The Linkz 25th Feb 2012

Its that time of the week again, The Linkz are here!

First off, a double header from Mike Robertson - An interview with Dean Somerset, and 34 quotes from the Charlie Weingroff seminar.

 Harold Gibbons has some wise words from Wooden and Wolf

Precision Nutrition comes up trumps with an awesome multi-part compliance series, part 1, part 2, part 3 and part 4.

Ladies should be doing chin ups. Tony Gentilcore shows you the way.

Ben Bruno has 8 great tips for putting more pull in your program

Dean Somerset takes a look at the leg press, spoiler alert! Its not totally worthless.

He also has 5 (count em!) types of awesome for you.

Ben Bruno again, this time with can vs can't

Marianne Kane with an evil awesome 500 rep kettlebell challenge

Neghar Fonooni asks if you are using the right tools?

Charles Poliquin on the awesomeness of coffee

Jim Smith gets back to the old skool...

John Romaniello looks at complexes

An interview with Joe Dowdell

There you have it, Enjoy!

Stay healthy.

The other 166...

The are 168 hours in a week, thats quite a lot...

If you are doing 3 sessions in the gym - well done, but lets face it, most of you will be doing 2 or less. I actually found out today that the average weekly attendance for gyms in the U.K. is 0.82 visits per week!

Shocking!

So assuming you are doing a little better than twice the national average, that leaves 166 hours that you have free to sabotage the hard work you are doing. You are working hard right? Right??

Lets assume that you are getting 8 hours sleep each night, that's a big assumption I know (most are probably less), but just go with it. That's 56 hours of sleep, 110 left...

Now, most of you will be working on your asses, no not on making them biggKer (though that will be happening for some of you...) I mean in a seated position. For about 8 hours a day. Now I know there isn't a lot you can do about that, but we'll get to that.

Theres another 40 hours, and we'll call it an hour and a half round trip to and from work. so add in another 7.5 hours, probably seated on a bus, train or car.

There we are, 62.5 hours left. 28 of those are, you guessed it, drum roll please... 28 hours on your ass in front of the tv! Thats 4 hours each day in front of the goggle box. 34.5 to go...

Thats 5 a day roughly, take an hour for dragging yourself out of bed and out the door in the a.m. and another hour in the evening messing around doing "stuff." Some time preparing dinner/ calling for takeaway food, maybe a shower, read a little, some family time and before you know it, times up.

Now, I'm not saying that all this a big useless waste of time...but kinda really is. But lets be honest, 2 hours of gym time isn't gonna reverse the effects of 70+hours of sitting and general wasting of time.

Butt (see what I did there...?) its really pretty straight forward to help your self out:

1. When you are at work, get up ever now and again, at least once an hour. Even if its just going to get a quick drink of water, or just standing to stretch out yourself, do it. Your body will thank you for it and you'll feel a whole lot better for doing it. And while you are at it go for a walk around the building to to the park at lunch.
2. Do you really need that 4 hours in front of the tv? Guess what, you don't. If there is something you really can't do without, by all means watch it or Sky+ it. Go out, put 1 or 2 of those hours into an extra gym class, go for a walk, play outside with your kids if you have them. But go do something!
3. When you are in the gym, for the love of all that is holy, steer clear of the sitty down machines. You've sat all day, probably had to sit in the car to get to the gym, don't add sitting on machines at the gym to the list. Its long enough!
4. Use compound lifts, complexes, sprints, carries, bodyweight exercises to get the biggest bang for your buck that you can.
5. Foam roll, get a good warm up with plenty of dynamic stretching and mobility to get your body moving.

If you work with a trainer or you just train on your own or with a friend, its up to you to look after those "other" hours to make sure you aren't just using the gym as a place to hang out and shoot the sh!t. You owe it to yourself (and your trainer if you have one) to help yourself as much as you can.
So go do something (now that you have sat on your rear long enough to read this...)


Stay Healthy

The Linkz 19th Feb 2012

Another week is about to begin! Hopefully you've had a great weekend and are ready to totally dominate the week ahead!

To help you out and keep you learning and motivated, I present this weeks Linkz!!

Mike Robertson kicks things off with a look at stretches

Eric Cressey had been getting his learn on in 2011.

Molly Galbraith on cheating or not...with food that is...

Getting long and strong with Tony Gentilcore

Jen Comas Keck on the importance of Recovery, thats with a Capital "R", cause its important!

Nia Shanks talks eating habits and triggers.

Jim Smith on warmups and foam rollers

And follows it with some inspiration, awesome read!

Great article from Duncan Ogilvie  on the misconceptions around female training

Jonathan Goodman with a glimpse into his desk...

Badass Roger Law on challenges

Another great post from Jen Comas Keck on the food police and making choices.

Charles Poloquin on 10 factors to live longer and stronger

Dean Somerset on getting crazy prison fit...

Todd Hargrove on the myths surrounding toning.

Martin Rooney wants to know if you love Mondays?

There we have it, go, read, learn!

Have an awesome week.

Stay healthy!

The Linkz 11th Feb 2012

How is everybody doing? Hope your weeks are going great! Mine has been pretty great, I did a DiSC profiling session at the start of the week. If you don't know what that is, and I'll be honest, I had no idea either! Its totally worth looking into. Its a behavioral analysis that is frighteningly accurate! I was a skeptic but Anne the profiler was amazing and really helped me understand how to get the best out of myself and others. Its an ongoing process but I see an amazing change already! If you are in the Edinburgh area and might be interested in finding out more get in touch with me and I'll forward the details!

Anyhoo, on with the best of the Linkz!

A great article from Mike Roussell on T-Nation on carb cycling, the only cycling I ever do...

Molly Galbraith has a great new site, and wants you to ask "Whats your Why?"

Dean Somerset gets Thoracic on your ass. Part 1, part 2 and part 3. Fantastic!

10 awesome shakes from Elite FTS. Nom nom!

Neghar Fonooni has a new 6 letter dirty word for you... A clue?? It begins with car, and ends in dio...

Tony Gentilcore revisists a classic.

John Romaniello breaks Intermittent Fasting down. Hot topic, great post!

Charlotte Ord looks at the Biggest Loser style of fat loss.

Bret Contreras has some randomness for you.

Mike Robertson knows knees...

6 from 6, tips from coaches that is, Ben Bruno on T-Nation

Let Marianne Kane guide you through your first time. With a kettlebell that is...

Interview with Girl Gone Strong Julia Ladewski on Driventrainingsystems.com

Enjoy!

Stay healthy.

Single leg training, if you don't, you should...

I love single leg work. Its a challenge, it demands greater levels of stability, helps create strength and its absolutely necessary in my opinion. Think about it, you spend a whole load of time on 1 leg...
Walking down the street? Yes.
Going up or down stairs? Yes.
Fancy going for a jog? All one leg.
I could go on but I'm sure you get the point. You spend a whole bunch of time on one leg and to do that successfully, you need stability and strength.

This isnt gonna do it...

When you take a step, on the flat, going up or down a staircase, taking a stride during a run your body needs to create stability at the knee, hips and core.  Without the strength to stabilise the hips theres a bunch of ouch in your future! 

When you take a step, your weight goes on to 1 leg and your other leg lifts off the ground. Without stability, your hips on the unsupported side would drop stressing out your lumbar spine.

(A) is good. (B) isn't...

To stabilise the hips, the hip adductors and abductors need to be strong enough to keep the hips level.

The adductors are the adductor longus, adductor magnus, adductor brevis, pectineus and gracilis.

The abductors are the muscles that pull the legs apart, the gluteus minimus and the gluteus medius.

When a step is taken, the adductors contract to shift the hips over the supporting leg, and to counter the tendency for the unsupported side of the hips to drop, the abductors on the supporting side contract to hold the hips up and level. Weak abductors allow the hips to drop on the supporting side and if the hips tilt puling the lower spine to the dropped side. Not good...

So, single leg training helps to enhance the internal stability by forcing these muscle to work to stabilise the hips increasing the strength and ability of these muscles to keep you on the level.

In its simplest form, single leg training could be standing on one leg. Seriously. Try it. Stand on 1 leg, you'll notice that your feet, thighs and hips start working overtime to stabilise your upper body as it balances on the single stick that is your supporting leg. As your hips tire, you start to lean further over your supporting leg, taking the load off the abductors and you start to rely on balance.

Now most of us can manage to do this relatively easy task, so how do we progress? Well, I wouldn't advise going all Ben Bruno straight of the bat (seriously, this guy is crazy strong!)

Option 1
Static lunge. Starting with your feet shoulder width apart, take a big step forward keeping your feet shoulder width apart, now drop your hips straight down keeping your torso as vertical as possible. At the bottom you should be in a 90/90 position i.e. a 90 degree bend at your front knee, your back leg should be going straight down from your hips and bent at 90 degrees at your knee.  From this bottom position (your knee should be just above the ground, not touching it), contract the glutes and quads to drive your hips back to the starting point. The further you step out initially the more your glutes will be worked, and the shorter the step, more quads. Complete your reps on one side then switch to the other.

Option 2
Reverse lunge. starting in a standing position, step back to achive the lunge position, and drop vertically to the bottom position (90/90), again remaining as vertical as possible. From the bottom position, drive up using your glutes and quads, this time come all the way back to the standing position. Going backwards into the lunge takes the deceleration force out of the movement i.e. you don't have to resist the forward movement with your front leg, so those with knee pain may find that they can do reverse lunges even though forward lunges hurt their knees. You can either do all reps on 1 side before switching or alternate legs since you are coming back to the start point each time.

Option3
Rfess. I love this exercise! Start a short distance from a bench, facing away from it. Reach one leg back and place it on the bench with the top of the foot on the bench surface. Keeping a vertical torso, bend the front leg and drop the hips straight down until the trailing knee is just above the ground, you should feel a greater stretch in the hip flexors and quad of the trail leg than in the first 2 options. Drive through the heel of the the front foot and return to the starting position. Complete all reps on one side, then switch to the other leg.

Front foot on the box allows a deeper drop. From the floor initially is fine!

Option 4

Step up. stand in front of a box or bench that is high enough to put the crease of your hips just below your knee when your foot is on the bench. Now drive through the heel of your foot on the box to straighten your leg and pull you up onto the box, pause at the top and control your descent back to the ground keeping your working leg on the box throughout. Complete all reps on one side before moving onto the other.

Now. This is only 4 options. There are limitless options for  progressing from these 4 options, not only that but there are bunches that I've not put in here because:
1. There are so many options that this post would be stoopid long,
2. I plan on doing a follow up post where I'll look at other single leg exercises and I need to save a few!

Needless to say, you can add weight, change the height of the front foot to give a greater range of movement, have your weight in one hand only so as to create a offset load to challenge your stability etc.

I really feel that single leg training is hugely important to your training and you should, if you don't already, look to begin incorporating it into your training. You will create more stability and strength than you otherwise might. And that can only be a good thing!

Oh, and before I forget...I mentioned Ben Bruno earlier...

Thats 300lbs on 1 leg...

Stay healthy!

The Linkz 4th February 2012

The end of another week has arrived, must be time to share some linkz with you...

Mark Young looks at whether cardio is bad for you...(spoiler - it won't kill you...)

If you haven't tried the Sexy Challenge from Bret Contreras yet, give it a go, I got 67. Moderately sexy...

Not losing fat? Jason Ferruggia has 12 probable reasons why.

Dean Somerset talks snoozies, that is, he talks about how much sleep is enough, not some kind of Canadian dialect...

You need to deload once in a while...Jeff Barnett guest post on Mr Gentilcores site tells you the how and the why.

And Tony Gentilcore himself speaks about the similarities of program design and hosting dinner parties...stick with it, trust me!

Awesome post from Jim Smith on next level thinking. Great interview with Martin Rooney.

Nia Shanks has a great post about feeling better if you are seated for extended time (ie 90% of the folks out there) and an awesome rant!

Guest post from Jon Goodman at Mike Robertsons site, all about improving your coaching cues.

Nick Tumminello sets out the perfect meal, whatever your goals.

Harold Gibbons on push: pull ratios. Pull wins. Sorry to spoil the end...

Martin Rooney on what you don't need to be doing in order to get stuff done...

Great interval workout from Marianne Kane, not for the faint hearted...

John Romaniello breaks down intermittent fasting.

Jim Wendler takes a good look at the bench press.

Ben Bruno wants you to consider whats holding you back?

And there we have it for another week. Get your February off to a great start with some great reads!

Stay healthy.

Randomness to kick February off!

Hi Folks,

I hope all is well and with the first month of 2012 already in the books, I hope you are 1/12th of the way to the levels of awesome that you had planned for yourselves!

I thought I'd put out some random thoughts/ status report to start the month off. So here goes...

• I started the week with this challenge from Bret Contreras' site. I scored 67. I learned that my incline press was pretty lacking (5 reps at 90kg), my pullups were average (10), front squats need work(10reps), but my glutes and hamstrings saved my score from being totally unsexy! Hip thrusts got me 15reps (only the second, but definitely not the last time I've done them!) and RDLs got me 27 before my grip gave out. Overall not bad. What did you guys all get? I'd love to hear...
• Since January is over, the N.Y.R.s (New Year Resolutionists) have all but disappeared...Got to the gym on Monday morning, around 645 as usual, the car park was eerily quiet, the cardio machine were barely being used and there was no queue at the adductor/ abductor machines... Obviously didnt read any goals setting and achievement posts...
• I've been reading a lot this last month as always, for Jan my reading list was:
• The first 2 Jo Nesbo books, Described as the next Steig Larsson                                 
• F*@k Calories ebook by Krista Scott-Dixon                                                               
• Intermittent Fasting ebook by Dr John Berardi                                                            
• re-read the nutrition section of Scrawny to Brawny by Dr Berardi                             
• The Leader in You by Dale Carnegie                                                                           
• about 30- 40 blog posts                                                                                                
• a shit ton of atrticles online about performance, coaching, nutrition and leadership   
• Been doing a lot to try to always keep a positive mindset too. It gets a bit tricky while I'm still doing a job i hate while I get the personal training off the ground. Unfortunately I need the money it gives me to pay the bills while I build the PT career. So I always focus on the positives, keep moving forward and I know I'll get where I want to be soon!
• I've been working on getting a lot stronger, my big lifts (bench, deadlift and squat) are all pretty low numbers, so my aim for this year is to boost all those significantly by the end of the year. 
• I joined fitocracy.com and I've been logging all my workouts there, its great for tracking progress. I also always have my notebook with me in the gym to log my training along with how each lift feels and any other notes I feel important.

There we have it.  Ill be back at the end of the week with a new edition of the Linkz, until then, stay healthy!