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In Omnivore’s Dilemma, Michael Pollan tracks our food sources from the ground, through its processing, sales and preparation in search of the perfect meal. In his research, he takes the reader through the industrial food chain wrapped tightly around kernels of corn, through the organic system, down the path of the small local farmers working the grass, and farther out through the individual hunters and gatherers.
It’s becoming rare for a journalist to invest such time — such perseverance — into a project like this. Pollan is a good investigator, the type who keeps pulling on the yarn, not just to find the other end, but continuing until it’s wrapped back up in a tight ball.
Although many friends recommended In Defense of Food, Pollan’s later work that I’d purchases it a couple of years ago, it was a conversation with Gray Cook that settled me in for the read. His challenge to me: In the reading, replace the idea of our western food supply with the concept of western movement. You don’t actually have to read the book to get the idea, but perhaps it will get you going on the read, as it did me.
I liked Omnivore quite a bit better than In Defense. It has a lot more depth, but then again, that may have been because I already knew much of the content of In Defense. Still, these two books are likely to be bundled in a discount that will get one nearly free if you buy from Amazon, so you may as well have the set. To round out the trio, Rood Rules, An Eater’s Manual, is his 139-page pocket size compendium of 64 very brief tips on better eating, a paragraph or two distillation of the two earlier books’ material. Very handy, easy to read and understand… and cheap.
There is one distracting oddity: Pollan is a journalism instructor. He’s a good writer who draws the reader into what could easily be a dry, hard-to-finish documentary. Yet most pages contain parenthetical remarks that could easily be melded into the text with a pair of commas, or just as easily have been left out entirely. There are a number of incomplete sentences and an issue of missing commas, many of which are a question of style, not editorial skill, but some that make this clear text a fraction more confusing. We don’t usually think of a college writing professor as someone who might need an editor — chalk this up as a indicator that EVERY writer will benefit from outside editing.
Closing the book on Omnivore, or whatever we’re supposed to call it when we finish reading a book on an iPad, I was happy with how things turned out. Opening the book took some consideration — vegetarianism was certainly a possible outcome. I’ve gone that route a couple of times before, but those were younger days when good nutrition was not as important. I’m not sure I’m up for the efforts necessary for healthy vegetarian eating.
Instead, the book left me with a desire to eat more local food. We’re blessed here in central California with family-owned grocery stores where local produce falls out of baskets, a cornucopia of invitation. That’s given me the excuse to move a step farther from the farmer’s market where my friend Crista sells her fish each Saturday morning. At the stores, with their displays looking even nicer than the tented market, I can shop whenever I choose, convenience winning out over the quality of produce picked the day before. Omnivore’s Dilemma redirected me a little closer to the farmer.
I’m glad to have invested my time into reading this book, and it has already brought me back in line with a fairly short-lived experiment a few years ago involving grass-fed beef. Whether Omnivore is a fair investigation of the industrial food chain, I couldn’t being to guess, although it feels right to me as an outsider. I definitely recommend it to anyone interested in food growing and processing, and how our buying choices might affect our nutrition.
In the end, you may even end up taking more pleasure in your cooking and food preparation, too.
Last month at Perform Better Long Beach, I watched as Gray Cook discussed shoulder mobility to a group of 300 fitness professionals while he smoothly swung a pair of one-pound Indian clubs. I have to tell you, I had a stab of jealousy—it looked cool and I wanted to be able to do that. The following week I watched the Club Swinging Essentials DVD he, Brett Jones and Ed Thomas produced a few months ago and decided to spring for a pair of clubs.
In fact, I’ve had a pair of Scott Sonnon’s three-pound mini-clubbells for ages, and had some trouble getting my head around ordering a new pair of one-pounders. Could there really be that much difference, and would they be worth the money as a second pair? Answer: Yes. No question about it—there’s an enormous difference. The threes are simply too heavy for me to practice the slow movements required to gain movement proficiency.
In the past three weeks since these wooden sticks arrived, I went from an FMS shoulder mobility score of two on the left, one on the right to a pair of twos with no other intervention. For the non-screeners, translated to English that means a dodgey right shoulder is now as mobile as the left—I can reach over and back as well with the right arm as I can the left. The elbow circling tip from the DVD was instrumental in that, and I think the underlying success was from increased thoracic mobility as a result of lifting through the elbow in addition to the glenohumeral and scapular mobility. Here’s the thing: Your neck ache’s probably going to disappear when your scapula moves better. And your low back pain might go away if your thorax gets a little more mobile. Guess what? Club swinging is going to make those things happen.
Even some of the crunchy shoulder syndrome is going away. CSS, Crunchy Shoulder Syndrome, that’s a medical term, right? I’ll let you know if the CSS goes away completely. Wouldn’t that be amazing?!
The light club circling trains joint mobility and muscle coordination at the same time, something we sometimes miss in our mobility programs, and always miss in our stretching. I’ve also been using some momentum swings that sort of force a range of motion, similar to Gary Gray’s stick pushing techniques.
Sounds silly, when talking about using one-pound clubs, but I can feel my neck tensing when I move past my skill level. That’s my cue to stop, restart at the slowest possible pace—absolute minimal speed—and LEARN. From the Amazing Brain Department: The right side teaches the left. Try this—test your uncoordinated side a few turns, then move to the more coordinated side for practice. Once you get a little smoother on that side, retest the original arm. Betcha anything it’s better right out of the gate, no practice necessary.
Plan on springing for the Club Swinging Essentials DVD if you order the clubs. There’s a technique to learning these that you won’t get on your own. Before watching the DVD, I played around with the clubs and aside from a little curiosity, got none of the results I’m seeing now. Three weeks in, it’s time to watch the DVD again to see how much I got right… and what points I missed.
I’ve been working on a fun project, a suggestion Gray Cook made during a phone conversation last week that sort of went wild. I think you’re going to like it. I’ve since conned Byron Chandler into joining me on it, and now that the design is done, we’ll see if we can’t get him to spout off with his opinions.
Here’s your sneak peak. It’ll get some major updates over the next week, then will get at least one new item a week to keep you up-to-date on the latest buzz. Have a look — and sign up for email or feedreader updates in the sidebar to get an automated notice of our new reviews.
The crowds in the expo hall of the Arnold Classic in Columbus are intense. The aisles are packed shoulder to shoulder, people shoving lightly against each other in an attempt to get a foot closer to the free giveaways. This is where I first met Scott Sonnon, an international martial arts champion and the creator of the Clubbells Circular Strength Training System. Dave’s second book,Your Body Revival, had just come out, and we were sharing some time with Scott at Odis Meredith’s Torque Athletic booth at the show. Scott and I were talking about how difficult it is to gain attention in that kind of crowd, this aside from the fact that in this bodybuilding-focused crowd people crammed into Dave’s corner at least four deep. The next thing I knew, Scott was on top of Torque’s massive structure, scrambling up there like a stuntman in a Jackie Chan flick. This guy can move! Scott’s known for a lot of movement-skill teaching, some of which is his clubbell training material in which he uses heavy clubs and works the clubs hard.
Fast forward in your mind a half-decade to this past year as I began working with Gray Cook on his new book Movement and discover one of the most brilliant people alive. If he tells me something, I’m going to believe it… solid.
A few months ago, Gray, along with his teaching partners Brett Jones and Ed Thomas, came out with a new Indian club swinging DVD and manual set, Club Swinging Essentials. They use light clubs, one-pounders mostly, whereas Scott’s older DVD, Clubbell Training for Circular Strength, shows Scott on the cover (sans tattoos… this was a while ago), hoisting a pair of what looks to be 20s but might even be heavier. What was I to think? That one of these guys was wrong?
I’d seen Scott swing his clubbells; he’s skilled at it, and is such an amazing athlete, I didn’t realize how difficult swinging would be. Last month at Perform Better Long Beach, Gray swung the clubs a few sample turns to demonstrate shoulder mobility, quite impressively, and it made me even more curious.
Who was right? Would I have to choose sides?
Let’s find out.
Since I already had a copy of Scott’s Clubbell DVD, I asked Gray to have a copy of Club Swinging Essentials sent so I could compare the similarities and differences. I’d seen forum posts asking this same question, and I knew others were as curious as I was. I’ve now watched both DVDs, and have played a bit with the clubs.
In fact, I’ve had a pair of Scott’s three-pound mini-clubbells for ages, and had some trouble getting my head around ordering a new pair of one-pounders. Could there really be that much difference, and would they be worth the money as a second pair? Answer: Yes. No question about it—there’s an enormous difference. The threes are simply too heavy for me to practice the slow movements to gain movement proficiency. I can’t comment on the heavier weight work, because the clubbells we have were a gift of the 15-pounders, and are too heavy for me to do much more than half-swings.
Now here’s a remarkable comparison to begin our discovery. When asked, What weight should I start with?, the Clubbell system will suggest a pair of 10-pounders for men or a pair of 5s for women, perhaps even heavier for strong athletes. If you ask the same question of Gray, Brett or Ed, the answer will be quite different: Learn the movements with a single one-pound club, and only when proficient, add a second. In Scott’s presentation, he’s working with weights, momentum and torque; in the Indian Club method, they may use the one-pounders over the span of a lifetime, perhaps never to increase the weight… ever. With these, mindful movement is the goal, and whereas Scott, who is also very much about mindful movement in much of his athletic activity, with the clubs is working strength.
So there’s no confusion, note that in his actual training, Scott begins with mobility work. He doesn’t jump straight into the heavy work of the DVD. Look here for an example:
Then he moves into what’s shown on the DVD, training that’s more similar to kettlebell work with a hip snap, swings, bottoms-up holds, followed by extended club overhead snatches. Soon he’s doing asymmetrical and symmetrical presses, leverage presses—both forward and lateral—and a variety of swing techniques, swing to lunge and more. He uses more “parked” positioning rather than the constant motion seen in Indian club turning—tight, loose, tight—training the reflexive core activity with leverage in the swing-and-stop actions. This DVD covers approximately 25 different moves and ends with seven minutes of combinations demonstration.
Contrast that with the Club Swinging Essentials DVD, through which we learn five basic movements… five rhythmical patterns of club turning used over a lifetime for neural training and upper extremity mobility work. The idea here is to encourage a stable body posture combined with relaxation and shoulder girdle mobility and joint integrity. First, they look toward mobility; later they look for efficiency. The overall theme of this DVD is this: Mindful movement is the goal.
In the club turning patterns, Ed does an initial demonstration, then Brett instructs Gray through the learning segment. Moving slowly, Gray practices the skill of pattern integrity first, teaching himself the way the brain likes to learn… slowly, much like the movements of Tai Chi. Brett’s looking for quality patterns, authentic reflex and stabilization. This was hugely fun, watching Gray struggle a little with the learning. It gave me a grin, and it gave me hope that I could learn too.
They move through all five movements in three positions, kneeling, open half-kneeling and heels-together standing. This is about precision, and they suggest hours on movements one and two, not jumping ahead, and getting competent in the kneeling postures even before attempting the standing activity.
In the Extras section, we watch as Ed does some advanced footwork with his turning combinations. In fact, they move fairly quickly through all the segments, I assume because they knew we’d have the companion manual to study at our own speed.
Video of intro to Dr. Ed Thomas via Dragon Door:
In the final analysis
For me, I certainly need to learn the coordinating mobility work first… and for life. I need to learn to move my upper extremities easily and smoothly without stress in the neck and torso. If I had to choose one method over the other, I’d go that direction, using light clubs for coordination and kettlebells for ballistics and a barbell for pure strength. But perhaps we don’t have to choose—could we use both? These are just two different to compare, a regular apples to oranges job. Scott’s is a ballistic and leverage strength system, whereas Gray and partners present a mobility and neurological training program. The Essentials DVD is based on club turning, while the Clubbells DVD is geared more toward swings, presses and leverage. We need both mobility and strength, plain and simple.
To quote Brett Jones, “Indian Clubs are an incredible tool with great systems of training, so it isn’t a case of one [style] being right and the other useless, but rather what are your goals and what do you want out of club swinging. In classical club swinging systems, everyone started with lighter clubs, then grapplers and wrestlers went heavier while boxers stayed with the lighter clubs for hand speed and coordination.â€
Louie Simmons of Westside Barbell uses club swinging for injury prevention after shoulder replacement, swinging daily or as part of his pre-workout warm-up.
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