I hope you enjoy this post. If you want my help to build lean muscle & transform your body using a TRX suspension trainer anywhere – It was 2017.
I’d been travelling Central America for about 8 months with just a backpack and my suspension trainer.
I’d arrived in Vinales, Cuba and was looking for a place to stay, a ‘casa’.
I knocked on a door.
An older woman answered.
She spoke no English.
My Spanish was limited, but I could get by.
She had a room available and I needed somewhere to stay for a month while exploring the tobacco fields and valleys around Vinales.
Sounds strange, but that’s the way it works in Cuba.
She was warm and welcoming, so I took the room.
She let me workout in her garden.
Here we are…
I’d hang the suspension trainer from a tree and do my workout.
One morning, after about a week, she pointed at the suspension trainer and said something in Spanish I vaguely understood.
She pantomimed pulling movements. Pointed at her back. Then at the suspension trainer again.
Oh. She wants to try it.
She was probably 60 years old and was hunched forward from what looked like years of poor posture.
But she seemed genuinely curious. So I thought, why not?
I adjusted the straps for her.
Showed her how to do a basic back high row variation for posture.
And by the sixth rep, her arms were shaking. But she was smiling.
That one set turned into a 10-minute session.
I showed her how to squeeze her shoulder blades together.
How to keep her core tight.
How to breathe.
Slow, controlled movements. Focusing on the muscle. Enjoying the process.
That 10 mins turned into a 7 sessions over the course of my stay adding more exercises each time.
After 3 weeks, I had to leave to catch a bus to Havana.
So I left the suspension trainer with her as I was meeting my cousin in Havana and knew she could bring another.
She hugged me. I left.
Eighteen months later, I was back in Cuba.
I wasn’t sure if I’d even remember how to get to her house.
But I found it.
Knocked on the door… and she remembered me!
My Spanish was a lot better so we started conversing and she invited me in for a coffee.
And there it was, the suspension trainer, still hanging on the tree in her garden.
And you know what…
She looked better.
Imporved posture. Less hunched.
She’d lost weight.
And I think she moved with more ease.
Through my broken Spanish, I understood she’d been using it consistently.
Not every day. But most days.
Here’s the thing about Vinales, Cuba:
There are no gyms.
No supplement shops selling pre-workout or protein powder.
But this 60-year-old woman transformed her body and maintained it for 18 months with a suspension trainer and a simple routine.
If she can do it…
If someone with no fitness background, no English, no access to gyms, no “optimal” nutrition, no expensive equipment can do it…
What’s stopping anyone else?
The fitness industry wants you to believe transformation requires:
- Gym membership
- Heavy weights
- Expensive supplements
- Complex programs
- Hours of time
- Perfect nutrition
- Professional coaching
But that Cuban grandma proved all of that is BS.
She needed:
- One simple tool (suspension trainer)
- Basic technique (slow, controlled, focused)
- Consistency (showing up most days)
- 20 minutes (not hours)
That’s it.
And she stayed consistent for 18 months because she could feel it working.
And enjoyed it.
Every workout, she felt stronger.
Every week, she moved better.
Every month, she saw progress.
That’s the key to long-term consistency most people miss.
You don’t stay consistent because of willpower or motivation or discipline alone.
You stay consistent because you feel and see results.
When every workout makes you feel stronger…
When you notice your posture improving…
When you move with more ease…
When you see visible changes in your body…
You don’t need motivation.
You just keep going because it’s working.
That’s what muscle-centric technique does.
Slow, controlled movements that let you feel the muscle working.
Focused isolation that creates tangible results with progressive overload that shows you’re getting stronger.
The Cuban grandma wasn’t following some advanced program.
She was doing basic exercises, practising perfect technique, and feeling the muscles work.
I think about her often when I hear people’s excuses…
I just picture that 60-year-old Cuban woman hanging the suspension trainer from a tree in her garden.
Showing up 3 times a week.
Doing slow, controlled rows and squats and presses.
Feeling herself getting stronger.
If she can do it, anyone can do it.
So it begs the question, what’s your excuse?
Coach Adam
Founder, Fitness Freedom Athletes
P.S.
I wonder if she’s still using it. She’d be about 68 now. Part of me wants to go back to Vinales and knock on that door again. I bet the suspension trainer is still hanging from that tree. Some habits just stick when they make you feel that good.
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