FightSmith Training, Austin, TX (2026)

04/03/2026

Max testing- getting back into it. What started as a new diet and trying to lose weight quickly changed into a strength gain. I wasn’t trying to gain weight but rather gain muscle. Meaning
- I hate the calories my body needed to sustain my current weight
- I focused on daily intake of high end research backed protein levels: 2.2g per kg (1 gram per lb)
- five days of heavy HEAVY lifting.

This is the result of max increases after 8 weeks
Bench went from 285 to 325
Squat went from 315 to 385
Overhead press went from 145 to 180
Deadlift went from 405 to 475

Kind of crazy to think as I approach my 40th birthday, I’m literally the strongest I’ve ever been. 🤘

02/23/2024

To get to where you WANT to go, you need some metrics to understand where you are and how you got there.

I am a BIG believer in tracking your food.
Personally I think adopting someone else’s “meal plan” is a bad idea and sets up some bad habits- by that I mean, if I adopt a specific meal plan “to get healthy” then I associate good vs bad foods and “eat this when I want to lose weight”…and when you do lose the weight, what food do you go back to? Exactly.

I propose to track your own food. Make zero changes. Just track it. There’s all kinds of apps nowadays to do it free too: MyFitnessPal, LoseIt, Calory- or even trainer specific apps (like mine).

Ok so seriously, some things for free here. If I got you started on weight loss.

1- Start by tracking the food you’re already eating. Don’t worry about making changes. Just get 1 weeks worth of what your food habits are currently. It’ll be eye opening.

Yeah I know, tracking can seem difficult- I promise it’s not. Most major restaurants now have their food in those apps- like, their complete meals built out for you. So no worries if you eat out.
It’s even easier to log it. You cooked it right? You know exactly how much of everything went into it. Write it down on paper first if you need and actually plug it into the app later.
But week 1- track what you eat. Be honest. And accurate.

2- eat those same foods, BUT, try to hit the calorie goals by logging the amount first that meets your calorie goals. Then limit yourself to eat only what you calculated.

No magic food. No crazy changes to your diet. We can worry about protein, fat, carbs and sugar later. First things first- let’s focus on JUST calories.

3- Find that diet doesn’t work for you. Maybe constantly hungry now? Can’t fight temptation. NOW is the time we look back at your log and see what foods we need to swap or make small changes to. Fine tune it but still leave it with food that you actually LIKE.

That’s it.
Seriously.
That’s a small step in the right direction, but one that doesn’t totally rearrange your life with different grocery shopping, meal prepping or planning. Start small. That’s perfectly fine and maintainable.

🤘👍

02/16/2024

Tracking your food:
Honestly what I think is one of THE top things to do when getting into your health, especially when it comes to weight management.

Cuz here’s the deal:
Weight comes down to a balance of energy. How much you consume vs how much you use.
We like to focus on the workouts and the movement aspect, but not the food.
Which is super imbalanced. Think about it: you might workout once a day, three or four times a week?
But how often are you eating? That’s going to have WAY more time around it.

Tracking your food also offers a lot psychologically too.
- Tracking offers an actual quantitative measure to food. Focusing less on “good” or “bad” and removing the guessing game.
- It offers a comparison. How much are you ACTUALLY eating vs how much do you THINK you are eating. It can be super demotivating when you are using your feelings and assumptions of “doing everything right” but still not seeing a change on the scale. It’s your food. It’s always the food. You’re eating too much and you’re not aware. Tracking will absolutely smack you with reality.
- Tracking is also a little measure of accountability. Especially when you have someone else looking at your log and weigh ins. It’s a time to be honest. Mostly with yourself. Log the things you ate and drank. Honestly. Accurately. It forces you to be more mindful about what and how much you’re eating. Ya know, mindfulness in life being important and all that 😉

If you’re not tracking your food, and you’re struggling to see a change in your weight despite feeling like you’re doing all the “right” things…it’s time to start tracking.

Remember, this is about being your own scientist. We’re looking for hard metrics, actual numbers, to quantify our health. And remove the guesswork, and emotions, and how we assume we are doing.

🤘👍

02/14/2024

Activity levels 🤨
How active are you really?
When it comes to food tracking and understanding daily caloric needs, I have found the biggest stumbling block out of the gate for clients has been understanding their activity level.

Why is this important?
Your chosen activity level will determine the modified daily caloric amount. And honestly it’s a pretty stark difference between levels. By over assuming, you can STILL be eating a surplus of calories…and do all the right things, and yet still be gaining weight. Which of course is super defeating.

A lot of apps and calculators use a “workout” method when choosing your activity level: 1-3 moderate workouts a week, 3-4 high intensity a week, etc.

Personally I find it deceiving and we tend to overestimate the intensity we are regularly participating in. So instead, I prefer the National Institute of Health and National Library of Medicine’s measurement system:

Sedentary: less than 5,000 steps a day
Lightly active: 5k-7.5k steps a day
Somewhat active: 7.5k-10k steps a day
Active: 10k-12.5k steps a day
Very active: 12.5k+ steps a day

If you have a smart watch it’s already tracking your daily steps.
Your phone, if kept on you all day, can track your steps.
A simple step counter (pedometer) can also be worn to track your steps.

Point being, TRACK YOUR STEPS, and use actual measurements to find your appropriate caloric intake.
Save yourself a little bit of stress and time by using actual numbers and science for your health goals and not how you THINK you’re doing or how you feel.

02/09/2024

Weight management is seriously a game of math. And honestly it’s not near as complicated as it looks.

This is a reminder that we don’t need to over complicate things.
Yes, the formula I wrote on the board is an actual formula for figuring out what your daily caloric intake should be based on multiple variables: age, s*x, height, weight, and daily activity level.

But guess what? You can find this for free on a simple google search! Even basic meal tracking apps like MyFitnessPal, LoseIt, and even my own app has this formula BUILT IN. It’ll do the work for you.

And this is where we should all start. ALL OF US.
Don’t get super bogged down in the weeds of details, hot topics, and the current “big thing” to focus on. At the end of the day it’s a simple math equation:
Gain weight: eat more calories than your body needs
Maintain weight: eat the exact amount of calories your body needs
Lose weight: eat less calories than your body needs

Doesn’t matter what the program, diet or trends say. At the end of the day is a biophysical equation of energy. You gotta know what you need and understand energy requirements before you decide to change it.

01/31/2024

Education Time 📚✏️

Calories. Another hot topic in the fitness world. From fad diets to miracle supplements, it’s all about calories.

Yes, that’s right. No matter if you’re into Keto, intermittent fasting, paleo, or anything in between, weight management is all about calories. We get sucked into the FINE details because it’s trendy and sales. It’s nearly impossible to market and sale a product when you educate people instead of pushing magic beans…

So what do we need to learn?
Calories are just a unit of energy. The idea of calories through thermodynamics has been around since the 1800’s…meaning it’s not new science.

-You need to eat X amount of calories to keep your body going at a certain weight.
-You eat “X +” or more than, you’ll store that energy (calories). Typically as fat. That’s the body’s natural energy storage system- fat.
You eat “X -“ or less energy than what you need, and your body will use its storage as energy, ie “fat loss” or storage use.

Think of it like gas in a car…but also imagine in this scenario that your car has some growth principles.
If you fill the tank everyday with exactly the volume it needs, it stays the same and runs as expected.
If you continuously every day, fill the tank with more gas than it needs the car finds other places to store it, and grows. It continues to store the extra more and more until your car is much larger. In time, the extra weight will start to wear on parts more and more and cause issues down the road.
On the other side of that, if you don’t put in enough gas, the tank will get smaller. Continue that and the car will get smaller and smaller until there are also some serious wear and tear issues down the road.
A helpful analogy? Maybe not.

But it goes to show that there is a balance. The amount of energy we consume SHOULD be a direct correlation to what we intend to do with it…
-Too much, it WILL go to storage. Not to worry, you’ll probably use it with the energy boost.
-Way too, everyday, and it WILL get stored as fat. Period. Your body has limited options with chronic excess calories.
-Too little, your body will use up available storage, or fat.
-WAY too little, you’ll starve.

🤘👍

01/27/2024

⚠️ warning- some real talk and acceptance from me ⚠️

We’ve all seen it. The amazing before and after pics from health and fitness products, programs and influencers.
Some are blatant and you can tell it’s not even the same person. Some are simple tricks like this.
Literally SECONDS apart. Just change the angle of the camera and better lighting and 💥 bam, whole different person.

I’ve apparently been on a theme this week. Honestly a lot of it is due to what I have heard from people when talking about their motivation and their own fitness journey. I think a lot of it comes from the industry selling magic beans and snake oil to people.

I also think a lot of it, is that people are too trusting. There is very little accountability in most places, especially the health world. So you, the customer have got to start looking at the products and programs through a critical eye.
-Is the message based on science and research or full of anecdotal “client testimonials”
-is it evidence based (and is it cited with studies) or just makes claims like “science proven”, “industry standard”, “client approved”
-does it seem too good to be true: ie, does it break basic rules of nature- an extreme amount of fat loss or muscle gain in a very short amount of time
——————
Don’t get me wrong. Im not saying before/after pics are inherently wrong. They can be a great tool to show physical changes.
I am saying however, be critical when their is a SALE as the intent of the message.

And honestly…stop using comparison of what someone looks like as your basis to determine what YOU should look like.

Work on nutrition. Teach yourself portions and calories.
Eat more protein and worry less about what you “can’t have”
Get more steps and daily activity
Maybe touch a few weights 2-5 times a week. Nothing intense. Just a little something.
Drink water.
Get sleep.
Intentionally work on your mental health. Go to therapy. Journal your emotions. Actively work on how you talk about yourself.

Worry less on how to change the before to the after, and worry about the NOW.

01/23/2024

I truly cannot stress this enough: BE CAREFUL WITH HEALTH MARKETING

Im not trying to pick on magazines…really all “health and fitness” companies.
If what they are marketing seems too good to be true, then it is. The reality is pretty simple:
THERE ARE NO MAGIC TRICKS

There’s not a secret food
There’s not a secret fitness move
There’s not a secret diet

Especially when it comes to fat loss and management. There are truly two variables to control and several others that can help

1- Calories
You gotta know how much you’re eating. In our society today it’s super easy to overeat. If you’re not tracking your food then you honestly cant say how “good you’re eating”. You don’t know.
Step one is figuring out how many calories you need to either lose, maintain, or gain. Then track that food. Period.

2- Movement
You’ve gotta get that daily movement up. Not necessarily workouts. Just movement. Go for walks. Daily. Regularly. Hit that 10k spots.

Things that can help:
Getting enough water
Limiting or abstaining from alcohol
Get sleep
Lift some weights (you don’t need to be a powerlifter…just do some resistance training a few times a week)
——————
We’ve all fallen victim to the magic beans that the fitness industry tries to sell us. It’s mostly always an unfounded marketing scheme generated to make money. And if it helps you in the end, then great. But understand that isn’t their intention.

01/08/2024

Happy new year!
Much like myself and many others, you may be finding yourself starting new goals…or in some ways, feeling like you’re starting over.

And I have what I hope are some helpful tips with goals and starting fresh

1- You gotta be honest
Sounds ridiculous but it’s true. What do you REALLY want? And even more so, what are you actually willing to sacrifice. Because to reach any goal, you’re gonna have to give up a lot.
You can’t reach something you haven’t had before by continuing to do the same things that have kept you where you are. Maybe that sounds ridiculous and philosophical but it’s true.
If you want to lose weight, get in “better shape”, etc- then TRULY, you can’t eat the same, move the same, sleep the same, or generally live the same. A lot needs to change, for a lot to change.
Part b of this being honest- remove the guilt, shame, and what you think others want of you. What do YOU really want for you? Now find the courage to do that.

2- Start small
My god this one hits me so hard. We want BIG changes and we want them NOW.

This is why magic pill supplements and fat burning 6 week challenges are so popular. I’ve done them. I’ve promoted them. And I genuinely don’t know a single person that has done one of those and made LASTING changes. And let’s be honest, that’s your real goal.
Your goal is NOT “I want to lose 15 lbs and get in better shape…and then gain it all back after I lose it…and redo this whole process next year and be pi**ed off about it not sticking”.
So ditch the crash diets and the soul crushing boot camp “challenges”.

Start small. Go for more walks in the week. Are you not walking at all right now? Then make a plan for this weekend to go walk at least once this week. Make that a habit for a few weeks. Then add another day in a month or so.
Not drinking enough water? Add an extra glass first thing in the morning.
Not stretching enough? (That’s all of you. If you’ve ever complained about back pain, good chance that’s you. Stretch dummy.)
Just move around. Try to reach your toes and hold that spot where it’s comfortable for 30 seconds. Can’t reach your toes? Try again tomorrow.

POINT IS- find an honest goal and then start small

11/29/2023

Progress. I know it’s tough, but you gotta look at the long term.

If you haven’t watched my stories, here’s a little update cuz I know I haven’t posted much…

I’ve just been cranking away on “the norm”: daily walks, hitting my calorie goals, staying hydrated, and stretching.
No fancy workouts.
No complicated meal prep.
No specific program.

With one major goal. Get my weight back in check.
I wanted to take a year, not marketing fancy programs, not pushing my own agenda…but rather show you that controlling your diet and getting movement is truly all it takes to lose weight. No miracles pills, programs or gear.

And lo and behold, even after a birthday, Halloween parties, and Thanksgiving…weight is still going down.

As much as I want it to? NO
Over the past month or so has it gone up? YEAH.
Has that been disheartening? No.
THATS the new part of this learning in my own fitness journey.
It’s simple math: I enjoyed ALL the treats with reckless abandon and didn’t move that much. Weight went up.

It doesn’t mean it STILL HAS TO. The holidays aren’t a wash. Just because you stopped and enjoyed life doesn’t mean you say “F**K IT I’m gaining wait again and not doing my program so I’ll keep not doing it”…what?!

That makes no sense.
That’s like getting a flat on the highway, pulling over, and stabbing your other three tires. “Welp, ones flat so F**K IT”…

No.
Get back on track for a few weeks. And then when the holidays (ya know the WEEK of Xmas to new years…not the WHOLE damned month), comes around, enjoy things. And then get back to it!

Look at the long road.
Look at the long path.
Week to week data, weigh ins and measurements can be helpful. But be sure to focus on the weeks and months those days make up.
Chances are you’ve made SO MUCH more progress than you think you are.

FightSmith Training

04/03/2026

02/23/2024

02/16/2024

02/14/2024

02/09/2024

01/31/2024

01/27/2024

01/23/2024

01/08/2024

11/29/2023

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