08 / martial arts illustrated

Bob Sykes talks to Ian McCranor about the out of control issue of obesity and why martial arts instructors should be at the vanguard of halting it...

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

martial arts illustrated / 09

Aformer England Karate international and longtime friend to the irrepressible Geoff Thompson, Ian McCranor is, to say the least, a well seasoned stu-dent from the school of hard knocks... Not

being one to live off the reputation of his past per-formances, the mighty McCranor has discovered a fresh way to channel his undying energies by impacting on what is today a multi-million pound slimming industry...

Bob Sykes: Ian, welcome back to MAI. Could you possibly tell me a little about your fresh approach to the martial arts?Ian McCranor: My new approach is very simple... While everyone has been clambering around, working out how they can get a piece of the MMA and self defence pie, I have been looking in a totally different direction.What I discovered is fascinating. There are 65 million people living in the United Kingdom - 46% of those are considered obese (very fat) while a massive 80% of Brits see themselves as carrying more weight than they are happy with. That 80% means only two out of every ten people I see today are happy with their weight and even they are only that way because they work at it. I also discovered that weight loss is a multi-billion pound a year industry, dwarfing anything that even the most illustrious MMA promoters make. I also discovered that 80% of people who try to lose weight fail and then fall victim to the scam artist who promises them success with either a pill or some sort of at-home workout device. After ten years living in the States and working with overweight individuals I had that eureka moment - I had discovered the real facts about permanent weight loss and it wasn’t about a particular diet or any one particular workout routine. How important do you feel it is for any martial arts instructor to set an example by

actually themselves being in shape?I now deal with facts rather than opinions - opinions are reserved for private conversations with friends these days. It’s a fact that the martial arts in Great Britain are in the pan. Standards are terrible, leading to the majority of martial arts clubs catering to children as children don’t ask questions and, to a child, it’s just one big game anyway. Do the instructors teaching children have to be in good shape? Dealing with facts again, the answer is no - there are many older, out of shape, but very experienced coaches from all sports who do a great job at passing on their knowledge. Being a role model and setting an example is a completely different matter though, and this is where the waters start to become a little muddy. Someone who wants to lose weight and decides to hire a personal trainer would look for a trainer in great shape, right? Wrong. People get fat for one reason, but remain fat for a completely different reason. People aren’t stupid - they know how to lose weight, they just don’t have the time or the motivation to do what’s required. A fat, out of shape bloke is not going to ask a fit, muscular trainer to help him get into shape because he feels embarrassed and intimidated - instead he will, in most cases, hire a fat trainer due to the empathy factor, and the problem with this approach is that expectations are often set too low. This has happened to the martial arts also. The expectation of what a martial arts instructor should look like has changed. A fit, muscular, disciplined athlete is not the cur-rent image - now here is where I cave and turn to opinion... I think it should be. How do you motivate someone to lose those extra pounds?Motivation is the key word, the buzz-word if you like. Motiva-tion is the missing link. The problem with losing weight is not a lack of information. There has never been a time where the information is so readily available, twenty four hours a day, seven days a week. Losing weight is one of the hardest things someone will ever have to do, but approaching it with all the correct information makes losing weight easily achievable for anyone. Your question was how do I motivate someone? Losing weight is not a one-size-fits-all solution and finding out how each person ticks is very important. One of the best

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examples I can give would be the lady who came to me with over 10 stone to lose - she had tried everything - or at least thought she had. Once I figured out what made her tick she dropped over five stone in the first four months. At the time of writing this, she is almost finished with weight loss forever. So how do I succeed where everyone else seems to fail? I use something I call Awareness, Focus. Here is how it works. Imagine for the purpose of this explanation a man who wanted to build a bigger biceps. The recommended and correct practise would be to lift a suitable amount of weight for the correct amount of repetitions. The next stage in the process would be adequate rest and diet... Yet, if any of these requirements are not adhered to then the desired results will not accrue. Now imagine this man has been doing everything correctly, but is not getting the results. I take a look at all the things he is doing and discover that he is not lifting enough weight, so I attempt to remedy the problem by giving him the correct amount of weight. He then tells me there is no way he can hold that weight due to the fact he has very weak wrist - something he had never bothered to mention before. In fact his weak wrists only came to light when he attempted to lift weights in the manner required, so he wasn’t aware of this problem himself. This is a great example of Awareness, Focus. By becoming aware of what is holding you back and focusing on it, you will bypass many of the pitfalls associ-ated with weight loss. The focus in this instance is now taken off building the bicep and attention is given to strengthen the wrists in order to accommodate the weight required to exercise the bicep. I have discovered that the majority of people on a weight loss programme are working with weak wrists ‘metaphorically speaking’ so failure is inevitable. Of course the man with weak wrists was just an analogy to explain what I believe to be the weight loss stumbling block. The lady who dropped five stone is a real person - her Awareness, Focus was life changing from the very first day. She, like most people had struggled for many years to drop even a couple of pounds, she had tried every diet and her home was full of workout DVDs. She absolutely believed that her body was not the type that could lose weight. As I mentioned previously, people get fat for one reason, but remain fat for another reason. So, I asked her to tell me why was she fat. Not what made her fat but ‘why’ she was fat. This is an incredibly important question that almost every fat person does not know the answer to. It took a while, but with a bit of probing she found the answer and a door to a whole new world burst open. She said she was fat because she felt she was invisible. Although she seemed a confident, outgoing person she was secretly shy and timid when it came to men - she was very uncomfortable with the idea of men chatting her up and would be mortified at

the prospect of the mating game interaction. Being fat was her invisibility cloak, no one saw her as she navigated life’s possi-bilities. Yes, she wanted to lose weight but wasn’t prepared to give up the ‘cloak’. Now that we were aware of the real issue we had our Focus.

Many would say that it is easy to talk about losing weight when you’re displaying a six pack, but what experience have you had, Ian? For starters, were you ever fat?This brings us back to the ‘empathy factor’ that I spoke about earlier where a fat person hires a fat personal trainer who, in most cases, steers the client in the direction of what they refer to as a ‘realistic goal.’ Losing weight is very hard work

and time consuming, but the rewards are life changing. I have clients regularly who, when asked, in a perfect world what weight would you like to get down to, they almost always choose a weight far short of what they can achieve - as though just losing scale weight is the ultimate goal. A man who weighs twenty stone and settles for being sixteen stone has done a great job, but really they are just now a lighter fat bloke. The scale is not the best ba-rometer, the scale simply measures how much weight is placed on it and doesn’t take into account fat around the heart or clogging the arteries. The scale is simply a compass letting you know that you are going in the right direction. You won’t get visible abs with exercise alone. You already have good abs, if you didn’t you wouldn’t be able to hold your-self upright. Your core is worked everyday simply by standing and bending. The only way you are going to see a six-pack is through a very strict diet. Exercise will thicken the muscle fibers, but all the exercises in the world will not show

off a six-pack if you are carrying too much fat.When I moved to the USA, I had some huge adjust-ments to make, any routines I had previously adopted in the UK were out of the window. I wasn’t competing any more so I had basically slowed down and taken things easy. In the first year I had gained close to five stone and didn’t even recognize the fact. It was only when I saw a picture of myself did I realize what had happened and here started my journey through the weight loss industry. People are fat because they do what is required to be fat. People are wealthy because they do what is required to be wealthy. The only thing stopping anyone from getting in the best shape of their lives is their own limitations and expectations.

So where does the martial arts aspect fit into all this?I am fortunate to have been involved in Karate at a time when physical conditioning was a major part of the training, this really isn’t the case in many clubs today. When I think of a

10 / martial arts illustrated martial arts illustrated / 11

martial artist or, in my case, a Karateka, I still picture an athlete - someone who looks the part. If I asked you to close your eyes and picture a professional footballer you would see the image of someone in great shape, the same would be true of a marathon runner etc... Now close your eyes and picture a martial artist. I am pretty confident I can say that you just had an image overload as your brain scanned through many files within your unconscious that produced images ranging from incred-ibly skillful to the downright bizarre. I am very sure most people will not picture fit, conditioned athletes unless they have only ever been subjected to the competitive element of the martial arts. As someone who was involved with competitive Karate at national and international level, I had to compete at a certain weight, so knowing how to eat to make weight, while still having the energy to fight ten or more matches was very important. Every athlete knows how to lose and how to maintain weight, so they are in a unique position as weight loss ‘mentors’. Many martial arts athletes have simply not yet recognized this fact yet. The martial arts have split into quite a few camps these days - this has always been the case, but even more splits have occurred. The camp that I am interested in is the one just mentioned, the one that recognises conditioning as a prerequisite and believe a martial arts practitioner to be a disciplined athlete as well as a skillful technician. I know this sounds very clichéd, but self-denial was a discipline associated with martial arts practise - a discipline that is sadly missing in today’s clubs and an essential component for permanent weight loss. The martial arts athlete possesses exactly what is required to be weight loss mentors.

So just how, in your opinion, Ian, does a martial arts instructor make the transi-tion from, let’s say, teaching kata to becoming a weight loss mentor?Weight loss is 80% about calorie balance - very easy to understand, but very difficult to adhere to. As I have already explained, I believe that getting someone to lose weight requires individuals to reinvent themselves - sim-ply giving them the information is not enough. For the martial arts instructor the transition from teaching their art to motivating people to lose weight is going to require them to reinvent themselves too, which is actually a lot easier than it sounds. Given the current climate, the martial arts instructor may

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

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FURTHERINFORMATION:Join the TaeRobics team at our

next instructors course on 11th

Sept. Contact taerobics@live.

co.uk or text/phone 07739

020100 for more information.

In keeping with MAI’s belief in

delivering information that you

can’t get anywhere else, we are

launching The Stop Being Fat

Network as a regular column

starting September 2011. Ian has

had tremendous success helping

people lose weight as well as

providing business opportunities

for martial arts instructors.

‘Are you fat?’ The Stop Being Fat

Network is asking this question

in next month’s magazine

and the answer may just have

you looking at yourself in a

completely different way...

12 / martial arts illustrated martial arts illustrated / 13

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

want to ask themselves a few questions. Are they happy and are they making a comfortable living? Martial arts instructors have no choice but to become involved with weight loss - it’s not a question of if they become involved, but ‘when’. Obesity is on the rise and weight loss is the subject of regular news reports, magazine articles and chat shows. I truly believe that retrained martial arts instructors now have the opportunity to attract the fastest growing, un-tapped market available to them in the form of the overweight, general public.

But many might say that the martial arts are about self-protection, not losing weight?The answer to ‘what are the martial arts all about’ will depend on whom you ask. Self protection has had its day actually - yes, many people have built their entire career around the subject and a great many martial arts instructors have jumped on the bandwagon, but real self-protection has now created its own identity and is seen as a stand-alone genre. When I say it has had its day, I am referring to its connection to the martial arts. Self-protection is not about being a skillful fighter, as all top self-protection advocates will no doubt echo. Yes you can cherry-pick individuals who are both martial artists and seasoned street fighters, but your average martial arts practitioner will never come close to a real altercation. This is a very interesting question as it brings to light another im-portant misconception about weight loss. Should you go and see a dietitian if you are looking to lose weight? Many would argue yes, but that is totally wrong. Again you can cherry-pick dietitians who are also fitness specialists but, to assume a dietitian can help you lose weight is to assume wrong. You will be amazed to know that I have many fat dietitians in my weight loss programs!Martial arts instructors will have far more success in helping people get into shape than they ever will producing fighters or people who can defend themselves. My job is to help martial arts instructors to recognise the difference and therefore their potential.

To be honest, Ian, I’ve never found it a problem but, in your opinion, how does one condition the mind to lose weight?This is the “what is the secret to weight loss’ question that every fat person is dying to know the answer to. Condition-ing the mind to achieve weight loss is really no different to conditioning it to achieve any goal. I know that many people use a computer as an analogy when talking about the mind

and for one good reason - a super computer called the human brain controls everything we do, therefore the information we program into it is vitally important. Let’s picture your brain as your home computer. You ask it to perform a task, it then searches for installed ‘software’ and it scans files until it locates the information you are searching for. Obviously, if you are searching for a file that is not installed on your computer it will not find it. People who attempt to lose weight go through a very similar process, the difference however is that the file located is often labeled ‘failure’. Every time someone fails at losing weight they create yet another file and every time they start another weight loss endeavor their super computer knows exactly where to ‘look’. Most people who go on a weight loss program are doomed to fail because the file labeled ‘success’ is simply not installed yet. If we all agree that the more you do something the better you get, then it’s really not surprising that millions of people are experts at weight loss ‘failure’.

So how do you programme them for weight loss success?All fat people need to be completely re-programmed as they are absolutely destined for failure right now. The re-programming cannot happen until an individual is ready to participate totally in the process.

So where does physical exercise fit into weight loss in your opinion?Physical exercise is the smallest part of weight loss, but it is the biggest influence on making weight loss possible. For example, you can work out for five hours a day and not shed a single pound if your calorie intake exceeds your calorie expenditure. The way in which you work out is far more important than the style of workout too. There is a chain of fitness clubs here in the States… let’s just call them Gym-Lumps. Gym-Lumps is a franchise that is very popular with fat people, in fact, if you ever felt inclined to watch fat people working out this is exactly where you would go. I know it sounds strange because if Gym-Lumps is a fitness club then you would expect that some people who go there would actually lose weight,

right? This is not the case though, Gym-Lumps has grown into a sort of fat person’s retreat - a gym that accommodates rather that motivates. A brilliant busi-ness strategy I have to say. Think of it this way - jail is supposed to be a punish-ment, a place so awful that you will make you think twice before committing another crime. For some people this is exactly what happens but, for many, jail is a college - a place for criminals to network and become better criminals. The only way to really stay out of jail is to stop being a criminal, requiring a complete lifestyle overhaul which is not easy when crime is the only life you know. Gym-Lumps provides an empathetic ear and enables its members to stay fat by creating a network of weight loss failures, which in turn has the same effect on each other. If someone really wants to lose weight they need to first accept some painful hard truths. They are fat because they do what is required to be fat, which is a choice... The only fat people you saw in Britain during the war were the wealthy, whilst everyone else survived on rations. Physical exercise is absolutely essential, not just because you are burning calories, but exercising in the correct manner creates a very powerful alter-ego that exists alongside of what you perceive as your reality. You have to work out in a manner that allows this alter-ego to take over and guide your every thought/action. When this happens

losing weight is not only a given, it is a breeze...

Ian, you look in great physical shape, I am guessing you put this down to TaeRobics - the workout you have established in the States and now bringing to the UK? Absolutely, Bob, TaeRobics is the hardest, most excit-ing workout I have ever been involved in, believe me, it’s not for the faint hearted, but it does produce some phenomenal results. As effective as it is, TaeRobics is not a stand-alone workout that gets the job ‘done’ by itself. TaeRobics is just a key that opens a door to incredible possibilities.Losing weight requires you to do things that you don’t like, let’s face it, if dropping those unwanted pounds was as simple as just doing something ‘fun’ you would be doing them already and regularly. If a fat person says, “Hey you need to come to the latest dance craze class, it’s so much fun...” you are not going to a place that facilitates weight loss or weight maintenance. The TaeRobics format wasn’t created to be fun - it was created to get results, the results make people excited, so they keep coming back. Let’s face it, the only people who enjoy dripping with sweat whilst gasping for their next breath as their muscles scream for mercy, are the exercise enthusiasts. A fat, out of shape person in a class for the first time will

not necessarily ‘enjoy’ it - they will struggle, hurt and feel totally out of their comfort zone, but this is exactly what is required. No one can ever give you the key to weight loss, you have to earn it.Bob, this is a very exciting time for us as a company, we now have people who have been through the first phase of instructors courses in the UK who are currently practising and building their own TaeRobics classes. We have a full time gym in Indianapolis, USA and our Stop Being Fat Network is about to be launched in the States and across the pond. Weight loss and personal conditioning is without a doubt the next big thing... Martial Arts Illustrated has a reputation of having its finger on the pulse and has never been afraid of court-ing controversial issue - you really can’t get any more controversial than calling someone fat! I would like to thank you, Bob, for being so open-minded and giving me the opportunity to bring this topic into the martial arts world and look forward to addressing this subject in much deeper detail in the coming months.

BOB SYKES

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weight etc... are all substitute words to soften the blow, so as not to hurt feelings. The lady who had enquired about having her body fat measured had fallen into the numbers trap that almost every fat person gets caught in - the number on the scale, inches around the waist. Both of which are relevant, but are only what I call the compass, they just let you know you are heading in the right direction. The word weight-loss when it refers to a human being, should be retired, made redun-dant, removed from the dictionary... Nobody is looking to lose weight - they are looking to lose fat and it’s about time we called a spade a spade. FAT is not a four letter word, it is not an insult or a slur - no one gets offended if you call them slim, fit, or muscular - nobody feels awkward when describing a fit looking colleague, searching for substitute words so to avoid the facts. As a male, if you have ever described yourself as heavy-set, a big man, large framed, portly, well-built or generously proportioned, then you are fat. I have even heard people in the martial art field describe themselves as ‘built for power!’ Being fat is a truth - calling yourself anything but the facts just makes you look foolish. ‘All bought and paid for’ is a diversionary verbal response that proclaims, ‘I did this to myself on purpose,’ so as not to be judged as a gluttonous fatty. If you are fat you are fat - you can’t hide this fact with witty terminology or creative labeling. ACCEPTANCEI know of many fat people who are completely happy with being fat - they love to eat and they love life - all power to them. It certainly is not my place to judge and tell people how to live. These people, however, are in the minority and, as you are reading this, I would guess this does not describe you. The Stop Being Fat Club is a place to open up - to tell it like it is, please or offend... You cannot change what you don’t acknowledge. As martial arts practitioners or even instructors we like to pride ourselves on being of a disciplined demeanor, but being fat is not something you can hide so its very presence destroys that illusion by revealing a weakness. We can all point to a skillful, tough martial artist who is also fat and thus proclaim that ability comes in all shapes and sizes and I would have to agree. The fact still remains, however, that you are fat because you want to be or because you don’t know how not to be.

IAN MAcCRANOR

Next month: Getting Ripped...

68 / martial arts illustrated

Ian McCranor tells it like it is as he encourages fat folk to call a spade a spade so they can accept their status in order to change it...

THE STOP BEING FAT CLUB

martial arts illustrated / 69

back at twenty five percent would she be happy with that?’ She replied, ‘Oh yeah, of course!’ I see this mindset every day. This lady was look-ing for a solution and it didn’t even matter if it was a contrived, miscalculated one. The fact that the mirror showed she was an out of shape, soft, flabby, pot bellied, miserable, single, unhealthy, forty-year old was of no consequence. If it had turned out that she measured a number that was deemed ‘acceptable’ she would have gone home a happy, out of shape, soft, flabby, pot bellied, single forty-year old... This lady is representative of many fat individuals. Visually, she is aware that she is fat but, emo-tionally, she has created a crutch to support her failings. I asked her if she had ever referred to herself as any of the following - plus size, over-

weight, curvy, full figured or B.B.W? This was a very important question, as the answer

would determine what our next move would be. I was very relieved that she

had only ever identified herself as be-ing overweight, as this was a place

she could remove herself from. Any one of the other terms would

have meant she had settled into a lifestyle - a place very few people can leave.

You can’t change what you don’t acknowledge... ‘A dieti-tian will tell you how to eat healthily. The mirror will

tell you that you are eating too much of it.’

There is no doubt the world is getting fatter, which is really quite bizarre considering the amount of weight loss information now available. The words ‘weight’ and ‘loss’ combined play a huge role in why obesity is on the rise. Weight loss, lose

I received a text message a few days ago from a client who had just recently started working out with me - the message simply said, ‘Can we do a

body fat measurement next time I am in the gym?’ So I sent a text back which said, ‘You can do your own body fat measurement right now and get spot on accurate results.’ She replied back ‘But I don’t have any equipment and I wouldn’t know how to do it.’ I then talked her through the very simple process. I told her to remove all of her clothes, go into a room where there is a good light and a full-length mirror. She responded and said ‘OK, did that. What’s next?’ I replied with ‘Look in the mirror. You’re fat.’ This lady is five foot, four inches tall and weighs fourteen stone. She isn’t a body-builder or power lifter, she is a stay-at-home-mum who leads a very sedentary life. She had wanted her body fat percentage checked as she had read that twenty five percent body fat for a female is quite good and she wondered how far away from that she was. So, at her next training session I asked her, ‘If I did actually measure you and it came

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Sumo Wrestlers - probably the only martial artists who need to be fat!