Starting Strength spanish edition, please!!

[Pnigro]

Hi Mark!!

Big fan here from Costa Rica. Your book opened my eyes on how to properly performed the barbell exercises. I also purchased Practical Programming and it's awesome.

I've been to several different gyms here at Costa Rica and I am deeply concerned about how ignorant the instructors are. Of all the gyms I've been to, only 2 of them have squat racks, and they are used for trap exercises or other stuff. Nobody ever deadlift or squat. It's really really sad.

I seriously believe that if your book could be translated to spanish it would have a strong impact on many countries not just USA. I would love to give your book to many instructors over here.

I could give them the english version but most of them don't know that much english to completely understand it.

Please take into consideration releasing a spanish version of your books, or at least Starting Strength.

Thanks.

[Mark Rippetoe]

We have considered this, but the market for the book in the Spanish-speaking countries doesn't seem to be anywhere near as strong as it is in Europe, where English is spoken as a second language. We have only sold one book in Latin America, and maybe 10 in Spain. We don't know how many have been sold through Amazon, yours obviously, but not that many because our numbers are usually proportional to Amazon sales. I am forced to conclude that there is a lack of interest in this material in the Spanish-speaking countries, and maybe you could shed some light on why that might be.

[YuanHao]

Hi Rip,

Big fan of yours too thanks to Pnigro. I happen to go to the same gym that OP goes to and yes, it IS sad around here...

I'm thinking about some possible reasons (why the low sales in Latam):

1. Most of us international buyers use a PO box address in the US.

2. A very small percentage of the population (I dare say in Latin America) has a decent English as to fully understand your book. Personally I don't have a problem with my English, but I'm pretty sure it's frustrating to not know what "hamstring" means (there is no equivalent word in Spanish, so looking in a dictionary is partly futile). In fact, as far as I know any school/college/university/etc. hardly uses material that is not in Spanish.

3. IGNORANCE. No one knows what a squat is without a smith machine.

I'm hoping that reason #2 is the biggest problem on sales in Spanish-speaking countries, but I can't guarantee that SS or any of your books would be a best-seller around here. I'd definitely LOVE to see your book translated so that both Pnigro and me can shut trainers (and my sister, who happens to study physical therapy and told me that squats kill knees, go figure) for good once we do some heavy squatting/deadlifting and people start wondering how we got there in the first place.

[Atlas shrugged]

if you sit and explain it to them, many people who speak spanish get interested. but as the OP mentioned, most of the trainers in gyms are really REALLY ignorant about training, even worse than in the US. also, high school sports have about 1% of the importance that they have in the US, and let's face it, the only sport anyone really cares about is soccer, and i think very few soccer players equate being much stronger with being a much better player.
anyway, i do think there's some demand for it as i've translated parts of the book and sample routine+explanations into spanish for several people in mexico. many of them are interested in ordering the book but the fact that it's only in english discourages them.
you should +2 the number of copies sold to latin america because i bought them here and took them in the plane.
best,
your biggest sales rep south of the border

[DV]

A very small percentage of the population (I dare say in Latin America) has a decent English as to fully understand your book.

I have lived in Spain and several Latin American countries over the last decade, and the above is in my opinion the main reason for your slow sales. For this reason I don't believe that the interest in your book in English is an accurate way to measure potential interest of a Spanish version - quite the opposite really.

In Spain NO ONE uses English to communicate if they can avoid it. Seriously. You are never going to sell a significant amount of books in English there, believe me.

In Latin America I think the mailing technicalities muddle the picture. Surely there are more copies of Starting Strength in Latin America than in Spain - if for nothing else, then because they are more, and generally speak better English.

If I were to have ordered your books while in Latin America, I would certainly have had a friend get hold of it, and then get my hands on it when they visited, get it sent with UPS or something similar. And thus it would never be listed as an international sale.

I concur with the OP: Your books seem to be making a difference similar to (dare I make the comparison) Starrs way back when in shaping the way people train. It would be a shame if the Spanish speaking population got excluded. You could do a feasability study prior to translation, but it would probably cost more than the actual translation. There are cheap and skilled translators English-Spanish to be found in Latin America.

Dave

PS: How about a version in Chinese?! If you could get it past censorship, that is...

[Mark Rippetoe]

Thanks very much for this input. We shall discuss it.