You may have come across gyms and fitness facilities that claim to offer lasting changes and many likely succumbed to their ‘broscience’ at face value. Fortunately, there are a few that excel head and shoulders above in terms of knowledge and service. One such outfit is BeStrong.
Founded in 2016, BeStrong provides a scientific approach to training and they mean business.
I recently had a few sessions with their co-founder and head coach Aleksander Grujicic and every time was a thorough learning experience.
Assessments were done in the first meeting using Functional Movement Screen (FMS) and InBody body composition analysis and the sessions that followed were target-specific based on the results.
What we ended up doing was more of a rehab on areas needing improvement, specifically in my mobility, or lack thereof, which in most cases caused pain and discomfort.
Everything Grujicic said or made me do had the science of biomechanics as the basis. This opened up detailed discussions during sessions that I truly appreciate. The following is an excerpt of the experience, which may be quite a lot to take in, but bear with me as I share the wonder.
FIND YOUR WEAKNESS
When asked about what ‘weaknesses’ were exposed in me, Grujicic had this to say: “While you were performing the exercise on the FMS test, the first weakness we noticed was the position of the ankles. Pronation of the feet can be the reason for deformity which is called ‘flat feet’. This deformity was not treated very well during your childhood and now you suffer from the constant inversion of your feet during walking, running and exercising. This inversion shows the pronation of the ankles and the possibility of other injuries, starting from the knees, hips, back and shoulders.
“The second weakness was in the knee [collapse]. The knee was showing instability caused by the weakness of the ligaments in the knee, tendons and muscles around the knee. During the test, you were compensating for the instability of the knee with ankle pronation and hip rotations in the transversal plane.
“The third weakness was the lower back pain during the test and a disc herniation between L5 – S1. The causes of this problem are bad posture, core weakness and wrong moving patterns during exercising in the past. Fourth weakness found was a shoulder restriction, related with tightness in deltoid and pectoralis muscles, also poor shoulder mobility and strength of rotator cuff muscles.”
BETTER ENGAGEMENT
I love all the educational technicality and the nerdy terms. I’m more engaged as a client when I understand the ‘how’s’ and the ‘why’s’. Intensity in workouts is what I look for — the heavier, the harder, the better. But Grujicic sold me on the seemingly lowly resistance bands, foam rollers, and medicine and Bosu balls. With the knowledge and understanding that I needed to sort of ‘reset’ my movements, I was happily on board.
- Aleksander Grujicic | BeStrong co-founder and head coach
Myofascial Release (MFR) and various proprioception exercises are some of the techniques we employed.
Basically, we ‘corrected’ my movements by teaching my muscles to fire up and function as they should — mainly my abductors, flexors, gluteus, core and rotator cuff muscles. “In general, the focus is more on pain relief, mobility and stability. This type of training is the best preparation for lifting weights and further complex exercises.” said Grujicic.
In hindsight, I should have done this long before injecting any intensity. But I don’t look at the statement above as invalidation of my fitness past, rather, a huge step in the continuation of a steep learning curve. And that’s probably the biggest takeaway from my experience with BeStrong. Knowledge. And knowledge is power.
“I can say that you have improved awareness of your body, the causes of pain, the instability and weaknesses in some areas… The most important thing is that you know the reason for the pain and our job is to guide you to beat that pain,” he said.
“At BeStrong we are treating the causes, not the consequences. That is what makes us unique… I strongly believe that my duty as a coach is to change my clients’ lifestyle for the better, not only during our trainings but for a lifetime… Teaching our clients how the body functions and what is good for them and their health is BeStrong’s biggest goal.” Grujicic concluded.
