I hear this all the time from personal trainers and their clients..."we are going to make a personal training program just for you..."  The reality is there are only so many exercises in the book and many of them overlap in their usefulness.  I have been training for over 30 years and I still do a lot of the same exercises now as I did then.  Why you ask?  Because when I started training in the 70's we only had free weights.  We did have one of the very first Universal machines but it was very limited in its use and not very well accepted at the health club I belonged to which had lots of heavy power lifters and bodybuilders.  We were macho men, no women in here, they had their own training area where they did aerobics so they would not get "bulky".  I will save that silly comment for another post.  We performed basic fundamental Olympic and power style lifts, including deadlifts, bench presses, squats and overhead presses.  Yes, we even did curls and triceps work for the girls I guess, as it had no fundamental use...ok another future post.

Now I watch trainers put every client through the same old exercises that everyone else goes through, sit-ups and bench presses and curls and pull-downs... doesn't look like anybody is getting anything special and surely not customized.  The reality is there are fundamental movements that we must all do every day like pick things up, pull things, raise things over our heads, jump over things and climb things.  How many different exercises can you create to do and train for what is always a whole body movement?  The only way you can create so many exercises is to split the movement into its component parts, isolate each muscle and then work an exercise for each one.  No wonder it takes most people so long to work out.  Why not do one exercise that hits all these movements and muscles at one time?  Isn't that more efficient and isn't that how we use them in everyday life?  Why would we train for an environment that does not exist outside the gym?

Now, if everybody is doing the same thing, then how is anybody going to get a customized program just for them?  Well, in reality they don't, the trainers use the same programs over and over again just changing the exercises so you don't get bored, but I guarantee you everyone is bench pressing and curling...  The reality is we change the exercises by scaling the load (using different weight), using different exercises to hit the same muscle (handstand push-up vs. an overhead press), or change the speed at which you work.  All this translates into "Intensity" and it is your intensity levels that are individual to each and every one of you.  Are high intensity workouts right for everyone?  Probably not.  Are CrossFit workouts for everyone?  Yes, because they are scaled.  CrossFit methodologies see some of their best health results when they are performed at high intensity but they don't have to be.  They can be performed at any level of intensity through substitution of exercise, change in weight and speed of the movement as well as increasing or decreasing the number of breaks you take, the reps you do and the sets you complete.  It isn't CrossFit that anyone fears, it is the hard work which can be incorporated into any program, but is  most beneficial when combined with whole body functional movement patterns that we use in our CrossFit methodologies.

So next time you hear that a trainer is going to "customize" a routine just for you, run the other way.  If he tells you he is going to scale the exercises to match your capabilities then hang with him.  It may take several sessions to learn what your abilities and limitations are but with the right amount of adjustment and experimentation you and your trainer will get there quickly.