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Bodyweight training for powerlifting gains

Some people are afraid of the weight, they’re afraid to take the strain, to have three hundred pounds over head that needs to come down to the chest and then be locked out overhead for a perfect rep. These people would rather push and pull their own bodies in various ways to achieve their fitness goals.
But for every person out there who is afraid to lift heavy weights there are those on the opposite end of the spectrum. There are those who see using their own body as an instrument to gain strength as burdensome, tiring and lacking in excitement.
The argument will rage on and many will criticize weight lifting for its steep learning curve and need for perfect technique to maintain safety. Is it important to know proper technique while weight lifting? The answer is yes but it also goes without saying that with bodyweight training that technique is important as well.
Not knowing the proper technique for some of the most basic exercises like a pull up or push up can result in a tweaked shoulders or other injuries.
An argument against bodyweight training is that you can’t develop maximum strength and hypertrophy doing it. Once again another misconception-- people perceive bodyweight training today as an endurance activity and are only familiar with push ups, pull ups, squats and crunches. People are blissfully unaware of all the variations of these exercises as well some of the more challenging isolation style exercises.
With each exercises there is a harder variation-- take for example the body weight squat. If a person can master the bodyweight squat the next step would be to move on to the one-legged variation called the pistol. Is 200-pound person weak if they can squat their own bodyweight with one leg? I think not which just goes to show that each system of strength training has its benefits.
What I am advocating as a strength enthusiast is a mixture of weight lifting and bodyweight exercises.
I admire the 300-pound strongmen like Brian Shaw and Zydrunas Savickas who can dead lift 800-pounds, lift stones that weigh more then they do and could crush my skull with their bare hands. However, I also admire gymnasts and their amazing ability to flip through the air, support their bodyweight in a handstand position and amazing conditioning.
At 170-pounds I am not going to be winning any strong man competitions and at my previous weight of 185-pounds I wasn’t going to either. I’m not even heavy enough to move a semi truck two inches. However, I am in a position to get massively strong and maintain my natural athletic ability.
Bodyweight exercises -- especially those that are used in gymnastics-- are an excellent way to compliment your weight lifting while maintaining athleticism. Bodyweight exercises like the handstand, human flag and L-sit are difficult and require a high level of muscular tension and strength. These exercises are perfect additions to the would be power lifter and bodybuilder.
Why? Well as far as power lifting goes the goal is to lift a maximum amount of weight. A power lifter relies heavily on creating muscular tension through out the entire body in order to get that burst of strength to lift the weight. This act of muscular tension is referred to by Pavel Tsatsouline as irradiation. Things like handstands, human flags and L-sits reinforce the concept of muscular tension and require a tremendous amount to maintain the feat.
For bodybuilding things like push ups, squats, pull ups and all their variations are not only going to build strength but will tone and create a physique that is to be admired. Gymnasts have some of the most defined bodies on the planet and rely almost exclusively on bodyweight techniques. Bodybuilders may want to take note of this and incorporate these exercises into their routines.
Finally, trying to build athleticism can be achieved using bodyweight exercises as well. Practicing things like cart wheels, back flips, hand springs and their variations can have a tremendous affect on developing coordination and explosiveness.
None of this I am sure is new information but it is relevant information and are great things to consider adding to any fitness routine. Remember however that it is important to learn these things from an experienced individual and in a proper training environment. Not all of these things can be accomplish on their first try and may require you to develop the skills to do them.

Cardio for athletic performance

When I was younger I always thought that being able to run five miles non-stop would get me in shape for a season of varsity soccer.

Boy was I wrong. Running at the same pace for 20 minutes didn't do jack for my in season conditioning.

The running I did in soccer was completely different then what I was doing on my own in the preseason.

In one minute of the game I could slowly be jogging to receive a pass and the next minute sprinting at full speed towards the net trying to shake defenders.

There was no carry over from the preseason to the season however from preseason to post I found that this was the opposite.

The constant pace change of the sport had conditioned my heart beyond what any sort of cross country work out had done.

I was running faster and doing more miles in less time then I was doing prior.

So what happened?

I’ll let the scientists and people much smarter then myself to figure this out but for my two centsI can only say that cross-country style running is a complete waste for sports conditioning.

Unless, I compete in an endurance sport rarely do I run super long distances.

Instead I find simply practicing the sport will give you the best conditioning you can get for it.

The more you the play a sport the longer you will be able to play it.

Now, that does not mean you can’t supplement your practice with conditioning.

However, instead of doing the typical knee crushing and ankle breaking long distance running people are obsessed with doing I suggest doing fast paced sprint style conditioning.

Do wind sprints, hill runs and suicides.

My favorite is lifting weights and swinging kettlebells.

If you raised your eye brow in confusion to the lifting weights part of the last sentence then let me explain.

When we lift weights for endurance we are working on speed and variety.

Something, I do not recommend in a strength building phase.

However, take a work out and do circuits from the floor to the ground and then let me know if you aren’t getting a cardio workout.

Here is a suggestion instead of focusing on the poundage on the bar focus on the time it takes you to complete a workout.


Work to minimize rest time.

Another classic is supersetting with reverse body parts like doing bench immediately followed by pull ups for reps.

Also, kettlebells nothing can compare to the affect of swinging a kettlebell for five minutes straight,

Not only is it taxing on your muscles but also your heart and your mind.

It takes will power to grind out five minutes of swings with a heavy weight and then it takes guts to try and best your reps by 10 next week.

Drink coffee, lift big then take a nap

If there is one supplement that does exactly what its suppose to do it is caffeine.

I’m not writing an article saying that drinking one cup of coffee before a work out is going to make you strong like Bill Kazimaier and ripped like Arnold Schwarzenegger but caffeine does have it’s advantages.

Personally, I don’t drink much of the stuff and when I do I usually stick to the basics coffee and tea (usually green tea).

Personally, I don’t like all the sugar that comes with drinking pop and energy drinks.

That being said caffeine is a wonderful supplement and something I recommend using on occasion.

Typically, when I use caffeine I use it when I am feeling tired, a little worn out and not very motivated to walk the two-feet from my house to the garage to work out.

First thing is first usually when I feel crummy like this it is from a lack of energy which boils down to two possible problems. Those problems typically are poor nutrition or a lack of sleep.

Like I said earlier in this article I don’t really care to drink caffeine but I hate even more to miss a work out. So, my solution is slug down a few cups of coffee or tea and whatever issues I am having.

Usually for me this would be going to bed earlier that night to make sure I am feeling ready to train tomorrow.

If your lack of energy continues after correcting your diet and sleeping more you may be getting dangerously close to over training.

If that’s the case it is time to consider a few days off from exercise completely to let your body recuperate.

As much as I hate taking extra days off I know that being over trained can lead to me getting sick. Something, I like to avoid and understand will cause more missed training sessions.

Remember caffeine is not a long term solution to correcting fatigue its simply a short term.

Use the stuff sparingly and try to use it as seldom as possible.

Caffeine is a stimulant and over time you can develop a tolerance (or so I’ve been told) so eventually the effectiveness is going to wear off.

For me one cup of coffee is enough. I use to drink no-Xplode before a work out and found that my body could hardly handle one scope full of the stuff.

I would experience caffeine overdose my speech would slur, I would have an extreme head ache, feel sick to my stomach and have the jitters.

Eventually, I got to the point where I could drink three scoops of the stuff but that was also when I could no longer discern whether the stuff was helping to boost my performance or not

Remember, moderation try to not be dependent. More is less with caffeine when I started using it constantly I found out that I wasn’t getting the energy or the performance enhancing qualities promised.

However, once I weened myself from using it again I found that on occasion a little bit would go a long way.

Goal Setting part 2

In my last post I talked about training consistency which is something that I believe is very important when weight lifting or doing any sort physical training.

However, that is only the stepping stone because the focus of these articles is success.

Any person doing any sort of exercise will be more successful if they set goals for themselves.

If there is one lesson that should be taken out of the last post it’s that you need to keep a journal, diary or whatever you call it to log your progress.

This journal or whatever will be instrumental for tracking your success and achieving your goals.

Here is an exercise that I think almost any person can benefit from in any endeavor whether physical, mental or financial.

On a piece of paper right out your long term goals-- things that you want to accomplish. From there take your goal and break it down it to several mini goals.

An example would be bench pressing 300-pounds. First what your would do is break that goal down to benching 145 for 3, 200 for 3, 225 for 3 and so on.

You want to set bench marks find mini-goals that are achievable that will eventually work to that final result.

Breaking something down smaller and smaller will help you gain the confidence you need to succeed.

Endlessly repping 195 for months even years at a time will not put you any closer towards that 300 bench.

Nothing is impossible it just might need more steps to complete.

If you continue to achieve these mini goals you will become more motivated to work hard and succeed.

Remember the naysayers that tell you, you can’t do something are people who are either jealous or have tried and failed.

Why did they fail because they didn’t set those mini goals they just went for it and failed.

Goal Setting part 1

For me consistently doing the same routine week after week is difficult. Week after week doing the same old thing over and over again just seems so boring.

So what have I done for most of my weight lifting career?

Well in all honesty I have constantly changed and reinvented my routine to a point where I had no clue how strong I was. The routine would be different from week to week taking in and accounting for every new breakthrough and fad that was popular at the moment.

I guess the pop term for this would be “muscle confusion” (imaginary finger quotes not needed) and is basically what is being sold by every mail-order exercise routine at the moment.

So what does muscle confusion do for a person who wants to be strong like a powerlifter? The answer is nothing.

I went from having a thin body (I’m talking Kate Moss) to having a lean over sized cross country runner body. I ended college at 185-pounds and did not look or feel like the weight lifting machine I had always hoped to be.

People still mistook me for being in high school and instead of looking 185 I looked like an big 155.

Huh? Yeah my thoughts exactly.

So, lesson learned muscle confusion was not the answer. What I am now finding out

and really have known all along is that keeping a training diary, log, journal or whatever is important to become successful.

Stick to a core routine and write down everything you do and accomplish. Exhaust a routine until you stop making gains and then change things or start over.

Simple enough yet for me it was and still can be the hardest thing to do.

I want to bench and press massive weights, be able to deadlift a car and tear decks of cards like they were paper. Unfortunately, muscle confusion and even those bodybuilding routines published in magazines were not getting me the results I wanted.

So after reading Pavel Tsatsouline books, reading John Brookfields grip books and looking through Brooks Kubiks “Dinosaur Training” I have finally found what I believe works for me.

My first step was losing weight-- why keep it if it doesn’t help. I’m between 165 and 170 depending on the day. I checked my ego at the door and have yet to see if affect my lifting.

Why carry the weight if I’m not strong enough to use it?

Next I decided to put together a core routine consisting of two sets of bench and two sets of dead lifts with five minute rest intervals. Keep the sets in the two to three rep range.

I add weight at either the end of a week or the beginning of the next.

For me doing only two exercises for two sets is hard. I’m someone who actually likes to exercise so when I cut my work out down to about twenty minutes I actually get sad.

My solution here was to alternate days between grip and ab work and biceps and stretching.

Keep a log and be consistent and make sure every week you try to go heavier.

Finally, Friday is a fun day you do your regular routine and then you throw in whatever the hell you want to do.

Go nuts this day is for you and feel free to experiment.

I like to do keg presses, ring work and mace swinging so these are the days I usually mess around with these kind of lifts.

Diet versus "Diet"

To many the word diet is a short term change to ones eating patterns to get thin. The thing is that a diet should be so much more.
People should think of their diet as rules to eat by for their entire life.
You will often times here so and so say I feel so great now that I began eating healthy and lost all this weight. Next month that person returns to their regular eating habits and undoes months of hard work spent eating healthy and going to the gym.
The word diet should carry a little more weight in peoples vocabulary. When I tell my friends a McDonald's Big Mac is not part of my diet they know that I don’t eat it. I don’t eat McDonald’s and I haven’t since I was a junior in high school.
People that know me know that my diet is how I always eat. I have never had to lose weight never had to “diet” in the usual Weight Watchers or Jenny Craig sense of the word.
So do I diet?
Yes I diet I constantly diet. I change it to fit whatever I am trying to accomplish.
Sometimes I diet to gain weight. For some that is a concept that might be confusing which may be understandable because the average desk jockey with a bad back doesn’t understand the value of weight gain.
People, my family and friends included don’t always understand that their is such a thing as positive weight gain.
What I mean by positive weight gain is that you gain weight to gain muscle not gain weight to get fat.
Regardless of all that there is too much emphasis on the “diet” and not a diet. People allow themselves to much leniency when it comes to eating. The simple matter of it is there is to much positive re-enforcement and to much incentive to eat poorly in most diet plans.
Most diets work on calorie counting.
“Oh if I just eat 15 calories for lunch then I can eat this 100 calorie piece of cake.”
Wrong, complete crap maybe I am someone who was gifted with a fast metabolism but from my stand point it is about the quality of food you eat not the calories.
What is cake?
Cake is sugar and carbohydrates plain and simple. Obviously sugar and carbs is no-no in any diet. How can simply counting calories prevent the negative affects that sugar and carbs have on your insulin?
I don’t have the answer because I’m not a dietitian but I know that insulin plays a big role in body fat percentage. In my personal opinion it is probably a lot better to eat 100 calories of almonds then of cake.
Why? Almonds=Protein.
Not only do almonds have protein but they are rich in unsaturated fats which by the way is an appetite suppressant.
There is to much fat-free and reduced-fat this and that. Diet food is crap for the most part. They replace one ingredient with another just to reduce the calorie count of the food and in turn might be replacing it with something that does you more harm then good.
The biggest joke is diet tea.
How can there be such a thing as diet tea?
Tea if it is brewed actually helps you lose weight especially the green tea variety. So something labeled diet tea is obviously not real tea.
Look it is simple if you feel better about yourself and have more energy from eating healthy why sabotage that?
If you know you should be eating a chicken breast instead of eating pizza why reach for the pizza?
It’s simple you lack motivation and you need to get it.
We all know that eating healthy you feel better, you look better, and if your an athlete probably perform better. But looking at it from a financial standpoint if you eat healthy you are going to have less doctors visits and less medications to buy for things like high blood pressure and type-2 diabetes.
So with less doctors visits and less medicine to buy you are going to have more money.
Isn’t more money enough of an incentive to try and be healthy?
So what are the blueprints for a good diet?
Simple fresh fruits and vegetables, raw meat that you have to cook yourself, nuts, milk and minimal to no carbs
The more you have to prepare your food the healthier it is going to be for you to eat.

Some favorites for odd object training

For me lifting the same old weight over and over again can get a bit boring and a bit tiresome.
Maybe I am a hipster when it comes to weight lifting and fitness because I am always looking to try something new, be different and do the opposite of whatever everyone else is doing.
Sure I do traditional weight lifting stuff-- you know the bench, dead lift and squats. One thing I also do though is lift weird awkward objects as well as do grip work that may appear slightly unusual the average gym rat.
Most of my unique training I do might be done with equipment that isn’t in the norm of your local gym or even is homemade.

The thing is that this weird awkward object training builds different levels of strength for an individuals that carry over to other lifts, they are great for conditioning and is just fun to do.

When it comes to weight lifting I try to not make it a chore. I generally enjoy working out and part of that is doing things that are unusual.

There is some great awkward object training that you can do right at home with a relatively low investment.

Keg Lifting

Probably my all time favorite thing to lift that is heavy is a water filled beer keg that I have in my garage. Beer kegs I feel like are one of the most versatile and challenging pieces of equipment anyone can work with.

One thing that is great about keg lifting is that just about any college kid who has an apartment probably has one laying around in a corner of some room from a party the night before.

Buying a beer keg just for the sake of working out may be a little costly. The cost itself is probably close to $100. The keg itself is really just a $50 deposit plus the beer. Luckily, if you have a few friends who can chip in you can empty the keg of beer and make your money back.

Now that you have an empty keg what do you do with it?

Well the most obvious thing is to shoulder press it overhead. Depending on the type of keg you have it can be relatively simple to fill it with water (I suggest that you look up a tutorial on how to do this).

With water inside the keg pressing even with it partially full can be difficult. The water moves back in forth inside of the keg making it hard to get the weight overhead.

There are also some other great lifts you can do with a keg besides just shoulder presses. You can do all of the Olympic lifts which can be very difficult as well as work on some strong man style exercises.

In the summer I like to take my heavy beer keg and bear hug it. I then walk the length of my back yard back and forth to see how many laps I can do.

Other uses can be partial dead lifts, kettlebells swings and shouldering exercises.

Great thing about the keg is that it works your stabiliser muscles and abs with the constant weight shift from the water inside.

Slosh Pipe
Another great awkward object to work with is a slosh pipe. A slosh pipe is just a long and thick PVC pipe filled half-way with water and sealed at both ends with caps.
The pipe was an excellent and fun piece of training equipment my college roommates and I had fun messing around with.
Our pipe was practically impossible to grip so lifting it over head was a real challenge especially with the moving water on the inside.
It is almost impossible to keep the water perfectly level within the pipe but that is also the challenge.
Try walking with the pipe in the crook of your arms, front squatting or pressing a slosh pipe and you may find yourself working muscles you didn’t even know you had.
It was always a challenge to work out with this piece of equipment and was something fun for my roommates and I to use.
We would keep the pipe in our living room and would challenge so-called college strong men to try lifting the pipe to level. If they were real masters we would challenge them to press it over head.
Have fun with it and give it a try but remember you need a lot of space to use this piece of equipment.

Maces

Another great piece of equipment that you may be able to make ( I didn’t though) are maces.
I have a macebell I bought from Torque athletic which I love and also paid a lot of money for.
Maces are basically large round weight on the end of a stick. I have seen some homemade versions online using dowel rods and bowling balls. Go nuts and be creative.
Maces are a challenge most because it requires some sort of leveraging strength.
The most common exercise is the swing which involves whipping the weight around your neck and back to your front. It is not as easy at seem this particular movement requires you to use your forearms, grip, shoulders and obliques just to complete it.
There are lots of great exercises like shovel lifts, uneven bicep curls and walking ab bridges.

The five myths of weight lifting or why some people can't do a PR

I originally submitted to this article to EliteFTS.com about two weeks ago unfortunately they never got back with me on whether or not they would publish this article so instead I am putting it up on this blog instead.

I have weight lifter’s ADD-- sad to say but it is true-- I am one of those people that spends a great deal of their time trolling the Internet for the newest, latest and most unconventional ways on how to get strong.
Of course with all my vast fitness knowledge, countless hours spent lifting iron and overall craziness I am relatively weak. I wish I could tell you that I looked like the incredible hulk, or weighed 145-pounds and could bench a half ton of weight.
The sad truth is I’m not a freak in any sense of the word, I’m fit, but not freaky.
However, with my constant self-experimentation I would say I have some good insight and advice in the world of strength training and fitness. I can honestly say that I am probably stronger then the average guy with a gym membership and have managed to accomplish a few personal fitness goals as well.
Some of those goals is a constant weight gain (from 145-185-pounds) since I started college in late-2006 and graduation in 2011. Took up steel bending for one year and managed to bend a few small nails before stopping and losing the skill all together and being able to successfully do a free standing hand stand pushup.
So here for your pleasure I present 5-weight lifting myths that I have discovered through my self-experimentation.

Myth 5: The biggest guy is the strongest guy or why bodybuilders are not the strongest

Look I have been there I have been that self-obsessed, image absorbed guy who wanted to be huge. I always told myself that wasn’t the case but truthfully I started out weight lifting for sport specific training and became more interested in the glamour of it all.
Bodybuilders are all about the pump and while there are some very strong bodybuilders who can bench press about 600-pounds there also guys who are about 90-pounds lighter who can do the exact same thing. 600-pound benchers in bodybuilding is not the norm it is the exception.
Of course strength is a hard thing to measure because there are many types of strength but in the pure sense of the traditional lifts: Dead lifting, benching and squat the biggest guys are not putting up the top numbers in these categories.
Remember, bodybuilding is about the pump not the poundage strength is just a by product that comes along with training hard.

Myth 4: You can’t get stronger at your current weight or why bulking up is only slightly crap

Look I can honestly say that I have tried bulking up and despite a constant positive looking muscular weight gain I have made relatively small gains in certain critical lifts.
I will first like to say that weight lifting starts first as a skill, second as overall personal psychology, third as good nutrition and lastly your genetic limitations at a given weight.
I have never been stronger then I have been right now and am currently 15-pounds lighter then my heaviest weight of 185-pounds. I was fit at 185 but I am superman at 170 in my most difficult lift--the bench.
Everyone is so obsessed with the bench despite it not being nearly as critically or developmentally as important as the dead lift and squat-- this of course is a topic for another article.
I have essentially become a better bencher out of the necessity to become a better lifter.
I taught myself how to bench as a technical skill that requires correct positioning of the shoulders, back and legs. You engage more muscles then just your chest in the bench and it is important to learn how to properly , lower the weight as well as pushing it up.
There are about a hundred itsy-bitsy things that can help to improve a bench press but the most key and critical thing I have learned is body positioning you need to know how to engage your legs, lats and triceps and protect your shoulders so you don’t hurt them.
A smart lifter is a healthy lifter and just about every lift has a few correct ways of doing it and about 100 wrong ways.
Another thing is finding psychological weakness-- a lot of people are going to sell themselves short on a lift just because they can’t believe they are trying to lift that much.
The truth is most people have it in them to accomplish great feats of strength but the psychology isn’t there. Each lifting routine should include some sort of meditation-- not the Buddhist kind but some sort of routine to put you in a winning state of mind.
Possibilities include: listening to certain types of music, visualization technique or like arm wrestler Travis Bagent screaming and self-hype.
Finally, if you are purely concerned about strength and have made all the adjustments and can’t seem to get stronger gain weight. Hypertrophy isn’t the be all or end all in strength gains but sometimes it is necessary.

Myth 3: Getting stronger and hypertrophy requires almost constant working out

Once again this another one of those myths that are not true-- these work out splits that they sell in bodybuilding magazines where a person trains five maybe six days a week is crap.
If you train that much you might get some good definition but you are also not going to make significant weight gains and will just make yourself sick from over training.
Do you think these bodybuilders are training six days a week for most of the year-- doubt it. I can’t actually say since I have never once been close to winning a Mr. Olympia but I can tell you that I made the biggest weight gains when I switched to a high intensity three-days a week workout.
I did everything I could do to reach that epic muscular failure that is so glamorized by meat heads in the work out magazines. Exercising like this allowed me to gain nearly 15lbs in one month.
Lets look at a not to scientific explanation: Muscle fibers break down, then they get plenty of rest to grow back bigger and stronger.
It doesn’t make sense that training to constant failure six out of seven days a week would make you get big and strong. When does your body have time to recuperate?
Hypertrophy is due to micro-tears in your muscle fibers if you are always tearing and splitting those fibers they aren’t going to have a chance to adapt.
In fact you will just make yourself sick from over training and then you won’t be able to work out-- so you are doing yourself a favor when you give yourself an extra day of rest.
The same goes with power lifting if you don’t hit that weight you were gunning for then you probably need to take a rest so that your body can heal back stronger.

MYTH 2: Flexibility makes you weaker or why I choose to give up my ability to tie my own shoes

There is this idea that stretching will make you weaker, while there may be some truth to this it is still only a half-truth.

The number one purpose of stretching is to prevent injury and to remove tightness from muscles.
Yet for some strange reason people view stretching as sissy and totally avoid the practice-- those people often times are the people who complain of bad backs from years of dead lifting heavy poundage.
To a degree if you stretch before a work out you are in a way overworking your muscles before lifting and could be making them weaker. Of course that is only a temporary result of stretching.
Stretching is something that should be done usually in between sets or after a workout.
Stretching is going to help remove blood from your muscles and help to relieve some of that next day soreness. There of course are some other benefits of stretching that weight lifters may not be aware off.
Stretching can be effectively used to increase muscle fullness in hypertrophy--if you don’t believe me then its time to seriously look into Dogg Crap Training.
In DC training weighted stretches are used to help pack on that extra density in a targeted muscle area.

MYTH 1: You need fancy protective equipment when you are lifting.

If you can’t dead lift 300-pounds without a belt or no straps then you aren’t strong enough to dead lift 300-pounds.
There is this mindset that to be a lifter you have to wear straps, expensive tennis shoes and use a weight belt. FALSE!
None of that stuff is necessary and in fact almost all of that hinders your strength gains. I am sure that there comes a time when maybe some of those things are necessary but when you consider that Louis Cyr quite possibly the strongest man to ever lived dead lifted over 500-pounds with no belt, straps or expensive shoes with only a finger then those things sort of seem pointless.
Once again I can’t stress technique enough which a lack off is primarily why people wear belts. Most people in a YMCA or college recreation centers are not a world powerlifting champion like current world strongest man Zydrunas Savickas.
I have yet to see in person someone dead lift 800-pounds at an everyday run of the mill gym. Until you are an elite power lifter there isn’t much of a need for a belt.
Read about muscle tension and irradiation written about in Pavel Tsatsouline’s “Power to the People” book and it becomes clear that bracing your muscles tight before a lift acts as a natural weight belt to protect your spine.
Next are straps another one of those things where unless your are an elite power lifter have no business using.
You’ll notice at most gyms these amateur bodybuilders will be shrugging with the 100-pound dumb bells but are using straps. These guys are weak, I’m sorry and are severely limiting their bodies development.
Don’t shrug or dead lift more then you can grip. If you can’t grip it then you need to go back to the drawing board and work on getting your hands stronger.
Stronger hands equals a stronger lifter the harder you can grip something the tenser your body becomes and allows you to lift more.
It’s irradiation again and even in exercises like the bench press a strong grip can make the difference in setting that new personal record.
Finally shoes.
A lot of lower back, knee and ankle problems come from modern shoes. Scientists are discovering that injuries shoes are designed to prevent actually cause them. Forget about lifting weights in Air Jordans your best bet is going barefoot.
If you can’t go barefoot then wear something flat like some Converse Chuck Taylors, Vibram Five Fingers or some of those water shoes you buy at the beach.
Why do this?
Well for lifters it is because you are lower to the ground and have less distance to move a weight off the floor from. Also, since your not as high up and your standing flat instead of a pronated position your less likely to roll your ankles and knees.
You get more muscle activation as well when your wearing a minimal amount of shoe your forcing those underused muscles on the bottoms of your feet to actually work.

Conclusion

Finally, I can’t stress technique enough I know there are going to be these first time lifters who read this that will think they can just pull weight of the ground without a weight belt. Technique is always the most important thing to learn in weight lifting and anyone considering doing it should research and train technique before attempting to lift heavy weights.
Be smart before you lift heavy and makes sure to talk to your doctor before starting any kind of exercise program.

Bigger biceps through grip training

I'm not someone who would probably win most arm wrestling matches.

Lets face it I am a skinny guy with skinny forearms and average sized biceps.

Don't get me wrong you don't have to have arms like Alexey Voyevoda to win matches, Jon Brzenk looks average compared to most people in the sport and he is like Muhammad Ali when it comes to slamming peoples arms on the table.

I'm not someone who is to obsessed with training biceps... I got over it a while ago. The last time I tested myself in a bicep curl I was somewhere around 105 or 110-pounds.

Not terrible, but not great... and I managed to get a few reps out of it.

Regardless you look at me standing next to my friends who enjoy lifting and I have baby arms. Where I think I am the strongest is in an overhead press.

I have shoulder pressed a keg a little over half-way full over my head before I got a groin injury from heavy front squats.

Needless, to say biceps I don't care as much for training.

But, lately I have noticed them getting a little larger.

I probably haven't done direct bicep work in over a month and even then I only did it about twice a week for three weeks.

So what happened?

Well I can only guess it happening because of the grip work I have been doing and heavy dead lifts.

Watched, John Brookfield's Blueprint for Grip Strength and I started doing his wet towel squeeze and twist (it is exactly what it sounds like). Not only do my forearms get tired by my biceps are pumping.

I'm not much of a bodybuilder (I tried with little success) but I can honestly say this is probably one exercise they could benefit from.

Besides just squeezing and twisting towels I have been doing my homemade rolling handle dead lifts for grip.

Dead lifts are considered one of the best exercises because of all the muscles they recruit.

I've read it was a great exercise for biceps but I didn't figure that me pulling about 190-pounds would have any affect ( I have a lower back injury that has reduced my once unimpressive 315-pound strapless overhand grip dead lift.) Never did I think that doing deads with such a small amount would have any effect.

Sure enough though I am seeing a change.

So, get gripping if you are looking to pack on some size.

Got my butt kicked at work today

Today I went to interview a local gym owner in my area for the newspaper.

I set up the interview because on the website it advertised that the guy was certified in Crossfit and Monkey Bar Gym training.

Yes!!!

I was excited because when I interned at a rival newspaper in this area I would always drive past the place and see the big tractor tires that mma

fighters, strongmen and etc. flip for conditioning.

I wanted to always check this place out so I finally got my opportunity.

Going in I was excited because I always read about Crossfit but I don't really incorporate any of it into my own personal training.

I think Crossfit is pretty cool but unless you have rubber bumper plates at your home or gym it doesn't seem very practical to do (mostly because dropping a barbell to the ground with Olympic lifts would mess up some steel plates).

Anyways, I get there do the interview and the coach there (don't want name names) asks, "Do you work out?"

Do I work out hells yeah I work out!!!

Then he asks "What was your last work out ?"

He asks me some questions and I try to sound impressive so I drop some names like John Brookfield and Pavel Tsatsouline.

I'm not strong, I'm really not but I know I am in shape so when he asks me to do a work out right then and there I agree.

5 rounds of pressing a 45-pound bar, doing overhead squats with a pvc pipe and some burpees.

I do all the rounds pretty much right in a row but I am gassed.

The guy wants me back and I say sure.

I'm running through my head do I want to come back? I'm trying to build strength in my power lifts.

I liked what I saw and I had fun but I was debating because I figured Crossfit training is going to be too exhausting to continue powerlifting and also was scared I was going to lose strength doing it.

Crossfit seems like it has a very high aerobic component in it

So I check out some videos of clients on Youtube and what do I see. I see women who weigh less then me cleaning 405-pounds to their chests and men weighing the same as me overhead squatting 405-pounds.

INSANE!!!!

I can't do either. The most I have ever cleaned was 170-pounds with shaky form and overhead squatting I leave to the professionals.

What I saw was inspiring and now I plan on going back tomorrow before a meeting I have to do for work.

I don't know if I want to do this five days a week but it is definitely something I hope to add to my arsenal.

I figure every other day I can do power lifting Monday, Wednesday and Friday and do Crossfit on Tuesday or Thursday. Maybe vice versa.

Of course I suppose I shouldn't call it Crossfit because it is a brand name which the coach reminded (but that is the name I know it by.)

I'm looking to get strong and this might just be the place to start.

Don't call yourself an expert when it comes to working out

I am not an expert and anyone who ever says they're an expert probably doesn't know what they are talking about.

Of course I don't qualify as an expert either because I'm not a personal trainer or certified in anything.

What I am though is a student.

I like the word student a lot more then the word expert because it says that you are open to learning.

I've never liked going to class but I do love to learn and am always reading up on things that interest me.

So when it comes to exercise nobody is an expert in my opinion just some people are more knowledgeable than others.

It's like science. A hypothesis is always being updated or being disproved every year there are very few things that can be called a law.

Exercise is science which means people that exercise should be flexible in trying new things, testing new things and deciding for themselves if they like those things.

I have certainly tried a lot of methods when it comes to exercise: changed routines, adjusted my diet and tried different supplements.

Where I am at now with exercising though is a good place that I will probably stay in for a while.

That is not to say that I wont change things up someday.

Right now I am loving just doing heavy dead lifts and bench press training. I lift four out of seven days a week with one day of fun.

I don't train to failure I give myself lots of rest and I make stretching a workout with sets of forced relaxation.

I feel great I never seem to feel sore training this way and I feel like I am getting stronger week-to-week.

Will I plateau? Will I change things up?

The answer is most likely.

I'll probably get bored eventually doing what I am doing but that's why I kicked in a fun day where I swing kettlebells, macebells, row bricks, heave sandbags, shoulder press beer kegs and maybe push my car while it is in neutral.

I don't do all these things in one day I just do what seems like could be fun at that particular moment.

Why deads? Why bench?

Simple for me it is easy to do from home.

I train at home by myself (not maybe ideal for everyone) but I only really have a bench and a barbell when it comes to traditional strength equipment.

I tried squatting at home but that required me to clean and press the weight over head just to get it to my back.

Olympic lifting is too technical and I can't clean what I can actually squat.

So dead lifting with all of its variations allows me to train a wide variety of muscles.

I train bench because I've always wanted a good bench and it is a good exercise in my opinion for building my front delts, chest and back. I try to almost row the weight down so that I don't burn my chest out before I get the chance to press the weight.

Is this the best method of exercise?

Maybe or maybe not but it works for me.

Find what you like and be flexible.

Easy DIY Projects That Get Big Results

I am not somebody who is very handy.

I'm not the guy who can fix his own plumbing or re-shingle his own roof I don't really own any tools besides maybe a tape measure and some duct tape.

However, some of the best strength training tools or the ones that you make yourself.

Sure there is always a quick buy already manufactured version you can buy-- but why spend hundreds when you can do it yourself for the fraction of the cost.

I can't say any of these designs were really original and there is probably a better of doing things but here are two do-it-yourself projects that don't break the bank (pictures to come hopefully).

SANDBAG

I'm a big fan of awkward objects. You may want to call me a hipster (but I rather you not) when it comes to strength training, but for me taking it old school and doing the unusual is cooler then simply lifting a barbell.

Sandbags are one of those things that are cool to train with right now (supposedly) which is cool since they are fun to use.

However, here in lies the problem people are charging hundreds of dollars for an empty duffel bag that is supposedly built for sand bag training.

I made my sand bag for $30 and there are probably cheaper ways out there.

What you'll need

1. 60-lb bag of sand from the hardware store
2. A duffel bag of some sort from your local sporting goods store

I wanted to start small so I bought a small duffel bag from Dunhams the brand of bag I bought was called Outdoor but any bag will work. However, what I like about the Outdoor brand bags is they come in different sizes which is great for when you decide to upgrade.

It is probably best to have your bag before you buy your sand. I found out the hard way that just because a bag of sand is marked non-tear or non-leak or non-anything that they still leak sand :(.
So, with my sand bought first I managed to create a mini- beach front property in my trunk.

So have the bag handy so when you get to the car you have something to put the sand into so it doesn't spill out in your trunk.

When you get home tear the sand open empty into duffel bag and zip it up. Simple.
If you are afraid the sand might leak or have some sort of bag without a zipper I suggest two things.

Either duct tape the spot where the sand is leaking out from or buy another bag to put sand bag inside off.

If you are concerned that 60-pounds might be too hard to start with get some sandwich baggies and put sand into them so that way you can add weight slowly as you get stronger. I didn't do this put it seems to be a semi popular method of sand bag training think of it as adding weight plates to your bag.

Homemade Rolling Handle and Loading Pin.

Grip strength whether it be for grip sports, arm wrestling or weight lifting is very important.

One of my new favorite ways to train grip is heavy one handed dead lifts with a rolling handle.

I can't promise that my handle works as well as Ironmind's Rolling Thunder but I like it and it seems to get the job done.

What you will need

1. Two different sizes of PVC pipe
2. chain, rope or cable
3. different size washers
4. carabiner
5. eyebolt
6. access to a saw
   

I had my neighbor help me with this one because he has a nice table saw that made cutting PVC pipe easy.

So, why two different size PVC pipe?

The reason is that you are going to put one inside the other so that it can spin around it.

I chose two widths I'm not sure exactly but one I believe was 3-inch width and the other was probably 2-inches. The point is that you want something you can grip but can't fit your hand all the way around.

You want the smaller pipe to fit just inside the other because the idea is for it to spin not flop.

Cut the inside pipe a little longer then a dumb bell grip (I may experiment with this so don't take this as law). so now you have your grip.

If you haven't screwed up you should have a decent amount of pipe left over. You are going take your smaller width pipe and make sure it fits nicely inside of an Olympic style plate.

If it does great cut the just short of the length of your eyebolt. You want this to go over your eyebolt.

Take your washers you bought which should be a couple different sizes. One big, one smaller one and if you can find a tiny one great.

I didn't really buy the right size washers so I improvised but basically you want a large washer that is wider then an Olympic plate hole so it does slide off of your pin when you lift it.

Put the smaller washer over the large one so that you block the hole of the washer so that when you put the screw that came with eyebolt on that it doesn't slide off. You may need to buy several sizes and experiment.

For me I didn't really know exactly what I was doing so I used a 2 1/2-pound non-Olympic style plate for my stopper.

Finally get your chain, rope or whatever put it through the handle, attach a carabiner or carabiners to the loading pin (preferably with weight) and dead lift.

Pretty simple right and if you have left over pipe you can use it as a make shift leverage bar by hanging a weight plate off of it (thank John Brookfield for the idea it wasn't mine.)

Now go out and have fun.


The author in no way was paid to endorse any company, product or brand name

My Wasted Weight Lifting

This is a tale of a misspent youth drowning in the over abundance of information related to strength and fitness.
I am not strong, I like to pretend I am but in all honesty I am not. I wish I could write an article about how a real man trains or about how these pencil neck geeks don’t know what the hell they are doing in the gym.
The simple truth is that I can’t because I am, was and maybe still am a weak pencil neck geek who gets sand kicked in his face by the bully at the beach.
What I am though is completely obsessed with strength training some would call it fanatical with the amount of crap that I have stored in my brain on the topic.
My story begins with my junior year of high school.

In 2005 I discover MMA, I love it and I decide I want to train for it. I get a book called “Superfit” by Royce Gracie my then hero which basically outlines his strength and fitness program.

Before that book I had been against weight training. I was a soccer player I figured that was something stupid football players did.
But once I tasted that steel I became obsessed and started doing as much research on it as I could. Probably like most I got my information from other people I knew who were doing some sort of program.
Next came the forums and then finally I graduated to websites and journals online.

Starting out I wanted to be fit, then I wanted to be bigger and now I want to be strong.

Getting bigger was easy-- just train and eat. Now I am not someone who looks like a bodybuilder but I have consistently packed on size over the years.
I went from a skinny 145-pounds in high school and finished college as a skinny looking 185-pounds.
So you would think there would be some strength gains along the way and well yes there were some but nothing tremendous.
My problem was the over abundance of training information available.

There are two many methods, two many exciting breakthroughs that come out and two much emphasis on bodybuilding.

I flip flopped from one routine to the next every other week and I was never consistent in the weights I was using.
The idea that to get stronger you have to do more led me to become chronically sick from over training and caused me to incur a longtime back injury.
So what has changed?
Well I train less now at least with a lot less intensity, I write things down and I stick to a fairly simple program.
I love the strength game and I will never stop trying to become more knowledgeable but sometimes doing less is doing more for your body.
The strongmen of yesteryear didn’t rely on science to tell them how to train and they were pound-for-pound stronger then most lifters today.
If you are looking to get strong there are three people I have to recommend-- Pavel Tsatsouline, Brooks Kubik and John Brookfield.
Read their books and remember keep it simple and condense the knowledge to your particular training program.

Keep training relatively simple, stretch eat right, train with awkward objects and never burn yourself out lifting.

Those are my suggestions and now after waisting six years of my life in complete confusion I am starting to finally make the gains that I have always wanted.