My Honest Thoughts on Group Exercise Classes

On this episode of Transformation Talks, I share my honest thoughts on group exercise classes: what they're good for, where they fall short, and my recommendation for most clients.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Welcome back to another episode of Transformation Talks. I'm your host, Sam Forger. And in today's episode, I'm going to give you my honest thoughts on group exercise classes because this is something that comes up all the time, especially with new clients, when I recommend a certain approach to training, which of course I'll break down in a moment. And they often respond with, okay, I know you recommend this, but what about this? And it's usually a class that they're doing that they want my thoughts on. And what I'm going to do for today's episode is actually give you a specific example of a question that a current client recently asked me. She broke down what her class looks like, asked me to give my thoughts. I'm not going to name the class that she's doing because I don't actually think it matters. That's not the point of this episode. I'm not trying to haul out or uh hone in on whether it's Barry's F 45, Orange Theory, you name it. I want to talk more general principles so you can make the best decision for you in terms of what your workout structure looks like in terms of how you spend your time exercising based on what you want to get out of your workouts. So I'm going to leave out the name of the class, not to be all mysterious, but just I don't think it matters. I don't think that's the point. This is more of a general principle conversation. So here's what she said. Hey, I wanted to give you an idea of what my workouts look like. This is what we did last night. Number one, squat to press. Two, push up to sumo squat row. Number three, RDLs. Number four, traditional rows, five, alternating lunges, six, push press sidebar here. Don't feel like you have to organize that in your head or remember that. It's not actually going to matter that much. Resuming. We performed three sets with a two-minute jog in between each set. All sets were max weight with breaks as needed. First round, 10 reps, then 20, then 30 reps. I did the first two rounds, no problem, but then went back to 10 reps for the third round. I know it's a different format than what you've prescribed, but I love the classes and I'm dripping sweat at the end, which I love as well. I've never had a problem with cardio, but have with weights. Let me know what you think when you have a chance. So the most important thing for us to distinguish here is that a class can be great for certain things and not so great for others. So if you ask me my thoughts on a specific workout class or honestly anything with fitness and nutrition, I'm pretty much always going to say, unless it's really dumb, I'm pretty much always going to say, it depends, which I know is an annoying answer at first, but then I'll say, well, what are you trying to get out of it? Give me a little bit more context here. So if she's telling me, hey, I'm doing a class like this because I love the structure, but I just enjoy the classes and I like breaking a sweat, great. You don't necessarily have to change anything. And generally speaking, I think these are some of the biggest benefits of any group X class. And I listed a few here. These are things that I really like from a group exercise class. The accountability and structure, like this client mentioned, she does a lot better when, okay, this is on the calendar. I'm going to show up. There's a clear structure for me to follow. You know, I just show up, I punch the clock, I work hard. Great. Energy and fun. Also, she mentioned that she really enjoys the workouts. That's hugely important for sustainability. And obviously, when you're in a group setting, whether it's the people around you, the instructor, the music, it can be really motivating. That's great. Cardio and endurance. Most classes obviously have a fair amount of exercises, tends to be higher rep, shorter rest periods. So depending on the overall structure, can be good for muscular endurance and cardio. And then I would say strength in the beginner stages, maybe early intermediate, but I would say generally speaking, strength in the beginner stages. So those are those are all the things that I think group X classes are great for. So if you say, hey, what do you think of this class? I would respond with, well, it depends. What are you trying to get out of it? And if you listed those things, great, keep doing them. But if you tell me that you want to get stronger and develop more muscle, classes like these are not very great. And of course, I'll break down why in a moment, as well as the changes that I would make to a workout like this to make it more effective for developing strength and muscle. Uh I lost my train of thought. I had a little sidebar there. Bear with me. Let me see if I can think of what I was about to say. Apparently not. So I'm going to keep things moving and perhaps it'll come back to me. But yes, it's great for a large variety of things. Developing, oh, here's what I was going to say. Developing strength and muscle. This is what most people who come to me say they want the most help with. Like, hey, I want to get stronger and I want to develop more muscle. Keeping in mind, if you don't say, hey, I want to put on muscle, but you say, hey, I want to look more toned, that is the same thing. Because to look more toned just means that you've developed muscle and that you've lost body fat. So even if you're not explicitly saying, hey, I want to develop more muscle, if you say, hey, I want to look more toned, I want to look more lean, more defined, more fit, that all comes down to developing muscle. So I think where in the past people have gotten confused, and perhaps this is my fault for not being clear enough about my stance on group X classes, is because I'm often, excuse me, try that again. I am often answering through the perspective of, well, this is what people tell me that they want. So this is why I wouldn't necessarily recommend, I want to say doing them all together, but making them your primary uh, you know, form of resistance training and doing nothing else outside of that. That does not mean I think they are bad. That does not mean I think they're ineffective. That again, it doesn't mean never do them. They're just not great for strength and muscle, which are the things directly or not that people tell me they want the most help with. So here's what I told this client as for what I would modify to make a workout like this more effective for developing strength and muscle. Keeping in mind, this includes you and your goals if you say I want to tone up. First, I said I would ditch the combination exercises, not a fan of those. So something like a squat to press. The reason why I don't like combination exercises is because you're always going to be hindered by whatever the weaker muscle is. So when she says squat to press, I'm assuming this is a dumbbell front squat to a dumbbell shoulder press or push press. So you have a dumbbell in your hands, I guess obviously, up by each shoulder, you hold them up there, you do a squat, and then you press up at the top. I'm gonna keep adding this caveat, perhaps. That does not mean I think this exercise is inherently bad. It's just not super effective for developing strength and muscle because I'll use myself as an example. If I'm just doing a say a dumbbell front squat, I might be able to hold, I don't know, I'm gonna be limited by what my shoulders can hold. So let me flip that a little bit. If I'm doing a dumbbell shoulder press, maybe I'm using, I don't know, 60 to 70 pounds. I'm just gonna throw out a number. My legs are significantly stronger than that. So either I'll have to use a weight that's heavy enough for my legs that I can't actually press with my shoulders, or I'm gonna have to use a weight that is inadequate to really challenge my legs. I mean, I might feel a bit of a burn, but not really approach failure, not really overload them because I'm gonna have to go lower to get a weight that my shoulders can actually press. So you're always taking away from one or the other. I feel like I should stop adding this caveat, caveat. Good for other goals, yes, but let's just assume that for the rest of this episode, I'm talking about for strength and muscle specifically. So combination exercises, uh, yeah, I would ditch them because you're always gonna be limited by whatever the weaker of those two exercises are. So it makes it far less effective for whatever the one is that you inevitably have to go lighter on. Another adjustment I would make way more sets within the 6 to 12 rep range. So obviously, in a lot of classes, you know, might be a structure like she describes where it's 10, 20, even 30 reps or time-based things, like, hey, you're gonna stay at this station for 60 seconds and just crank out as many reps as you can. The tricky part about that is the most important thing for developing muscle is what's called proximity to failure, where you go until just about to the point where you literally cannot do any more. So let's say a dumbbell shoulder press, just to keep keep with that example. Unless I want to develop more muscle in my shoulders, I had mentioned 60 pounds. I press, I press, I press. Maybe I get up to six, seven, eight reps. And when I get to eight, I feel like honestly, gun to my head, maybe, maybe I can do one to two more. Well, great. That is proximity to failure. And it's those last few reps right prior to failure that are the most effective for developing muscle. So the reason why I recommend, I mean a variety of reasons, but the primary reason I recommend more lower rep sets is because it's far easier to gauge proximity to failure. When you're cranking out 15, 20 reps when you're moving at a very fast pace, two things can be simultaneously true. One, that it was wicked hard. Like it was a really hard set. It left you gas. But also, maybe you could have done four to five more plus reps if the timer hadn't gone off. Um, you know, if it was, if you didn't hit some arbitrary rep total of 10, 15, 10's actually a good spot to be, but say 15, 20, 25 reps. So two things can be true. It's a hard set that crushes you, but also you're not consistently training close enough to failure because it's tough to gauge when you get up to 20 reps. You know, 22 to 26, it all gets pretty hard at that point. So it's far easier to gauge proximity to failure when you bring the rep range down. And then also you tend to recover a bit better. If I'm training with a proximity to failure at 10 reps, I can reasonably recover from that. If I'm trying to approach failure at 15 to 20 plus reps on a lot of stuff, like it's those last couple of reps before failure that can develop muscle well. It's true at any rep range, but I had to do a lot to get there. So it will be more difficult for me to recover and perform well either on my next set or perhaps even during my next workout. So that's why the second adjustment I would make to make your workout more effective for developing strength and muscle would be dropping the rep ranges and doing a lot of work between six to 12 reps. I do want to reiterate that you can build muscle in any rep range. It just comes down to proximity to failure and accumulating these really effective reps. Uh, but six to 12 tends to be, you know, a sweet spot for people because if you if you go really low, um, I don't want to say it's inherently like a safety issue, you might get hurt, but you know, that's a different skill to be doing a heavy double or a heavy triple. Most people can manage six to twelve reasonably well. And then, like I said, when you get really high, you're looking at a much harder time, gauging that proximity to failure and then recovery issues as well. The next adjustment that I told her I'd make is completely resting between sets, which is obviously very at odds with most group X class structure, where kind of the whole thing is we're gonna keep you moving. For the most part, we're gonna keep you moving, whether it's jogging between sets, whether it's moving to the next station, whether it's a short rest period, and then some uh some horn, some buzzer goes off. Okay, got to get into the next set. This is why those types of workouts can be effective for cardio and endurance, but for strength and muscle, you want to make sure you are adequate adequately recovered to produce as much force as possible on the next set. So let me actually scroll up to something she said, and I think this will be a really important distinction, an important thing for people to keep in mind. She mentioned all sets were max weight, which I have no doubt is true. Of course, she's telling me I lifted the most amount of weight that I could lift for each set, which is great. But also, if she completely rests, I would say a bare minimum of 60 to 90 seconds, but ideally two plus minutes on the bigger, heavier stuff. If she completely rests, then the max weight that she's using will be higher. She will be able to produce more force, which is great for developing strength and muscle. So again, it can be true that you're lifting as much weight as you possibly can. For sure, that's great, but you'll be able to lift more weight and be able to do that weight for more reps if you're actually resting between sets. I would actually say this is one of the ironic parts about what an effective workout for strength and muscle and transformation really looks like, is that it won't necessarily feel as productive as something that is less effective, like a group X class where you keep things moving, you're breaking a sweat, you're out of breath, you feel like I did some stuff today. Like that was productive, yes, for a bunch of things that aren't really developing more strength and muscle. Whereas a strength and muscle focused workout, you're doing a set and you are just sitting tight. Maybe you're adding a mobility drill between sets, maybe you're doing a superset with a, you know, a different muscle group that's not going to really hinder performance. Sure. But as a whole, like you have a lot more idle time. I always think about this almost like, you know, video games, arcade games as a kid where you have like a turbo boost or a nitro boost. And you you hit that button, the car that you're driving goes, takes off. And then you run out of that turbo, that nitro. And even though you can still technically keep driving, i.e., move to the next station, whatever the next exercise is, you'll drive faster. The car will perform better if you give it a moment for that turbo, that nitro boost to kind of recharge a little bit. It's the same thing with strength training. Yeah, you can keep things moving, but you'll perform better if you allow that to fill back up, and then you have another burst like that. And then the last adjustment that I recommended, uh, which I pretty much never maybe she's doing this. So again, this is generally speaking, and I almost never see this with group X classes, would be all your weights and reps cracked. Not in your head. That is not a thing. Oh, I remember what I did last time. No, you don't. I say that with love because I want you to get the best results possible. You may remember, like, I think I grabbed the tens last time. But if you're training the way that I'm describing, where you're ditching combination, combination exercises, you're doing a lot more close to failure sets in the six to 12 rep range, you're doing adequate rest periods, your workout might look like dumbbell shoulder press. Again, I'll just I'll continue using myself as an example. 60 pounds for 11 reps. I rested two minutes, maybe I 60 by nine, and then maybe I get really tired in the third set and I did 60 by seven. I'm probably not going to remember that a week later when I go back to try to beat whatever I did the previous week, which is crucial for developing strength and muscle. That's what's called progressive overload. I might remember that I used a 60. I might remember that I got somewhere like 11 to 12 on the first rep. But as you get stronger, the jumps that you take week to week get smaller and they're just impossible to remember. And that's even with one exercise. Picture if you do, you know, even two, three days a week, five, six exercises per session, you're not remembering all those sets. And, you know, we can pull from a variety of expressions here. If you're not uh assessing, you're guessing. Random workouts produce random results. What gets measured gets managed. Whatever cliche we want to pull, it drives the point home that you need to be actually tracking that stuff to ensure that you are doing tangibly more over time. Your weights or reps are going up. You need to give your body something to respond to. That's that progressive overload to develop more strength and muscle. And again, just the nature of classes, you're you're not doing this. You're not, you know, pulling out your phone almost always. You're not pulling out your phone between sets and jotting down what you just did because you probably have to get to the next station or just keep things moving to whatever the next exercise is, you know, whatever the flow. Maybe you're breaking out into a jog. I see this at my gym all the time. As I get three to four blocks from my gym, I see people running around the street. And I know that they're in between stations or like mid-circuit and whatever the class is at my gym. So it just doesn't really lend itself to you actually tracking each of your sets and trying to beat them over time. I want to circle back to something I said at the beginning of the episode. Me mentioning all of the changes that I would make to your typical group X class does not mean that I think group exercise classes are bad or that you shouldn't do them. These are just the changes I would make. If you're telling me, hey, I want to get stronger, and you're beyond the very early kind of beginner stages where anything works. I want to get stronger and I want to, whether it is, build more muscle, get more toned. Um, I mean, we have also the whole topic of um aging well, where it's crucial that you're maintaining muscle as you age. Like that's a whole rabbit hole in itself. Um, but again, I'm just honing in on what people typically ask me about the most, which is what are your thoughts on this group X class? To which I'll say, well, what are you trying to get out of it? And if the answer is accountability and structure, the energy and fun, cardio, endurance, strength to a very limited degree, then I would say most group X classes can be great for that. And also, obviously, I'm a fan of whatever gets people moving. If people are doing nothing and a class is what gets them to move, great. I just want to make sure, if you're telling me I want to develop strength and muscle, how many times can I say that in an episode? That you're also doing what's highest yields where you're gonna get the biggest bang for your buck. So that's why sometimes I like all movement is good movement. Yes, I feel very strongly about that, but sometimes a little bit mixed as well. Because if you have somebody who is struggling to be consistent, yes, I want them to do whatever gets them moving, but I also want to make sure they see a return on their time and effort investment. And if the goal is strengthen muscle, then you won't see a huge return on classes like this, at least not for long. Once you get past those beginner stages, you'll see a bunch of other benefits, but stronger, getting stronger, developing muscle, they tend to be pretty limited. So I do hope that I answered this question with enough nuance that your takeaway from this episode is not Sam doesn't like group exercise classes, which is something I've heard many times over my now 14-year career. That is not the case at all. I just don't love them for what they're typically marketed as or marketed for. And awesome train of thought. Second time in one episode. I always want to take these, and you can tell I'm committed to that. I don't love them for what they're typically marketed for, or here it is, second comeback, or for what people tell me that they want as their top priority. But if you want to do group exercise, excuse me, group exercise classes for these other things, wonderful. Dust settled, what do I like for most people? Well, the vast majority of people that I work with say very similar things to what this client mentioned. So I love the classes, I'm dripping sweat, which I love as well. Um, you know, she enjoys the energy, they're fun, they hit the structure helps. Wonderful. Okay, so what I would recommend, if this sounds like you too, if these are the things that you like and you understand what you're getting out of the classes, which is often not what they're marketed for. Um, or yeah, it's often not what they're marketed, then I would say a good mix would be a bare minimum of two full body strength sessions per week that are structured like I'm describing. No combination exercises, a lot of sets within the six to 12 rep range, adequate rest between sets, and all weights and reps tracked and beaten as often as possible. Ooh, one thing I wish I mentioned in there is also like not changing the structure for a bare minimum of six weeks. Obviously, a lot of group X classes, you walk in and it's like, what are we doing today? And you're mixing it up all the time. Doesn't give you the opportunity to really get better at anything or overload anything. So I'm gonna add that as kind of a bonus one at the end of okay, I would say no combination exercises. You do maybe uh two full body sessions a week, four to six exercises per workout that you do not change for a minimum of six weeks. So you actually have a runway to get better at the exercises and get something out of the program. Uh, six to twelve rep range, uh, yeah, adequate rest periods between sets, and you're tracking every set, beating them as often as possible. Even those two sessions, which could take you 30, 40 minutes. You don't have to live in the gym to do that. 30, 40 minutes, that can be more than enough for most people's strength and muscle goals. And then what you can do is Supplement that with say one to two other classes per week that you enjoy for all the other reasons that I mentioned, for all the other benefits that they have to offer. I love that as a sweet spot for most people, especially because when it comes to the strength training style that I'm describing, that is most effective for developing strength and muscle. There's a point of diminishing returns where adding a third, I mean, a third workout is certainly additionally beneficial. But then when you get to like a fourth or fifth, things level off very, very quickly. So I'd rather have you do, say, minimum effective dose around those, uh, that two per week mark and then supplement it with things that perhaps you find more enjoyable, that feel more sustainable. That way we have a mix of things that allow you to stay consistent and get the best results possible. Now, if you would like an example of what this two-day split looks like. So here I am saying, hey, yeah, keep up with your classes. Just make sure you know what you're getting out of them and not getting out of them. And also supplement it with some more strength and muscle focus workouts. If you want an example of what that looks like, just head to the show notes. I'm going to include a link to a free training template that I give away. It's called the BDB program, which just stands for bench and dumbbells only. I created it for a variety of reasons. One, I wanted a purposefully minimalist program for people who like don't want to be training, say, three, four, five days a week, or just don't have the time to do that. Bench and dumbbells only. So you could do it at the gym or you could do it at home with a very basic setup. It's great for travel. The average hotel gym obviously isn't particularly stocked. Maybe you're staying with a family member who only has a bench and dumbbells. I like it for gym timidation. You may have heard me talk about that on the last episode before this with Michael Soros, where we really like simple stationary workouts that don't require you to bounce around and grab every piece of um equipment in the gym. So two days per week, it's a phenomenal program because it checks a lot of boxes, a lot of different kinds of use cases. So just head to the show notes. You'll be able to enter your email and you'll get that straight to your inbox. Like I said, it's completely free. The BDB workout program. And uh it's basically exactly what I recommended to this client. Hey, do something like this, at least one, but ideally two days per week. And then you could take one to two classes outside of that. And that is a really good place for a lot of people to be. Very last thing I'll say before I wrap up this episode. Um, I do hope, again, that your takeaway is not that I don't like group exercise classes, they just don't do what they're often marketed to do, and they often don't match outcome-wise what people tell me they want the most. So I think it's really important to get clear on exactly what you're getting and not getting out of these. And if you're telling me, uh Sam, I want to get stronger, I want to develop muscle, I want to look more tone, I want to, you know, you know, maintain muscle for longevity, for long-term metabolic health, for quality of life, all these things, then they're pretty much never going to cut it. You got to supplement it with something else. So I do hope you find this episode or did find this episode helpful for understanding exactly what those changes need to be. And if you have any questions at all on anything that I went over, as always, my inbox is open. I encourage you to reach out. My email is mail at samforger.com. So you can ask me any questions you want about the BDB workout program, about the specific Rubeck classes that you are doing, literally anything else. You just let me know and I will get you taken care of.