Jan Griscom
One needs a version of those Harry Potter video newspapers to properly capture the energy and zeal of Jan Griscom, personal trainer at the Chelsea Piers, single mother of three, and frequent speaker at the New York City Ballet Workout Summits and their Dance for Wellness Days..
Griscom, who has been quoted in Prevention Magazine, Allure, Shape and More, is a no nonsense crusader for safe, sane exercise that does what it says it is supposed to. She has little patience for what she calls 'gym science' - misconceptions and misinterpretations of the workings of the body that are still prevalent today, still passed from trainer to student, and still believed as fact in spite of modern science and technology. She has made an art of investigating and explaining these inaccuracies in a way that laymen can understand and apply.
Exercise machines are neither a favorite nor a frequent device of hers. She believes the human body is one of the finest machines created, and noted that architects in the Far East are studying the human body, using its amazing combination of strength, stability and flexibility as a base for buildings' designs.
When she spoke at the studios of the School of American Ballet for the annual New York City Ballet Workout Summit this past June, and last year at the first Dance for Wellness Day, she walked in with an elastic band and a rope, and showed the participants how those small, simple, portable items, plus one's own body or a partner's will provide excellent equipment for cross-training.
If you are lucky enough to work against her own toned, taut form, or attend one of her lecture-demos, you'll find her uncannily accurate and quite sensitive about the body she is helping. Her touch is light but zones into the problem with the precision of the finest radar. More important, she can explain what works and what doesn't and why, eliciting a "Eureka!" response from her clients. Wide eyes, light bulbs of understanding and "I didn't know that's!" are frequently murmured during her sessions.
Griscom wants us to ask questions. Why are so many women working on inner/outer thigh machines but not getting results, except for bigger muscles? Because when one uses a muscle, it gets bigger, and because that machine doesn't do all people expect it to do. It can't because of the way the body is designed. Why are trainers telling teens to stay away from weight training until they are eighteen or older when that is exactly what they should be doing and when. Both sexes need to begin building bone mass to prevent osteoporosis, and during one's teens one has the most even ratios of strength, flexibility and endurance. Look at the best athletes and dancers, the ones pulling off technical moves that were once thought impossible. What ages are they? Why are people working so hard on elliptical machines when the human body does not move in an elliptical way? Why is the term six-pack still used when the correct term is a twelve-pack - and available only to a select few because of the body's design.
And speaking of abs, Griscom offers two things to those brave enough to ask her what to do. One we'll tell you now. She advocates "push ways" (as in from the table), adding that dieting is a key ingredient for getting that lean ab look." The other "The Slither," you'll read about next month. Special equipment? A towel and your own determination.
Why are women still afraid of weights and building too much muscle when we all use weights daily? It's called "gravity," Griscom points out. Unless we are swimming, everything we do is against gravity no matter what an exercise trainer may say.
Muscles shorten. An exercise cannot "lengthen" nor "elongate" muscles, because lengthening is not a muscle's active property. Muscles will return to their resting state or tonus by letting go from that contracted, shortened position. Muscles have "pull" power, not "push" power.
Griscom has a B.S. degree and is working on two Master's Degrees.
She will be returning to the New York City Ballet's Dance for Wellness Day Sept 16th in an extended session, back by popular demand with a longer session that was requested by previous participants.
" I believe that fitness should make sense and that the only magic should be the human body. It is a wonderful machine and if cared for will reward the owner always. I look forward to many opportunities to share with you what I believe about it. "
Look for more on Griscom next month, with more to follow from Griscom as she joins Dancer's writing staff.