Coming from
this thread, since the topic of retention and adherence of men vs women is more for this thread.
mgil wrote: ↑Sun May 13, 2018 10:44 amYou do understand that you’re being hand wavy just like Rip?
No, because Rip doesn't keep data of his signups, their attendance or results. He may have done so in the past, I don't know, but honestly he doesn't strike me as the type, I'd be surprised if he ever did more than glance across people's journals. Plus he throws out people who annoy him; adherence and retention numbers don't mean much if treating it like a club rather than a profit-making business.
If the globogyms have metrics regarding attendance, that would be somewhat interesting. Do they track classes as well? My suspicion is that most of the folks go to the gym to do LISS cardio and fuck around. They aren’t “training” by the definition of Rip.
Correct. Class attendance is very big, and tracks well with overall retention. At one point at a place I worked, we had 150 signups a month. About 50 of those new people took the "free" (actually paid for by their joining fee) appointments to get them started. Originally we had a big spreadsheet where each trainer recorded "John Smith, 35yo accountant, wants to lose weight, has bad back, first appointment Jan 5th, programme showthrough Jan 8th, review March 1st" etc, and twice a year they'd go through and check and see who was still members. So if 85% of Jen's people are still members and 45% of Kyle's, well then maybe Jen has something to teach Kyle?
12 months later, 40 of the 100 who didn't do the appointments were still members, and 40 of those who did the appointments; in other words, just talking to a trainer once or twice doubled retention.
We gave them programme cards with space for 18 workouts, which went into a filing cabinet, they'd pull them out when it came to their workout and fill in what they'd done. Less than 1 in 3 cards had any entry beyond the first which the trainer had written down. Of those with more than one entry, only 1 in 3 had more than a simple tick, ie they'd just repeated what they did the first time, if they pressed an 8kg dumbbell the first time they did it the 18th time, as well.
It's possible that some of those who didn't fill in their cards did actually do the programme, or at least repeated their original workout - but the number couldn't have been great. I know this because for at least 3 of the 4.5 years I worked in globogyms (2010 July to 2014 Nov) there were certain exercises which only I prescribed - goblet squats, barbell squats, and overhead presses - no other trainer prescribed them, and nobody came in and did them on their own; the last 18 months people started copying a bit, and some ex-crossfitters etc came in. But for 3 of the 4.5yr, I could easily spot anyone I'd given a programme to. So really not many beyond that 1 in 3 complied.
I tried filling in every 6th workout for them so they'd at least go from 8, to 9 and then to 10kg, but I found then they filled them in
less than 1 in 3 times, ie adherence drops when you insist on progression.
So only about 1/3 of new members were given any programme, only 1/3 of them did the programme given more than once, and only 1/3 of them progressed the effort in any way. These are just rough numbers. Gender didn't make a difference to adherence, nor age, nor did certain programmes win out over others. Whether I tried all machines, all dumbbells, all barbells, or tried to adjust to my perception of the person's eagerness for challenge - it didn't make much difference, though there was a definite drop-off if it was all barbells, particularly the low-bar squat. 1-2 supervised sessions just wasn't enough for them to feel comfortable with it, vs 1-2 sessions learning the leg press or whatever.
We later moved to a computer system, which had lower participation than the card system. But it wasn't super-easy to use, people had to log in on a computer in the gym, which sometimes wasn't working, or someone else was waiting, etc. There was an "app", but it was just a link to a webpage.
When I went through the programme cards, and when we looked at the spreadsheets, and later the computer system, women had better adherence to gym workouts than men, and adherence led to retention - if you're following some sort of plan, you're more likely to still be a member in 12 months than if you're just doing random shit. But women were also overwhelmingly the people attending the group fitness classes. Some did
only the classes, but a fair number - I want to say it was 20%, but I don't recall exactly, it definitely wasn't over half nor under a tenth - did gym stuff, too. Between gym, classes and the swimming pool, the people with the best retention used 2/3 - almost nobody used 3/3, just not enough time I suppose.
But as you note, it wasn't
training - they just showed up and flapped around as the group instructor told them to.
So adherence at a globogym drops with barbells, and with insisting on progression. So once I'd given my notice I was leaving for my garage gym and said "fuck it" and gave everyone Starting Strength regardless of what they said, can you guess what happened?
In fact, at least 4 of the 24 I gave it to quit the gym entirely, 2 of them making a formal complaint for which I received an official warning from the manager (legally, you get two verbal and one written warnings, the second written warning they can dismiss you; most workplaces confirm the verbal warning in writing to cover their arses). Gainz did not result, alas.
Because those who weren't compliant with the programmes we gave them didn't record what they did - I literally never once in four years saw anyone with a workout journal unless it was a client of mine working out on their own - we can't say the exact numbers or LISS vs HIIT vs weights etc. But various studies have shown that, left unsupervised, most people will go at 40-55% of 1RM. When I got people working out on their own on treadmills or bikes to measure their heart rate, it was rarely above 120bpm, and commonly down under 100bpm, which wouldn't help them unless they were 70yo or something. There were however usually 1-2 people in there at any time who'd be doing some sort of interval training, the scariest was running at 12+km/hr on the treadmill, then hopping on the side and letting the thing keep spinning while they did their rest interval; we got a fall each week from them.
I’m glad you’ve tracked your data. That’s excellent. How well does this extrapolate to other black iron gyms? You mention PTC does well with men and consistency. That’s a confounding result.
Yes, as I said, I believe culture is a big part of it.
Point being, when small gyms are considered in the context of strength training, a lot of data is needed to figure out compliance metrics and remove biases like the gym owner and training environment before a general statement like “women are better at DTFP than men”.
The SS journals study did say that women had 21 weeks of entries on average vs 14 for the men. But it didn't mention
what they were doing.
ithryn wrote:wouldn't the women who go to a "black iron gym" be pretty narrowly self-selected and more likely to adhere?
Yes. But the same goes for the men. It's just space. Gyms tend to top out with a membership of 1 member per square metre (that's counting toilets, swimming pools and so on, too, everything except admin). People show up to a black iron gym more often than they show up to a globogym, which is still more than an unstaffed 24hr gym, but they use more gear and there are more instructors hanging around taking up space, too. Past that and you get the thing where you show up and can't find a free rack or treadmill or the class is already full, so you quit and go somewhere else. But there are not many 1,000m2 black iron gyms, the typical crossfit is 120-240m2. So a black iron gym just doesn't have many members. When you only need 100 people to fill the place, that it only appeals to 1% (or whatever) of the population doesn't matter.
In my place, I get roughly 50-50 enquiries from men and women. However, the men's enquiries are almost all through the website: someone googled "starting strength melbourne" and there we were. The women are mostly referrals, a current or former member tells them to come, so they do. Of those who enquire, about 2/3 show up and try it out; of those who show up and try it out, about 2/3 sign up. But the guys don't tend to last, and the women do.
The interest among women is out there. I think how you present yourself is key. My Sydney coach friend - Trent at PTC Sydney - who advised me to give the men their own individual programmes, rather than just 3 sets of 5, he had an issue with too much success competitively - he said the newbie women came in, saw "200kg" on the record board, and walked right out. Thomas Plummer said that if you have a guy who lose 150lbs,
don't use him in your advertising! It's too much, it's a whole person. Use the guy who lost 10lbs. So I said, yes, put up on your FB feed the woman who squatted 200kg - but also put in the guy who comes in on day one and you have to start him with dumbbell squats to a box, and 6 weeks later he's squatting 60kg.
He took my advice and said he made another $2,500 a month from that. I didn't get a commission, sadly. Reminds me of when I was in school and I helped other kids with their maths homework, and they ended up getting better marks than me on the test. Anyway...
Many black iron gyms advertise themselves using an obese bald guy with no neck, a goatee, screaming before he unracks 300kg from a monolift. Not many women will go to that place, still less older people, that demographic we discussed earlier in this thread. If you want everybody in your gym, then you have to show everybody there, not just the fat screaming bald guy bending the bar while Pantera plays. Compare the feeds of
Westminster S&C and
The Australian Strength Coach, and it's not hard to see why Bryant trains a lot of women and older folk, and Oreb doesn't.
I think women's appetite for effective training is left unsatisfied by much of what our culture offers them. Anyone who's trained women has known the experience of telling a woman to eat, telling her that yes, she can pull this weight - and it's like you've given them
permission to live. Most of that "empowerment" stuff is just words, this isn't. They respond to that. They go from worrying about the weight on the scales to the weight on the bar. Sure, it's a minority of women - but it's a minority of men, too. It's certainly enough to make a small business out of, if you do it right and don't chase them away with your advertising.
There's an old racist joke that, apart from the racist word, is also anti-racist. "How do you stop a n- from drowning? Take your foot off his neck." It's the same for many things, I think. Just stop holding the person down and they'll rise up. I had a colleague who used to do the gym intros for the young women, they'd try to book her in with them. I'd hear her in the next cubicle saying, "And I'll put some weights in your programme - don't worry, you won't bulk up!" Well, she wasn't worried... until now. Just put the weights in her programme, show her how to do it, and encourage her. Leave it up to her to accept or reject. Take your foot off her neck.
Women and older folk will come, all you have to do is not actively exclude them. So when you look at these gyms, you do see that they promote themselves in different ways. And so then their retention and adherence among various demographics make a bit more sense. Our experience is that if you do not actively exclude them, as many women as men will come, and the women will last longer in training. Older folk will come, too, but their adherence isn't great - they just have more shit to deal with in their lives and medically.