CategoriesMiscellaneous Miscellany Uncategorized

Miscellaneous Miscellany Monday: Catching Up

I haven’t done one of these in forever, and boy oh boy do we have a lot of catching up to do!

1.  First and foremost, as I’m tapping away on my keyboard this very moment there’s only 507 days, 17 hours, and 18 minutes until the premiere of Star Wars Episode VII.

If you want to keep track for yourself you can go HERE.

Don’t worry about it. Embrace you’re inner nerd.

2.  I can’t believe that we’re only a few days from hitting the dog days of summer! Speaking from a personal standpoint August is going to be the quiet before the storm. I have a very busy fall schedule on the horizon.

Excellent High Five Workshop Reminders – London and DC (<– Important!)

Dean Somerset and I are going to be in London the weekend of September 13th and 14th at The Third Space Soho to kick off our little “tour.”

This will be my first trip to London (or Europe, for that matter) and Dean’s 212th visit (give or take).

We’re both really excited to be bringing our workshop overseas and anxious to share our information with other trainers, coaches, and fitness enthusiasts eager to learn.

We’ve capped the number of attendees due to space restrictions and we’re thiiiiiiis close to hitting that number, so if you were planning on waiting till the last minute to register I wouldn’t wait much longer.  Seriously, go HERE.

In addition to London, we’ll also be in Washington, DC the weekend of October 18th and 19th at Underground Athlete in Sterling, VA.

We have an early-bird special running until August 15th, and after that date the price increases $100.  That’s like dinner for two at a nice restaurant, or 14 at Olive Garden.

Either way, saving yourself a hundred big ones never sucks.  For more information and to register go HERE.

3.  I’ve made several cameo appearances around the interwebz as of late and wanted to share them here:

– What do you get when you clump together six trainers/coaches and ask them what their favorite exercises are to strengthen and firm the abs?

Unfortunately, not some raunchy reality tv show

Instead, you get THIS doozy on WomensHealthMag.com (additional contributions from Mike Boyle, Rachel Cosgrove, BJ Gaddour, Ashley Borden, and John Romaniello).

– The CrossFit games were this past weekend (c0ngrats to both Rich Froning and Camille Leblanc-Bazinet for making us all feel bad about ourselves) and as such there were a slew of articles all over the mainstream media which preceded them.  Some good (yay for CrossFit!), some bad (CrossFit is Satan’s spawn).

I’m not going to open up Pandora’s box on that topic, but needless to say I was happy to be a part of THIS article which was featured on the Huffington Post.  In a nutshell: moving well and taking the time or properly progress people should ALWAYS take precedence.

Yeah, that’s right….Tony Gentilcore, in the Huffington Post.  Excuse me while I go order some Grey Poupon.

On an aside, the author of that article, Sophia Herbst, took my lengthier responses to her initial questions and posted them up on her blog HERE.

– I also made a bit of a cameo in a hilarious – albeit 100% spot on – article on Buzzfeed last week titled 15 Things Girls Who Lift Are Tired of Hearing.

The author – Hannah Bass – was kind enough to link to an old blog post of mine on Tracy Anderson (see point #5 in the article).

– A few weeks ago EVOShield in conjunction with Stack Magazine came to Cressey Sports Performance to film a few videos on baseball training starring……..ME!!!!!

All of them are within the 3-6 minute range, so grab a bag of beef jerky or something and enjoy. They’re pretty much the sexiest thing on the internet.

Seriously though, I hate watching myself on video. For me it’s like listening to Freddy Kruger scratch a chalkboard, or worse, listening to a John Mayer song.

But I have to say, these all turned out great!

Safe Upper Body Exercises for Baseball Players

Essential Mobility Drills for Baseball Players

How to Keep Your Shoulders Strong and Healthy

The Best Two Lower Body Exercises for Baseball Players

The Best Plyo Exercises for Baseball Players

And that’s it for now.  Unless you want to know what I had for breakfast this morning too. In that case:

– 5 (whole) egg omelet with onion, broccoli, and cheese (seasoned with pepper, turmeric, Italian seasoning, and garlic)

– 1 cup oatmeal with scoop of protein powder and 1/2 cup blueberries.

– 6 Flame Out capsules

– 20 ounces of water with a scoop of Athletic Greens.

– And, boom goes the dynamite.

CategoriesProgram Design Strength Training

CrossFit and Baseball: The Two Don’t Mix

Some things are just made to complement one another.

Will & Grace

He-Man and BattleCat

Boston & Red Sox

Peanut butter & jelly, peanut butter & chocolate, peanut butter & well, pretty much anything.

Hint: I really like peanut butter.

It goes without saying we could fill an infinite abyss of “synergistic” pairings that play off one another, of which one component helps to enhance or harmonize the effectiveness of the other.

One pairing that doesn’t belong on that list is CrossFit and baseball.

We work with a crap ton (just a shade under a boat load) of baseball players and one of the more common themes or questions we receive on a weekly (if not daily) basis is our opinion on CrossFit.

It seems you can’t walk more than 20 yards nowadays without crossing paths with a CrossFit gym – or someone bragging about their Paleo lifestyle.  And, for better or worse (mostly better, it’s hard to dismiss anything which gets people excited to grab a barbell), it’s abundantly clear it’s been tattooed into our popular culture.

As such, many people – athletes in particular – are curious about its merits.

CrossFit is a great fit for a small percentage of people, an okay fit for a slightly larger percentage, and an absolute ball of walking fail for an even larger percentage.

Baseball players fall into the latter category and in my latest article for Stack.com I explain why.

Is CrossFit a Good ‘Fit” for Baseball Players? (<—- Spoiler Alert:  No.)

CategoriesProgram Design Strength Training

Why Baseball Players Shouldn’t Bench Press

I’ve been keeping this article in my back pocket for a while now because I wasn’t quite sure how I wanted to approach writing it.  Lets be honest:  talking smack about the beloved bench press is the fitness equivalent of talking smack about Princess Diana or worse, kittens.

You just don’t do it!

To save face, though, let me be clear up front:  I LOVE the bench press.  Well, let me back track a little bit.  From a personal standpoint I freaking hate the bench press.

I’m an admittedly horrible bencher (god awful in fact), and if it came down to choosing between bench pressing or tossing my body in front of a mack truck, I’d seriously consider the latter.

Every time I look at my program and see the words “bench press” written down this is pretty much my standard reaction:

Temper tantrums aside, I do recognize that the bench press is an important strength building (and for those more aesthetically minded individuals reading, chest building) exercise.  I think we can all agree that the bench press is a super star and is one of the staple exercises behind any well-rounded program.

But is it for everyone?

One of the more common questions we receive at Cressey Performance when people come in to observe is:  Tony, why do you coach with your shirt off? Tony, how come you don’t allow your baseball guys to bench press?

It’s a loaded question, but one that can be answered relatively easily.

I’m of the mindset that there aren’t many contraindicated exercises (you can generally find a legitimate and appropriate use for any exercise. Yes, even if done on a BOSU ball), as there are contraindicated lifters!

For me bench pressing and baseball don’t mix – for a variety of reasons – and there are plenty of other exercises we can use in lieu of the bench press to elicit a training effect.

In this article I wrote for Stack.com I explain my rationale on both fronts:

Why Baseball Players Shouldn’t Bench Press (<— Click Me, That Tickles)