National Women’s Rugby team, and she currently trains clients at Movement Minneapolis. Jen talks fitness, food, happy life, and general health topics at her website, JenSinkler.com. And she just authored her conditioning resource sequel, Lift Weights Faster 2. Jen, yes you’re there, you’re already laughing at me!
Jen Sinkler: {laughs} I loved the bangs talk. I feel like, that was a breakthrough moment in our friendship, as the bonding over bangs. I remember taking a selfie of my bangs and discussing exactly how to cut them so that you’re eyebrows don’t split them. Because the splitting of the bangs, that’s a real deal breaker for people.
Diane Sanfilippo: It’s a big problem.
Jen Sinkler: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: And I think you also told me that they needed to be thicker when I had them.
Jen Sinkler: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: Because they weren’t lying down. But guess what? I’ve been like, forget the bangs, I can’t handle it.
Jen Sinkler: You’re hair always looks great, so bangs, no bangs, it doesn’t really matter. If you do the bangs thing, though, this is the thing that nobody knows. I take this information with me. You have to cut them in an M shape. Which sounds so weird.
Diane Sanfilippo: That’s so weird!
Jen Sinkler: But you’ve got to have long on the edges, and shorter above the eyebrows, and then long in the middle again.
Diane Sanfilippo: Ok, alright.
Jen Sinkler: I think, I’m pretty sure I made that up. Because I take that to different hairstylists, I’m like, can you please cut them in an M. Because that’s how you keep them from splitting! Otherwise you’re expressive eyebrows split them right above your eyes.
Diane Sanfilippo: That’s true, and that is a very annoying thing.
Jen Sinkler: I’m glad we’re talking about this. This is good.
Diane Sanfilippo: I feel like one day I’m going to cut them again.
Jen Sinkler: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: Because I literally thing I have, and I’m overusing literally already, but I really think that I have bangs amnesia.
Jen Sinkler: {laughs} Yes!
Diane Sanfilippo: It’s like I forget how annoyed I got by them.
Jen Sinkler: Everyone does.
Diane Sanfilippo: And I’m like, oh that would be so cute, and then I could just cover any aging that’s happening in my forehead, or anywhere.
Jen Sinkler: Yeah, completely natural Botox.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: I have a friend, Yvonne Ward, she posted on Facebook a few months ago. “I couldn’t resist the siren song of the bangs; regret will set in in 3…2…1…” That’s the way it goes.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah {laughing} That’s what happens.
Jen Sinkler: Unless you cut the M shape, I’m telling you.
Diane Sanfilippo: Alright. So if I ever dive into the bangs pool again.
Jen Sinkler: And you will.
3. Beginner fitness and ways to get started [9:33]
Diane Sanfilippo: I’ll go for the M shape. So, let’s talk about all things fitness. I know we talked about a whole bunch of stuff with the first podcast that we did together, and if folks want to get a little bit more background on you, definitely go back. I feel like it was episode 132.
Jen Sinkler: It was.
Diane Sanfilippo: Because I had to go grab a link recently. Ok, so if you’re listening and you want to find out who the heck is this Jen Sinkler chick, instead of spending 10 minutes on her bio today, I think what we’ll do is just jump into questions, because we have so many and I would love to get them answered. So you guys can all go back and listen to episode 132 and learn more about Jen if you haven’t. So let’s just dive in, does that sound good?
Jen Sinkler: That sounds great.
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. So, we have a lot of questions on fitness for beginners. Just like super quick context for people who are listening; Jen is not a one size fits all kind of person, she doesn’t just train people in Crossfit, or just in this, that, or the other. It’s kind of a broad spectrum, so she’s got a very broad perspective, as well. So let’s talk a little bit about fitness for beginners. What do you do with people, how can people get started. I would say, too, to just give that a little context with the current landscape of what’s popular. Obviously, Crossfit is really popular, but what’s out there that people could get into that you think is a great way to start?
Jen Sinkler: Well the reason that I am, as you said, the fitness eclectic, is that I think there are a lot of different entry points that get you towards the same positive body change. Same goals, same feeling of ease in your body, building muscle, etc. etc. The things that people are after, whether you call it toning or call it getting fit. Whatever your lingo is. But some people’s entry point is going to be kettle bell training, some people’s entry point is going to be calisthenics, some people’s entry point is going to be Crossfit, and so on, and so on, and so on. Olympic lifting, and anything else you can name.
I think the general idea for beginners is you want to improve posture, you want to build bone and muscle density, many people want to improve their body composition. That’s not something that I always assume. I’m not going to assume that every person wants to lose fat. Some people just want to maintain; some people just want to feel better. But broad strokes, you want your exercise program to make you feel better.
You want to seek help getting the basics right. And honestly, strength training, some sort of strength training, and all of my certifications are under some sort of strength umbrella. I think those are the activities that are going to be the most bang for your buck in terms of fitness activities. You’re going to change your body shape, you’re going to change your hormones, you’re going to burn fat, you’re going to build your capacity to eat more calories. That’s a big thing too, right?
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} That’s the only reason I work out. Let’s be honest.
Jen Sinkler: {laughs} Yeah, you’ve got to feed that muscle. You get just blow you away results with strength training. So that’s the first thing. That’s the tenet number one; find some sort of entry point in the strength training umbrella. That’s my best advice. Once you get there, focus on big multi-joint movements, and use these six categories of movements. A lot of people, you don’t know where to start because you’re brand new, so you’re like, well I guess I’ll do some bicep curls, and that’s a single joint exercise. Whereas if you’re doing a squat, you’re involving ankles, knees, hips, and so on. You’re involving so many muscles in your body.
These are the categories of movements, too. We don’t think, often when we’re early in our fitness journey, we don’t think about balancing out our fitness program. And I look to these categories: Number one, some sort of explosive movement. That can be swings, or jump squats, or even just hops across a line. Something explosive. That’s a quality that we lose as we age. Very often, we stop sprinting, we stop doing things that are dynamic and ballistic, and I think that’s an important quality to maintain or to reattain. That power.
That can help you, number one, develop type 2 muscles, which tend to be the ones that look more toned and shaped. Again, I’m just using the lexicon of the current fitness landscape on that. You also, when you’re more powerful, you’re quicker, you can save yourself from a fall. Say you trip in the street. If you’re doing more ballistic exercises, you’re going to be able to right yourself more quickly. So, explosive; that’s one category for beginners.
Also include upper body push movements, whether that be overhead or horizontal. So like pushups, or overhead press if you can do that. Bottoms up press is a good one for beginners, because it’s a good way to figure out if you’re shoulders are happy with overhead pressing. Upper body pulls, like some sort of row variation or pull-up variation.
I have a video E-course that launched this week that gave two of my favorite, we call them pregressions at my gym, with my husband, the Movement Minneapolis. One of our members is like, I don’t want to do a regression. This is a total side note.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: But she’s like, I don’t want, that sounds bad! So we started calling them pregressions, and now everyone is happy.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: So anyway. Box pull-ups. Like box assisted pull-ups, I like a little bit more than band assisted pull-ups. Because the bands abandon you, pun intended, when you need them the most. Like right in the middle, all of a sudden, they aren’t helping you finish the range of motion. Whereas if you’re doing a box assisted pull-up, and you’ve got a foot on a really tall box, and you can just give yourself a nudge through your sticking points, I really like that variation. And I really like jumping pull-ups.
So anyway, upper body pull, that’s a category. Then lower body pull, which is all things hingey and dead lifty. Like kettle bell swings, again can cross a category of explosive and lower body pull, all dead lift variations are pulls. Then you’ve got lower body push as a category, so that’s anything more knee dominant, like squats. Lower body pulls are hip dominant, that’s sort of an interchangeable term. Lower body push is knee dominant, so all squat motions are push.
And then last but not least, you’ve got this sort of catch all core category that involves rotation, antirotation, and carries. I love farmer’s carries for preventing back pain, preventing or alleviating back pain, actually, because they liven up your lumbar stabilizing muscles.
Diane Sanfilippo: That’s awesome. I think the only one that we really don’t do a lot of; I’m just going to touch on some Crossfit stuff a little bit, because that’s what I’ve been doing for a long time.
Jen Sinkler: Mm-hmm.
Diane Sanfilippo: But kind of like you, I’m a bit of a fitness eclectic. I don’t come from Crossfit, you know? {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: Right.
Diane Sanfilippo: I come from the depths of other gyms. I was gym girl for a long time, probably had every gym membership, and did every type of training and workout. I’ve done it all. Except I have never taken a Zumba class.
Jen Sinkler: {laughs} I haven’t; that’s like my one thing that I haven’t done.
Diane Sanfilippo: I feel like we should do that together {laughing} one day.
Jen Sinkler: Oh my god, let’s do that in Austin.
Diane Sanfilippo: Oh my gosh. I don’t know that that’s going to happen in Austin, but one day, it should happen. But I think the one thing we don’t do a lot of is rotation and antirotation, and that’s something that I’m a huge fan of. I went and just did a workout on my own today using a cable machine, and I like to twist, because I feel like I haven’t been doing it for so long. I love that too, and I love the carries.
And I think for people, I am not as much as I’ve been in the fitness world as kind of a consumer for a long time, I am not a fitness expert in terms of being a trainer, being able to educate and teach people a lot about it. But I think if people are getting started, and they want to work out on their own, that’s where a lot of stuff that you create, that’s exactly what it’s for. Somebody who, maybe they do go to a gym also with a coach, or a trainer, whatever, but if they’ve got a couple of days a week or even one day a week where they need to figure out something on their own.
The same way I write meal plans, and I don’t use them myself, but if somebody made a workout for me, or if I need a workout, I can look into stuff that you’ve written, and be like, ok what should I do, and I don’t have to question if I’m putting together some of those 6 categories properly, because I know that you’re already planning it that way. So I feel like that’s such a nice thing for beginners to hear those categories. And if they know what to do with it, great. But if they don’t know what to do with it, I love that that’s kind of the way that you put things together.
Jen Sinkler: Yep.
Diane Sanfilippo: It just makes it really easy. It’s like the macronutrients of movement.
Jen Sinkler: It is! It is exactly that. And a couple of things to build on this; you want to make sure that your basics are solid. And you want to find, even if you’re not going to work one on one with a personal trainer, which can be really expensive, or join a gym, which I totally think everyone should do for community and accountability piece. There are ways to do everything on mine if that’s what you need to do or want to do, if you’re trying to do it on the cheap or save some dollars on that, there are ways to do that. You can access continuity sites for more information. Some of the more advanced ones I would say would be like juggernaut training systems or strengthcoach.com. But you can also buy more, I guess, beginner friendly programs. And Lift Weights Faster and Lift Weights Faster 2 that is one of those programs. I have 30 instructional videos on some of the more complicated lifts, and that’s one of the things that people have really liked about the program, and that’s the feedback I get. Like, thank you, I feel like my form is totally banging now.
Diane Sanfilippo: Mm-hmm. {Laughs}
Jen Sinkler: Which that’s the goal, I want people to feel safe in learning the exercises, and gain that confidence to be like, yeah I know what I’m doing here. And other programs, like say Neghar Fonooni’s Lean and Lovely is going to map out your plan for you. That’s one thing that I would say to beginners, too. You go in the gym, and you’re like, I don’t know… Again, you’re like, I guess I’ll do some bicep curls, because that’s the only thing that occurs to you. But if you have a plan, and you’ve got a way to learn to do the movements in the program, you’re so much better off. You’ve got this balanced, periodized program, and you’re well on your way to body change and strength building and all of the things that you’re after.
4. Power lifting, getting started and training [19:57]
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. So, let’s talk about power lifting.
Jen Sinkler: Ooh, ok.
Diane Sanfilippo: This is something that a lot of people asked about. How can people get into it, what should they know, and maybe a little bit on preventing injury and not getting too crazy with it.
Jen Sinkler: Power lifting is something I got into last summer, sort of entirely by accident. I mean, I got hooked on it by accident. I didn’t accidently enter a power lifting meet.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughing} I filled out a form, I don’t know what it was for.
Jen Sinkler: I know! Oops! Although, that is how I entered a 5 mile race once when I thought I was entering a 5K. I think we talked about that on the last podcast.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughing}
Jen Sinkler: So my attention to detail sometimes is lacking.
Diane Sanfilippo: Oops.
Jen Sinkler: Yeah. But power lifting. So I had entered a strong man competition, I think it was in June or July, because I have a friend, and I’ve told this story before, but she’s one of my old rugby friends. She equate endurance training with fitness, so she would constantly, after we retired from rugby, would be like, let’s enter a triathlon, let’s enter a half marathon, let’s enter a marathon. I was like, Pam, I’m never going to do those things with you. Never, ever.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: She’s like, well what can we do? I was like, how about you come learn to lift. And she’s so good at it, she really took to it like a duck to water. Her body feels so much better, too. These activities that she said she loved we really hard on her body. That’s not what was best for her. But she’s been excellent at lifting. We entered a strong man contest, she was awesome at it. And then she was like, what should we do next. And so we decided as a lifting buddy group, power lifting would be next. So we just Googled a local meet. And we all entered it.
I didn’t really think that I would like it that much, because it’s 3 movements. Squat, bench, and deadlift. And I just thought, it didn’t seem terrible tactical, or engaging in the way that a lot of sports usually are. But it’s so much more those things than I ever anticipated. It helps, of course, that I’ve got this long time rival/really good friend who, we basically just try to beat each other in every power lifting meet. And now we’ve entered I think 3 together. I’ve entered 4 total. I was so hooked that I was entering them 2 months apart for the past 6 months, and now I’ve sworn them off till at least late summer, and probably nationals in October.
But, it’s been a lot of fun and it’s been another way to, and we started this whole thing at Movement Minneapolis, where now all of our gym members are entering the meets too. It’s a way of setting goals, especially for women, that focus on what they can do rather than what they can look like. Because what you can look like is not super motivating over the long term. It just isn’t. It’s not engaging, it doesn’t get you to the gym. You’re like, I want to get skinnier today, I better go to the gym, I can’t wait to get skinnier! I’m like, no that’s not exciting at all. But trying to work towards performance based goals, like a double body weight dead lift or something like that, that’s engaging. That gets people to the gym over and over and over.
We’ve started this whole movement, pun intended, at The Movement. We’ve started a power lifting team. And most of our team, by and large we have 17 lifters and 14 of them were women at this past meet.
Diane Sanfilippo: Wow.
Jen Sinkler: It’s awesome.
Diane Sanfilippo: So to get into it, you really just have to sign up for something, and be like, ok I’m doing this.
Jen Sinkler: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: So what do people need to know, maybe about shifting up their training or kind of little details that maybe you wouldn’t have thought of.
Jen Sinkler: Again, your program is a really good starting point. You want to have a good program to be your basis. And then from there, we make tweaks. You know we’re very big on letting every person do variations that are good for them on a given day. So you might come in and it’s squat day, but front squats might test better based on our biofeedback test, than back squats do. So we let our members, and we encourage our members to roll with that. We find that that helps prevent overuse injuries. Because that’s the trick. When you’re training for power lifting, you can feel a little tweaky when you’re focusing on these big 3 lifts. It’s important to incorporate enough variation that you don’t end up breaking down.
So to periodize our program and to include that kind of variation, we use an intuitive training protocol to sort of prevent injury, keep the body feeling good. But also it’s important to just take breaks, too.
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5. All about intuitive training and rest and recovery [25:26]
Diane Sanfilippo: So, what is intuitive training? How does somebody do it? I know that we had a question also about rest, and you just said it’s important to take breaks, so let’s kind of touch on what intuitive training is. I think you mentioned it also in the previous interview, but I think people would be curious to hear more about that. And then what you really think about rest, and how much rest people need or recovery and all that.
Jen Sinkler: We did definitely talk about it in the last one. It’s one of those things that repeated touches is a good thing, because it’s a little like, what? What are you talking about? We use range of motion testing, which is a cousin of applied kinesiology, to determine which lifts, which exact variations all of our clients, and ourselves, do on any given day. So our programs are written in a different way than most gyms programs, Our members come into the gym, and there is a workout on the whiteboard, just like there is at Crossfit. But instead of saying “back squat”, it’s going to say “back squat/front squat/zercher squat” or something like that. There are going to be different variations. So we have to put options in for every movement category that we talked about earlier.
I’m just going to explain the operational logistics of how to test, and we’ll start there. You come in, you test your base range of motion, and then you do a couple reps of each of these variations, and you retest your range of motion after you’ve done each of the exercises. And whichever one increases your range of motion the most, that’s the one you’re going to do that day. Which sounds totally out there, and I get that. It was out there, it was hard for me to believe at first too, but this is the kind of training that got me out of pain. I saw it myself, I see it with our clients all the time.
It’s essentially a way for your body to red light or green light any movement on any given day. It’s a way for your body to communicate the things that we already know intuitively. Like this feels good, this was good for me today. Because everybody has had those workouts that you leave, and you’re like, I feel worse. I feel worse, I feel bad. That was so hard and, no I don’t think I should say that word.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughing}
Jen Sinkler: Poopy. Poopy today. {laughs} But this is a way of leaving your workouts and being like, I feel better. That’s our main goal whether somebody’s goal is power lifting or just general health. Every single workout, we want them to leave feeling better.
And to roll in the rest day question, the answer to this one is, it depends. And I know that’s a frustrating answer to get, but it really does. It depends on your life stresses. It depends on how you’re eating, how you’re sleeping. Everything is cumulative. So you can’t come in and say, ok, I know I’m supposed to hit it today. Because if you slept like crap, and you ate like crap, that might not be the plan for your body that day. We have, in the past, sent members on a walk.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: Like, ok, we’ll see you in an hour, because that’s what they need that day. They need to chill, they need to take a stroll, they need to breathe some fresh air. They don’t need to hammer themselves in the gym.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think that’s awesome. I’ve told the story a few times about when I was running Balanced Bites, it was a meal business years ago. I actually just posted an Instagram today, we got some meals from a local company doing that.
Jen Sinkler: {laughs} I saw that.
Diane Sanfilippo: It freaks me out, and kind of takes me back when I put the little containers in the fridge. I’m like, ah! I did this like 7, 8 years ago. It’s so crazy. I was like, what was I doing? What was I thinking? That I could have that business and grow it and do all the things that you need to do. I mean, I got it started, but man, I was just getting crushed energy wise doing it. Which brings me to my point, that I would cook meals 2 days a week, and it was a super intense, 6-8 hour shift of cooking, and just against the clock, adrenaline pumping. Literally the adrenaline I could feel, my heart rate, I felt like it was high the whole time I was in the kitchen, as if I was jogging on a treadmill. That’s how I felt, like I was doing that for 6 hours, or 8 hours at a time.
So I would go into the gym the next day, and I was working with my now friend and then friend and trainer Dave Engan in San Francisco, and he was like, dude what’s going on. {laughing} He could just see it on my face, which I’m sure you could tell with your clients when they come in. You just know these people so well, and we were not working out that day.
Jen Sinkler: Yep.
Diane Sanfilippo: And that was even with a one on one session. He was like, alright, we’re going to do a guided meditation today.
Jen Sinkler: That’s such a good trainer. That’s such a good trainer. That’s so rare.
Diane Sanfilippo: I miss that, but it was cool that I went in, and I was laid down on a mat that was a room that was like a quiet yoga room or something, and he just did this talk, whatever, I don’t know, he was talking about walking through a forest. I have no idea. He’s a really cool guy {laughs}.
Jen Sinkler: {laughing}
Diane Sanfilippo: He’s got a lot of stuff going on. But it was really neat. And that’s the kind of thing that I talk to people about a lot too, because I ebb and flow with how intensely I can train, and how often I get to the gym, and sometimes I just need to kind of take it easy and get in and be consistent that I show up and do something, but not always have to go super hard. I think that’s something, I don’t know if we have that in one of the questions, we have a huge list of questions here.
Jen Sinkler: No, we do. The paleo meals thing, they can come in handy. It’s funny you mention the stress and the exhilaration of trying to get everything done right before a deadline. I said I’m right in the middle of the Lift Weights Faster 2 launch, and I said I would learn all these lessons from the first one.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: And I didn’t. There’s something about this process that’s serving me, clearly, to wait on the marketing pieces until it’s almost too late, and then it’s hurry, hurry, rush, rush, and get everything done. The workouts, those are the workouts that we use in the gym, it’s not the content that’s the hurry, hurry, rush, rush, it’s the marketing. I thought about ordering paleo meals for this week for the team, because last year we ate cookies and ice cream. Within our staff, we called it Get Fatter Faster instead Lift Weights Faster. Because that’s all we could manage at that point. We cut out exercise, and this, for the time being, this year is better. It is better than it was last year. But it’s still, I have dramatically reduced my exercise program, because I think when your life stress is super high, your workout stress needs to be super low. Otherwise, you’re going to flame out spectacularly.
6. Training while recovering from adrenal fatigue [32:25]
Diane Sanfilippo: That’s true, and we did have a question about how to exercise when recovering from adrenal fatigue. This kind of touches on the same thing, whether you are coming through a time of just some massive fatigue, where you’re like, I don’t even know how to get started because I feel like I have no energy and I just want to sit on the couch, or anything I go to do makes you feel worse. That’s kind of what you were saying, and I definitely went through, I’ve gone through a few different periods in my life where I’ve been super stressed out work wise, and it’s one of these things, it’s not necessarily just the work of it. It’s not, oh, why didn’t you do it sooner and not leave it to the last minute. It’s not even that. It’s the mental stress that this thing is now going to be out there for thousands of people.
Jen Sinkler: {laughs}
Diane Sanfilippo: It’s not even the work.
Jen Sinkler: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: It’s just, shoot, if there’s a typo and that book is printed.
Jen Sinkler: You want it to be good.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, you want it to be good, and you want people to love it. So it’s not even the work itself, it’s like the personal pressure and stress of it. I don’t know of any other way to alleviate it. But we have people who are dealing with that kind of thing, we have people who are dealing with tons of people who listen to this show; autoimmune conditions, and they’ve had a flare where there’s Hashimoto’s or something else. Something went on, and they’re just like, I need to get started again, they don’t know what to do. One of the things I always tell people, even though I’m not a fitness professional, but I’m…
Jen Sinkler: You know a lot of stuff.
Diane Sanfilippo: I do a lot of this stuff, so I speak from experience. But I know how it works with nutrition; just because you eat doesn’t make you an expert on nutrition, it can make you an expert on what you eat.
Jen Sinkler: {laughs}
Diane Sanfilippo: So I’m an expert on how I train. But one of the things that I have always had to focus on, and I definitely want to hear your approach to this and what you do for yourself and your clients, which you just touched on anyway. But I try to do work that will not put me in that adrenaline mode, where you just feel your heart pumping for a long period of time. And for a long period of time means a minute or more.
Jen Sinkler: Yep. Yep.
Diane Sanfilippo: It can be a few seconds where you just hit that point, and you’re like, ok let me cycle that intensity. That doesn’t necessarily mean high intensity interval training, because that’s a very high heart rate for a short amount of time relative to what other types of training are, but it’s still too long for you. So when you’re dealing with adrenal fatigue, it’s kind of like your body has been living in that adrenaline state for too long somehow. And it’s that stress mode; you’ve put your stress capacity up to 100% and anything you do that’s pushing it higher, you’re just going to push yourself over capacity, and it’s not going to help you get stronger or recover.
So that’s kind of the way I will approach it. I tell people, don’t be lifting 90-100% of what you can. Take it down. I think, personally, just being consistent. This is what I’m doing for myself right now. I’ve been kind of out of it for a couple of months since I’m traveling a lot, and I’m just not consistent. I just have to be consistent. I just have to get in there as many days as I can. Like you said, if I end up walking or I end up doing something, I just have to make sure I make time for the movement, and the results will come. It’s like with paleo; you don’t have to be 100% strict all the time, but you just have to be really consistent. So how do you approach that?
Jen Sinkler: Consistency is absolutely the root of all fitness success, I absolutely agree with that. As far as adrenal fatigue goes, I love, love, love what Jade Teta, he’s a naturopath and the found of Metabolic Effect in North Carolina, I love what he says about this. And I’ve interviewed him on this topic, so I’m pretty much going to synopsize what he told me for your listeners. So he says very long duration exercise can further disrupt and worsen the condition; it can reflare it. Because you need to essentially retrain both the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system. Because you have taught yourself that it’s never ok to chill. So now you’ve got to teach yourself to chill. He likes really short bursts of high intensity exercise, and then complete recovery between them. So that you’re essentially teaching yourself; ok, it’s go time! And now it’s rest time. And I think that’s really valuable. That’s a way I hadn’t thought of it before.
Diane Sanfilippo: That’s really interesting. I think if I leave myself to my own devices, which I think we can talk about the question about group fitness and how all that works next because it’s kind of on the heels of this other topic; if I leave myself to my own devices, that’s kind of how I’ll train right now. If I just show up at a gym and nobody’s told me what I should do, I’ll go in. I mean, what I just did today was like that. It was kind of little bursts of energy, and then I just kind of stand there {laughing} and catch my breath.
Jen Sinkler: Yes! That’s perfect.
Diane Sanfilippo: Or I’ll sit there.
Jen Sinkler: Well, that’s intuition piece, right?
Diane Sanfilippo: It’s so funny because years and years ago, I used to watch people at the gym and I’d be like, what is that person doing, just standing around. {laughing} And now I’m that girl who’s just standing there. I’m like, I’ve got my ear plugs in, nobody talk to me. I’m just chilling out between the lifts. And I feel like that helps a lot. It’s a really big important piece for people to remember that you can still get work done and still achieve new levels of fitness while you’re recovering a little bit.
But I’m with you too on the whole strength training thing. I think if you like to do cardio kickboxing or Zumba or something, is that considered calisthenics? Or just aerobics?
Jen Sinkler: I think we can categorize that under the aerobics category.
Diane Sanfilippo: Ok, so aerobics. That can be great for fun, and it can be great for cardiovascular fitness.
Jen Sinkler: Mm-hmm.
Diane Sanfilippo: I went in and took cardio kickboxing, and I was like, wow this used to be a lot easier {laughs}. And I hadn’t done it in a long time. It wasn’t so bad. I did alright. I kept up with it. But it was like I could definitely not do that every day given the state of my stress levels, you know. It really pushes the intensity to the 60-70-80 percentish for the whole time instead of that 80-90 for very short, and then come back down. So I love that, I think that’s a great way to look at things.
Jen Sinkler: Well it’s all about balancing the pieces of your life, right? If you have hobbies; my husband sky dives. And when we first started dating, he asked me to go sky diving with him, and I went. I guess that was a year into our dating, or something. I was just about to leave my job, or had just left my job at Experience Life Magazine as their fitness editor. So I was working for myself for the very first time, which is a stressful situation. I’m like, am I making a mess here? {laughs} It’s fun, it’s awesome, there’s lots of work to do. But you never know when to stop, and think being an entrepreneur is an interesting choice, and it changes the whole trajectory of your life. And I think for a lot of us, it means that our hobbies need to balance that out and need to be more chill. So sky diving was not the right choice for me.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughing}
Jen Sinkler: I was terrified throughout the whole class, and then it was too windy, so I had to wait a week to do my sky dive. You go through this class so you can jump by yourself, by the way. So there was this added element of, I don’t think I should be in charge of this canopy, of driving the canopy.
Diane Sanfilippo: Ugh.
Jen Sinkler: It was the landing that was really freaking me out. So then there was a whole extra week of anticipation. And the sky dive itself was really enjoyable. It was not that bad. I landed it, and it was fine. But there’s that relief. I don’t need to do that over and over. I don’t need a hobby that terrifies me.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah.
Jen Sinkler: Yeah, so that’s my spiel on find balance.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, sometimes as an entrepreneur the unfortunate side is that your hobby ends up becoming the thing that you’re now using to earn money.
Jen Sinkler: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: And for me, cooking is totally a hobby and I love it. If someone said, if you were going to wake up, what would you do that would be super fun, I would cook and I would go to the gym. And I would probably go shopping. {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: And get my nails done. {laughing}
Jen Sinkler: Yes!
Diane Sanfilippo: Pretty much. And I love all of the tech stuff that we do with the business and all this stuff, but if I’m just going to pick what I’m going to do, I’m super relaxed just cooking, and tasting it, and feeding people. But then add on top of that taking a picture against you know daylight hours running out, and making sure the food still looks good, and it’s hot when you want to eat it, and writing down the recipe and all of that. I’m not complaining; I’m so fortunate to have this work. But, that now turns something that I love into something that puts me into the adrenaline state again, where I’m like ahhh stressed out doing it. So it’s a really tough call to balance all of that. But with your training, it’s really important to not crush that adrenaline all the time.
7. Weight lifting group classes and Crossfit [41:31]
Diane Sanfilippo: A couple of questions that we have here, one is about group classes that are strength, or weight lifting classes. Is it ok to do that stuff in a group? How do you think people should look at that? And I think we can roll that into some questions just about Crossfit, because I know it’s kind of the biggest thing people have questions about too, if we’re picking one track of fitness that people who listen to our show are pretty into.
Jen Sinkler: I saw that question. It’s something along the lines of, are group classes that focus on weight lifting, are they a good option.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah.
Jen Sinkler: The answer is hell yeah!
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: The best results of my life, personally, started when I began at a gym called Urban Athlete, which Jason C. Brown and Pamela MacElree when I lived in Philadelphia. And from there, I transitioned to Crossfit, and from there I transitioned to Movement Minneapolis, and now I’m still working out with a group of people, my fitness buddies, which is like a class. But the accountability and the community that’s involved when you’re working out in a group is huge. The people who are saying, why didn’t I see you on Monday, where were you?
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: You start looking forward to your workouts in a way that you’re like, I’m going to go hang out with my friends now. That becomes a social activity. So group fitness classes, and group fitness classes that focuses on weight lifting, in particular lifting weights, that’s the best of all possible worlds. You’re going to build muscles, you’re going to do extremely useful exercise, very useful exercise in a very short period of time. The classes are usually an hour long.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think one of the things that people are curious about when it comes to something like Crossfit, is it safe or effective to lift weights when you’re in a group and somebody can’t be watching you specifically all the time, and I think that’s something that’s kind of on a case by case basis with different gyms.
Jen Sinkler: It is.
Diane Sanfilippo: You have to just get a feel for it. Just because there’s a lot of people and only a couple of trainers doesn’t mean that they’re not able to watch you. Some of them are great at it. Some of them aren’t as great at it. Sometimes it’s one coach and 30 or more people.
Jen Sinkler: Ugh.
Diane Sanfilippo: And that might not be great. I know that typically at our gym, if there’s 20-25 or I think we max out at 25 in a class, but there’s always at least 2 coaches there.
Jen Sinkler: Yes.
Diane Sanfilippo: One main one and an assistant, and they’re walking around. That way if there’s anybody really new, they can get a little bit of extra attention because they need it. Even if they’ve gone through the essentials, and they’ve learned the basics that way for a couple of weeks, people still can’t remember what a snatch or a clean and jerk is {laughs}. I remember those days when I first went to Crossfit, I was like, shoot which one is that again?
Jen Sinkler: {laughing}
Diane Sanfilippo: Now it seems so funny that you were like, really, they’re so different.
Jen Sinkler: Everybody gets that. It’s overwhelming!
Diane Sanfilippo: It doesn’t make any sense at first, you know?
Jen Sinkler: It doesn’t, and the new people inevitably get a little more attention than the ones who are old hat. But you need a little less attention when you’ve getting in the groove. You’re getting a bunch of work done. It can be as simple as a cue; Sarah, keep your chest up. And then I’m done coaching that person.
Diane Sanfilippo: Right.
Jen Sinkler: I don’t personally like to see ratios of more than 10 to 1. I want there to be at least 1 coach for every 10 people in a class. That’s sort of my earmark. And that’s the way; did I say earmark? I’ve lost so many words.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: Over the course of this launch. I’m just talking nonsense. So I apologize for that. In any case, it’s also how I do my fitness workshops, my strength workshops that I do around the country. I cap it based on how many coaches I’m going to have. And if I know that I want to have 30 people, then I make sure I have at least 2 co-coaches.
8. Training and movement before, during, and after pregnancy [45:25]
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. So we have a bunch of questions about different types of populations, and I think a bunch of people had similar questions. We had a couple from women asking about pre-pregnancy, also during pregnancy and after. Different types of training, or things they should kind of look out for or movements, etc., to either avoid or include. Can you talk about that a little bit?
Jen Sinkler: My best recommendation for both prenatal and postpartum exercise is go to Jessie Mundell’s website. It’s JessieMundell.com. This is her entire specialty, training women who are pregnant or who were pregnant. She talks a lot about how the goal is to reprogram the pelvic floor and the abdominal muscles.
The general consensus of when you’re pregnant; I shouldn’t say the general. The newer consensus is you can continue doing what you have been doing. It’s not a great time to launch into a brand new high intensity program, but you can continue on with what you’ve been doing. That’s my understanding of the research that’s out there right now. Once you’re postpartum, the goal is to reprogram the pelvic floor and the abs, to reteach breathing, and I got this really great drill. Shoot, who did I get this one from? I think this one was from Anne Wendell, who is a physical therapist and covers a lot of this stuff too. I’m sure you know Anne. But push out like you’re going to pee when you inhale, which seems backwards; so you push out like you’re going to pee, and then draw up, like you’re stopping you’re flow on the exhale.
Diane Sanfilippo: Everybody is trying to do that in their car right now.
Jen Sinkler: I know. I’m actually…
Diane Sanfilippo: I’m trying to do it.
Jen Sinkler: {laughs}
Diane Sanfilippo: It’s like, uh… {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: I’m trying to do it right now while I’m talking to you. It’s really good for SI joint pain, for solving pelvic floor problems. The problem is, however, is that everybody is a little bit different, so it depends on if you’ve got, and I can never say this term, is it diastasis recti? How do you say that?
Diane Sanfilippo: I don’t know, I’m not an anatomy expert.
Jen Sinkler: I’m going to call it DR from here on out.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} ok.
Jen Sinkler: It’s when your abs split, though.
Diane Sanfilippo: Oh.
Jen Sinkler: It’s when your abs tear apart, and you get that separation.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, I’ve seen that.
Jen Sinkler: What’s good in those situations, if that’s happened with you, is really low level, dead bug exercises. Side planks, pallof presses.
Diane Sanfilippo: Did you say dead bug?
Jen Sinkler: Yeah, dead bugs!
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughing}
Jen Sinkler: So you’re on the ground. I have dead bugs in a lot of my circuits, too, for Lift Weights Faster. You’re lying on your back, both your arms and legs are pointed towards the ceiling, and then very slowly you’re going to lower, keeping your arms and legs straight, you’re going to lower your opposite arm, opposite leg towards the floor, only as far as you can without your lower back popping up. I would say pretend you are very thirsty and you’ve got to make wine, so you’re going to crush grapes under your low back. And then you’re going to alternate; bring them back up to point the arms and legs both facing the ceiling again. And then alternate; opposite arm, opposite leg. Only as far, lower to the ground only as far as you can without your low back popping up. So, it’s a lot about sort of reconnecting all the muscles in the core to work together again.
So yeah, dead bugs, side planks, pallof presses, and again, carry exercises. Carries are great. Farmer carry, racked carry, waiter carry, etc. Some exercises that Jessie says to avoid if this occurs to you, the DR, anything on all fours, front loaded planks, or any supine crunching or flexion movements, like sit-ups and that kind of thing.
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. So this kind of ties back to what we were talking about with the post adrenal fatigue movement, but when I was talking about my trainer, the reason why he had that experience of how to work with me when I really couldn’t do the whole workout thing is that he was trained as a CHEK practitioner. I think there are CHEK practitioners around the country; they’re definitely easier to find in California, because they’re certification headquarters is in San Diego, or that area. There are a lot of them overseas, as well. I know in the London area he’s pretty popular. But Paul Chek is super knowledgeable on all of this stuff too when it comes to any corrective movement.
And part of the whole postpartum thing, correcting any of the pelvic floor issues, and all of that, I know every check trainer I’ve worked with, two or three different ones when I’ve lived in different places, they all do the same kind of thing like you’re talking about, where it’s really just slow controlled movements and just getting your muscles to work the right way again. I think we have so many listeners to this show who are into Crossfit, and I think understanding that there’s so much more to fitness than just going hard, getting your body working and moving right, or working in balance, or just correcting those imbalances before you build more strength is always a good idea. I always want to encourage people to find somebody, a really experienced trainer who can help you do a lot of corrective work before you go to really intense stuff. Especially if you have injuries or if you are postpartum, I just think that’s a really good time to look into it.
I know that a lot of the, we affectionately call them Chekies, a lot of Chekies definitely specialize in that type of work. So they are ready to have you come in. You’ll be sore the next day, and you’re body will change, but you won’t be dripping sweat and panting, you won’t even know what happen. Some of the work I did with Dave, exactly what you were saying, he would put this little bladder thing behind my back, like an air bladder, and have me do different movements, and be like the pressure you’re putting on that bladder can’t change. So I had to maintain my lumbar curve, or flat, however it was, I had to maintain it, so that was all of the work was happening in my core all over every different little abdominal muscle that’s in there was doing the work, and my arms and legs were moving. It’s cool stuff, and the next day I was like, oh my god I feel like I did 4,000 crunches, but I was barely moving. It was like a laying down workout.
Jen Sinkler: Yes, exactly!
Diane Sanfilippo: I was like, great I just laid down and I’m really sore! {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: Exactly. And that brings up a good point. That sort of pelvic floor health situation isn’t just limited to expecting mothers or mothers. A lot of women, there’s this thing where I pee when I jump, and it’s not normal. I asked, again Anne Wendell, to write a blog for me, a guest blog for me, and it’s called curing a case of the workout pees I believe.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah {laughs}
Jen Sinkler: It’s one of my most popular blog posts, because it’s such a common condition. And she says common doesn’t mean normal. She’s another really good resource on pelvic floor health, as is Katy Bowman.
Diane Sanfilippo: Mm-hmm. Yeah, we’ve interviewed her on the show at least once.
Jen Sinkler: Oh, she’s so good. She’s so good. I ordered her DVD, Down There for Women, which is a fun package to get in the mail.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} And an awesome title.
Jen Sinkler: {laughs} I know, I like it.
9. Training and coaching for teens [52:38]
Diane Sanfilippo: Alright, so I think we’ve just got a couple more. Another specific population that we have folks asking about, training for teens. Is there something different they should do? And then somebody asked, is there a viable market for coaching teens? I don’t know if they’re a trainer who wants to specialize in coaching teens, but what are your thoughts on training and coaching for teens?
Jen Sinkler: As for whether there’s a market for coaching teens, that largely depends on if you can get teams, with an M not an N, into your facility. If you’ve got that kind of space. Because there are plenty of parents who will shell out the big bucks for making their kid, you know.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, one on one.
Jen Sinkler: Yeah, or even in a team setting where they’re wanting their kid to be a really great athlete. So it’s kind of a problem, I’m sort of reluctant to give this advice, because a lot of parents take it and run and then we end up with a sport specificity at too young an age problem. It’s like, no you want your kid to play every sport. If he or she wants to, that is. But early specialization is an issue, and it can lead to a lot of injuries in kids, so that’s what we don’t want with kids in strength training and sports in particular, is we don’t want early specialization at all. Some of the best athletes, most well rounded athletes, and most injury free athletes are the ones who’ve played the biggest variety of sports when they were growing up.
As far as weight training goes, it is not nearly the safety concern it’s made out to be. Eve