Fitness Professional Online Show : 023 – Julio Salado
iTunes Link: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/fitness-blitz-radio/id1385238100
Announcer: Welcome to the Fitness Professional Online Radio Show where you get access to fitness industry news, tips and insights from professionals around the world. Visit us at FitnessProfessionalOnline.com and now, your host, Doug Holt.
Doug Holt: Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of Fitness Professional Online. I’m your host Doug Holt and I’m happy to be here with you today. It’s raining here in Southern California which is pretty rare. I got an exciting guest on today, a writer for Fitness Professional Online.
Julio Salado will be on with us today. Most of you probably know Julio but if you happened not to read his articles already, go over to FitnessProfessionalOnline.com where you can pick up some of his authorship. Julio is an NSCA-CPT, U.S.A.W. Performance Coach. He is also a nationally recognized personal trainer, post-rehab specialist and a certificated Kettlebell & TRX Suspension Training instructor. Julio is also a motivational speaker and an author. And you can find his latest articles and video tips on his website FitnessFoundry.net.
Before I get in to the show today, just a few reminders, Fitness Professional Online is currently being redone. Our team over here at Fitness Marketing Alliance is going through the website taking your feedback, thank you for those of you that sent that in and redoing the website to give it a cleaner, easier to follow look. That way, you can access the articles, the opt-ins, the radio show subscriptions as well as the community.
We know at this day, a lot of people that have been veterans of the industry are regulars at Fitness Professional Online but we also wanted to help those new to the industry. So, the new site is going to have an easier entry for those that are a little bit newer under 5 years in the fitness industry.
We’re also still accepting article submissions from fitness professionals. So for those of you that write in or interested in writing, go ahead and just please email us at authors@fitnessprofessionalonline.com with your bio and article topics and as well as a submissions so our editors can take a look at that.
Moving forward as we’re going to the New Year, we’re accepting applications for our 2015 mastermind groups. Shoot us an email if you’re interested in taking your business to the next level in 2015 by joining myself, and other top fitness professionals with our online mastermind group, those have been very successful.
We’re only accepting a few more applicants coming in to the next year. We’re often ask what we’re looking for and what we’re looking for are fitness professionals of all levels and experiences but all members must have a very high level of integrity and passion for growth not only for themselves and their business but also, helping each other grow.
You can only be on your own island for so long and by joining a mastermind group with other high-caliber players, you’re only going to grow more and it’s all through synergy. So with that said, go ahead and shoot us an email when you get a chance. And without further adieu, let’s bring Julio onto the call.
All right Julio. Thank you so much for taking the time today to be with us.
Julio Salado: My pleasure.
Doug Holt: Let’s jump right into it. Tell me a bit about your journey and how you got to where you are today?
Julio Salado: I actually been working out for over 20 years and one day, I was at the gym and another trainer watched me and he listened to how I was explaining the exercises to another member and at this point, I only learned about ex-fighter’s Julio through a mentor and in fact, he actually thought I was a trainer at that time and I was actually studying [03:23]. From there, he kept catching upon me to lead, to get into the fitness industry and I just kept postponing and then putting them all. Then one day, he gave me a book from AFAA, that’s how far back I go and I opened the AFAA book and I was totally in love with the size behind exercising.
Doug Holt: And it’s a popular journey when someone approaches you at the gym and you kind of been doing it as your passion and making it a career. Was there one thing in particular that decided you to actually make it a career and make that shift from something you just enjoyed to actually training into something you do full-time?
Julio Salado: The biggest thing and is still is the main fact that I can improve people quality of life through exercise and it’s a very powerful tool. It’s just I was given the communication and motivation and to give people a vision of what I can see and what they can achieve without even achieving it.
And then actually, has given a program to see little by slow achieve those goals and then see them into the quality of their life. So I don’t take forgranted the ability to motivate individuals but also knowing that if they do XYZ, they will get the results but they have to participate also in their workout journey.
Doug Holt: You definitely have the gift of communication. You’ve written several popular for Fitness Professional Online which has gotten a lot of responses and a lot of reads when we look at the analytics. What made you decide to share your knowledge with other people in the industry?
Julio Salado: First and foremost, I am blown as a trainer. And then, I do have a passion and I also knew that another way that I can share my knowledge as I continue to learn to is by using anything accessible to me and at this time, it was pen and paper. I am happy to be born in the age of the enrichment because like 20 years ago or 30 years ago, there had been trend and I would have to pay to get my articles out there but I took advantage of the internet and social media.
Little by slow, I developed writing skills from constructive criticisms from my peers whether it’s editing, I have an editor but I always talk to the science foes within my articles and need of the article was always well-said but learning how to deliver it, it’s an art that I had to learn.
Doug Holt: Yeah. You’ve done a great job. I think it’s been rare for me at least being in the industry for a while as well as you but not everybody chooses to share. What made you actually want to share with more people?
Julio Salado: I want to reach as many people as possible in my lifetime. So I will continue to promote health and fitness through writings, videos, blogging, workshops, presentations and interviews over the phone like radio or anything that I can get my hands on that’s my main goal is to just reach as many as possible.
Doug Holt: That’s great. I love that and I applaud you for that. You’ve obviously had a ton of wins. Can you tell us about a time when you’ve hit a wall that was just seemed impossible and we all hit those walls in our lives but this time, you found a way around to push through it or climb over it? Can you give us a scenario in your personal training career when that’s happened?
Julio Salado: Sometimes, you’ve get a client that biggest thing within your scope of knowledge. So if you need to fit in it because there is no shame in passing along a client to another experienced trainer and I’ve done a couple of times throughout my career and some of the clients that we get come from different walks of life just with illnesses like cancer survivors and then, from that point on, we started to evolve our own specialties and for me, I ended up going into post-rehab more than anything.
Even though, I’m a USA weightlifting coach and I love athletics but I came to a point where I didn’t have the funds to put myself back to college to get Exercise Science degree but I really had the funds and the means to go to symposiums held by PT’s and sports PT’s and that was my wall, was like, “How am I going to continue my education on a different level without having the funds and the way that I found it was to network and to attend as many workshops as well as up to the industry that to what I was trying to learn. I don’t know if that kind of answers your question but the education part of it can some back, yeah, that was my wall, is the education and I found a way around it. It was by also reading and buying books.
Doug Holt: Yeah, absolutely. Definitely, you’ve hit that a lot. I hear a lot from trainers. I get emails all day for people that have questions and problems and what you often hear is “I don’t have the education” “I don’t have the knowledge-base” or “I don’t have access to a masters degree or so and so has a PhD” but the truth is, there is so much information out there on the internet these days that’s free. And that was my mission for putting out Fitness Professional Online for free was to give a voice to Fitness Professionals around the world. There’s really no excuse for not educating yourself these days.
Julio Salado: I agree. And another great thing about Fitness Professional Online and my practices are as that, we learn to make our articles or presentations practical. So we kind of pick all the big words out of the article, out of the presentation or seminar and we would like to get the potatoes of it and we show how we can apply to real world or situation of real world finds. And that’s the people who I also continue to follow through today.
Many people don’t need to know about the types of fibers and more there are units and how they fire but I can we’re going to do a low impact biometrics then, the reason in this because it’s conducive to your goals. So that’s kind of stuffs that I get from my predecessors.
Doug Holt: Yeah, you speak to your audience. You speak to their level. They don’t know to know a lot in terms for every muscle insertion origin or all that good stuff then you know, “How is this going to apply to me?”
Julio Salado: Exactly.
Doug Holt: You do a great job of that with your YouTube videos and I’ve gone through almost all of your YouTube videos, you have a lot of them up there. I think they’re great in a way you’ve transitioned into this. How have those helped your business and if so, how?
Julio Salado: They helped me in my own journey of having the self-confidence that I know what I’m doing to a certain extent, meaning like, when I put something out there, I mention like heat mobility or [10:03] below attraction and the audience is wide audience there in YouTube but I also know that fitness professionals are also looking at it. And I also know that there are a lot of individuals who are getting injured and they hear words like “rotator cause”. So, I put those words in there so they can identify what the exercises are and then also they could apply it as known workouts. It’s free. The only thing that causes time in trying it out I believe in wide information.
Doug Holt: I think they are great. Like I said, I acquired over 18 degrees and certifications in this field then I was watching your videos, I was like, “Shoot! I got to use that” or “Damn! That’s a good idea.” So I found them to be a fantastic resource and I’m definitely a subscriber. I think you did a great job.
Julio Salado: Thank you.
Doug Holt: And we put stuffs out in YouTube. You have the trolls and you have all these people are going to throw comments at you one way or the other. It doesn’t matter if maybe they didn’t like the music you put in there or what have you. It’s just so easy for people to be mean and hide behind the internet. So it takes a lot of courage to put those videos out there and I know it takes a lot of time and you’re doing a good job with that.
Julio Salado: [11:10] it applies to articles too. You always going to have naysayers but you can’t naysay the science behind and if their business really does bring results, the naysayer is going to say what they want. I’m a big person with principles over personalities. I say it like that.
Doug Holt: I’m with you. I’m absolutely with you. And plus, there’s a lot of ways I think especially in the fitness industry, people can get stuck on one dogma. Maybe I only follow what I [11:39] or I only follow Paul Chuck or I only follow heat training or I only follow whatever rather than looking at the whole picture and realizing there might be many ways to get to the same outcome and that everybody truly is different.
Julio Salado: Well said, I agree. 100 percent agree.
Doug Holt: With your videos, obviously getting your confidence up, have they directly contributed to any increase in business that you can relate to or is it really just a labour of love?
Julio Salado: It’s both, labour of love. But obviously, I am being contacted by different organizations and individuals and companies that do presentations. So you never know who’s actually going to read your article or who’s going to pick up on it or who’s going to see your video. Again, I call it piggy backing. So if I had an article or I’m tweeting I will tweet and include somebody in the tweet that I know has a bigger follower than me.
In a nice way, I would say, “Hey, this is a relative article for people who had knee injuries.” And then, they will pick up and re-tweet it and then the next thing you know, the contacting has became a contributor. Perseverance is big part of it and then if you believe in the information you’re putting out, eventually, other individuals are going to pick up on it and get conversation with you Doug because I’ve been following you for a couple of years and follow your footprints and I’ll get similar results.
Doug Holt: I feel the same way. That’s very humble. Thank you. A little off topic but getting in kind of nuts and bolts, where do you use to edit the videos and where do you get your music?
Julio Salado: I used to use Sony, I forgot the X store in Vegas. Then that subscription ended and then I just started to use a very simple tool that uses the Microsoft forgot what it called.
Doug Holt: MovieMaker?
Julio Salado: Yeah, MovieMaker. And then I had some old CDs from when I used to buy CDs from like [13:39] or whatever and they don’t have Volume 2 and I just put it on and obviously, the tempo and the theme has to match the exercises I’m doing in the video.
Doug Holt: Okay, it makes sense. They’re well-done. I like them a lot. I use MovieMaker to my digital agency, the Fitness Marketing Alliance. We use GarageBand and everything else. I was just curious what are you using. But something else I noticed and I got to ask you. You’re reading your credits, I was reading one of them and I stopped and looked back. You have an executive of snacks Foo, what is that?
Julio Salado: Fool is my 20 lbs. Russian blue cat. She’s in all the credits of my videos. Sometimes, she has a credit for choreography and I had humour at my stuff training so it carries over to my videos. I’m very intense in my workout. Even if it’s correct to post-rehab or I’m on at the glimpse but I always infuse humour in my style training and obviously, it’s in my videos. And a lot of people don’t catch that, so you have a good eye. One of these days, I got to include a picture of her in there.
Doug Holt: You got it, absolutely. You got to send me one so I can put it with this podcast and be able to put it in show notes. Everybody listening, you got to go check out those credits. That was great and it caught my eye definitely.
Julio Salado: He’s a fitness fool.
Doug Holt: There you go. You got to love it. Julio, let me set a scene for you. You walk around in Boston, you find a time machine and you’re able to go back and talk to yourself your first year as a fit pro, what advice so you give to your younger self?
Julio Salado: I would say, definitely jump-in in the back pocket of a trainer who you feel comfortable with and you know that they know what they are doing and follow their lead. Now, a lot of these trainers that you will probably come across who fit in this category, they believe in assessment before exercising. I am huge on that. I was fortunate when I first came into the industry, I work in a small studio and the individual who hired me, he actually end up buying a book and he was big on doing writing before he even wrote his book to this stuff and he was big on assessment. These are years ago and that never changed.
So definitely, I swallowed the pride and remained teachable and strive with the philosophy of learning assessments of [16:10]. In general, he worked with the general population and then, that changes it changes some work condition as what we get and set it in through the lifestyle, so that’s my biggest suggestion were.
Looking back, again, I was fortunate because I was guided in the right direction right off the bat. So I didn’t have mentors who said, “Alright, right off the bat, we’ll do plyometrics. Let’s put some weight over the head” that’s to overhead knowing that you have run your shoulders and you’ve kind of fought, who cares? Pain is the cleanser. He’s got to move away from those individuals.
Doug Holt: Absolutely.
Julio Salado: Yeah. Hopefully, that answers your question.
Doug Holt: Absolutely. That’s what you’d say to yourself, there’s no wrong answer. I think we all wish we could go back and talk to our younger selves about a lot of things but to do with the career. So basically, you’re saying, if you’re not assessing, you’re just guessing. Not all the axioms that’s been out there?
Julio Salado: Yeah, exactly. That’s very true.
Doug Holt: I agree with you 100 percent. At our studio here in Santa Barbara, we always assess every client before they even start with us. I think that’s critical for all the trainers, especially the younger trainers that are listening. That’s easy to get away from because the assessments are easy to do but also easy not to do but I think, it’s one of the more critical parts of a training program at the beginning to know what you’re dealing with and what limitations your clients might fall into.
Julio Salado: And the paradox of really investing and learning how to assess whether it’s a movement screen or the biomechanics method, whatever it, you’re going to be very surprised how your exercises are just going to grow out of you. They’ll just going to come to you naturally because once you know the kinematic thing, the movement screen and its chemistries, you’re going to automatically look for exercises to help fill that need.
And then, with practice and time, you can do an assessment in less than 5 minutes. You can visually look at the biometrics and say, “I wouldn’t do this with you.” And that’s another important thing is to know what not to do with the client and that comes with time because we all can say, “I know what to do with you” but do you know what not to do with somebody right off the bat that adds more value to your service because part of training is also selling how to add value to your service and assessment is part of the whole package of training.
Doug Holt: I couldn’t agree with you more. What assessments do you do personally? Do you have certain assessments that you do with every client? I’m sure you have a whole toolbox that you pull-out but are there other key assessments that you’re always doing?
Julio Salado: Well that’s why I have a toolbox so I don’t have like one brand. I’ve gone through the function and movement screen. I worked with different organizations where they do like single balance. When I do my assessments, I always apply symmetries and look at the [18:56] look at the hips and look at the ankle mobility and then I work from there and all these postural. But I also look for movement on deficiencies and talk about movement and I also factor in modestly age, preconditions and what their goals are and then I just package it into what they’re looking for and again, it comes back to the value of it.
If somebody wants to lose weight and I understand, it feels the way I’m not saying “obese” just “overweight” and if I learn about their shoulder nagging them and they have a lifestyle that set eventually and they need [19:34] and that’s something structural, then I can say, “Hey, I’ll help you lose weight but I’m also going to help you with your needs, the [19:39] on your right side and I’m going to help you with your posture but I’ll work all that in for free along with you help me lose weight, so that’s value.
Doug Holt: Yeah, that’s a lot of value. Your average client let’s face it, wants to drop 5 or 10 lbs. and just look better naked, but when they come back to you and they didn’t realized they had any pain because they’ve been living with it so long and they come back to you and they’re able to play with their kids or do something they weren’t able to do previously, I mean, that’s why we’re in the industry, right? I mean just life-changing moments.
Julio Salado: Well moments, million dollar moments.
Doug Holt: Absolutely. So with that, do you record everything on paper or do you have a software program like BodyEvolver that you use?
Julio Salado: BodyEvolver, I’m very familiar. I know the gentleman who started that, he’s from Boston too.
Doug Holt: He is. We had Mike on the show.
Julio Salado: Mike D’Angelo. He’s an awesome guy. I’ve met him many years ago at one of the clubs here on air. He’s one of the guys are out to follow their lead. He’s in an entrepreneur and he’s still in the industry. But to answer your question, throughout the year as me learning different assessment tools, I created my own template. So my brand is Fitness Foundry and I created my own Fitness Foundry movement stream and it includes everything from single like balance to the basic overhead squat to [21:08] to see the rotary and symmetries and things like that. I even have a physical stretching.
Doug Holt: Can people find that in your website?
Julio Salado: No, I have my own personal thing that I have. But actually, it’s something because I’m looking more in my career doing more education. I’m glad you brought that out, so I never had thought about that and that probably was enthroned doing it in the future.
Doug Holt: You should reach out to Mike because you guys know each other. You guys can work together, you never know. It’s a beautiful thing about the fitness industry, it’s a lot of synergy out there.
Julio Salado: Yes, agree.
Doug Holt: If someone listening to this, obviously, they’re getting inspired because you’ve obviously had a lot of success. You talked about following other people in their footsteps and people are following. Here’s a hard question I’m going to toss to you. It might be a little tough but what book has made the biggest impact in your life and why? And it doesn’t just have to be fitness related, it could be any in general. But can you give me a book that has made a huge impact in your life and tell me why?
Julio Salado: It’s not necessarily a book but it’s actually a quote more than anything. It’s a quote from the Buddha and it’s in Sanskrit and it’s Buddha’s under the philosophy, it’s a way of living. And it basically says that, in Sanskrit, it’s called [22:25] and it’s on my website and basically says, “Come see for yourself” or in other words, always investigate prior to believing. So that’s something I apply to a lot of aspects in my life and also, it’s okay to ask question and always investigate. So when you learn and you exercise and you learn something, you should investigate, you know why this exercise affects the lower anything you like. So it’s not necessarily a book, it’s more of like…
Doug Holt: An act?
Julio Salado: Yeah. Like I said, it’s a powerful word like a mantra. I’ve come across that a little over 20 years ago and still think of the daily.
Doug Holt: I think that’s fantastic. It’s funny because as soon as you said that quote, a memory for me about 10 years ago popped in my head, I was at my training studio, somebody told me about an exercise that they love with clients and I was like “I’m definitely going to use this” and then I went to go try it and I was to hurt myself. I thought it was the most ill-conceived exercise ever. It sounded good but when I went and did it, I always most felt flattened myself. I wouldn’t even describe because it’s embarrassing.
But yeah, if I didn’t check it out myself, I would have just taken this person’s word on it and I’m sure it was me, it was the end user that had the problem, that wasn’t the person that given the recommendation. It’s a great quote. It’s the first thing it popped to my head. In perusing your website, I know you do some works with charities as do I, I do a lot of works with charities too, why is that important to you?
Julio Salado: It’s giving back. That’s just paying it forward. Someone has to do it and if we rely into another person to do it, then we’re really like not only a test in the buck but you’ll be surprised how much or any contribution does how much effect the community have. So it doesn’t have to be a million dollars, it could be 10 bucks. It could be the contribution of just time but just getting out of yourself and knowing that you are actually contributing in your community really helps not just the charity that you’re assisting but it gives you a sense of fulfilment and then you can’t buy that.
So it’s another paradox, it’s like, you have more from giving. That’s just been a part of me since I was a child because a lot of people gave to me a lot of charities. When I grew up, I think us as poor but there’s just something that was instilled in me when I was young to always give back and I continue that. And then going through, I continued as I get older.
Doug Holt: You mentioned earlier, can’t remember the exact words you’ve mentioned but going back, you judge people in values are more important to you than just knowledge or something to that extent and obviously, walk the walk with this.
Julio Salado: Yes, that definitely. And again, like everyone, someone has knowledge. Like they file with the lawyer, some lawyers, they go pro bono. In our industry, we have information that can actually change somebody’s life. It could be as simple as teaching somebody some ankle mobility exercises and then their need just comfortable as the way or could be a simple stretch. I don’t hoard the information I have, I share it. I also get to charities too.
Doug Holt: This is what I find. So maybe on the fact, if some looking for information or to see if you it’s the same with you. But the more I share, the more I feel it opens up more for me to learn too and more for me to receive. Do you find that with yourself as well?
Julio Salado: Yes, for sure. And sure it definitely opens me up. Some people don’t like to say because they may feel vulnerable but as they see the vulnerability that you grow, the uncomfortableness is where we grow and then it just becomes a part of your nature.
Doug Holt: I couldn’t agree with you more. Especially, in this industry as the fitness professionals grows and as our industry grows, this I hope that it doesn’t get into one of these industries where everybody is too scared to share information with each other because they worry about competition and that we go the opposite way of almost over-sharing with the idea that we can all grow together.
Julio Salado: Well yeah, that’s true. And sometimes, because of the internet and social media and everything, a lot of the information that I obtained for free now, it’s just being packaged and has a price tag on it. Yeah, it’s good to have structure but you know you still want to be able to make the information readily available to somebody who’s willing to learn and it’s something I believe in. And we don’t have to sell everything because that’s getting kind of out-of-control, that’s another topic though.
Doug Holt: Yeah. Everybody has to get to pay rent though, I get that. I guess, what I’m saying is to see if free exchanged information like you’re doing, taking time out of your day-to-day to come on to the show when you could be training a client making money, you’re doing out of the benevolence of your heart to give back to other people, I think that’s incredible.
Julio Salado: That’s true, I didn’t even think about that. I do that daily. I love mentoring trainers and I just love sharing.
Doug Holt: Yeah, we talked a little bit about that offline earlier before the call and it sounds like you do a lot of that mentoring and I really respect that. For someone just starting out, kind of like looking to make the next move in the industry in closing, what advice would you give them that the person just starting in the industry or the person that’s really trying to jump forward but hasn’t taken that leap yet?
Julio Salado: Well, you got to jump in with both feet and it’s a worthwhile investment and career. We are put in the position where you don’t have to have a doctorate to help change someone’s life and I’m not trying to be dramatic but we don’t have to have a doctorate degree to improve someone’s quality of life. And if you just follow the other person’s lead or if you go to a credited certification for training and then you follow the rest and figure out all the assessment and staying within your scope of knowledge and staying teachable, you’ll be surprised how your skills that will expand.
Next thing onto mind it would be a new moulds of training and always looking for the process in any modality of training but the mean potatoes of it, move in performance scale. If you can follow that, that came from someone else. And I also would like to add the four pillars to that is movement, performance, skill and then self-efficacy, that’s the fourth one because all of our clients, at the end, I don’t want they’re holding their hands for life. I want them to be able to be able to use the tools that I get on at any given time if that makes sense.
Doug Holt: Absolutely, I agree with you. Julio, I appreciate your time. We’re coming to the end here. Thank you again so much. If somebody wants to find out more information about you or reach out to you, where do they go?
Julio Salado: FitnessFoundry.net that’s where you can find me and all my health and fitness articles, videos and presentations.
Doug Holt: On behalf of all the team here at Fitness Professional Online, I really want to thank you again for taking the time today and jumping on with us.
Julio Salado: It’s my pleasure. It was awesome. Thank you again. And Foo, thank you too, the fitness [30:20].
Doug Holt: Send me that picture of Foo, I want to see her.
Julio Salado: That’s alright. I will.
Doug Holt: Another great interview from another great fitness professional. Julio is being on the East Coast that’s always fun. Me being on the West Coast to see whatever the people are doing and what they’re up to and we had a great chat offline. So we’ll definitely have Julio back on.
Please continue the discussion on our Facebook page. And again, just a reminder, go ahead and send in those applications or information request for that 2015 mastermind group that will fill up quickly. We really are looking for a diverse group of people.
So for some reason if you feel you’re not qualified, I encourage you to step up and really raise your game and put yourself out there by at least putting in your application and then for some reason it’s not a great fit for us, we’ll let you know why and help you grow so maybe you can make into the next round. From all of us at Fitness Professional Online, have a happy and healthy day.
Announcer: Thank you for listening to the Fitness Professional Online Radio Show. You can share your thoughts and join the discussion on this episode by going through our website or on Facebook.com/FitProOnline. Let us know what you’d like to hear on future shows and please feel free to contact us via e-mail or give us a call at (805) 500-6893. We look forward to hearing from you.
Links & Resources Mentioned In This Episode:
- 0share
- 0Facebook
- 0Twitter
- 0Pinterest
- 0LinkedIn
FPO Crew
Latest posts by FPO Crew
- The Fitness Industry Voting Results - March 26, 2018
- Greg Zuffelato of Too Busy To Eat - November 7, 2016
- Karsten Jensen – The Flexible Periodization Method - October 17, 2016
