CategoriesNutrition

Understanding the Importance of Satiety

I guess some people took my comment that I don’t include nearly enough nutrition content on this site to heart.  The “Dynamic Duo” (Chris and Eric Martinez) are back, and with some quality information concerning the topic of satiety.

We’ve all been around someone who’s been “hangry” before.  You know… hungry and angry. And it’s not pleasant. Borderline dangerous if you ask me.

How can we combat this phenomena?  Read on to find out!

“In all pleasure there is satiety.” –George Hakewill

In all honesty how many of you can relate to the above quote?

We sure hope many of you are nodding your heads and saying yes. When you stop and think about it, isn’t life more enjoyable when you feel satiated and not hungry? Who wants to be that guy or gal with their stomach growling like there is a volcano about to erupt? We certainly do not; all you can really do when you hear hunger pangs like that is just look straight forward with your eyes widened like you saw a ghost.

We all should be aware that satiety means to feel satiated (aka feel full).

By accomplishing this feeling, one must actually eat throughout the day!

With how society works now there is quote on quote no time to eat right? We get it, life can be stressful, we are all on the go, we don’t have time to cook, we don’t know what to eat, etc.

These are just excuses at the end of the day. By not eating throughout the day you are just doing your entire body and brain a disservice. So, the question becomes, how long can you stand being hungry before you start eating again? Well, only you can really determine that.

Understanding Hunger and Satiety

Hunger is one of your body’s strongest and most beneficial stimuli, it helps ensure you consume enough calories for your needs. It also works against you when you’re trying to lose weight. You could easily lose weight just by eating less, but the less that you eat or the longer you postpone eating, the hungrier you become, and the longer it takes your hunger to subside once you do begin to eat. (1)

Typically the hungrier you are, the more likely it is that you’ll overeat, consuming extra calories that can quickly inhibit or reverse your weight loss progress.

As we mentioned earlier, the only way to end hunger and feel satiated is to eat. Yes eat, which is one of the most enjoyable things to do in life and pretty important from a human physiological stand point. With that said, our main point here is eat and cure those awful hunger pangs and give your body the nutrients it needs to operate and function properly throughout the day.

Are All Foods High in Satiation Levels?

Some foods are better than others for satisfying your hunger. A baked potato, for example, will most likely “fill you up” much more than a serving of candy that has the same number of calories.

We have often heard people claim that you have to cut potatoes out in order to lose weight. Funny thing is they never have any data or proven references to back up these narrow minded claims.

For example, Chris Voigt, head of Washington State Potato Commission, went on a 60 day potato only diet and lost 21 lbs while improving his blood lipid profile and reducing his fasting glucose levels. Still think you can’t lose weight while eating potatoes? Another study found that potatoes were far more satiating than all 38 common foods tested, including protein dominant foods. (2)

Some foods fill your stomach faster and/or remain in your stomach longer, and therefore do a better job of holding off hunger. For example, Higher GI carbs, which are fast digesting breakdown faster into the blood stream and store faster in your glycogen levels. As opposed to complex carbs that take longer to break down will keep your satiety levels much higher throughout the course of a day along with keeping your blood sugar levels stable.

In another study which was conducted by Suzanna Holt of the University of Sydney, fed human test subjects fixed calorie portions of 38 different foods, and then recorded the subject’s perceived hunger following each feeding.

The results of Holt’s study, like many similar studies, indicate that satiety is most strongly related to the weight of the food consumed. In other words, the foods that weigh the most satisfy our hunger best, regardless of the number of calories they contain.

However, higher amounts of certain nutrients, such as protein and dietary fiber, also appear to improve satiety. (3)

Can Satiety Be Predicted?

Sure it’s that popular hormone we call “Ghrelin” that many of us dislike.

All kidding aside, if there was a way of predicting satiety, we would be able to select foods that satisfied our hunger, but contained fewer calories. These foods would greatly improve our ability to create meals that were effective for weight loss. Some research studies have mentioned to consume foods with low caloric densities (foods that have the lowest total calories per gram). (4)

We feel caloric density alone is not a reliable predictor of satiety, and it overlooks many enjoyable foods that would make awesome additions to your diet. The last thing we would ever suggest is to cut out certain food groups or foods that people enjoy. This is a recipe for disaster, possible binge eating occurrences, eating disorders, and more.

The best way to predict satiety is to have foods that contain large amounts of water, dietary fiber, and are high and rich in protein. Whole foods such as complex carbs, veggies, fruits, quality fat sources, and lean meats do a better job of satisfying your hunger.

Best Food Options to Maximize Satiety Levels are?

This list of foods was adapted from Holt et al. (5) The foods are listed from most filling to least filling:

  • Potatoes, boiled
  • Ling Fish
  • Oatmeal/Porridge (<—- Tony’s personal fav!)
  • Oranges
  • Apples
  • Brown Pasta
  • Beef
  • Baked Beans
  • Grapes
  • Whole Wheat Bread
  • Popcorn
  • Eggs
  • Cheese
  • White Rice
  • Brown Rice
  • All-Bran

As you can see it is quite the variety and the list still continues, but we feel you get the idea of which foods are more filling than others.

Wrapping This All Up

As we mentioned earlier, isn’t life more enjoyable when you feel satiated and not hungry and deprived of food?

We hope this article cleared up some confusion about satiety and what foods are more satiating than others.

The bottom line here is pretty much trial and error. Experiment with different food sources and see what foods are more filling for you. Of course we are not saying to go out and splurge and try a bunch of chocolate or candy. We are simply saying do this experiment all while hitting your macronutrient ranges and micronutrients and enjoy life. If you are confused about macronutrients, we suggest you read this very informative article on FLEXIBLE DIETING.

Once you really figure out what food sources keep you full throughout the day, it is a thing of beauty because you are not always thinking about when your next meal is, you are less likely to pick at foods which will hinder weight loss progress, and depriving yourself from certain foods you want.

Oh yea, and you won’t be that person everyone can hear your stomach growling.

References:

1.)   Anderson, G.H., and Woodend, D., “Effect of glycemic carbohydrate on short-term satiety and food intake,” Nutr Rev 2003.

2.)   Voight, Chris., “20 potatoes a day,” 1995. http://20potatoesaday.com/

3.)   Holt, SH., Miller, JC., Petocz, P., Farmakalidis, E., “A Satiety index of common foods,” Eur J Clin Nutr 1995.

4.)   Porrini, M., “Effects of physical and chemical characteristics of food on specific and general satiety,” Phys Behav 1995.

5.)   Holt, SH., Miller, JC., Petocz, P., Farmakalidis, E., “A Satiety index of common foods,” Eur J Clin Nutr 1995. 

About the Authors

Chris and Eric Martinez, CISSN, CPT, BA, also known as the “Dynamic Duo” operate a world class personal training and online training business “Dynamic Duo Training,” They’re also fitness and nutrition writers, fitness models, and coaches that love helping people reach their goals. Their philosophy is “No excuses, only solutions.”

Visit them at:

Dynamic Duo Training

Blogsite

Twitter

YouTube Channel  

 

 

CategoriesUncategorized

Pre or Post Workout Cardio: When Is It Ideal?

Note from TG: Theeeeeeey’re baaaaack.  The Dynamic Duo, Chris and Eric Martinez, strike again. And this time they’re setting their sites on the whole “should we or shouldn’t we perform cardio” around training time debate.

(For those out of the loop, HERE and HERE are two other previous guest posts by the Duo.)

As with everything the best answer is…..it depends.

Contrary to popular belief I’m not at all opposed to people tossing in some dedicated cardio into the mix. I recognize that it’s important, that it offers a ton of benefits, and that it serves as an ideal time to catch up on reruns of Judge Judy.

I keed, I keed.

In all seriousness, there’s a mountain of research backing up traditional cardio as a fantastic way to improve overall conditioning, heart health, hormonal profile, immune function, as well as stuff like reducing the risk of developing type II diabetes, to name a few.

My main beef is when people rely SOLELY on “cardio” to be the end-all-be-all panacea of health and performance.  As an example: If you’re trying to increase strength and are still running 20 miles per week, good luck with that.  

Alas, the point of this article isn’t to throw cardio under the bus.  Rather it’s to demonstrate that there’s a time and place for it given your goals and needs, and that WHERE you prioritize it can have a huge impact on long-term results.

Especially if you’re a performance athlete or someone who likes to lift heavy stuff.

Enjoy!

The lovely world of cardio, we have to love it right? Cardio has countless benefits for the human body, so it must be good for us, right? How else do you think all the celebrities stay so skinny and “toned?”

How many times have you seen people get to the gym and hop on a cardio machine and just gas themselves, and not to mention go do some resistance training right after. Or what about when someone gets done from an intense lifting session, then goes off and does an intense cardio session?

We know you’ve seen this before and we are not going to get into the psychology of why people do this because that could be a whole other article itself. We are more focused on is it optimal to perform cardio pre and post workout? With a specific focus on which cardio modality (type of cardio you do) is the best to perform to avoid the interference effect of strength, power, and hypertrophy gains?

But before we give you the answer, it’s vital that we always have to take people’s goals, activity level, overall health, and training experience into consideration before anything. So please read this with an open mind and a non-black and white answer, all or nothing approach.

What’s This Interference Effect Thing?

When we refer to the interference effect, we are talking about the interference of strength, power, and hypertrophy gains (muscle growth) when doing cardio pre or post workout. This topic of discussion has been floating around for quite some time now, whether concurrent training is optimal or not.

We all have our biased opinions, but what is the correct cardio modality to do pre and post workout and should we even be doing cardio pre or post workouts? That is the million dollar question that many of us would like to know.

Why continue to keep robbing your hard earned gains and progress if you don’t need to. Instead, why not continue to maximize your overall potential the correct way instead of shooting yourself in the foot? As always, we bring scientific based evidence to the table to get to the bottom of these popular topics, because the research doesn’t lie folks.

Before we delve into the research, we want to quote what Brad Schoenfeld said:

 “There is no one cookie-cutter recommendation I can provide that will be ideal for everyone. People have varying responses to exercise programs. Large inter-individual differences are seen in any research protocol. Thus, in giving advice on a topic such as this, I can only provide general recommendations that must be individualized based on a variety of genetic and environmental factors. This is the essence of evidence-based practice, which should form the basis of every fitness professional’s decision making process.” (1)

We can’t agree more with this statement and we truly feel this statement is a legitimate and valid way of viewing such a topic like this one.

Cardio Modalities

We are certain we can all agree that there are numerous different cardio modalities out there today. To name a few modalities that have more ground-reaction force with higher impact are:

    • Conventional sprints
    • Up-hill sprints
    • Resisted sprints
    • Car pushes

  • Prowler pushes
  • Sled pulls

Pretty much all the badass cardio workouts that we look forward to doing.

Cardio modalities that minimize ground-reaction forces are:

  • Cycling bikes

  • Treadmills
  • Ellipticals
  • Various machine based equipment

 The stuff we like to watch TV on or read magazines 😉

These are all great choices whether you use them in the form of HIIT or LISS, but which modality is more optimal to prevent the interference effect and when should you do these you ask? Let’s delve into some research shall we.

Should you do cardio pre or post workout?

Layne Norton and Jacob Wilson claim that when you choose a cardio modality such as running or sprinting after a resistance training bout, the ground-reaction force (think sprints) and distance causes more muscle damage as opposed to a modality with less impact such as cycling instead.

Cycling seems to be more similar to hip and knee flexion as opposed to running because it’s biomechanically interfering with squat and leg press patterns. This muscle damage seems to be coming from the eccentric components when running and sprinting (2).

Norton and Wilson make a valid point in the essence that if you are going to do cardio post workout, make sure you do it in the form of an opposing muscle group.

Let’s say you did a grueling lower body workout, you would then want to do cardio in the form of using your upper body, something like rope slams because otherwise if you go and run or do sprints you are going to get a complete interference effect and possibly get injured.

After resistance training you have mTOR (cell growth) being ramped up and protein synthesis (making of new proteins) being turned on and when you do cardio after resistance training you get such high drastic rises in AMP kinase (signaling cascade for ATP production) that it ends up shutting off protein synthesis.

In easier terms, cardio after weights interferes with the muscle growth phase and a good analogy is after training you turn the faucet on for muscle growth and when too much cardio is being done or after training, it shuts the faucet off.

As for pre workout cardio, this tends to be a little trickier than post workout cardio and we say this because it really depends on a lot of factors such as: What muscle groups are you training that day? What form of cardio are you doing pre workout (low, moderate, or high intensity)? What modality will you use? Are you in a low calorie and glycogen depleted state?

A Study in the Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise shows 30 minutes of jogging pre workout decreases volume of spinal discs and leads to a reduction in the amount of weight you can load on your back (3).

For example, if you did a moderate-high intensity cardio bout such as jogging before squats it’s probably not a good idea because it will lead to decrements in strength and negatively affect your squats. Jogging shows to have a lot of muscle damage in the quads, hams, and glutes, so this will definitely affect your squat game.

A 2012 study in the International Journal of Sports Nutrition showed extended periods of moderate volume concurrent strength, power, and endurance training interferes with explosive strength development (4). This is not something you want if you’re trying to increase your 1 rep max on squats and deadlifts.

The data is pretty clear that performing moderate-high intensity cardio pre workout will lead to decrements in strength and power with your resistance training. Perhaps doing cardio earlier in the day and performing resistance training later in the day will not have a negative impact on either the performance or the measured markers of the exercise induced growth stimulus the resistance training session will have.

However, we highly encourage doing resistance training and cardio on separate days as this would be the most optimal route to go.

Is there really an interference effect?

In a study by Wilson et al. a large body of research indicates that combining aerobic and resistance exercise (concurrent training) has a negative effect on gains in muscular strength and size (5).

There is credence to the underlying concept that catabolic processes predominate to a greater extent in aerobic training, and concurrent exercise therefore has the potential to impair muscular gains. There is even evidence that cardio can blunt the satellite cell response (helps with muscle growth) to a bout of resistance exercise and therefore potentially impair the protein-producing capacity of muscle (6).

With that said, why are people still considering doing cardio pre or post workout if clearly the evidence indicates that it can potentially inhibit muscular gains, strength, and power?

What if you could avoid the interference effect?

Burn more calories, increase muscle, and acutely increase your metabolic rate, sounds good, right?

This is where the famous HIIT cardio would come into play.

When you think of HIIT, high intensity and high stress should be taken into consideration. What we have to keep in mind is that stress has to be recovered from, just like the stress from weight training. Last time we checked HIIT cardio is done during the week along with resistance training. If you are still recovering from a HIIT cardio session to the point that it affects your ability to lift weights, then it can be detrimental to your gains.

If there is a significant eccentric component (sprinting and running), or high level of impact, HIIT can cause problems in your overall training and potentially lead to chronic overuse injuries. You have to be cautious and smart when incorporating HIIT into your training protocol because it seems that the work to rest ratios in HIIT intervals are very similar to resistance training sets and your number one focus should be on progressive resistance training.

Here are some ways to avoid the interference effect:

  • Schedule your cardio around your resistance training, especially HIIT cardio
  • If your number one priority is resistance training, then perform cardio modalities that minimize ground-reaction forces
  • Perform a cardio modality that is opposite of the muscle group your training. For example, if you do train legs then do an upper body dominate form of cardio and vice versa
  • If you absolutely have to do cardio the same day as your resistance training and you can’t find a cardio modality opposite of the body part you trained then make sure to keep the intensity to low-moderate.

Wrapping this up

We believe that the research is pretty clear here when it comes to this particular topic. Clearly there is no black and white answer, sorry to disappoint, but at least we have a great indication of what to do and when not to do it.

It’s tough to predict that anyone can avoid any interference effect when it comes to aerobic or anaerobic training. Just like anything else you have to compensate something. We are not all built like machines and able to handle the same workload as others.

Genetics always play a vital role in how someone responds to training. Other factors such as nutrition, stress, sleep, occupational activity, ect. All must be taken into account. Refer back to Brad Schoenfeld’s quote if needed, it pretty much tells you there are only general recommendations that can be given here. The best thing to do is choose the correct cardio modality that suits your training and goals. Always train hard, think logically, and but most importantly train smart.

References:

(1)  Schoenfeld, AARR Research Review. Cardio Roundtable Discussion. February and March 2013.

(2)  Norton, L & Wilson J. Muscle college radio with Dr. Layne Norton & Dr. Jake Wilson. http://www.rxmuscle.com/2013-01-11-01-57-36/muscle-college/7694-muscle-college-3-12-13.html

(3)   Kingsley, MI., et al., Moderate-Intensity Running Causes Intervertebral Disc Compression in young adults. Med Sci Sports Exerc, 2012.

(4)  Mikkola, et al., Neuromuscular and cardiovascular adaptations during concurrent strength and endurance training in untrained men. Int J Sports Med. 2012.

(5)  Babcock, L, Escano, M, D’Lugos, A, Todd, K, Murach, K, and Luden, N. Concurrent aerobic exercise interferes with the satellite cell response to acute resistance exercise. Am. J. Physiol. Regul. Integr. Comp. Physiol. 302: 2012.

(6)  Wilson, J.M., et al., Concurrent Training: A Meta Analysis Examining Interference if Aerobic and Resistance Exercise. J Strength Cond Res, 2011.

About The Authors:

Chris and Eric Martinez, CISSN, CPT, BA, also known as the “Dynamic Duo” operate a world class personal training and online training business “Dynamic Duo Training,” They’re also fitness and nutrition writers, fitness models, and coaches that love helping people reach their goals. Their philosophy is “No excuses, only solutions.”

Visit them at:

Dynamic Duo Training

Blogsite

FaceBook Page

 

Twitter

YouTube Channel 

CategoriesStrength Training

5 Reasons Your Glutes Aren’t Growing

The Dynamic Duo – Chris and Eric Martinez – are back!  This time with a vengeance, as they set their sights on the glutes (or lack thereof).

In this lighthearted, “investigative” report, Chris and Eric discuss some of the top reasons why your glutes aren’t growing.

Enjoy!

Have you heard the breaking news about people’s glutes plateauing and not growing? Well, word on the street and from the media is they are known as the “Top 5 Glute Killers”. Reports say that they are going around destroying people’s glutes and restricting further muscle growth and strength in today’s modern era.

We have heard certain reports saying the investigation is top secret and the authorities have no clue whether it’s one person or multiple people committing these glute crimes. All we know is that these criminals have been leaving messages saying “Glute killers are on the rise, glute hypertrophy will not be allowed and we will not be stopped, MUHAHAHA!”

Not many people seem to be doing anything about these glute killers, so we will have to take matters in our own hands. We will solve these crimes ourselves and be known as the “Glute Slayers!” Along this investigation we will have the help of the one and only Bret Contreras aka “The Glute Guy.”

In this investigation we will be using some of The Glute Guy’s awesome articles, research, and of course good ole anecdotal evidence to catch these monsters. We promise we will find these “Top 5 Glute Killers” and put them to rest at once.  Each glute killer will be exposed for their crime and will be sentenced with a solution, so they can never harm one’s glutes again…Get ready!

Glute Killer #1: Too Much Sitting!

Crime: Recently we just caught our first suspect. This criminal has confessed to us that he has been advising people to sit around all day long. We asked the suspect why they would do such a thing to one’s glutes? The suspect replied, “I want more and more people to live a sedentary lifestyle with no exercise, that way by them sitting all day they will accumulate chronic back pain, tight hip flexors, and tight hamstring muscles. I want to create more inhibitory consequences to excessive sitting, as compression slows down vascular function and interferes with nerve function.”

Sentence/Solution: Try your best to get up as much as possible and move around. We understand people have to work desk jobs for 8 hours. But this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t get up from time to time to stretch, walk, and keep your blood flowing in your body. Try getting up every 1-2 hours to walk for 5-10 minutes, do some dynamic stretches, do some body weight glute bridges, practice your hip hinge, use the stairs when going places. Main point is to keep your glutes firing throughout the day.

Glute Killer #2: Glute Imbalances

Crime: When we caught the next glute killer, the suspect had a little more sympathy than glute killer #1. But the suspect still confessed to causing glute imbalances in harmless people’s glutes, so we still had to nail him. Glute killer #2 said “there are 3 main causes of Gluteal Imbalances,” he heard this from a man by the name of Bret Contreras, we didn’t believe the suspects allegations but we still let him state his 3 main causes:

1.)   Asymmetrical Human-Nature: By nature, we are asymmetrical beings; our anatomy itself can be asymmetrical. Therefore, it comes as no surprise then that one glute or region of the glute might be stronger and more coordinated than the other (1).

2.)   Inactivity: When considering the human body, we know that some muscles are more prone to inhibition than others, and the glutes are one of these “easily-inhibited” muscles. Neural and mechanical inhibition involving opposing muscles can interfere with gluteal activation, and therefore could shut them down. Gluteal inhibition can negatively impact posture, and poor posture can further inhibit glutes, thereby creating a downward spiral in gluteal function. Probably the biggest reason why the glutes shut down is due to inactivity (1).

3.)   Pain, Prior Injury, and Structural Issues: Pain is a huge inhibitor of the gluteus maximus, which is a pretty big deal at the end of the day. Research shows that glutes can become inhibited with just about any lower body or spinal injury. The glutes are major propulsion muscles. They produce powerful locomotion. Inhibiting the glutes will cause an individual to slow down so they can heal. The problem is that the glutes don’t necessarily turn back on automatically. They must be reactivated, restrengthened, and recoordinated back into every day movement and activity. Following injury, most people continue to keep working out, and their movement patterns suffer and other muscles will then compensate for others (1).

Sentence/Solution: This suspect was being very hard headed when we asked him for a solution to Gluteal Imbalances. He pretty much said you have to read this blog on how to correct Gluteal Imbalances or else they cannot be fixed.

Glute Killer #3: Improper Glute Activtion

Crime: Luckily Glute Killer #2 made our investigation a bit easier and turned in the next glute killer on our list. When we found out who this was, we were not surprised. This is a very common mistake many people make and it doesn’t help when you have criminals like our glute suspect showing you the wrong way to activate your glutes. For those that are not familiar with the term “glute activation,” it’s just a fancy way of saying warming up your glute muscles properly.

So we asked this suspect why he had been showing people the wrong way to warm up their glutes. The suspects reply was “glute activation is not important in my book, when people don’t activate their glutes properly they have a higher probability of getting injured and not gaining strength and muscle MUAHAHA!”

This was quite a disturbing answer by the suspect but we found a solution.

Sentence/Solution: Incorporate various glute exercises in your dynamic warm-ups for 15-20 minutes prior to a lower body session. Mainly glute exercises that target the glute medius, minimus, maximus, and even your TFL. These are all extremely critical muscles to activate and are often over looked.

Some examples are Monster and Sumo Walks with resistance bands:

X-band walks:

Glute Bridges:

And a ton more. For more glute activation solutions read here. Always remember your glutes are the steering wheel to your lower body, they deserve a proper warm-up.

Glute Killer #4: Not Working Your Glute Muscles Directly

Crime: After Glute Killer #3 testified, in order to reduce his sentence he was willing to give up our next suspect on our list. We caught him red handed in a big box commercial gym, we definitely thought he was smarter than this. We wanted to know his reasoning for not having people work their glute muscles directly.

The suspect said “there is no need for direct glute work; all you need to do is squats, deadlifts, a little Zumba, and the Brazilian butt lift videos.”  While we wanted to chuckle at his answer, we knew this was a serious matter and this is a very common mistake many make when it comes to resistance training. While squats and deadlifts are awesome and do help build the booties, but at the end of the day it’s not enough direct work to the glute muscles to increase hypertrophy.

Sentence/Solution: Do not take Squats, Deadlifts, Step-Ups, Good Mornings and, Lunges out of your routine. These are your vertical loading exercises. Simply add in other superior glute exercises such as the famous Hip Thrusts, American Hip Thrusts, American Deadlifts, Glute Bridges, Back Extensions, and Reverse Hypers.

These are all considered horizontal loading exercises (2).

Also, one must not overlook the importance of mechanical tension, metabolic stress, and muscle damage to promote hypertrophy in a muscle. Brad Shoenfeld says “hypertrophic benefits associated with eccentric exercise may be due to a greater imposed mechanical stress compared with concentric or isometric actions. Indeed, muscles are capable of generating greater absolute force when contracting eccentrically vs. concentrically. Despite this fact, however, muscle activation during maximal eccentric actions is generally less compared with those performed concentrically (4). So try and use different methods of resistance training: eccentric, concentric, or isometric when training the glutes. You never know which method your glutes are going to respond to best.

Glute Killer #5: Disuse of glutes in general (Flatassitis)

Crime: To wrap up this grueling investigation we caught our last suspect. Needless to say, this suspect was very easy to find. The suspect was relatively easy to find do to the disuse and inactivity of the glute muscles in general. There really was no reason to ask this suspect any questions, it was plain and simple that the suspect was trying to get people not to use their glutes overall.

Sentence/Solution: As the old saying goes “If you don’t use it you will lose it.” Well our new version is “If you don’t use your glutes, you will lose your glutes.” So get out there and put those glutes to use or else you will never fill out those expensive jeans you buy and you will always envy another big booty Judy when they walk by.

Investigation Conclusion:

Wrapping up this very intense investigation, we are pleased to say we caught all of the “Top 5 Glute Killers” that were going around harming people’s glutes. We would like to give a huge thanks to “The Glute Guy” for helping us out with this one, not quite sure we could’ve done this on our own.

The mayor of our city has presented us with the key to the city for our duties. We are now known as the “Glute Slayers” around town. All we ask is that we hope you put all of the solutions to use from now on. These solutions are great tools and will only benefit your training and help you achieve the goals you are after. Until more glute killers break loose, we leave you with this, “If you don’t use your glutes you will lose them.”

References:

1.)   Bret Contreras (2013). How To Fix Glute Imbalances

2.)   Bret Contreras (2013). The Science of Glute Training. NCSA Conference 2013

3.)   Brad Schoenfeld. Potential Mechanisms for a Role of Metabolic Stress in Hypertrophic Adaptations to Resistance Training. Sports Medicine (2013) 43: 179-194.

4.)   Brad Schoenfeld. Does Exercise-Induced Muscle Damage Play A Role In Skeletal Muscle Hypertrophy? Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research (2012) Volume 26: number 5.

About the Authors

Chris and Eric Martinez, CISSN, CPT, BA, also known as the “Dynamic Duo” operate a world class personal training and online training business “Dynamic Duo Training.” They’re also fitness and nutrition writers, fitness models, and coaches that love helping people reach their goals. Their philosophy is “No excuses, only solutions.”

Visit them at:

Dynamic Duo Training

Blogsite

YouTube Channel

CategoriesUncategorized

Soccer Players: To Squat or Not To Squat?

Whenever people think of Cressey Performance, there are probably two things that immediately pop into their heads:

1.  Deadlifts.  And….

2.  Baseball.

And neither of the two should come as a surprise.  For starters, we kinda have an affinity for deadlifts.  Walk into the facility at any given moment throughout the day and you’re bound to find someone pulling something heavy off the ground.

Likewise, and with respects to the latter, roughly 85% of our clientele are Victoria Secret models baseball players.

And while many people are under the impression that we solely train baseball players, that couldn’t be further from the truth.  I mean come on:  I literally just said that 85% of our clientele are baseball players.  You weren’t listening were you?  WERE YOU!?!?!??!

Sometimes it’s like I’m talking to a brick wall.

In fact, we’ve had every sport imaginable train underneath our roof.  You name the sport, and it’s likely we’ve worked with them:  softball, tennis, volleyball, football, ultimate frisbee, hockey, basketball, wrestling, boxing, field hockey, swimming, lacrosse, and you can even add fencing into that pile.  Totally not kidding.

About the only sport(s) that haven’t made an appearance are ice curling, synchronized swimming, and competitive eating (if that can even be considered a “sport”).

But lets dial  in the conversation to soccer.  We’ve trained our fair share of soccer players at CP ranging from high school players to recreational players to even having a cameo appearance by the likes of USA Women’s team member Lori Lindsey on occasion.  What what!

Given that soccer is the most popular and widely played sport in the world, I thought I’d share a guest post by both Eric and Chris Martinez (AKA: the Dynamic Duo).

I probably shouldn’t admit this, but I enjoy reading research about as much as I enjoy getting dropped kicked in the face.  Which is to say:  I freakin hate it.

This isn’t to say that I don’t do it:  I just don’t like it.  At all.

But thankfully Eric and Chris were kind enough to review a recent squat study as it relates to soccer players, and I felt I’d share here on my blog.

Enjoy!

Soccer Players:  To Squat or Not to Squat?

GOOOOAAAALLL! We’ve got one question for all of you soccer players…Do you SQUAT? Although we are not expecting any answers back at the moment, we do hope you are saying yes to your computer screen while reading this.

It’s not a coincidence if you are reading this and questioning, “Well, why should I squat if I do indeed play soccer?”

In all honesty, we could sit here and explain all the great benefits of squats, but that could take a whole other article itself to school everyone on. Instead, we would like to breakdown a study that the great Chris Beardsley and Bret Contreras discovered and dissected on their fantastic Strength and Conditioning Research.  

The aforementioned study revolves around how strength training can lead to increases in power and speed for elite soccer players.

So, if you’re a soccer player or coach soccer players we highly recommend you sit back, relax, turn off the FC Barcelona game on the flat screen for a bit and take some notes.

If you are a current soccer player or former soccer player, you should know that the sport involves movements that involve speed and power. Ask any Strength and Conditioning coach how important those two elements are for athletic performance. We promise they will tell you it is very damn important for sports performance. If you want to be the best, you have to train like the best!

Back to our original question:  If you play soccer do you squat?

We asked this question because the study we are about to break down by Keiner et al. shows strong correlations that sprint performance and leg strength can improve by doing both back squats and front squats. Man, if only we knew this back in our days when playing futbol, aka soccer. We probably would have been bending it like Beckham 😉

So What Did the Researchers Do?

The researchers wanted to track the development of 30m sprint performance in youth soccer players over a 2-year strength training intervention. So, they recruited 134 elite soccer players, not world cup stars ladies and gents.

The players were subdivided into three age-groups (A, B and C cohorts) and the average ages of each group were 17, 15 and 13, respectively.

To be very clear here, the participants in each cohort were divided into two groups. One group (Strength training group [STG]) was subjected to regular soccer training in addition to strength training twice a week for 2 years. The other group (Control group [CG]) completed only the regular soccer training.

The strength training group performed their workouts on non-consecutive days and the exercises varied between the parallel front and back squats during the week and also performed bench presses, deadlifts, neck presses, and exercises for the trunk muscles as well as the standing row.

Squat training for the strength-training group was periodized such that following initial technique training, the subjects started with a hypertrophy training block, which comprised 5 sets of 10 repetitions with 3-minutes rest between each set.

The next training block comprised a strength period of 5 sets of 6 repetitions with 3-minutes rest between each set followed by an additional training block of 5 sets of 4 repetitions with 5-minutes rest between each set.

The researchers measured 30m sprint times, including splits every 5m, and maximum 1RM front and back squat strength after two years of training.

So What Happened After All of This?

For Maximum Strength, the researchers reported that the strength-training subgroups of all three age-groups displayed greater improvements in the front and back squat 1RMs than the control sub-groups.

For 30m Sprinting Performance, the researchers found that in the A and C groups, the strength-training sub-group displayed significantly better reductions in sprint time than the control sub-group at each 5m split time between 5m and 30m. They found that in the B group, there was a significant difference between the strength-training and control sub-groups at the 5m, 20m and 25m splits.

Correlations; the researchers performed a correlation analysis and found that there was a significantly positive but moderate relationship between strength gains in 1RM expressed relative to body weight and improvement in sprint performance in all age groups.

The correlations were highest for the first 15m of sprinting, indicating the greater importance of squat strength for accelerating rather than maximal speed sprinting.

What Did the Researchers Conclude?

The researchers concluded that a strength training program involving front and back squats led to a positive improvement in the sprinting performances of young soccer players. Pretty cool. Right?

Wrapping It All Up

As you can see the research doesn’t lie. Of course there were limitations, but all studies have limitations. And, at the end of the day if those do not agree with these findings, that’s ok too because science is always open to debate.

We can definitely tell you from anecdotal experience that squats and front squats will 99.9% of the time increase speed, power, hypertrophy, strength, and overall athletic performance. In other words, we highly agree and approve of this study by Keiner et al.

So, just too briefly recap, if you are a soccer player, coach, or just an overall jock, we highly recommend you implement some sort of squat variations into your training regimen to maximize your full potential.

Don’t get us wrong here ladies and gents, we are not asking you to go load up a squat bar and max out for 500 lbs. We are simply saying whether its conventional back squats or front squats that you chose to do, do them with proper precautions, make sure you squat deep, and don’t be afraid to progressively overload.

And hey, if you squat more often, maybe you will score more GOOOOOAAAAALLLLLSSSS than the famous “Pele” did.

“No Excuses, Only Solutions”

 References:

 1). Influence of a 2-year strength training programme on power performance in elite youth soccer players, by Sander Keiner, Wirth and Schmidtbleicher, in European Journal of Sport Science, 2012.

2.) Chris Beardsley and Bret Contreras, 2012.

About the Authors

Chris and Eric Martinez, CISSN, CPT, BA, also known as the “Dynamic Duo” operate a world class personal training and online training business “Dynamic Duo Training.” They’re also fitness and nutrition writers, fitness models, and coaches that love helping people reach their goals. Their philosophy is “No excuses, only solutions.”

Visit them at:

Dynamic Duo Training

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