It finally feels like summer here in Boston. Last week at this time it was 50 degrees outside, and I was wearing sweatpants to work. It could have been worse, though. On Memorial Day – which was earlier this week – there were people up in Vermont and in the Adirondack region in Upstate NY digging out of two-feet of snow. A week before June! Crazy.
I’ll take 50 degrees over two feet of snow any day.
Nonetheless, yesterday was the first 90+ degree day in Boston and it was glorious. I happened to have the day off from work so I was able kick back a bit and enjoy it putting in some quality time reading outside and rocking the early stages of a farmer’s tan.
Today is a bit hectic only in the sense that Lisa and I are hosting a girl from Colombia for the next three weeks, so I was placed on apartment cleaning duties for most of the morning. And let me just say I can Swiffer like no one’s business!
To give a bit of the back story: Around two years ago Lisa made the trek to Colombia as part of a youth sports development initiative through one of the higher academic institutions here in Boston. She stayed with a host family for ten days in Medellin and was immersed in their culture while visiting various sport/club groups and institutions in and around the city to see if she could offer any feedback as to how to make things run more smoothly.
Lisa fell in love with her host family, and likewise them with her. They’ve corresponded throughout the years and their oldest daughter, Christina, who’s expressed an interest in journalism, is coming to Boston for three weeks to stay with us as she completes a pseudo “internship” at a local latino based publication in the downtown area.
Lisa jokingly mentioned to me yesterday that “I’m so excited, we’re going to have a teenager for three weeks!” To which I replied, “no boys”
Totally kidding.
But I’m not.
Anyways, I need to get back to cleaning. So, here’s some stuff I think you should check out:
Paleo? Vegan? Low Carb? High Carb? Intermittent Fasting? The Unicorn Tears Diet? Which is best? Which is a fad?
There’s no shortage of diet “groups” out there, and likewise, there’s no shortage of people walking around wondering what the hell it is they’re supposed to eat. One week eggs are the bees knees. The next, they’re worse than Hitler.
In this excellent article by Dr. Berardi and the peeps over at Precision Nutrition, they lay it down like this:
I don’t believe there’s a single, absolutely, positively, without-a-doubt best diet for every person to follow, always, and forever.
Running with the same theme as above, in this article Jen discussing an alarming, often popular tactic used by many online “diet gurus” that’s just flat out asinine.
That’s all I’m going to give you. You’ll just have to click on the article to find out.
For those who aren’t familiar with the good Doc, he’s easily one of the most passionate people I’ve ever met and he’s someone whom I respect a lot.
He’s obviously learned a lot throughout the years, and this article, while not completely fitness related, offers a gulf of sage advice that will just make you a better human being in general.
There’s no question that lunges (and all of their infinite variations) have a ton of efficacy as well as have their place in any well-designed strength & conditioning program, which is why we utilize them quite a bit at Cressey Performance.
I don’t think I have to go into any great detail as to why performing single leg work is important. For that just go read any one of the bazillion-gazillion-cajillion articles that Ben Bruno has written on the topic….;o)
For those that need a bit of a primer or cajoling, though, the main benefit(s) include but aren’t limited to:
1. Improved athletic performance.
2. Improved core and hip stability.
3. Joint health.
4. Improved strength.
5. Reduced spinal loading.
6. Curing bad breath.
Yada, yada, yada….so on and so forth…..to name a few.
All that said, while people aren’t shy to include them as part of their weekly routine and reap their benefits (high five!), I have to say, many (and by “many” I mean – M.A.N.Y), really go out of their way to butcher technique.
For example, whenever I travel and have to grab a lift at a commercial gym I can’t help but observe other people training. I can’t help it – it’s the strength coach in me, and it’s pretty much second nature, kind of like putting on my right sock before my left, saying “bless you” after someone sneezes, or vomiting a little bit in my mouth every time I hear a story of Justin Bieber acting kind of douchey.
On one hand I have to give some people the benefit of the doubt. While I could be nit-picky, go all John Madden on them, bust out my X’s and O’s board, and break down everything they’re doing wrong, at least they’re doing something worthwhile and not curling in the squat rack.
On the other, and what really grinds my gears, is when I watch personal trainers allowing their clients to perform exercises with atrocious technique, act all cavalier, and don’t do anything to fix or adjust the problem(s).
And lunges rank high on the list in terms of those that tend to be the most “WTF is (s)he doing?” worthy.
Sure, I can sit here and discuss stride length, rounded shoulders, forward head posture, heels coming off the ground, knee valgus, or any number of other “offenses,” but today I want to share one simple, often overlooked, albeit very important, coaching cue that will undoubtedly help clean up one’s lunging technique.
And it pertains to locking down the rib cage.
The short video (1:23) below helps to clarify my thoughts while also demonstrating that when I wear my glasses I look really, really intelligent and obviously know what I’m talking about:
As a quick FYI: For those interested in more single leg badassery, I’d highly encourage you to check out Mike Robertsosn’s Single Leg Solution, which contains a ton of useful information from anatomy, how to train around injuries, exercise technique, and exercise progressions.
Today’s guest post comes to you from Michael Anderson, Boston based strength coach and personal trainer. Mike has contributed a handful of posts on this site, and this one is yet another fantastic piece.
Enjoy!
The medicine ball is often seen as an archaic tool because they’ve been around for so long. Sand filled balls were used as training tools for wrestlers 3000 years ago in Persia and Greece. Savages who were preparing to do hand to hand battle were using these, and now they’ve been relegated to this; being used by dorky personal trainers to load their weak clients in a crappy exercise.
<=== Ahhhhhhh, My eyes. MY EYES!!!!!!!
Frankly, this is B to the S. This makes me as mad as seeing people using kettlebells instead of dumbbells for regular exercises like biceps curls or triceps extensions. The 18-pound kettlebell you’re curling with shouldn’t even be considered a real kettlebell! But I digress; that’s a topic for a different day.
Medicine balls can, and should, be used to make you explosive as hell. Notice that I used the word “explosive” and not “strong”. Medicine balls should be used in a forceful fashion; save the nice controlled tempo for barbells and dumbbells.
Note from TG:although, to be fair (and I think Mike will agree), I’ll always encourage people to be “explosive” with their DB and BB exercises as well – particularly on the concentric or overcoming portion of the lift.
It’s just that with med ball training, the objective – ALWAYS – is to be explosive and to help develop power.
These things are strong (or should be). They are made to be tough, rugged and to take a beating. Unless you’re a medicine ball that is unlucky enough to be destined for Cressey Performance.
Note from TG (again):There’s no question that we absolutely crush med ball at Cressey Performance. We used to use First Place med balls exclusively (pictured above), and had great success with them, but at some point they changed rubber manufacturers and their durability went down the tubes.
What once took a few weeks (if not months) to eventually break, turned into days…..sometime hours.
Now we use DynaMax med balls and love them.
Here are some of the most common medicine ball mistakes that I have seen during my time in both commercial gyms and strength facilities:
Not throwing the damned ball.
More often than not, when I see someone doing a medicine ball drill, they are simply completing the exercise in a fashion that could most aptly be described as “flaccid”.
Moving a MB with a submaximal force does nothing besides make you look like a turd. When you step up to do a drill, you should be prepared to produce the maximal amount of force that you can for the given exercise. This is not the time to be gentle: act like you are trying to kill something with the ball. Anything less and you won’t be getting the right training effect.
Hey there! It’s me again, TG:Two great cues we like to use at CP when people are quote on quote “being turds” while throwing the med ball are:
1. “It’s a ball, not an egg – THROW IT!”
2. “Try to break the ball. If you do, here’s a $20 bill with your name written all over it.” Note: you should actually have a $20 bill….;o)
Here is an example of how different they will look: one is powerful and awesome. One is lazy and foolish.
Using a ball that is too heavy.
A ball that is too heavy is going to limit the amount of velocity (v=d/t…check me out with the equation!) that you can produce.
The name of the game when throwing a medicine ball is to move it as quickly as violently as possible. Yes, you can argue, that throwing a heavier ball will result in the produce of more force (f=m*a). This is true in theory, but not in practice.
Using a heavy ball will simply make you move slowly, and you want to move fast. If it doesn’t look fast, it’s not fast. Mike Boyle used to tell people to “make it look athletic”. Clumsily throwing a ball thats too heavy certainly doesn’t look athletic.
Using the bounce
This is a personal preference, to be honest. I find that it’s analogous to jumping back down after completing a box jump. I want each rep to be a separate entity so that you are only concerned about being able to produce as much force as possible for each rep.
Using the bounce of the ball allows you to move faster through the exercise, but not produce more force. While there is nothing wrong with the other way, I simply think too many people rely on it. There may be instances when you want your athletes to learn to quickly receive the ball and return it forcefully, but it’s a more advanced variation that has a more limited application.
Using them to mimic sporting movements
This is one that falls on the coach specifically. If any coach or trainer starts telling you, as an athlete, that they will be utilizing medicine balls/loaded balls to strengthen your sporting motion, tell them to sit on a blender. Throwing or shooting a weighted ball will do nothing but murder your mechanics and probably inflict some serious injury to your joints. A baseball weighs 5 oz and a basketball weighs 20 oz, performing your mechanics with a ball that is twice the weight will simply butcher anything you go do on the court afterwards.
Note from TG:We do implement SOME weighted ball drills with SOME of our pitchers – typically at the end of their throwing session at a distance of 10 or so feet into the matting. But as a whole, they encompass a fraction (10-15 throws total) of their total throwing volume.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=JQWyRk0n1MM
Thanks for reading today! I hope you enjoyed it, and if you get a chance please go check this out (http://operationrun365.blogspot.com/) and help a great cause. Have a great day and go lift something heavy!
When asked to name popular dynamic duos many people will inevitably toss out examples such as Batman and Robin, The British Bulldogs, Thelma and Louis, peanut butter & jelly, and while many non-nerdy types will gloss over this last one, even Optimus Prime and Megatron were once BFFs and “brothers-in-arms” while on their home planet of Cybertron. That is, of course, until their friendship turned into an episode of Gossip Girl.
You see Optimus was given the title of Prime by the Council of Cybertron, a title that Megatron felt was rightfully his. Megatron called Optimus a big, fat meanie head. Optimus was like, “oh no you didn’t!” And then all hell broke loose, and the two brought their little disagreement to Earth.
And while I’d love to sit here and discuss Transformer mythology with you until the cows come home, I know that’s not necessarily the reason you log onto this site on a daily basis. Besides, I have some pretty BIG news and more important matters address.
Speaking of dynamic duos, both Dean Somerset and myself are going to be putting on a two-day workshop here in the greater Boston area the weekend of July 27th. Saturday July 27th and Sunday July 28th to be exact.
Dean and Tony’s Excellent Workshop High Five
While we’re half jokingly using that as the title, anyone who reads our respective blogs understands that even though Dean and I like to NOT take ourselves too seriously, we also pride ourselves on providing top-notch information and doing our part(s) in trying to make the industry better.
This workshop is going to be our attempt at doing just that.
Our goal is to cover a litany of topics ranging from assessment to corrective exercise to exercise technique to how long it takes before I start saying “eh” every other sentence from hanging out with Dean for an entire weekend.
Pssst: Dean’s Canadian…..;o)
In all seriousness we’re really excited about this opportunity, and while the goal is to target personal trainers and coaches, anyone who has an interest in fitness and making people better would gain a lot from attending this workshop. As Dean put it:
You’ll be able to follow along even if you’ve never taken an exercise physiology course or worked as a trainer before. If you know the difference between your diaphragm and your knee, you should do alright.
The workshop itself will be held on my home-turf, Cressey Performance, and for those curious CEUs will be provided!
Also of note: our goal is to keep this fairly “intimate” and small(ish) in size, as we’d really like to give people the opportunity to interact as much as possible with myself and Dean. To that end, we’re capping the number to 30 attendees.
Space is expected to go quickly, so if you’re teetering on whether or not you should come (and you totally should!), you’ll want to take advantage of the early bird special as soon as you can.
For more information – including topics covered, dates, cost, hotel info, etc, please follow the link below. Really hope to see you there!
Unfortunately I have to keep this one pretty short today. Lisa’s dad and step-mother flew into town yesterday from the Dallas/Ft. Worth area and after taking them out to a nice dinner, we all walked back to our apartment where Amanda (Lisa’s step-mother), busted out her iPad so that we could all play Ellen DeGeneres’ game Heads Up.
For those unfamiliar (which was the case with me less than twelve hours ago), it’s simply a word guessing game where your friends try to get you to say the word on the screen by giving you hints. Only with Heads Up, you hold the phone or iPad above your head and it records video of your friend giving hints. You have sixty seconds to guess as many words as you can.
It’s basically Blind Man’s Bluff meets charades, but with video.
And let me just say it’s sooooooooooo addicting. Lets just put in this way: there may or may not exist video of me imitating Forrest Gump, a Canadian, and Elmo.
Not to brag or anything, but my Forrest Gump is pretty spot on. And, surprisingly, my Elmo wasn’t too shabby either. At one point I had Lisa crying in laughter.
So basically this was just a long-winded way of saying that we slept in this AM, and here’s some stuff you should check out:
Outside of having one of the most epic mustaches in human history (^^^), David is also the owner of Movement Minneapolis, as well as someone who’s long championed the sentiment of auto-regulation.
We’ve all been there. Some days we feel like rock stars heading into the gym. while on others we feel like we’ve gotten run over by a mack truck.
With respects to the latter, is it best to suck it up and train anyways?
Sometimes, yes. Sometimes, no. But according to David…….usually no. But that doesn’t mean curling up on the couch and catching up on episodes of Teen Mom.
It may just mean nixing your planned workout and going with Plan B or C instead.
Coincidentally Plan C almost always entails some form of bicep curls. Just sayin……
In this well written and well researched editorial piece, TC dives into some of the research behind the efficacy of probiotics. We’re literally just scraping the tip of the iceberg as far as understanding the role that bacteria play in our gut, but you’d be hard pressed to get that notion from all the hippie naturopaths out there claiming to know otherwise.
Fair warning: this isn’t going to be the type of post which delves into anything remotely strength and conditioning related. So if you’re in the mood for talking shop on things like hamstring “tightness” and how I think that’s a BS term (neural or protective tension is more like it), periodization, deadlift technique, or something as inane as whether or not I feel a 501 tempo is better than a 402 tempo for muscular gains (Hint: does it really matter?), I’m sorry to say, you’re out of luck today.
It’s my blog – deal with it…….;o)
Nope, today’s post is going to have a bit more of an introspective feel or flavor to it. Which, coincidentally, after Mint Oreo, is my second favorite flavor of ice-cream.
The impetus behind today’s post stems from something I read over on writer Jeff Goins’ site, which happens to be one of my favorite blogs dealing with the whole topic of writing and how much of a cluster**** that can be.
Yesterday he had a pretty cool guest post by a guy named Darrell Vesterfelt on the whole notion of faking it till you make it.
Not to play all spoiler king or anything, but this guy Darrell? He’s not a fan.
I’ll let you read the actual post if you’re interested, but to give a brief gist: in the world of social media, where some are constantly under pressure to be “on,” it often breeds an environment where there’s a lot of pressure to perform. As a result this whole notion of faking it till you make it rears its ugly head.
Speaking honestly, I do believe there’s a time and place where this sentiment is perfectly justified. For example, with each intern class that comes to Cressey Performance, many of them, not surprisingly, are wet under the ears and a wee bit intimidated or overwhelmed when tossed underneath the proverbial microscope and asked to coach someone how to squat or to take someone through an entire training session.
Maybe even doubly so when asked to do so with either myself, Eric, or any of other coaches watching their every step.
Upon their initial orientation we let every intern understand that they’re not going to be “supervised” 24/7 and that we encourage a bit of autonomy. By that same token we expect them to be able to coach things like foam rolling, dynamic warm-up drills, or even a push-up well on day one.
As the days and weeks progress, and we’re able to coach them up ourselves, take them through a few staff-inservices, and engage them in more one-on-one scenarios, they’ll undoubtedly gain more confidence in their abilities.
On the off chance that a scenario arises where they have no idea what a certain exercise or movement is we often use the whole “fake it till you make it” mantra with them, because at the end of the day we want to ensure that our athletes and clients have confidence in THEM.
I mean, what does it say if an athlete looks at their program asks one of the interns what a certain exercise is and then said intern looks around, utters a bunch of “um’s” and “uh’s,” and then starts hyperventilating into a brown paper bag?
Of course we don’t want them making stuff up out of thin air – before you know it, people are juggling oranges on BOSU balls – and it might just be something as simple as taking a few moments to ask myself or any of the other CP staff a quick question.
But still, there IS a semblance of confidence that serves as a nice prerequisite to it all.
On the flip side, however, I think it says a lot when someone can recognize they don’t know what they’re talking about, that they don’t have all the answers, and that they don’t pretend to be someone they’re not.
Sadly, while not always, this is a sentiment that fails to catch on in the world of the internet. Everyone is an expert or guru or world renowned.
Please, tell me, how can you label yourself “world renowned” when you still live with your parents? Better yet, how are you able to give yourself such an acclaimed title when you’ve only been training people for less than six months?
Perusing the internet you’d think everyone out there was training professional athletes, making six figures, and writing the next best e-book on how to get the abz.
While this may be the case for some, clearly, people tend to be giving themselves a little too much credit.
Hell, I’ll throw myself under the bus. I’m often asked how I became so successful and how I was able to build a respectable following through my blog and other social media outlets?
Here’s the cold truth: I still have student debt (not a lot, but I still have it. And thankfully, that’s the ONLY debt I have). I still drive my beat up Hyundai Elantra that I bought back in 2002. It’s 500 miles away from hitting 200,000 total, the check engine light has been on for the past three years, and it’s a wonder that I haven’t been ticketed for noise pollution when driving it through the city.
Based off the reaming I received my dental hygienest yesterday, I don’t nearly floss enough. Oops.
I’m scared to death of putting myself out there and taking risks. I’m constantly asked when I’m going to be writing a book or producing my own fitness content, and while I’ve made strides to do both (ahem, Muscles Imbalances Revealed – Upper Body and Spinal Health & Core Training Seminar), there’s still half of me that seemingly bullies the other half into holding back.
I’m not infallible, and contrary to some, I’m not world renowned. Far from it.
But don’t get me wrong, I’m good at what I do and feel I’m better than the average cat. But I try not to pull off any self illusions of grandeur in the process.
But I think it’s that “realness” and non-sense of entitlement that often gravitates people to this blog, and my writing in general.
As Darrell pointed out in his post linked above:
Real connection happens when – and only when – you’re completely honest.
There are plenty of people out there who brag about their 400+ lb bench press. It’s amazing how many people out there are elite benchers. I can count on one hand the total number of people I’ve seen bench press over 400 lbs – and that includes a year of training at South Side Barbell in Stratford, CT back in the day (circa 2005-2006) alongside some ginormous, very strong dudes.
Note: South Side Barbell no longer exists.
Want to know something else about me? I HATE benching. Pretty blasphemous words coming from a strength coach, right?
This isn’t to say I don’t find value in the lift, recognize there’s a lot of efficacy towards its use, and go out of my way to coach it well. It’s just for me personally, I’d rather go to a Zumba class than bench press.
My best bench is 315 lbs, and if you held a gun to my head today I’d be lucky to eek out a rep at 285. Paltry numbers compared to most. Especially on the internet.
I can DL like a mofo, though.
If there’s anything I can relay to people out there reading – especially those who are looking to write a (successful) blog – it’s this: STOP BEING FAKE!!!!!!!!
Nothing trumpets this sentiment more than THIS heartfelt, humorous, REAL blog post I came across recently by Erika Heidewald.
Erika used to write about how “healthy” she was, when what she was really doing was hiding her eating disorder from family and friends the entire time.
This parallels much of what I see in the e-world. Where people take on another persona altogether in order to convey a certain image or hold onto some standard.
If you don’t actually train people (like, in real life) why do you write about how to train people? Sadly, this happens more often than you think.
If you write about a certain way to eat – whether it’s Paleo, Intermittent Fasting, high fat, no fat, replacing all calorie laden drinks with unicorn tears, whatever – and don’t follow the same “rules” yourself……………..like, WTF!?!?!?!?!?
Note: I actually know of a popular fitness personality who has written several best selling diet books who admitted – to a friend of mine – that he never follows his own advice. Pretty shady.
If you haven’t ever actually performed the OLY lifts, why are you espousing their benefits or calling people out if they don’t include them themselves?
If you’ve never trained a female athlete, what makes you an authority on “female specific training?” Does such a thing even exist?
If, if, if, if, if, if. I could easily keep going.
If dingle berries were diamonds, I could open a Kay Jewelers in my pants.
HA – count it!
All of this to say, sometimes, it’s best to NOT fake it till you make it and actually just own up to who you really are. Is that so bad?
For most of you who read this blog on a regular basis, I don’t really need to introduce Dean Somerset. The man is quickly climbing the “kind of a big deal” ladder in the fitness community, and has really gained a reputation for being one of the brightest minds in the industry.
For those who aren’t familiar, here’s a brief introduction:
1. He’s a strength coach as well as the Medical & Rehabilitation coordinator at World Health, located in Edmonton, Alberta.
2. He’s a regular contributing author on T-Nation.com, as well as writes a pretty kick-ass blog HERE.
3. He’s the co-contributor to several DVD compilations such the Muscles Imbalances Revealed series (both the lower and upper body versions), as well as the Spinal Health and Core Training Seminar of which I was part of as well.
4. He can deadlift in the mid-400s (and 500 is just around the corner).
5. His wife, Lindsay, is an accomplished tri-athlete and has recently qualified for world competition over in Europe!
6. He owns two dogs, and loves rainbows.
Okay, I made the rainbow part up. But come on: I had to bust his chops in some way.
Dean just released his brand spankin new product, Post Rehab Essentials 2.o today, and I wanted to give people more of an inside scoop as to what to expect from it.
Unlike most sequels, which suck (yeah, I’m talking to you The Hangover Part II), PRE 2.0 really takes the information offered in the first edition and takes it to another level.
Speaking candidly, I’ve only just started to watch the videos myself, but from what I’ve seen thus far – I’m pumped that this information is going to be making its rounds. It’s undoubtedly going to make people (and the industry as a whole) better!
I can’t even begin to tell you how much I was nodding my head in agreement as I was watching the first section. It got to the point where I was high-fiving my computer screen.
Nevertheless, below is a candid interview that Dean and I did the other day which, outside of discussing the product itself, is chock full of knowledge bombs in of itself.
Enjoy!
TG:Dean! Okay, lets cut to the chase: I know you’re an Oilers fan, but they unfortunately didn’t make it to the playoffs. Are there any teams left on the docket that you’re rooting for?
Side Note for a little TG Trivia: I for one, have never been to an NHL hockey game, and while the Bruins are still in the chase, sadly, the only time I’ve ever stepped foot in TD Garden (where both the Bruins and Celtics play) was for a live Star Wars in Concert event.
Literally there was a live orchestra playing music from Star Wars with a giant screen playing scenes from all the movies in the background. Upping he geek-factor ante, Anthony Daniels (who plays C3PO in all the films) was there in person narrating the event.
Too, Lisa dressed her hair up in Princess Leia “buns,” and we had our picture taken with a live StormTrooper.
It was pretty much the greatest day in my life. True story.
DS: Funny enough, I’m probably one of the very few Canadians who not only doesn’t play hockey but never even learned how to skate. I only started watching hockey a few years ago and didn’t even know what offside was until 2010.
That being said, I do watch the Oilers when they play because it gives some good water cooler talk while I’m training clients. Plus, I may or may not be eventually working with them directly in the coming seasons, and recently had a chance to do all the exit testing on the entire team for this current season, which was pretty cool.
I just want a Canadian team to win so that Montreal has something less to cheer about as they were the last Canadian team to win the cup back in 1994 (I think).
TG:So, I was a huge fan of the first edition of Post Rehab Essentials, and I really felt it was a product that helped me better understand the assessment process as well as hone my programming writing skills. Like a ninja.
First off: what was the impetus behind releasing a second, more awesomer version?
What does this version contain that the other didn’t?
And Secondly: what do “we” actually mean when we use the term “post rehab?”
DS: Awesome questions. Much like you, I train people all day long and do things like writing and blogs on the side. I try to stay up on research as much as possible given the number of hours in a day, and try to view my own clientele as a cross section of average people, in which I can test to see if certain things provide better benefits or worse.
If something doesn’t seem to hold up across the board, I toss it out. If it’s something that’s universally effective for the vast majority of my clients, I continue to use it. When I put out the first version, my thinking of how the body worked was in one place. This current version represents the refinement of those thought process and includes a broader implementation of the concepts instead of spending as much time talking about the theory and anatomy.
That’s still there, but I wanted to make this more of a hands-on version.
For your second part, post rehab essentially means once you’ve received medical contact and have been cleared to begin a workout program in a guided setting.
Think of if you go into a chiropractor with a really sore back. They crack you, and send you out. You go into the gym not knowing whether you can do your favourite exercise program of high volume leg presses, stiff leg deadlifts and elbow to knee crunches.
What do you do? You find someone who has gone through Post Rehab Essentials V.2.0 to make sure they have tools to work with that won’t cause them to become a walking bag of fail.
TG: Since this is a product that’s targeted towards personal trainers and coaches (and for those who are just fitness nerds in general), where do you feel most tend to miss the boat with regards to writing effective programming?
DS: Another great question. I feel that trainers have forgotten how to coach. We’re more concerned with giving the exercise than teaching the client how to do it properly. Stu McGill has said there’s no bad exercise for the spine, just contraindicated ones for the specific individual, and even then every exercise is bad if done incorrectly.
This video series brings back the coaching aspect to training and helps you understand how to get someone out of a poor spinal position with their exercises, how to hip hinge, what it means when their shoulders shrug into their ears, and how to fix that. These simple fixes can represent about 90% of every training program.
Correct exercise is corrective in nature.
TG: OMG!! Yes!!! I couldn’t have said that better myself. Whenever we start with a new intern class almost always they want to dive into assessment on day #1. Much like you I’m under the mindset that they need to LEARN HOW TO COACH, and do it well, before we start discussing the finer points like assessing hip IR/ER or discussing the differences between flexion vs. extension based back pain.
One of the main points you covered in PRE 2.0 that really hit home for me is the whole concept of protective tension. Put another way: people aren’t nearly as “tight” and stiff as they think more as they’re actually just really, and I mean REALLY unstable.
Can you kinda give everyone a Cliff Notes/Laymen’s terms synopsis of this whole phenomena?
DS: Muscles are pretty dumb creatures. They’re the slave of the nervous system, and if the brain says to contract, they will. If it doesn’t say to contract, they won’t. It’s really that simple. If you have a muscle that is constantly “tight” and won’t release no matter how much work you do to it with respect to stretching or SMR work, you may need to ask why it’s tight in the first place. Typically it’s trying to provide some form of stability for another area that isn’t being held tight enough.
Think of the hip flexors as a classic example. I’ve found that when people who have chronically tight hip flexors, they also tend to have very unstable spines coupled with weak abs. The same thing goes for tight posterior hips and lateral core stability.
Note from TG: For those looking for a cool demonstration of what we’re talking about, I’d HIGHLY encourage you to watch the video below. It’s eleven or so minutes that will blow your mind.
TG: Breathing and breathing patterns are all the rage in the industry nowadays. I’ll admit that we use a fair share of them at Cressey Performance and that we find there’s a TON of efficacy for their implementation.
I’ve seen firsthand the kind of voo-doo magic that breathing drills and diaphragmatic correction can have on many common injuries and dysfunctions.
What do you feel are the major benefits/take-aways that most people can gain from paying more attention to them?
DS: Core stability comes from the interplay of the pelvic floor, diaphragm, obliques, rectus abdominis, and multifidus (plus quadratus lumborum, but who’s counting). When you want to have a stable spine to lift stupidly heavy things, having the ability to squeeze your core tight between these structures is incredibly important. Likewise, recovering from hard workouts comes down to breathing through your entire lung deeply, rather than just shallow breathing through your upper ribs and shoulders.
The shoulders hang off the ribs. If there’s any issue with the ribs, the shoulders will be directly involved, meaning potential shoulder issues could have their roots in faulty breathing mechanics. People with low back pain breathe in a very guarded manner, which affects their core stability in a negative way. People with hip issues tend to be back breathers, forgetting how to get their diaphragm going. You picking up what I’m putting down yet??
Endurance athletes benefit the most from breathing work as that’s their gas tank. If I can get a runner to do a breathing exercise and it means their threshold speed goes up by a half mile an hour (true story) with no other intervention, it’s pretty important. I’ve had people breathe for 5 minutes and double their squat depth.
Breathing effects everything you try to affect.
TG: You also cover core training and what that actually means. So, what does the word “core” mean to you?
DS: You mean teh abz?? In reality, core training is pretty simple. Make the core reactive so that it can contract really hard and make the spine stiff and strong, and then train it to pulse on and off.
Think of a baseball pitch.
The windup really doesn’t involve a lot of max core contraction. But at a certain point, the core has to brace incredibly tight, incredibly quick, and then turn down the tension at another point of the follow through so as to generate a whip effect. If the core was simply tense the entire time, you wouldn’t get any whip, and you would most likely throw molases off the mound instead of heat.
Likewise, with people who have a history of back pain, they has a defect in the ability to generate tension through their core and brace their spine, and then create a hip movement or a shoulder movement to propel stuff into or through other stuff. They tend to either hold on to tension too long or not generate tension quick enough to get stabile to control the spine during movement. It’s sort of like watching Lindsay Lohan walk down the street.
Core training typically involves learning how to brace the core in a neutral spine position, then getting them to control that neutral spine while either creating movement in other joints or resisting forces being applied to their body that try to push them out of neutral spine. Once they can do that, we can start looking to hit up things like heavy deadlifts, backflips, and cutting off that truck full of gun lovers on the free way.
The End
And there you have it folks. Post Rehab Essentials v. 2.0 is on sale for this week only! The entire set is shot in HD, and you’ll get immediate access once you purchase. If you’re a fitness professional or just someone who loves learning about the human body and performance, I can’t recommend this one enough. It’s a game changer for sure.
I recently had the pleasure (and honor) to have my very first article posted up on BodyBuilding.com at the tail end of last week. As it happened I was contacted by one of their fitness editors asking if I’d be interested in providing some monthly content, and I of course jumped at the chance.
But only under two conditions:
1. That I’d have a fair amount of autonomy and be able to focus my writing towards universal themes such as placing a premium on strength as well as having the opportunity to teach/coach people on proper exercise technique (in addition to addressing common myths and fallacies such as squatting deep is bad for your knees or that Keanu Reeves is somehow, somewhere, considered a good actor.)
2. That they’d include a link to my blog on my bio page. Their Alexa ranking (a site which ranks websites off of traffic and popularity) is 693 in the world!
That’s a crap load of traffic!
So, in case there’s anyone new visiting the site today – welcome! Hopefully you’ll stay around awhile…;o)
Nonetheless, I submitted my article last week and it’s already up – so they must have thought it was sorta good.
So far the responses it’s been receiving has been great, and I’m really happy to see that many who have read it are on the same page as myself.
They’re obviously very smart and good looking….;o)
That said there have been numerous comments on MY comment concerning head positioning during the squat, and I’d like to take a few moments to address it.
A handful of people were a bit perplexed that I advocated to NOT look up when squatting. Apparently all their football coaches told them otherwise, and then I had to come out of no where and ruin their world…..;o)
By that same token, some felt (and misinterpreted) that what I was actually advocating was for people to look down, which is also false.
In short, as coaches and fitness professionals, we’re constantly stressing the importance of maintaining the spine’s natural curvature (a certain amount of lordosis in the lumbar spine, and kyphosis in the upper spine) while training.
In my experience coaching people to look up and to hyperextend their cervical spine isn’t a great idea in the grand scheme of things. We’re always telling people not to deadlift or squat with a rounded LOWER back (which is part of the spine last time I checked) for fear of compromising its integrity and causing injury.
Why, then, is it perfectly okay to disregard the cervical spine? Do we not want to prevent anything bad from happening in our neck?
Simply put, and as renowned strength coach and therapist Charlie Weingroff has repeatedly stated, maintaining a neutral or “packed neck/chin tucked” posture while squatting or deadlifting is a fantastic way to not only prevent injury, but it also makes you more stable, which in turn will allow you to lift more weight.
And as we all know when you lift more weight, you’re more capable to fighting off zombies when they inevitably attack. It’s standard procedure, really.
This teeny tiny deviation from the norm may throw people off guard, and it will definitely take some practice and some getting used to if you’re not accustomed to it, but in the long run it will pay huge dividends as far as overall squatting performance.
Outside of that, give the article a read and let me know what you think!
Who’s pumped for a little Star Trek action this weekend!?!?!?! I know THIS GUY is. It’s funny: I was never really much of a Star Trek fan back in the day, preferring to get my geek fix watching Star Wars over and over and over again. Sure, Captain Kirk had a way with women, but come on, Luke Skywalker had a freakin lightsaber!
I’ll admit, though, I often caught glimpses of Star Trek: The Next Generation on tv and thought Capt. Jean Luc Picard was pretty bad ass. But alas, he was no Han Solo.
Suffice it to say once I heard (back in 2008) that the nerd of all nerds, JJ Abrams, was going to helm the next reboot of Star Trek I was intrigued. To me Abrams can do no wrong, and like the baller that he is – he delivered.
His re-envisioning of Star Trek – updating the characters (albeit maintaining the quirks and inside jokes of the old series) along with all the mind-blowing special effects – really revitalized a dying franchise and won over a treasure trove of new fans.
Myself included.
I’m sure at some point this weekend Lisa and I will be making a cameo appearance at the cinemaplex. The only question remains is whether or not she’ll allow me to wear my Spock ears to the showing?
Totally not kidding.
Alright, lets get to the stuff you should read.
Oh, before I get into that I want to remind everyone that you only have until TOMORROW (Saturday, May 18th) to take advantage of the sale (48% off the regular price) that Eric Cressey has placed on his renowned program, Show and Go: High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better.
If you’re in a training rut, in a programming flux, or are just kinda going through the motions, this program is about as close as you can get to training at Cressey Performance without actually training there.
Well that, and techno Thursdays…..;o)
Okay, for real this time – here’s some stuff you should read:
Here’s a very interesting piece written by former CP coach, Brian St. Pierre, on the current state of affairs of our food – as well as what’s in store for the future.
Meat grown in test tubes?
Insects as an awesome source of protein?
Cows modified to produce human breast milk?
Surprisingly, this is NOT science-fiction, but things that are actually happening or going to happen.
This was an EXCELLENT rebuttal/dose of reality written by Adam (with a supporting role by Brad Schoenfeld) on the shadiness behind the current “research” regarding the 7-Minute Workout craze that’s currently making its way through the mainstream media.
By now many of you have undoubtedly heard on the news or in the magazines that all you need to do is “workout” seven minutes a day in order to attain the body (and health) you’ve always wanted.
Adam and Brad peel back the stupid and let it be known that there’s a litany of flaws with this so-called “study,” and that all it takes is a little common sense to smell the BS.
In this article the good Doc uses a nice parallel between the book The Power of Habit (which I’d HIGHLY recommend to everyone) and how what we do as fitness professionals has far more reaching benefits than just teaching them to exercise properly.
There’s certainly no shortage of articles, blogs, and rants out there in the digital world decreeing, loudly, that using a scale to measure success is kind of pointless.
SPOILER ALERT: this is going to be one of those rants.
I’ve been working as a trainer and coach for well over a decade now working with various females – short, tall, skinny, overweight, athletic, blue-collar, white-collar, Team Jacob, Team Edward – helping them achieve “the look.”
What “the look” entails I’m not exactly sure, as different women have different goals and different viewpoints on what they’d prefer to look like.
More often than not, though, for most, it just comes down to feeling and looking better, and not being bashful at rocking a strapless dress whenever the time calls for it.
Or, to put it more succinctly (and a tad less narcissistic): just becoming the best version of YOU that you can be regardless of sexiness factor or societal standards.
If I had to narrow it down to one celebrity who gets the most “Yeah, I want to look like her” nods it would undoubtedly go towards Mrs. Justin Timberlake (AKA: Jessica Biel), circa whenever it was she did that redunkulous spread in GQ Magazine.
Don’t shoot the messenger! I’m just stating that in my experience this is “the look” which many women I’ve worked with have gravitated towards.
But again, it’s just one example and doesn’t represent a universal mindset – so please, please, PLEASE don’t mistake this as me saying “hey ladies, this is what you should look like!”
Because at the end of the day, it’s about you, not me.
But here’s the deal: it’s a fairly well known fact that Jessica is a very active person who routinely lifts weights, plays sports, and leads a healthy lifestyle. Or, at least that’s what all the magazine articles and interviews tells us.
Her celebrity status aside, I look at her and see a full-figured, athletic woman who doesn’t look frail, weak, emaciated, or the second coming of that creepy skeleton looking guy from Tales of the Crypt.
Unfortunately, many (not all) women are under the impression that in order to achieve said look they have to diet for months (if not years on end), do copious amounts of long-duration, steady-state cardio, and avoid lifting weights like the plague.
To justify my point – especially with regards to the dieting side of things – Elizabeth Walling had an amazing guest postover on Nia Shanks’ blog the other day on the stress and damage caused by chronic “dieting.”
To steal a quote:
We’re often given the impression by the diet industry and mainstream media that dieting and metabolic health go together like peas and carrots. But in reality, most diet plans that claim to boost your metabolism are really just low-calorie deprivation diets in disguise. Just a quick internet search reveals a disturbing trend: these diet plans that promise to raise your metabolism often recommend eating as little as 1000-1400 calories a day.
I don’t think it’s wrong for me to say that many women fall into this trap (guys do too, by the way) and often end up stuck in this never ending cycle of dieting, feeling like poop, not getting ideal results, dieting some more, feeling even more like poop, not getting results, and well, you get the idea.
They’ll hop on the scale – as if that’s somehow the end-all-be-all panacea of health – and see that they’ve made little (if any) headway in terms of the number going down, feel even more desperate and frustrated and repeat the cycle over and over and over again.
Why doesn’t dieting typically work? To steal another quote from Elizabeth:
Because the body views dieting as a famine (it doesn’t know what a bikini is or why you’d want to starve yourself to wear one). The body detects a lack of energy coming from food, so it turns to alternative energy sources to cope with the shortage. And how does the body access alternative energy sources? By releasing stress hormones.
And while it’s much more complicated than this (I’m going to refrain from going into the actual physiology), the body will go into “preservation mode” and start storing fat to stave off a perceived threat.
As such, many women will continue this perpetual cycle, jump on the scale expecting that all their suffering will somehow lead to weight loss, only to be disappointed, pissed off, frustrated, and thiiiiiiis close to punching a kitten in the mouth.
True story.
On the training side of the equation, we typically have the treadmill/Zumba class/step-aerobics/ avoid lifting weights at all costs camp.
Listen, I’m not here to bash “cardio.” I recognize that it’s part of the equation and that any well-rounded fitness/health routine will include some (key word: some).
That said, 100% of the time I feel it’s drastically overemphasized and could be more deleterious than beneficial. While I don’t want to go into the semantics here and start WWIII, I’ll just defer to an excellent (albeit controversial) article that John Kiefer wrote a while back titled Women: Running Into Trouble.
With that little song and dance out of the way I’ll admit it: I’m biased. I’m a strength coach, so of course I’m going to be adamant that women actually lift weights. Appreciable weights. None of this soup can/pink-dumbbell high rep nonsense.
Listen: If you want to change how your body looks – like, in a “holy shit, did I go to high school with you?” kind of way – you actually have to put forth some effort.
You need to actually provide enough of a stress to make it change.
Deep down, do you really think that lifting a weight that weighs less than your purse is going to do anything as far as body composition goes?
Come on, really?
No seriously, really?
You get out of it what you put in. If you lift light weights, your body is going to represent that fact: You’ll look frail and weak.
Maybe that’s what you want. And if so, more power to you. I guess. But I doubt that’s the case.
Now I’m not saying women have to lift weights so that they can win a knife fight in a back alley or challenge The Rock to an arm wrestling match, but I can’t stress enough how crucial it is to, you know, actually challenge the body and work.
Only then will you see the fruits of your labor.
Which is why I’d much rather see women focus more on strength/performance based goals rather than the scale to gauge progress/success.
Without getting overly technical, one lb of muscle weighs the same as one lb of fat, albeit takes up 25% less space. This is why you will often see contestants on the television show “The Biggest Loser” weigh the same as many professional athletes, despite being the twice the size.
Following a resistance training program helps build muscle which increases strength and firmness. Aside from that, muscle is also metabolically active tissue which will also helps you burn more fat. In essence, someone might see very little overall weight loss or even GAIN weight in order to achieve “the look.”
The latter is especially true for petite women.
As an example, a 5 foot 4 ,140 lb woman with 25% body fat wants to look leaner and achieve that “toned” look. I just threw up a little in my mouth using the word toned, but I’ll run with it to get my point across.
She wants those flabby arms to go away and she wants to fit into those pair of jeans that she used to wear back in college. To do so, this particular woman feels she should lose weight and get down to 110-115 lbs through restrictive dieting and copious amounts of cardio. If she takes that course, she may look thinner, but at the expense of looking like a smaller, weaker version of her original self.
Conversely, let’s take the right course instead.
Six months later the same 5’4” woman has followed a resistance training program (which is also great for strengthening bones and preventing osteoporosis), changed her diet to include more healthy fats (fish oil, nuts, avocado, olive oil, butter, coconut oil, etc) protein (ie: chicken breast, lean beef, eggs, cottage cheese, whey protein shakes) and less refined carbohydrates (ie: cereal bars, bagels, 100 calorie snack foods), and most importantly, she threw away her scale.
She made more QUALITATIVE goals and challenged herself to work up to being able to do five, un-assisted chin-ups as well as deadlift 200 lbs.
Mind you: when she started, she wasn’t even close to doing ONE chin-up, and could barely deadlift 100 lbs without shitting a liver.
Now she’s 135 lbs with 18% body fat. She lost eleven lbs of fat and gained six lbs of lean muscle, for a net loss of only five lbs.
But she looks like she lost 15 lbs. She’s not “skinny-fat.” She’s stronger and healthier. And she can fit into those jeans no less!
Using a more real life example, here’s a before/after pic that’s made its way around the internet which I feel gets the message across pretty concretely:
Most women would faint at the notion of GAINING nine lbs, but try to tell me that the after picture doesn’t look like she LOST weight?
You see: the scale only measure QUANTITATIVE progress. For some, especially those who are morbidly obese and need to lose weight for health reasons, it makes sense to track weight using the scale. For everyone else, however, it’s nothing more than mind f***.
Seeing the number on a scale go down doesn’t really tell you the QUALITY of weight being lost. As noted above, many will sacrifice muscle – which I’d argue you want to keep as much of as possible – in lieu of just seeing a loss. Any loss.
Hell, losing weight is easy.
1. Don’t drink any water for a day.
2. Go to the bathroom and drop it like it’s hot.
Problem solved.
See what I mean? Seeing a number dip on the scale doesn’t tell you the quality of the weight being lost.
And just to save face, as I noted above, for some, using the scale makes sense. Those who need to lose weight for health reasons would be high on the list.
Likewise, I’d even go so far as to say that those who take more of a Curious George approach and are very inquisitive or “in tune” with their bodies (think: physique athletes) would fall into this camp as well.
For most, they just want to see what variables – following a certain diet plan (low carb/high carb, intermittent fasting, Paleo?) or exercise routine (5/3/1, body part splits) – will do as far as fluctuations in their body weight.
This even applies to those who don’t compete, too.
As an example, I was having this conversation with one of my female clients, Claudia, who mentioned not too long ago how if she has a heavy salted meal the night prior, it’s not uncommon for her weight to go up 5 lbs (or more) the following day.
She likes to fiddle with “stuff” and see what affects her weight.
But she knows better and won’t jump in front a mack truck if she sees the scale go up a few lbs. She understands that if she gets back on task, the weight will go away after a few days.
To her credit, Claudia, who’s 48, always (and I mean always) stresses performance based goals over the scale. Here she is crushing an EXTRA set of softball grip pull-ups after performing four sets prior:
And you know what? I garner a guess that there’s plenty of women HALF her age who would kill to have her body.
Did I mention she’s 48?
She’s 48.
[And yes, I had permission to divulge her age]
Closing Up Shop
Many women make the mistake of equating progress with the number on the scale going down. If they don’t see the number going down on a weekly basis, they feel they’re failing. Let me make this simple. The scale can be very misleading and in a lot of ways, invalid.
How do you know the weight you’re losing is fat and not valuable muscle?
You should be more concerned with what the mirror is telling you. Are you losing inches around the body? Do your clothes fit better? Are you lifting more weight now compared to two months ago? Can you bang out ten crisp push-ups whereas before you could barely do one?
Perhaps these results are less quantifiable and harder to notice, however, the sooner you realize that these are better indicators of progress, the better off you will be.
This isn’t to say the above is an all encompassing mentality either. I realize that there are extenuating circumstances, and that utilizing the scale does have some merit. But for 95% of the women who are reading this post, it doesn’t correlate to much.
Actionable Item
Do yourself a favor: for TWO months ditch the scale. Give yourself a goal. It could be squatting “x” weight for “y” reps, improving bench press technique, performing your first chin-up, doing a handstand! Anything! Whatever you do, just focus on that instead.
