Happy Tuesday…I hope everyone enjoyed their long holiday weekend.  I spent some time hanging out at my boyfriend’s pool…savoring the last bits of summer.  I am sad to see summer end, although if I had to pick a favorite season it would be fall.  Love the slightly cooler weather and the changing of the trees. 

Today I want to share two pieces which my strength coach, Tony Gentilcore, shared on his blog a week or two ago.  I loved both of them, so want to pass them along to you. 

The first is called “Show Me Your Guns!” and is a blog post by a woman named Christina who asked her readers to send in photos of their guns…not their rifles or semi-automatics, but rather their biceps.  You know, THAT kind of gun show.  And she got a ton of responses.  It is fun to scroll down and see all the women flexing and showing off what they’ve got.  A testament to strong, fit women (we see enough of guys flexing in the gym, time for a show from the ladies).  I like anything that promotes women strength training and developing some muscles. 

The second piece, Why Cressey Performance is Awesome, is by a guy named Will Davis, a Brit who is traveling around the US visiting different gyms and training facilities with the goal of learning how to be better at what he does.  Pretty awesome, huh?  Anyway, Will spent 3 days at Cressey Performance, where I train once a week (I lift twice a week on my own at my local gym).  I drive 35-40 minutes to get to Cressey…and a lot of people travel farther than that.  To me it is totally worth it.  Tony Gentilcore (who is a part owner) talks a lot about “training environment.”  I agree wholeheartedly with him when he talks about how important this can be.  When you go to your gym are you inspired?  Do you work harder when you’re there? 

This message really hit home for me last week.  I have been going to Cressey since last October, so not quite a year.  At this point I have probably 25-30 training programs that Tony has written for me.  Plus, I’m a personal trainer myself, so in theory I can write my own training programs, or at this point I could recycle some of my older programs from Tony.  I had missed a week of training at Cressey due to a knee injury, and last week I was driving up there after not having been there for a few weeks.  Life has been busy and I found myself wondering if I should stop training at Cressey and just work out on my own at my local gym…the travel time to Cressey, the additional expense…was it really worth it?  Two hours later as I was driving home I had answered my question with a resounding “YES!”  Totally worth it.  I love the atmosphere at Cressey.  While I am often the only female there, I feel very welcome, very comfortable.  The gym is filled with athletes who are all training hard.  This is not to say there is not talking, laughing and general fun…there is.  But no one is goofing off, not pushing themselves, or being generally lame.  I love the staff at Cressey, who really push me to work harder and do things I probably wouldn’t do on my own.  Despite having trained there for almost a year, I continue to learn new things.  I walked out of there last week feeling awesome…I had worked hard and I felt great about what I had done.  To me, that is so worth the drive and the money.  Anyway, when I read Will Davis’ piece I was nodding my head at all of his observations.  He hit on all the things that make Cressey a great place to train.  Does your gym make you feel like that?  If you are working with a trainer, are they teaching you new things, are they pushing you…or are they just “mailing it in” (I see this at my local gym all the time).  Think about it.

By the way, Eric’s dog, Tank (above, with Eric) is almost as cute as my dog.  These video clip cracks me up (these are some of the shenanigans that go on at Cressey…it’s not all work and no fun):