Episode 159 - Lee Boyce: Prioritizing Soft-Skills in Coaching & Education - D&D Fitness Radio Podcast

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:14):
Welcome to the D and D Fitnessradio podcast, brought to you by your
hosts Don Saladino from New York Cityand Derek Hanson from Vancouver, Canada.
Lee, Boys, you've been astrength and conditioning coach for I want to

(00:35):
say as long as I have,or if at least as close to.
So how many years are you inthe business now? Oh, we're going
into twenty four now, so thisis my seventeenth year, just about to
start now. Wow. Yeah,so you're right, you're not as old
as me. So it's a Derek, what do you know? I'm like
twenty five? Now, what areyou twenty five years? Geez? I
started in like coaching track in likeeighty eight, so I don't know.

(00:57):
Through the math, it's eight thirty. You're like thirty. Is that thirty
six years? Yeah? Someone likeright, don't remind me you're that old.
But so listen. The reason whyI wanted to bring you on was
I feel like you're someone I've beengetting to know throughout the years. First
off, I've been reading about yourstuff on teenage and it seems like decades

(01:19):
ago. And when you when youstart reading, I've always become a fan
of certain coaches, Like you'll readabout a coach and you'll say, oh,
Wow, this guy's really intelligent,or this woman's really intelligent, or
I like their approach, and everytime you see their name, you always,
you know, pay them some respect. But you also dive in and
you and you read about it.So I think over the last couple of
years since I've been getting to knowyou, you know, it's obvious why

(01:44):
you've done so well for yourself inthis space, right, And you meet
coaches and you just hit it off, and the next thing you know,
you're at every speaking of you knowevent together, and then the next thing
you know, we're on this podcast. So could you just get in your
background a little bit, talk abouthow you started, talk about how your
business is pivoting now, because Ifind that interesting. Yeah, So back

(02:05):
in the days, I remember evengetting into personal training in the first place.
It started kind of by a wayof I was in the eleventh grade
and one of my friends he hada session with a personal trainer for helping
him out with some hockey training,and so he was like, you want
to tag along? I was like, sure, went there, did the
session. It was the most amazingthing that I ever experienced. And so

(02:28):
the guy just impressed me. Histrainer just impressed me, not for any
sort of knowledge or anything like that, just his presence and his energy and
all that stuff. And I waslike, man, this seems like such
a cool career path. I kindof put it out in mind after some
time, and I wanted to becomelike a piro Warria or some other kind
of thing like that. Learned aboutexercise science in school, took that course
not once but twice, did wellin it, not once but twice.

(02:49):
I went to two different schools whenI was doing that, and then yeah,
got into kinesiology and university. Igot recruited as a track and field
athlete as a sprinter in university aswell. And so while I was doing
those things, and I started makingup my mind whether or not I wanted
to take things to working with patientsand in a kind of like a clinical
kind of setting with physio and stufflike that, and doing more school for
that too, versus working with andI'll say the term loosely, but healthier

(03:13):
clients who aren't injured on an outin an athletic circumstance, where I'm working
with coaching clients or personal training clients, and I said, you know what,
I think that's more of my thing. And at age twenty I got
into that while I was still runningtrack. While I was in school,
I got my first job at acommercial gym, and the rest sort of
speaks for itself, and the snowballsort of began. By the time I
was twenty three, I started writinga lot, and yeah, just been

(03:36):
working for myself since about twenty twelve, so after my sixth or seventh year
in the industry, and I've I'vebeen on my way since. Was there
anybody who like influenced you, acoach or somebody like that who really got
you excited about doing what you're doing? And because I think we all have
that one person or two people whoyou might have said, oh wow,

(03:58):
that really makes me feel like Ican get into this field. Yeah,
I would say that other than thatparticular personal trainer that I worked with that
time when I was a high schooler, I would say that my experience with
track was definitely helpful with my secondcoach, particularly because he was really really
into breaking down the biomechanics of movementmuch more than other track coaches that I'd

(04:21):
had, and so that really reallystruck with me because it was it was
just very academic, It was veryintelligent methods that he would use and that
he would explain, and he hada great way of breaking things down,
complex subjects down, and I tooka page out of his book when I
became a trainer myself. That wasdefinitely an influence, and I peeled a
whole bunch of track exercise into mypersonal training sessions as well, which was,

(04:43):
I'm probably looking back, not thesmartest thing at the time, but
it was what I knew. Andthen I think that one thing that was
really important to me was I hireda coach of my own when I was
going for my own goals as atrainer at age twenty is my first year,
and he was trying to help meput on strength and size, and
his coaching particularly, I remember likeit was yesterday in terms of how impactful

(05:03):
it was learning things from the perspectiveof being a client, but also just
how well he was at coaching andhow well he was communicating, how well
he was and doing all those typesof things the soft skills of personal training
really and that resonated with me alot, and I still model my approach
after his to a certain degree evento this day. What type of coach

(05:26):
I don't want to say what typeof coach, I want to say more
of what type of trainer? Doyou feel like you have become throughout the
years, Like you have this runningbackground, but I also see you,
you know, doing things that Ilove to do, like picking up heavy
stuff and sticking to the basics whenit comes to your list. So when
you're designing programs, obviously they're goingto change per person, But what would

(05:47):
you feel is more of your laneor do you just kind of utilize many
different tools out of the toolbox.I like the idea of saying that my
template is that I don't have one, and that my brand is that I
don't have one, and I'm sortof a generalists trainer. I'm a general
pop guy. So it's anyone andeveryone in terms of that side of things.
When it comes to the actual methodsthat I like to use, I've

(06:10):
taken a little bit from everybody thatI've learned from, and everything that I've
studied, and everything that I've read, and every you know, influence that
I've had, and I feel likethat's sort of the best way for me
to go about doing what it isthat I do. As far as my
coaching style, I like to followthe kind of the mantra that learn to

(06:30):
move well, then get stronger whilemoving well. That's basically it. And
if I can sort of stay underthat umbrella with people, then it makes
it a lot more universal, alot easier, and it kind of a
do no wrong approach. And aslong as people can follow those tenets,
they're going to see good things happen. Love that tay. And with the
clients you're working with, is therelike sort of a sort of a variety

(06:54):
in terms of one their activities,their goals, but also their ages,
Because like I'm you know, andI'm in my mid fifties and I've had
to modify things for myself. AndI was talking to somebody the other day
and just saying like, Okay,I've shifted it away from like heavy lifting
obviously, but I found other thingsthat I like and that I think are
doing a good job for me.Yeah. So my clientele as a whole,

(07:19):
I would say, especially based onsecond place in particular that I worked
when I was working for a companystill I worked for a medical clinic that
was a little bit more of anolder demographic and kind of like the heart
of downtown Toronto and that's like thefinancial hub. So it was a lot
of kind of like pinstripe white collarexecutives who were forty plus and that was

(07:41):
that made up one hundred percent ofmy clientele at the time, and now
there's still a lot of that thatcomes through to see me. So I
do sort of cater towards at leastpeople who are at the minimum of my
age. I would say I dohave people who are younger and so on.
I have had my pepperings of youngathletes and other stuff like that.
But the heart that you know,thirty five to fifty five type of crowd

(08:03):
and you know, some older youngerthe main component of my clientele base,
and it is a lot more ofthe what can we do outside of lifting?
Heavy Lifting heavy is one piece ofthe pie. Strength is one element
of fitness, But what is fitnessas a whole and how can we achieve
that? So I look at fitnessin the terms of health and skill related

(08:24):
fitness, which are eleven components deep, not just one. Strength is one
and we can get there with strengthtraining but what other things are we missing
out on? What trade offs arewe hitting by just only doing strength training?
And that's what I like to explorewith clients, and it usually gives
them a little bit more of arounded approach and it gives them more respect
for these just lifting heavyweights. Haveyou can you find me in seventeen years

(08:48):
right, you said you've been coachingfor roughly have you feel like the challenges
stay the same when it comes towhat you're dealing with with clients? Or
do you feel like, because obviouslyyou evolved as a coach throughout the last
decade plus, do you feel likeyou just those challenges that you had maybe
seventeen years ago no longer exist ordo you find as a coach that you're

(09:09):
always being faced with the same challengeswhen it comes to dealing with clients.
It's a little bit of both.There's a lot more public knowledge about fitness
and what fitness sort of entails areand how to train as a basic level
today than there was fifteen years ago. Ever, oh a bit more knowledge
and a little bit more experience.Oftentimes maybe they said they've done crossfoot now,

(09:33):
or maybe they've had a personal trainin the past or whatever. And
you know, it's less likely aswell that a much old client is going
to train with a twenty one yearold version of me versus a thirty six
year old version of me as well. Right, So it's just it's a
little bit more common ground when thatage gap is a little bit more shrunken
oftentimes. So with that being said, people who are more experienced in their

(09:54):
lives, with more time spent alive, they're going to have probably more experiences
in the fitness space than somebody whowas a lot younger would. Right where
they're been one dimensional. I justwant to get big. I want to
get huge, or I want tolift as heavy as possible, or I
want to do this competition or somethingalong those lines. And so from that
perspective, it presents a little bitmore unique challenges as far as I'd say

(10:18):
two things a managing or working aroundlike I have this area of chronic pain,
I've been diagnosed with this, Ihave these kinds of issues that I
have to deal with. How canwe still make progress and make gains surrounding
those issues? And also maybe myschedule is a lot more full of responsibilities
than it once was, So that'sone thing, and I would say that

(10:39):
the other thing would be the challengethat I'm presented with these days has more
to do with those soft skills.I was talking about just making sure that
you're a good communicator, which Ithink is more than half the battle as
a personal trainer. If you're beable to get your points across, get
the learning experience to be worthwhile forthe clients, and provide that kind of

(11:01):
value in the time that you're notspending actually lifting weights, then you know
you've accomplished a whole lot by doingthat. So there's a lot of credence
that I believe that I have inthat Lee. You mentioned this idea of
like you have to be a greatcommunicator. How and I go through this
a lot myself. Is how importantis writing for you? Because obviously Donna

(11:26):
mentioned you did some writing, andnow I think everything is kind of shifted
towards video and not obviously podcasts.But do you think it's still important to
write and get your thoughts on paperor type them out. Yeah. I
have a blog that I write onas frequently as I can. I used
to be much more constant and consistent, but now it's a little bit less

(11:48):
just because of I'm spread much morethin than I used to be. With
that being said, I do thinkthat like the contents of that blog particularly,
are not things about six ways toimprove your bench press or four different
ways to increase your squad performance.There are things that I see in the
industry from a socio cultural perspective.They challenge the art of writing. For

(12:11):
me, number one, so Ithink that's a great practice for me to
continue doing, so I'll never stopdoing it. But also it's a great
way for me to just verbalize orat least articulate my thoughts in a cogent
manner. And if that's another channelor medium that I can use to get
more people to understand where I'm comingfrom, or get more people to hear
my thoughts on something, or tosimplify a topic for them, than great.

(12:33):
Then there's the articles and all thatstuff that I write that are actually
about direct training content, and Ithink there's a lot of value in that
too. There has been a countlessnumber of people over the course of my
writing career. I guess where theydid contact me or find me through some
kind of written word that I putout there. So there's even benefit from
the business perspective in that regard,and I just I always when I'm at

(13:00):
the writers for you know, teenagefor example, or the writers for place
like that, as you know,this was some they's had a certain level
of my respect and figure Harvard Hathwayand figures that were really being pioneers in
a way or spreading a good setof information, and so I wanted to

(13:22):
be one of those people as well, and I aspired to be like them.
And for that reason, I justhold writing in a very high regard.
Even if it's be viewed as antiquatedor anything like that, I don't
really I don't really care. Ijust I'm never going to stop doing it.
So it's something that I hold prettyclose. Doing this now for seventeen
years, right, I mean,when you're I find that I'm still as

(13:43):
much of a sponge now, maybeeven more of a sponge now than I
even was when I was a lotyounger. And that's because I feel like
now we know where a lot ofthe sources are, right Like, I
feel like we have access to somany more sources where we don't have to
be at these events right like twentyyears ago, we couldn't turn on our
social media and start learning from greatcoaches, or do zoom calls with them,

(14:05):
or do webinars, et cetera.What do you find how do you
stay up to speak? Do youfind it's from speaking out a lot of
these engagements or do or are therejust a select group of coaches that you've
always like to pay attention to,or do you have a mentor like how
do you how do you keep up? It's a combination of kind of everything
you just said there. It's definitelybeing around a lot of other good minds

(14:30):
when it comes to conferences and differentevents to speak at a fair amount of
them. And so I was ableto and have been able to repeatedly connect
with a lot of people who Irespect, whose work I follow along with,
and whose work I very largely agreewith across the board. And so
it's and brings an ideas table,It reinforces current ideas or past ideas,

(14:50):
and it brings some stuff out ofthe woodwork for me as well. So
I think that the events and thespeaking engagements and all that stuff are a
big facilitator toward, you know,keeping my information up and at the end
of the day, in one regard, it's sort of like you're also getting
you get to go to a freeweekend of information. Right it's free conferences
over and over again that you're doingmultiple times per year where you're hearing,

(15:13):
you know, fifteen different lectures orwhatnot of different people on certain subjects.
And these are industry leaders, soI can't complain about that. So that's
a huge one as well. Andas far as like people on social media
and people follow and including the peoplewho are usually at these events speaking,
it's you know, I'll have likea good, let's say three dozen or
so poor group of like go choose. As far as like this is information,

(15:37):
this exercise that I'm seeing right here, I'm going to go and apply
that tomorrow at the gym with mynext clients and so on that kind of
stuff. So social media definitely hasits advantages that outweigh its disadvantages, I
would say, So I take thatpretty seriously. As well, follow crazily
high amounts people I don't have inthe thousands of people that I FOLLO or
anything like that, so that Ican still stay with the just not get

(16:00):
too much of a good thing,if that makes sense. The analysis paralysis
or too much of a good thingor overexposure or anything like that. So
I think that it's nice to keepit sort of close to it sometimes,
Derek, I still think it's amazinghow you can get together with the same
person over and over and over andyou're still always picking up on things,
right Lee And and I know thisis part of the magic of speaking out

(16:22):
a lot of these events and goingand listening to people lecturing. Sometimes I
find that even a bit less stimulatingthan just spending some alone time with an
additional speaker, or going for aworkout with them, or actually going and
having dinner with them, because alot of times the speakers are going up
there and they're trying to generalize thetopic. A lot of times they are

(16:44):
repeating things that you may have heardor they've definitely presented a dozen times.
But like the other day, Derekwas over here, like Derek and I
do a weekly podcast, and Derekstarts talking to me. You know,
I know you're I know for youpersonally, you're a back squat person.
I enjoy backs lots. It's somethingthat I've always been dialed into doing.
Yet it's a movement that's been bastardizedby so many striping conditioning coaches. Now

(17:07):
we all know that there's not aone size fits all, and we can
put that aside because everyone's heard thatbefore. But Derek started talking about,
you know, activity through the Achillestendon, that he's finding that a lot
of people are a lot of athletesaren't getting by not putting loading on their
back or trap bar, and howthat's removing from specific improving, specific attributes

(17:27):
from the athlete that you know,maybe they're getting so ne dominant now and
why are we getting a lot ofpulled hamsters in the NFL. And that's
derek specialty. So to be ableto sit with my podcast partner and listen
to him, and I've listened tohim a million times. You're always picking
things up I find from the peoplethat you're even really close to. Yeah,

(17:48):
that's very true, and I likethat as well. It's funny because
I was just thinking about, asyou were saying that, the different opportunities
I had in the last i'd saytwo or so years, I guess post
pandemic, to get one on oneor in small group settings with coaches that
I respect and whatnot. Most recently, I can think about Luca and the
fact that we were to do aworkout together when he was here in Toronto

(18:11):
and then go to breakfast afterwards andgrab a bite to eat, and you
know, the nuggets of wisdom thatI was able to sort of absorb from
him over that brand total of maybethree and a half hours that we spent
together was it's invaluable, you know. And you know I could say that
about even when you and I werein Edmonton and we're able to get that
workout in as well, and we'reable to talk about stuff just Andy Morgan,

(18:34):
we can I can go on aboutall sorts of different people like that
where you have Andrew Coats, whereyou have different opportunities to sit down spend
some one on one time and yeah, you learn something new. And it's
gotten to the point for me wherewhat I like to do is kind of
and I know that everybody is goodat everything, but I like to sort
of put people in their own littletemplates. They're little, they have their

(18:56):
their their thing that they're so goodat. For Luca, I say,
this guy knows the hustle side ofpersonal training. This is what he knows.
He's the hustle guy. And sowhen I have things to think about
in terms of learn to build abusiness or really really how to work a
client in that regard. That's whoI would try to talk to, you
know. And then Don sald DonSaldinos he's about celebrity training especially, and

(19:18):
so when I have certain things Iwant to do about that, I'm going
to talk to Don Saldia. AndrewCoats. He's about connections. He's about
making sure that you've got connections andso on. So I could talk to
somebody about that introductions and networking andall that sort of thing and so on
and so forth. And I findthat, hey, the more you talk
to somebody, the more you learnabout sort of what they're best at and

(19:40):
how you know you guys can helpeach other and what area. But number
two, it's just you learn newthings under those subheadings every single time that
you talk to somebody. And Ithink that's great and it's very very it's
priceless really, yeah, I mean, just to add to what you guys
are saying. Like the course thatI taught last Sunday dawn, it was

(20:00):
good because the people who are therewere all intelligent. Everybody who tended,
so it was like I was we'rejust going back and forth, and I
like that type of dynamic rather thanme just speaking to an audience that can't
ask questions or just sits there.Right. So, I think, like
you guys said, getting into moreof a collaborative learning environment is really useful.
The question I had for Lee wasthe one thing I'm not struggling with,

(20:22):
but I have to work hard atis there's always new technology coming out,
and sometimes you know that it's frivolous, but other times you're trying to
assess like is that going to beuseful for what I do? Or should
I learn more about that? Doyou find that you're in that space as
well, where you're trying to golike, Okay, I want to be
current, I want to be youknow, technologically advanced with what I do,

(20:47):
But how do you filter out thecrap from what is actually useful?
Yeah? Well, I'm in someways I'm not the greatest person to ask
because of how behind I am withsome of those types of things. I
keep it old school and I'm veryvery aware of that. So I'm not
like on the latest, uh,you know, gadgets that are out there
for from a personal training perspective,but also from like a business development perspective,

(21:10):
I'm just not that guy, haven'tever been. With that being said,
I do think that there is somecredence in the idea that you know,
the tried, tested and true oldschool method is there's a reason why
they're stick sticking around and they're stillthere and they still are useful because you
know they're they're tried, tested andtrue for a reason. And so I
try to apply that to both sidesof my work. Number one, the

(21:30):
business side of my work in termsof you know, what tends to work,
is what tends to work, anddon't really mess around with too many
of those methods. But on theother side, like in terms of personal
training, the act of personal training, are we starting to use more AI?
Are we starting to use more differenttools and gadgets. Are we starting
to use more different things that aregoing to enhance a personal training experience for

(21:52):
a client, or are we gonnait's kind of like lifts right like?
Or are we going to stick withyour basic your squad pattern, your hinge
pattern, your pushing pull pattern,vertical, horizontal and know that these things,
no matter what phase of training you'rein, are going to yield the
results that you're kind of looking forwhat the client is looking for, and
all you have to do is nowmake microadjustments to things like volume, things
like intensity, things like how you'regoing to group prepare your sets, rest,

(22:15):
interval and so on, and soI try to apply the same thing
to on the gym floor and offof the gym floor in terms of the
business side of things. So,I mean, I know it was a
little bit of a roundabout answer thatit doesn't really exactly tell you whether or
not I'm I'll really up to datewith all that stuff. But at the
same time, you know, asbad as a person as I am to
ask, I do think that thereis something to be said for keeping it

(22:40):
old school. Sometimes. I wastalking to Don about this, and there's
people that I'll meet who can't doan exercise without attaching something to themselves,
whether it's like velocity based lifting oryou know, those types of things where
it's like, come on, justjust work out, like don't worry about
that stuff. You know. Ihad a I've had a couple of clients

(23:00):
where and this gets back to thecommunication aspect of it as well. Actually,
like I've had a couple of clientswhere they are very caught up with
those smaller facets, the minutia behindtraining. What is the amount of ground
contact time I should have on adepth jump into a box jump? I
heard that anything over point two secondsof ground contact time means that I have
an inferior amount of pliometric capability orfast switch or high threads with more unit

(23:25):
capability. And it's like, dude, just jump off, like, just
do the thing, you know,it's it's not going to be any more
useful to you to know this datarather than just practice the thing and get
better at it. Right, Andit's probably it's probably one of the big
uh, probably the area of ourindustry that I'm really you know, I'm

(23:45):
a bit bummed out about. Right. It's like you suddenly people start taking
something that's good and they start shiningor really you know, they start taking
light off of it, right,like you know, this is this whole
need you know about it. Everyone'scold plunging down and everyone's jumping in saunas
now like this cold therapy guys,as we all know. Anyone listening,
like it's been around for centuries,Like this is not some new science.

(24:07):
But you know, I don't knowwhere everyone's jumping into cold plunges and now
five minutes later, well you shouldn'tdo it after a workout. Well it's
gonna you don't want to cut downon an inflammation completely. I'm like,
dude, shut up. Just ifyou have an opportunity to jump in the
tank for a minute and you're gonnafeel better, you know what. So
am I gonna tell someone, Well, I can either do it after the
workout for a minute and I'm gonnafeel great, or I'm not gonna do

(24:29):
it at all. One minute.A cold plunge is suddenly gonna it's gonna
it's gonna stint to your gain.So like you're suddenly not gonna you know,
you're not gonna develop and you're notgonna evolve. Well, that's funny,
Like hasn't happened to me, AndI've been doing it. I've owned
crowd therapy chambers. I've been doingcold therapy for twenty five years, Like
I don't maybe maybe maybe longer.So that's the part of the industry that's
bumming me out. What is somethingthat sticks out in your head since you've

(24:52):
started that you're saying to yourself,Oh, man, I you know,
I wish, you know, Iwish people would relax. I wish it
didn't go in this direction. Andthen I want to hear from the other
end, what are things that haveevolved for the better? Well, I
think that as a whole, andthis is something that actually we were together
in Edmonton when I was giving thistalk. It was about, you know,

(25:14):
just the identity crisis that sometimes Ithink that the personal training industry can
suffer from. At the end ofthe day, it's not too difficult to
learn enough ample information to get yourbody to a different level of fitness and
health. If you follow certain simpleinstructions and guidelines, you're probably going to
do more good than you are badfor yourself. Right, learn technique,

(25:37):
you learn how to eat decently,you learn how to consistent, and you
keep on doing the same things overand over again by repetition practice. Through
repetition, good things are going tohappen. So I almost feel like because
of the way that our industry mightbe viewed sometimes by people who aren't in
it, whether it could be consideredless academic, or it could be considered

(25:59):
less serious, or whatever it is, I feel like the general nature of
our industry might be to overcompensate bybeing overscienced about things. Now, there's
a really good place that they're there. That's that belongs for research and for
all kinds of things like that andstudies and journals and all that stuff,
and we need that stuff to keepin industry moving forward in the right ways.

(26:22):
But at the same time, itdoesn't mean that every jack and jail
personal trainer out there who's working withsimple clientele who don't need to advance information
or who would benefit the most fromthe least amount of that information, that
these people are going to require thatsort of thing. And that's the issue
of the identic crisis thing. Wetry to make ourselves sound a little bit

(26:44):
more scientific and more smart and allthat stuff than we really need to be,
and sometimes less is more. Sothat's that would definitely be my feedback
on what I've seen industry in thepast, like you know, decade and
change at least maybe even the entiretime will over the years to try to
claim a little bit more relevancy ortry to maintain a little bit more of

(27:06):
like an air of I don't know, not inferiority, I'll say that.
So that would be that that woulddefinitely be that side of things, And
you know, I struggle to evenarticulate that properly, but I hope that
that makes sense. That I dothink that its especially around you know,
a city like mine. It definitelyexists, and there's a trainer on every

(27:26):
street corner in the city like inmy city. So there's a whole lot
of people who think that giving aqueue like setting your shoulders back and pulling
the weight toward you with good formis not enough to teach for a seated
row. And you have to sayten million more things to get a client
to do it well, and findten million more things that are wrong.

(27:48):
And if somebody isn't sitting like this, but they're sitting like that, then
that's a problem. And on andon and on it can go. And
sometimes we don't need to split somany hairs, and there's there's a beauty
in that simplicity if we actually takeit seriously, and again, if we
focus more on soft skills and otherskills that aren't just technicalities of personal training
and biomechanics and all that stuff,then we'd probably be a lot better off

(28:11):
as a career personal trainer. That'sfor sure percent. I mean Derek.
The other day, a good buddyof mine came to me and his diet
is beautiful, and he said,what do I need to do with my
diet? And I've got a littlebit of experience getting people ready for contest
prep or getting ready for timing,timing wise from a nutritional standpoint, and

(28:32):
I said nothing. I said,your die, it's amazing. And he's
like, what's wrong? And I'mnot going to replete peak the language that
I use, but I said,your training is just it's become soft.
Like I saw you working out lowerbody, You're checking your emails. Your
intensity is probably a four out often. And I was like, these
are areas that people don't want totalk about everymore anymore. They want to

(28:52):
talk about the perfect exercise, theperfect way to measure macros, metabolic flexibility,
you know, using all these devices. At the end of the day,
it's okay. If you built upthat experience and you have that training
age underneath your belt, getting underneaththe bar and being a little nervous for
a set, I think it's ahealthy thing. And I don't know where
your opinion is on that. Iwould assume it's wherebindas Yeah, it's exactly

(29:15):
the same, it's exactly the same. Sometimes it's too much of a good
thing could be more harmful than good. And I think that once you start
splitting too many hairs focusing on stufflike what your exact VO two max is
or what timing this is, andwhat is the most perfect rep of the
most perfect set or the most perfectexercise. And you know, before we

(29:37):
even go any further, we haveto consider the fact that you can't blanket
one thing and say that this isthe best or the most stimulating exercise for
a person, because how many factorsare at play there. If we think
about, okay, the peck fly, the seated, the forty five degree
incline dumb bell peck fly is goingto be the best best way to stimulate

(30:00):
your chest through its range of motion. Okay, well, what's the training
age of the individual who's trying whoyou tell you trialed this out on number
two? What is the actual age, what's their flexibility levels and what's there?
What is their actual like ten atattachment point? Look like where is
it located on the humors? Whatare the leverages and that for palmtary of
the individuals and somebody with very longarms for a massive moment time where they're

(30:22):
doing that fly or some of thevery short arms where they're barely going to
feel anything when they're in a fullarm extension like that. There's a whole
lot of questions that you can askthat could influence whether or not a lift
or a movement, or a trainingprogram or a system is going to be
the most effective for them or not. And it's it's not that the exercises
should be contraindicated, but it's thepeople that should be contraindicated. We keep

(30:44):
that in mind, then we realizethat there's no bad exercise, that every
program has its own good that itcan provide, and a wicked program that
you see in a book or ina magazine or in an article or something
like that might not be the bestfit for you because of what your starting
point is, whether you're a beginner, what you're advanced. You know,
it's all fantastic information, but doesit fit you as an individual? And

(31:07):
that's where I think a lot ofpeople sort of get lost in the lost
in the woods there. Love it. Yeah, it was interesting, Like
I was telling down that one ofthe missing pieces in my own training was
I discovered because I we acquired adog. So guess what, I'm the
one who has to clean up afterthe dog, feed it, and walk

(31:30):
it. So I'm walking the dogfor seven days a week. I'll probably
do at least one to one anda half hours at and I'll try to
walk, you know, fast,so it's like a one ten to one
twenty beats per minute. But thatwas the piece that was missing, that
low intensity component, and so byaccident I figured out that, Wow,
now I sleep better, my bodycomposition is better, I'm not a stiff,

(31:52):
you know, I just feel bettergoing into other workouts. So it's
sometimes it's interesting finding this real boring, you know, element that I was
missing because I was trying to pushit in other areas. So do you
do you ever find stuff like thatwhere it's just this really basic stuff that
maybe somebody's missing. Yeah, onehundred percent. As you were saying that

(32:13):
stuff about low intense cardio work walking, I could relate my own personal workouts
as of today, Like as ofthe last literal two weeks, I've been
training in a certain way I've beendoing I was even pushing a heavy squat
just the other day. But Isaid, you know what I haven't done
in a while thinking about fitness,I haven't done a lot of muscular endurance
trading like I'd hit eight reps,my squat's in deadlis, I'd be doing

(32:36):
triples and stuff like that, andthen i'd be doing body weight workhouts and
whatnot. But when's the last timethat I did everything for a muscular endurance
multiple rep sets we're talking about ten, fifteen, twenty repetitions and so on.
Change my rest intervals up as well, And immediately since I've started doing
that for the last two weeks now, Number one, I've noticed that my

(32:57):
sleeps are better. Number two,I've noticed that my body is starting to
recomp just a little bit from thatchange in conglomerus with a good diet and
so on. And number three,I'm noticing that, you know, joint
pain, chronic pain, discomfort,all that stuff, my body is saying,
thanks for not having as much loadingon it all the time. So
I'm going to stick with it fora while. Feeling great and feeling really
good, able to train more frequently. Energy levels are on point, CNS

(33:21):
isn't getting destroyed by it every singletime as well, it's feeling fantastic.
So again, like you're saying,it's the little things. It's the smallest
tweaks that can make all of thedifference. You get a client who comes
in and, as you know,I'm hitting a plat toe with all these
gains and whatnot. I want toget this, I want to get that,
or deal with pain here, orwhatever the case may be. Say
okay, let's take a look atyour lips. You take a look at
their squad, your deadlift or whatever. It looks fantastic. Take a look

(33:44):
at their pull up looks fantastic.Okay, let's change that pull up into
a flex starm hang just hold that'sall. Let's change those squats into a
three second ecentric take away twenty fivepercent of the loading that you're lifting all
the time, and freeze at thebottom for a good two second count.
How does that feel world of differencefor them? All of a sudden they
bust through those plateaus. It couldbe things as simple as that that can

(34:04):
make all of the difference in theworld, all the change in the world
for a person. And yeah,it can be a massive, massive catalyst
to gains if we just think simple. Bret Bartholomew who said something that always
stuck with me, and he saidthat when he was making or looking at
programs and reviewing clients old programs,he doesn't look at what he can add
to it. He looks at whathe can take away from it to make
it more effective. And so Ialways liked that idea, using like a

(34:25):
law of subtraction to think about howmuch more can we remove simplify this to
make it more effective for a person. So I try to follow that too.
It's amazing how just the simplest changes, right adding in a pause,
changing up an ecentric or even aconcentric or even you know, increasing reps.
I mean you could keep the sameprogram and do something like that,

(34:46):
it changes the entire dynamic of it. It's amazing how you could just start
feeling better from such an easy,you know, such an easy adjustment that
took you time though to realize,isn't it because it's not a I think
there's certain things. I have alot of friends who are young coaches,
and they're just things you're going tolearn through trial and error, not through

(35:07):
reading books. There's things you're goingto learn through how your body feels,
hitting plateaus, and how you getyourself out of that. Do you feel
like age was a factor there?Do you feel like that? Because hell,
do you know, I'm thirty six. I'll be thirty seven next month.
And like it's a huge, hugepoint is that I always say that,
like, you gotta learn your body. You got to know your body.

(35:27):
And I always attributed to like acar type of thing, like when
you drive a brand new car.You know, I have a great time
driving that brand new car off thelot and whatnot. But there's certain things
that at least in personal experience,that you can't do with it just yet.
After you've been driving that thing everyday for like, you know,
a couple of good months, youcan parallel park it with your eyes closed.
You don't have to look over yourshoulders to do this kind of maneuver.
That kind of maneuver. You knowexactly how much gas you've got to

(35:51):
hit in order to get around thatother vehicle if you want to pass it,
et cetera, et cetera. Likeyou just learn your car. You
know how to manage through tight cornerswithout chipping it and whatnot, and the
same thing going and that just comeswith experience driving the vehicle right, and
then you know your vehicle so wellthat you can do things that people who
are in the passenger seeing like howdo you even just do that? So
the same thing goes for the bodyin terms of like learning the skill of

(36:15):
training intuitively and understanding a what worksfor your body and b what doesn't.
It comes with only one thing,and that is time spent under the iron
in the trench, is doing thething of working out and learning those movements
that are going to be the friendlyones to your body and the ones that
aren't. If you've had injuries orsome kind of setbacks, that can be
a great learning experience for that stuffas well, and it can go a

(36:37):
long way in teaching you what kindsof things are going to be friendly to
your body and what kind of thingsaren't. So that's a little bit of
a lemonade way of looking at injuriesor setbacks for sure, as a glass
half full way of taking advantage ofthose drawbacks that you've had or some sort
of stagnations in your training, becauseit can teach you a lot. It
can teach you a lot. AndI'll tell you, like, I don't

(36:58):
train myself the way that I didwhen I was twenty two. I don't
train clients the way that I didwhen I was twenty two, And I
wouldn't train a client who is fortyyears old the same way now then I
would have when I was twenty twoand I had a forty year old client,
I wouldn't train them the same way. A lot of things, you
know, start talking about body typesagain as well. You throw that factor

(37:19):
into the mix as well, andyou start seeing, Okay, I've got
a taller client, I got alonger legged client. I got a client
with a short torso I've got aclient with this that or the third small
hands. There are all kinds offactors there that can influence Okay, well,
how much rest, how much weightam I making them use? What
versions of this deadlift am I makingthem do? What is going to be
the tempo that I'm going to makethem lift that? How many sets of
this? And so on and soforth. It makes a huge difference.

(37:42):
What happens that the lifter is twohundred and seventy five pounds versus and in
shape versus a lifter who is onehundred and sixty pounds and in shape.
What's that going to mean? Forthis conditioning workout what do we have to
change here? Right? And theseare the things that again, like you
can't expect to know right out ofthe gate. But we're in one of
those unique industries where we get betterat doing this job through practicing doing this

(38:07):
job more than anything else can teachus, in my opinion. So I
tell a lot of young trainers andthe students that I teach at the college
and so on, that the mostinvaluable thing for you as a young trainer,
lift or whatever you want to callit, is hire a coach.
Hire a good one, learn fromthat through the experience of being the client,
and it could be a big gamechanger for you in the trajectory of

(38:30):
your career. No, that's somethingDerek, that I've been doing for twenty
five years, is that I youknow, whether I hired a coach in
the past, or I would workwith a coach that maybe had something to
offer that I wanted to learn from. And I always recommend a coach paying
another coach, I said, orat least if you have some type of
barter to work out something that theyneed specific, do it. Hands down,

(38:53):
do it, because even to thisday, my eyes are being open
to different approaches, you know,ways about going different ways that they would
go about things, and then you'realways kind of taking and implementing a little
bit of these these these tricks lead. It could also be something that you
know, maybe I saw you doingfifteen years ago and then suddenly you forget

(39:14):
about it because think about how manythings when you're like, holy shit,
i'n't done that in years, Likelike, I got to start re implementing
this, right, I mean,does that happen to you a lot?
It does, one hundred percent,and to the point of hiring coaches like,
yeah, I did. I've doneit multiple times over the course of
my career. Most recently I've beenworking with well, I haven't, I'm
not currently, but most recently Ihad been working with an isometrics only instructor

(39:37):
and an isometrics only coach. Andyou know, Brad Thorpe is a brilliant
you know, muscle activation techniques guy, and he's brilliant with things like what's
the name of the certification there,Resistance training Specialists, that's the name,
and so just talking about how musclesaffect mobility, how muscles create motion and

(39:59):
all that stuff and what are goingto be the actual ways to break down
a horse curve. This is isometrictraining to the max. Is the type
of stuff that he does and theamount of stuff that I've pulled from it
personally, and the amount of stuffthat I've pulled from it to use in
my clients, my workouts, myprogramming for online clients, and all kinds
of different methods. It's I teachit in school now too. It's just

(40:20):
it's fantastic information. And I attributeso much of my last let's say,
seven or eight years worth of knowledgethat I put out there to that experience
alone, to those experiences of workingwith that coach for the isometric stuff and
being able to collaborate with him,being able to sit down with him,
being able to hang out with him. You know, he's involved in the
NBA now, he's involved in thethe Toronto FC. He's got a lot

(40:45):
of different sports teams who are utilizinga lot of his methods. You know,
we got out to go last lastseason out to a Raptors game where
he was playing the cab They're playingthe Cavaliers and the Calves are using that
thing on the court as well,and it's like it's really cool to see
and so you know, the conversationswe can have is as byproduct of that.
It's it's fantastic and it definitely itreally helped me out a lot,

(41:06):
and it's again something that I highlyrecommend in terms of working with coaches and
how much you can learn from it. Yeah, I have a question for
both of you, and how dothings change as we go into December?
Is how you know you train somebodywinter, inclement weather, stress levels,
people wanting to take time off orvacation. How do you organize people's lives

(41:27):
around this time of year? Anddo you change much to make sure that
you are still getting you know,some effective workouts in and some consistency.
We'll leads the guests, So let'slet's fire it out him. Well.
Funny enough that this might not bethe answer that a lot of people expect
me to say, but I justmake myself more available than usual. To
be honest, I make myself moreavailable than usual. Rather than say,

(41:47):
you know what holiday season, Yeah, I guess what the offer holiday season
as well. I know that thingsare going to be a little bit fluctuating
in terms of people's availability. Somepeople might have more during certain weeks of
it. Some people might have less. Some people might want a little bit
more flexibility in the sense of,you know what, I got these holiday
events that I have to go toback to back to back, or I

(42:08):
have these parties, or I havea lot of business stuff that I've got
to do that's going to be crammedinto this spot. And then you know,
then I'm going to have a weekor it's free, or I'm going
to be on vacation from the twentyfourth until the third of January, so
it will be around. Can youramp this up before? Can you tell
me some stuff to do during?And then can I hit you right afterwards
as well? All those different scenariosthat have come up for me, and

(42:28):
I'm sure they've come up for youas well. And so in that vein,
I sort of try to make myselfa little bit more available, a
little bit more flexible, because therewill be almost guaranteed a slightly lower client
volume when you have the holidays rollaround, right, and so managing that
by making yourself a little bit moreavailable, and say, you know what,
most stuff is in time off inthe big pictures, So why not

(42:50):
just make myself available and it's goingto A it's going to be more possible
business, but B it's just goingto accommodate clients a little bit better,
show that you're there for them.Number two. And I mean, I
happen to love what I do,so it's not a problem for me to
do so. And that's the waythat I try to sort of get ahead
of things and be around as avoice of reason for people if they tend
to want to maybe overindulge a goala little bit too hard when it comes

(43:14):
to the holidays or fall off thewagon. Maybe even they go on that
vacation and then the New year hitsand they were ready to go at first,
but then once that all came throughand transpired, all of a sudden,
that new year's start gets pushed backto the second week, third week
of January. I hit a whirlwindof work and a storm of work when
I came back from holidays. Let'sstart in February. Like, those kinds

(43:35):
of things start to creep into thepicture. So usually absence can make that
sort of thing more of a realityfor people than not being absent and staying
consistent. So I try to makemyself say, you know, what guess
what this all. I'm working rightthrough. Don't worry. Yeah, okay,
you got Christmas Day, you gotBoxing Day. But otherwise I'll be
there between New Year's and Christmas andall that. I'm there, don't worry
about it. We can still getsome sessions in. Let me know what

(43:58):
you got. So that's the kindof approach so I like to take to
try to get ahead of things andfor lack of a better term, some
damage control where it needed, andit tends to work out pretty well.
Love. You know, it's funny. I was watching you guys watch that
Connor McGregor documentary yet called McGregor Forever. I don't if you don't seen it
yet, you know it was interesting. I mean, the last couple of
documentaries I watched between him and Beckham, it was It's amazing to me where

(44:22):
you see these world class athletes andwhat you don't realize because you know,
I was not a huge McGregor fan, and I wasn't a huge Beckham fan.
I just wasn't around those sports.But you don't realize the amount of
volatility that was in their life whenit came to their success and failures,
Like they would win and they wouldlose massively. They'd win, they'd break

(44:44):
you know, a foot, youknow, they'd win, they would get
caught cheating, whatever it was.It was always these these massive highs and
these massive lows that crushed, thatwould crush normal people. And McGregor said
something, I wrapped up the documentarylast night. He said something, and
I really I did it. Heended up losing a match years ago and
they were like, well, whatdo you think changed in your preparation for

(45:07):
this? And he's like, youknow, I started waking up in the
morning rather than being up at thistime. Maybe I'd hit the Smoot news
it was a half hour later,and I'd have to train at eleven and
maybe became one. I would stillget the stuff in. Most people would
say, what's the big deal,and You're still doing it right, But
he's like, it was the discipline. It was the fact that I was
giving in. It was that mentalit was that mental discipline of life.

(45:30):
I said I was going to dosomething, and then suddenly the time of
the day changes, and then yourmentality changes, he thought. I he
just got kind of soft and hegot loose, and it was something that
I was talking about a few minutesago with my buddy John Abococo here.
He was five hundred and twenty fivepounds about eighteen months ago, and he's
about to crack that four hundred poundmark. And I'm super proud of him.

(45:51):
But it's that discipline again, unableto walk forward to six hundred steps
a day. And I'm looking onhis calendar here and he has six thousand
on day one, over six thousandand day two, six thousand, day
three. He had over six grideach day for five days. And then
what happened? He dropped to thefour thousand mark and he dropped a four
thousand market. I'm like, ohmy god, we're so close to hitting
that pr why did you back off? And he went into the mental approach

(46:13):
on all this, and it's justit really is all of what we're doing
here. For me, it wasnever about this. It was always about
this, right. It was alwaysabout how can we get you to January
one? Not having to recreate allthese resolutions or set all these resolutions,
but waking up saying, wow,this is the best I've felt on in
January first and how however many yearsand that's what I really respected. What

(46:36):
McGregor said, and I don't thinkpeople realize sometimes that doing things like continually
hitting the snooze button, or doingthe things like not following through with a
plan, you could develop bad habits. All I'm really looking for out of
someone's consistency, Be consistent, doggit. I don't care show up and
down shift and go in third gear, but get it in if it's a
bad day. But be consistent.So I loved your answer what you gave.

(47:01):
You know, mind, I thinkit's a way, very very similar.
But in a way, you know, we're also talking about this,
yeah, one hundred percent, Andlike you said, the habit side of
things and building making sure that thingsare it's not it's not something that's worth
compromise. You can't compromise. Theseare the non negotiable aspects. And you

(47:22):
know, if you train at seveno'clock, then that's when you train every
single time. You know. Again, Andrew Coach says a lot of this
sort of thing as well, whereit's like there are a lot of things
and moving parts in somebody's life,but don't let training be one of them.
And he's a real disciple of thatthat that craft himself when he says
that, and I agree. Iagree. I'm somebody who likes to train
usually in the late mornings, andthat's the time that I tend to get

(47:45):
it in. I write out whateverit is that I have to do.
I try to get it in asconsistently as possible, and I do that.
I've been doing that for years,So it's it's really good habit to
get into, and it really facilitatesa lot more discipline, lot more games,
and a lot more mental fortitude anda lot of other things too that
can come along with it. Well, Derek, anything else to close out

(48:07):
with? Did you watch this TheLoone? Yeah? Yeah, what'd you
think of that? Oh? Man? Uh? I thought it was a
little redundant, right, it wasjust kind of you know, it just
you just felt like it was thesame story. I think these other two
documentaries I saw was interesting because everythingwas changing so much much. I know
Sly uses some pretty intense words,which, yeah, question or even in

(48:30):
the dictionary, but they'll listen.He's a rip and he's I think he's
a genius for what for the brand, and he's one of the only what
other actors do you know? Youknow created three different you know, what's
the word I'm looking for between RockyRambo and the expendables. Three different,
help me out there, Toronto blankYeah, they're like yeah trilogies or yeah,

(48:52):
yeah yeah, three different. Rob'snot helping me out he stallone was
created, three different, He createdthree different, created Rocky Insurances franchises.
God, thank you, thank you, my God. But I'll lead to

(49:14):
me a favorite. Can you leteveryone know where they can find you.
You got some programs launching right now. Talk about that for a second.
So email us is coming for sure, and right now. I got social
which is coach Lee Boyce across theboard. You got Twitter, I got
Facebook, I got Instagram, soyou can find me on those, especially
Instagram. I'm posting at least onceevery single day and it's been that way
for five years now, six yearsnow, every day without fail. Always

(49:37):
good fitness content on those and alsoleeboys dot com. That's my website.
Find archives of all of the articlesone thousand plus articles that I've written over
the years for different publications that canhelp with training. And if you want
to read more editorial content on thatblog. Right on the website, you'll
see a lot of stuff about fitnessfrom a social cultural perspective and whatnot and

(50:00):
some good thought provoking, counterintuitive takesthat are pretty unfiltered and they're pretty good
reads. So that's where you canfind me. And last but not least,
Strength Training for All body types.The book is a book that I
wrote with Melody showing filmed and thatis now available everywhere. You can catch
it on humankinetics dot com but morecommonly you cuch it on Amazon and that's

(50:20):
going to be for sale there.There are some promotions coming up for the
holidays for it as well. It'sdoing pretty well, so something that everybody
should read. It's got a lotof good technical information with the real mainstream
reach at the same time, soit's really beneficial to literally everybody trainer clients,
beginner, intermediate, advanced, socan't go wrong. Well, my
man, you are a real coach. You know, it's very few,

(50:44):
you know, we could say aboutvery few out there, and like you
said earlier, the Lucas and youknow there is a list of obviously boiled
the Godfather Strength and Conditioning and histeam he's put together, Charlie wine Groff,
you know, Jordan Shallow. There'sa group of us out there that
I feel like Derek kantson real coachesLead boys. You've been a real coach
for almost two decades already, socongrats on everything your success. We're in

(51:05):
your corner if you need anything,and we'll let you know what this live.
Appreciate it, Appreciate it all right, brother, great, Thank you
very much, thank you, thanks, thank you so much.

All Episodes

Episode 159 - Lee Boyce: Prioritizing Soft-Skills in Coaching & Education

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal

On Purpose with Jay Shetty

Dateline NBC

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Episode 159 - Lee Boyce: Prioritizing Soft-Skills in Coaching & Education