The weather is warming up, must mean my first match for Rugby is approaching, oh would you look at that I have one at the Military Academy in West Point NY this weekend, BOO YA. As if you couldn't tell I'm pretty pumped to go out and smack some people around. My friends and coworkers are all in agreement that I need to get outside and physically punish someone (legally), before I hit one of them. It's only an exhibition or what would be termed in Europe as 'friendly', nothing too friendly about going out to smash others though, especially when you open your season against your local rivals to start the season like we did last year for an exhibition.
OK back to the business for today, like the video says it's a new mobility drill that I've discovered. Thanks to my buddy Mike because he has been having me do them, I've had good success with increasing my mobility so I've passed it along to some of my clients that are mobility challenged. This video below is pretty much the first step to many in a prying deep squat. The trick is to get your quads to relax so you can sit in and hold it, if you can do such a thing without hanging on to anything and sit deeper and deeper as time progresses then do it, you'll be better for it.
Keys
-As I said before if you're quads are on fire and uber tense, you probably need to hold on to something like a strap or a gymnastics ring
-Keep the heels on the ground/don't get too toesy, no need to get knee issues, we're trying to fix problems not create them
-Start with at the very least 3 minutes, shoot for 4 or 5, I've done up to 6 and I know it's not a party and be prepared to sweat bullets, but try to relax and your hips will feel much more opened up
-This is best paired with a heavy leg day, really not a ton of point in doing a deep squat if you're gonna be working on rows and push press all day
That's it for today folks, have a good day and weekend, go out and get after it today!
The weather is warming up and that only means one thing...it's time for RUGBY, I'll get into that another day though. I'm going to preface this post with the fact that I love what I do. I get into the reasons why for the most part in this article, so I won't get too far into it. Let's just sum it up with I like making people strong and seeing the look on their face when they get a new PR or do something they couldn't do before. There are downsides to this job though. The list below is in no particular order.
-You Have to Be a People Person...ALL the Time- When you are a trainer or a coach, in most scenarios, you have to be switched on and glued in 100% of the time, OK not 100% but close. Even if you are having a shite day you have to put on a freaking happy face. I'm usually in a good mood and easy to get along with so it's not an issue for me. No point in being pissed all the time, just kills everyone around you, but even I'm not immune to having a shitty day, so having to turn it on like things are all good can suck the life out of ya.
-Minor in Psychology Anyone?- Sometimes I feel like trainers and coaches should have a minor in psychology to deal with clients. Like I've said before sometimes part of my job is being a shrink and just listening to other's issues. Most days it's easy, some days I've just had enough of the pissing and moaning. Also you have to know how to get someone to do an exercise they are really not willing to do, I'm not talking about "oh do I have to?" I'm talking about little kid pouting and throwing a fit because they don't like the exercise, that's always an adventure.
-I'm Rich B...Wait No- Guess what to all you trainer wannabes out there, if you are looking to get into this and try to become a millionaire, pick a different tree to climb up. Good facilities will pay you decently and let you keep your sanity by not making you work from sun up until sun down, unless you have a great passion and want to live at your facility, like I said you need to love what you are doing. I've been on the wrong end of such things and with more expenses than I could handle, practically living at my facility (I did keep quite a few personal belongings there) and little compensation, my clients were probably lucky I really liked them and what I did.
-Grocery BILL$!- Big guys like myself, or even the average guy or gal, that are training or coaching most of the day and on their feet during said times, work up a pretty big appetite. The money I spend on food is pretty alarming to a lot of folks. I now feel the pain of what it was like for my mom to feed this bottomless pit (and sometimes 4 other growing hunks), so sorry Mom.
Sorry if this seemed a big negative, contrary to what you probably believe I'm actually having a pretty good day. Hope everyone else does, go out and get after it today!
Just a forewarning on this one I went a little more primal with the language than usual, use your discretion. So the "We" I mention in the title is those of us that do heavy resistance training, competitive athletics and lift competitively. This will just be a quick post, or as quick as I can make it, about why we get to consume all those calories and not have to worry about it after training. To the story of this past Saturday, we had roughly 10 people go to a friend's gym in Hopkinton, Mass, Crossfit Resilience I know about every one of you is saying "holy shit I thought you hated that stuff." Trust me I'm OK with throwing this out there for 2 reasons; 1 because we rarely end up doing anything that's "CrossFit" and 2 Dan Atkinson, the man in charge of training over there, is a beast and super smart guy, smart enough to not do any of the really dumb shit that you see from some places.
Back to the story, this past Saturday 10 of us got a great lift in. Mucho PRs going down and lots of muscle being built with the smell of chalk and sweat to accompany it. Sounds pretty appetizing doesn't it? Power Snatches, Deadlifts (some with chains) and more were being smoked for 3 hrs+. Prying, Front Flips and Log Press were just of few of things that shot my CNS and destroyed me on the day, so did Sumo Deadlifts with chains but I was looking forward to that.
To the point about why we get to eat all that, because after we did get to the local deli and mow on a great quanitity of food, my own included BBQ steak sandwich, fries, home fries Catherine didn't want, toast Catherine also didn't want, and a final Buffalo Chicken tender my buddy Mike didn't want. Trust me I wasn't the only one getting after it at the table like this. All the meanwhile ALL did not give a rats ass about what would happen because we have all built up good muscle tissue and were heavily depleted from calories...that made sense right? Lean muscle tissue burns the hell out of calories, especially shortly after a big lift like we had Saturday. Now if all you do is go to the gym on the treadmill for 20 minutes, use green resistance bands and lift pink weights you don't get to do this if you don't want to worry about what your body will do in terms of weight or body fat.
Let me be clear though, because you lift heavy weight does not mean you get to eat candy every day and not worry about your body hating you. One of my first mentors in this industry up at Maine, Dan Nichol, told me if you put garbage in the tank you will get garbage out. This was said to me when I was still up in the 280 and obese part of the universe. Eat protein, especially things that once had a face (thanks for that one Mike) and plenty of fruits and veggies, get strong and then you can eat a meal like I did and....(pause for effect) and not give a FUCK! You can also eat what you want and not care if you would prefer that lifestyle that's your choice and I'm not stopping you, but just in case that's not your lifestyle then consider those things above.
That's all I got today guys, if you have yet to, get the hell out there and get after it!
Snow hit New England with a big old kick in the nuts this past weekend, if you didn't hear get out from under that rock, thus it has caused havoc with everything around here. The public transportation went in the crapper, roads are still a pretty good mess and schools only just went back into session today. My rugby team was not immune to being effected by the storm. We usually practice at the Armory in Dorchester until we get outside, but because of the blizzard the military were actually using it for it's intended purpose. This put us in a bind, we had to try to get something in because to beat the teams we are going play this spring you can't let snow force a day off. Luckily for us Cambridge Strength and Conditioning came through and gave us a whooping.
Cambridge S and C started with a couple of local "Old Boys" (basically guys that are now too beat up to keep putting their body on the line week in and week out), and if you can't tell by the picture below, I felt like I walked into Apollo Creed's "Tough Gym" in Rocky III. It was a hell of a change from the commercial gym I work at. Did it the old school way for a lot of our training too. I came into this pretty much gassed from my pre-season strength work out earlier that morning, having done squats and lunges, the second I saw squats on the white board I knew my legs were gonna be smoked.
The workout here included squats, as I said, 3x5, overhead press 3x5 and deadlifts with sets of 5 basically walking from a bar to bar set up with 135, 225, 275 and 325. Then the real fun ensued, 6 stations were set up, 3 guys in a group, 5 minutes at each station. Stations were as follows; Prowler pushes of 20 yds, trading off, Box Jumps AMRAP, only had one box so we used the concrete ledge made for the generators as 2 more spots (crazy). We busted out the tires for 2 stations, one had a station of swinging the sledge hammers, one hammer was hitting it on the side while the other was hitting it over the top, 3rd guy rested. The other tire station was one of my favorite, tire flips, each guy got 3 then switch. The final bit of fun was about a 40 yard sprint carrying a sand bag on your shoulder. None of it was a super exact science and I'm not getting into the benefits. I just gotta say for about 45 min-1 hr of work, certainly felt like I got my money's worth. So if you are in the Cambridge area and want to become a beast, Micah and his crew will get it done for you. Micah did us a huge favor because apparently he also cancelled a date to help us out, hope she isn't too pissed off bro.
That's all I got for today everyone, go out there and get after it today! Also if you ever have any suggestions please by all means let me know.
Been a dandy of a time to try to be a weather caster on local or national TV. Pretty sure we had in the same week to 10 days, blizzard like conditions and near spring like conditions. I don't know if you can place bets in Vegas on what the weather will be like 3 days from now, but I'm pretty sure my uneducated guess would have about the same odds as a meteorologist. So if you're packing for a trip to New England any time soon, good luck figuring out what weather you're going to pack for.
My pretty educated guess is that most of you out there probably don't have a clue as to what to do with soft tissue work, unless I've trained you, then you better be on the soft tissue work wagon or so help me. Most are quite baffled as to what the crap these things are and what they are used for. Below I have pictured many of the tools used for soft tissue work
I probably should have arranged them in some sort of ascending/descending order but it just didn't happen, brain wasn't quite ticking in the fashion. The items pictured above are foam rollers, for the most part at least. The white one 2nd from the top is the least dense and is something I usually use for some of the older population that are a bit more sensitive with soft tissue work to start with. The gray/metallic black roller at the top is a little denser, personally the difference between the white one and this one isn't great enough for me to really have the desire to use it, but it's there if necessary. The black one 2nd from the bottom is probably the most common one and the one I use the most personally, it's pretty dense, hell when it's fresh out of the box it's as hard as a rock, breaks up the muscle tissue pretty good like that though. The final thing that's got the black stripes on it, yeah it's exactly what it looks like, a PVC pipe, I've coached athletes that had to use these before so yes there is a reason for having one, some spots I even find these more useful and bearable to use. It rolls and it's a bit harder than a foam roller, but not quite enough to make you feel crushed after your done with soft tissue work.
Above I also have pictured a couple things that you may not have known how to use for soft tissue work. The singular balls by themselves are a tennis ball and lacrosse ball. They both can be used to get some more localized and specified soft tissue work. Sometimes I skip the roller completely and go after certain areas with a lacrosse ball because it's going to be more worth the time. The other object is a peanut, I use this on the the thoracic spine, it works perfectly because you can target the soft tissue around the spine, but the indent avoids contact and pressure on the spine directly. Nothing really tricky about it, it's just 2 lacrosse balls or tennis balls taped together.
So if any of the items you've seen here today are foreign to you, make yourself more familiar with them and you will be better off. Hope this helped some of you out there, go out and get after it today!
So this month marks a full year that I've been at this as a paid professional. Ok it was end of January, but I was a little busy until now. Yeah it's kind of daunting really, it seems like I've learned so much and come so far and been at this for way longer than a year. At the same time the year flew by and it feels like I was just in Maine a few weeks ago.
To recap what exactly happened from then to now for those that are someone interested I'll give you the highlight reel so I don't bore those that could give a crap. Was working in a restaurant in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. Landed a job at the old digs (pictured above with one of my favorite clients) in Hudson, Mass with a company I don't really care to speak of, but hey it gave me my start. Had some great clients and coworkers which became friends, about the best I could say for that. August I left the old company for the current gig here in Brookline, been training and learning by leeps and bounds since.
Anyone that's been in the business and survived knows the first year is tough. At one point or another you end up frustrated with something; yourself, employer, client, coworker, and want to put your head through a concrete wall. In the end that doesn't happen, you forge forward and come out the other side fine. I've posted a few things below on how I survived and ways to help others in similar situations.
-Don't be picky: Don't be picky on who you train and be really flexible on when you train. Train all comers, if the washing machine wants to be trained do it. Eventually you will nail down a pretty consistent and full schedule that you can work the rest around.
-Bring food and a few extra bucks: When you are on your feet all day and constantly training your body is going to STARVE for calories. I packed my lunch bag to the brim with good stuff every day...and I was still hungry after I ate it all. When the lunch bag is empty and the body still needs fuel you're gonna want a couple extra bucks.
-Live close to the facility (within reason): This was one of the areas I made a huge mistake with the first club, I lived a solid hour plus commute from the first place and pretty much woke up before sunrise and got home after sunset 80% of the time. Needless to say I've finally moved to a short commute away and life is a crap-ton easier.
-Educate any way you can: I got to the old place, needless to say I really was forced to do much self teaching for awhile. Other people gave me tips here and there that I applied, mostly though I had to read books and articles (which I did before I got my job) to learn. Didn't really have too many to mentor me, pretty much just had people put in front of me and was told to train them.
-Make relationships that last: Most of my old clients still keep up with me because I built a solid relationship with them. Hell 10% of my job was being a shrink or just an ear to listen to about their day. Another 10% was getting them to laugh and make their day better and the rest was being their trainer. Building that relationship got them to trust me fully and the ones that trusted me fully (even I couldn't get them to all trust me, it happen) became BEASTS. Even though I've moved on some of them would still enjoy training with me should the chance present itself just because of the relationships I made with them.
-Be happy with what you are doing: Training isn't all that glorious, unless you are putting your name on products like Eric Cressy or Dean Somersett then you probably aren't exactly rolling dough, so be sure you are happy with where you are training and with what you are doing. No situation is ever going to be perfect, like I said about my first place, with the exception of my clients and some of my coworkers, wasn't all that great. I changed it to make myself happier, but no situation will ever be perfect, even owning your own facility will bring things you don't like. Know your limits that you can deal with and then adjust and adapt from there.
The last thing to talk about is the knockouts portion. No I'm not throwing haymakers...yet (rugby starts tomorrow, get excited!). Saturday night I took the time to find an establishment to watch the most recent UFC Pay-Per-View. I did not regret watching it because there was a couple damn good fights and a couple sweet knockouts. One thing I really like is the President of UFC Dana White preaches to all his fighters, young and old, don't leave it in the hands of the judges. Twice this statement came to mind on the night of this event. One of the prelims was a split decision and the guy that lost genuinely believed he got robbed, the other incident Allister Overeem clearly won 2 of the first 3 rounds, guess what 3rd round he got a little cocky and Big Foot Silva made him pay with a flurry of punches that knocked him the f*&$# out! The point here is never leave what you want into someone else's hands, take what you want by the scruff of the neck and get it done. No one will hand it to you (unless you're a spoiled bratt, then you'll be in for a huge wake up when you don't get what you want handed to you eventually). I see this almost every event UFC does or Ultimate Fighter Season that is aired.
Hope that wasn't too much for you all to endure. Go out there today and get after it!
