The Path of Most Resistance
Dan John's new DVD set: Intervention
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Have you noticed it’s a crazy world out there? We need to be careful how we engage strangers over the internet and answer our email.
Someone from Phoenix, a B-72, asked me how he can get huge and ripped for his 50th wedding anniversary in July. Yeah, right! I congratulated him on his marital fortitude and his aspiration and suggested he train hard, eat smart and step judiciously off a small cliff (ha-ha). “The swelling from the impact and the gashes from sliding down the rock face,” I explained, “is your only scheme to achieve size and cuts these days, Pops.”
He wrote back expressing mild disappointment because there are no adequate cliffs in his desert-bound neighborhood. Were there pills he could take?
Seriously?
I dared not suggest he step in front of a speeding bus, a clever alternative. I might get sued by the bus driver.
I don’t have any more answers, though the questions are endless. Answers, when stretched out in words on reams of cosmic paper, are errantly re-placed like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
You want muscles? Lift weights, hard and consistently. You want trim and lean? Don’t eat like a pig. You want endurance? Run hills and stairs and hike with a weighted backpack. You want good health? Do it all with sensibility.
My favorite biceps developer is the standing barbell curl done with full ROM and a lovable, coaxing thrust. The Oly bar is fun till the wrists groan, then, it’s time for the bent bar. Dumbbell inclines work, preacher curls have their say and any of your unique variations of the curl are, no doubt, worthwhile.
Bis are engaged, more or less, every time we pull: chins, rows, pulldowns, crossovers, pullovers. They get lots of work when we least expect it, which can catch up with us when we least expect it. Be aware.
Triceps are engaged every time we extend our arms. They, too, work like oxen at the plow. My gripe is tris are more complicated than the biceps; they’re in the back and I can’t see them when training; they don’t endure aging well (wither) and they’re connected to the elbows, which have been known to complain loudly when the tris are beaten lovingly and relentlessly.
My favorite moves are lying and seated overhead triceps extensions with a barbell (Olympic or bent) for mass and power, and pulley pushdowns for health, shape and specific recruitment. Dumbbells fit in here and there as desired for change and relief and interest.
Some guys I know, the dirty rats, do nothing more than close-grip bench presses for meaty, shapely and powerful triceps. I think they have mental defects and, probably, have never been on a date with a girl.
You notice in my incoherent ramblings about nothing, I began with biceps and triceps, a dead giveaway of the important order of things in life. And now a word or two about shoulders: Call me dangerous, foolish, careless and adorable, but seated press-behind-necks have always made my heart sing. I love them. Bill Pearl loves them. They, also, make me scream. They wreck the shoulders but, hey, they work. Who said lifting was safe and sane?
My advice: Stick to dumbbell inclines and front presses on the Smith machine. I love one-arm lateral raises with improvised grooves and thrusts, and dips on the dip machine with accents where needed or permissible. I press every other workout and perform laterals alternately.
My chest is big enough for me and my T shirt, and gets enough pressing action from the incline dumbbell presses and dips (got to love those two-for-one deals when you’re a senior citizen). Besides, as the years go by big pectoral muscles become a liability. They seek gravity enthusiastically. Cable crossovers, one-arm and two-arm movements with tight contractions, strengthen and tone the area better than any other. Low incline flies are fun three times a month just to be sociable.
The bench press took a permanent leave of absence when I grew up 20 years ago. It had something to do with open rotator surgery and shredded stuff. I do not miss the overrated lopsided painster one bit. Dumbbells are where it’s at, the little ones on the left end of the rack.
Deadlifts were a joy not so long ago. Today, I get all the back work I can handle from pulldowns (behind and before the neck, close-grip and wide-grip) and seated lat rows with full range of motion. One-arm rows, done with care and no rigorous twisting, are worthy. However, reaching for the heavy stuff is costly. The ensuing pain and stiffness and immobility are mean and nasty and unhealthy.
Squats took a hike just in time. I now do extensions and curls and freehand squats and calf thingies throughout the week to keep me agile as robotic rhino or hamstrung hypo. I’m glad I can walk across the gym floor without a stick.
When discussing abs and torso work, bombers, did I ever mention rope tucks? Must have slipped my mind. They are the greatest invention since the wheel or the Top Squat even. I commence my two heady weekly workouts with four sets of 40-50 RTs (RTs… we cool). I can enter the gym feeling like 50 cents and within a set of delicious tucks, pulls and yanks, I feel like a million bucks.
The whole upper body from the hips to the traps can be delightfully engrossed by the skillful application of the rope attached to the weighted cable. Practice and focus, intensity and knowing. Sometimes, after four sets of 50 reps with some freehand squats between, I feel like I’ve done all I can to keep it all together.
Drink your Bomber Blend… Avoid contact with moving buses… Never quit…
Go… Godspeed… Dave
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Everyone has heard of the light at the end of the tunnel, but few have experienced it… or know anyone who has. Lo and behold, Laree D has, and it is neither daylight nor the headlight of an oncoming train. It is the 3.5 hour, three-disc DVD series by Dan John called Intervention: Course Corrections for the Athlete and Trainer.
Three months ago Dan John gave an in-depth seminar about the fundamentals and intricacies of correct training structure for the focused athlete. Cameras rolled as he described, demonstrated and detailed on blackboards the functional movement systems and their achievement. In the ensuing months, Laree edited the raw material, arranged it for clear understanding and added files of related information to present a bright light to which few tunnels lead.
Here’s a quick look: Dan John -- Intervention.
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