Phil Phifster vs Mariusz in 2006

Derek Poundstone vs Mariusz in 2008

Look at the reaction of the man who came out on top in these match ups and the man who was bested. What feeling do you want? I’ve been on both ends. I had a 3 way tie going into Washington’s Strongest Apple last year in a keg load and came out the victor and it felt amazing but losing a lead on the last event feels 100x worse.

Nothing will make you better at stones than actually lifting stones but you might not have access to stones every week and for me training them more than twice a month beats me up way too much. Here are the most effective assistance exercises I have found that can be done in any regular gym.

Stone Trainer: This is the closest you can get to mimic lifting a stone in a normal gym.

Unscrew the end of a cheap barbell or grab a loading pin. Load it on the bar and lay it so the plates are standing up, grip it around the plates. DO NOT grab the bottom of the plates by the lip to make it easier to grip. You need to train your upper body to be able to squeeze the stone and this is one of the biggest benefits of the stone trainer. Keep it to a weight you can lift up in one motion from floor to extension (don’t work lapping a stone with the stone trainer) for 3-4 sets of 8-12 reps. Your chest and forearms will be on fire from having to grip it for that long. That amount of time under tension can’t really be duplicated with an actual stone.

Off the floor:  When picking a stone you are in a stiff leg deadlift position so naturally stiff leg deadlifts will help with the initial pick and build up that hamstring strength to rip stones off the floor. I like to do them for dead stop reps after my regular deadlifting for sets of 6-12 reps. Leave your ego at home and lighten the load. Make sure you actually feel it in your hamstrings and are not putting unnecessary stress on your low back.

Loading: Front Squats will give you the quad and upper back strength to stand up with heavy stones and load them onto the platform. I like to cycle these really heavy to overload with reps in the 3-5 range to build strength for big stones and lighter in the range of 6-15 reps to help condition myself for comps that have a light stone over bar for reps.

Grip: The area I’ve struggled with the most on stones is actually gripping the stones off the ground. Aside from proper tacky I have found doing some chest flies has helped a bit with the squeeze and who doesn’t want a bigger chest anyway? I prefer dumbbell flies on various inclines with a real deep stretch at the bottom for sets of 3-4 and reps in the 12-20 range. Another thing I can not recommend highly enough is the Spartan Stone Sleeves they have taken my stone loading to new heights!

The post Atlas Stone Training In A Commercial Gym appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

I know this, because when I texted her asking if we could discuss her squat for a JTS article, her exact response was “I like squats.”

Specifically, Amy likes to squat heavy and often, and it shows. She’s back squatted 305 and 290×4 (high bar, no belt, ass-to-grass) and front squatted 275. This as a 150lb CrossFitter. Here she is front squatting 250×3 and 265×1…

But Amy’s squat is different from a lot of big squats. Amy’s squat is useful. She gets more value out of her squat than almost anyone I know. It allows her to do silly shit like this (208):

And this (223):

(Author’s Note: Amy actually has very good form – these are atypical lifts for her. I’m just showing you the kind of silly shit she can pull because of her useful squat.)

Many, if not most, of the readers of JTS are after more than just numbers. Squatting strength that carries over into speed, power, capacity – in short, into being a better athlete – is huge. So I figured the best way to figure out how Amy got such a useful squat was to ask.

How does your squat contribute to your overall athleticism, capacity, and movement?

As cheesy as it sounds, because I think the phrase “core strength” is funny, I think having a pretty solid squat has contributed to my core strength, which in turn has carried over to all my other movements, from snatches to handstands to running.

In your opinion, what makes the difference between a big squat and a useful squat?

First off, I will stand by the claim that the high bar squat is much more useful a movement than low bar. Low bar may let you use more weight, but it encourages getting strong in a less useful, athletic position, and won’t carry over, or may even negatively effect, other movements.

Mobility is also key. This is true for the obvious reasons, of course: first off, a full depth, rock bottom squat is the most valuable squat you can do for general strength and athleticism. Good mobility is also necessary for keeping strong, safe positions in the hips, knees, and back. In addition to that, it’s rare that you see an immobile squatter who is fast and explosive. Develop mobility so that you can hit full depth comfortably and be powerful throughout the range of motion.

What are your “rules to squat by?”

No belt for back squats. When I started lifting, I never touched a belt. It wasn’t for any particular reason – we just didn’t use belts at the gym I trained at. I didn’t even know where to get a belt. Because of that, I learned how to stabilize under heavy loads, and I feel like that has made me able to stabilize doing pretty much any movement. When I miss a lift, it’s never because I just crumple. If you don’t know how to make your own belt, you have no business putting one on.

Squat heavy often. Being under heavy weight regularly is the key to developing that built-in belt. Unless you are a very advanced athlete, it’s unlikely that you need to be using bands, chains, boxes, or dynamic effort days. Put weight on the bar – a lot of weight – and squat, three times a week at least.

Don’t get caught up in your 1 rep max. In the last year, the thing I’ve pushed the most with my back squat is the 5RM. I believe this is the rep range that has contributed the most to my general strength, power, athleticism, and capacity. I feel like for most people, especially females, your 5RM will still be a pretty high percentage of what you can do for a single. But the increased time under tension, and the volume involved with working up to a top set of 5, seems to have carried over to the rest of my training better than focusing on my top single. Additionally, there is less mental stress involved with the 5RM, and over the course of a long training cycle it can be a lot easier to keep progress going. This isn’t to say that the 5RM should take the place of the 1RM as the singular focus of your squat training, but rather that you should avoid getting completely intent on building your top single and neglecting other rep ranges

How do you approach your squat sessions?

Firstly, I always start with a thorough warm-up and mobility session, particularly my hips.

As far as the squat itself, I always think about taking a huge belly breath. I’m definitely not looking sexy. As I begin the descent, I focus on creating a lot of tension in my hips, and really shove my knees out to initiate the movement. At the bottom, I get a sharp bounce but don’t think about it too much – I just let it happen. I push my chest up and keep my belly tight through the ascent – when I miss a squat, it’s usually because I get pushed forward, and that happens when I get loose and let my chest drop.

The mental aspect is important too. I think the best thing to do is just get in and get work done. I don’t really get amped up. I stay pretty neutral and just step under the bar and squat. If you’re squatting three days a week at least, like you should be, getting emotionally involved every time you do it is going to be very exhausting and leave you psychologically drained, especially when you don’t have a great session. The important thing is to get in and do the best squatting you can do, and not worry about the numbers from day-to-day.

In your opinion, what is the biggest mistake most people make with their squatting?

The biggest mistake is not squatting. Especially in CrossFit, there are so many people who just don’t understand that they need to get their squat up if they want to improve their performance. Even competitive CrossFitters neglect it too often.

Going back to what I said earlier, I think a lot of people put the belt on way, way too soon. You are denying yourself a lot of the carryover you can get out of heavy squatting when you don’t learn how to do it without any help.

Another one is foot placement. Many people never really play with this, and don’t find the best way to set their feet. They might be too wide or too narrow or have their toes too far out or too straight – it runs the gamut. In my experience, simple changes in foot placement can make a big difference to your range of motion, comfort, and timing in the squat.

Lastly, people need to remember that their movement will evolve over time. As you gain or lose flexibility, gain or lose size, develop musculature in certain areas, or even just get more technically adept at squatting, things may need to change. There is nothing wrong with this. Don’t get stale or stagnant. Always be willing to make changes to the way you move.

The post Building A Useful Squat appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

10. Build a base. You should have at least 5 years of training before suits and shirts even cross your mind.

9. Train like a bodybuilder. Make every muscle strong.

8. Eat right. I’m sick of looking at fat ass powerlifters sticking their fat asses in gear. The top level lifters don’t shove McDonald’s down their throats 3 times a day.

7. Do accessory work. This kinda goes along with the bodybuilding one, but I’ve trained for twenty years and I still do leg presses, hack squats, dumbell presses, and flies.

6. Quit following other peoples routines. Figure out what works for you. At the same time listen to stronger people.

5. It doesn’t matter what kind of shirt Kennelly is wearing. He would be stronger in a trash bag then you in a triple ply Inzer Fury Rage Quad Seemed Dynamic Stiched Poly Shirt.

4. Do full range movements. The top level guys doing board presses in a shirt already know how to touch. I have watched countless board press heroes blow it at meets.

3. Train your abs hard. I’m unsure when people started to believe that abs weren’t important in powerlifting. If you’re ever standing up with a thousand pounds, you will thank me.

2. Bands, chains and boxes are awesome tools, but you can learn how to manipulate them. Bands stabilize lifts and boxes will stop you. This doesn’t happen with real weight.

1. Start your powerlifting journey at a commercial gym. Stay in the power rack and with dumbells. Things like deadlift bars and monolifts make stuff way easier. This was probably the most important thing I ever did. I got really strong using minimal equipment. It will make a powerlifting gym that much better.

The post 10 Rules to Getting Great in Gear appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

As I said earlier warming up properly will help most of this and something like a little extra time focusing stretching or rolling on an area may allow you to continue training as normal. More severe things may have you avoiding lifting around them.  For example if I injured my lower back and cannot squat as prescribed I would still do the exercise with no weight and up the reps.  Following this with some hot cold contrast showers helps me tremendously.

Training your hardest you will always be riding that line between healthy and injured.  Most likely I will spend the majority of the 1^st half of the season with some type of tweak.  Last season I had a couple and all of them trained around or through.  Just off the top of my head last year I had problems with my right hand, low back, left side ribs, left Achilles, and my right shoulder.  These things were all minor setbacks and took work to get back where I needed them.  I was able to get everything healed and healthy to allow me to finish strong at the end of the season when I needed it.

Despite the degree I have on the wall and the crayon MD addition I added I am not a certified doctor, so always be careful and train smart in regards to injuries.  As a rule of thumb, if something hurts, stop doing it.  If it’s important, figure out why it hurts, fix the problem, then get back to doing it.  That said, we all deal with aches and pains due to old injuries, stiffness, or just normal wear and tear.  Only you know the difference between discomfort you can, and should, work through, and pain that is your body’s way of telling you to stop doing whatever you’re doing immediately, if not sooner.

The post Training with Injuries appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

When I think of myself, and my identity in this sport, I classify myself as a powerlifter, but in reality I would rather be classified as an all-around strength athlete.  We have gotten so separated in our little “titles” that we have lost sight of a lot of things, one of those being strong. “I’m a powerlifter, I’m a strongman, I’m a bodybuilder, I’m a weightlifter, I’m an arm wrestler…” Do we not all have a love for strength? Do we not all devote insane amounts of time to our efforts? We should spend more time in learning from one another, and less time bashing, I think we all might realize how much better we can be if we did so.

If I gave you a scenario, that took lifting out of the equation, that would show you how absolutely ridiculous we have become in our way of thinking, we have allowed “weakness” to creep in and take hold. So here goes; imagine that you are walking down an alley with a loved one, possibly a grandparent, parent, brother, sister, child, best friend, husband, wife, you get the point,  now, imagine this person is attacked by someone in the alley.

Do you?

A)     Calmly explain to the attacker that you are currently a little rusty, need some time to go back to the gym, take some martial arts classes, and drop a few pounds?

Or,

B)     Do you do your damnedest, and start giving the attacker every ounce of your worth, and defend your loved one?

For me the answer is simple. I’m gonna try my best to defend my loved one. I always want to be ready for the unexpected. I want to be a guy that is well rounded, I want to be ready for anything, any challenge, at any time. Does this mean I will always win? Most certainly not but if you follow a few steps you can shed yourself of previous “weakness”, and start progressing towards being a badass 365 days a year. Stop limiting your human potential, and short changing yourself of the gift of a life, and a body you were given, and learn to push yourself, challenge higher than you ever thought possible. For too long all I’ve heard in strength sports is “you can’t be good at more than one discipline”. “Hey Brandon, you know if you deadlift in the Animal Cage you won’t be able to lift the next day in the XPC!!” Who says? I can give you a list of names from powerlifting that say so, weightlifting that say so, bodybuilding that say so… Do you think Mikhail Koklyaev gives a shit what those people think? Do you think that at sub 10% bodyfat, with an IFBB Pro Card Stan Efferding ever believed that because he was a Pro Bodybuilder, he’d never set a powerlifting World Record? 2303 lbs. at  275 lbs. BWT, know many have done that? One. You think Bill Kazmaier was thinking as a powerlifter that he was jeopardizing his future as THE most famous American Strongman, and possibly the most famous strongman in the world? Shane Hammond, Matt Kroczaleski, Shawn Frankl, Chad Smith, and a host of others all decided to believe differently. They pushed the envelope in multiple disciplines, and have inspired me to be the best I can be.

So, how does one become “365” strong? In my journey these steps are what I have found to work best for me, and allowed me to be great at some things, good at others, and dominant in a few , but mostly to be well rounded. There have been a few times when I have focused too much on powerlifting, and I lost a lot of base strength, I think a lot of this was an over commitment to powerlifting gear, notice I said, and OVER COMMITMENT, I think you can achieve 365 strength in gear, you just have to be aware that sometimes the gear comes off. So here is my plan to be a big, strong, jacked, fast, and powerful badass on demand.

• Train like a strongman, diet like bodybuilder, mobilize like a weightlifter, and think like a powerlifter. What does this mean? Strongmen need to be brutally strong, but they also have to be able to move with big weights. So train lifts in which you are no longer stationary. Do walking lunges, farmers walks,  and stone/weight carries. Don’t like hours of cardio? Pick up a weight and start walking with it… You’ll thank me.  Bodybuilders have the most necessity for food, and understanding what foods are important. There has been tremendous research done on the power of foods, and bodybuilders are leading the way for all of us, as far as pushing  the envelope on how much nutrition can help you. They eat a balance of proteins, carbs, and fats that not only allow for optimum performance, looking, and feeling your strongest. I used to buy into the idea that bigger was better, but then you see guys like Dan Green, Eric Lillibridge, Mark Bell, and Stan Efferding lifting at the highest levels and looking like bodybuilders it makes you wonder if you really got stronger, or if you just fattened your way to better leverages. Don’t get pissy, I believed in being a fatty for a long time too… You can change. Weightlifters put their bodies through rigorous training filled with explosive, joint slamming lifts. They allow their bodies to prepare for this because they dedicate to mobility work. This is a must for all of us, or before too long you will end up bound by your own muscularity, and literally unable to utilize the physique you worked so hard to build. Stretch for preventative measures, and for quality of life. Thinking like a powerlifter is important because for a powerlifter it is all about one big number. Many times in life, and in competition you will have to bring it all, 100%, full out, or you will fail. That is why in the back of your mind you need to unleash the inner powerlifter. Some days when it’s a designated “light” day I’ll go in, and just say “to hell with it” and max out. Why? To see if I can? To see if I PR? No, for me it is to see that my strength is high no matter that I didn’t sleep well, I maxed out earlier in the week, I haven’t eaten enough… Being able to bring it any day, any time is 365 strong.
• Keep the main movement hard, and heavy, then scale back, and hammer the reps on accessory work. This is the basic philosophy that I built the Cube around, and since that time, shared this idea with my teammates at Lexen, and Berea Barbell. In that time I have seen some amazing improvements not only in their lifts, but their physiques as well. Make the gym fun again. Push each other on weight, reps, then when you start to fail out, use Rest-Pause Sets, sets where you burn out or do as many reps as possible. Try throwing in a set where your only goal is time. We used to do benches at Lexen for two minutes. Just see how many reps you can get without stopping. Talk about brutal!! But these types of challenges amongst your teammates, and within yourself will not only keep you motivated, but having fun, and learning to compete.
• Never Build Walls Around Your Progress. What the hell am I talking about? I train the Cube Method, and I believe in it whole heartedly, but if I found a new way of doing things tomorrow that proved to be better for me why the hell would I keep training the Cube? If you ate cold mashed potatoes with your dinner every night you might think they are good, and enjoyable, but then somebody gives you piping hot mashed potatoes, or introduces you to how to use a micriowave my assumption is that you would most likely treat yourself to hot mashed potatoes from now on. Training is the same. I never understand this blue blood, dyed in the wool stance for any training idea. I trained the Westside Method, and had great results, but in my own belief, and the numbers I’ve put on the platform would indicate that for me the Cube works better. I believe in science, and Louie has loads of it, and I respect the hell out of the 30 plus years he’s given to the sport, but you know the only man that truly holds the key to my total? Me. So if you find yourself on the Cube, 5/3/1, Westside, Juggernaut, Lift Run Bang, Starting Strength, Sheiko, Smolov, etc. if it’s not working be willing to adapt. As you gain training experience learn that you can take parts of one, mix with another, and do a hybrid… Just find what works best for you. That doesn’t mean you don’t like me, Louie, Jim Wendler, or the others, it just means you made a decision to keep chasing progression. But with that give any program ample time to work… Don’t be a program jumper either.
• Lose hope, gain strength. What? I probably have more goals than any human alive today. Don’t believe me? I literally have the goal everyday to “wake up tomorrow”, and more importantly “wake up tomorrow better than today”. I have goals for everything I do. I believe that as each day passes I should be better than before, so set yourself daily training goals, weekly goals, monthly, quarterly, yearly, 5 years, 10 years, etc. Have a clearly drawn out map in your mind, and I almost guarantee you that the body will follow. This is the best advice I ever received about goal setting… A professor of mine told me the best way to achieve anything is to “lose hope”. Hope is the expectation that God/Mohammed/ The Universe will somehow magically intervene and fix your issues. He went on to explain that when you stop expecting things to happen, you get to making things happen. I hear guys say all the time “I want to squat “x”, but when asked how do you plan to do it they lack the answers to make it happen. I will tell you right now that I have a goal of benching 600 lbs. in a raw competition. I intend to do this by continuously strengthening my shoulders (front, side, and rear delts), working my triceps in multiple positions (pause press, floor press, boards), increase my overhead, improve my rep work on incline DB Press. Outside the gym I have ideas about improving my nutrition to stay as big, strong, and healthy as possible. I even go so far as planning to improve my sleep. A goal without a plan, is like a map without roads. Clearly plan for your future, and start upon your path.

I hope that after reading this article you make some sense of it, and realize that if you limit yourself to one way of thinking, whether it is a specific discipline, training method, or idea you are limiting your ability to be the best. Always be willing to receive new ideas. Never stop believing in yourself, and always push to be better in some area, I credit Mark Bell for the line “Strength is never a weakness”, but to further that you need to admit where you are weak so you can ultimately become strong. Raise your game, dedicate to be being a badass 365 days a year.

The post 365 Strong appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

The post Breathing 101 appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

Squat:

The biggest problem I see here is the infamous “Butt-wink” which is when the pelvis tucks under as the lifter gets to depth or close to depth. Why does this happen? Well basically your hamstrings are stretched as much as possible. The uneducated would see this and decide to stretch their hamstrings out but for most people that would be wrong. The tight hamstrings are only the effect, not the cause.
More often than not it is caused by weak glutes and abs, so naturally to solve this problem, I throw my clients into a program full of trunk and glute strengthening movements. Here are some of my favorites

Trunk: 

• Planks
• Anti-Rotation Band holds
• Front Squat holds
• Ab coaster

Glutes:

• Glute bridges
• Kneeling squats
• Wall sits with band around knees
• Split squats

To further this, we work things at both ends. Weakness is the main problem in my opinion but the lower back and hip flexors are “hella” tight in people with APT so we do the normal myofascial release work. I generally start people on a normal foam roller then as they advance we move on to a rumble roller then to a baseball. Nothing fancy here, just roll 4-5 minutes on each spot and move on.

Bench:

We all know someone that constantly pull their pec’s dont we? Hell, I’m one of them. This major problem is usually caused by the inability to retract and hold the scapula. A big problem here is having the inside of the shoulder blades “glued up” and full of knots and adhesion’s. I’m sure everyone is already working these out with their lacrosse balls getting lose but find themselves back at square one the next day. Why is this? Weakness! I’m not going to bore you by naming 47 little muscles in there you need to strengthen because it doesn’t matter! We train movements and functional muscle groups.

Here is my solution. These are bench press specific pull apart that DESTROY the scapular re-tractors like no other.

To do these correctly, do them exactly how you bench. Touch in the same spot, start in the same spot, lateral forces on the “bar”, arch, pause, etc. Everything is the same.

Deadlift:

Luckily I live and train in a place where there are no planet fitness or any other poser gyms around. This means I see deadlifts all day long. This also means I see horrible form ALL DAY LONG. Out of the 5-6 people I see deadlifting per day I am lucky to see one maybe two actually use their legs and not straight leg the weight up. Its not that these people don’t have legs because they all squat and leg press like mad men. So what is it? Easy, Lack of hip flexion.

By definition, “the hip flexors are a group of skeletal muscles that act to flex the femur onto the lumbo-pelvic complex, i.e., pull the knee upward.”

The problem can be a stability issue, meaning the core is too tight to stabilize the spine. This causes the Psoas to tighten up and shorten. The other major issue I see is tight glutes. Luckily, both of these are pretty simple fixes. Refer to my “trunk” list earlier in this article for movements that will help stabilize the spine.

If your glutes are the culprit, do yourself a favor and buy a lacrosse ball or just go get that baseball out of your basement, either will work fine. Now just sit on it. Its that easy really, you just want to sit on it and roll around until you find some really uncomfortable spots then work them until they release a little. Go ahead and skip the rumble roller here, unless you’ve got a serious donk, its not going to get deep enough to do anything beneficial.

Now this doesn’t cover everything that could be wrong, it does cover the major problems seen in a lot of people. Stop being lazy and implement these suggestions and watch your lifts get less painful and your PR’s grow. Remember, Strength is never a weakness but a weakness is always an inconvenience. Mobility problems are an inconvenience that are usually just an effect with the cause being weakness.

The post Mobility for the Big 3 appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

Check out this FREE preview of Ryan’s presentation “A New Approach to Mobility” from the Juggernaut Seminar Series at Derby City Crossfit in Louisville, KY this past February…

CLICK HERE to become a Juggernaut Member today and access Ryan’s full 75 minute presentation. Juggernaut Members get access to all our Members only content! 

The post A New Approach to Mobility appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

Hypertonicity refers to being in a state of excessive muscle tone, and it figures a great deal into the flexibility / stability / mobility equation.

If a muscle is hypertonic it is going to be producing excessive tension beyond what is needed for the stability of its joint(s) or anywhere in its line. If you are already on the “joint congruency” band wagon, then you understand that anything being out of place is going to cause some problems.

The trick is that a hypertonic muscle gives you pretty much the same signal as the tight muscle. I guess that it is also important that we distinguish between a “tight” muscle and a muscle with excessive tone. It is possible to have muscles that have an excessive tone, but do not actually lack tissue extensibility, the muscle will appear tight but may not respond to stretching techniques.

Hypertonic muscles can wreak havoc on your posture and your performance. Often times, especially with lifters, we see the lumbar erectors with excessive tone. Often times, this area already has is allowing too much motion and the last thing that we need to do is go stretching and creating more. If you continue to allow the hypertonicity, the excessive lordosis is going to be creating extra pressure on your spine, tugging on your hamstrings, and giving you weak hip flexors… not to mention all the problems it will cause in your tspine and your shoulders.

Physical or emotional stress can both cause hypertonicity. The the lumbar spine is just one example, and since the perceived “tightness” is caused by increased neural activity and not due to the physical properties of the muscle, traditionally stretching techniques may fail to alleviate your symptoms. Which sucks.

Some PNF stretching techniques are effective, as well as some nifty PRI tricks. The problem with that stuff is that you do at least have to have some sort of clue as to what you are doing.

My case for meditation, waterfalls, and other zen types of shit

The third best looking man in Kentucky, Jim Laird, has been preaching the value of meditation for a while now. I always just thought that it was because he is a grumpy old man, but recently I have been more and more on the zen train.
I teach a set of 5 “breathing, mobility, and movement” classes in the DPEC (Darkside Performance Enhancement Center). In the first class, we talk a ton about breathing and it’s effect on your posture and your movement. We take a look at each others breathing patterns and try to decipher what everyone is doing wrong. Then we do some drills in order to strengthen our breathing and to learn to gain better control. In the second session, we do the same sort of group assessments for the hips. We use 4-6 hip test, depending on the individuals, practice some specific stretches and exercises for what we find, and then we re-test to make sure we are idiots. Session three is the same as two, except that we focus on the thoracic and the shoulders.
The final two sessions covered movement and controlling your movements while maintaing good breathing patterns. It wasn’t until I talked to John one afternoon in the gym, that I realized what a monumental portion of good movement that I was missing.
Just as important as it is to be capable of controlling all of your movement, it is equally important to be capable of letting go. Tense, hypertonic muscles can wreak havoc on your posture and performance. They also inhibit the effectiveness of any other exercise you are doing to correct the “tightness” that you feel. For the average person who doesn’t have access to a good assessment it is difficult to determine what PNF or PRI techniques are going to be effective for you. The best solution is to shoot for a total system shutdown.

The Juggernaut Meditation Challenge.

The beauty of the fact that these hypertonic muscles are cause by increased neural activity is that probably one of the best solutions to the problems would then be decreased neural activity. Enter the meditation.
Every day for the next 30 days, practice the breathing drills laid out in the video on Friday on jtsstrength.com, use the couple of quick test in Wednesday’s jtsstrength.com videos to see if you should be stretching your hips or strengthening them, and spend 30 minutes per day laying in some sort of position of comfort (maybe a small pillow under your knees, whatever it takes to get you to totally relax) and use a soft but deep diaphragmatic breathing pattern (as long as you are doing your other drills you’ll be strong enough to get lots of air without much effort) and try to focus on turning things off, sinking into the floor/bed. You can even use a meditation app for your phone. They aren’t sponsoring me yet, so you can just google which one is the best.
Movement shouldn’t be so difficult all of the time. You shouldn’t have to focus on maintaining your posture, or make sure that you are walking correctly all the time. The other side of the coin is that we have got to learn to let things go, just as much as we need to learn to control them.

Try the drills laid out for the next 30 days, let #mobilityweek change your life. It can not only have a tremendous impact on your movement quality, but studies have shown that people who meditate (not in a creepy way) are 66% less likely to stab their partner with a knife.
and if it doesn’t work for you, then I will personally send you a $7 IOU. Actually, I will probably make my slave Kellie mail it.

The post Relax Your Way To Better Movement appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

My hope is that I can I simply explain this topic so it is easily digested, and readily usable to everyone who finds themselves on this page today. I am not going to attempt to cover the material in the detail that you will find by exploring the links that accompany this text.

My second reaction to Chad’s request was: “Shoulder mobility is not the right way to think about the intended focus of this article.”

I find that people’s definition of mobility is a bit off. So is their definition of stability. While stability is not the center of this article, it really needs to be understood within the context of a common theme. The theme being: optimal joint function.

Bill Hartman (PT and Co-Owner of IFAST) defines the two simply as:

Mobility: The ability to produce a desired movement.

Stability: The ability to resist an unwanted movement.

That’s a pretty general understanding of those two terms. However, it should be enough to understand the content moving forward.

There are a couple other terms you should be familiar with as well. These pertain to the kinematics of human movement.

Osteokinematics: Most everyone acknowledges these types of movement. They are the visible movement of bones. These movements take place voluntarily. Think: flexion, extension, abduction, adduction, ect.

Arthrokinematics: These are often forgotten movements taking place within the joint. They are much harder to see, if at all, unless you are looking for them. These are non-voluntary. Think: Glide or slide, spin and roll.

It’s crucial to understand that for every voluntary movement of a bone, an involuntary series of movements within the joint occurs.

With that in mind, let’s backtrack a second. My second reaction to Chad’s request was: “Shoulder mobility is not the right way to think about the intended focus of this article.”

My reasoning was as follows. Often people are looking to learn about more than just mobility. They want to know how they can improve movement in general. They want to know what to do in order to keep joints healthy. Improving mobility alone is not the answer. Armed with the knowledge I just gave you on mobility, stability, arthro-, and osteo-, kinematics, you can imagine the dilemma.

If the ability to produce a desired movement (mobility) is improved, but the ability to resist unwanted movement (stability) is not, then you will most likely find a bunch of unwanted movement going on within the joint. That is a recipe for disaster.

Recently, Mike Reinold delivered an in-service for our staff at Cressey Performance. He opened with a question: “What’s more important, mobility or stability?” That’s a tough question, right? There’s probably no clear answer, as they are not mutually exclusive. His question was meant to introduce a new way of thinking about movement. He wanted to place commanding respect on the concept of “position.”

What we are looking to achieve, if optimal joint function is the end goal, is a better position. When things line up they move better. Furthermore, we can’t look to improve the range of motion at a joint until we are sure it is positioned correctly.

Visualize it for a second. The head of your humerus (big upper arm bone) is sitting like a golf ball on a tee. The cup of the tee is the glenoid fossa of your scapula. Ideally, as the golf ball moves the tee will follow with it. As a result the two don’t kink around off each other but instead they work together. Now imagine the positioning of your scapula (golf tee) is out of whack. When the humeral head (golf ball) moves, the scapula (golf tee) doesn’t move fluidly with it. Now we have a problem because the two are colliding all the time. Or to say, when the osteokinematic movement of the humerus takes place, the arthrokinematics of the shoulder joint are faulty.

It’s all starting to make sense right?

In order to keep joints healthy we need to optimize positioning. In order to keep athletes healthy we need to optimize positioning through out their respective sport movements. Position must be achieved first, and then position must be maintained as we strive to improve mobility. All of which cannot occur if we don’t have the stability to resist unwanted movements through out the body, and within the joint.

If we want to improve mobility, we must first look at position. More times than not, improving positioning will result in newfound mobility (not to mention strength that was already present, but lacked a position capable of producing it). If position is achieved and there is still a restriction, then we can attack mobility on a more localized level.

When our positioning is on point in one joint, there is a good chance it is on point throughout the chain. Likewise, if our positioning is off in one joint, there is a good chance it is off throughout the chain. Fascia is a fascinating system of the body that connects everything. It’s pull will effect the entire chain, for better or for worse.

Assessing position will tell us where we need to focus our efforts in improving movement and performance. Is something over active, stiff, or short and not allowing something to move? Maybe we need to inhibit, manually release, or stretch it. Is something weak and / or inhibited and not pulling it’s weight? Maybe we need to activate and / or strengthen it.  Lastly, maybe we need to just give our athletes an overhaul in movement education.

It’s not as simple as prescribing a shoulder flexion drill to improve mobility in the pitcher who walked in to the gym today; with his ribs flared up, scaps pulled down, and overly extended posture. If we don’t attack the over active lats, faulty breathing pattern (rib positioning), and weak anterior core we won’t get anywhere. In some cases we may just cause more problems.

I hope part I of this article hit home with a lot of you. It’s an important concept to digest. Keep it in mind with all the articles you read during mobility week, and we’ll see how it all applies to the overhead athlete is part II.

Greg Robins is a Strength and Conditioning Specialist at Cressey Performance in Hudson, MA. Greg has worked with clientele ranging from general population to professional athletes. His unique experience in many different aspects of fitness, strength training, and athletic preparation have helped him become an unbiased authority on all things fitness and performance related. Outside of coaching Greg is a former collegiate baseball player, active member of the MA ARMY National Guard, and enjoys power lifting.

The post Shoulder Mobility for the Overhead Athlete Part 1 appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

In this video, Jim Laird and I will show you some breathing techniques and exercises to help correct this position. We learned these exercises from Mike Robertson and Bill Hartman at IFAST, and they have been an integral part of our programming at J&M Strength and Conditioning for over a year with great success.

If you’re interested in learning more about what we do at J&M, check out Bootcamp In a Box. If you run group personal training classes, bootcamps, or even train smaller groups of 2-3 people, this product is a MUST! It’s all about how to get maximum results in minimal time, while challenging your clients appropriately. Check it out!

Learn more about Molly and all of her exciting projects to help you improve as an athlete and coach in this exclusive interview…

The post Fixing Low Back Extension appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

In order to solve this training problem there are a few VERY important distinctions that have to be made. We have to first look at the ultimate goal of the individual. This is the most important thing to clarify. For instance if a person wants to train just for the sake of training because they love it that much, then by all means train however long you want. If that ultimately is more important to you than the gains you make there is nothing wrong with that. In fact I too love training so much I wish I could train all day everyday. However, my ultimate goal is not to just train, but to make progress. And not just make progress but to find the OPTIMAL way to make progress. Keep that word in mind, because its roll in deciphering the overtraining puzzle is paramount. This, my friends is the ultimate goal of every true athlete, to find the very best way to improve. Not sounding super tough and extreme to the core, or being lazy by being scared of overtraining, but actually GETTING BETTER.

Now lets define adaptation and progression.

Adaptation- In the terms of strength/fitness this is the idea that whatever stress you put on the body it will eventually adapt to that stress and be able to handle the workload. It is because of this thought that people espouse the more is better, no such thing as overtraining approach. Now there certainly is truth to this. The body will indeed adapt and be able to handle whatever workload you put on it. However, just because the body will adapt, doesn’t mean it will progress optimally. So I may be able to eventually squat twice a day every day but that doesn’t mean it is the best way to advance in the squat.

Progression- In the strength/fitness world this is referring to actual increases in strength, and or performance. This is not just the ability to adapt but to improve. Some would argue that adaptation is progression, and it is to the extent that all progression comes from the body adapting. But what if my body got use to the workload of squatting twice a day everyday but my squat never went up? Is that really progression? Now what if it went up 5 pounds in a year? Well yes that is progression, but it may not be Optimal progression. Which really is what we are after.

I can remember not to long ago reading about a high level american athlete who was doing this exact protocol, squatting twice a day every day. He suffered a small injury and because of this he had to start squatting less frequently. His coach said that when he backed off the squatting his squat started to go through the roof. The same coach however, still promoted the more is better, adaptation philosophy. I wondered why the coach couldn’t see the obvious correlation between strength gains and lowering of training frequency. It was obvious that if training less made him stronger then that is what he should be doing. Surely we can all see this correlation.

Now, I am well aware that some people will shout out about “Chemical assistance” and how that effects how an athlete trains. However, I would say the goal still remains the same for the natural or enhanced athlete-to find the optimal way to progress. Even if an athlete took everything under the sun, they would still need to find the training program that provided the most efficient gains possible. They still wouldn’t train 24 hours a day everyday. So the principle still holds up.

The role of trial and error- Ok so you may say tell us how to find the optimal way to train. Well we first must go through a certain amount of trial and error personally. For instance lets say that you try two different training programs, one with more training frequency and volume, and then you try training with less frequency and volume. Perhaps you got more results on the more training. Then for you, more training would be better. Seems pretty simple right? Now what if you went somewhere in between? You may find that it will give you even better results. I have known some athletes who get there very best results from training only 2 times a week. Who am I to argue with them if they get the best possible results from that? At the end of the day it is going to come down to each individual. After a lot of trial and error I found that for me the best training protocol was that middle ground, so I created the Cube Method for Strongman. I and many other people have found that this is indeed the sweet spot for Optimal training. Maybe it will be for you, maybe not. The point is to find out what works best for you so that you are maximizing your training and performance.

Get The Cube Method for Strongman Here!

I believe that in the strength and fitness community we should stop talking about overtraining and undertraining and instead focus on Optimal training. I believe being super dogmatic about either over or undertraining is not necessary, and unproductive for any real athlete. The conversation should switch to what is the very best way possible for me to reach my goals. So the secret at the end of the day is….wait for it…whatever works for you. Begin thinking for yourself in terms of how your body responds to certain training stimulus and don’t be afraid to experiment in order to define what does work. If it works for you, go with it. Begin to put your focus on what is the optimal way to get stronger for you. Results are after all, what we are after, not training for training sake.

The post Optimal Training: The Death of Over and Under Training appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

Read Chad’s Training Log Here

How would one undertake the daunting task of simultaneously training for 4 unique and challenging sports that people dedicate their entire lives to succeeding at? First let’s look at some of the traits required for success in each sport and please keep in mind that these lists aren’t complete by any means but are my opinion of the most important traits in each…

Weightlifting-Being a great weightlifter requires tremendous technical skill combined with exceptional lower body strength, speed, flexibility, and upper body stability. The overwhelming majority of highly successful weightlifters begin training in their sport at a young age, particularly when compared to their other strength sport comrades. I don’t know the exact age that Misha began training for weightlifting but I’m sure he was young and to achieve the level of success he has across a variety of disciplines it is necessary that weightlifting was his introduction and foundation to training.

Powerlifting-Being a great powerlifter requires above all, great maximal strength throughout the entire body. While technical mastery is of course important, you will find a much greater variances in techniques of top powerlifters than you will great weightlifters.

Strongman-Strongman is like the MMA of strength sports. In the same way that a great MMA fighter must combine high level qualities across a number of varied disciplines, so must the successful strongman possess great maximal, explosive and special strength, solid technique in a number of unique movements and unique among strength sports, a well developed aerobic base.

Highland Games-There have been many great strength athletes who have had crossover success in the highland games and vice versa. A great thrower needs speed, technique/coordination, special strength and maximal strength throughout the entire body.

There are many qualities that are unique to the different sports and a few that overlap, it is these shared qualities that you must focus on developing in your goal is to become a truly well-rounded strength athlete.

Let’s examine the exercises that will have the highest degree of transfer between these unique disciplines…

Squat-When I say squat I am referring to a high bar back squat and front squat, both done to maximum depth. While high bar back squatting may not be your strongest squatting position for powerlifting, it is critical for success in weightlifting and training a low bar squat will interfere with your motor patterns needed to maximize your performance in the snatch and clean. Training the front squat hard will help improve your back squat, deadlift, clean, snatch and strongman movements like log press and atlas stones.

Clean & Jerk and Snatch-There is no other way to get better at these than to practice them and there is no other way to get great at them than to practice them a lot. Training these exercises and their variations from various heights, on blocks and with pauses will of course be necessary to improve your weightlifting, but will also improve your general explosive qualities that you need to succeed in Strongman and Highland Games. Also training these hard will keep you in touch with deadlifting and help you become faster off the floor. Understand, that the first pull of the clean IS NOT a deadlift, deadlifting more will not make a weightlifter of any real qualification better in the clean or snatch-in fact it will actually interfere with their progress. Good weightlifters don’t train the deadlift more than a few sessions per year. With that being said, being a great powerlifter and particularly a great strongman hinges upon being a great deadlifter so it will be necessary to include heavy pulls more frequently than you would if you were just training to be a weightlifter.

Overhead Pressing-Overhead strength is a must for strongman and weightlifting (while it isn’t a press, it is still necessary and the stability it will help create is important), will have great transfer to Highland games (I personally preferred the bench press and variations when I was throwing the shot but overhead/push presses are great too) and improved overhead strength will improve your bench press. The majority of overhead work will need to be done with a barbell, as you will be able to handle the most weight which of course will have the highest transfer to other exercises, but some training with the Log will also be required because as those of you who have ever pressed a log understand, it is a different beast.

Strongman Events-As with the Olympic lifts, there is no other way to improve strongman events but to do them. There are so many different strongman events that trying to train all of them would be futile, so you must train those which appear most often and have the highest degree of transfer. Those events are Yoke, Farmers, Stones, Pressing and Deadlifts, the latter two I have already addressed. The Yoke and Farmers are very similar, essentially if you are good at Yoke and have a good grip/deadlift you will be good at Farmers. Doing as much submaximal training with events (and everything) as possible will be needed as the unstable nature of event training presents such a great load to the CNS and there are so many high intensity stressors in a program of this nature that you must do everything possible to keep your cup from overflowing. For those of you who haven’t read many of my previous articles, legendary sprints coach Charlie Francis likened your CNS to a cup and that every high intensity stressor you present to it (whether training induced like heavy or explosive weights, sprinting, jumping throwing or life induced like illness and emotional stress) fill that cup up to some degree and overflowing this cup means that you are overtrained, which is an arduous process to recover from.

Throwing and Jumping-If you are going to be a great strength athlete you have to be explosive and if you are going to be a great thrower, you have to throw. Throwing (both specific, ie. Actual HG events and general, ie. Medball and other weighted throws) will not only help build the general explosive qualities needed for weightlifting, powerlifting and strongman it will also build the specific skills needed to excel in HG. The usual Highland Games competition consists of 2 stone throws, 2 weight for distance throws, 2 hammer throws, weight over bar and caber toss. While this wouldn’t hold true for a high level competitor in just the Highland Games, it is in the interest of this program to put most of your attention towards the stones (the majority toward the light stone), weights for distances (the majority toward the light weight) and hammers (the majority toward the light hammer) because the WOB is the most general of the throws and frankly, who really trains the caber. The focus towards the lighter weights is done to develop speed/technique and rely upon your strength developed in the weightroom to handle the heavier weights and to avoid beating your body up as much. Jumps both upper and lower body varieties are a great general explosiveness builder and will have transfer to all of these activities.

Now that we have laid out the various means that we will utilize to tackle the complex and daunting task of being highly competitive across all the major strength sports. Lets look at how these pieces could fit together into a 3 week training cycle…

Now this is just one option to consider when trying to train for this variety of disciplines and is just a snapshot during a small part of the more complex training year. You must take into account your own abilities, strengths, weaknesses and training background. For example someone who’s history in in throwing and Olympic lifting may need to spend more time on their strongman events and powerlifts, while a powerlifter may need to do more mobility work and focus more on their weightlifting and throwing. The possibilities of this type of program are endless, but hopefully it got your wheels turning about the exciting challenge of trying to be a true strength athlete who is capable of performing well in any discipline put in front of them.

The post Training for Everything appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

Most athletes, especially elite level athletes, experience some type of injury during their athletic careers. Whether the injury is a sprained finger or an injury that needs to be fixed with surgery, there are five basic steps on the road to recovery.

1. REST

Resting is one of the hardest things to do, even when you know you need it. “If I rest, I won’t get better.” I lifted on my torn labrum for 8 months, before I decided that I should rest it. My coach always told me that I should not work on it if it hurt. Being stubborn, I tricked myself into thinking that the pain was part of my imagination. Even after surgery, I wanted to work out as soon as possible. Thanks to my physical therapist, I have given my body the proper rest to assist recovery.

When a specific part of your body is injured and you continue to train on the injury, you may be able to push through it and make gains. However, I can guarantee that you will not be able to achieve your full potential. An injury constantly puts stress on the mind and body, even if you aren’t aware of it. Giving your body the proper rest will allow you to recover faster. What is the proper rest period for an injury? It depends on the type of injury and how serious the injury is.

The best advice I can give you, is to listen to your body, coach and medical professionals (who know your sport). If your injury is serious enough that it needs medical attention, get multiple opinions!! The first surgeon that I saw proceeded to tell me that I may want to consider another sport, but I knew multiple people who have had the same surgery, are back to weightlifting and stronger than ever. Of course there is always risk in re injuring yourself. If you are doing something you are passionate about, you need the help and attention from professionals who understand your passion and are dedicated to returning you to your sport. Find these professionals and LISTEN to them! Most of all, pay attention to your body and the level of pain that you are experiencing. If pain levels are increasing over time, your body is probably telling you to rest!

2. REHAB

Rehabbing injuries, is THE most important part of recovery. If you don’t rehab an injury properly, then it will be extremely difficult to reach your maximum potential.

I was told that I would be able to recover in 4-6 months. I remember thinking that two months could be the difference in whether I would be able to compete at the 2013 American Open. When I asked why there was that 2 month gap and the doctor said that depended on how fast I healed. This seemed to be a circular answer that did not provide much information. It wasn’t until I started rehabbing that I knew what the doctor was talking about.

Proper rehab is the difference between a 4 month recovery and a 6 month recovery or a 9 month recovery and a year recovery. This doesn’t mean doing rehab exercises once a week, it means making that extra time in your day to do rehab exercises every single day, scheduling soft tissue massages to work through scar tissue, and using ice/heat therapy after workouts. Even if it is a small injury, like a sprained finger, it is important to move your finger throughout the day to increase your range of motion.

It is incredibly important to first, increase range of motion and second, rebuild strength to the injured area of the body. So you have done both of these? It doesn’t stop there! Rehab maintenance should be a part of your work out to keep that once injured area healthy and strong. If you are experiencing an injury that is not healing, research physical therapy facilities that are sports performance based. These facilities will, more than likely, be able to help you with a rehab plan that is sport specific.

3. CHANGE FOCUS

Changing focus does not mean changing sports! It simply means using your recovery period as a time to focus on other areas of your training.

Since my shoulder is not yet strong enough to lift or even hold a bar on my back for squatting, what have I been doing to maintain strength? I started off biking with resistance for calories. Then, I started air squatting and doing lunges. Next, I was interval biking, leg pressing and doing hamstring curls on a machine. More recently, I have been able to safety bar squat, do hip dip squats, and RDLs while holding a dumb bell.

Finding exercises that you can do during recovery, rather than dwelling on exercises that you can’t do, will help you stay focused and give you the ability to set short term goals. These short term goals will be the stepping stones to your long term goals, after recovery. For example, because I have not previously used a safety bar, my goal every week is to increase the weight on the bar. This has given me a chance to set PRs (personal records) in something other than the Olympic lifts.

Use your coach and physical therapist as reliable people to assist in your new, temporary change in focus. Again, listen to your body! If an exercise increases your pain level in the injured area, then stop doing it. The long term reward will be much more rewarding than the short term satisfaction of completing that exercise.

4. STAY POSITIVE

Cliche? Maybe. True? Yes.

I can’t tell you how many times I have heard this phrase. However, staying positive does not mean that every second of every day you need to be happy and smiling.

As I mentioned earlier, I have experienced an array of thoughts and emotions from my shoulder injury. Ask my coach. I have complained multiple times, saying things like “This sucks”, “I just want to lift”, and “It’s so hard to watch other people making gains, while I am stuck recovering”.

There is a difference between negative thoughts that inhibit confidence and negative thoughts that fuel your fire. Negative thoughts that inhibit confidence and decrease your athletic drive,  are when you tell yourself things like, “I’ll never be able to do anything again” or “I suck because I can’t perform”. Negative thoughts that fuel your fire to return stronger than you were, before injury, are thoughts like, “It sucks being injured, I just want to lift”.

As long as your outlook is more positive than negative, you will thrive in your recovery. When negative thoughts begin to outnumber the positive thoughts, people tend to become less motivated. Less motivation results in lack of training and rehab. Lack of training and rehab can lead to a prolonged recovery.

Surround yourself with people who support your recovery and people who push you to stay positive. It is also important to do things that involve you in whatever you were doing before injury. For example, since I can’t currently compete or practice the Olympic lifts, I have been coaching and attending training sessions to watch my competitors. Watching other people improve, while you are in recovery, can provide motivation to continue building your strength.

5. MINIMIZE FUTURE RISK

Once you have recovered from an injury, it is crucial to minimize the risk of injury in the future. This may seem obvious, but many people heal, do too much too fast, stop rehab, don’t listen to their bodies and then injury themselves again.

The surgery that I had two months ago, was on my left shoulder. About two years ago, I had surgery on my right shoulder. Although I did not reinjure my right side, having to get surgery on the left side was just as bad. I should have been more proactive in preventing my body from further injury, but I wasn’t. I knew that I had hyper mobile joints and that it put me at a higher risk for injury. I slacked off on rehab exercises and started doing them when it was too late.

The key to prevention, is first, identifying how you were injured and second, why. Were you negligent to performing accessory exercises? Did you avoid weaknesses and over develop your strengths, which caused an imbalance? Did you not warmup properly? These are three basic questions to help identify the initial cause of injury. Talk to your coach and design a program that will keep you healthy and prevent injuries!

So, stop wallowing in your injury and become proactive on your road to recovery. Experiencing an injury is never fun, but it is not the end of the world! If it was an injury that ended your athletic career in a specific sport, find a new passion! Nobody else can do the work for you! Taking responsibility for your injury and recovery will be worth it in the long run, when you are strong, healthy and have the ability to maximize your potential.

Ariel Stephens is a fast rising Olympic weightlifter based out in Woodland, CA and competing for Monterey Bay Barbell Club where she is coached by Jacob Tsypkin. Ariel competed in swimming for the University of Hawaii-Manoa before beginning to compete in weightlifting in March 2012. Her PRs of 98kg in the Clean and Jerk and 76kg in the Snatch make her a very formidable competitor in the 69kg weight class.

The post Recovering from Injury in 5 Steps appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

There are few days in the year more important than ‘Game Day’ for athletes, if any.  Every month away from season is spent preparing, training, dieting, and dreaming of what will happen next season, when all the hard work culminates in dominating performances.  Making all that pain, practice and sacrifice worth it a 100X over.  For many of you, Game Day now looms hours away, it’s time to shine, and you may be wondering, ‘What do I do now, am I ready?’  Assuming that your coaches did a good job preparing you mentally and physically, you now have total control over priming your body for peak performance by incorporating these nutrition strategies into your Game Day Preparation.

Nutrition: What, Why, and When

There are just a few nutritional aspects that even need discussing and clarifying when it comes to athletes and performance.  One major premise that should dictate your dieting mindset and decision making process is this: The focus of in season athletes is peak performance, and nothing else, so eat that way. Starving yourself and trying to loose 25 lbs. during season will absolutely lead to poor performance or injury.  Like wise, going to the buffet bar and eating 25 fried buffalo wings and washing them down with a ‘Diet Coke’ after practice will sabotage all your hard work as well.  You need tons of calories, you need lots nutrients, and a diet based on whole foods, not fast foods.  Vegetables and protein are a given, simply put, you need tons of both.  So much misinformation surrounding protein sources and serving sizes bombard athletes, and it’s time to clarify these areas of confusion.

Misunderstood: Protein

Muscles are not light switches, eating protein and rebuilding muscles does not occur with ‘one flick of the switch’. It is a continual process and each meal should contain protein sources that allow you to recover for your next training session.

My biology teacher in college would strictly adhere to the serving suggestions of the FDA for everyone, but the FDA doesn’t take into consideration individual body weight, lean tissue mass, and the caloric/recovery demands of a training athlete.  There are also misconceptions out there about protein digestion and synthesis.  So many think that you have to get protein into your body 20 minutes after training or all is lost and you shouldn’t even bother.  Or some compare tissue repair and protein replacement to a light bulb, one ‘flick of the protein switch’ and your muscles are healed, repaired, and ready to go again an hour later.  This couldn’t be more wrong.  The soreness you feel after training is partly due to the muscle tissue micro-tears and trauma induced by exercise.  Think of these micro-tears more as small cuts in your muscles, these take time to heal, and protein serves as the Band-Aid to make this process happen more efficiently.  Right now, you may be thinking, ‘This makes sense, but what’s wrong with thinking that you have to get protein into your body right after training?’.  Well, nothing, but thinking that the 20 minute window after training is the only time to get protein into your body is where many go wrong.  Tissue rebuilding/repair and protein synthesis occur around the clock.  You wouldn’t try to argue that blood flow only occurs around exercise would you?  That would be idiotic, which is much like the argument surrounding ‘time frame’ protein digestion.  Protein absorption works much in the same way, like blood flow, nutrient exchange and digestion occur at accelerated rates during exercise, but nutrient exchange occurs every second of the day.  Not realizing that athletes need more calories and protein than non-athletes, all the time, is a huge mistake.  Increasing these two aspects of your nutrition will greatly improve your Game Day performance.

The Big Three

Caffiene, carbohydrates, and proper ion concentrations are major areas of confusion and impact your performance the most.  A full discussion of the positives and dosages of these three components are outlined in my previous article, Nutrition for Two A Days, under the ‘Logical Considerations For Athletes’ section. Trying to argue that caffeine is not effective nor improves performance is simply ignorant.   There is a reason that sports like track and field disqualify athletes that test with high blood serum levels of stimulants like caffeine (and the hormones caffeine induces the release of) and why gimmicks like the ‘Power Balance’ band are allowed, one works and the other doesn’t.  The effects of caffeine are comparable to a ‘game day steroid’, focus increases, muscle contraction strength and coordination improves, endurance increases, the list goes on.   The point is, caffeine is legal, and if you are looking for every edge you can get over your competition, you should consider its use.

Carbohydrates are a performing athlete’s best friend, if you want to be explosive, if you want to have endurance, if you want to go hard the entire game/match, then you must eat carbohydrates.  Eating carbohydrates at the wrong time is where most go wrong.  Long story short (again, if you want the long story, read Consideration #2 in the ‘Two A Day’ article), don’t eat carbs the morning of any game, and try to eat a large amount of carbs the night before you play.  Muscle glycogen is what allows you to be explosive, not eating carbs 90 minutes before you compete.  The best carb sources out there are sweet potatoes, raw oats, black beans, and wild rice (that’s right, not bread). Your body doesn’t care how long ago you ate the carbs, all that matters is that there is glycogen in the muscle cell when contraction takes place.

Calcium is a crucial part of a performing athlete’s nutrition, Vitamin D, which is found in fish helps your body process and use Calcium.

Not eating enough carbohydrates is the main contributor to fatigue, but another strong contributor is inefficient ion concentrations in/around the muscle cell.  You see, every muscle contraction, which generates movement, requires an exchange of Sodium (Na), Potassium (K), and Calcium (Ca); if there is a shortage of these ions, contraction efficiency diminishes, this contributes to fatigue, and eventually leads to cramps.  Calcium is the most important ion, in my opinion, because it plays a pivotal role in so many bodily processes.  Having a shortage of calcium will create major problems, and this must be avoided.  The best sources of calcium are sesame seeds, almonds, herbs, green leafy vegetables, and whey protein.  Salt and fresh water fish are high in Vitamin D, which aids in the absorption of calcium, so if you have an indoor sport, or are in a poor climate make sure you consume fish as your protein source when possible. This is the problem in neglecting any macronutrient type, athletes must have a diet rich in every nutrient category because of the complementary interactions that occur.  If someone is telling you not to eat a certain major food group, I would question their level of education and ability to help improve your performance.  Below, depending on game time, I will outline how to get the nutrition you need, and prepare your body for great performances.

Game Day Nutrient Timing

Morning Games

Considering what we have discussed previously, morning games should be the easiest to prepare for nutritionally.  The night before, dinner should consist of water to drink only, a medium sized animal protein serving (8oz for men, 4-6 oz for women), a dark green vegetable, and a large carbohydrate serving (gram size does not matter, just get full from a ‘good’ source).  Before bed take your vitamins, with a small, concentrated whey/casein protein shake.  The morning of the game you should eat proteins and fats only, carbs will only impair your ability to perform at this point.  Caffeine can be consumed, just make sure you have experimented with this stimulant before, game day is not the time for trial runs.

For hydration, I recommend just drinking 6-8oz of concentrated salt water, this will give you necessary ions without all the corn syrup that many sport drinks give you.

Afternoon Games

The same ideas and concepts apply to these game times as the ‘Morning Games’, but the dinner carb sources should be more starch based (rice and sweet potato).  If your game does not start until 2:00 pm, I recommend a blended protein shake around 11:00 am, with peanut butter and a banana; this will not introduce too many carbs (induce an insulin spike or activate the Autonomic Nervous System the way a whole food meal would), but will give you the calories and nutrients necessary to perform well.  As you warm up, your body will become much better at processing food/glycogen, so snacking on small bites of fruit, trail mix, and energy bars is fine.  Also, as you warm up, sip a caffeine source, or right before drink a small, concentrated caffeine source, again that is safe for YOUR body to operate with.

Evening Games

The previous day’s dinner is crucial for evening game times due to the amount of activity you will have prior to playing your game the following evening.  Morning meals need to be very high in protein and fats, and should include a vegetable serving if possible.  This will create blood sugar stability the entire day, while giving you a large amount of calories.  At approximately 11:00 am (these times are not arbitrary), I recommend a blended protein shake with either 1-2 banana(s) or 1 cup of raw oats.  At lunch, a medium carb serving should be eaten first, before any other menu item, try avoiding starches here and eat fruits or black beans for your carb source.  Afternoon snacks should be whey protein, animal protein, trail mix, or fat based.  Caffeine, because of time window can be consumed 30-45 minutes prior to warming up.  Hydration throughout the day is important, make sure that you don’t over hydrate and excrete large amounts of ions in your urine.  A concentrated class of salt water would be great for evening games as well.

Regardless of game time, you need to be at your best, these nutrition strategies will improve your body’s ability to cope with the demands of competition.  You’ve worked too hard in the months leading up to the game not to give yourself every opportunity to dominate the opponent across from you.

The post JTS Classic: Game Day Nutrition appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

Gaining this muscle mass can be very beneficial, and is by no means a new concept.  As lifters we must train for strength first and foremost, but there are times when it is helpful to train some extra lifts “like a bodybuilder.”  Packing on muscle in the right places to compliment what is left lacking by the main lifts will ensure that you give yourself a chance to later strengthen some of your weak areas—which likely negatively affect your technique on the main exercise or limit your ability to execute it under progressively heavier weights. Additionally some bodybuilding training can be used to build up the stabilizing musculature or antagonist musculature in a region of the body to keep the body in balance.

Generally each lift has a few body parts that can be effectively built up to help out the lift directly or lay the foundation for future strength gains. What follows will be my take on assistance lifting and which lifts I find beneficial to the three big lifts.

Squat:

1. Hack Squats – Hack squats are a classic bodybuilding exercise and are my preferred exercise for building up larger quad size. I prefer the hack squats because they place very little stress on the back and isolate the quads I feel better than leg pressing. They also allow you to practice driving your hips forward as you would if you are a quad dominant squatter who also engages the hips well. Like any exercise I will try to push these so the rep and weight combinations are difficult to complete, but shooting for 1-2 very hard sets of 20 is ideal here.
2. Weighted Straight-Leg Situps – I perform these on a GHR and hold a dumbbell behind my head for added resistance. The keys for execution on these are extending all the way OUT (not back) so that your body is as horizontal as possible. I also lock the hips at full extension by squeezing the glutes as you would during a deadlift lockout. I try to do these for 2 sets of 15-20 reps. These will be felt heavily in the lower abs and hip flexors but will absolutely benefit the torso strength.

Dan Green is one of several Team Juggernaut lifters who combine record breaking strength and a stage ready physique.

Bench:

1. Dumbell Bench or Incline – Pressing a high volume with dumbells is a tried and true winner for chest, delt, triceps and even forearm development. Bodybuilders love them because the effect the dumbells have on the stabilizing musculature builds mass AND carries over to the barbell bench. For these… The more the better! The more weight, sets and reps performed the better. I’d recommend starting with a target number of 50 and accumulate 50 total reps. That could be 5 sets of 10 or 4×12. Again the more the better because these pack on mass. These can be done also as the lifter nears a competition for the strength they build by lowering the volume lifted and focusing more on the weight lifted.
2. Military Press – Raw lifters need big delts! If not show me a 600 bencher with mini delts…The delts help to drive the weights from over the sternum into the lifters groove or sweet spot. Military Pressing is a great way to build both usable strength in the bench and huge traps and delts. A very simple program to follow is my method of building up to a 1-5 rep max first and then lowering the weight and following a simple rep scheme of 3-4 sets of 7-10 reps. This is a high enough volume of pressing to build mass and the heavy sets build strength and make progression attainable. My preference in technique is to keep the back arched and the chest up. I flare the elbows out when I press and lock the weight out directly overhead, not behind as is common in Olympic lifting training. This technique utilizes the delts and clavicular segment of the pecs along with all the musculature encasing the shoulder blades which is needed for stabilization and shoulder health. These are a must!

Deadlift:

1. Rowing – For the deadlift I like all varieties of rows, but my favorites are chest supported rows and one arm dumbbell rows. For rows I like high reps: 15-20 per set. This allows the lifter to use a full range of motion to allow the shoulder blades to fully protract and abduct when the weight is lowered in front as well as achieving a full contraction at the top of the row. Moving the shoulder blades through a full range of motion AND your thoracic spine will not only load up the lats, but the traps and upper spinal erectors as well. Doing 3-4 sets of 15-20 reps will pack on tons of mass to the upper body’s biggest muscle group.  If your lat strength is lagging you will struggle to pull big weights through to lockout.
2. Stiff Leg Deads – Stiff Leg Deads put mass on all the pulling muscles as well. But they really teach how to control the lower back, hips and abs. They slow down the lift so the lifter can feel the lats kicking in to help pull the weight to lockout. These will absolutely fry the lower back, glutes and hamstrings. I like to stand on a 3-4” box to increase the range of motion. Reps fall in the 5-10 range here.

The post Raw Powerlifting and Bodybuilding appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

I have to say that of any of the athletes that I work with, training the MMA athlete is probably my favorite. I think that it requires a coach to consider a broad range of attributes that must be accounted for. I also think it is fun as hell to watch guys go beat the shit out of each other. I love the intensity of the training close to fight time. I love the pressure that comes with the fact that if he isn’t fast enough, or strong enough, or have enough gas…. he might get his ass kicked, literally.

That being said, traditionally my stance has been that I don’t use CrossFit for MMA athletes. The main reason being that, MMA is great conditioning for MMA. What could possibly conditioning you better for your sport than your sport. Plus, you also acquire greater skill in that sport. The time that I have with the athlete should needs to be spent on developing qualities that are needed, but not developed by sport alone. I have a limited time with the athlete and they already have a high training load. If you think about how hard your olympic lifting, CrossFit, strongman, or powerlifting program is on you, then you can easily see how easy it could be to “over fill the sink” as Mike T talks about in his recovery article.

Months away from a fight, training volume and intensity outside of the gym is lower. Many of the “rules” I talked about in training an MMA athlete can be loosened or even changed. You can afford a much higher training volume and focus on building different qualities. Of course the hierarchy of the qualities will still remain the same. The other thing that you can do is have a little fun. After the last Bellator fight, I was supposed to start teaching Brent some olympic lifting. We didn’t mess with it leading up to the fight, but he sees us kicking shit and throwing it and getting pissed off, and then started watching YouTube videos, and now wants to learn. We figured that we would have a long enough lay off that we could just have some fun.

After breaking his hand during the fight, the olympic lifting plans were sorta derailed. Don’t get me wrong, he was back in the gym squatting with the safety squat bar like three days after the surgery, and shit is going to get real in the next Bellator tourny in the fall. I got on this whole line of thinking because Brent asked me if he could do a couple of the CrossFit classes during the week. Just to get some extra conditioning and have some fun.

I guess that I should also point out that, by adding CrossFit, I am not saying that a planned CrossFit program to build a CrossFit athlete doesn’t look remarkably similar to the program that we would be using for an MMA athlete. They both require many of the same qualities. The differences would be in the movements and the volume. With the MMA athlete I tend to throw away the inessential, or complicated movements in favor of more basic ones. In a real CrossFit program, the movements are the sport. I don’t have much of it in my gym, but I know for a fact that there are tons of gyms where people come in and do random shit everyday. They still work hard, but they are there for the fun of it.

I would also typically say that it is not the athletes job to have fun in the gym, that they should be in the gym to get better at their sport… and they should, but when the hell did I decide I needed to be so damn serious all the time.  Why have a program that allows some flexibility to be able to jump into the random workout or class once in a while. The other side is the allure of how crushing those workouts can be. Combat sport athletes tend to be the type of people who enjoy some punishment. Who am I to hate? It wasn’t that long ago when I started CrossFitting in the Marines that the only thing it was about was crushing the shit out of fools. Making people suffer. Building discipline with pain and suffering. It isn’t the best thing in the world for making you become a better athlete, but sometimes it can be refreshing to give yourself a nice beating.

So, here we go… a 9 week offseason program for MMA/Combat sport athletes with some room for CrossFit classes

CLICK HERE to become a Juggernaut Member today and access this complete training cycle. Juggernaut Members get access to all our Members only content! 

The post 9 Week MMA / CrossFit Program appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

Keep Ringing that PR Bell!!

Here are some helpful tips to keep those coaches and solo athletes focused as they train on their own:

Compete: Sign yourself up and get nervous! Competitions make you realize your weaknesses and motivate you to work on those movements or skills that you may be neglecting in your everyday training. Competitions also give you an opportunity to work out with others and meet new athletes and coaches.  Competitions can be great community events that help to keep your love for the sport on fire and push your body to the limits.

Video Analysis: I am a huge fan of videoing your workouts, not just that one rep max that you want to show off to your friends. That one rep max of the day might be close to perfect but how efficient are your consecutive 75lb clean and jerk half way through a met-con?  I don’t know about you but when I am tired I know I am not thinking about those little cues that I should be thinking about.  Trying to analyze why that last muscle-up failed without a slow-motion replay is nearly impossible. However, having your phone or video camera set up to record and review later will give you a little more insight and way more accountability.  And of course if you approve of your performance, you can still use it to brag about your workout to your friends.

Set Goals: Write it Down! You have your athletes do it so why don’t you? Set goals for your fitness, write them down, tell people about them, post them on social media and then set a time frame in which you want to reach them. Be specific in your goals and then let people know when you make them and also when you reach them!  We are all motivated and inspired when we watch people hit their goals so don’t be afraid of seeming cocky or arrogant if you want others to celebrate with you! Ring that PR bell when no one is around to hear it for yourself and then let them know that you did!!! You deserve it!!

Check out this interview with JoEllyn…

Learn: For some reason when I get new shoes I want to go workout right then and there. Maybe you get new wrist wraps or a belt and you want to try them out right away? I feel the same way after reading an informative article, participating in a training camp or attending a seminar. It is worth the money to make yourself a better coach and/or athlete and guess what?  You might even get motivated to try it out when you get back to your own gym! Seminars, camps and articles can all be found on the Juggernaut website. Also, check your local colleges for classes offered, research certifications and coaches that you respect and find out what new courses they offer in your area of town.

Find a Coach/training partner/or local CrossFit Box:  Anyone can take a novice into a gym and produce results but for those athletes to push pass good to great, takes coaching and programming, not chance.  These athletes need to be analyzed, fine-tuned and stay consistent in training.  There are multiple ways to get that coaching that an athlete needs, and the easiest way is to just walk into a local CrossFit gym. Even if you drop into a local class a couple times a month (most gyms have a one class drop in rate) you can get some pointers on skill work and experience a bit of the community that training alone lacks.  Seek out a specific coach for the skills you struggle with whether it’s Olympic lifting, mobility, or gymnastics.  There are also online training programs where you can submit videos and receive feedback from great coaches, such as the Juggernaut team.

Have Fun and Train Hard!

The post Staying Motivated appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

In this installment, I want to talk a bit more practically about things. However, before we move on, I need to clear up  an important misconception that seems to have arisen from Part I: I am not going to write you a program.

There will be no sets and reps. I am not going to talk about designing the perfect couplet or triplet. If that’s what you’re looking for, you won’t find it here, and more importantly, you are missing the point. What I am espousing is a philosophy, a lense through which to view the process of developing CrossFit athletes. If you don’t realize that you need to train the clean & jerk for 1 rep, 5 reps, and 30 reps, you haven’t figured out what CrossFit is about yet, and this article will be of little use to you.

The closest I will get to this is showing you the template I use to schedule my athletes training during the pre season and competition season.

I want you to understand this: nothing is set in stone. Nothing here is perfect, and writing a program for you to use, or for you to use with your athletes, would be a disservice to you or your athletes, because I do not know you or your athletes. We’ve never met. I don’t know what you’re good at, what you’re bad at, or what motivates you. More importantly, you need to understand that good training is an organic process. Apart from some fairly basic principles, everything is – and must be – flexible.

There are no rules. You’d better get comfortable with that.

Scheduling

Before you read any further, read what I just wrote about rules again. Got it? Good. This is just the template I use, to more easily organize the daily, weekly, monthly process of programming. It doesn’t actually matter all that much what days things happen, so long as they happen. With that said, the template we typically follow is laid out here. I follow the same rough schedule during off season, pre season, and competition season, but the nature of the workouts themselves will change dependent on the athletes needs and phase of training.

Monday: Snatch and/or C&J, back squat, conditioning

Tuesday: Overhead/pressing strength, gymnastics work, conditioning

Wednesday: Snatch and/or C&J, front squat, conditioning

Thursday: Active recovery

Friday: Snatch and/or C&J, conditioning (2 pieces)

Saturday: Back squat, conditioning (2 pieces)

Nothing particularly fancy, but I’ll talk a bit about the rationale behind the schedule and the way I program each item.

Snatch/C&J: This indicates heavy work. It does not cover the use of the lifts in conditioning sessions, which could happen any day because you know, constantly varied and stuff. During both offseason and preseason, it is generally fairly high volume. Typically I will pick a variation and stick with it for 4 weeks or so. Some of my favorites include paused snatches/clean & jerks, snatches/cleans from a deficit, and timed sets (typically 15-20 reps on :60 for the snatch, 10-15 reps on :90 for the clean & jerk.) I work in power variations, but sometimes switch them out for the full lifts for less skilled athletes (this is my philosophy with my weightlifters as well.) Sometimes we will train the clean and jerk separately, but not very often. If we do, I’ll typically work the jerk in on Tuesday in place of the overhead strength/pressing work we would typically do.

During the competition season, there is more variety in the schedule, but for the most part we still stick to this template for the lifts. However, there is a lot more work with heavy lifts in the context of CrossFit style workouts. We are in the middle of preparation for NorCal Regionals right now – here are two examples of workouts we’ve done in the last few weeks utilizing heavy snatches and clean & jerks:

AMRAP 10 minutes:

2 snatches, 85% (must be full snatch)

8 burpees (land on 45# bumper plate)

3 rounds, individually timed:

2 clean & jerks, 85%

Sprint 400m

Full recovery between rounds

Squatting: If you’ve read my article “Squat Development For Weightlifting,” you will find the following information familiar: for most of the year, we back squat for volume on Monday, front squat on Wednesday, and attempt to set new PRs on the back squat on Saturday. Typically I will start the volume at 3×5, gradually progress to 4×4, 5×3, and maybe 6×2. In the meantime we will push the 5RM on Saturday, switch to 3RM when it seems like most of my athletes won’t make another PR on the 5 rep (at this time, I usually give them the option of 3RM or 5RM), and occasionally test a 1RM. For the front squat, we usually stick to heavy triples, be they 5×3, 3×3, ascending, or a 3RM with drop sets. We test the max single front squat more regularly than the top single back squat because 1) I think the top set of 5 is more useful in the back squat, whereas the top single is more useful in the front squat and 2) I think a 1RM front squat is less stressful than a 1RM back squat.

After we cycle through this to the point where athletes are stagnating, I’ll work in a different program, mostly for some variety. At this time I may use something like Smolov Jr., or work on squat variations (paused squats are one of my favorites.) After that, we simply return to the meat and potatoes of our main squat program.

During the competition season, I treat the squats in much the same way as the snatch and clean & jerk. There are still three days of heavy squatting, but one of those days will typically utilize heavy squatting in a CrossFit workout. A couple examples from the past few weeks:

8 rounds for time:

3 front squats, 85% 3RM, must be unbroken

8 toes-to-bar, must be unbroken

5 rounds for time:

5 back squats, 80% 1RM

5 handstand pushups to challenging deficit

Overhead/Pressing Strength: The push press is the main movement I like to use for building upper body pressing strength. I work in bench press (I prefer close grip) and strict press further from the competition season. I typically stick to volume work – lots of heavy sets of 3 to 5 – with occasional 1-5RM for testing purposes. I very much view these lifts in the way a weightlifter would – as auxiliary work. The bench press because I doubt it will ever come up in a CrossFit competition, and the push/strict press because CrossFit competitions tend to prescribe shoulder-to-overhead without a specific movement, as this is the nature of the sport, and it is rare that push pressing, let alone pressing, will be the most effective method of getting the bar from the rack position to overhead. The only time it is the most effective way is during a workout with light enough weights that the shorter cycle time of push pressing is advantageous – these loads are low enough that an extra 10 pounds on an athletes max push press won’t make much of a difference.

At times and for some athletes, we may do heavy jerks from the blocks in place of push presses.

I’ll sometimes work in conditioning circuits with heavy push presses or bench presses. This is in the same style as the snatch, C&J, and squats, but I’ll do it fairly regularly outside of the competition season. A sample workout:

8 rounds for time:

3 push press, 85% 1RM

15 Russian kettlebell swings, 32kg/24kg

“Monterey”

5 rounds for total reps:

Max strict press, 135#/85#

Max L-Pullups

Rest between sets but do not rest between press/pullups. Any grip is allowed on the L-Pullups.

Conditioning: Sorry, no magic here. Mostly couplets and triplets, high intensity, focusing in on the 8-15 minute range. Running and rowing intervals are a fairly big part of our programming, especially during the off season, and longer efforts become a bigger part of training during the pre season and competition season, particularly as part of active recovery days. But the really important stuff is 100% pure CrossFit: thrusters and pullups and running and cleans and kettlebell swings and pushups and overhead squats and you get the picture. Keep the intensity high, vary the loads from very light to very heavy, and focus on the most crucial movements. And don’t forget about the Prowler, because your athletes already hate you, so you might as well make it worse. Some coaches structure their conditioning around their strength programming. I believe this is a mistake, as it limits the variety with which you can work.

Auxliary Movements: Of course we do auxiliary work. During the off season, we do all kinds of assistance exercises. These may vary from rows, several variations of strict and weighted pullups/chins, strict and weighted ring dips and bar dips, RDLs, walking lunges, to prehab work with bands and light weights. They may be done on their own, or as part of an untimed circuit with abdominal movements, low back strengthening exercises, skill practice or mobility drills. I really believe that when it comes to auxiliary work, the important thing is just getting it done.

Hopefully this has provided you with a clear look into the thought process behind my programming. Again, keep in mind that there is no equation, no brilliantly planned and executed madness to my method. The basic principles are what matter.

Individualization: You have to work on your weaknesses. By nature, this is an individual process, and beyond the scope of this article. The following is a very basic framework of how I individualize training for my competitive CrossFitters: I work with my athletes one-on-one throughout the year to make sure they’re regularly practicing skills they are deficient in. During the competition season, two days a week have specific weakness programming, and athletes are provided with skill circuits to perform daily, which change slightly week-to-week. These circuits are focused on improving proficiency in lacking areas and accumulating volume in commonly seen movements such as chest-to-bar pullups.

Part III will be released after NorCal Regionals.  We will take an in-depth look at what my athletes did during the competition season from the Open through Regionals, and what things I think I could have done better.

The post A System For Developing Competitive CrossFitters, Part II: Building The Machine appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.

As a coach one must research and venture to gain more experience in each of their sports. I challenge myself to know what my athletes are going through both in training and competition. Through observing practices, attending competitions I can develop a stronger relationship with the coaching staff and the athletes, ultimately benefitting everyone involved.

Relationships are tough to create at the start of a new job. Collegiate strength coaches are constantly moving, although Olympic sports coaches tend to stick around for a little bit longer. A coach comes in and must work with a new coaching staff and athletes, the sooner everyone is on the same page, the quicker the program can be utilized, and the faster results are achieved. A coach needs to come in and learn the names of all of their athletes! I cannot tell you what a difference it makes when addressing an athlete as “hey you!” or whatever the term of endearment of that day is. As opposed to “Kyle, knee’s out, feet flat!”

Along with knowing all athletes on a first name basis, you must be able to develop cues that can help them understand how to relate a movement in the weight room to what they are doing in their sport. I can write about “the transfer of training” forever, but being able to throw something out verbally can really help an athlete make the connection between weight room work and increase in production on the field.

As a former thrower I especially enjoy working with the throwers here at CSU. (They are not my favorite; I enjoy working with all of my teams) However, I remember back to the days at ‘Zona of raging in the weight room and dropping bombs in the shot and disc. A thrower is usually very motivated to hit the weight room and increase max rep numbers as quickly as possible. However, it takes a good coach to be able to channel an athlete’s intensity towards certain lifts in specific sessions at a planned time of the year. Helping to relay the similarities of an Olympic lift to a throwing event is a very sound way to help the athlete realize the transfer of their own weight room training to technical event success. Yes, the starting position in the snatch is much different to the entry in the discus. However, many similar aspects are involved when comparing the entire movement to one another. Both are very explosive, total body movements that require the highest level of neuromuscular efficiency and two full handfuls of RAGE!

“Tangent: Often I am asked “how much should I be able to (bench/squat/clean/snatch) to throw (19 through 70 meters) in (shot/disc/hammer/javelin)?  This question drives me nuts; as I’m sure it does several other strength/throws coaches around the world!  Throwing is a blend of so many athletic measurements. Technique always rules, strength is an easy way to see quick improvement. However that quick improvement quickly diminishes and one much is able to transfer their gained strength to their throws with loads of drills and throws of various weights. “

Utilizing sport-specific cues to establish a mental connection for an athlete can be a double edged sword. A strong example is telling a golfer (right handed for this example) to “keep the knee out” when landing on a single leg. So you’ve got a right handed golfer performing a single leg hop onto a box and the coach drops that cue. It is definitely the correct cue (to help prevent the valgus movement of the knee when landing on the box). The coach should use it, but refrain from overuse—and here’s why. As that golfer is told to “knees out, weight on outside of the foot, push knees out, etc.” he/she is thinking about that constantly. They are being conditioned in the weight room to drive the knee out, when it can become detrimental to their sport specific movement- the golf swing. During the back swing the golfer needs to establish a strong right side (actually driving the right knee medially) to create a strong base of support. This is completely opposite of the cues he/she is hearing in the weight room. YES it is a totally different movement, just be aware of the overuse of some cues as they can lead to unwanted changes in the technical event.

To summarize these are the main points:

• Know your athletes by name (and position!)
• Have/Develop an interest in the sports you coach- gain experience
• Help them realize a transfer of training from weight room to sport skill
• Research and be selective with coaching cues in the weight room

That is about all I’ve got time for now- Feel free to respond with questions / comments and I will do all I can to answer.

The post The Power of Words appeared first on Juggernaut Training Systems.