In the 80’s and 90’s the shiny gym chains all across America were in their heyday. Slick marketing and high pressure membership drives brought in legions of Americans to chrome and neon fitness palaces in those heady days. Fitness gurus sprouted up all over the place from Jane Fonda to Richard Simmons to lead followers to the true road to fitness. The shift away from the big box mass consumer gyms has been going on for several years now. Greg Glassman and Crossfit have been in front of the drive away from the big box “Globo Gyms” as Glassman calls them. Recently, the Los Angeles Times ran the story, “Gym Payments Too Big A Stretch” in response to rising fuel prices where the author states more and more Americans are heading for outdoor parks where they can exercise free.

If people are working out in the parks and in their garages doing Crossfit, then the way they train has also been changing, away from expensive machines and complex equipment. Over the last few years, you have seen more routines featuring the “lost” exercises like bodyweight movements, old school implements like barbells, dumbells, and most recently, kettlebells and sandbags.

Exercise seems to be going “retro” and I think it is a good thing, (except for the new crop of gurus coming on the scene. Ok, call me cynical). People are rediscovering “old school” training methods from a bygone era. One of my friends, Steve Belanger has the “Old School Barbell Club“. Zach Even-Esh, founder of the popular UndergroundStrengthCoach.com has developed training programs around stones, sledghammers, barrels, sandbags, tires and more. Ross Enamait is one of the best trainers in the old school tried and true. Other leaders include Brooks Kubik, author of Dinosaur Training has defined the genre in his excellent book of the same name.

Author and friend, Ori Hofmekler has been advocating the dietary equivalent with his “Warrior Diet” in which he advocates a more simple, basic diet which calls for eating as close to the bottom of the food chain as possible for optimum health. It must be noted that Ori was also one of the early movers to a more functional appriach to training with his Controlled Fatigue Training (CFT). I was fortunate enough to have gotten several CFT training sessions with Ori and it is the real deal. Recently, Ori and one of the big names today in fitness, Marty Gallagher, have been doing Ori’s interesting and knowledgeable internet show, “The Warrior Within”. (By the way, it should be noted that both men despise the word “fitness”), Marty is one of the true giants in the strength game that has been out of the “scene” for a bit but has returned with a new book, “The Purposeful Primitive” about to be released July 1, 2008. I ordered a copy and learned it is 396 pages large! Here is a look at the Table of Contents. If you would like to get an idea about what Marty is all about, there is an article available for download at DragonDoor, titled “The Purposeful Primitive Pulls” .

I think all these new “Back to the Future” events and new faces in fitness are a good thing and as someone who worked out using machines for most of my life except for the last two years, I enjoy training like a primitive, a caveman, old school, whatever you want to call it. If you aren’t training old school yourself, take a look. It’s a lot of fun for being such hard work!