With Day 2 of the Muscle Imbalances Revealed initial launch, I wanted to share a quick Q & A with one of the contributors, Tony Gentilcore. I’ve interviewed Tony in the Past, and it was definitely a shelling of knowledge bombs and a dash or two of humor. Muscle Imbalances Revealed Upper Body is on sale for this initial promo until tomorrow evening at midnight, so be sure to check it out and pick up your copy now before the price doubles.

So what’s Tony have in store for us today? Read on and find out!!

1. So I know you’ve been seriously thinking about putting out an info product for a while now. What made you decide to partner up on this one??

TG:   Well, a few reasons, actually:

1.  As a coach, I spend the majority of my days trying to get people to leave their “comfort zones.”  As creatures of habit – and because it’s human nature – we tend to gravitate towards what’s easy and what we’re good at.  Using exercise as the obvious example:  we all know of THAT one person at our local gym who’s been doing the same exact routine week in and week out since 1996.  You know who I’m talking about: it’s the same guy who’s been walking around with the same issue of Muscle and Fiction for past decade and is still sporting the discman – most likely rocking out to some Hootie and Blowfish.  How’s that for some nostalgia!

When I first came into the industry, the internet was still, well, kinda new (I know, I’m dating myself here), and the whole interwebz marketing bonanza was no near the juggernaut it is today (for better or for worse).  For all intents and purposes, my days were generally filled with waking up, heading to work to train clients, doing some reading here and there, talking to hot chicks online, watching 90210 re-runs, and eating beef jerky.  Yeah, I was pretty cool back then.  Somewhere along the way, as I gained more experience working with various clientele, and as I started to do more and more reading, I started to realize that I had a lot that I wanted to say and started writing articles.

At first, I wrote for free – just to get my name out there; and eventually, I was fortunate enough to catch the eye of TC Luoma (of t-nation.com), and started writing for them.  This eventually led to me starting my own blog (NEWSFLASH:  if you’re reading this right now and you happen to be a fitness professional, and you don’t have a blog or website, you’re an idiot), which, as the years have passed, has grown to be fairly popular.

I say all of this because as I alluded to above, like everyone else, I like being in my comfort zone.  I’ve been content with helping to grow Cressey Performance (of which I’m one of the co-founders); writing articles for publications like t-nation, livestrong.com, and Men’s Health; growing my personal business (blog, online coaching, etc); and yes, still watching 90210 re-runs.  Don’t judge me!

Having an “online presence” and being considered somewhat of a big deal, it was only a matter of time before people would start asking when I was going to hop on the fitness product bandwagon – which, I’ll be the first to admit, has been humbling.  I mean, it’s always flattering when people go out of their way to say how much they enjoy something you wrote and that the start their day by reading your blog, and that they love your work in general.  Who wouldn’t love that?  It’s an awesome feeling.

So, it’s only been within the past year (or two) that I’ve been receiving more and more inquires from people asking when I was going to write an ebook, produce a dvd, or give away my trade secrets for having abs that could deflect an oncoming Mack truck.  I’ve been resistant to it, thinking to myself (in typical TG fashion) that I’m just not ready for that yet; I’m not that “big time.”

But, then I got to thinking:  there’s a lot of douchy people out there putting out some real dog shit (ie: bad) products that people are buying.  What’s more, I have student loans I’m still paying off, I want to someday own something, so “fuck it,” I said to myself.  “It’s time to put my big boy pants on, stop being a cottenheaded ninny muggins (name that movie reference?), and put something out there that can (and will) actually help people.”

2.  Of course, however, I just didn’t want to jump in gun’s a blazing.  My compromise was to try to partner up with someone and kind of get my feet way so-to-speak.  Fortunately, Rick (Kaselj) happened to email me out of the blue asking me if I’d be interested in contributing to MIRU.  I’m not gonna lie – there WAS a small part of me that was hesitant to say yes, but you emailed me and basically said “dude, you’re doing it,” and so, here I am.  You’re my boy, Dean!

3.  And lastly, I’m awesome – I just came to the conclusion that people need a little more Tony G in their lives.

2. You’re doing a presentation on Corrective Strategies for Overhead Athletes and Meatheads. First, love the title. Second, what are the three big take-aways from this seminar you think everyone should be able to walk away with and put into use

TG:  When Rick originally contacted me to take part in the product, it took me all of 3.2 seconds to figure out what the first presentation would be on.  As a former collegiate baseball player myself (1998 Division II Player to Watch, thank you very much) at Mercyhurst College, I look back at how I used to train and basically wish I had a Flux Capacitor somehow handy so that I could go back in time and scissor kick myself in the face.  My god, some of the nonsense I used to do just makes me cringe.   Bicep curls the day AFTER a start?  Five mile runs 2-3 times per week?  Really, Tony?  Really?

Anyhoo, one of the reasons why I love my job so much (other than the fact that I can wear sandals) is that I have the ability to teach kids what NOT to do.  More specifically, we train a lot of baseball players at Cressey Performance.  And by “a lot,” I mean roughly 85% of our clientele are baseball players, so it only made sense that I’d go into at least some detail on how we go about training our guys (and girls).  Moreover, I didn’t want to limit it to JUST the athletes – as we train quite a few weekend warriors and “meatheads” at the facility, too.

To that end, a few things I feel people will walk away with are:

– No matter what, you can ALWAYS train around an injury.  I’ve noted this in the past, but I don’t care if you’re in a full-body cast, we can still find something to train.  I’ve never bought into this whole “just rest” mentality that the primary care community has opted to embrace.  More specifically, as it relates to this particular presentation, I discuss how to program around a few common shoulder pathologies that re common in the overhead athlete (and meathead) population:  namely, shoulder impingement, and AC joint issues.

– “impingement” is basically a garbage term that many fitness professionals tend to throw around to either sound smart or because they have no idea what the heck they’re talking about.

– you’ll also walk away with some pretty cool corrective exercise protocols you can use to better setup your athletes and clients for long-term success.

3. Seriously, how many times did you make reference to Star Wars, Harry Potter, or nerd-gasmic stuff like that?

TG:  I’d say the over/under is somewhere between the total # times George Lucas made me vomit in my mouth with all his cheesy dialogue between Anakin and Padme and # of times Harry used his Patronus spell in The Prisoner of Azkaban.

4. In the last instalment of the series, we had a lot of physios, chiros, and athletic therapists as well as trainers and the average meathead pick up a copy. With respect to your seminar, “Corrective Strategies,” who do you think will benefit the most, and why?

TG:  Great question!  Ideally, I’m hoping to “spread my wings” and hopefully appeal to a fairly broad spectrum of fitness professionals.  if I had to pick one demographic, though, I’d say I’d really like to make an impact on new trainers coming into the industry.  As I noted previously, while I’m in a special circumstance personally given I have the opportunity to train a lot of athletes on a day-to-day basis; there’s a reason why I included “meatheads” into the mix too.  Not to rub it in or anything, but not everyone is spending their days training professional athletes, and that’s cool!  There’s a lot to be said for working with the general population and having a profound influence on their daily lives.

As trainers, we’re ALWAYS working with people who are either banged up or well on their way, and I’d like to think that whomever watches that particular presentation will walk away with a better understanding of how to not only recognize and properly screen/assess their clients, but have the wherewithal to actually write an effective program to get them better.

Take for example, shoulder impingement.  What the heck is impingement anyway?  What’s the functional anatomy that’s involved?  How does someone develop impingement?  How can you differentiate between the TYPES of impingement?  More importantly, how would you go about writing a program for someone with internal impingement as opposed to external impingement?   Trust me:  there’s a lot more to it than just showing someone some simple band exercises.

5. Everyone builds a seminar to try to get a specific reaction from a specific sub-set of the population. For instance, doing my two seminars I wanted to get a little “shock and awe” going from personal trainers and get them testing out some of the stuff I showed the next day on themselves and on their clients. What reaction did you want to get and from whom?

TG:  I’m pretty much on par with you, actually.  Except in my case, I was shooting for less “shock and awe” and more of a “Wow, Tony is so smart, I really want to hang out with him some day” kind of thing.

In the end I’m just really excited to help people out.  I don’t claim to be a Mr. Smarty Pants or anything; nor do I claim to have all the answers, but I do have a sincere hope that people walk away with some practical advice that they can use the following day with themselves and their clients.  At the end of the day, any way I can “Pay it Forward,” and somehow make the industry better, I’m pretty happy.

6. So how close are you to hitting that 600 deady you’ve been shooting for?

TG:  Lets break it down like this:  I’m about as close to deadlifting 600 lbs as I am to making out with Alicia Keys. Okay, maybe a little closer than that, but you get the jist.  Unfortunately, I’ve had to put that plan on the back burner for a little bit due to some funkiness going on with my back.  I’m sure I’ve got some significant (product plug alert) imbalances going on, but I’ve also come to the conclusion that standing around on hard, rubber matting for 6-8 hours per day coaching isn’t doing me any favors. Too, I know that when I’m consistent with my soft tissue work (foam rolling, ART, etc) – and I haven’t been consistent with it lately – that that makes all the difference in the world.

Also, sometimes, I just need to freakin practice what I preach.  I wrote a quick blog post a few weeks ago discussing why it’s pretty much impossible to CONSISTENTLY deadlift heavy on a weekly basis and expect to make progress; elaborating on how the stronger you are, and the more neurally efficient you are, you’re just going to beat the body down at some point.  To that end, I made an executive decision to lay low on the deads for the time being, and hopefully come back with a vengeance in the near future.  In the meantime, though, I’m still kicking ass and taking names.

Thanks for giving some feedback on your approach to this product, Tony!! To find out more about Tony’s seminars as well as those by Rick Kaselj, Dr. Jeff Cubos, and the smokin hot dude with the best hair in fitness whose blog your reading right now, check it out by clicking HERE. It’s on sale for $77, and going up in price to $147 come Thursday evening, so get your learn on, and order your copy today!!

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