Do You Need to Be Fit or Well Dressed for a Dating Bootcamp?

No. A Cold Approach Bootcamp has no skill floor, no fitness test and no wardrobe requirement. Every level is welcome. You should be able to spend long stretches on your feet, and you should show up clean and comfortable. Beyond that, nobody is grading your body or your clothes. What the coach works on is how you walk up, what you say and how you carry yourself while you say it.

Many men talk themselves out of booking because they think they must first lose weight, buy a new wardrobe or get their life in order. That plan postpones the thing that would help most.

A bootcamp for approaching women sounds like it is for a certain kind of man: gym-built, sharp dresser, already confident. A man who is none of those pictures himself standing next to a coach and feeling out of place.

The picture is wrong. The program is built for men who find approaching hard, and it specializes in approach anxiety. A man who feels self-conscious about his body or his clothes has the same kind of problem as a man who goes blank when he sees someone he wants to talk to. Both are the hesitation, and both are what the training is for.

The days are active. Every training day is two four-hour blocks in the field, and in the field means standing, walking and talking in streets, cafes and bars. You need to be able to do that.

You do not need to run, lift or be lean. If you can spend a long day sightseeing in a city, you can do a Bootcamp.

If you have a physical limit, tell your coach early. Private is the better choice if you want the pace to be yours alone, since it is 1-on-1 for one, two or three days. Group runs at no more than three students per coach.

There is no dress code in the program. Use judgment, as you would for a day out in the city and an evening at a bar.

• Clean, and fits you. Clothes that fit your body look better than expensive clothes that do not, and a good fit shows you take care of yourself.
• Comfortable shoes you have already broken in. You will be on your feet for hours.
• Suited to the weather. Miami and New York change a lot with the season.
• Something you feel good in. If you feel awkward in what you wear, you will think about it during the first thirty seconds of a conversation, and that is when you need your attention for her.

If you only have one decent outfit, wear it. If you have no idea what suits you, ask your coach. A few small changes can help, but a Bootcamp does not wait for them.

The four parts taught on every day are approaching and conversation, attraction and delivery, numbers and dates, and handling rejection. None of them is about owning the best jacket.

Delivery covers your voice, eye contact and posture. A man who stands tall, looks at the woman and speaks at a calm pace does better than a man in a nice shirt who mumbles at his shoes. a dating coach notes that confident body language can be improved, and a coach can see in real time what yours is saying.

Genuine interest matters too. A woman reacts to whether she feels noticed, not to how much a man's outfit cost.

Men ask this directly, so here is a direct answer. A Bootcamp does not screen for how you look. Women respond to many types of men, and the way you approach counts for more than most men expect. a dating coach says that in the end a man must accept what he looks like and play from there instead of apologizing for it.

He tells men who worry about height or other features to find the lowest level of self-acceptance they can live with and then act.

Getting fitter or improving your wardrobe is worth doing for its own sake. It helps your mood and how you feel about yourself. Just do not treat it as a prerequisite.

The sequence that tends to work better is to start approaching while you improve the rest. Confidence in approaching comes mostly from approaching. If you wait to feel ready, you tend to wait a long time.

Come as you are, in clean, comfortable clothes you feel decent in, rested and fed. Tell your coach about any physical limits. Leave the rest to the training.