Mobility Mondays

As my roommate put it, it's a national holiday for those that compete in athletics or do a heavy lift on the weekends. This to some is better known as a recovery day, certainly something I am in desperate need of today after about 60 minutes of rugby. Being out of training and matches for 2 week certainly takes an effect on you in a bad way. Suffice to say that my everything has hurt the last couple days. Done whining onto why I do recovery days and why they are important.

-You're body won't hate you: This is pretty much the top reason I do recovery days either in season or when I'm a midst a tough off-season regiment. Going through a recovery day will help get rid of the soreness that you feel all over.

-An off-day and still doing something: Recovery days give your muscles a chance to recover, because remember now kids your muscles don't actually grow and get bigger when you workout, they do it when you're recovering. You are in fact making little tiny micro tears, so it need s chance to recover. At the same time I'm not a giant fan of complete rest with exception of Sunday, if I can help it at least. Some days you just need it, but be honest with yourself.

-You don't want to be overtrained: This over laps a bit with the first 2 I just listed but I really wanted to hit on it. Simply put you're body can not handle being pushed 7 days a week 365 days a year or you will crash and burn and then get hurt. Even if you are Superman you are going to need some non resistance training days and some complete rest days.

Below is what I usually do for a recovery day or similar:

I usually spend plentiful time foam rolling, you should too, EVERYONE should. On days like this I spend about a minute per part per side. Even if it's not super sore give it that full minute and you may well find a tender spot you wouldn't have before.

A1) Bench T-Spine Extension: 3x8
A2) Side Lying Open Book: 3x8/
A3) Quadraped T-Spine Extension/Rotation: 3x6/
B1) Dowel OHS against wall: 2x8
B2) Knee Break Ankle Mob: 2x8/
B3) Couch Stretch: 2x30s/

As you can see really not too complicated, some upper and some lower, hope this helped someone out there today. Have a good day all and get after it today...even if it's just mobility.

Like A Glove!!

Quick one today guys, hit a new deadlift PR. Nowhere near anything as impressive as Cressy or Gentilcore or even my roommate Luis who has hit 5 hundo, but still felt good. Hit it last Friday, but because I didn't have the evidence I was challenged to do it again this week. Challenge accepted and risen to. Probably could have gone higher but time just wasn't on my side. Enjoy guys, that's 445 going up, like a glove.

Have a good day guys, go and get after it!

You Might Be Down But You Are Not Out

Anybody that's been a training professional for longer than a couple weeks has experienced a client going down because of an injury for one reason or another. The best trainers experience a client getting hurt some how and some way even when they are coached to perfection clients get hurt, mostly on their own time. It's not because they suck or their dumb, most of the time it just happens. I've injured myself training and I know what the heck I'm doing, so odds on someone that has a lesser clue is certainly going to have some sort of injury, hopefully minor.

Dealing with athletic injuries and dealing with general population injuries can be quite different for the most part, but there's one thing in common with most injuries on either side, you can train through them. Per example I got a pretty nasty gash on myself last week that left me out of competition for the better part of 10 days (picture below). Granted this is not a limb injury which can make working out 10 times harder, but at the same time I don't stop training, pulling 445 was a fun way to keep that going.

The basic advice I have for those that are hurt out there is simple, if it's a lower body injury, train the upper body as much as you can and do everything you can to avoid the problems that usually stem from being out with a lower body injury. Example is glute activation, there are a kajillion glute activation exercises and I'm sure that you, or your coach/trainer can figure out one that works for you, also any sort of core and mobility exercise you can do safely without pain, DO IT! These things won't keep you completely from having issues once your injury has healed, but they will cut down on the time it takes to get you back into the fold.

Upper body injuries much of the same applies, probably want to work on keeping the mobility in the shoulders and T-Spine as much as you can. Again like the glute activation there are plenty of drills for this that you can do safely, just ask. There will be cross over from injury training for upper and lower body, simply put, if it doesn't hurt and you can do it safely, it'll probably be OK and will be better than nothing.

Have a good day everyone and get after it...even if you are hurt!

Jumping, There's a Right Way and Wrong Way

This past Sunday, with the weather once again messing up our schedule, I had rugby practice on Sunday in beautiful South Boston. I say beautiful with pretty much as sarcasm as I possibly can lay on. We started with a jog out to Castle Island and back, mapped it out on Google from the stadium in Moakley park, not a short one at least not for me, about 5-6 miles. We then proceeded to practice lineouts since the surface was covered in snow, save what we shoveled off to do said lineouts, we couldn't get much else done in the way of team activities. Give the video a quick look over so you can see physically what it is I'm talking about, for those that don't know already.

See the guys that go flying in the air? Well that would be one of my big roles in this set piece from the game. The name of such a position is practical enough, Jumper, but there's a right way and a wrong way. Learning how to be a jumper can absolutely translate to the fitness field.

1. Arms up and jump as high as you can; This is actually something that is encouraged for me with jumps with my clients/athletes, the hands up allow for a solid counter movement to jump with, the jump as high as you can cue should be presumed. You have to say it for the rugby purpose because some guys simply just don't when they are learning and assume the lifters on either side are going to get it done on their own.

2. Go up tight not "fat"; Go up with control and not dead weight, going up without control of yourself and letting yourself go wherever, well if you're in a lineout and if it's not in the middle of a match, most likely results in the lifters will accidentally on purpose drop your ass to teach you. As you fall through the air after this thinking "oh shit" you'll probably realize what you did wrong. I may or may not have been guilty of this in my college playing days (yes I can do both, it's called versatility). You learn quick enough, hopefully, that you don't get dropped on your head over and over. Same applies to doing broad jumps, if you just jump with no control eventually you're just going to end up on your face from catching your shoe or something to the like of.

3. Control yourself in the air; Kind of goes along the same thing, for lineouts you need to keep your spacial awareness at high alert. Turning towards the opponent once you've caught the ball is gonna be bad news so just be aware of where your body is and where it's going. Same applies to our jumps in the weight room, know where your body is in space and where it's going to be in the next moment.

4. Land with ease; Land softly, it doesn't take too long to figure out when you don't catch yourself when you land, it hurts. Landing without catching yourself is tough on your body. I landed to the best of my ability every time I jumped Sunday and my body still hated me yesterday and I had something fairly soft(ish) to land on, concrete and hardwood floors aren't nearly as forgiving. You'll be able to tell when you don't catch yourself when it reverberates (big word I know) up your whole body through every bone.

For more on this subject my friend Mike did a great post on jumping and box jumps. There's a pretty good epic fail box jump for those that need a chuckle.

Hope everyone learned something today, go out there and get after it!

Much Needed Learning Experience

You know those really long car trips that you take some days and wonder why the hell you ever do it more than once? Well I did one this past weekend with Catherine, needless to say we were both beat from 3.5 hours of driving back and forth to United States Military Academy in West Point, NY. Oh did I mention that I played a rugby match between each trip where I basically just put my body out there and willingly punished it physically?

The match itself was a little disappointing honestly, we did not play well collectively, individually I felt like I was sucking gas from the first minute and the first hit. The problem being I think was the first hit was exactly that...the first hit I'd really experienced since this fall. We have been inside for the last 4 weeks with the exception of 1 day and that day wasn't really a day we had the opportunity for hitting. I can make excuses for the team up and down, but in the end we just didn't lay the hammer down and execute. The thing I think will help us from this start as to last seasons start is last year we stomped our first opponent in our 'friendly' opener and the next one as well. The season that ensued was all but a disaster (1 win out of 8 and a draw). You learn more from a loss than a win, hopefully we learn faster than last year.

The tape will tell no lies when it comes out later today. The best thing to do from what really wasn't our greatest effort as a team is learn. Figure out the things we did well and try to repeat those and the stuff we didn't do so well, well certainly don't want to repeat it unless we want another dismal season. It's a proud club that I play for with plenty of history of success so I have more than an inkling that last weekend is going to be more of a rarity than a common occurrence. Our schedule is long, but the roster is deep and a number of players are hungry for success.

Just a quick one today folks, I know I was a bit scatter brained, have a good one guys and get after it!