Repair Your Resolutions

Once again, it has been quite some time since I last posted. That is one thing that will change with the first of the year. I will be posting on a weekly basis, so be sure to check in often.

Since finishing school and coming home a lot has happened. I've started working with clients at Neighborhood Health and Fitness Center in my hometown of Ravena, NY. I've been studying for my CSCS, with the intention of taking it as a birthday present to myself by the end of January. And I've been contacting old friends from the area to help network myself as a strength coach and personal trainer.

As a side note, I am offering 2 free training sessions for anybody that would like to take a test run. I will only be offering this for the next few weeks, so take advantage soon!!

Now that you're caught up with what I'm doing, let's get into some New Year's Resolution talk.

Every year thousands of people set resolutions with all of the intention in the world of keeping them. Many sound like, "I'm going to get a gym membership and workout five days a week," or, "I'm going to stop drinking soda and eating junkfood and eat nothing but egg whites and chicken breast."

Although these may be great training and diet goals, they are simply unrealistic. And having unrealistic goals is the reason why you see so many people fail only months or even weeks into the new year.

So what should you do? Not make training and diet goals? Of course you should!

I wrote very early in this blog that if you want to change something, work on doing it for 6 months and it will become a habit. That may have been a bit long, so I want to decrease the time to about 3-4 months.

Work on changing one aspect of your training, diet or life for this amount of time and it will become a habit, says the author of Success Principles, Jack Canfield.

For example, my diet resolution is to drink a gallon of water a day. This equates to 128 ounces, which means I have to fill up my shaker cup just over 5 times a day.

Once I have done this for the next 3-4 months, I'll pick another "resolution" that will eventually become a healthy habit.

You can pick 3 or 4 resolutions for any aspect of your life to work on for the year, but work on only one at a time. This focus will make it much easier to change into a habit that should stick with you for the rest of your life.

Hope this helps you in your quest to lifelong fitness and health! Please leave any questions or comments below.

I can also be contacted for questions or inquiries about training at bobby.fisk@yahoo.com.

Recent Events and Training

It's been a while since I posted, as I've been busy finishing up my MBA, training teams entering their playoffs and making plans for when I come home in a couple weeks. It's an exciting time of year as fall sports begin the playoff season. With that, I want to congratulate the Averett men's and women's soccer teams for winning their first round matches today, both winning 2-1. I'm looking forward to watching both team's play this Friday in their semi-final games since both teams were consistent with their strength training throughout their seasons, and because I'm a huge soccer fan. I also wish the best of luck to the women's volleyball team who will go into their tournament this weekend and the football team who has two weeks left of their regular season.

I also thought it would be a good change of pace for me to give you guys a look into what I have been doing in the weight room along with the two gentlemen that have made up my first training partners in two years.

I have been thinking about getting into powerlifting in the past couple months so I've been focusing on maximum strength. This has created an interesting dynamic since one of my partners has an arena football league tryout in February. He has also been on the same strength program.

In my mind, its no coincidence that my lifting numbers are as high as they have ever been. For the last three months I've missed very few workouts with my group, we push eachother every single day and we have a ton of fun together. I believe intensity is the most important key in strength training, as we have had many conversations about exercises and set rep schemes and haven't stuck to one program for longer than a month. Having partners that you are accountable to, are stronger than you and have the same goals cannot be replaced.

As for my diet, I have taken the approach that since this is most likely the last time I will ever have an all you can eat buffet, I'm going to take advantage of it. Eating a lot of good foods with a few glasses of milk throughout the day, as well as really focusing on post-workout nutrition with protein and creatine has helped me gain about 20 pounds, with very little of it being fat.

For the first time in a while I have also been running on off days at least two days a week. These running days have included short sprints (under 40 yards) and hills. It helps that the football player I train with is trying to decrease his 40 yard dash time, so I run starts and build ups with him.

I'm still nowhere near my goals and in order to even look decent at a powerlifting competition I will need to continue increasing my strength numbers. With that said, I will be looking for people who would like to train with me when I come home, so if you are somebody looking to add strength, mass or just get in great shape all together, please let me know.

For those training for a sport, I have gained a great amount of knowledge by working with the Averett University teams this fall and I will continue to learn by going to seminars and possibly even taking undergrad classes in order to better myself. No matter the goal, I can certainly give some pointers whether I work with you one-on-one or just from a distance.

If you have any questions or comments be sure to post or email me.

I look forward to being back home for the Thanksgiving holiday and getting to work in the career that I have fallen in love with. I hope to hear from all of you soon!

Move your body first

It's been a while since I've posted anything because I have been doing what I love - working with athletes to help them get stronger. I'm learning a ton by working with as many as five teams a day and I couldn't be happier with how busy I've been with that, school and my part time job.

Anyway, on to the topic of this post.

I've been working with many athletes who have never even seen the inside of the weight room, which, as I've told them, is better then being taught how to lift weights before they are actually ready to do so. When athletes are young, many are given the same program sports teams have done for years without any type of progression. Do they get stronger doing this? Yes, many do. But many are often building strength on top of dysfunction (Got that from learning all about the Functional Movement Screen).

So when I get these athletes, many cannot squat do a depth anywhere close to parallel and can't perform a perfect set of 20 push ups. So my job is to start them back at the basics. I want to see them get into a nice squat position, with their thighs below parallel, before they goblet squat. I want them to be able to do 15 push ups with a 45 pound weight on their back and their feet on a bench before they bench press (that, I believe is from strength coach, Mike Boyle).

They need to be able to pump lunge with a 45 pound plate over their head without losing their balance before they have dumbbell's in their hand for walking lunges.

These are some of the progressions I have learned from others that I have my athletes work through. Many can perform these perfectly within the first few sessions, but some need more work which could include holding certain positions, stretching or just some technical form correction. But whatever it is, I want my athletes to be able to move as close to perfection as possible before adding difficulty or weight to exercises.

This will also pay off in the long run. By getting athletes to move through a better range of motion now, they should be able to stay healthier throughout their careers, as opposed to gaining a lot of strength on top of faulty movement patterns that do not put them through a full range of motion.

What I want you to take away from this post is: Move your body through a range of motion first, and once your technique is flawless, that is the time to add weight, but at the same time, you don't want to lose that range of motion.

For more progressions, questions or comments, be sure to email me or leave a comment at the bottom of the page.

I'll be trying to post at least once a week, so keep checking back and thanks for reading!

Another Diet and Warm-Up

I'll start with a great article I read last Friday on a way to think about your diet. It comes from EliteFTS.com and if you are interested in anything that has to do with training, sign up for their newsletter. Here's the link to the diet...

http://articles.elitefts.com/articles/nutrition/the-mountain-dog-diet-%e2%80%93-a-healthier-way-to-get-leanadd-muscle-or-both/

I also wanted to touch on warming up before training. Too many times I see people walk into gyms and weight rooms and just begin their training. This drives me nuts, to see competitive athletes and every day gym-goers starting their workouts without properly preparing themselves.

A warm-up serves two purposes: To get the body physically prepared and to get the mind mentally prepared. By warming up you get the joints and muscles ready for training by increasing blood flow throughout the body. And this is the time that should be a signal from your brain to your body saying, "its time to get to work". This is your time to concentrate on what you need to accomplish during the training session.

Warming up can be done in 5-10 minutes and does not have to be as boring as riding a stationary bike (although that is better than nothing). It also does not include static stretching, unless flexibility is a concern.

Here is the warm-up I have my athletes do prior to strength training and/or agilities and conditioning.

For this warm-up I have them take their shoes off (Why I, and many other trainers do that is for another post).
This is done from sideline to sideline on a basketball court.
Each exercise is done for 1 length.

Toe walks
Heel walks
Forward lunges
Backward lunges
Side lunges - Left foot lead
Side lunges - Right foot lead
1 leg deadlift walks
Quad grabs
Frankenstein walks
Knee hugs
Ankle pulls
Skips
backward skips
High knees
Butt kicks

Then they get on their hands and knees and I put them through a couple core and glute activation exercises I learned from Kettlebell Master David Whitley (who is also a strong man and does shows. Youtube his name and prepare to be amazed).

Then they will put their shoes back on and we will start out training session.
I will add and take out things that I see from other trainers, or sometimes I will think of something that I believe is new myself until I type it into youtube and see somebody else was doing it 6 months ago.

Now you don't need to do all of the exercises for a warm-up. This was an example. Personally, I do an abbreviated warm-up based on what I am doing that day. I start every session with some corrective exercises since my hips have been pretty terrible for years now. Then I go through a number of the above exercises and go through this jump rope routine:

100 regular jumps
50 left foot
50 right foot
100 alternating
50 high knees
100 regular

This is from Dave Tate's 5/3/1 Manual and I really like it as the last piece of my warm-up.

The point of the warm-up is to get a good sweat going. The guys I work with now would be jumping into first-step exercises or will be warming up for a heavy lift next so they need to be mentally and physically prepared. And this isn't just for athletes, as anybody going into a training session with the goal of getting better needs a solid warm-up.

Be sure to leave any questions and comments below or on Facebook.

Sunday Thoughts

I've been studying and studying for my CSCS exam which has led me to a lot of interesting topics that I could talk about. So instead of just hitting you with one, I'll briefly discuss a few thoughts I have had in my last week or so of studying.

Do something every day

Cartilage in joints has the least amount of blood flow and needs activity to get the necessary nutrients to keep it healthy. My high school basketball coach used to say this to my team all the time, to do SOMETHING even on our days off. Now this makes sense, especially as we all get older.

General Adaptation Syndrome and Progressive Overload

You have to place demands on the body that your body has not felt before to improve. This means you need to add weight, add reps or decrease rest periods in order to get anything out of your resistance or aerobic training sessions.

Stop looking in the mirror

It takes 16 training sessions before hypertrophy (increases in muscle fiber size) to occur. Yes, after a workout you will feel pumped, but go into each session working on gaining strength and the muscle will be sure to follow it.

Training differences between males and females

There aren't any. The only real differences between training males and females are that females should incorporate a bit more prehabilitation to protect the knee joint. Other than that, females have the same potential to build strength as men do. Don't worry, ladies, resistance training won't make you look like a bodybuilder because of the 10x difference in testosterone production that men have. But, the same rules apply: Progressive overload is a must.

That's all I have today since I have to get to the gym myself and tackle a couple of practice exams tonight, along with some finance homework.

If you have a question or comment, be sure to leave it below.

K.I.S.S.

Many of you have probably heard this acronym.

Keep It Simple, Stupid!

With so much information available to us, its easy to over analyze things. So I just want to remind everybody to keep it simple.
One way to keep it simple is with your diet. I read an article yesterday on tmuscle.com called, The Green Faces Diet. Probably the simplest whole foods diet I've seen. You can read the article by following the link at the bottom of this page, but the cliffnotes version was this:

1. If its green, eat it.
2. If it had a face, eat it.
3. If it isn't green and never had a face, don't eat it.

Sounds like it would be terrible. But go to the page and read the list the author gives. Looks like a pretty great idea, where you cut out refined carbs and get tons of great fiber, protein and essential fats.

Simple, and there's no doubt in my mind that it could work wonders for somebody trying to lose some body fat.

Another area where we need to keep it simple, is with our exercise selection. It's easy to pick up a bodybuilding mag and check out a 'roided up lifters program and use it. But the vast majority of people who strength train don't need to directly focus on the lateral part of their quadricep. The vast majority need to get strong all over. What's the best way to do that? Big, compound movements. If you have been lifting for less than 5 years or haven't gained any mass or strength from lifting no matter how long you've been doing it, these exercises, or some progression of them, should be about all you need for a while:

Squat
Deadlift
Bench press
Pull up
Military press
Row

A trainer I've read articles on who I can't recall right now, recommended, to spend 5 minutes at the end of your workout focusing on whatever you want, like your calves or biceps, just so you can work some smaller muscles you may feel need extra improvement. But 5 minutes is the max.

Keep it simple, keep it consistent and progress week to week and you can make improvements in any area of your life, especially in the weight room and with your body.

Got a question or a comment? Leave it below or shoot me a FB message or email.

The Deadlift

Every couple weeks I will discuss some of my favorite exercises, as well as exercises that I think work best for certain goals. So to start, I chose my favorite exercise, the deadlift.

I have already mentioned on this blog that this is one lift that everybody should do some form of. The benefits can be tremendous from an athletic standpoint, as well as from a muscle building standpoint.

Athletically, it works your posterior chain (glutes and hamstrings), which is chronically weak in young athletes who are more quad dominant. This will also act as an injury prevention exercise because a lot of knee injuries involving the ligaments of the knee can be prevented by strengthening the hamstrings. The posterior chain can help with speed development, which any athlete should want more of. It will also strengthen the core because of the stabilization necessary while executing the lift.

From a muscle building standpoint, how many other exercises work almost every muscle in your body? Other than the Olympic lifts, which are more technical and harder to learn, I can't think of a better exercise to increase overall muscle mass.

Now if you have never done deadlifts before, you need to find a good coach to teach the lift to you. There are a number of things I would look for while putting somebody in position to deadlift that I will not dive into extensively today, but one thing that I see with my athletes is that they are not able to maintain a neutral spine when going to start the lift. This can be caused by a number of things, like a lack of ankle or hip flexibility. If either of those are the case, then I would give a few corrective exercises to help that area.

As far as programming, beginners can deadlift two times per week. Once you get the form down start with 3-4 sets of 6-8 reps. I really don't like going higher than 8 reps because if form breaks down on this exercise it could be detrimental for days after the training session.

Work your way up to deadlifting your weight for 6-8 reps, then start using more weight and less reps one time per week. Try 5x5 for 4-6 weeks. Then try 10x3 for 4-6 weeks. As long as you keep your form tight and are continuing to increase weight, just keep lifting.

Nothing, in my opinion, gets me more amped up than deadlift day. So when you know you are going to deadlift, get in the gym, crank up your headphones, don't look at anybody else, and be focused on every rep. If you go to a gym that does not allow deadlifts, let them know you will not be back.

As much as I love the deadlift, it shouldn't be the only lower body exercise you use. Be sure to have a single leg exercise every lower body day, or if you are training 3x per week, at least two of those days should have a single leg exercise after the deadlift.

Be sure to leave any questions or comments down below, or hit me up on Facebook and leave them there.

Wanna improve? Lift Heavy!

I got a chance yesterday to get in the weight room, something I will not have the opportunity to do a ton this summer because of my busy schedule. Now this doesn't mean I won't be training, as I've learned how to use anything I can find to get a training session in. However, I always love getting back in the weight room because it gives me a chance to move some heavy weight. I'm not saying I'm He-Man, but I do understand that in order to get reach my goals, I need to work with heavy loads.

A misconception that I hear a lot is that when people want to improve in any area, they tend to stay away from lifting heavy. Somebody trying to "just tone" their muscles (which is another post for another day) does high reps, as does a person trying to lose weight. Somebody trying to jump higher, does endless jumps with their bodyweight. There is a better way to improve strength, body composition, in-game performance and build muscle, and its working with heavy weights.

I am not suggesting that somebody with no experience goes in and tries to squat 300 pounds. What I am saying is that after you have built up a level of strength where you can squat and deadlift your weight for 10 perfect reps, you need to start working with heavier weights. Instead of continuing with the programs that most beginnners are on of 3 sets of 10 reps, or doing a program you find in a muscle mag that calls for slow reps that last 30 seconds, start adding weight with 3 sets of 6-8 reps. After a few weeks of that, 4-5 sets of 4-5 reps. What many advocate, including somebody that after finding his website got me really interested in training as a career, Joe Defranco whose site is linked below, is working up to a 3-5 rep max on the big lifts of bench press, squat and deadlift and their variations. For more on this type of program, leave me a comment below.

Do not do all 3 of these lifts with heavy weights every session, but pick one to start out with and make it your heavy exercise for the day. If you improve on those 3 exercises then the rest of the improvements will be sure to follow.

Before you do anything, find a qualified coach that can teach you how to perform certain exercises and put you on a program to work up to a level to begin heavy lifting. If you are already at that level, start adding weight to the bar!

The benefits of heavy lifting are numerous, like an increase in ligament and tendon strength and an increase in testosterone production, as well as an increase in the speed you are able to move lighter loads. Also, the dirty looks you get from 140 pound trainers for deadlifting because it will hurt your back or the increase in times your asked how you met Barry Bonds' trainer. (Ok, the last one was a stretch, but I had to have some fun, I just got out of the car after 8 hours. But the first one WILL happen. When it does, smile, grip and rip that bar off the floor!)

So add some weight to the bar when you're ready. And it doesn't need to be a lot. A 5 pound increase in your deadlift, squat or bench every month for 5 years is 300 pounds. That may sound like a long time, but remember, this is a journey, not some quick fix.

If you have questions about exercises, programming or either of the two for a certain goal or sport, be sure to leave them below, as well as any comments!

I don't know if I will be able to post next week because I'll be working basketball camp in the Pocono's, but I'll be sure to get you some good stuff after the 4th!

A Few Simple Steps to Fat Loss cont'd

Sorry for the delay, but between my brothers bachelor party weekend, driving back down to VA for class last night and the USA's dramatic victory this morning, I've been swamped!

But as promised, here is the second installment of Simple Steps to Fat Loss...

5. Eat breakfast every day
This can't be emphasized enough. Breakfast does a number of things to promote fat loss. First, its starts off your metabolism early in the morning. Second, it will help you feel more full later in the day, which should decrease the chance of over eating at later meals. A lot of people say they just aren't hungry in the morning. I understand that, but force yourself to have something. Then there are people who say they don't have time. To those people I say that they are not committed to changing their body. When you don't eat breakfast, your metabolism slows down and you will end up stuffing yourself at lunch and dinner. You know what that sounds like to me? A sumo wrestlers diet. They train in the morning only to eat piles of food for over an hour in order to gain weight and slow down their metabolism. Do you want to look like a sumo wrestler? Didn't think so. So eat breakfast.

6. Small meals throughout the day
Much like starting the day with a meal, you want to keep your metabolism working all day long. You never want to feel starved because that's when your prone to over eat and/or grab something from the vending machine. The only way you can do this is by preparing yourself each day to do so. Bring fresh fruit with you to work. Drink a shake in between small meals. I'm not saying this is easy to do, but it can work wonders for fat loss because you never allow yourself to get extremely hungry or extremely full.

7. Fibrous foods first
Start lunch and dinner off with a salad, or make it lunch and dinner as you get used to eating smaller meals. Salads are great because they are low in calories, provide a feeling a fullness and most of us don't eat nearly enough vegetables anyway. And be creative with what you put in your salad. Mix it up from week to week. Fresh vegetables are great this time of year so go out and try some new things and try them in your salad. As great an idea as salads are, don't ruin them with heavy, creamy dressings. Use a splash of olive oil and vinegar and the real flavor of your salad will come out.

8. Water only
This is what I tell people to start out with when attempting to lose fat. Get rid of the empty calories in sugary drinks. I allow myself coffee in the morning with milk and sugar and a post-workout shake, but other than that, it's water throughout the day. Most of us don't drink the recommended amount of water anyway, so I recommend keeping a bottle on you all day long. Get a water filter and use water fountains at work to fill up and try to avoid buying bottled water daily. There have been studies done on the harmful affects of drinking from plastic water bottles. But by drinking only water throughout the day you can cut as many at 500 calories! So drop the soda and energy drinks and stick to water!

This has been a short list and the things you can do to lose weight are endless. But I feel that taken one at a time, these can help jump start your goal of fat loss and a healthier lifestyle. Remember, building the body you want does not happen overnight, but can happen by being consistent and disciplined in what you do on a daily basis.

Because this post came later in the week, look for another one very soon!

Get it done

I drove home Tuesday night after class (from 10:30pm-6:45am) and I obviously had a lot of time to think. The two things that come up a lot are my two passions in life - training and business.

So I thought about what my training would be like for the rest of the week seeing as I would probably not have access to a gym since I will be at my girlfriends house for the next few days, then traveling on Friday to see the rest of the family and get ready for a weekend with some friends.

Well, what ended up happening is that I had one of the best workouts I've had in a while. Here is what me and my girlfriend did last night:

15 min. dynamic warm-up
4 laps around a track in the following manner - sprint the first 50 yards of a straightaway, jog to the start of the next.
Push ups - 3 sets
Chin ups on the back of the football field stands - 3 sets

1/2 mile on the track doing the same thing

After this workout, we were both pretty fried. Especially me, since I haven't done sprints on a flat surface for the past 3 weeks because I have fallen in love with hill sprints and sled pulls.

The point of me telling you what I did last night was to show you that anywhere you go there are opportunities to have a great workout. You don't need fancy equipment, air conditioned gyms or sparkling spring water. Get a partner and/or some good music and get it done. There are no excuses to building the body you want. People have done so with far less than what many have these days.

If you are new to training or just have questions, leave a comment or shoot me an email letting me know what equipment you have or where you would like to train and whats around. Chances are you can build muscle, strength and athleticism no matter how little you think you have access to.

I'll post on the next 4 simple steps to fat loss next. I really felt like I needed to get this topic out there.

A Few Simple Steps to Fat Loss

This week’s posts will be on the topic of fat loss. I will touch on 8 things I think can help in this area that are very simple to do. One of my favorite books is, Success Principles, by Jack Canfield. He recommends trying to change behaviors 1 at a time and to give it 6 months. This is only 2 behaviors a year, but think of those bad habits you can get rid of and good habits you can create in the next 10 years!
I recommend doing the same. Start out with 1 of these at a time, and when you feel comfortable with it and it becomes a natural habit or behavior, on to the next one. I will start with the first 4 that are based on training and activity. The next post later in the week will be more focused on diet.
Before I start, here is a great article I read yesterday for those of you who don’t want to lose weight, but gain slabs of muscle. This is a topic I deal with all of the time with my own athletes and this really hit home for me. http://articles.elitefts.com/articles/training-articles/the-young-skinny-training-with-add-guy%E2%80%99s-guide-to-gaining-mass-and-strength/
Here are your first 4 simple steps to fat loss…

1. Strength train
Study after study shows that resistance training does a number of things to improve body composition and overall health. Through resistance training, you can lower body fat, increase metabolism, burn fat more efficiently for a longer period of time and build a strong, athletic looking physique. Train with the big, compound movements and limit isolation exercises. You can build a lot of strength through squats, deadlifts, rows, pull ups, bench press, military press and lunges. If you’re just starting out, look for the owner of your gym or an older athlete to help you with form. Stay in the 8-12 rep range. If you’re a beginner, you will get stronger quickly because of your body getting more efficient at the movements.

2. NEPA
This stands for non-exercise physical activity. This can be any number of things that only need you to be actively aware of your daily actions. Taking the stairs, not the elevator. Parking farther away from the store in the parking lot. Carrying your groceries and not pushing them in a cart. Mowing the lawn with a push mower instead of the riding mower. Like I said, this can be anything that gets you moving a little bit more on a daily basis.

3. After dinner walks
This probably goes along with NEPA, but I like it so much I let it stand alone. What do most Americans do after getting home from work? Eat dinner and sit in front of the tv until they go to sleep. So the dinner you ate is not being burned off AT ALL! Getting a few of those calories burned off from dinner with a 30-60 minute walk will do wonders if your body has been used to sitting around after dinner for years. Enjoy the cool summer nights, especially since across the country right now, its pretty tough to exercise outside during the day.

4. Sprint
This is my favorite and I have been hearing more and more about it in the last couple of years. Steady-state cardio is ok, but there are more effective ways to burn fat. Sprinting is definitely one of them. This doesn’t mean you have to go out to the track and run 100 meter dash’s for an hour, but some kind of interval training is great for fat loss. The analogy I hear all of the time is, would you rather look like a marathon runner or an Olympic sprinter? Most people will say they would rather look like the strong, athletic monsters that run sprints. This is why sprinting cannot be beat.

As a side note, my favorite kind of sprinting is running hills. There are a few reasons for this: As Jason Ferrugia said in his blog, with hill sprints less of a warm-up is needed and there is a smaller chance of injury than sprinting on a flat surface. The other reason I like them is because you can work them in a couple different ways. First, you can set a certain number of sprints and time yourself. The next workout, you must try to beat that time. The other way is to set a time and try to beat the number of sprints you do each workout. I can personally tell you, hill sprints will get you in better shape in a hurry and you will most certainly benefit from them with regards to leg strength and conditioning. The last reason I like them, is because they are hard. There is no getting around it, sprinting up a hill is hard work and when you get through a workout and your legs are shaky and you feel like you might not make it to your car, it is the best feeling in the world because you know you just did a tougher workout than 90% of the population and that is a key to success. Do what others won’t or can’t do.

I’ll be back at the end of the week to talk about 4 areas that have to do with nutrition.

Don’t forget to leave any thoughts or questions below.

Progression and Consistency

You can find a quick fix for anything these days, especially fitness and health. Ads talking about the best muscle building routine or supplement guaranteed to get you ripped in 2 weeks, or late night info-mercials selling weird contraptions that you only need to use for 7 minutes a day. Of course they sound great, but these weird tools are only marketing gimmicks that are used to make the owner a quick buck.
It amazes me that people get sucked into purchasing some of these tools. I feel as though it would be similar to somebody coming on tv and saying, “learn advanced bio-engineering in 30 days!!! GUARANTEED!!!”. I don’t think anybody would fall for that one, so why do we in the fitness world?
Very few things happen like they do in the fitness world. Pro athletes train for years to become pro athletes. Doctors are in school for years before they are actually doctors. Most people work at a job for around 40 years before they retire!!!
The same principles apply for building the body that you want. It doesn’t happen overnight. However, every single day you can behave in a manner that can help you get to your ultimate goal.
For those of us who want to build a strong, athletic looking physique, progression and consistency are key. I believe anybody that wants to build muscle and look like a beast when they are at the beach (or lake) over the summer must make deadlifts, squats, pull ups, bench press, military press and dips at the forefront of any program. But, there is a progression one needs to go through before getting to these major exercises. I’m not going to start somebody off with bench press if they have never lifted a day in their life. So one must progress to these, by starting with push ups, adding weight to those push ups, elevating the feet, performing 1-arm medicine ball push ups and explosive push ups.
With the amount of information on the internet, progressing to all of these exercises would be a daunting task, so every week or so I will give a progression for another great exercise that should be in everybody’s training.
Along with progression, is consistency. Like I said before, building the body that you want does not take weeks or months, but many times, years. The more you train your body, the more you learn about your body and the way it reacts. Don’t hate the process of becoming healthy and more fit, but learn to enjoy the journey, because everyone should be on the lifelong journey of being healthy, no matter how you personally define physical health.
So below is the progression I use with my athletes for the bench press. I usually start with 3-4 sets of 10-15 perfect reps. If the rep is not perfect, it doesn’t count. I normally wait until an athlete can do 10 push ups with a 45lb plate on their back, they are more than ready to bench press.
Push up progression
1. Push up
2. Feet elevated push up
3. Medicine ball alternating push ups
4. Weighted push up – vest, plate or bands
5. Feet elevated weighted push up
6. Dumbbell Bench press
7. Bench press

If you have any questions, don’t be afraid to leave a comment.

Next week I will start off with some simple, everyday fat loss tips.

Change the Game

The name of this blog is, Change the Game Sports Performance. When I was thinking of a name and bouncing ideas off of a couple of my best friends, this one seemed to make the most sense.

Even though I want to work with anybody who has the desire to better themself physically and mentally, the majority of the people I have worked with and will continue to work with are athletes. With that in mind, my goal with any athlete is to prepare them and give them the confidence to compete at the highest level that they can. And, not only compete, but to have the oppotunity to change the game because of their capabilities and work ethic.

In another way, athletes can change the game through the way they act on and off the field of play. Like any other coach, I want the athletes I train to work relentlessly in every aspect of training. But I also want my athletes to be the most respectful in the classroom and within their communities.

So much showboating goes on now and it makes me sick. I spent the last two years recruiting for a very good D3 men's basketball team and it took no time at all for me to cross kids off because of a lack of respect for their coach's, parents and the game.

I want to coach the kids that want to be great athletes and great people. Hard work and sacrifice pays off. Being great at anything is not easy and takes drive, discipline and determination. And I think people can learn a lot of those principles through strength training.

Change the Game - on and off the court

Strength For When It Counts

Bobby

Welcome...

Post #1...really not sure how to start since my bio is sitting off to the right, so I'll just let you know what you can plan on seeing from this blog on a pretty regular basis:



I plan on giving you links to video's, articles and anything else that I have read that I think you may find of interest. From nutrition to exercise protocols, I will be broad and general in the area that covers health and fitness, from the standpoint of a strength and conditioning coach.



I also plan on filling you in on what I am doing. As of right now, I will be working with a number of collegiate teams when they get back to campus at the end of the summer and I am already working with 2 teams with their off-season training. I will mostly talk about my professional work, but may throw in some personal stuff that may be important.



Along with what I am doing, I will let you know when I am offering certain services, which may be at a low cost or for free, seeing as I want as much experience as I can get before finishing school and heading home to continue learning and working in this great field that I have built such a passion for.

More than anything, this will be the learning process that I go through as I go through the steps to make myself a successful strength and conditioning coach and personal trainer.

I thank you for reading and starting this journey with me that will lead to my own sports performance business one day. I expect many ups and downs and I am happy that I can share the path that I will travel on.

Change the Game

Strength for When it Counts





Bobby