These days you can’t turn around on the internet without finding someone who is a “fat loss expert” or a “body transformation specialist” who is hocking their “Extra Lean Ninja-Style Fat Loss Assassin Six-Pack Attack McWorkout” based on their ability to program 3 sets of 10 reps of body part isolation work combined with a paleo diet. The funny thing is that a lot of these people will pump their tires stating how amazing their results are, even though they may not have ever trained a client, and if they have they’ve had decent results with a small handful of individuals.

The true experts are the ones who can say they’ve tried it all, on themselves and with their clients, and know what works best for the majority of the time. If you follow the definition of experts as outlined in Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers, you have to invest a minimum of 10,000 hours in a specific entity to assume mastery over it, and unfortunately the timelines for a lot of experts don’t add up unless they’re finding a way to work 32 hours a day, 9 days a week for 61 weeks a year.

Eric Cressey’s a little different. He runs a sport performance facility outside of Boston that trains pretty much every majorleague baseball player (plus a lot of single, double and triple A, college, high school and junior players) along the eastern seaboard, as wellas a lot of “Average Joe’s” looking to get fit, healthy and deiseled out with sheer awesomeness. An average month during his “slow” phase will have him work with over 100 people – not sessions. PEOPLE.

Yeah. That’s his “slow” phase. 

In full off-season I’m pretty sure he can top out over 200 people. When he’s got close to a billion dollars worth of athlete’s contract coming to him to get an edge, you’d better believe he’s a guy I will gladly listen to any day of the week. That’s why I’m pretty excited he’s decided to dust off his Show and Go Training package with a quick-action sale for 50% off until Friday at midnight.

I reviewed this training system in the past, and also gave it a good once-over with my own training program, and it’s definitely a beast. While I had to make some modifications to get through some of my own specific obstacles (ie. back of a ninety year old arthritic hernia patient), I managed to increase my deadlift considerably and add some decent size to some lagging body parts with some cool new exercises that also found their ways into my clients training programs when applicable.

But today, rather than try to sell Eric’s product for him, I thought I would ask him some of the common questions that I would have if I wanted to buy something like this and get the straight goods from the man himself.

1. What led you to want to come up with Show and Go Training in the first place?

My first book, Maximum Strength, was published in the spring of 2008 – and I learned a lot from that process.  I’d originally resisted the idea of writing a program for the masses, as I have always been huge on individualization.  However, once I gave in, wrote the program, and was absolutely blown away by the awesome feedback on the book.  Even still, I knew I could do better.  Rather than reinvent the wheel, here’s an excerpt from Chapter 2 that summarizes how I did so:

In Maximum Strength, we took people who just worked out and taught them how to train. With this program, the goal is to take motivated individuals to the next level – just as I did when I took up powerlifting myself years ago. If the original Maximum Strength appealed to the 35-40 million people in the U.S. that consider weight-training a hobby, this book might appeal to 1-2% of them – including you.

In other words, Show and Go is a niche book. To demonstrate what I mean, I’ll be blunt; this book is geared toward people who really give a shit.

I wouldn’t have even been allowed to say “shit” – much less put it in bold – if this was a mass-market book. In fact, you’ll find that the tone of this manual is much less conversational and entertaining, and much more “troubleshooting” and “do this and get diesel.” Fortunately, just as you’re more tolerant to cursing, you’re also more tolerant to training programs that will challenge, educate, and motivate you to all news levels of strength, performance, and health. My feeling is that you didn’t purchase this e-book to be entertained; you purchased it to get direction and results.

In the program that follows, I can do a lot more in terms of exercise variety, at least within the confines of what “typical” gyms’ equipment selections allow. I can build more “on the fly” strength tests into the programs on top of the already-challenging loading protocols. I can include both 3- and 4-day-a-week training programs to accommodate your unique schedule. I can provide exercise alternatives if you lift somewhere that doesn’t have all the equipment you’d need to perform the program as-written. And, I can create an online video library to make it easier for you to see the exercises and learn some of the exact coaching cues we use with our athletes at Cressey Performance.

Additionally, self-publishing affords me several luxuries; most notably, I have no restrictions on the length of the text. I can write as much or as little as I want – and basically do whatever is required to make the program exactly what I want it to be. Exercise descriptions aren’t limited to a certain number of sentences, and if I want to include seven exercises in a specific day’s session instead of six, for instance, it’s okay. I can also include ready-to-use templates that you can print out and take with you to the gym to record weights used, whereas traditional books are never conducive to this. Rather than do just one chapter on nutrition, I (thanks to the help of Brian St. Pierre) can have an entire section that could be an exhaustive resource in itself.

And, on perhaps the most badass note, instead of just exercise photos for demonstrations, you’ll find an entire video library where you can view the proper technique for every single exercise in the Show and Go program. That’s about 175 exercises – which constitutes just enough on-camera time to qualify me for an Oscar in the “Best Performance by a Balding Meathead Strength Coach” category. Assuming an average of 12-15 seconds per video, you’ve essentially gotten yourself the equivalent of a 35-45 minute DVD on top of all this programming and my charming wit and personality.

2. There’s a million weight loss-build muscle-get sexified programs out there right now. How is this one different?

It’s written by a guy who actually trains people.  Kidding…sort of.

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Most products are written with a specific market – trainers, females, fat loss, or something else – in mind.  In the marketing world, they tell you to not try to be everything to everyone.  Well, I’m not a good marketer – so I decided to make this resource extremely versatile and a good fit for a LOT of people.

The reason is that there are a lot of things in a comprehensive strength and conditioning program that everybody needs to utilize.  From the minutia to the big picture, I could go on all day: foam rolling, mobility warm-ups, single-leg training, more horizontal pulling, fluctuation of training stress, sufficient deloading periods, extra posterior chain work, a balance of open- and closed-chain upper body pressing, glute activation, rotator cuff strength – the list goes on and on.

So, I guess you can say that the #1 thing that is different about this product is that there are easy-to-apply modifications in it that make it a versatile resource that offers something for everyone.  From the 2x/3x/4x per week training options to the supplement conditioning options, there are ways to make it the right fit for YOU.

3. What can someone expect from this kind of workout that may be different from what they have ever done in the past?

They can expect to look, feel, and move a lot better – and be able to lift some much heavier weights in the gym.  And, in the process, they’ll learn a lot of new exercises and training techniques that they’ll be able to carry forward to the rest of their training career.

We test-drove this program on a lot of people before releasing it, and the feedback was outstanding for folks from a variety of walks of life.  As long as the individual modifies the program for his/her goals, it can be applied to many different objectives.

4. What kind of results have you seen from people who have done this program?

Before Show and Go was ever released, I put a big group of “guinea pigs” through the program with some outstanding results.  It wasn’t uncommon to see increases of 80 pounds and more on the squat and deadlift, with improvements about half those amounts on bench pressing and chin-up totals (understandably smaller, given the smaller window of adaptation for upper body strength).  We had people drop more than 25 pounds and 5% body fat while on the program, and we had scrawny guys who gained as much as 24 pounds in the four months.  It came down to what their starting goals were, and how they attacked things nutritionally on the side.

We even had many athletes who used this program in conjunction with their sports training – from endurance competitors to rugby players – with excellent improvements.

The cool thing is that literally every single one of these “guinea pigs” made a point of noting how much better they felt; they improved mobility and moved more fluently by the end of the program.  This is a stark contrast to the aches and pains you normally see with programs geared toward performance improvements; the program not only improved performance and made people bigger, stronger, and leaner; it also helped set the stage for healthy future training.

5. Have females used it as well?

Yes, we had several females go through the program with outstanding results – and in particular, we saw a lot of girls banging out a lot of chin-ups! Here’s a testimonial from one of them:

“My fiance, Mathew, and I completed Eric’s 16-week Show and Go program in June.  We were both extremely pleased with our results.   I increased my squat by 55lb, my deadlift by 33lb, my 3-rep maximum chin-up by 12lb, my bench press by 8lb and my standing jump by 7.5”- great results in just 16 weeks.

“This is the first intensive strength program I have undertaken.  The program will produce amazing results if you are completely committed, determined and motivated for the 16 weeks.   I even managed to complete my training with international travel and demanding work pressures.   Mathew was an ongoing source of support and this program highlighted the importance and value of a committed and motivated training partner.

“As a female who up to three years ago focused their entire fitness regime on cardio, I highly recommend Eric’s program and his strength and conditioning expertise for maximizing strength gains and sculpting a lean physique.”

Cassandra Lees
Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea

I actually wrote up a post highlighting the success of some of the ladies on the program HERE, too.

6. What else will people get with this program in addition to the workouts?

It consists of four 4-week phases, and it offers five different supplemental options to accommodate the fat loss people, the get bigger/stronger folks, and the competitive athletes in the crowd.  It’s got 2x/week, 3x/week, and 4x/week training options to work with the schedules and competing demands (or lack thereof) in these different populations.  Plus, there is an entire chapter devoted to exercise modifications to help trainees work around equipment limitations (e.g., training at home with certain equipment) and mobility shortcomings.  And, there is an online video database of the more than 175 exercises featured in the program so that you can not only learn the technique for each exercise, but also quickly and easily find substitutions for exercises that might not work for you.  Many who have purchased the program thus far have said that this video library alone is worth well more than the price of the resource in its entirety.

There are also foam rolling protocols and full mobility warm-ups for each one of the four week phases.  Most programs completely neglect these crucial areas – but Show and Go really emphasizes their importance.

In short, this is a “modifiable” resource, not just a static book.  You’re keeping the meat and potatoes, but changing the portion sizes, the side salad, and how frequently you eat them.

Finally, accompanying the product are some pretty sweet bonuses:

1. Five Fantastic Finishers, by Tony Gentilcore – Tony pulled together some crazy innovative add-ons for the end of training sessions to keep things interesting.

2. The Top Five Glute Exercises, by Bret Contreras – Bret offers some forward-thinking lower-body exercises in light of some detailed research he’s done.

3. Innovative Soft Tissue Strategies for Health and Performance, by Chris Howard – Chris is the massage therapist at Cressey Performance, and in this write-up (which is accompanied by several videos) he details some new strategies you can use for self-myofascial release (in addition to the foam rolling techniques I teach you in the main manual).

4. The Show and Go Quick Exercise Reference Guide, by Eric Cressey – As I noted, this is a collection of links that go directly to every exercise in the program so that people can quickly refer to it when they’re at the gym and using an iPhone, iPad, or Blackberry to get an exercise technique refresher.

5. 2x/week Show and Go Training Programs, by Eric Cressey – This is available for all four phases, and these are perfect for in-season athletes and endurance athletes.

6. What kind of person will get the most benefit from this program?

It is certainly geared more toward those with some resistance training under their belt, but that’s not to say that a beginner wouldn’t be able to apply this with great success if he/she simply is conservative with weight selection and really focused on perfect technique.  I put several beginners through the program with great results, and we also had “guinea pigs” who used this program to get their bench presses up over 300 pounds and squats and deadlifts up over 500 pounds.  So, it has some merit across the board.

One guarantee that I’ll make is that everyone – even those utilizing this for fat loss – will get stronger along the way, and that’s going to carry over to athletics for sure.  That said, the exercise selections definitely have an “athletic flavor” to them, and by selecting the appropriate supplemental conditioning option, you’ll get even more carryover to athletic performance and the real world.

7. Will following this program get me a 500 pound deadlift, legs that could cut diamonds, and have women everywhere fainting from my sheer radiating awesomeness?

There is a 60-day money-back guarantee, but I can’t say that we’ve ever had anyone request a refund over that last part.  Let’s hope you’re not the first.

So there you have it folks. If you want to get the next best thing to training at one of the premier facilities in the world with one of the best coaches in the world, this is where you should spend your time and invest in a program that can get you the results you’re looking for. Stop doing concentration curls with 10 pound dumbells and start lifting the way you want to look.

Pick up your copy of Show and Go Training now before Eric jacks the price back up. As an added bonus, he’s going to do a live Q & A with anyone who buys a copy today, Tuesday October 25th, so definitely take him up on this offer!! Good moods come along only once in a while, so take advantage!!! Get your copy HERE.