In the book Extreme Ownership by retired Navy SEALs Jocko Willink and Leif Babin, the prevailing message is that great leaders take ownership of every situation they’re in and never point the finger at others. Even in situations where outside people or events may have affected the outcome, true leaders reflect on how they could …
6 Questions to Ask Yourself Before You Say Your Program Isn’t Working Read More »
As I sit here with crippling delayed-onset muscle soreness (DOMS) from Tuesday’s squat session, I got to thinking about soreness and how it’s been misrepresented on both ends of the spectrum by coaches and trainers. One side (the no pain, no gain side) of the coaching continuum uses soreness as a form of self-validation. When …
3 Random Thoughts on Delayed-Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS) Read More »
Coincidentally, I’ve had a recent spike of clients experiencing sleep issues. Sleep is THE most important thing to enhance recovery, and if you’re not getting it, your physical and mental performance in the gym (and all aspects of life) are going to suffer. As I must always disclaim, I’m not a doctor, so don’t take …
I’ve noticed that around holidays (such as this 4th of July), my clients who partake in heavy barbell training tend to accumulate a lot more nagging injuries. Nothing major, but sore hip here, cranky shoulder there. And while I’m always striving to keep my lifters as healthy as possible, the truth is that if you …
At our Optimizing the Big 3 seminar this past weekend, we spent a good chunk of our lecture section talking about training philosophy and program design. When the topic of when to use a deload week came up, people had lots of questions. It got me thinking that my philosophy on deloading has changed a …
If you’re reading this, my guess is you enjoy exercising, and not exercising is a foreign concept to you. But deloading – a purposeful reduction in training frequency, volume and/or intensity – is necessary to help your body and mind recover and keep making progress. Deloads are boring. But Alex Viada said it best at the …
10 Deload Week Mistakes that are Hurting Your Recovery Read More »
STACK.COM – 3 WAYS TO REDUCE DELAYED ONSET MUSCLE SORENESS There’s a famous saying that “fatigue masks fitness.” Basically, we can rarely show 100 percent of our true athletic potential because we’re always under some sort of stress. This means that recovery is extremely important if we want to perform to the best of our …
Stack.com – 3 Ways to Reduce Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness Read More »
Have you ever thrown an ice pack on sore muscles or achy joints, thinking you were helping the healing process? Did you ever stop to think that maybe you were HURTING – not helping – your recovery? This sounds like heresy to many athletes and sports medicine practitioners, but it’s the stone cold truth: ice …
The body is a fascinating machine. No matter what stressors you throw its way, it finds a way to adapt, however big or small the change. But when those changes aren’t as positive as you’d like or don’t come about as quickly as you want, you have to change your approach. Deloading is not a new …
Stack.com – Deloading: The Secret to Better Workout Recovery Read More »
Superstition is as much a part of baseball as bats and bases. Spitting sunflower seeds, leaping over the foul line and not washing your lucky jock… none of these things make you a better baseball player, but good luck telling someone on a 10-game hitting streak to ditch the silly antics lest their fortune runs …
