What are good sources of info, particularly in the form of camps/certifications

[cheath]

In the "What's Wrong With CF" thread, one of the issues that came up was the ongoing learning, primarily through various certifications, attending seminars, etc. I was just wondering what resources you all know about that exist?

I know books can be a great source of information, but I personally find it more enjoyable, rewarding, etc., to attend an in-person camp/certification. I have a pipe-dream of owning a gym someday, and if I do that one important aspect of me would be to continually grow my body of knowledge. Hell, even if I don't ever own a gym, I'd still like to know what I could be doing if I had more money.

So what are some camps/seminars/certifications that you all have found valuable/respectable/worthwhile? Or are even aware of I guess.

I know SS has seminars that can lead to a certification. Greyskull seems to have a good reputation and offer seminars, though I don't find much about them.

[Tamara Reynolds]

At some point, I did a long write up about this on the CF forumz, and I think I posted about it here as well.

Based on my limited experience and what I currently do at my gym, I would have all potential coaches do the following, in this order:
1. USA Track and Field cert
2. Starting Strength Seminar
3. USAW Sport Performance Coach cert

Prior to the SS seminar, they need to have run linear progression and be comfortable with all of the lifts. Prior to the USAW Sport Performance Coach cert, they need to have run some sort of beginning weightlifting programming for a few months.

And, then they need to get on the platform and compete in something. After that, I would tell them to do some advanced/specialty seminars based on their interests. If they have been competing in weightlifting, then I would certainly send them to Rip and Moser's Oly seminar. For powerlifting, I'm not sure. I haven't competed in powerlifting, and I'm not sure what the "good" seminars are.

Now, I don't think the USAW seminar provides the most fabulous information, but I think it is useful to have that background information if you are planning to coach weightlifting in any way. I learned a lot just by having a group of 20 different lifters in front of me, and I will actually be going to hang out at another USAW cert next weekend.

Starting Strength was by far the most useful coaching seminar I've done. I would highly recommend the USA Track and Field cert as a prerequisite to the SS Seminar. Most people do NOT pass Rip's seminar. It helps to go in prepared, and the USATF cert is excellent and serves that purpose, especially from the anatomy and biomechanics side of things. I went to the SS Seminar a second time, and it was much different being there after having spent more time under the bar and also after doing the USATF cert. I'm going down to Atlanta next month and bringing one of my coaches with me to do Steve's SS squat camp, and I am sure that I will come away with new information.

I've done a handful of other certs and seminars, but these were the most useful. More useful to me has been the one-on-one time that I've had with my own weightlifting coach for the last year, as well as the opportunities I've had to extensively pick other coaches' brains as much as they will let me. Also, competing in meets helped me better understand how to coach other beginning lifters at meets, which is why I think all coaches need to get on the platform themselves.

And, this is all said with me being a beginning coach, so I recommend these things based on the assumption that the person taking my advice is also relatively new to lifting and to coaching lifting.

Under no circumstances would I ever recommend that anyone spend $1000 on a CrossFit Level 1 cert. But, if someone insists on coaching CrossFit, then I would tell them to go ahead and spend the money on Jeff Tucker's Gymnastics cert, which is excellent and will probably prevent a lot of unnecessary injuries in their gym.

[PaulBeech]

I recently got the usaw sports performance cert. It was hosted at california strength by Glenn Pendlay. I thought the course was great and I learned a lot from it. My only gripe with it was the number of people on the course. At one point I was being coached by five different people all saying different things, which got confusing and frustrating very quickly. Most of them were crossfitters too! I also wouldn't recommend it to someone with no prior lifting experience already.

[Tamara Reynolds]

Any idiot can take the USAW seminar and pass it. When I did mine, there were a few people there who had literally NEVER done a snatch or a clean before. But, of course, it would be less of a waste of everyone's time and money if that weren't the case.

The first Olympic lifting seminar I did was with the Wilkes brothers back in the height of my CrossFit meth addict days. At the end of the seminar, they said, "Now you need to go home and start snatching, cleaning and jerking at least three times a week. If you don't, you just wasted your money here." Well, I didn't listen. I went home and went back to doing CrossFit WODs. When I was ready to start taking Olympic lifting seriously, I started working one on one with a coach every single week. Then, I did Glenn's seminar through MuscleDriver, and my entire plan was that after the seminar, I was just doing Olympic lifts. And, that was that. I went home and started weightlifting three times a week.

I had a full year of CrossFit under my belt before I started running any sort of linear progression. In that year of CrossFit, I squatted heavy (not in a WOD) about five times. Five times in one year. In my first two weeks of LP, I squatted more than I had in a year of CrossFit.

This is why it is important to get under the bar and to take that experience with you to any seminar you attend. I am still a beginning lifter and a beginning coach, but how in the fucking fuck could I expect to teach a new lifter how to squat after only squatting five times ever? Same with the snatch or the clean and jerk. I understood the squat a whole lot better after squatting multiple times per week on LP. Now, I squat, front squat, snatch, clean and jerk six days a week. It gives me a lot of time to practice.

I would also recommend training with as many different coaches and other lifters as possible. Even if you don't agree with someone's philosophy or method of teaching the lifts, I think you can still learn from them. Sometimes, you hear something in a different way, and it just clicks. Sometimes, the cue that works for you as a lifter is not the one that works for your lifters when you are the coach. I had a friend and fellow weightlifter come train with me last month. She gave me a new cue and a new drill for the snatch, and all of a sudden, a whole bunch of things made sense.