IOL Strength and Conditioning

The remarkable presenter list from the Perform Better Summits is truly a who’s who of strength and conditioning experts, each one a headliner. These two-and-a-half day conference events, held annually in Providence, Chicago and Long Beach, are broken up into four lectures per 75-minute time block and, as I noted last year, it’s an internal fight to choose. Imagine my pleasure at having not only permission, but actually orders to move between lecture rooms to monitor recording equipment! Get this: Chris Poirier, the guy behind these stellar Perform Better events, gave me the lucky task of recording the lecture sessions for a 27-CD live-recording set. Assuming my work next month goes as planned, you’ll see the CD recordings of these outstanding lectures on their site in about six weeks.

This assignment gave me something else, too: upfront access. Through Dave’s history in the early bodybuilding scene and in my work with guys like Dan John, Michael Boyle, Gray Cook and Lee Burton, I do have unusual connections to some of the leading experts in the fitness field, but recording the event added another element of entry. You’ll see more discussion of this as we begin to talk about our new audio lecture site featuring many of these speakers and their peers, set to launch early November. I’ll keep dropping hints for another month or so as we build up the content—specifically when we have about 50 lectures recorded, edited and transcribed for the audio product library.

We began the Long Beach immersion on Thursday by filming Gray’s four-hour pre-conference workshop as he built upon the movement screening foundation by showing the attendees what steps to take after the initial screen. What do you do with the screening results? This was where he answered that important question.

After a brief introduction to the Functional Movement Screen for those who weren’t familiar with it, several of his colleagues ran audience members through screening, and then Gray and Brett Jones reviewed the results and provided guidance on what each person would do next.  Gray and Brett are a hoot together, solidified by a 15-year friendship and a love of teaching, and, as always, Gray was simply brilliant and a joy to watch. We had three cameras on hand to capture the event,which you’ll see available on DVD in early November.

The next morning, early Friday as I hauled recording equipment from the hotel to the near-empty, still quiet Long Beach Convention Center, the first person I bumped into was Ed Thomas, whom you may remember from Gray and Brett’s Club Swinging Essentials DVD as the guy responsible for keeping Indian Club swinging popular here in the States.

As it turns out, he’s been an inversion advocate since the early ’70s when he made a trip to Santa Monica and discovered Franco Columbu hanging upside down from a pullup bar. That was the trip when he met Dave at Joe Gold’s old gym, a meeting that made an impression on him which he told in a story that choked me up through the grins.

Last year on Gray’s recommendation, I bought an inversion table, but it made me nauseas and I quickly gave up on it. Ed, a passionate teacher, spent about an hour with me over the course of the weekend, gave me a vestibular green light and showed me how to get my feet high and my head low. It’s a wonderful feeling that we’ll be talking more about here as he prepares his forthcoming inversion instructional material.

There were about 900 energetic people scurrying between the four conference rooms, but no chaos other than an errant fire alarm, and even that only gave the speakers fodder for laughs and presented no problems. The Summit’s lecture topics ranged from barefoot training to speed work, professional business guidance to nutrition; from kettlebells to ropes, women to youth and rehab to Olympic weightlifting. Regardless of niche, no one went away unsatisfied.

The event ended for me mid-day Sunday, when other than the Perform Better crew doing tear-down, I was the straggler in the convention center. By then I was carrying such a load of priceless treasure that I couldn’t bear to haul it through the maze of air transport. What if I lost track of a hard drive of film footage? These things happen in airports! With a canceled flight and a rental car, the drive home would let me keep my eyes on the film and audio footage packed tightly into barely zip-able bags. Interesting, this turned out to be a settling way to decompress after four days of activity, and whenever possible future recording trips are likely to include a calm drive home.

While the lectures were fabulous—highly recommended for anyone in this profession—for me, events like this are all about the camaraderie. It’s wonderful to sit back and watch the connections, excited chattering as trainers and coaches from Michael Boyle’s StrengthCoach.com forum meet for the first time in person, or presenters make instant decisions to collaborate on future events or projects. I got to see Gray, Lee, Brett and Mark Cheng meet Craig Liebenson for the first time after years of mutual appreciation, and looked on as Dan met Todd Durkin and re-connected with Ingrid Marcum and guys like Charles Staley and Thom Plummer. And even though he was only there one day, Michael, as always, was a crowd-pleaser with his happy laugh. But of course, that could have been because when he makes his quick-turnaround travel plans, his stay somehow always includes the free-beer social. He’s definitely a hit at free-beer socials.

It’s a remarkable blessing, and believe me, I do not take it lightly.

Your Favorite EverythingStrength.com Links Last Week

1) Man Skills: Adam Glass on Physical Transformation

2) The Deadlift: Commentary and Video, Mike Robertson

3) The Health-Performance Continuum: Keith Norris, Theory to Practice

4) Daily Training: Making it Work, Bret Contreras

5) Lying Triceps Extension: Mark Rippetoe Video Discussion

6) Mobility Maintenance: Steve Reed via SA Performance Training

7) Excluding the Middle: Lyle McDonald

8) Corrective Complexes: Michael Ranfone via T-Nation

9) Lift, Run, Bang: Pushing the Envelope with Paul Carter

10) Coyote Point Kettlebell Club: Training with Dan John

For all the gazillion great weights-related articles and blog posts (and the not-so-great ones we might want to filter out), wouldn’t it be nice to have a simple, clean portal into the strength web? It could be curated by a few active ‘net participants who cover a variety of strength disciplines to bring together the most important news you need to know, and the hidden gems and bits of cleverness you may have missed along the way.

It could… and would!

Just taken live this week, it gained instant traction, averaging 1,000 daily visitors from day one. I think you’re going to like it: EverythingStrength.com.

Everything Strength Weekly Top 10, June 2, 2011
Your top 10 click-throughs for the week, in order of clicks

A stunning gift to those who thrill at the idea of mountains of weight moving overhead real fast,  Arnold Classic promoter, Jim Lorimer, and IronMind’s Randy Strossen teamed up this year to bring in the 2008 Olympic gold medalist, Matthias Steiner, from Germany, along with his weightlifting team for an exhibition showcase on the main stage in the expo hall at the Arnold this weekend, Saturday, March 7 at 1pm.

Ingrid Marcum, our inspiring friend from the forum, has been invited to participate in the exhibition, so after a very short break home following her bobsled season travel, which spanned non-stop from September thru February, Ingrid treks to Columbus this weekend to join the showcase.

Ingrid’s an amazing athlete, skilled in multiple sports, and a great inspiration to those of us in the IronOnline forum, and especially those who were around in the beginning email discussion days as we watched Ingrid battle back from a career-ending back injury to where she is today, striving toward the 2010 Olympic bobsled team and competing at Olympic level in both weightlifting and bobsled. She’s our summer and winter gal.

Here’s Ingrid in action getting the weight overhead: Clean and jerk, 220.5 pounds

You can befriend Ingrid on Facebook here, and catch up on her competitive travels here at her blog.

Via Mike Robertson’s blog this morning, for those interested in more on Olympic lifting, here’s an outstanding set of youtube weightlifting videos—enough to keep you busy through the weekend.

Fitness conferences like the IDEA event in Las Vegas last month, originally created for group exercise instructors, have come a long way from the 80s’ aerobics classes toward providing material for the information-hungry personal trainer. Today’s presenters are extremely knowledgeable, and the trainer who won’t learn from them are few and far between.

Put your toe in the water: Those readers here in California within easy driving distance can cheaply expand their knowledge of the corrective exercise and movement pattern fields next month at Mindy Mylrea’s FitFest 08, September 26-27 in nearby Los Gatos.

In fact, the casual fitness enthusiast would have a great time participating in the classes and sitting in on a few lectures, as well — think of it as a major-league fitness bootcamp class.

I’ve put together a sample session line-up for a personal trainer who hasn’t been to a conference like this and might not know where to start. Look here:

Friday, 12:00-6:00pm
Session 1: Best Workout with Mindy Mylrea
Session 2: BOSU Ballast Ball with Rob Glick
Session 3: Nutrient Timing with Len Kravitz (or Group Xtreme with Corey Sobas; this one’s a toss-up depending on the attendee’s interest)

Saturday 7:00am-5:30pm
Session 1: Pick something you’ve never tried for a morning wake-up workout
Session 2: Keynote with Skip Jennings
Session 3: Movement Science and Corrective Patterns with Yoga with Robert Sherman
Session 4: Medicine Ball Training with Robert Sherman
Session 5: Lactate Threshold Training with Len Kravitz
Session 6: Assessments: Imbalances and Corrective Movements with Robert Sherman

Now, of course, if I was just going for the fun of it, I’d choose sessions using implements I’d never used or hadn’t been taught how to use, like a BOSU or a variety pack in one of the sports training classes, where they’ll use tools such as kettlebells, med balls, bands, tubing and such.

Speaking of cool tools, Mindy’s conference last year was where I first met Marc Lebert, the guy who designed those nifty Equalizer dipping bars I later ordered. In fact, if you wanted a set and hadn’t yet pulled the trigger, you can get a $10 discount when ordering from the Lebert Equalizer site by using the coupon code 0807LD.

Friday single-day price is $119; Saturday one-day cost is $139; both days is $189. As a personal trainer who needed to choose a single day, Saturday’s the big-payoff day.

If you need to update your CPR, they’ll do that, too, on Friday evening, $29.95 for a two-year certification. Trainers needed continuing education credits will be offered CECs for both ACE and AFAA.

Take an extra fifty – there’s a trade-show expo where all the toys you play with that day will be sold on discount. The expo is open to the public for those who need a stability ball but don’t have all day to spend goofing around at the conference.

Grab the 11-page registration and session description pdf here from Mindy’s conference page.

There are 206 bones in the human body, and between 640-850 muscles, depending on the source and how that source classifies the muscles. An agreed-upon number does not exist.

The vertebral column (the spine) is made of up 24 vertebrae beginning at the Atlas at the base of the skull, C-1. There are 7 cervical vertebrae, C-1 moving down to C-7, aka the neck, that are naturally lordotic, meaning the bend is toward the front. Next there are 12 thoracic vertebrae connected to the 12 ribs, T-1 down to T-12, and these are naturally kyphotic, with a slight bend toward the rear. Finally there are 5 lumbar vertebrae, L-1 down to L-5, which are again somewhat lordotic with a bend toward the front. At the base of the spine is the sacrum, then the coccyx, both considered part of the pelvis.

Easy markers to find your place in the spine: C-1 is the base of the skull; C-7 is the base of the neck; T-2 is at the top of the scapula; T-7 is the bottom of the scapula; L-4 is the top of the iliac crest (top of the pelvis).

There are 12 pair of ribs (occasionally there are 11 or 13 pair), originating at the corresponding thoracic vertebrae, and, like the thoracic spine, need mobility also: The ribs are suppose to move easily… not a great deal of movement, but easy movement.

Ribs 1-7 attach directly to the sternum; ribs 8-10 attach to the sternum via cartilage; ribs 11 and 12 are floating ribs and do not attach to the sternum at all. This is the reason you need to be careful when foam rolling the lumbar spine. In fact, self-massage of the lumbar spine is best done carefully with a small ball instead of the foam roller.

Intercostals are the muscles between the ribs that hold the ribs together. The diaphragm is a muscle that expands the ribs to make space for the lungs to fill, rather than a “region” below the ribcage.

The coveted “Christmas Tree” shape seen at the base of an extremely lean back isn’t a muscle at all. That’s the tendon the lats attach to called the Thoracolumbar Aponeurosis.

The popping and crunching sound of tendons and ligaments moving around the joints is called crepitus or crepitation. Crepitation is a descriptive word for the sound made, not type of joint injury.

Pelvic tilt or rotation refers to a shifting from neutral, the optimal. Neutral is evenly balanced side to side, top to top and front to back. Posterior tilt moves too far to the back; anterior tilt moves too far to the front; lateral tilt means one side is elevated (hip hitch), which makes the leg on the elevated side functionally (not structurally) shorter. Pelvic rotation adds a turn to the side from the optimal neutral to exterior or interior. A person can have varying degrees of both problemic tilt and rotation, both side or one or the other or even one of each. These conditions are almost always fixable with corrective exercises.

Here’s a simple human movement terminology cheat sheet, and here’s an easy-to-understand explanation of human planes of motion. This section in our forum has been set aside for corrective exercise and rehab questions, and you’re welcome to join us there if you have questions or contributions to the topic.

Expanding on our earlier discussion of human planes of motion, today let’s take a look at a few other common movement terms that are a touch out of range of most of us traditional gym rats. We’ll keep it as brief and simple as possible so you’ll have a cheat sheet for reading some of the more advanced corrective exercise articles found on the ‘net, stuff that’ll might turn around that aggressive aging process.

Prone vs supine
Prone is lying face down; supine is face up.

Superior vs inferior
Superior means closer to the head; inferior means closer to the feet.

Medial vs lateral
Medial refers to nearer to the center; lateral refers to farther from the center.

Posterior vs anterior
Posterior is toward the back; anterior is toward the front.

Distal vs proximal
Distal means farther from the torso; proximal means closer to the trunk.

Extension vs flexion
Extension straightens a joint; flexion bends the joint.

Supination vs pronation
Supination and pronation are used to describe action at the feet or forearm. In the feet, supination refers to excessive outward action; pronation refers to the ankle turning in. With the forearm, supination refers to turning the palm up; pronation refers to turning the palm down.

Medial vs lateral rotation
Medial rotation turns toward the center of the body as in internal rotation; lateral rotation turns away from the body externally.

Inversion vs eversion
Inversion turns the foot in; eversion turns the foot out.

Elevation vs depression
Elevation means upward; depression means downward. These terms are most often used to describe faulty scapula position, too high or too low.

Protraction vs retraction
Protraction moves a joint forward; retraction moves it backward.

Adduction vs abduction
Adduction brings the limb in toward the body; abduction moves it away.

Dorsiflexion vs plantar flexion
Dorsiflexion at the ankle is to bring the toes toward the shin; plantar flexion points the toes away.

Joint mobility vs flexibility
Joint mobility encompasses the ability of the joint to move through it’s full range of motion; flexibility is about muscles, not joints, and is about lengthening to optimum.

Stability vs mobility
Stability is the muscle, tendon and ligament action needed to hold a joint in position; mobility requires the correct muscle action on one side of a joint and the necessary muscular flexibility on the other to produce full movement through a joint’s range of motion.

Activation vs dormant
Activation means an action to trigger a muscle that’s not firing well; dormant refers to an inactive muscle group, at varying levels from fully inactive to fully engaged.

Tendons vs ligaments vs fascia vs myofascia
Tendons connect muscles to bones; ligaments connect bone to bone; fascia is connective tissue that covers soft tissue from head to toe, superficial to deep; myofascia is fascia covering muscle

Lordotic vs kyphotic vs lordosis vs kyphosis
Lordotic is the curve of the spine bending to the front; kyphotic bends toward the rear; lordosis describes too much lumbar curve (toward the front); kyphosis describes too much bend at the thoracic spine (to the rear)

Bilateral vs unilateral
Bilateral refers to both sides of the body working together; unilateral is one side alone

Concentric vs eccentric
Concentric shortens the muscle; eccentric lengthens, ie in biceps curls the concentric action brings the wrist toward the shoulder; eccentric returns the weight to the side

Isometric vs isotonic
Isometric changes the muscle tension without changing the length; isotonic changes the muscle tension while changing the length

Origin vs insertion
Origin of a muscle is the stationary attachment site of muscle to bone; insertion is the mobile attachment end site

Primer mover vs synergist vs antagonist
Prime mover is the main muscle that carries out an action; synergist assists the prime mover; antagonist performs the opposite action

Planes of movement — Sagittal vs frontal vs transverse
Sagittal refers to forward or backward; frontal (aka coronal) refers to side to side; transverse refers to rotational — more on planes of motion here

There ya go. The simplest movement cheat sheet on the ‘net.

I’m a big fan of attending seminars and workshop weekends on topics that have my attention — website work, book publishing, software, stuff like that.

Since the early ’80s, I’ve been going to day-long or several-day conferences on weight training, including several trips to the big IDEA conferences, which formed much of my thinking, built on my enthusiasm and helped open my eyes to training methods I hadn’t seen here in the gym.

In fact, I went to one just last weekend and learned more of the structural assessment stuff we’ve been talking about over in the rehab/prehab section, and am eying one of the upcoming Perform Better Summits.

Alwyn Cosgrove sent a note this morning to tell of a workshop weekend he’s contributing to, featuring many of our favorite training educators, and it’s to be live ONLINE.

One of the downsides (aside from money, it’s probably the only downside) of attending big conference weekends is that you’re forced to chose between multiple sessions taking place at the same time. Alwyn and his partners have this remedied by archiving the sessions, giving “attendees” access to all the sessions for three months. We don’t have to miss a word!

They’ve got a terrific presenter line-up and a really great plan going here. It’s 50% off right now, $99. I wish I had the cutoff date for the discount, but that hasn’t been disclosed yet. I’ll letcha know when I hear.

Right now there are 102 55-minute sessions lined up… yes, that says one-hundred-two sessions. This is the bargain of the decade, no kidding. If you have any interest in this field at all, can spare the bucks, and will actually take the time to watch the seminar videos online, this is a no-brainer.

After I signed up for the conference, I signed up for an affiliate link, which I’ve never done before, but as long as you may be signing on anyway, I can use the affiliate bucks to pay for some bandwidth.

Here’s the link to check out the online conference, and here you’ll find the expo calendar pdf that shows the sessions to be archived.

Ages ago, last winter when we were discussing spin bike training, I promised to write about heart rate training for the benefit of those who bought a heart rate monitor but never learned how to use it. Aside from being the most affective method of cardiovascular training, it’s also a way to spice up aerobic training for those who find cardio more boring than waiting for the spouse outside a Macy’s fitting room.

For years we’ve been encouraging high intensity interval training (HIIT), more work gets done… faster. So, now that you know what high intensity is, how do you measure it?

A heart rate monitor.

You already know I consider the spin bike the way to go for measured, planned cardio because it allows total concentration on technique (unless, of course, you’re lucky enough to have the structure for sprints and easy access to a cinder track, in which case all spin bike recommendations are nixed pronto). And as most of us are heading into winter, indoor cycling with a HR monitor is the order of the day. Let’s figure out how to do that, and slide into a simple heart rate training ride so you can learn how to use your new monitor.

Your monitor is a feedback tool; it’s going to take the guesswork out of your cardio training. Once you learn how to use it, you’ll have precise control over your training; your resting and intensity intervals will be planned in advance and each workout will end as intended, lightly worked, completely wiped out or a selected range between the two.

Most people use what are called training zones, the five training zones from the Zone 1 range of 50-60% of maximum heart rate to the red-line zone at 90%, Zone 5. Usually the initial suggestion is to calculate from a max heart rate of 220 minus age, yet what’s not commonly known is how wide a variance there is of max heart rate per person, per activity, heredity, fitness and more. Here’s a better method to calculate your maximum heart rate.

Not many people fit into “average” when it comes to max heart rate, so for today, let’s just take a little test ride and see what we learn. What we’d like to know at the end of this ride is our anaerobic threshold, that is, at what heart rate do we go from breathing comfortably through the nose, to the slightly uncomfortable anaerobic work that calls on us to breathe through the mouth, the place where nose breathing doesn’t provide enough oxygen.

Let’s hold up a sec for the cautionary note: If your cardiovascular fitness is low, that is, you’re unfit, this point may be low, quite low, and if you discover you hit that point too quickly, back off. Stay in your aerobic zone, a more low-key and comfortable place while you condition yourself, and simply use your heart rate monitor to coach yourself to that calm yet challenging place.

A reader, Susanna Hutcheson, reminds me to tell you that some medications, especially beta blockers, will blunt the natural heart rate numbers. Take your time, learn *your* numbers and work from there. How your heart rate numbers compare with another’s is fully unimportant and may not be a reflection of conditioning in any event. What’s important is to learn to use the heart rate as a training tool… that’s it.

You know what? Before we get into the nitty gritty of heart rate training, which we’ll do next week, let’s go for that test ride. Put on your monitor, grab a bottle of water and a music player and get on your ride.

This is a 60-minute ride I took recently to plot this out for you. If you want to go for a half-hour instead, that’s fine; it’s just a test run to see what the monitor has to offer.

Ready? Okay, let’s ride.

Pedal one minute to activate your monitor, where you’ll maybe see 80 or 90, something like that. Then, increase 5 beats per minute (BPM) per song. That’s it… hold your heart rate as steady as possible during each song and increase 5 beats per song until you get to the top of your aerobic zone, the spot where your mouth opens to breathe.

Make note of the number on your heart rate monitor, perhaps it will be 120, maybe 140, could be higher… just note it and we’ll use it another day to figure out an interval training ride.

If your songs are longer than average, more than four minutes, say, use the clock instead, and increase 5 BPM every four minutes.

Now make your way back down, easing off by 10 BPM per song to finish the ride at around 90 BPM.

Very simple, nothing tricky, just a learning tool to find your aerobic/anaerobic threshold, where it is currently on this particular cardio machine, hopefully we’re talking about your spin bike, but whatever you have access to is fine.

Watch your heart rate jump when you sit upright, balancing with your torso, all your weight on the seat and pedals instead of partially on the handlebars. Raise your hands overhead and watch your heart rate jump again. Your monitor may take 5-15 seconds to register the changing numbers.

Keep hydrated. Heart rate goes up without regular water intake during training. Make your muscles earn the rising numbers.

You’ll find this interesting: 10-point jumps are easier; 5 points take more attention, more finesse.

Also interesting, the way back down is harder to control. If you’ve been riding regularly, your heart rate will drop faster than your planned goal, which is a good thing since your conditioning is better than expected. If long rides are new to you, your legs will feel leaden by 45 minutes and it will be difficult to get your heart rate down. Slow as a tortoise, those moving pedals.

The first time you do this monitoring, use pedal speed to make your increases. You may have to adjust the resistance up or down if you’ve guessed wrong, but for this ride, let’s just have the one variable to attend to. Next time you can bring in the harder gearing.

Once you have the hang of controlling your heart rate, try this: Note your heart rate, decide your next marking point and close your eyes. See the new number in your head and pedal up to it. Open your eyes and see how you did. Amazing, isn’t it, how you can hit that new target so precisely and after just these introductory instructions?

A heart rate monitor is one of the more outstanding modern training tools, and at less than $75, an average unit will coach you into great conditioning workouts for years to come.

That’s it alright — Golden Era camaraderie meshes with modern day technology to create the best of today and yesterday.

Over the weekend we installed new forum software that’s light years beyond our old board. (Kinda funny, since it was state-of-the-industry when we first set it up — it’s an internet tale.) This new one’s clean, with multiple new features, one-click options and user controls far above other internet board software.

• Number One feature: It’s FAST. No kidding, this board’s a speed demon, which will slice wait time off even the fastest connection, making forum participation possible for even the slowest dial-up modem.

• First-time forum users, start here for the basic what’s-it: Top 10 Forum Board FAQ.

• Personal features in My Control Panel now offer massive individual control over the look of the forum. You do have to register to take advantage of these, although as non-members you can now print or email posts and attachments, along with other features not previously available to you.

• Check this out: You can toggle the sidebar on and off at will. Your monitor’s too small to see the threads well? No problem, turn the sidebar display off until you need it. One click and gone.

• Fully configurable quick addition of a personal signature and a link to your website, MySpace, Flicker or YouTube account

Possibly the most intriguing new feature of this board over our old board is how private messages are handled. People who use private messaging (PMs) will really appreciate this one, because instead of one conversation creating a mass of PM notes, a single thread is kept intact. Additionally, a private topic can include more than two participants, which is significantly different than before.

You can now add an image, multiple images or other files to a post, either by linking to or uploading to our server. Better yet, you have the ability place the image or images in an exact position within your text, which was not the case before. The board software will shrink them to a standard 400-pixel-wide size, but will retain the original size so users can click on the image attachment to view it full size. Very cool!

• Valid file types at this time are: .gif, .jpg, jpeg, .txt, .zip, .png, .pdf, .doc, .mp3, .rm, .avi, .mp4 .xls, .wmv, .mov, .3g2, .MOV, meaning we can now share our training log spreadsheets, coach via video, and, well, our options are nearly unlimited.

The search feature on this board is quite robust, much better than our former software. The basic, built-in searches are quick and effective, but there are also advance search techniques that will search through our quarter-of-a-million posts and cough up precise results in seconds.

This forum upgrade has been on my mind for more than a year, when I first discovered the best hackers from our old forum software user’s group were working on new board software. The results, Fusion Bulletin Board; the developers, Josh Pettit and Dave Lozier; the response from IronOnline: OUTSTANDING.

Take a visit, stick around for awhile. Our IronOnline members welcome you.

This simple device is a T-Handle. Dan John calls this bad boy a Hungarian Core Blaster, a name that obviously has a lot more panache than “t-handle.” Legend has it this device was the secret of the Hungarian hammer throwers’ success years ago. I like that name, but it is so flashy I think it may give people unrealistic expectations. They may be let down when they see the simple device to the left. It just can’t compete with the dozens of core gadgets on late night infomercials for flash and glitz, and to date lacks bikini clad miracle makeover endorsements.

But for results, I’ll stack the T-handle against anything you can make in five minutes for ten bucks. Nobody is let down by the effects of the swing, the exercise for which this tool is ideally suited.

If you are considering buying kettlebells, by all means make a t-handle and swing away. The swing is one of the most basic kettlebell movements. With a t-handle, you can decide what weight kettlebell will suit you.

Even if you aren’t interested in kettlebells, just about anyone can benefit from some swings. You can do swings Tabata style – eight sets of eight with ten seconds rest between sets – for a four minute, minimum cost, minimum footprint interval workout. You can do light swings as part of your warmup.
Directions for making a T-handle (for those of you who use directions) can be found in the IOL Wiki.

You don’t have to be middle-aged to know that Golden Era bodybuilding photos — the classic photos of bodybuilders from the mid-’60s to the early ’70s — jerk a smile from even the most jaded of bodybuilders. So, hey, lookie here: Golden Era Biceps.

That’s right! Our entire Draper photo archive is uploaded into a new IronOnline Dave Draper flickr photo display. Look, you don’t even have to sign up. Just click on over, then tap on the link at the top right to View a Slideshow. Speed ‘em up or slow ‘em down using the arrow that appears at the top of the slide window as you run your cursor over it.

What’s a flickr?

Sure, you’re old enough to remember Flicka, but this is different. There have to be a hundred thousand photos of beautiful black stallions on flickr (Flicka, of course, was a mare, but, eh, “beautiful black mares” just didn’t do it for me). But kids today, they don’t go to horsey PG matinees, not when they can be out cruising the malls with their camera phones looking for whatever’s most ridiculous to one-up their mates’ flickr photo sharing accounts.

The bottom line is this: It doesn’t matter how old you are or how comfortable you are with new technology. Clicking through photos is universal, and flickr makes it easy for people without websites or computer skills to share their photos.

Here, have a look at the set of 332 photos of Dave I uploaded this morning. He’s gonna shoot me for spending the morning on this, but hey, I’ll just tell him I did it for you.

I love Google; couldn’t live without it and I’m sure you’re the same. But often — too often — pages and pages go by before the right site pops up, and sometimes I give up too early and start jumping around to the most likely sources. Quick scan, read a few interesting but un-related pages, click off to another site, ditto action, until an hour’s slipped away and I’m late for the gym.

Yeah, I know that’s what the web’s all about. But still.

Today I’m here to tell you I love Google even more than yesterday because they’ve given us the tools to create our own search engines. You heard me: We get to google only the sites and pages we choose — so far about 150 sites have been selected by the IOL team for our search page. It took about a day to set up, and I’m sure there will be further tweaks over time, but man, oh, man is it worth it!

Here’s what it looks like. It’s operational; give it a shot and see what pops up.