Ashley Conrad is who the stars call when they want to get in shape, and get in shape fast. Named one of"America's Top 10 Celebrity Trainers" by Oxygen magazine, Ashley is one of the most sought after and fitness trainers in Hollywood. Her signature program,"Ashley Conrad Clutch" system, has earned her a diverse clientele that includes A-list celebrities like Bradley Cooper and Kate Hudson, professional athletes, runway and fitness models.

We spoke with Ashley Conrad about her "Clutch" system, the right and wrong way to burn fat and lose weight, and how you can soon reep the same benefits her celebrity clientele does!

Can you tell us a little bit about how you got into the business?

Sure, well, I've been an athlete my whole life. I played basketball at USC and after USC I was going to school for physical rehabilitation with athletes, so to make money I began personal training, which was something I had done in high school - parents would want their kids to train with me and have me do with them what I did and yada yada - that's kind of how I started. Then when I was in college (post-grad) I started training here in LA, and I actually started at 24-hr Fitness because I didn't really know how I wanted to go about procuring clients. My methods of training are slightly different then I think what's typically done so I think it's how like in LA if you're good at what you do word spreads quickly, and that's exactly what happened to me. I had a whole slew of clients and a bunch of celebrities within a couple months, and then decided to set up my company Clutch Body Shop to kind of fill the niche/need that I saw here in LA for a company that sort of provided a high-end clientele everything they could possibly need to get their bodies back to where it needs to be.

That's interesting - 24-Hr Fitness!?

It's so funny...not to sound too old school but I think in today's times these kids are coming out of college, it's such a hard job market, and people have such pride that they're so afraid to start off somewhere not at the top. Like for me, I was a high caliber athlete, so I was like "Oh my God, I can't believe I have to work for somebody who actually isn't even an athlete! You know it was a little bit of a blow to the ego, but I think you just have to do what you need to do to get where you want to be.

Can you describe your system - The Clutch System?

Basically what it is it's a system that's comprised of 3 things: Exercise, food and supplements. The way the system is designed it has the capacity to change someone's body within basically 7 days of going on it. It can be used to change somebody's body within 24 hrs if necessary. It's a system that works with your body so it makes it very easy for your body to let go of weight, build lean muscle, and it gives you more energy so as oppose to a lot of these crash diets and extreme lengths people go to lose weight and look great on camera. You actually eat more and work out less on this system, and in a way in which it works completely with your body's metabolism so that you're burning through calories and it just makes it really easy to get your body where it needs to be.

Yeah, I feel like there's this huge misconception about just working out in general and having to do hours of cardio. Doesn't that end up having the reverse effect if you do too much cardio?

You want to know something? I have this conversation in particular with female clients all the time. This is what I want to write the book on. It's kind of one of those conversations that's a little tricky because okay, there are 2 parts to this: 1. People have been so mislead by all these stupid fad diets and books and all this crap that's out there because everybody wants to make a dollar. So they'll tell people that they hardly have to do anything and they will lose weight. That's not true. What is true though, especially in regards to women, is everything that controls like any function of the body - in regards to this conversation of building our bodies to burn fat and put on lean muscle - those are controlled by hormones.

So with that being said, when you are working out too much - which is like 2 hrs a day - excessive amounts of cardio on top of not enough sleep and everybody just being completely over caffeinated, overstressed and overworked, your body stays in a constant fight or flight mode. So exercise is no longer this kind of stress relief or about being healthy. It's all about vanity and trying to get your body as lean as possible. So people go to these excessive lengths with exercise to try and drop weight, but what ends up happening is your body thinks it's under attack. It literally goes into flight or flight - it's 2 steps: your cortisol rises , adrenals get blown out, and then everything in the body shifts. Your body's natural growth hormone and testosterone levels are completely suppressed and your body absolutely cannot burn fat - you will not lose any more weight.

With my female clients who come to me, new clients and especially actresses, I think the old school way of thinking is 'Oh I have to work out 2 hours a day'...'Oh I have to do an hour of cardio' and they've been working with some trainer that's been kind of powering this into their head and they're like 'Yeah I lost weight initially, but now it's impossible for me to lose weight'. It's because your body is rebelling! It's saying, 'Okay this is going to keep happening so I have to now slow your metabolism just to survive!' So yeah what I do is not that - it's not 2 hours a day to work out. My clients don't have two hours a day to work out - their schedules are insane.

Page 2 >>