Before you get distracted by all the great options you're about to find here, please sign up for Dave's free weekly newsletter so he can continue to encourage and motivate you toward your fitness goals.
Chris M writes: "You blend plain-spoken wisdom, motivational fire and wry humor into a weekly email jolt that leaves me itching to hit the gym. Whether I'm looking for workout routines, diet tips or a friendly kick in the butt, the Bomber comes through every time." ...
Read more...
Last summer after a conversation about not having enough time to sit comfortably to read or watch training videos, Gray Cook, Lee Burton and I partnered up to build a new audio lecture site, movementlectures.com. Wouldn’t it be nice, we thought, to be able to listen to speakers lecturing on subjects we need to keep current with — just download the files to iPods and laptops for listening on planes, on the road or out for a health walk?
Yes, we decided — that would be nice.
So we called on colleagues to record lectures on topics they’re eager to talk about. Over the course of the last months, we gathered a bunch of recordings, made transcripts and pulled these together into a collection of inexpensive downloadable audio and text files.
And you are about a week from getting a look.
We’ll open with the first 50 lectures; there are another 20 in varying stages of completion that will be rolled out a few a week until finished. At that point, our expectation is one new lecture a week… ongoing. These recordings range in duration from 15 minutes to nearly 3 hours, and span the price scale from $2.95-$20, with most of them being around $5.
With all new websites come glitches, and to offset that we’re going to roll it out slowly over our available outlets. First look will go to those on our Facebook page, so that’s where to head to get in on the ground floor.
What an amazing time to be a writer! You now have control over your writing life and your income in a way never dreamed before by writers, not only of earlier generations, but even just a few years ago. It’s astonishing… and wonderful.
It’s not so wonderful for most publishers, because this career freedom the writers now enjoy in most cases comes directly from the income of their former publishers. That doesn’t have to be the case, though. If publishers are able to switch mentality from Big Business Boss to “publishing partner,” things can be real bright for everyone. My sense is that most writers really have no desire to pay for editing, cover art or learn how to typeset, index or format digital files. They’re just fed up with making 10% of retail, or maxing out at $10,000 for three year’s work after waiting two years for the book to be produced. Who can blame them?
Smaller, more nimble publishers can adapt to this new market if they can put aside traditional bookmaking in favor of today’s new opportunities. On the print book side, this means printing fewer books per print run, and, for publishers like On Target, limiting or even canceling the old-school open returns policy. Returned books are the biggest area of loss for a publisher, about which the writers and customers are usually in the dark. Let’s just say if only half the books come back from a store, dinged-up, for full refund, that’s considered a good sell-through. cRaZY, is what that is, and smaller publishers, while possibly losing a few random bookstore sales (and honestly, I’m not even sure that’s true anymore), would be well-served to consider outright cancellation of the decades-old full returns policy.
On the ebook side, we need a radical change of mindset. What has happened to most publishers is different than what’s happening with writers who are self-publishing to the digital market. Writers are playing with pricing, and, although bouncing around some, are mostly trending down, even way down. Publishers took a different track; they mostly price their ebooks based on print book pricing. I think the idea behind that is to help hold up print book pricing, but I’m pretty sure that’s backwards.
Certainly publishers are telling the truth when they discuss the costs of editing, artwork, indexing, typesetting and formatting. Those costs are the same, regardless of format. The book printing, shipping, warehousing — and the ugly returns — are the part that goes away as we move from print to digital. The other costs are still there.
But where the thought-process breaks is in the attempt to lump all book customers together. Here’s the thing: The print customers and the digital customers are different. There’s some crossover, certainly, but most readers are one or the other. And even if they still read both formats, they — we — think differently when we consider a book purchase. Amazon has changed our comfortable price points, and guess what? $9.99 is where we’re going to find the top for awhile. Sure, I’ll buy a higher-priced ebook, but a price over $9.99 slows me down with an “I’ll decide later,” which of course never happens — for the publisher, and the writer, that is a lost sale. And this is even for a book I know I want. A book I happened to scroll across has absolute no chance over $9.99… none. The mental pricing for print books is much, much higher, and it doesn’t matter a jolt that I understand book publishing costs. Amazon has trained me, just like it’s trained nearly every other ebook buyer on the planet.
Now we’re to the part where I tell you which direction On Target is going. Oh, heck, I don’t even need to tell you… you’ve already guessed: Our top ebook price is $9.99. This is now in place across all the digital resellers, and on our On Target and davedraper.com sites. Our ebook pricing is no longer related to the print book price. It’s a different product, different market, different pricing guidelines.
In partnership with the writers, which is exactly how I see small presses succeeding as we move forward — a partnership — we’ve decided to put all the digital formats in one package when buying from our site. I can’t make that work for people who want the convenience of buying from Amazon, BN.com, Apple or the other reseller sites since they only sell in one format, but if you buy from us, you’ll get the full package, epub, prc and PDF files that will work on the full selection of readers and devices. This will allow you to move from device to device — we don’t use digital rights management (DRM), you’ll read it on your phone, your laptop and your iPad, all for the same price. I am so happy to have settled into this, thrilled really. It just feels… good.
The benefits of the new pricing range from increasing the potential customer base, to allowing people on a budget to grab a digital copy in addition to an earlier purchase of a print book that rests on a now-dusty shelf. The biggest benefit for publishers and writers is that instead of crushing the book market, digital devices have exploded the practice of reading. The readers are there, more now than ever. We just need to learn how to respond better to their reading needs.
Last weekend a group of IronOnline forum friends traveled to Bakersfield, California, for in the Volkslauf Mud Run, a Marine Corp Toys for Tots charity obstacle course. We had a half-dozen participants, and an equal number of cheerful supporters who got especially cheerful about bystanding as we watched our friends struggle through the mud and over some pretty difficult obstacles.
Mark, Lori, Bob
About noon as the next to last of our group finished the course and found dry shoes, we set off to catch up with our final participant, Mandy Trept. An hour later, Dan Martin, the fire captain traveling with us, found the medical tent and discovered she had been med-evaced to a nearby trauma center. Mandy had fallen coming over the top of a 16-foot ladder obstacle and is partially paralyzed from a neck injury. The surgeon is unable to foresee how her recovery might go. He did give a hopeful signal after Saturday night’s surgery, but again said he didn’t know if it meant anything more than that.
Mark, Lori, Mandy, Bob
From our man on the ground, Kyle Estle:
“A local group has been formed to coordinate things for the family while they are here. There is a donor willing to allow the family use of their 5th wheel and hospital administration has allowed them to park the vehicle on hospital grounds so the family can be close.
“A Facebook group has been formed that is taking in donations and updating status as things progress. If you are on Facebook, please join Miles for Mandy.
“A benefit run is in the planning stages, spearheaded by Amy Villicano. The Bakersfield Track Club has been contacted about helping with organizing and coordinating the run. Once a date is set they will help advertise the cause as well. Amy did an interview with a local television station this morning, which will air on the local news this evening. The more eyes we get on this cause, the better.
“There are some really good people involved right now and we have momentum. I encourage all of our brothers and sisters in iron to do what you can, prayers and of course donations are always welcome.”
After the ICU stay, it will be several months before it’s clear what kind of recovery she can expect. Once she’s stable, they’ll figure out how to get her back to her home in Texas for her rehab.
We’ve created a fund to cover Mandy’s family’s travel costs, hotel and to pay a couple of month’s rent for Mandy’s new apartment since she won’t be working while she’s recovering. The fund is growing, close to $5,000 this morning. It would be wonderful to see this fund grow not from big donations, but from an outpouring of the affection of our IronOnline group… small contributions we can afford, and that will make us all part of the only thing we can do now: support her and her family during this crisis.
This is our IronOnline Mandy Fund link via paypal. Please make a small donation so we can tell her a zillion people helped, and so you’ll know you were a part of this instead of a bystander. No contribution is too small; please don’t be concerned about the size of the donation… that’s not the point. If you’d prefer to mail a check, please send that to me at Laree Draper, P O Box 1335, Aptos, CA 95001, and I’ll merge it with the paypal fund before sending off the check, which I’d like to do on Monday, October 24th.
I wish there was something more we could do. For now, prayer and good thoughts, a donation to help the family with travel costs — and let’s pay Mandy’s rent for a couple of months, too — a post here in her training log or over on her facebook page… she and her family will appreciate whatever you’d like to do to express your support.
The other thing we can do right now is send a card. Let’s make the ICU staff wonder who this famous Mandy is, shall we? No flowers or phone calls are allowed in the ICU, where she’s expected to be for about two weeks, but Mandy’s family can read her our cards and she’ll know we’re thinking about her, and that we care. She’s at:
Mandy Trept, C/O ICU
Kern Medical Center
1700 Mt. Vernon Ave
Bakersfield, CA 93306
Each year around the middle of October, our IronOnline forum members band together to challenge each other to get through the holiday season with our training and diets intact. This year’s Year-End Challenge, in which everyone selects their own goal for the next 10 weeks, begins Monday; Mandy was planning her challenge to get through Dan John’s Mass Made Simple.Certainly you can guess we’re dedicating this year’s challenge to Mandy, and we’re jumpstarting the Challenge with a No Junk-Food Monday, with the financial savings dedicated to Mandy. Your assignment, should you feel challenged, is to skip some treat you normally eat or drink, and PayPal the few dollars over to the Mandy Fund. I think a latte’s about $3.50; that draft you normally get is gonna cost you a little more…. and, guess what… you don’t even get to drink it.
When she wakes up over the next few days, we want her to know she’s not completely alone, that we’re supporting her and her family as she begins her long rehab.
What you can do:
1: Join the Challenge
2: Jumpstart the Challenge and contribute the $5 you saved… or the $20 for you twice-daily latte and bagel gluttons
3: Send a card. Her sister’s going to cover her ICU wall with cards; we’re looking for cards from every state in the US, and every country we can find someone willing to buy an international postage stamp.
4: Send some bucks. We’ve got about $5,000 collected from the IronOnline group, and we’d like to double that as we go wider with this. The goal is to pay her rent for a couple of months, pay the family’s travel expenses and build a ramp or whatever accessibility needs she’ll have during her rehab. Help if you can, or send a card instead if money’s tight. Or dedicate your year-end training to Mandy and hit it hard. That’s plenty good!
6. Visit the www.milesformandy.com site for regular updates, and news about the Bakersfield Walk/Run Benefit called Miles for Mandy (see Miles for Mandy facebook group, too), tentatively scheduled for mid-December. There may be a sister walk/run in Dallas the same day.
This was supposed to be an announcement that Dan’s Intervention DVD was ready as a downloadable product, but unfortunately I only have an “almost” for you today. Uploads take longer than downloads; my machine is chugging away and I have -0- clue how long it’ll keep up this grinding. When it’s done, and when I get things set up correctly, we’ll We have four packages for you, for now available via ejunkie, here:
An mp3 audio file of the full lecture (without video), with a transcript pdf, Dan’s newest writings on Intervention (unpublished elsewhere), and the workshop handouts, $20
Downloadable video file of Disc One, $20
Downloadable video file of Disc Two, $20
Downloadable video file of Disc Three, $20
I’ll update the above with live links, hopefully tomorrow. And of course, all of this is part of the DVD physical package, available now for $129, here: Dan John’s Intervention DVD.
The e-book addition of Michael Boyle’s Advances in Functional Training is nearly done. We could see that in two or three weeks, And the softcover edition of Gray Cook’s Movement is heading for the printer next week. While all this is in motion, our new audio lectures line is ramping up. This is you catching a whiff, and you’ll get hit with the full blast inside of a month.
Now for the surprise. We have a new email acquaintance who’s been collecting Don’t Make Waves photographs for the past 40+ years. I’ve been watching the Don’t Make Waves memorabilia for about 25 years — seems like he swooped up some of this long before I came along. Much of it I’ve never seen! DMWs is newly available on DVD at Amazon.com.
The learning has come in a cascade around here lately. Earlier today I uploaded our first Kindle book, Dave’s Iron On My Mind, which will be available at Amazon tomorrow. And just a few minutes ago wrapped up a phone consultation with a retired audio book publisher who’s guiding me as I poke around the edges of hiring a narrator and sound engineer to record Dan John’s Never Let Go for audio book publication. It’s all downhill momentum on the Kindle editions; now that I know how to format for it, the other books will follow quickly.
But first: A couple more edits of Dan’s new Interventions workshop DVD, which is going terrifically well. He’s an outstanding teacher, and for this workshop he organized about 30 years of learning into a three-and-a-half-hour DVD. You’re going to love it… ’round about mid-June.
I have a couple other ideas simmering, and the guys have other projects in the works, too. It’s a big year for us, meaning a big collection of new content for you.
So here are my questions—if you have input to share, scroll down and add a comment, would you? Your suggestions could easily tilt how this summer’s chores will play out.
Are you a print book reader? E-books? Half and half or fully committed one way or the other?
If you read print books, do you look for softcover or hardcover, or does it matter?
If e-books, what format and where do you buy them?
Do you listen to audio books? If yes, do you buy CDs or Audible.com downloads? Or do you get them from the library?
For our international readers, are you able to buy the On Target books you’d like to read in your country? Can you buy and use Kindle books from the Amazon.com US site?
The work lined up for the summer months includes a possible mix of the above, even audio books, which I haven’t dabbled in before. I’ll do it if it seems like we can at least break even on the experiment.
Forthcoming…
Never Let Go, Kindle edition by Dan John
Interventions, DVD set by Dan John
West Coast Bodybuilding Scene, Kindle edition by Dick Tyler
Advances in Functional Training, Kindle edition by Michael Boyle
Movement, Kindle edition by Gray Cook, with Lee Burton, Kyle Kiesel, Greg Rose & Milo Bryant
Movement, softcover edition by Gray Cook, with Lee Burton, Kyle Kiesel, Greg Rose & Milo Bryant
Functional Movement Systems: Applying the Model to Real Life Examples, DVD set by Gray Cook
If you’ve followed the other “squat-challenged” posts(here, then here, and finally, here), you’re familiar with the many and varied approaches I’ve taken over the years to find a reasonable substitute for the squat. Free squats, Zane styled squats, dumbbell squats, hip belt squats, leverage machine squats, shrug bar squats and the lengthy “let’s forget about it altogether” squat…they all found their way into my workouts from time to time. All had their time and place, their advantages and disadvantages…but none completely satisfied. None filled that nagging little “squat sized” hole in my psyche. None.
This past Tuesday night saw a victory of sorts take place in the WWGG. (The Wicked Willie Garage Gym for the uninitiated.) I actually did squats. No tricks, no assistance, no machines – “just put the barbell on my back and squat” squats.
Granted, the weight was embarassingly light. (Somewhere, a ten year old girl has just warmed up with a heavier weight.) Granted, it was only to just parallel and not the most upright of squats. Granted, I didn’t always push through my heels and my lower back may have lost its arch a time or two…BUT THEY WERE SQUATS! Without falling and without losing balance, standing on my own two feet with my heels flat on the floor, I squatted. Felt good, it did.
How and why did this happen? I have a theory.
All of the various movements I used over the years helped to build quad strength but lacked in the balance department. Looking back, I can see an unconscious progression from movements that addressed the balance issue by eliminating it, to movements that assumed increasingly greater amounts of free movement. I went from movements that utilized various means of assisting balance (hip belt squats holding a tether, Zane “Leg Blaster” styled squats in the same manner) to movements where I stood on my feet without the benefit of assistance – i.e. shrug bar “lifts,” dumbbell squats and free squats. Albeit slowly and without conscious thought, I was progressively developing the strength in the ancillary muscles and the neural pathways that would allow me to make the necessary corrections to squat without losing balance. Call it serendipity or pure dumb luck…the end result was the same. I squatted.
Tempering my joy is the knowledge that I have a long way to go to reach a matured form. Flexibilities will have to be developed and movement patterns will have to be addressed, isolated and fixed. All of that seems a little less onerous and a little more possible now.
I sincerely doubt that I’ll squat three wheels. Two wheels may be a lofty goal. In truth, ONE wheel on each side may be enough to satisfy me for a long time. It doesn’t really matter…the journey has begun. Am I still “squat-challenged?” Yes. Does it matter?
In 1984 I started college and said goodbye to a football career. I was coming off of two ankle fractures and knew my chances to play ball and get respectable grades for PT school were not complementary. It was then, as a college freshman, I first found the weight room.
We didn’t have a legitimate weight room at high school and instead, most of us worked jobs around our rural community where strong and tough went hand and hand. When I arrived at college and became part of the weight room scene, I observed all the fussiness and culture associated with just lifting some weight. I noticed the rigid routines, the gadgets, the notebooks and the 400 mirror checks per workout. This was a new language, with a lifting etiquette, and we had to know our numbers: Dude, how much can you bench?
I wondered how much of this was science and how much was the lifting culture. The guys I grew up with were easily as strong with half the work and without the social gathering to discuss it. My unpopular philosophy to get some work done and get out meant I really did not fit in.
The following year, I was validated by a 10-minute segment of a goofy movie—the movie was Rocky IV. Watch the clip and then read on… just do it!
Yes, I know the soundtrack is totally ’80s and, yes, I’m that old, but don’t miss the point because I’m going to make one.
You just watched a video of two guys training, both expending physical energy. One was in a stable and modifiable environment, and the other had to adapt and work around natural limitations. One was having his workout brought to him, while one was just looking to work. Rocky’s work looked like hard fun and Drago’s work looked like some kind of exercise lab rat.
Part of why I like the clip is because I’m an outdoors guy and I always work harder out of doors, but this does not mean I don’t like the gym. I just feel a deeper and subtler message, a message that says we can engineer strength, but maybe not toughness, tenacity, adaptability and functionality. Those things need to grow naturally from correct doses of stress. The message says when we try to micromanage and control our workouts—when we try to microscopically isolate focus—we actually give up some degree of function and adaptability. A workout should be an obstacle that becomes manageable through hard work, movement learning, proper technique and physical adaptation… then we move onto other obstacles.
I often see people doing awkward or unnatural movements and exercise variations just to make things harder. Some are proud of how hard they can make a goofy exercise. They demonstrate a dumbbell front raise with the thumb pointed down as they awkwardly shrug the shoulder and contort the neck and face. Why would you lift that? Or how about a weighted squat on an unstable surface—what’s that all about? I guess the front raise thing is supposed to isolate the rotator cuff, but learning to push, pull and press correctly creates an integrated and stable shoulder, and thus the need to isolate the cuff using supplemental exercises never presents itself. The guys I grew up with did not know what a rotator cuff was, and never lifted with an intentional mechanical disadvantage. They knew how to manage weight, use leverage and work efficiently—injury-free.
The point is not to make things unnecessarily hard; it’s to make really hard stuff become easier, safer and more manageable, and then move to something harder. Somehow squatting weight on an unstable surface does not seem that smart or necessary. Balancing on an unstable surface is a great way to train balance reactions, and squatting with weight is a great way to get strong, but combining the activities only reduces the benefit of each in an artificial attempt to be functional. You can’t fool nature; nature knows it’s a stupid exercise. Instead of trying to make our fluffy exercises harder with awkward angles and bad lines, we should pick some hard exercises that are time-honored and technically sound, and learn the art of making them easy.
When I first learned kettlebell training, my team of instructors did not obsess on making the work harder—it was naturally hard. We instead learned how to make a large amount of weight seem manageable. Our instructors spoke of fatigue management and preached alignment, pressurization and proper technique. They demonstrated how to tap into more efficient tension and competent movement patterns. No one ever spoke of calorie burning, muscle hypertrophy or a cool way to make something harder in order to smoke oneself. This work was naturally hard and in this environment the fat-to-muscle ratio took care of itself without being the subject of conversation.
No mirrors were used throughout the entire RKC experience. One might wonder, has this weird tribe of RKC athletes discovered that we don’t need permission from a reflection to get stronger?
Maybe real functional training is the ability to adapt and tolerate various forms of work and naturally become more efficient. The work you do should create body knowledge, movement awareness, and over time maybe it even produces some toughness. The obvious goal of exercise is to learn the movement in front of you, but the deep goal is to learn to use your own body with its abilities and limits. When I train and rehabilitate athletes, military operators, firefighters and regular Joes, I design the work to produce and reinforce smart minds and tougher, more functional bodies. The strength seems to take care of itself.
Nice workout, Rocky, and thanks RKC.
Author’s note: The same year Rocky IV came out, the band Dire Straits hit number 5 with Money for Nothing. Please don’t look at the four songs that charted above it. I think Aerosmith was in rehab that year.
Visit GrayCook.com for more articles and audio material from Gray.
You’ve heard what an outstanding job Perform Better does with their conferences—and after my trip to Long Beach last weekend, you can add my voice to the cheers of others. It was wonderful to spend the time tagging along with Dan, seeing old friends, meeting some new, learning and laughing. I even got to introduce him to a couple of people.
“Hi, folks, this is my friend, Dan John, you may have heard of him.”
My first opportunity to pull this off was when we bumped into Chris Poirier, the head of Perform Better, the guy behind all the goodness about to unfold. Attendees and speakers alike tell what an enjoyable guy he is, and what a good job he and his staff do creating these weekends, but what I hadn’t heard was how easy he makes it look. Big events are not easy, and it’s monumental for him to always take time to stop and talk, and be paying attention to the conversation in the midst of what must be chaos in his head. He made us welcome, even that first night when he’d probably been going 12 or 14 hours on no rest and perhaps no food.
A few minutes later, I got to run through the Coach John introduction again when John Brookfield and Ingrid Marcum walked through the glass Hyatt entryway. I hadn’t seen Ingrid since she visited us in 2002 on her way home from two weeks training with Olympic coach Jim Schmitz, and it’s been a few years since we last saw John during which he did one of his many feats of strength before a rocking Arnold Classic crowd. Over dinner, John told us of his plans to stun the Perform Better group by rolling a 20-foot bar into a ball small enough to stow in a box the size of a briefcase, which he did the next night under the WWF-quality announcing of his spur-of-the-moment MC, Martin Rooney.
The following morning, we’d planned a book marketing brain-storming breakfast to start the day, Dan and me, Michael Boyle and Gray Cook. Between the four of us, three had flight delays; our plans wavered from moment to moment through the night. As it turned out, Michael gave his lectures on only a few hours sleep, and Gray arrived an entire day late after driving to a different airport to find another flight. Apparently these guys get routed around a lot on the way to speaking events, but they take it in stride and we never hear about the escapades.
Let’s stall over breakfast for a sec, because I want you to picture this as I saw it, sitting there watching Michael Boyle and Dan John meet. These guys, who’ve appreciated each other’s work from opposite sides of the country, perhaps for decades, were instantly friends, joking, with an instant bond of mission clarity. And here I sat, watching it all. I just love this stuff—enjoying the personalities more than the lecture education.
The Perform Better events are a conflict of decisions: By choosing one presenter, you’re deciding to take a pass on three others. There are a total of 13 session decisions to be made, and not a single one easy. Session number one, I stood in the middle of the hallway trying to decide between people I knew and people I wanted to know. The truth is, I stood there conflicted until Dan walked up, saw my dilemma and offered an easy choice, “Just come with me.”
So, we started the day in Josh Henkin’s lecture room, where Dan practically pulled me to the front row (heels dragging but no match for the beefy Coach John), a pattern that was to continue throughout the weekend. Amid my own misery of being in the front, there was time to feel a little bad for Josh, Dan sitting there, pen in hand, eager as a puppy. But Josh took it in stride, and the audience was never the wiser that one of his heroes was watching his every move.
Now this front row bit was interesting. Dan was so eager for information that we moved from the second row to the first when the spots opened up. Bit quirky, but endearing. And it definitely says something when a 31-year veteran teacher races to the front row.
Compare that with my norm: When I travel with Dave, we arrive late, slip in the back door and stay there… in the back… near the door. The truth is, that suits me just fine, but since I’m trying to step out just a little more, you’d have to say Dan was a good influence.
The next session was Michael’s lecture, and honestly, when you combine our friendship with his engaging speaking skills, I really didn’t mind sitting in the front.
Now this was interesting: Because I’d worked on Michael’s book, Advances in Functional Training, and since we’d discussed much of the content, his material wasn’t new to me. That left time to observe and enjoy him as a person and as a speaker, and guess what? He’s terrific at both. I watched him and reflected on how lucky I am to be able to work with him, and then realized all that reflection was while seated next to Dan John, waiting for Gray Cook to show up. Amazing combination of talent!
But Gray was still en route, and Michael decided over breakfast that he’d sell out Gray’s book before he got there, a friendly little challenge that only the one friend knew about. I have a feeling Michael doesn’t lose many self-challenges, and this one was no different. The debut of Gray’s new book,Movement, was over before noon, five hours before Gray arrived. Sort of sad at the time, this will be a Boyle vs Cook story they’ll poke at for years to come.
Later that evening, the keynote speaker, our old friend Thom Plummer, surprised Dan by including him as a part of his “Lessons of Success” lecture. There we were, sitting, as you know, in the front row, and onto the overhead flashes an image of Dan, hauling a rock off the cover of Never Let Go.
This was just after Thom talked about Dave’s contribution to our field, complete with enough stirring personal thoughts about Thom and Dave’s friendship and Dave’s character to have me fairly choked up. And those were followed by Thom’s discussion of both Michael and Gray, two other pillars of fitness education. I love being a fly on the wall, standing aside, while knowing I helped these guys make a contribution. It’s an extraordinary feeling, and Thom gave it to me in spades that night.
From there, another highlight: Meeting Gray. The Perform Better events include a free-beer social, and because of the flight cancellation this was Gray’s first appearance at the event. Gray and I have logged probably dozens of hours of phone time, but hadn’t met. I knew what he looked like, and that left him at the disadvantage of knowing only my voice. I got a kick out of standing nearby, making a couple of comments while knowing he had no clue who I was.
That reminds me of another intriguing contrast. Working on Dan’s book involved passing notes back and forth in a private section on our IronOnline forum. With Gray’s, we used email when it was necessary to exchange text, but did the bulk of the work by phone. Michael’s book was done entirely by email. Check this: We’d never even spoken before Friday.
The next morning, Gray, his wife Danielle, and his two daughters, Jessica and Kayla, invited me to breakfast. After breakfast, the womenfolk hiked over to the battling ropes workshop, definitely groggy and possibly intimidated knowing Ingrid had a plan for them, while Gray and I made up for the work we missed the day before.
After that, we were off to Gray’s lecture on dynamic stability training. Gray has so much insight into human movement that it just slips out between his thoughts, in writing and in conversation. So picture this: Throughout the weekend, Dan was taking notes in everyone’s lectures, big note-taker, that guy. Every few minutes I’d hear a “hmmm” or an “oh, that’s good,” as he scribbled a thought, followed by the sound of paper rustling to make way for another page.
At the opening of Gray’s first talk, Dan made a single note, then no more.
Now you know it wasn’t because there was nothing to write down. No, it was because there was so much to write down, he’d have never caught up. When you’re listening to Gray lecture, you want to stop and think about a concept, sort it out in your head, but there’s no time— you know you’re going to miss five more intense thoughts while you’re off pondering. I’d be willing to bet there were few notes taken anywhere in that standing-room-only crowd.
Gray had four contributors to his new book, one of whom is Greg Rose, a chiropractic doc who co-founded the Titleist Performance Institute. Home for the first time since mid-May, Greg is a sought-after speaker on golf mechanics, and he was next on my lecture schedule. His topic was based on the golf swing, but more than that it was a discussion of the joint-by-joint approach to movement, specifically as it relates to rotational sports. Because Dan’s a thrower—primarily a rotational athlete—I was disappointed to find Dan’s unattended notepad there next to me in the front row, Dan having been waylaid in the hall on his way back from the water fountain.
The upside there was that I got to sneak over to the sideline to sprawl on the floor, unnoticed.
Getting the spine flat for a bit was a welcome relief, because our next stop was Gray’s hands-on lecture. It’s no stretch to say there wasn’t a person in the room thinking there’s never enough time to listen to Gray and to test his techniques. Subtle tips, a fraction of an angle or a turn of the head, these all make up a fascinating difference you can feel. The trainers, coaches and medical pros all left that room with at least a couple techniques to use this week, and a few others to experiment with as they learn the nuances.
The event vendors lined the edge of the presentation room, and as Gray finished, Dan and I hurried over to visit with Anthony Carey, the creator of that fabulous CoreTex I fell off during last year’s IDEA expo. This year, no fall, nor even a close call; even Anthony, whose swift move last year stopped me from knocking over a nearby apparel display, would have to say I’d made a bit of stability progress. I’m going to have to spring for one of these things—it’s truly a blast, fun and effective at the same time.
By this time, we’re coming to the end of our trip, but not before we get a half-hour of personal attention from Gray. In the dim light of a secluded hallway, Dan and I took turns rolling around the crummy convention hall carpet as Gray pushed and pulled on bodyparts to offer a few corrective suggestions. Beyond doubt, I’d have gone to Long Beach for those few minutes, just that alone.
Sadly, Summit attendees miss as many great speakers as they see, in fact, more than two times as many! I missed a couple of good friends talk, and missed a few stellar educators. Lee Burton, another of Gray’s co-authors, arrived at LAX the same hour as we flew home, and I missed Sue Falsone talk about the thoracic spine, surely the biggest problem area in this 54-year-old body. But, hey, this is why Perform Better schedules three such weekends each year in addition to their one-day events.
Next stop: the San Jose airport, where in a bit of a tsunami I tried to tell Dave this story over a span of about five minutes.
Amazing from start to finish, the three Es— educating, entertaining, and finally… exhausting.
If you are not yet familiar with the joint-by-joint theory, be prepared to take a quantum leap in thought process. My good friend, physical therapist Gray Cook has a gift for simplifying complex topics. In a conversation about the effect of training on the body, Gray produced one of the most lucid ideas I have ever heard.
We were discussing the findings of his Functional Movement Screen (FMS), the needs of the different joints of the body and how the function of the joints relate to training. One beauty of the FMS is it allows us to distinguish between issues of stability and those of mobility; Gray’s thoughts led me to realize the future of training may be a joint-by-joint approach, rather than a movement-based approach.
His analysis of the body is a straightforward one. In his mind, the body is a just a stack of joints. Each joint or series of joints has a specific function and is prone to predictable levels of dysfunction. As a result, each joint has particular training needs.
This joint-by-joint idea has really taken on a life of its own, one I certainly didn’t envision. It seems like everyone’s familiar with it; it’s become so common knowledge people fail to reference Gray Cook or me as the developers of the idea.
The table in the next column looks at the body on a joint-by-joint basis from the bottom up.
The first thing you should notice is the joints alternate between mobility and stability. The ankle needs increased mobility, and the knee needs increased stability. As we move up the body, it becomes apparent the hip needs mobility. And so the process goes up the chain–a basic, alternating series of joints.
Over the past 20 years, we have progressed from the approach of training by body part to a more intelligent approach of training by movement pattern. In fact, the phrase movements, not muscles has almost become an overused one, and frankly, that’s progress. Most good coaches and trainers have given up on the old chest-shoulder-triceps method and moved to push-pull, hip-extend, knee-extend programs.
Still, the movement-not-muscles philosophy probably should have gone a step further. Injuries relate closely to proper joint function, or more appropriately, to joint dysfunction. Problems at one joint usually show up as pain in the joint above or below.
The primary illustration is in the lower back. It’s clear we need core stability, and it’s also obvious many people suffer from back pain. The intriguing part lies in the theory behind low back pain–the new theory of the cause: loss of hip mobility.
Loss of function in the joint below–in the case of the lumbar spine, it’s the hips–seems to affect the joint or joints above. In other words, if the hips can’t move, the lumbar spine will. The problem is the hips are designed for mobility, and the lumbar spine for stability. When the intended mobile joint becomes immobile, the stable joint is forced to move as compensation, becoming less stable and subsequently painful.
The Process is Simple
Lose ankle mobility, get knee pain
Lose hip mobility, get low back pain
Lose thoracic mobility, get neck and shoulder pain, or low back pain
Looking at the body on a joint-by-joint basis beginning with the ankle, this makes sense.
The ankle is a joint that should be mobile and when it becomes immobile, the knee, a joint that should be stable, becomes unstable; the hip is a joint that should be mobile and it becomes immobile, and this works its way up the body. The lumbar spine should be stable; it becomes mobile, and so on, right on up through the chain.
Now take this idea a step further. What’s the primary loss with an injury or with lack of use? Ankles lose mobility; knees lose stability; hips lose mobility. You have to teach your clients and patient these joints have a specific mobility or stability need, and when they’re not using them much or are using them improperly, that immobility is more than likely going to cause a problem elsewhere in the body.
If somebody comes to you with a hip mobility issue–if he or she has lost hip mobility–the complaint will generally be one of low back pain. The person won’t come to you complaining of a hip problem. This is why we suggest looking at the joints above and looking at the joints below, and the fix is usually increasing the mobility of the nearby joint.
These are the results of joint dysfunction: Poor ankle mobility equals knee pain; poor hip mobility equals low back pain; poor T-spine mobility, cervical pain.
An immobile ankle causes the stress of landing to be transferred to the joint above, the knee. In fact, there is a direct connection between the stiffness of the basketball shoe and the amount of taping and bracing that correlates with the high incidence of patella-femoral syndrome in basketball players. Our desire to protect the unstable ankle came with a high cost. We have found many of our athletes with knee pain have corresponding ankle mobility issues. Many times this follows an ankle sprain and subsequent bracing and taping.
The exception to the rule seems to be at the hip. The hip can be both immobile and unstable, resulting in knee pain from the instability–a weak hip will allow internal rotation and adduction of the femur–or back pain from the immobility.
How a joint can be both immobile and unstable is an interesting question.
Weakness of the hip in either flexion or extension causes compensatory action at the lumbar spine, while weakness in abduction, or, more accurately, prevention of adduction, causes stress at the knee.
Poor psoas and iliacus strength or activation will cause patterns of lumbar flexion as a substitute for hip flexion. Poor strength or low activation of the glutes will cause a compensatory extension pattern of the lumbar spine to replace the motion of hip extension.
This fuels a vicious cycle. As the spine moves to compensate for the lack of strength and mobility of the hip, the hip loses more mobility. Lack of strength at the hip leads to immobility, and immobility in turn leads to compensatory motion at the spine. The end result is a kind of conundrum, a joint that needs both strength and mobility in multiple planes.
Your athletes, clients and patients must learn to move from the hips, not from the lumbar spine. Most people with lower back pain or hamstring strains have poor hip or lumbo-pelvic mechanics and as a result must extend or flex the lumbar spine to make up for movement unavailable through the hip.
The lumbar spine is even more interesting. This is clearly a series of joints in need of stability, as evidenced by all the research in the area of core stability. The biggest mistake we have made in training over the last 10 years is an active attempt to increase the static and active range of motion of an area that re-quires stability.
Most, if not all, of the many rotary exercises done for the lumbar spine were misdirected. Physical therapist Shirley Sahrmann in Diagnosis and Treatment of Movement Impairment Syndromes and James Porterfield and Carl DeRosa in Mechanical Low Back Pain: Perspectives in Functional Anatomy all indicate attempting to increase lumbar spine range of motion is not recommended and is potentially dangerous. Our lack of understanding of thoracic mobility caused us to try to gain lumbar rotary range of motion, and this was a huge mistake.
The thoracic spine is the area about which we know the least. Many physical therapists recommend increasing thoracic mobility, though few have exercises designed specifically for it. The approach seems to be “We know you need it, but we’re not sure how to get it.” Over the next few years, we will see an increase in exercises designed to increase thoracic mobility. A leader in the field, Sahrmann was early to advocate the development of thoracic mobility and the limitation of lumbar mobility.
The gleno-humeral joint is similar to the hip. The gleno-humeral joint is designed for mobility and therefore needs to be trained for stability. The need for stability in the gleno-humeral joint presents a great case for exercises like stability ball and BOSU pushups, as well as unilateral dumbbell work.
In the book Ultra-Prevention, a nutrition book, authors Mark Hyman and Mark Liponis describe our current method of reaction to injury perfectly. Their analogy is simple: Our response to injury is like hearing the smoke detector go off and running to pull out the battery. The pain, like the sound, is a warning of some other problem. Icing a sore knee without examining the ankle or hip is like pulling the battery out of the smoke detector. The relief is short-lived.
In this article, which he calls Housekeeping, our favorite MD, Dr. Mike Nichols, gives us a look at what type of information we can expect from his new site, whenyouareserious.com.
There is a large collection of measurable variables that, when improved, lead to a longer, healthier life. Most people have not heard of these variables or have read about them only in glossy ads designed to encourage the purchase of supplements, vitamins, miracle foods or weird electromagnetic devices. More magical thinking, more death or a pill thinking tricked out in self-referential gloating about not being hornswoggled by Big Pharma.
Basic medical science is genuinely interested in discovering the causes and cure of disease, suffering, aging and even death. Thousands of people, pure of intent, of keen intellect and purpose, work long hours in labs, in offices, in institutions to unlock the processes of disease and the mechanisms of possible cure. If you don’t believe this, what I say won’t make much sense; it won’t motivate you to take seriously the work of these scientists, these benefactors of mankind.
Why do I take you back to whether or not you have a basic belief in scientists and the scientific method? Because as a practicing physician for many, many years, I’ve grown accustomed to the fog of beliefs, doubts, skepticism and confusion most people work within in their perception of medical science and physician recommendations. I well understand the problem, but need your essential conviction that real science well done can and does discover things that matter.
This is not as silly as it first seems. If, for example, you believe, as most doctors do, that your cholesterol number is one of the most important things in the world and that behaving in such a way as to drive this number down is “all that matters trumps everything, is the be-all and end-all of heart disease, risk for stroke and the like,” then I cannot be of help. For reasons big and small, all of the basic medical literature has always been clear about this: Cholesterol is just one number among many, and those then are nested together to evaluate your relative risk of vascular disease.
If this notion of multivariate relatedness is too much to swallow, what I say will sound like little more than questioning conventional wisdom “the Holy Grail is Lower Cholesterol” when what I will be trying to do is put this one number in the context of many others that matter as much or more but for which there is no pill to fix, and for this reason you will not have heard as much about these other numbers. The wonderful thing is you have an enormous amount of control over these other important variables, actually much more control than over your total cholesterol number.
With this background in mind, I need to make a few other conceptual points before I get to articles cover the actual things you can fix and why.
Let me introduce you to four ideas:
* First is the idea to be skeptical about what matters. For example, something might change a number related to disease, but not affect or, in some cases, might adversely affect, a more important endpoint like death. Maybe it lowers blood pressure, but happens to increase the chance of death, or lowers blood glucose/sugar but not the diseases or death associated with diabetes. Over the years, many drugs have been withdrawn after discovering just such problems.
An everyday example: Most of the common anti-inflammatory and pain medicines like Advil have been around for decades and work very well for the endpoint of pain. The endpoint of death happens to be increased in those who take these medications, for they are associated with an as much as 40% increased chance of heart attack in regular users. Be careful how you choose your desired endpoint.
Another example: High homocysteine is associated with stroke, heart disease and premature mental decline. Take an array of vitamin Bs and homocysteine goes down, but not the homocysteine-related risk for stroke, heart disease and premature mental decline. Oh, and there is a known risk of colorectal cancer, breast cancer and prostate cancer if you take the B vitamins.
* Second is to note or watch for abuse or misuse of statistics. You will often hear that use of Lipitor and related drugs ‘reduces heart disease by 30%.’ What this actually means is that 1,000 people need to take the drug to prevent heart-related problems in about three people. If 1,000 people do not take the drug and 11-12 of them have heart-related problems, and 1,000 people take the drug and only eight or nine people have heart-related trouble, that ‘reduces heart disease by 30%.’
The perception and the facts don’t add up. A reasonable person thinks “reduction” means if 10 people take the drug, it will save three people’s lives. What it actually means is that 1,000 people risk the side effects and as-yet unknown long-term effects of a drug so that three people might not have a problem. Fine, let’s help those three eating peanuts three times per week has been shown to have about the same statistical impact as Lipitor, yet no one, rightly, has claimed that eating peanuts three times per week reduces heart disease by 30%.
* Third is “number needed to treat” (NNT)—how many people have to take a drug or change a behavior to have a measurable benefit for one person. For example, on the order of one person has to take an antibiotic to be of benefit to one person. This is stretching the case, but is true to the nearest rounded integer. For primary prevention—that is to help a population of otherwise seemingly healthy people—at least 200, that is two hundred, 200 or more people have to take Lipitor to be of benefit to one… I said ONE… person. The others just get the cost and side effects like memory loss.
As you will have noted, NNT and the misuse of statistics are related and reveal each other. By comparison, seven people need to raise their exercise capacity by one MET, a very reasonable thing to do,I will get to this in a later article to help one person avoid the same endpoint, heart attack and so on, as the 200-300 who take Lipitor to help the one person.
* Fourth is “number needed to harm” (NNH). Fine, NNT helps me know my chance of benefit of a proposed therapy like exercise or medication, but what is my risk of harm? Not what the harm might be, but the number of people who take the proposed therapy and wind up having some kind of harm from it. Now this does not tell us whether the harm is a hangnail or death, just the relative risk of harm of any kind. If the NNH is sufficiently high, what the harm is might become less of an issue. If the NNH was two, for example, and the risk was death, I would probably take a pass. But if the NNH was 1,000,000, death might not look like a bad risk if it prevented me from suffering a stroke at age 50 when the NNT was 100.
Think this way when you worry about flying versus driving.
Now with these ideas in mind, you can both police my claims and be a better consumer of pharmaceutical and other medical advice.
Let me summarize those three points.
NNT: number needed to treat
NNH: number needed to harm
Abuse/misuse of statistics
Meaningful clinical endpoints—am I dead or not—and not “some number went down” that may or may not matter when treated.
Mike Nichols, MD
As you finish reading, click on over to the doc’s site and listen to the video lectures. Then subscribe to the updates (right sidebar subscription box) so you’ll get an email notice of his new articles. Each one leaves me pondering, considering changes I need to make, and they’ll do that to you, too. Especially those cardiovascular lecture video clips. Wow! I heard them once, but need to go back for a second round. ~ Laree
Broken up into part lecture and part hands-on practical workshop, John Izzo’s educational dvd, Shatterproof Spine, How to Build an Athletic Low Back, is geared toward personal trainers, but will also be quite useful to individuals who have the occasional or recurring twinges of back pain. 90 minutes spent attentively with this DVD will give you the tools to reverse that increasing back pain — why your back hurts and what to do about it — for life.
In this easy-to-follow DVD, John pulls together his in-the-trenches experience with his clients and athletes (with a particular focus on golfers), and his understanding of the latest research on back pain by industry greats Dr. Stuart McGill, physical therapist and educator Shirley Sahrmann and Dr. Larry Foster. The lingo of these experts is often hard to follow, and in this DVD John makes this material accessible to the rest of us.
Part one covers an introduction to low back pain, the various types of back pain, the function of the spine and stresses on the low back, muscular imbalances and exercises and drills to reverse them, and what actions to avoid.
In the discussion of muscular imbalances, you’ll hear about short muscles vs tight muscles, long vs weak and short and weak — overactive, lengthened, inactive. These are terms we read often these days. Do you understand the differences and how to fix the problems you find? John explains this in simple language, and once you get it, more of those articles you’re reading on the net will make sense.
You’ve heard about Gray Cook and Lee Burton’s Functional Movement Screen, but do you understand it? While the Screen is not covered in full, you’ll see a few comparison videos of poor mobility and good mobility, discover the subtle things to look for in poor mobility, learn how to tell the difference between good and lousy movement, and ideas of how to fix poor movement.
There’s a brilliant visual of how hip mobility affects the golf swing, and of course, that’s going to translate to all implement sports with a club or racket, and with a little imagination, you’ll be able to project this into your own sport or activity.
You’ll also learn:
Unusual stretches with a twist, including thoracic mobility needed but not normally done
Why to wait 1-2 hours upon rising before forward bending — avoid flexing the spine — and why Dr. McGill suggests waiting 2-3 hours before heavy bending
How to understand spinal rotation and anti-rotation
In the practical portion, the attendees are talked through a variety of exercises to strengthen the muscles that support the spine. Many of these are unique, and John’s outstanding guidance presents the tips for perfection in technique of:
Reverse deadbug with med ball (you’ll never guess what this looks like)
Pelvis disassociation drill
T-spine disassociation drill
Plank with row
Med ball extension drop
Single leg RDL
Med ball shoulder exchange
Coil/Recoil with a band
Hip hinge with a band
Dumbbell side bend
Dumbbell side bend? Hey, I think we know that one! Only guess what: We’ve probably been doing them wrong from day one. Hint: The movement is much smaller than what you remember.
The final section of the DVD consists of a live workshop during which the camera follows John as he demonstrates and corrects individuals performing these exercises. This will be useful both to personal trainers who need to know what to look in error control and how to explain the fixes, as well as individuals interested in corrective spinal exercises for personal use.
Seems like such a great dream – noble even – to build a dungeon where heavy iron hits the floor and bumper plates are heaved smoothly overhead. Instead… I look in the crystal and see a three-year nightmare that ends with you and your best-bud training partner feuding, your back account empty (or worse, owing borrowed money), and the IRS hounding you for unpaid payroll taxes. It’s a heartbreaker.
We hear from people weekly, either by email or in the forum, writing of their amazing plans to build their dream gym. They write to share their excitement, or perhaps to get a tip or two from someone who built and ran a couple of gyms over a fifteen-year period.
Each time we have the opportunity, both Dave and I do our best to talk the planner down from the lofty heights and back to reality. In only one instance do I know of a person who stuck with the plans after our badgering, and who’s truly made a go of it in the health club business. All others had everything going against them, aside from their immeasurable enthusiasm. Unfortunately, in a business that can be compared in difficulty with the restaurant industry, enthusiasm simply isn’t enough.
Your gym business, odd as this may sound, will be competing with every outdoor fitness activity… running… walking… biking… swimming. If your community enjoys good weather, this is a negative in your business plan.
My first goal in jotting these notes is to talk you out of it.
My second is to convince you you don’t have enough money set aside for it to work.
Failing both of my real goals, my final goal is to get you to a Thomas Plummer workshop before you sign a building lease, and certainly before opening day.
It’s true you can build a dungeon-like gym on a shoestring, some tenant improvement money and an equipment lease. But you can’t make it run on that, and the reality will become real, real clear about three months after opening day. The joy of building and opening the gym will fade as you discover the rent’s due, the checkbook’s short, and all those guys from the foofoo gym who said they’d be over on Day One are still back at 24/7 waiting either for the rest of their eighteen-month membership to run out, or for you to find the money for the bumper plates you promised.
When’s that reverse hyper going to be delivered, anyway? Oh, right. You borrowed enough money from your home mortgage payment for the equipment, but still don’t have enough to cover the freight.
And you know what? That’s exactly how it’s going to go for most enthusiastic independent gym owners. Here’s what happens: We have great passion for our gyms, and we know – just know – we can run ours better than the gym where we currently train. A few training buds get together, jabbering about a bunch of great-sounding ideas, and they’re off, cruising the town looking for an empty warehouse to hold a huge pile of iron.
None of the chatterers have a lick of business experience; no one even knows which permits need to be purchased, let alone what city, county or state department issues said permits. This isn’t uncommon, this enthusiasm coupled with a lack of business acumen, but in our industry it’s rampant. Add in lack of free capital and we’re hearing a death rattle; it’s a killer.
If you find yourself reflected in the above paragraphs, opening a gym is likely to wipe out your retirement savings — assuming you have any, big assumption in today’s economy – or it’ll ruin your friendships and possibly your marriage.
I know you’re enthusiastic, excited, eager and can barely temper your glee, and that’s why I scratched out all this negativity. You need to hear it.
Dave’s genius lies in seeing what we all see, but being able to describe it in a way few of the rest of us had considered. That’s why I don’t want his musings of the internal coaching personalities from the column a few weeks to disappear into the depths of the archives, now reaching a thickness of over 500 columns, without calling out those familiar nags.
Before sending them off to history, which of your internal advisers is your favorite, which visits the most often or is the most destructive? And I wonder this: Do we have the skills to bring a more positive and more successful internal coach to the forefront?
Can we send the faulty ones to the rear?
Quoting Dave Draper:
Me, the pragmatist: Ask yourself, “What if I don’t go?†That dopey question usually works. I let the five one-syllable words tumble around my head for a few agonizing minutes and…
Off to the gym I go like a scolded child.
Myself, the negotiator: Think of how much better you feel when you’re done. Go. Set yourself free. The clever statements trick me every time. I’m dimwitted. I admit it.
Off to the gym with a sappy grin.
I, the ego: Oh, no! The arms are the first to go. They hang like buggy whips in the wind. Then the shoulders, slumping forward, narrow, bony and powerless. Loose fat collects immediately around the navel and love handles. The pecs droop, airless balloons.
Absolutely unbearable. Zoom. Gone to the gym.
College professor: Now is not the time to pause, neglect or doubt, my good man. With haste summon your discipline and perseverance, your most precious assets long in development. Let this day not pass without continuous and virtuous triumph. Live, lift, learn and grow.
Off to the gym I go, a brilliant and assiduous student of life… D-
Fatherly persuasion: Be brave and courageous, my son. You’re in the shadow of the valley of tedium that must be traversed before ascending the noble and exciting mountains ahead.
I hike to the gym in mountaineering boots.
Street talker: Don’t think about it, man. Just do it, you’ll like it.
Off to the gym I go, a free spirit… with a millstone chained to his ankle.
Philosopher: Be strong. These are the times that test the soul.
I go boldly to the gym, heart in hand.
Big brother talk: Nerve and guts, that rebellious pair of wiseguys, can always be counted on when the going gets tough, you little punk. You got any nerve… any guts?
I squeeze into a tanktop and shuffle off to the gym.
Cheerleader: No wimps allowed. I’m counting on you, Double D. You can do this. You’re the man. Let’s make this work big time. Go get ‘em, Bomber. Give me a B, Give me an O, Give me an M, Give me a B.
Gym-bound, pompoms in hand.
Burly coach: Listen up, Draper, and the rest of you lugs out there. Treat every workout like it’s your last workout. Every workout counts. Never say, “I’m not up to it, I can’t do it, I don’t have it in me.†Stand tall, throw your shoulders back, spread those lats, flex those tris, grab the iron and push. Never quit! Never surrender! Never give up! Squats and Deadlifts and Presses and Curls.
Me, gym. Coach’s orders.
Fatalist: Miss one workout, miss two. The terrifying training gap has been established. Miss two workouts, miss three. You’re a goner. There’s no recovery, no turning back, you’re a dead man walking. You cannot let this happen. Do something. Do something now or we all die… aaarrrgh!
Off to the gym or I’m dead meat.
Psychiatrist: You’re crazy if you go, you’re crazy if you don’t go. Don’t go, they throw away the key and you can’t get in. Go, they throw away the key and you can’t get out.
Goodbye, cruel world. Admit me to the Dumbbell Ward.
Psychoanalyst: You think you’re depressed now; forego your workout and the world will come tumbling down on you. Hope surrenders to despair, compassion morphs into anger, enthusiasm dissolves into apathy, fear thwarts joy and light fades to darkness.
The gym, now, or I shrivel.
Cop: Drop the Bomber Blend, hands behind your head, down on the floor, spread ‘em and don’t say a word or it will be held against you. What’s this about not going to the gym? Don’t answer that. Get in the patrol car and watch your head… kaboink… you’re going to the gym. 90 minutes, hard labor.
What is social media? How can we use it? Why would we want to?
I know you’ve heard of it—social media, Facebook… Twitter. You may be thinking the same as Dave, which is why would anyone want to do that? That’s what he said when I told him I was sticking my foot in the social door, but that’s also what he said when I started making a three-page website back in the winter of 1998, or started the email discussion group the following summer. He said it again when I installed the forum board software in 2004. He sure was wrong on those occasions, so why not now?
How I see it is the trilogy of our well-established strength training forum, plus the personal and easy-going aspects of Facebook and the wider-reaching, free-wheeling nature of Twitter rounds out everything we could need for learning and growing our web-based education and camaraderie of iron.
We’re sharing information, passing on links, getting a quick grin from a note from a new acquaintance—a friend of a friend, perhaps—enjoying a memory of someone who was in the audience when Dave won the Mr. America onstage at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in 1965. You’re not going to get that stuff training at home, and rarely will you get much of it at your neighborhood gym. You’re going to have to cast a little wider for the real gems, and that’s where the new social media comes in.
The forum IronOnline you know of if you’ve been reading past blog posts or are a subscriber of Dave’s weekly newsletter. That’s social media; it’s just not the social media you heard about on CNN.
The CNN stuff, that would be more like Facebook and Twitter; Facebook is a site in which you create your own page, add a profile page with a bio and a small photo avatar, then update with a status from time to time, add photos, video or blog-like posts, and begin collecting friends.
Twitter is all about short bursts of information, perhaps an answer to a person’s posted question or a link to something interesting in your field. Some people post bits of nothing; others post solid information, and what you see depends on what type of people you follow. When someone posts their every trip to the grocery store, I’ll have to unfollow—for me, that’s just too much information. But already I’ve had some truly choice links pass through my filter, stuff I would not have otherwise seen, and I’ve introduced myself to leaders in our industry in a way that simply would not have been possible via email.
Let’s say you’re mildly interested. You’ve gone over to Facebook or Twitter and signed up. What do you do next? One easy way to build up some camaraderie pronto is to go to my Facebook friends or Twitter followers and wheel through the names and avatar photos scanning for your acquaintances from our forum or your other stops around the ‘net. On Facebook, click Add Friend to send a friend request; on Twitter, a simple click on the follow link adds that person’s twitter updates to your message scroll.
You’ll be using me as a hub to your iron connections. By the time you’re finished, maybe you’ll even post one of your golden era memories on the Dave Draper fan page, or will RSVP for our next bash event, a Dan John seminar in Draper, Utah, just south of Salt Lake City, on June 6. If you’re an IroingnOnline forum regular, you’ll have certainly re-connected with a hundred or so familiar faces in about five minutes by clicking through my Facebook friends, and if you add yourself to the IronOnline business list, you’ll get a status note in your Facebook page when new videos or photos are uploaded.
Your new Facebook buddies would love to hear stories from those of you who enjoyed the training golden era in person. What was it like training back before it was cool? Did you travel to any contests, maybe hitchhike with a gym buddy? Give us a choice memory and we’ll reward you with a big IronOnline welcome.
It’s been a couple of years since I purchased the PowerTec Leverage Squat machine and I’ve learned a few things in my pursuit of “squat.” Unfortunately, not everything that I learned was positive. (Click here for part one or here for part two.)
First thing I learned was that although machines can allow you to perform a reasonable semblance of a squat, they still fall short of the real thing. No balance is involved and it can be easy to “cheat” the movement. I mentioned these things in a prior blog and time has done little to change my opinion.
Second thing I learned was that since the machine forces you to conform to its movement path, it can set you up for injury. That isn’t a startlingly new revelation but I learned its truth when I became injured using the PowerTec. My knees started complaining and my shoulders also rebelled against the movement. I “believe” that my knees hurt from the resulting tension and rigid positioning that occurred when my feet were solidly planted on the floor and the lever arm was firmly in place on my shoulders. Neither “anchor point” allowed natural movement…and my knees were the recipient of some unnatural forces. My shoulders hurt from the way that the pads pressed down on my trapezius and deltoids. I “believe” that I irritated a nerve deep in my trapezius in the same manner. The lever arm and the pads stayed in a fixed position, while I moved slightly underneath them as I squatted. My left shoulder would become numb and tingly after a squat session. When squatting with a barbell, the contact point on the shoulders comprises a much larger area and distributes the load somewhat. With the leverage arm of the PowerTec, the load is concentrated on a reasonably small area of each shoulder/trapezius area.
I am unwilling to completely abandon the PowerTec, since using the angled foot platform changes the movement enough so that these “issues” aren’t as problematic. (When using the angled foot platform, the movement becomes more like a leg press in function, stressing the glutes more heavily.) However, for a short while I’ve stopped using the PowerTec machine and returned to using the hip belt squat. Squatting while using the hip belt is kinder to the back, the shoulders aren’t stressed at all and it also allows for natural movement at the knees and hips.
The bottom line here is that I think I am too tall or otherwise physically unsuited to the consistent, hard use of this machine. I guess it is still true – “One size doesn’t fit all.”
Live and learn, eh?
We’re all readers or we wouldn’t be hanging out online, so let’s start with this assumption: Sitting here reading isn’t all bad. Online articles are terrific, and have contributed greatly to our understanding of training, nutrition and how the body works. Now blogs, those are a little different because we get a peek inside the writer’s head, see what he or she’s contemplating, informal stuff — what possibilities are simmering that aren’t developed enough to stand up to Article Status. Blog posts let us get down on the ground with the writer, where we find out if there are any lumps under the rug.
I’m a big blog reader. Maybe you’d like to see what’s popping up regularly in my feed reader.
Mike Robertson’s one of our go-to guys in the corrective exercise field. Week after week, he’ll give you something to try in the weight room that’ll surprise you in its simplicity.
Eric Cressey’s another — very helpful in clearing up those nagging, well-earned aches. Seems like a heck of a nice guy, too.
Rounding out that trio is actually the team’s leader, Bill Hartman. Unfortunately for us, he’s too busy fixing people in person to post much. Brilliant stuff when it pops up in the feeds, though.
In Shoulder Performance & Rehab we get regular updates on how the shoulder works, and specifically what causes it to not work and how to fix those issues. Very educational.
Scott Sonnon’s a guy who, in addition to being knowledgeable and willing to share, is just plain fun to watch. The best days are those that include a youtube link to some unbelievable action that he makes look easy.
Iron Tamer: Dave Whitley, a monstrously strong kettlebell and conditioning instructor who also happens to bend stuff that really doesn’t need bending.
Rambling along, Mike Nelson gives insight into Dr. Eric Cobb’s Z-Health program, as well as general joint mobility, kettlebell stuff and current research. He’s a friendly guy, and a sharp cookie, too.
Mike Boyle from StrengthCoach.com is ramping up his blog presence, good for us since he’s got a whole lot of insight after decades in the trenches training athletes and general clients like you and me. This will be a good blog to monitor.
Over at John Izzo’s you’ll get a glimpse into the life of a personal trainer. The advanced questions he gets, you’ll get the answers; the beginning trainee instructions, you’ll get those, too. There are even the occasional rants, written for the personal trainers, but understandable by all.
At Scott Bird’s Straight to the Bar you’ll get a variety pack of the interesting, the unusual and the outstanding feats of strength, along with do-it-yourself instructionals and more. Here’s your catch-all spot, stuff to keep you occupied during a coffee break.
Lyle McDonald’s Body Recomposition is where you want to be for the science of body comp. He’s the guy who wrote The Ketogenic Diet book that became everyone’s diet bible a half-dozen years ago; today he does the fine-tuning.
Dr. Mike Eades is the author of the Protein Power series of low-carb instruction. He covers a variety of topics, some so far over my head the third reading doesn’t even get it for me. If you have an interest in low carb eating and its position in medicine, this blog’s for you.
I’ve found Dr. Mike Jones to be the most assessable of the physical therapist blog writers – I usually make my way through his medical posts fairly successfully. And his instructional youtube videos, those are fabulous. There’s often an mp3 download to close out the entry. Great stuff for those trying to get a handle on injury prevention and rehab.
With the next two, we’re getting a little deeper into the physical therapy field, too deep for most of us. But I like to see what these guys are up to, and once in a while I get a clue, some buried treasure an uneducated novice like me can catch hold of. Here’s Mike Reinold’s sports medicine blog, and Jason Harris’s physical therapy documentation.
Heading slightly off topic, Steve Chandler’s iMindShift. He’ll get you thinking, and once in a while he’ll surprise you with a workout reference, probably at just the moment you’re thinking about bagging that day’s trip to the gym across town. He’s a motivational guy, so expect those timely kicks in the rear to work.
Leading contender of Blogs I’d Like to See: Byron Chandler, from the IronOnline forum. Each day I learn something new from his posts; a blog where he could write whatever he was pondering without needing someone to ask a question first, now that would be outstanding.
We have to add Dave to my blog wish list, of course, and Dan John, these two for motivation and for creativity in training. Gray Cook, can’t get enough of that guy. Tom Incledon because I’m always dying to know what he’s up to. Len Kravitz, he’s a guy whose blog would be intriguing, not to mention a riot. Bill Peel, from the IOL forum, for odd-lift instruction and for plenty of off-topic reading enjoyment. Keith Wassung, less prolific in his new job than before, when he had three of them.
I’ve got another list, stuff that’s a little farther out there and not as shareable, and there are others in my blog feed reader — some real favorites — that have unfortunately gone dormant. I’ll never delete them from the Newsgator, ‘cause you never know when they’ll be revived. Like when New Year’s comes along and the resolutions flow fast and furious. Updates, here we come!
Two new field records, six event wins, a second and a third placing earned Dan John first place overall in the Men’s Master’s Division (age 50+) in the scorching heat in Pleasanton, California, last weekend at the 2008 Highland Games.
Of course, the pros were on tap, including five-time world champion Ryan Vierra, who finished out of the top three this year, returning title-holder Sean Betz, who placed second to the eventual overall winner, Eric Frasure, as were the women, where Mindy Pockowski set and re-set a world record in the weight over bar event while her professional competitor husband crouched nearby.
Eric Frasure, Pleasanton Highland Games Pro Winner, 2008
But the attention of our group was solidly on Coach John, a strength coach with a substantial following of athletes and training enthusiasts and who takes the lead in a training Q&A section of our IronOnline forum. How could we not look toward our pal Dan, who once wrote the following of his first highland games competition:
“When I showed up people were dancing, men were in skirts, guys were drinking booze and competing in throwing big stuff. I said to myself: ‘This is heaven.’ “
Don’t you just have to follow around a guy like that?
It’s especially fun when the fellow you’re tracking is taking home all the medals.
Dan John, heavy weight for distance
The event implements are odd and the rules are unusual, some less understandable than others (think caber). Most of the events take a best of three attempts, but a few go on until someone is the clear leader… except in the case of a tie, when the thrower with the fewest misses takes first place. In the one event Dan won this way, and as such explained the rules that allowed me out of the sun for a brief respite, he called it a sloppy way to win, but I noticed he took the medal anyway.
Most interesting was the variety of throwing techniques: Anything goes it seems, and each competitor demonstrated a different throwing style. Dan’s is clearly based in his discus history, but wouldn’t you know it, right when I was starting to get his style down and the timing right for photography, he up and switched mid-event between straight-forward throwing to rotation.
And each event is different. Even though the idea is to throw an implement for distance, in the Stone Put he made no turns; in the heavy weight for distance he took two; and in the hammer it was three.
Oddest of all is the caber, similar to a tree trunk that’s been sanded down to a short telephone pole with one end tapered. The attendants prop the thinner end of the caber in the athlete’s toed-out feet. The competitor then brings the pole upright and while balancing it straight into the air, begins to walk or run down the field. When he or she is confident the pole is stable, a huge heft propels the caber into the air. The goal is to flip it over so the larger end hits the ground first and the smaller end extends straight away from the thrower’s body in the 12:00 position. Many, many throws did not turn the caber at all, and it was great fun to see all three of Dan’s tosses land in near-straight positions after the highest of flights through the air.
Dan John, caber toss
The unofficial results of Dan’s Pleasanton throws, August, 2008:
Stone Put, 1st, 41 feet, new field record
Braemar Stone, 1st, 29′ 5″, new field record
Light Hammer, 1st, 98′
Heavy Hammer, 1st, 83′
Light Weight for Distance, 2nd, 55
Heavy Weight for Distance, 1st, 40
Weight Over Bar, 1st, 15′
Caber, 3rd, 11:30
Here’s what I saw in the midst of throwers’ yells and the all-day drone of hundreds of bagpipes.
Masters competitors Dan John, Larry Sisseck and Jim Walker
The bagpipe parade
Iron sport historian, highland games MC, David Webster
Dan, mid-toss in the weight-over-bar event
Not a dry eye on in the grandstand as the Marine Band performed.
It’s an appreciated time to be in the US military.
Interested in trying your hand at some implement tosses in your neighbor’s backyard? In this article, Dan discusses how to get started throwing: Thinking Throwing Through.
I leave you with the most intriguing shot of the weekend:
I’m afraid that this is going to be a rambling post, so if you’re not in the mood to indulge me…you might wish to look at other areas of the site. Due to a recently acquired shoulder issue, I’ve been forced to change my training and re-evaluate some of my thoughts regarding training, results, health, longevity and goals. Whew! Still with me?
Most of us train because we enjoy it. We look forward to our session with the Iron…if we don’t, something is amiss. Like any enjoyable activity, we engage in it frequently. Like any enjoyable activity, there is also a potential for abuse. If we engage in this activity so intensely and so frequently that it consumes an inordinate amount of our time and interferes with our daily lives…that is abuse. It goes without saying, that if it harms us, it is abusive.
For example, the first area where I found myself engaged in abuse was the quest for results. Like anyone else that is honest, I preferred that results from my training be quickly obtained, rather than slowly. To be totally honest, I wanted “overnight” results. In order to achieve this, I was willing to engage in some training “ideas” and protocols that upon later examination, harmed me rather than helped me. Let’s examine two of them – training in mechanically inefficient positions and training to failure of positive movement.
Vince Gironda is probably one of the best known proponents of modifying movement positioning and performance to target specific areas and obtain quick results – i.e. making a movement harder and training in a mechanically inefficient position. This causes the muscles targeted to work harder and grow quicker. Which sounds OK upon shallow examination…but in my case, it proved harmful. Any time you bypass the body’s natural patterns of movement, there is the potential for harm…and that is the “dirty little secret” of training Vince Gironda style.
Let’s examine some of his recommendations for pectoral development and specific movements – the V bar pec dip and the Neck Press. In the dip, you’re supposed to use vee shaped dipping bars with the ends spaced some 32 to 36 inches apart. You dip by holding your body concave and dip to the limit of your shoulder flexibility and then slightly “bounce” at the bottom. The wide grip and body positioning is supposed to minimize the contribution of the shoulders and transfer the stress to the lower pectorals. In an ideal world, this works…but in my world, it increased the stress on the shoulder attachments and elbows, eventually hastening injury. The same situation existed with the neck (bench) press.
The neck press is performed by taking a wide, thumbless grip on the barbell. The elbows are intentionally held wide and in line with the bar. The bar is lowered high on the chest, nearly to the base of the throat and then pressed back up. This really stretches the pectorals and directs the emphasis to the upper portion mainly…again minimizing the contribution of the triceps and deltoids from the positioning. If you have robust shoulders, this is exactly how it does work. If not, you are actually causing the shoulder to rotate in an unnatural manner and are again, stressing the attachments just as much as the muscles.
Herein is the problem. Your body is efficient, it seeks to accomplish a task with the least amount of effort. Usually, this is because many, many muscles are working together in planes of movements that have the most beneficial leverage. When you modify that, you cause multiplication of stresses in specific areas. One more example: Vince was big on the use of the sissy squat, to avoid the activation of the gluteus and to direct the stress to the lower portion of the quadriceps, just above the knee. This was done by rising up on the toes, leaning back and “hinging” the movement from the knees, with a straight body. This really minimized the gluteal contribution and really focused on the lower quads. The problem with that is that it changes what kind of lever your legs are and directs most of the stress to the knees. In a normal, naturally performed squat, you lean forward just slightly and this activates the lower back, the glutes and just about everything else. Rising is effortless, compared with a sissy squat and the knees aren’t stressed as much. Why? Because your body is working in the manner that is was designed to work.
When I was young and wanted instant muscles and results, natural movement didn’t matter to me. Now that I’m much older, the accumulation of dings and dents and numerous insults from less than natural training practices, has caused me to question the intelligence of how I trained as a young man. Were I to do it all over again, I’d work more along the lines of natural patterns of movement and let the chips fall where they would…and would probably have a lot less injuries and still be able to do various movements.
Have you had enough heresy? Stick around, there’s more.
Training to failure is another training protocol that appears to be very logical and well thought out upon surface examination. You want to work a muscle somewhere in the area of 60 to 80 percent of available output, to maximally stimulate the adaptive responses that cause muscle to grow rapidly. The problem with this thought is, how do you determine when you’ve reached this percentage of effort? The easiest way is to go well beyond that…and then you can be sure that in passing, you’ve reached it. Dig? If you train until you fail to complete the positive portion of a repetition, you can guarantee that you’ve reached 60 to 80 percent output. Simple.
However, training in this manner requires exacting attention to proper form. Since you’re trying to achieve literal exhaustion of the targeted muscle mass, you’re also going to exhaust stabilizing muscles as well. When these stabilizers exhaust, your ability to hold proper form is compromised and you’re likely to experience injury. If you’re like most folks, you’re also willing to sacrifice proper form in order to get a few more reps or use a few more pounds…again at the expense of potential injury.
This style of training is also hard on your body’s recovery system. As your strength increases and your ability to train intensely increases, your demand for recovery time and nutrients also increases. If you don’t provide both in adequate amounts…you harm your system, actually creating inflammation and other “emergency” responses. As a general, continuing practice, this is not good. Your training is actually creating a continuing series of “mini-emergencies,” and your body responds appropriately to the alarm. This is something that they are discovering with marathon runners – that they are burning out their systems and accumulating lots of repetitive stress injuries because what they are regularly engaging in is an “emergency” situation. You simply weren’t designed to run 26 miles with regular frequency.
To make a long story short…I try not to train to failure. (Although it’s tough, having trained that way for so long and having my head tell me it was “right.”) I try to leave a few reps in the tank, so that I leave a training session feeling well worked but refreshed, rather than exhausted and trembling. (Yes, I trained that hard…foolishly.) If I’m doing a final set of 8 reps…repetitions 7 and 8 are very hard but completed. I feel that if I really dig deep, I’m good for 9 and 10 but I stop at 8. Again, this is the way your body works. Your body and mind want to do just what is sufficient to accomplish a task. You’ll only contract the amount of muscle fibers that are necessary to complete a movement. Granted, results won’t come as fast training like this…but neither will injury or inflammatory responses.
If you’re still with me…I’ll wrap up my ramblings with this point. Your body is a machine. All machines are subject to wear, especially in response to the demands made on them. There is no such thing as a perpetual motion machine. Drive with your foot to the floor all the time and your motor will wear faster. Your body was “fearsomely and wonderfully” made to be self-repairing and long term useful…but it will still wear. Wouldn’t it make sense to moderate your training, move naturally and limit high level stresses, so that you could enjoy your body longer? Granted, when push comes to shove, I’d rather wear out than rust out…but I don’t want to unduly hasten the process, either.
I don’t pretend to know how to balance the desire for results with the desire for healthful longevity. I just wanted to toss the concept out to you so that you might consider it in the light of my experience. Good training to you.
Loading ...
Mandy at Bash 2010
