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Primal Foundations Podcast
Welcome to the Primal Foundations Podcast! We will dive into what I believe are the 4 essential foundations you need to live a healthy lifestyle.
Strength , Nutrition , Movement , and Recovery.
Get ready to dive into discussions that will guide you on your transformative journey to unlocking your path to optimal health.
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Primal Foundations Podcast
Episode 53: Strength as a Skill with Michael Kurkowski
What if the key to lasting fitness success isn’t found in the latest workout trend, but in understanding your identity? In this episode, Michael Kurkowski—strength coach with 15 years of experience and host of The Strength Connection podcast—shares powerful insights into the psychology behind sustainable progress. After a hip injury as a teenager led him down a path of rehabilitation and movement quality, Michael discovered the transformative power of proper assessment and mindset work. He explains how the pandemic revealed a widespread struggle with autonomy in training and how true change stems not just from tactics, but from a deep belief in one’s ability to grow. Through stories of elite athletes, the power of fundamentals, and his own evolution from structured training to earned autonomy, Michael offers practical wisdom for coaches and everyday fitness enthusiasts alike. This conversation dives deep into building confidence through mastery, creating habits that stick, and connecting physical strength to every other part of life.
Connect with Michael:
The ONE Day Strength Challenge
Strength Connection Podcast (Apple)
Strength Connection Podcast (Spotify)
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On today's episode of the Primal Foundations podcast, I'm joined with Michael Krakowski, strength coach, educator, host of the Strength Connection podcast. With over 15 years of strength and conditioning and training, michael has trained elite athletes, everyday adults and even kettlebell instructors. Michael is on a mission to help everybody connect to strength on a deeper level. Michael, welcome to Primal Foundation's podcast.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much. Tony Really appreciate being here. I'm pumped.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm excited. I told you off air. You know I love your podcast, your Instagram. You put a lot of content out there and for some of the people that don't know you and haven't connected with you yet, you know, can you share, kind of to start us out of, like, how you got into fitness and athletics in the beginning and what inspired you to pursue a path as a strength coach and an entrepreneur?
Speaker 2:Sure, you know, I think, like like most people who get into you know, personal training or fitness or so, had an athletic background, played baseball and basketball growing up. My dad was a fantastic athlete and you know baseball was kind of my first love, uh, that I got into. But like a lot of coaches, I was a good athlete Um, not like great, um, not mediocre, kind of like in that middle zone. So for me to really compete at the highest level, I knew at an early age that practice was so important. I actually kind of enjoyed practice more so than the games, because I just inherently knew that like that was where you could tweak things and kind of really work on technique or form. So I always kind of had a love for the process of getting better.
Speaker 2:Things shifted a bit. I've told this story a few different times but at 14 years old a lot of things changed for me where I had a it's called a slipped epithesis, where essentially my femur slipped out of my growth plate and I had to have emergency surgery on that day when I found out. So before then it kind of the symptoms kind of feels like a bad groin pull. I thought I just pulled something and so I was kind of going through basketball season just trying to stretch it out, but it never got better. So finally my parents brought me to an orthopedic saying, you know, maybe something's going on, and he saw it immediately and I had to have surgery that day because the big risk of that is for the femur to completely slip out. And then there's a lot of you know issues that could come up from that. But what was challenging about that was that kept me off my feet for over like a year and a half. So I went from athletics, which not only was something I love to do, but all my friend group was a part of sports as well. So they all went on and continuously played sports while I was sidelined for a bit, so kind of was a loner for um, you know, a bit throughout my life.
Speaker 2:But then in my early 20s I just had this itch of seeing if I could fulfill that lifelong dream of playing professional baseball and wanted to. You know I knew I had to get in really good shape and that's when I kind of fell in love with the gym and getting into fitness. Kind of very, you know, grassroots, just beat the crap out of your body. Type training, you know, like when you're 20, you're made of rubber and magic, so you can just beat the crap out of your body as much as possible. So I did that for a bit. Moved down to Florida. That didn't pan out. Moved back up to where I am in upstate New York, and during that time I was just working at a restaurant. But a friend of mine who worked there was also a personal trainer and I was kind of just looking to get back into shape.
Speaker 2:I had a trainer before when I lived in Boston and so I met with him and he introduced me to the FMS system and functional movement from Gray Cook and Lee Burton and he put me through a functional movement screen. So, going back to when I was 14 years old, what I didn't realize, as throughout that whole time I developed so many asymmetries and compensations in my movement. So when he did a screen with me, I realized how out of balance I was, and so he was kind of showing me the you know what was going on in my body. And then we started to do some corrective exercises to get my body back in balance. And what I realized, Tony, is I felt amazing, like felt so strong, so energized but didn't even realize that I didn't feel well before that until it was actually corrected. So that's when I really kind of fell in love with understanding what the body is capable of. I knew there was a lot more that was going on than just this meat suit that we walk around with.
Speaker 2:So a little ways down the road my trainer, who ended up being the manager of that club, just asked me like, hey, do you ever think about getting into personal training? I think you could be really good at it. And I was like well, how does it work? What do you need to do? And he told me about some certifications to do. And I was like, you know, might as well give this a shot. And got like a NASM certification. And immediately, as soon as I got on, just fell in love with it. I always liked, I always knew I was going to work with people. I like talking to people and, you know, seeing how I could help them. So it just was, I kind of just found my niche at that time. And then, you know, just a year or so down the road was very fortuitous is Brett Jones came to my gym and did an FMS workshop where he was a master RKC at the time with Pavel Tatsulin, with hard style kettlebell training, and I had a fascination for you know kettlebell, the you know the kettlebell training, and I had a fascination for the kettlebell. The kettlebell world was chewing his ear off over that weekend and decided to go into the original RKC with Pavel in April of 2010.
Speaker 2:So 15 years ago, and since that time, that school of strength and that methodology has been something that I've been working on aiming to master throughout that time.
Speaker 2:So went from there, managed a throughout that time. So went from there, managed a club for 10 years. Then me and my former partner had a small kettlebell studio in my area. Then a lot of things changed around COVID when we were locked down at that time and we couldn't be in person with people, and that's when I really started to look at the psychology of success and really where the mindset and mental performance side needed to be a part of the physical side of training and planning. And so about three and a half years ago is when I opened up my own business called Breakthrough Secrets, where I work with individuals who are I call it like the advanced beginner stage, where they've seen some success, They've maybe got through like the beginning stages of making positive changes in their life, but now they're at that kind of tough spot where the early things that they are doing aren't working as well anymore and they're trying to find, like, what's that next progression to go into. So that's really the demographic and the people that I really aim to work on with now.
Speaker 1:That's amazing time and I got over it and they end up kind of going into that profession as well. And same thing with people that fall into this. You know strength training world of wanting to get better, wanting to get stronger, wanting to build a really good foundation. Maybe if it's a performance thing, maybe it's just a lifestyle thing, but what a what a journey. I mean that's crazy from from. You know an injury in sports. Now you're an entrepreneur, you got your own business. And one thing that you said that I want to talk about too is with those clients that have some success there. They want to get in shape or whatever it's performance, but they have trouble sticking to their goals. Can you kind of talk about people that you know might be self-sabotaging themselves when it comes to goals?
Speaker 2:that you know might be self-sabotaging themselves when it comes to goals. Yeah, a lot of avenues that we can go down in that route right there. So where it started for me, where I was looking at it differently, was during that time of COVID. I'll just kind of paint the picture of where I was at at that time is you know me and my team. We had a small studio, but we were super successful. We were bursting out of the seams. We had like 150 members in a thousand square foot space and we're actually expanding. At that time there was a space next door to us that we were knocking down the wall on and we were expanding out. We signed that agreement to do that a week before the COVID lockdown happened, in March of 2020. So not exactly the best time to be expanding and building out of space at that time, but I was at such like an optimistic viewpoint at that time because things were going so well. I was like, all right, like we were very forward thinking. We took our entire system of training. We went in like the weekend before and recorded all of our classes that we were doing and put them right online. So as soon as we were locked down, we immediately popped this thing up and people could keep, you know, going forward with their programming.
Speaker 2:For a short period of time people were doing very well, but then we started to slowly see people like not getting into the workouts. We were doing live streams. They weren't showing up, kind of like their spirits were down and I was kind of in that moment of like, well, we still are offering everything. It's not in person, but you know it's still available. Why are so many people now falling off? And as we were calling people up during this time, how's your spirits Just trying to keep connected with everybody? There was an answer that I got pretty regularly. That kind of shocked me, where people said I don't feel like I know what I'm doing if you're not there, and I was like all right, that's kind of curious, that's interesting.
Speaker 2:And I started to explore that a little bit more and what I realized is, as coaches, I think, and even as clients, we get in this habit early on of like telling you exactly what to do when you're following our plan and our you know our system, but as soon as you remove the coach out of the equation and now you're following our plan and our system, but as soon as you remove the coach out of the equation and now you're there to fend for yourself, you feel like you have no idea what to do because you've been following orders really well. So we're very good soldiers, but actually being autonomous with our health, that was really getting lost. So as much as we were trying to help people, I think we were subconsciously enabling people at the same time. And then I was having conversations with some of my other friends who were in the business and they were having the same things that was going on with their clients.
Speaker 2:So that's when I started to look at the psychology of success, like what makes some people succeed in the long term versus so many people are in this yo-yo cycle of succeeding for three to six months and then falling off for a year and then going back, and it's this endless loop of success versus failure and what I think what it comes is. Number one is its identity. You know, if you don't believe that you're capable of change, that inner voice is very powerful. It is going to self-sabotage you back into what you believe you deserve. So if you look at it with weight loss, like if you don't believe that you're that healthy person and that capable person. Eventually you're going to get to a sense where you're going to start self-sabotaging yourself and that's why so many people go back to the weight that they were at before. It's not a change in tactics or strategies, it's more of who do you believe that you really are underneath the surface. So that's why I think there's time for structure, like following, like a set plan. But then there's also an avenue where you need to start being a little bit more open with it.
Speaker 2:I like the intuitive training type style and I think that is the phase that we don't often get to and we don't market a lot in fitness because it's very sexy to talk about. You know, from the ground, you know getting to the first steps. That's a very easy sell for a lot of people. But what happens after the initial honeymoon period? You know, comes in and life starts to get in the way, life starts playing defense at you. That's when you really try and see where consistency lies, where your resolve is and where your resilience is. So that's where it's, in that kind of middle zone of the journey, where I think so many people start to fall off because the feeling, the nuance of it from the beginning steps starts to fade away and then you either chase, you start to program hop and try and chase that high of the new program over and over again, versus just staying the course and just sometimes aggressively maintaining where you're at or just making those incremental steps going forward.
Speaker 1:That's so interesting Because when you, when you, when you talk about the intuitive training, when you talk to a trainer right, and more more than likely a trainer is not on a program yeah, you're like what, what's your uh splits, what's this, what's that? I don't know. I just go to the gym and I lift heavy or I lift till I feel good, or I'll do. You know, I'm going to do some deadlifts here, whatever, but there's literally no like prescription for the day Most of the time because you're going to do some deadlifts here, whatever, but there's literally no like prescription for the day Most of the time because you're going to get in where you fit in. I got 30 minutes. What can I get done in 30 kind of deal? Can you talk about in, like what it means to train intuitively? And I also look at this as an eating as well. You know there's people that track everything and then, when they don't have the numbers right, they have to kind of, like you said, fend for yourself.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love you brought this up. It's one of my favorite topics to talk about because I made every mistake in the book with trying to teach people intuitive training from the jump. So you know intuition. I think it's a. It's a very fun buzzword to say around like trust your intuition, know thyself right. Know thyself is a skill, just like everything.
Speaker 2:Intuition is a skill that you need to build up. So in order to get there, it's not the first phase that you need to go down to. So if you take a lot of trainers, if you've been training for years, you've built that those early stages of consistency and of pattern. It's now just a part of your lifestyle. You identify with a healthy person or somebody who trains on a regular basis. Yeah, an intuitive approach might be very good for you, but if somebody's first learning and just getting into the stages, that's where structure really needs to come into play.
Speaker 2:And I made this mistake is when I first began my business that I do now. I was in a zone myself of very intuitive training. I was doing, you know, working with Brett Jones with an iron cardio based protocol. You know we were doing that for a while where, at the beginnings of a brand new business. You've got a lot on your plate and a lot on your mind to get things off the ground. And I was like I don't have the bandwidth right now or really the even like the motivation or desire to follow like a strict, you know, progressive overload type program. So that's when I went into like, all right, what do I feel like doing today? All right, I'm going to play around with some different movements. And I was still making progress. I was like, oh my God, I feel like I, you know, found this golden treasure. You know, at the end of a rainbow here I'm like I'm going to teach this to everybody. Then I started really promoting a lot of like this intuitive training.
Speaker 2:The challenge was is, when I was getting in with people who were at those early stages and getting into an intuitive approach, they were so overwhelmed and so freaked out about that because they don't have that intuitive muscle that's built up yet. So that's why I think having at the first phase of getting into something and a phase I think is six months to a year of consistency, yeah, that's a good time where you should be following a pretty set program. You know, it doesn't need to be like stripped down, like exactly five days a week or whatever. There could be some wiggle room in there, but you need to kind of just get your reps in and just follow that. And if you ever read the book Mastery by Robert Greene, if you haven't, it's a phenomenal book.
Speaker 2:He goes into the three phases of mastery. The first phase he calls apprenticeship, which is shut your mouth and get your work done, where it's like follow your master from there. He uses examples like Mozart and stuff like that. You first need to just build up your reps of just knowing this inside and out. But then you get to the second phase, which is the creative, active phase, and this is where you take all of the knowledge that you've built up and and now you start to you know, make it your own, you start to play around with different things. So it's like learn the rules so you can break them down the road.
Speaker 2:That's, I think, where, like, intuition comes into With nutrition. I think it's. It's a great concept, but personally I think it's a very small percentage of people that do really well with an intuitive eating type structure, at least at the beginning steps. You need to learn the foundational principles and the knowledge and the wisdom down first and then you can kind of talk about intuition. So I think it's a great thing to do and it's a great skill to work with. And if you are kind of looking at this on a 1% better every day and really build like a mastery type process of getting a little bit better each day, intuition is going to come into play. But be very wary about jumping into it early on. Before you build that muscle of patience and consistency down first.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you get. It kind of depends on the person too, whether they're proficient in the gym or not, or know their macros, or you know, or have the MyFitnessPal and they've kind of mastered that a little bit. But there's just sometimes people that also I get in the gym all the time. I'm like, hey, you know, we're doing some warmup rounds, some mobility, like two to three rounds, you know 10 minutes, if you can kind of just kind of loose. Well, is it two or is it three? I'm like two, two to three.
Speaker 1:They're like I need to know, because I need to manage the client, I need to know you have to tell me. And I'm like, okay, make it three. Like, well, you go three and you get just tell me what to do, I don't want to make a decision today, I will do that. And I was like, okay, fine, that's all good. And then some people like the autonomy. They can move at their own pace, they don't want to be bound down by a clock. And I find sometimes those things work. I usually try to give ranges for people, but sometimes they're like is it two, is it five?
Speaker 2:Well, you need to wave in between both of those. Right. It's like, I mean, there's times where it's you know, we call it uh. I use an analogy of the highway, um, where it's like there's the left lane, the right lane in the middle lane. So if you think of a highway in a plan, your middle lane is like your set plan. This is what I have set for the day or for the week.
Speaker 2:The left lane, that's the speed lane. That's where you're going a little bit faster. Maybe you've got more energy or maybe you've got more open time for this week. So we're going to try and make a little bit more progress. That might be increasing your volume this week or putting a little bit more you know attention into the mental performance work that you're doing. But then there's the right lane no-transcript. We're trying to really push your progress right now because we've got an open window. But then there's other times of the year where we're going to ease off the gas pedal. We're going to go into the right lane and maybe we're spotlighting one or two things, but not everything all at once. But you're still making progress, going forward.
Speaker 1:I love that. I love that Making progress. Even if it's a little slower, you're still. You're still moving, which is which is what we want. You know it doesn't have to be, you know, going 95 every day. You know you're going to burn out, you're going to burn out 100%, exactly.
Speaker 1:You kind of talked about building like the importance of like foundations. When, like the importance of like foundations when it comes to strength training, you know we get you get some of these misconceptions about. You know chasing performance and chasing aesthetics, right, can you kind of talk about you know the importance of building a foundation and the proper ways to kind of transition into if aesthetic is what you're looking for or performance is what you're looking?
Speaker 2:for you know, I think you know the Dan John like. You know, big five protocol, I think, is always a great way to start. You know, if you're getting a push, pull, hinge, squat and a loaded carrier, a core, you can't go wrong with that. You know, if that's as far as like a foundation of getting those things down, um, the, the older I've gotten now you know I'm 41 now, so I'm not old, but I'm getting seasoned in that time. Mobility plays a huge role in the work that you do. A full range of motion. I have such a deeper appreciation now in this stage of my life of lighter weight or submaximal load with full range of motion than I did just pushing the volume or pushing the intensity of getting in there.
Speaker 2:You know, with foundation things, I always like to just look at it from the client's perspective or the person that we're working with's perspective, right? The last thing that we want to do with anybody is make them feel overwhelmed. Most people who are trying to approach them, specifically if they're working with a coach, they already probably feel a little uncomfortable. They're not really comfortable in their own skin or maybe it's the first time even asking for help. Giving them a million different things to remember is gonna be way overwhelming. Okay, focusing on mastering a handful of things at one time and get them feel really competent in one or two things, that starts to build confidence and it starts to build self-trust. You know there was a guy I had on my podcast his name's Joel Cochran that he dropped this line that I've never forgot, where he asked me he's like what's the number one role as a coach that we need to do first? And I was like, oh shit, like you know what's the answer. He's like our role is to instill confidence. He's like if somebody is confident, they can move mountains. He's like so the best thing that you can do is help somebody build confidence, celebrate the small wins that they have over and over again.
Speaker 2:So from a performance side from there I think I mean total body movements I'm a personal one I think you know the kettlebell swing or the kettlebell snatch is just go-tos that you can get in there If you can work on overhead mobility and getting into pressing. So vertical based strength work is always going to be there of getting in. You know, getting a squat pattern in there like goblet squat or a heavy front squat, of just adding that in there. So kind of to.
Speaker 2:I think if anybody's really looking to get that foundation down, I can't stress enough Brett Jones's work that he's done with iron iron cardio protocol of single rep complexes. Um, from the structure standpoint, as well as the intuitive standpoint, as well as just the movements that you're doing of focusing on one single rep at a time, that is just a foolproof. I think, regardless of whether you're a beginner or if you're really advanced, that is a perfect protocol to go into. In fact, from that, I wrote an e-book called the One Day Strength Challenge, which is how to just incorporate a single rep complex one day a week into any program that you're doing, whether it's a strength doing, whether it's a strength focus, whether it's conditioning focus. This is how to incorporate that in. So, as far as a foundation, I think those are the things that I would really focus on first with the general population of anybody that I'd be working with.
Speaker 1:You don't want to build a house on a shaky foundation. You know it. Just a lot of people are getting into I got to do this muscular failure stuff because I want to build a house on a shaky foundation. You know it, just a lot of people are getting into I got to do this muscular failure stuff because I want to be shredded and I want to look great and they're doing crazy, different, weird stuff that I've never seen with a cable machine before and it's just like can can you lunge, Can you rotate, Can you squat Right, and they can't really do those movements proficiently and they're worried about you know, more of like this aesthetic feel.
Speaker 1:That's what I see a lot, and maybe there's two ways to think about Instagram and social media. Like for as many things as you can find that are amazing, you're going to find equally amount of just like bad information, and I get you know I work with a lot of youth athletes as well and they'll come in and they'll be trying to hook up bands to the squat, like to the barbell for squat. I'm like Whoa, Whoa, Whoa. Like what do you? What are you doing? I go go front squat that um, uh, you know that 24 kilo real quick. Let me see that and it's really bad. I'm like okay one, you're not back squatting yet and you're not adding bands and chains. You know what I'm saying, I think, and there's, there's something especially and I want to get to some strong first stuff too.
Speaker 1:But there's something really important and just amazing about getting brilliant at the basics and I think people overlook that a lot. If you know, you, you start off with those basics and it's those. Um, you know a push, a pull. You start off with those basics and it's those. Um, you know a push, a pull, a hand just squat all those things and people start starting to run with that, which is great. But I can't stress enough Like you need to really take some time into that because you can always make those basics even better. Like a basketball team right, the first thing, when they get on the court of game, they do dribbling drills, know how to. They know how to dribble. They do dribbling drills, they, you know they go into layup lines, right, they, they are a nba player, you know they know how to make a layup, but they just over and over and over again until it's it's absolutely perfect. But, um, I think we can't stress the, the basics. Uh, yeah, enough do you ever?
Speaker 2:do you ever hear that story of when that youth hockey kid met Sidney Crosby on his town rink? This was one of my favorite stories ever. This young kid from Canada was in an outdoor rink or something like that and just playing around just doing some drills and some guy came up like hey, do you mind if I work in? He looks over and it's Sidney Crosby who is from this area. And if anybody doesn't know, sidney Crosby is one of the greatest NHL hockey players of all time. And the kid's like yeah, sure, or whatever. And he's like just sits kind of to the sideline and he goes and see Sidney Crosby start like just you know, working on his stuff, and he said Crosby was doing the most remedial like edge drills on his skates, like just side to side, and he was doing it for like 90 minutes of just getting on his edges, just back and forth things that you learn when you're six years old, of just learning how to skate. Crosby was doing this and he said the look in his eyes was this such focus of just getting in. This is a guy that's mastered.
Speaker 2:You know the basics and really understands that, but at the same time too, like you know, variety for the sake of variety is a very slippery slope to get down. But at the same time too, like making something fun is a huge part of what we need to do too. Like throwing in a little just like variety piece that's going in there is always a good idea If somebody is having fun, like that's when we learn. You know, brett Jones has a great quote If you're not laughing, you're not learning, like. So he always tries to crack jokes and make it very lighthearted in that same time.
Speaker 2:But then with that, when somebody is kind of open with that, I like to say like, look like I want, I know you want all to get to all these goals and stuff for the next four weeks. First, as we just get started, just trust me, we're just going to get these basics really down and then all these other things are going to open up for us. But just have some faith and just lean in and just, you know, trust me and we're just going to focus on these things. Can you do that? And everybody's like yeah, sure, absolutely.
Speaker 1:But you can get that down, yeah, so you know you. You know, you know, give them what they want, but also give them what they need at the same time. I love that. There's a coach that I crossed paths with. He's from Indiana, kevin Vanderbush, and he goes we do like he's. He's a really good high school strength coach. He's got national championships you know, multiple state titles. She's got national championships. You know, uh, uh, multiple state titles.
Speaker 1:He's like yeah, we do bicep curls, like every other day bicep curls. And they're like talking to him about it, and he's just like they're like is that like a functional thing? Is that he goes listen until like, when somebody scores a touchdown and they flex their hamstring instead of their, their biceps, we'll, we'll do it with hamstring curls every other day, but for right now, the kids just want to see their arms pop it out of their shirt and they get jacked about it and they're excited to see the veins. He goes that's what we program to every like two days, okay, curls, curls, till you can't do them anymore. And he's he's just like yeah, it's, there's no function for that. It's just like intimidation and the kids love it. I love it, amen.
Speaker 2:He's tapped into something and I think that's you know, a big thing, tony. That I see as well is it's so easy for coaches to just take this stuff so seriously, like everything has to be so just broken down and just dissected into everything. Yeah, you should know why you're programming specific programming, but at the same time, if you're working with kids, you're working with general population and even working with professional athletes or whatever it is. They want to enjoy the process. Make sure that they're having fun.
Speaker 2:Mike Boyle had a great speech in his seminar of like 25 years, 25 mistakes, and the first slide that he has is don't be an asshole. He's like if you're a, if you're a dick, like nobody wants to spend an hour with you. It's like the first thing to do is make it an enjoyable process and not take it so seriously. Like getting in shape should be a really fun thing, getting stronger, like preparing for a game, that should be really fun. Like let's not make this. Like you have to be this, like stern face, like stoic, you know, focus down there, cause that worked for 5% of the people in there, 95% of people. They want to feel comfortable, they want to enjoy the process and if they do that you can teach them anything you know. You can teach them principles and mastery and all these buzzwords that we use all the time. But make it fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. You're strong. You're strong first and I definitely you know. I just got back from the dome with the SFL. I helped assist. It was a first time assisting.
Speaker 2:I got to assist Fabio with the bar certification One of my favorite people in the world.
Speaker 1:He's the man. We had, mark Valenti as well, and they're amongst other assistants and just the whole crew was out there and it's just a great time and it's Chicago's the one of the only places that it has all the certs and you get all those master instructors in there. So it was fantastic. But being a part of Strong First and doing that certification, you kind of touched on a few pieces of it. But how does that system influence your approach to teaching and programming and the way that you view strength?
Speaker 2:April of this year, 15 years since I went to my first event of RKC in 2010. So I found this world relatively early, where Pavel was still teaching at certification. So I feel really fortunate that I got to learn directly from him in a couple different events from there. What I saw from the School of Strength which is strong for us now but was like the original RKC with Pavel is coming from a baseball background. Baseball was such an interesting sport for me because the details matter so much. Like just changing the angle of your elbow or shifting your weight, like all those little intricacies could be the difference between a pop fly and a home run. So I was always kind of fascinated by the form and the technique and like always getting better at that and then repeating that. And I saw that in, like in kettlebell training, just like learning things like the swing you know in the Turkish, get in the Turkish, get up and the snatch and you know, when I first got into it it was kind of more of like a challenge. I just like something. Something feels like it's calling, you know me to to learn this more. And that first certification I remember was very life-changing for me. Like you know, not just the, not just going through the event and the, the challenge of it, of having to get through it and really test your, your grit and your will and your resilience, but the coaches that I met there, who wore the instructor shirts and stuff, the way that they carried themselves, the way that they spoke, the way that they articulated strength, not just in a technical piece, but just how you felt like this whole teaching embodied them as part of who they were and it was authentic across the board. And I was like this feels very different than other programs, other workshops and things that I've been a part of before. There's something that is very deep within and that was really the system of strength is a skill like strength is a skill just like anything, and skills are meant to be built like, they're meant to be mastered. And when you master something, you realize that there's never a full end. You know result, you'll always, you can always get better at it and I, just from that, I wanted to find something that I could focus on few things but do them very well.
Speaker 2:And you know, you know like, going from SFG one like, you learn six movements in SFG one, right, it's not a lot, but the depth and detail of how to break it down, how to teach it, how to coach it, how to look for you know different um, you know asymmetries or compensations and how to fix that on the fly. Different, you know asymmetries or compensations and how to fix that on the fly. That was just something that really hit me. And then I went to, you know, sfb, you know with Karen Smith, and then I went to SFL. I did that with Fabio and then became an elite instructor and I've assisted a few different times and that same you know just mindset that I had from that beginning stage has only gotten stronger every event that I've gone into.
Speaker 2:So you know, the word authentic gets thrown around a lot with a lot of different people. But what I've just learned from Strong First and the people that have really taught there and are in leadership there, like they really walk the walk, you know, not just talk the talk, and I just, you know, think that I wish that was something that I saw in every program that I've gone into, but unfortunately that's just not the case. So that was really like the main thing is everything that I've gone through. From there I was like I trust these people because they believe in what they're saying. They're not trying to make me believe in what they're saying. They believe in what they're saying and that's a very powerful message. Cbt.
Speaker 1:Be a quiet professional right, like you some of these people are. I mean, I've seen some, some instructors, we're doing the if people don't know, the grad workout, the graduation workout, when you do SFG one, um, you know everybody either pass your snatch test or you don't, or you didn't do a skill right. Whatever, it doesn't matter. Everybody's getting bells and you do like what seems like an endless workout.
Speaker 1:But uh, I don't know how your experience was, but it's still the armor building, like the, the two, one, three we were doing I, if I remember it was just like yeah, uh, basically it was just clean squat pressing for a long long time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:And then it was swings, and then it was single arm swings and then it was clean squat pressing again, uh, but then I just remember instructors grabbing like a 48K on the side and they were doing it with us. I was like Jesus, whoa, these guys are amazing. But it's this piece of be a quiet professional. They don't have to tell you how much they lift, they just go and they grab their bell and they do it and they're the kindest people they want to help. But there's also this standard that you don't get at other certifications rkc, strong first, right, uh, where you go and you you have to perform the movements and you have a standard of quality of movements. And I'm not telling people don't go to other certifications that don't have this. I think go see as many different things as possible, but I don't know of one where it's like, hey, you actually have to hit certain standards to get the certification, versus just going and showing up to a workshop and then you get your certificate.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you know, to recertify you have to prove that you've kept your movements and kept your strength in there. Like I think that's a huge thing to do. You don't just write in your renewal certification and pay a little bit of money. You got to prove that you still are capable of doing these movements. But that's another point that you brought up there.
Speaker 2:Like, some of the strongest men and women that I've ever met are from this system and not you wouldn't think of them like if you just saw them walking down the street as like the strongest people, but the amount of density in their muscles, the amount of skill that they built up to be able to move, you know crazy loads. Like I met Michael Willey when I assisted with him, who's down in Florida. He's a team leader and one of the lightest beast tamers ever, and seeing him just playing around with these heavy weights, with just this grace of movement, I'm like what? Like what is going on over here. So, yeah, it's not just the, the mindset approach of it and that it yields crazy results.
Speaker 2:Like if you get strong, like if you get really strong. It's, you know, it's like a glass. Everything else fills up into that. Like afterwards, like it is amazing when you feel really strong and I'm a light, I'm a lighter guy. You know I'm on the. You know I'm on the South end of 150 pounds, you know so. But to be able to maintain very strong movements and keep them over over years and keep progressing, yeah, it's a phenomenal system.
Speaker 1:I want to segue to you and your podcast, and you have the strength connection podcast. You've had a bunch of different, probably kind of like the who's, who's, the strength coaches on here. It's a great. It's a great listen. Uh, you know, brett Jones, stan John, what's one conversation that you had, or I guess that you had on that uh was, would you say, like a life, life-changing one Oof.
Speaker 2:Well, you know we're 285 episodes in right now, so there's a lot that's flowing through my mind. You know some of them that you know podcasting is interesting. I fell in love with it because me and my former partner during COVID, just kind of out of boredom and trying to figure out things to do, we decided to start a podcast ourselves. It started as called Stories Beyond the Bell and then that shifted to the Breakthrough Secrets podcast, where we started to invite people on and, you know, get deep down into you know the work that they do. And hearing everybody's stories of you know people that you've admired or you work with, who are incredible masters and coaches and have made great impacts, hearing their come up and the journey that they had in their welcome to the kettlebell moment where they got smoked by a 12K bell or something like that, or the mistakes that they made, I just fell in love with it. So when I started my own podcast on my own business, I was trying to figure out what did I really love to do, and what I love to do was having conversations with people. So I started inviting people on and, you know, diving in and getting the work in there I'd say one that comes up to mind on the on the strength set was um, I got to talk with Dennis Vasilov, uh, a couple of times. So Dennis is from the, the kettlebell sport world, so not from hard style, but if you don't know, I believe he's the 12-time consecutive world champion right now in sport and the mindset and the training that he does and just the strength and the smarts that he has around training is just such next level From being in a hardstyle background and knowing one kind of school of thought and philosophy. I didn't know much about the Jerovoi sport and the GS world at all but after talking with guys like Dennis and then Bill Lesh and Fionnn Bartul and stuff like the ones that have done these high endurance based work, it is such a depth of practice of endurance work and strength that they need to do breath control, mindset, like I mean. You know, I kind of say in start we have to do a five minute snatch test but you can switch hands as much as you want, right, it's a challenging test but it's very manageable. If you go into a sport world, you're doing a 10 minute snatch test but you can switch hands as much as you want, right, it's a challenging test but it's very manageable. If you go into a sport world you're doing a 10 minute snatch test with one hand switch and you can't ever put the bell down. Like the amount of yeah, the amount of grip, of grit, of everything in there is phenomenal.
Speaker 2:And to see a guy like Dennis, who I think did like 212 reps or something like that, with a 32 K bell with one hand switch, and to see a guy like Dennis, who I think did like 212 reps or something like that, with a 32 K bell with one hand switch and if you see him he's not this monster of a guy coming out there Don't quote me on the exact reps on that, but it's something around there that like opened my mind into like oh, there's a whole nother world of strength in different schools of thought than just one particular mode.
Speaker 2:And that was like one of those that made me kind of probably subconsciously start to look at a lot of different other masters of coaches, not just in the physical strength world but the mindset world, theology, spirituality and stuff like that, and you realize there's some common threads among all of them. But when somebody like is such a master at one vocation, like you can learn so much of that and apply it into your own life. Even if it's not like specifically what you do, you can take so many golden nuggets from them in those conversations. So Dennis was one of those, him and Paul McElroy they came on both together when they were doing a charity thing. That was a really special one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome, yeah, and it's great. We think of these people as like, oh my gosh, these are giants in the industry and, uh, whatever you know, you DM them and they're like yeah, I'll do a convo.
Speaker 2:Great, everybody wants to talk.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, they're like the nicest people. It's great. And for you, what's? What's coming up next? Is anything big coming up with the podcast yourself, business, what have you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, you know my business always runs as it flows. You know, as far as my clientele work and stuff like that, you know, if I can, you know I'm always looking for for new clients, if I can fit them in or not. But with the podcast, I actually have two podcasts that I run right now. So the Strength Connection is the one that is on just a flowing stream. We do once a week right now episodes with people and that's just on a running loop. Absolutely love it, it's a blast and I've got some things that I'm trying to work with on the production side of that that's coming up. The other one that I'm doing is something that's kind of near and dear to me, which is a podcast called Inspire Saratoga.
Speaker 2:So I'm from Saratoga Springs in New York and my roots are here and I'm building spaces and work in my area and what I wanted to do is also create another show specifically to my local area and the people that are doing cool things in here, and that's something that you know as coaches. Specifically now, with online space that's blowing up so much but it's also so saturated, there's such a power of connecting with your local people in your community, you know, and I think some people have lost that. I felt like I lost that a little bit and shifting a lot from a lot of in-person into the online space and I wanted to do something specifically for people in my area, in my community. So we created this show specifically highlighting people who are just doing inspiring things, who are doing positive things in this area, because I think you know you can learn things about your strength and your health journey by hearing from you know the executive director of Cafe Lena, who you know runs an arts, you know an arts program because of the work that she's had to do and build resilience from. You can adopt that into your own, into your own life.
Speaker 2:So that's why I called the original podcast the Strength Connection, because I think we saw so much of like physical strength is one thing, mental strength is another, spiritual or emotional or relationships or another. No, everything's all interconnected. Like the more you have victories in your physical strength, you can weave those into work you're doing with mental strength or with faith or your you know, your spiritual connection or your emotions or your career, like it's. We're not just in a vacuum of one thing versus another. So that's why I wanted to try and talk to anybody about different things in strength, not just physical training and sets and reps but what are some other areas of strength that maybe you can grab some things in and that will help you? Because if you're inspired and you feel really good and you feel connected with another person that you're listening to, that's only going to help you just create some more abundance in your own strength.
Speaker 1:That's great. I think I love the whole, your whole outlook, right? You even said like we're not talking about sets and reps here. We're talking about life and ups and downs and mental fortitude and having a positive mindset and an abundance mindset versus a scarcity mindset and things like that, and I think that these things are very much overlooked. People get bogged down with all this stuff about in their life, social things, their jobs, whatever but I think people taking a step back and showing gratitude and putting time in the gym, putting time into their life, putting time into their families, just will make everybody even more happier.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think it's important to like recognize those things when you're going into it too right. It's like if you want to get healthier and get fit and you ask that big question of why, well, it's like if you're connecting that with your mindset and your things that you value maybe it's your spiritual connection, maybe it's your work, maybe it's your family and you recognize that by getting stronger and healthier impacts those things. It's not just a selfish venture for external gain or looking a certain way or building aesthetics. If it's actually helping you in the things that you value the most, it's going to be a lot easier to get up on that day when you don't feel like it, because it's a bigger thing than just you.
Speaker 1:I don't know how to end it better than that. That's a good thing than just you. I don't know how to end it better than that. That's good, Michael. Where could people find you connect with you? And I know you said the other podcast. Well, make sure you mentioned that one again. So we have it.
Speaker 2:Sure so that one's called inspire Saratoga. And then my other podcast is the strength connection, which you can get on all platforms. You can go to our YouTube channel, which is called the strength connection, and, uh, yeah, just grab me on Facebook or Instagram. Uh, Instagram is Michael underscore, strength connection, and then Facebook is just, uh, my name, uh, Michael Krakowski. And then I have a private Facebook group where I do a lot of lives and really connect individually with people, which is called the Strength Connection. And one thing you know I'll do too for any listeners that are out there I can send it over to you and put it in the show notes is I have a free ebook that I can send over to you, which is called the One Day Strength Challenge. This is all the stuff we've been talking about of intuitive training and kind of, you know, single rep complexes and stuff like that. This is just a free resource that you can use to start adopting this a little bit into whatever you're doing, and it might be a good resource for you.
Speaker 1:Amazing. Well, we appreciate that. Definitely put that in the show notes. And again, thanks for coming on tonight and sharing all your wisdom. We appreciate your time.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, man. I've been following your stuff and you're doing a great job, so I really appreciate your work.
Speaker 1:Thanks, sir, and thank you everybody listening to another episode of the Primal Foundations podcast.