Interview: Rob Leslie

Over the next few weeks I’m going to take my blog in a different direction interviewing athletes and coaches in the fitness industry. If there is anyone you would like to hear from please let me know?

First cab off the rank: Rob Leslie

Firstly, I would like to welcome Rob to the Blog and thank him for his time.

A little bit more information about Rob to give you an indication as to why I wanted to interview him. Rob has over 13 years’ experience in the fitness industry and has worked throughout Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom. He has a background in Rugby Union and is a former nationally ranked Olympic Weight Lifter.

Currently Rob works as the Athletic Development Coach at the St George Illawarra Dragons and runs his Exercise Physiology and Personal Training business “Perfect Form Fitness’ out of a studio gym in Caringbah. When I first met Rob in 2007 he was a Personal Training manager at Fitness First mentoring many Trainers and showing them his know how.

Rob has an Exercise Science Degree and is also an Accredited Exercise physiologist with a wealth of knowledge and experience in the fitness industry;

I hope you enjoy his interview.

Q: You’re the Athletic Development Coach at the St George Illawarra Dragons can you tell us a little bit more about what that involves?

A: Basically I fill the gap between the strength and conditioning coach and the physiotherapist. I work closely with our re-hab group in consultation with the physio and assist the strength and conditioning coach with our strength programming while taking charge of the functional strength and trunk strength part of the program. I also oversee the performance side of our High Performance unit which is our elite junior squad.

Q: How would you describe the differences in working with elite athletes and working with the general public in regards to exercise prescription?
A: The fundamentals essentially remain the same. Mobility must precede stability and stability must precede strength. There are, however two fundamental differences, firstly there needs to be a much greater emphasis on power when training athletes. Almost all sports require speed and power. Secondly, is the time factor. When dealing with professional athletes we have a lot more time to attend to all aspects of physical preparation. With general population time becomes even more valuable so you really need to focus on what is most important. That’s not to say that all of the training that athletes do isn’t important…

Q: Having seen you train regularly, I know you use Olympic lifts as a part of your training program -in your opinion do you think Olympic lifts are necessary for athletes? And do you think Olympic lifts should be used by non-sport playing clients?

A: As I have said power development is essential for almost all sports. Olympic lifting allows for possibly the highest power output of any gym based training program. With that in mind, I think most athletes should be progressively taught the Olympic lifts. The key word here is ‘’progressively’’. The difficulty with Olympic lifting comes with learning correct technique, and an often held view that Olympic lifts are ‘’high risk lifts’’. If technique is progressively taught by proficient coaches then the risk in these lifts is substantially reduced.
I think there is the opportunity to use Olympic lifts with some non-sport playing clients. Olympic lifts not only develop strength and power, they also promote good posture, engage all of the trunk muscles, emphasis the posterior chain (which is often weak in general populations), and are highly metabolically active lifts! Again, clients need to be progressively taught the lifts – it is no good teaching a client to dead lift one day and to power clean the next. That is asking for trouble! Acceptable levels of mobility and stability also need to be reached prior to attempting Olympic lifts, and the client’s injury history also needs to be taken into consideration.

Q: If you could only pick three exercises for your Athletes which three would you choose? And why?

A: I like to break the body up into 5 fundamental movement patterns: lower body push and pull and upper body push, pull and rotation. With that in mind it makes it very hard to choose just 3 exercises but given that criteria I will choose the following:
Squat: Best lower body push strength exercise.
Dead lift: Best lower body pull exercise. Also allows for progression to Olympic lifts and strengthens scapular retractors and core
Cable push pull with rotation: Allows for strength in upper body push and pull with rotation.
NB: I feel that bench press is on over used exercise in athletic preparation. Developing strength in a bilateral movement while lying on your back doesn’t make sense to me unless you are a power lifter. I would prefer to use this exercise sparingly.
Q: You’re a very well qualified Coach, for any new Coach or PT looking to get into the industry what courses/study would you recommend they do?

A: I wouldn’t recommend any specific courses; I think that is really an individual choice. However, I will say that continued training and development is essential for success in this industry. The best trainers never have to worry if they have enough CECs for registration! I also think that you need to match your skills to your client base, or your intended client base. Don’t do courses that will help your own training program, do courses that will help your clients training program!

You can check out more of Rob’s stuff here: www.perfectformfitness.com.au
Again, Thanks for your time Rob – appreciate you doing this interview, good luck at the Dragons for the rest of the season and I hope everyone reading has enjoyed it.
Cheers,
Dean.