Charlie Cates

Charlie Cates is the leading consultant to high-level professional, college, & high school basketball players in the Chicagoland area for injury prevention, recovery, & muscle performance. As a certified Muscle Activation Techniques® MATRx practitioner & former college basketball player, he uses his personal experience & understanding of the game & player demands to create customized exercise options for his clients to recover faster & perform their best. He is certified in the highest levels of MAT®, including MATRx, MATRx Stim, and MAT® Athlete. Follow him on Instagram @CharlieCates!

Can’t feel the exercises you are doing? Read this.

Check out a snippet from Charlie’s most recent article on FitnessProfessionalOnline.com, titled “Why Your Clients May Not Be Able To Feel The Exercises You Are Doing With Them“!

“Have you ever had a client that just couldn’t feel the exercise where you wanted them to?  Every time you would do a chest press, all they could feel were their deltoids.  Or if you did deadlifts, they only felt their hamstrings, never their glutes.  You tried cueing them differently or changing how they would do the exercise, but still, they just couldn’t feel the muscles you were trying to work.

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By Charlie Cates, ago

7 Exercise Tips If Your Body Has Been Getting Achier For No Apparent Reason

Many prospective clients tell me that their body seems to be getting achier for no apparent reason.  They weren’t in any accident.  They don’t have any surgeries to speak of.  In fact, they have been relatively healthy their entire lives and cannot pinpoint a single injury or trauma.  Yet, it seems that their bodies continue to get achier with each passing year.  Activities they once loved to do now take a toll on them.  Playing with grandkids, chores around the house, and exercising as they once did leave them feeling beat up.  And the number one scapegoat seems to be the aging process.

As a certified personal trainer and Muscle Activation Techniques™ specialist in Schaumburg, I run across these scenarios a lot with prospective clients.  After they have been cleared by their medical professional for regular exercise, there are seven tips I suggest they incorporate into their exercise plans. (more…)

By Charlie Cates, ago

Healthy Feet (Part Three): Why your feet MUST be stable.

In Part One of the Healthy Feet series, I wrote about why your feet must absolutely be able to move.  Your feet are made up of 28 bones and over 50 joints, and each one of these need to be able to move in order for the joints to remain healthy.  In Part Two, I wrote about why your muscles need to be strong in order to support the bones and joints of your feet.  I also recommended three different exercises that you can do to help improve the strength of your feet.  Now, we need to talk about why your feet must be stable in order for them to be healthy.

What??  Feet need to be both mobile AND stable?? (more…)

By Charlie Cates, ago

Testimonial: Justin Ehrhardt – Head Trainer at CrossFit Rise

Justin Ehrhardt, head trainer at CrossFit Rise in Schaumburg, describes his experience with Muscle Activation Techniques™ (MAT™) and MATRx™ with Charlie Cates at Muscle Activation Schaumburg.  Justin gives details about the PR’s he has hit since beginning his MATRx™ sessions, and the suprising increases in strength, performance, and mobility that he has noticed. (more…)

By Charlie Cates, ago

Healthy Feet (Part Two): Three At-Home Exercises to Help Strengthen Your Feet

In last week’s post, I discussed why your feet need to move.  To recap, your feet are made up of many bones and joints.  In order for each of the joints to stay healthy, they have to be able to move. Performing exercises for the muscles of your feet can help with this.

One of the most effective ways of ensuring that your joints are able to move is to make sure your muscles are working well.  Why?  Because the number one purpose of muscles is to help position and control joints.  In other words, muscles help your joints move, so making sure your muscles are working well will help to make sure your joints are moving well.  As a certified personal trainer and Muscle Activation Techniques™ specialist in Schaumburg, this is a conversation I often have with my clients. (more…)

By Charlie Cates, ago

Healthy Feet (Part One): Why Your Feet NEED To Move

As a certified personal trainer and Muscle Activation Techniques™ specialist in Schaumburg, I understand the importance of having healthy feet.  In fact, making sure my clients have healthy feet is of great importance to me because of how often we use our feet.  Nearly every physical activity is heavily dependent on your feet being healthy, stable, and functioning well.  Furthermore, issues that begin in the feet can quickly impact the health and function of the rest of the body. (more…)

By Charlie Cates, ago

Organic Exercise

You likely understand that in order for your body to work as well as it can, you should not be eating a diet based around cookies and cupcakes. However, when it comes to exercising, you may be stuck on a metaphorical dessert-heavy diet. As a Muscle Activation Techniques™ specialist and certified personal trainer in Schaumburg, I often have to discuss with my clients the difference between exercising for health and exercising for entertainment.

While what you are currently doing for exercise may seem more fun and entertaining than it’s healthy “organic” counterpart, understand that if you only eat the foods that are highly processed, eventually you are not going to feel well. Likewise, while the high-intensity, made-for-tv-esque exercises may be appropriate for your body from time to time, if that is your only form of exercise, eventually your body is going to be needing something “healthier”. (more…)

By Charlie Cates, ago

5 Exercise Tips If Your Back Tightens Up In The Car

One of the top physical complaints I hear from prospective clients is that their back tightens up when they drive for longer periods of time.  They often have to change from favoring one hip to another as they shift their body weight back and forth during their trips.  And when they finally arrive at their destination, there can be some difficulty getting out of the car right away because their back and hips feel tight.

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More times than not it has been recommended to them that they need to spend more time stretching their low back and hips so they don’t tighten up so easily.  While there may be some merit to this kind of suggestion, I offer up a different solution that they don’t often hear – they need to find the muscles that are too loose and tighten them up. (more…)

By Charlie Cates, ago

5 Ways To Change Up Your Workout So You Don’t Get Bored

Bored with exercise?  Finding that your current workout plan is a drag?  Interested in learning new ways to change up what you are doing?  Looking for some tips to amplify your results at the gym?

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Join us on Monday, November 7 for our final Exercise For Life Talk of the year!  At Muscle Activation Schaumburg, certified personal trainers, Julie Errington and Charlie Cates, will be discussing five simple ways to completely transform your current exercise routine.  In this live workshop, Julie and Charlie will be teaching you some of their biggest secrets that they use with their clients to provide a world class exercise experience and make exercising feel like it has never felt before. (more…)

By Charlie Cates, ago