StansellFit, Atlanta, GA (2026)

02/13/2026

Maturing as a trainee and coach is realizing that the relationship between technique and injury is tenuous.

This is a GREAT thing because it allows us to not be so rigid in our thinking about what strength exercises are supposed to look like. We don’t have to put the fear of God in anyone that deviates even the slightest bit from our standard and it gives us far more flexibility when training people with different anthropometry and constraints.

Technique still matters. But not for the reasons most people claim it does.

02/08/2026

There are several reasons someone might not be feeling an exercise where they’re supposed to: their technique is off, they are too far away from failure, the load is TOO heavy, a non-target muscle is too weak for the target muscle to get a proper stimulus, etc. Rather than immediately jumping to the exercise itself being a bad pick, make sure you’re doing it right and with the proper stimulus (reps and weight). If you’ve checked all of these things off, then you can look at switching exercises. If you’re thorough here, it will keep you from constantly switching movements and allow you to zero in on the best movements for each muscle growth for you.

There are caveats here. You need to assume that the exercise is supposed to target the muscles you want to target. Bicep curl for biceps, leg extensions for quads, etc. If you’re straight up picking an exercise that doesn’t work the muscles you’re trying to work, no adjustment can fix that.

If you have questions about specific exercises, happy to answer them.

02/05/2026

One of the surest ways to increase injury risk is to progress too quickly, because even if the muscles are fully capable of producing enough force, your connective tissue may not have adapted yet. And even if it HAS adapted, your working capacity on any given day isn’t always up to the task.

Slowing progression is one of the simplest ways to reduce injury risk and allow adaptation to keep pace with training stress.

Here are three strategies for slowing progression.

For clarification, RIR, or Reps In Reserve, refers to how many more reps you could have done. If you did a set of 7 but you could have done 8 reps, that’s an RIR of 1. RPE is commonly used as the inverse of RIR. Meaning if RIR is 1, RPE is 9.

These subjective measures may be difficult for new lifters as they have pushed enough to know where failure is. So it may still be useful to take SOME sets to failure for more precise calibration.

Feel free to drop any questions in the comments or a DM.

This is an excerpt from my most recent substack article, which you can find via the link in my bio. It’s the first link under Train With Me.

02/02/2026

I think being a beginner at ANYTHING is such a valuable experience. Especially if you’re like me and extremely novelty averse. I love doing the same things, going to the same places, being around the same people.

But while settling into routines can be great and enjoyable, it can also shrink your opportunity to learn new things if you never stray from them.

Running has been VERY hard for me and tested me many times, and I haven’t even been doing it that long. But the longer I do it, the more I respect the process and other runners.

The single biggest lightbulb moment for me regarding running is the sheer messiness of how adaptation works. It’s predictable when zoomed out, but extremely unpredictable when zoomed in.

I’ve slowly learned that you must do what you can to drive progress but forget any expectations of “neatness” in how you expect progress to look.

It’s not always going to be the 5 seconds shaved off your pace each time you run. Or always being able to run longer without problems. It’s often felt spontaneously during random runs at random times over random intervals.

It may be feeling like you can breathe better, or suddenly realizing you don’t hurt after a run, or recovering faster after a particular hill.

The moral of the story is that you should focus on the process, keep showing up imperfectly, appreciate but don’t expect progress every time. Tale as old as time.

02/01/2026

Nothing is more frustrating than watching someone half ass something and then move on because it “isn’t working”. You can hardly blame an approach, routine, etc when you’re doing a sh*tty version of it.

The truth is most things “work”. The results are more often found in the commitment than the specific approach, especially with the information we have at our disposal these days.

Before you get stuck in half-ass purgatory, jumping from one program you do poorly to another, you need to make sure the results aren’t hiding in the work you’re not doing.

Fully commit before deciding if something needs to be changed. Then if it does, you can feel good knowing you truly gave it the space it deserves before abandoning it.

01/30/2026

The only people who truly appreciate how difficult it is to build muscle are the ones that have put in the work to do it.

Obviously genetics make it easier for some and muddy the relationship between input and output, but it’s probably best to assume an average rate of muscle growth. It is slow as f**k. And that’s if you do everything right. Which most people don’t.

Dipping your toe in to get used to strength training is a great way to get started. But if you want to truly change your body, you gotta commit.

That means doing hard sets where the weight is slowing down significantly and you have to do that consistently. If you can do everything quickly and need minimal rest, you’re probably not pushing yourself.

If you’re not sure if you’re training hard, you probably aren’t. Obviously don’t YOLO your way through training with weights you have no business using, but don’t be afraid to increase the weight if you can and don’t be scared to get closer to failure.

01/23/2026

Let me start by saying every client is different. If someone indicates to me that they’re comfortable opening the throttle, we’ll do that.

The message is that building buy in and trust is the first step with any new relationship. Especially one where great harm is possible if negligent.

One of the worst things I could do as a trainer is to discourage someone to the extent that it makes them quit before they’ve gotten off the ground. It’s also why, broadly speaking, we have to learn to work within the space we’re given at all times. Not every client is going to give you as much space as you want and that’s okay.

And you cannot help people that decide to stop working with you because you tried to force them outside of that space. This is ultimately about helping people lead healthier lives in whatever capacity we’re able.

01/18/2026

If you want to see real change in your body and large returns through resistance training, you need to let go of the need to be titillated by your workouts.

Consistency is absolutely key in lifting for 3 reasons:

1. You need to be able to compare performance in the same lifts to measure real progress.

2. You waste time reacclimatizing to movements every time you switch.

3. You’re constantly exposing your body to new movements, which can make managing training stress a headache.

So my quick and dirty answer to “when should you change exercises” is “when you need to”. And you need to when you stop making progress.

01/16/2026

This is one of the best pieces of advice I can give any new gymgoer. Do not miss workouts. Do not miss workouts. Do not miss workouts.

Not only do you not get the stimulus for that day, it primes you for a backslide. Missing a workout is you telling yourself it’s okay to miss workouts. Your resolve loosens, and you start to allow thinner and thinner excuses to keep you from training.

You need an insanely high threshold for missing workouts if you want to achieve any kind of long-term success. Maybe it’s a little intense and/or not entirely relevant for this message, but I love the quote: “Those who stand for nothing, fall for everything.”

You need to decide that this is important and give yourself little to no wiggle room.

01/11/2026

As a trainer, my goal is to match up with clients I believe I can genuinely help. Part of that means being realistic with what each potential client has to give at this stage of their life.

I’m sure there are plenty of trainers that would be all too eager to take on anyone or to throw shade at me for not taking on a client that may need my help.

But in my experience, someone at a 10/10 stress is not in a position to be adding the kinda stress that in-person training creates. I also don’t want to take anyone’s money when I don’t believe they’ll be able to consistently show up and put in the work that this process requires.

There are all sorts of reasons someone may be getting absolutely buried by life. But the last thing I would suggest for them is to try to start a lifting program during these periods. To be clear, I’m not talking about someone that’s stressed at work. I’m talking about people that are struggling to exist.

For many of these people, even going for a 15 minute walk or doing two exercises at home may be a Herculean feat. And those are probably closer to where they need to start.

At the end of the day, it’s all about matching your routine with your capacity.

12/17/2025

Stretching has gotten a bad reputation in the fitness space due to poor evidence for various outcomes. But I’m not convinced we’re looking at the RIGHT outcomes.

The problem is that research relies heavily on metrics that are easy to quantify and many of the improvements people feel or see when they regularly stretch are qualitative in nature. And thus difficult to quantify. For instance, they may FEEL better or MOVE better.

This is the unfortunate limitation of research and why it’s probably not great to rely SOLELY on it. It should, of course, underpin your understanding of any topic if possible but it’s neither exhaustive nor infallible.

I’m of the opinion that if we have good research on something, best to start with that. But if it’s lacking, think critically and form your own opinions through trial and error. At least until it catches up.

12/15/2025

I get that everyone has aesthetic preferences. I do. But it’s much harder to get behind when those preferences keep people from being the healthiest and most capable version of themselves.

Muscle is unequivocally good for you. No one is saying you must become a bodybuilder. But the muscle you can build on a well-balanced strength training program is NEVER a bad look.

StansellFit

02/13/2026

02/08/2026

02/05/2026

02/02/2026

02/01/2026

01/30/2026

01/23/2026

01/18/2026

01/16/2026

01/11/2026

12/17/2025

12/15/2025

Address

Website

Alerts

Shortcuts

Share

Category