Boring But Big

Odds are that if you've been in close proximity to iron bars and cutoff shirts for any real length of time, you've heard about 5/3/1, the training program developed by monster-truck-that-walks-like-a-man Jim Wendler.

If you haven't, well, now you have.

This is a strength program developed for people who want to get stronger. If that statement seems redundant, a quick glance through one of Wendler's books will tell you that this man is nothing if not direct. No frills, no "functional" training, no imbalance correction, and no equipment that comes in colors other than gray or black. He is a meathead worthy of the title, and while he doesn't go so far as to throw decades of lifting science out the window, he insists that the only measure that matters in the gym is the weight on the bar.

Though seven years of gym experience that encompass a Bachelor's degree in Kinesiology and two training certifications, I feel I am qualified to agree that, scientifically, you should indeed lift weights in an effort to get stronger. So, you know, he has science to back him up.

I haven't had a goal to train for since competing in my first -and only- bodybuilding competition back during my Sophomore year at the University of Kentucky, so my training has been without constant direction for some time now. Like many lifters, I'd go through spurts of different programs. I did Crossfit for a year, and when my elbows stopped working I get really into the corrective exercises of rehab and prehab (go figure), then I went back to bodybuilding for size, then I decided I should have a six-pack year round (HA.), then I got into Olympic lifting....

You can see where this is going. Month after month, year after year of looking the same and being slightly more improved at whatever I was doing at the time but no stronger in anything else.

The one thing that has steadily improved over my years of program hopping has been my deadlift, due entirely to my love affair with it. Seriously, I love me some deadlift. When my deadlift hit 450 for the first time, I entertained the notion of entering a powerlifting competition, momentarily forgetting that you also have to be good at the squat and bench press and also 450 is not that impressive. Maybe I just missed that competitive drive, or maybe I just really wanted to wear a singlet, but I now have my sights set on the Georgetown Classic  as a raw full powerlifter in the 181 lb class.

Pictured: Style.

So after I finished my 10,000 kettlebell swings (really oughta post something about how that went...you know, like I said I would. Good, for the record), I needed to bulk up. At 167 lbs, I had plenty of room to go to remain in my 181 lb class. Which, finally brings me back to the 5/3/1 program.

5/3/1 is fairly simple. Your main lifts are the press, the deadlift, the bench press, and the squat. You work these lifts on separate days of the week using preset percentages based off of your training max. Your training max is defined by 90% of your best current one rep max in the gym.

Week one has you doing three sets of 5 reps at 65%, 75%, and 85% of your training max on your lift for that day.

Week two has you doing three sets of 3 reps at 70%, 80% and 90% of your training max.

Week three has you doing 5 reps at 75%, 3 reps at 85%, and 1 rep at 95%.

After this three week cycle, you add 5 lbs to your training max for your upper body lifts (the press and the bench press) and 10 lbs to your training max for your lower body lifts (your deadlift and squat).

There is a swarm of different variations and concepts, but that is the gist of the program. If you want more information, please support Jim buy actually buying the 5/3/1 training manual. His four basic principles, in particular, are fantastic, and I'd feel like I was blatantly stealing them by posting them here.

To gain some much-needed size (big muscles are strong muscles, after all), I decided to go with a hypertrophy variation of the 5/3/1 program called "Boring But Big".

In the past, "bulking" has usually consisted of me changing nothing about my training and just eating a lot. I get fat, then I hate feeling fat, than I diet off the fat and I'm back where I started with very little to show for it.

From the start, I had two advantages. The first was the 181 lb weight limit on my chosen class. I know that if I go over that limit and have to compete in the 198 lb class, I will be crushed, perhaps literally. The other is the nature of the program: high volume with slowly heavier weights.

I'm telling you all of this because I started it back in November, and it's been by far the most successful bulk I've ever done.

Disclaimer: I cheated. I didn't do the program 100% as written, because my ego thinks I know better than someone three times stronger and with decades more experience than me. My ego is dumb. Still, it sure did work.

The concept behind the program is simple. The 5/3/1 sets of the big lifts will keep you strong. To get big, though, you need lots of volume. This variation has you doing 5 sets of 10 reps of the bench press after your strength work on your press day (and vice versa) and 5 sets of 10 reps of the squat after your deadlifting strength sets (and vice versa. Yes, 5 sets of 10 deadlifts on your squat day. Yes it is awful.)

So where do you start on those five sets of ten? Easy: 50% of your training max.

DO NOT UNDERESTIMATE THIS. When you load up the bar with essentially 45% of your one rep max, it seems like a joke, or at the very least a warm-up set before you put the real weight on. I'll admit that my first week had me doing 5 sets of 10 reps on the bench press with 105 lbs. You read that right: an aspiring powerlifter doing 105 lbs. Most beginners start with more than that. It was humiliating, and as I was doing it I hoped people though I was coming back from an injury of some sort, like maybe I had my arms recently re-attached after a horrible farming accident. The weight felt like nothing, even when trying to throw it at the ceiling, and even after all five sets.

The next day I was so sore I could barely move my hands closer together. 50 reps is a lot, even with a "light" weight. Start light and add 5 lbs per week to your press and bench press, and 10 lbs per week to your deadlift and squat for your 5x10 sets. Going up slowly and steadily like this means at the end of the program, your volume for your squat and deadlift go up by 4500 lbs (90 extra pounds over the course of 50 reps) and your upper body pressing volume goes up by 2250 lbs (45 extra pounds over the course of 50 reps). That's a big improvement.

The last thing I'll say regarding this bulking program: Eat. Eat like you're not afraid to gain weight. Weight gainers, whole milk, jars upon jars of peanut butter; any high-calorie food that isn't junk should be going down your gullet in sizable proportions.

The Program

This is a nine week program that has you working out 4 days per week. It is structured as follows:

(note, exercises and stretches under main lifts are meant to be done in a superset fashion, alternating between the two)

Monday:

-Press: 5/3/1 sets and reps

   -Pulling exercise x 10 reps between sets (chins, rows, pullaparts, etc)

-Bench Press: 5 sets of 10 at 50% of TM (add 5 lbs next week)

   -Chin ups or pulldowns: 5 sets of 10 with moderate load

-Optional 3 sets of ten for biceps, triceps, and upper back

Tuesday:

-Deadlift: 5/3/1 sets and reps

   -Stretch hip flexors

-Squat: 5 sets of 10 reps at 50% of TM (add 10 lbs next week)

   -Ab work, 5 sets of 10 reps

Thursday:

-Bench press: 5/3/1 sets and reps

   -Wide grip pullups/pulldowns, x10

-Press: 5 sets of 10 reps at 50% of TM (add 5 lbs next week)

   -Dumbbell row: 5 sets of 10 reps at moderate load

-Optional 3 sets of ten for biceps, triceps, and upper back

Friday

-Squat: 5/3/1 sets and reps

   -Stretch hip flexors

-Deadlift: 5 sets of 10 reps at 50% of TM (add 10 lbs next week)

   -Ab work: 5 sets of 10 reps, optional crying

There you have it. By the end of this program I was much bigger and much stronger, going from benching 105 for my volume work to benching 155 (if you can do simple addition, you may notice I got ambitious one week and added 10 lbs instead of five. Ego, again, gets in the way.) My chest is much bigger, my arms are bigger (even bigger than when I finished by direct arm training program a year ago), and my squat is much, much better. This isn't some theoretical concept of bulking here; I did this. This exact thing. And it worked. It worked so well, I've put several of my clients on a similar program.

If you do it right, it will work for you too.   

Simple Fat Loss: a 4-Week Experiment

I like it when things are simple. Simple things make me happy, and I like to be happy.

So when I looked at my kettlebell swing form in the mirror after getting out of the shower (don't try to form too clear a picture in your head, and definitely don't ask why) and saw things jiggle that ought not to jiggle, I decided it was time to drop some body fat.

Not lose weight, mind you. You can chop off an arm and lose weight. I still want to be strong(ish) and I still want to look like I'm strong(ish), and that requires holding on to or even gaining muscle mass. That means staying far away from any starvation-based, macro-nutrient demonizing, Hollywood bimbo-endorsed "diet cleanse" that leaves you hungry and weak and requires you measure every seed in your tiny serving of watermelon so as not to go over your allotted food mass limit of the week.

For my fat-loss program to work, I need four things:

-Plenty of protein to maintain muscle mass
-A caloric deficit large enough to be effective but small enough to stay away from starvation mode
-Plenty of vitamins, minerals, and fiber to keep me feeling good and healthy
-Some leeway to account for having a life outside of dieting.

This last one is what I thing breaks most people. In a bubble, I think most people have the willpower to see even a super-strict diet to its conclusion and see great results. But life...just, like, frickin' life man, it just gets in the way. Work gets overwhelming, your significant other wrecks your car, 30 Rock has its final season, and when your buddies invite you out to the bar Saturday night you just want to unwind and have like six plates of wings and a beer for each one and not have to explain why you're on a diet and only ordered water.

The other half of the equation is what happens in the gym. Nineteen protein shakes a day won't help you hold on to your precious muscle mass if you don't give said muscles a reason to exist. I firmly believe you should keep lifting heavy while dieting, and seek to at least maintain your strength levels while throwing in some conditioning work to burn more calories and increase your work capacity.

Here's the thing though: I hate training when I'm on a diet. My willpower is usually so sapped from denying myself food that I can't pony up the man juice to do that last set of heavy front squats. As a result, my workouts suffer and I don't do enough to elicit a training effect to hold onto what little mass I've worked so hard to get.

I need three things from a training program:

-Simplicity. I don't want to write an extravagant workout-to-end-all-workouts every time I lift, I just want to train and go home. Or more accurately, back to work, seeing as how I work in a gym.
-Rigidity. I need a plan on paper that I'm not allowed to deviate from, and that I must complete before I'm done.
-Intensity...sort of. I need weights that keep me strong without breaking me, and conditioning work that gasses me without obliterating me.

With that, and with not just a little inspiration from T-Nation, I've developed a four-week fat loss plan that is simple and has everything I require.

Nutrition

My diet, every single day, is:

Breakfast
1 cup oatmeal
1 scoop vanilla protein powder
1 tbs peanut butter

Meal 2
1.5 scoops protein powder
1 tbs peanut butter
1 serving of fruit

Meal 3
1.5 scoops protein powder
1 tbs peanut butter
1 serving of fruit

Meal 4
1.5 scoops protein powder
1 serving of canned vegetables

Meal 5
1.5 scoops of protein powder
1 serving of canned vegetables

Total Calories: ~1800
Protein: ~ 180 grams
Calories required for defecit: 2200

See that last part? I have 400 calories not included in my meal plan. Those go wherever, however I want them. Two slices of pizza at night? Go for it.  A couple of brownies my roommate cooked up? Sure! Even -gasp- a beer or two after work? CRAZY! IRRESPONSIBLE! ....and allowed.

I try to eat a lot of colors and add spices here and there to make things bearable, but that's the entirety of my meal plan.

Training

Even simpler. The 10,000 Swing Kettlebell Workout, as prescribed by Dan John:

http://www.t-nation.com/workouts/10000-swing-kettlebell-workout

I chose this one for two reasons:

1. Dan John wrote it

2. See number 1

Okay, a little more reasoning:

I am a big fan of kettlebell swings for conditioning. They gas you pretty quickly, they're easy to learn, and they work my favorite muscle group, the glutes. The workout also intersperses heavy strength movements into the mix, which I really like. 

It's also tough, but doable. My first workout left me sweating like I haven't in months, but I didn't have the burning in my throat and the dizzying fatigue I remember from my Crossfit days. And something about the workout just...I don't know, felt right. 

Starting video and photos

Here's a video of my fourth round of the workout:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mze_bMBd0jk

And here are my starting photos:

I will try to update often, post about my progress and, above all, see this little experiment through to the end.

Writing Your Success Story: Strength

We all have our reasons for going to the gym. Or at least we have reasons why we know we should go to the gym. You might even go through the process of writing down a specific, attainable goal that you consistently work towards.

 But how do you know if you've made any headway?

If you're going to write your own personal success story, you need definitive proof for yourself and all those who care to know that you've moved away from where you were and closer to where you want to be. This next series of posts will be about what you should be measuring in the gym to keep track of your progress and how you can go about it.

Hint: your goal should look a lot like this. Including the beard. Yes, you too ladies.

Goal: Get Stronger

It's a small wonder that even in 2013, where a strong back doesn't have nearly as many career advancement opportunities as a strong background in database management, strength is still a hugely valued attribute. What's even more surprising -and awesome, in my opinion- is that it's not just limited to rage-fueled jocks anymore; geeks, girls and geeky girls are finally inching their way into the iron game and finding their place under heavy weights.

But it's not enough to just show up at the gym and grunt, though grunting will account for most of your success.

Attained by: getting stronger in three big lifts, over the course of three months. 

Pick three big, multi-joint lifts, and try to improve your numbers in these lifts over the course of three months. Pick whatever three you want, but follow these guidlines:

-You should pick lifts that cover your entire body

-You should be comfortable with and have excellent form on these lifts

-You should pick a rep number to quantify your improvement. Said better, you should decide if you want to improve your 1 rep max, your 2 rep max, your 5 rep max, etc. I personally dislike 1RM's because they encourage bad form and are heavily influenced by outside factors; I like 3 reps, because ego is less of a factor and you'll get more training stimulus by keeping the reps slightly higher.

Here are some ideas for your big three exercises:

Back Squat, Deadlift, and Bench Press

The classic powerlifting combo is popular for a reason. A bit low-back intensive, but with the added possibility of getting involved in a growing sport.

Bench Press, Chin Up, and Front Squat

This is a great combo for anyone whose back can't handle frequent back squats and deadlifts.

If physique is a secondary goal, you should aim to be really good at chin-ups. If you're getting better at chins, it's either because you're stronger or leaner or both. I have this theory that for as long as you can do 10 honest, all-the-way-down, all-the-way up chin ups, you'll never be out of shape. And if you can do 3 chin-ups with 100 lbs of external load, you get your beast card in the mail within 5 business days.

Hang Power Clean, Push Press, and Bulgarian Split Squat

Are you an athlete? Whether you're on your high school football team or just play pick-up basketball every Thursday, you need two things specifically in addition to your other gym goals: power and single-leg strength. I like the hang version better than the pull off the floor, simply  because you don't get a whole lot of added power compared to the increased risk. The push press is a great way to get crazy upper-body and core strength without destroying your shoulders, and....no, really, the push gets the bar out of the "danger zone" as far as your shoulders are concerned, even when you use more weight. And the bulgarian split squat can be loaded up like few other single leg exercises.

Putting It Together

Strength is a goal that benefits with a lot of rest, so go with lifting 3-4 days a week. Here's how you would divvy it up, using the powerlifts as an example:

 3 Day Split, 3 RM Goal

Day 1

A- Back Squat: work up to a heavy triple over the course of 3-5 sets

B1- Deadlift assistance exercise (Romanian Deadlift, pull from blocks, deficit, etc.): 3 sets of 6

B2- Upper body pull:  3 sets of 8

C - Abs, your choice

Day 2

A- Bench Press: work up to a heavy triple over the couse of 3-5 sets

B1- Squat assistance exercise (Front squat, squat w/chains, overhead squat): 3 sets of 6

B2-  Glute work (hip thrust, glute bridge): 3 sets of 8

C- Abs, your choice

Day 3

A- Deadlift: work up to a heavy triple over the couse of 3-5 sets

B1- Bench assistance exercise (close grip bench, floor press, board press): 3 sets of 6

B2- Upper body pull: 3 sets of 8

C - Finisher: Max reps of Bench and Back Squat with 60% of your 3RM from this week

Stay on this program for 3 months and try to add 5 lbs to your 3 rep max every week.  Provided you're doing everything mostly right outside of the gym -eating enough calories and protein, getting enough sleep, drinking water, getting sleep, avoiding excessive alcohol consumption, sleeping for the love of God- you'll be well on your way to being a modern He-Man. Or She-Ra. 

7 Minutes of SCIENCE!!

SCIENCE, HO!!!!

I love me some science. Maybe because that's just the in thing nowadays, maybe it's because I work in a profession perceived to be dragging its knuckles and grunting loud noises and I like to break the stereotype, or maybe it's because I'm actually smart.

No one asked you, stock image of laughing business people.

Training is, in large part, a trial-and-error process. Even today, with exercise physiology a rapidly growing field of scientific research, most trainers and fitness buffs rely primarily on personal experience to let us know what works and what doesn't. This is due in part to the fact that some of us are exactly as stubborn and thick-skulled as the aforementioned stereotype suggests, eyeing research like a new form of magic to be feared and distrusted. However, this is also due to the fact that, as a new field, there are a lot of bad studies out there that do little to broaden our understanding of the field.

That's why I love reading the good stuff.

A recent study by the University of Buffalo and published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research looked at the various metabolic differences between traditional methods of cardio, such as walking for long periods of time on the treadmill, and high-intensity interval training, in this case sprinting.

If you're not familiar with high-intensity interval training, let me sum it up for you: Work really hard for a short time. Rest for a short time. Do it again until you're done. (If this thesis-worthy explanation has left you wanting, I'll elaborate in a bit.)

They observed things like VO2 max (a measure of how hard your lungs are working), heart rate, blood lactate levels (a measure of how hard your muscles are working), and total calories burned.

The results? The subjects who performed the interval workouts burned the same amount of calories and trained their cardiorespiratory system just as well, despite spending literally half the time working as the steady state group. Just remember, shorter intervals mean harder intervals; the interval group trained at about 90% of their work capacity during their work intervals, instead of the stead-state group who trained at about 70%. 

Now, what does this mean in practical terms? It means that, scientifically speaking, cardio blows and strength training is awesome. Horray science!

Okay, so maybe a bit more guidance is in order. A great example of high-intensity interval training was provided in a recent article by the New York Times, appropriately titled, "The Scientific 7-Minute Workout". The workout involves simple bodyweight movements, with the only equipment required a chair and a wall, two things most of us have laying around somewhere. The "scientific" part lies in the order of the movements combined with the time intervals.

Since you're continually shifting from upper body exercises to lower body ones, your heart keeps working hard supplying blood to all of the muscle groups instead of just the legs, as would be the case in something like jogging (do not compare the slight motion of your arms in jogging to tricep dips, thank you). 

Here is the workout, as posted in the May 12 issue of The New York Times Magazine:

How do you do it? I'm glad you asked, metaphorical person in my head!

1. Warm up. Follow along with this extremely handsome demonstrator. 

http://youtu.be/7L5KVw2Pwic

2. Go to www.tabatatimer.com and set up the timer in the following manner:

Prepare: 10 sec

Work: 30 sec

Rest: 10 sec

Cycles: 12

Tabatas: 1

You might notice that setting up your workout in this manner results in the workout taking 8 minutes and 10 seconds, not 7 like mentioned in the title. You will ignore this, because shut up.

3. Complete this workout by working as hard as possible during the work time using the exercise provided, and resting during the rest. 

4. Do this workout every other day, on top of your best effort to living an active lifestyle. 

 This simple routine is a fantastic introduction to interval training. It's short, lasting just 7 minutes (you will shut up so help me god) and covers the entire body, using the pace of the strength exercises to train the heart in tandem. If you're sick of running miles in the rain, nursing shin splints and losing muscle instead of fat, you can literally do this right now, using the chair you're sitting on and the wall your computer is plugged into.

There you have it. Detailed instructions for a simple workout you can do at home that is as effective -if not more so- than the traditional methods of "cardio" so many associate with weight loss. It's up to you to build up the motivation to follow through with it.

Now go forth! Lift heavy things, for SCIENCE!!!!!

Want to Get Started? Try Showing Up

"80 percent of success is showing up" - Woody Allen

I don't know about you, but when I need motivation to throw some iron around in the gym, I always turn to the wise words of Woody Allen. Sometimes. Once. Anyway, I like that quote.

Nowhere is this sentiment more applicable than the gym. If you come to the gym on a regular basis -I'm talking, 3 days a week for 3 months or more- and do something, you are on the right side of in-shape. You might still be overweight, you might still be using the lightest dumbbells on the rack, you might still be scorekeeper for every pick-up basketball game you are a part of, but I would bet my favorite Adidas ClimaTee that you are not "need-a-doctor, never-take-the-stairs, cholesterol-higher-than-your-credit-score" out-of-shape.

But it starts with walking through the door. You will lose weight or gain weight or get stronger or get faster one way and only one way: bit by bit. You're building a tower on top of quicksand, and if you take too long adding to the top it's just going to sink underground.

Show up. Here is how you do it:

1. Set a goal, and let the world  know. If you want to bench 225, that's a Facebook post you should be making every bench day. Write your current weight on the top of a sheet of paper on your fridge, your goal weight at the bottom, and a weekly weigh-in that hopefully bridges the gap between the two.

 2. Find a gym or buy some equipment. In all honesty, unless you have friends or a favorite trainer to influence your opinion, the most important aspect to look for in a gym is convenience. Your facility should be close by, or on the way home from work. A thirty minute drive to a gym across town is a great reason not to go. Failing that, spend $50 on a pair of adjustable dumbbells; they're really all you need to get started.

3. Have a game plan. I meant it when I said that doing something was good, but having a plan is the way to go. A plan could be:

-Tagging along with a friend who knows what they're doing. Anyone worth their gym socks is happy to show a newbie the ropes. This is how I got started as a fat kid in high school, and I've shown up ever since.

-Google "beginner program" and stick to it. Stick to reputable sources (Men's Health, Shape, Bodybuilding.com, etc.), but pick one.

-Get a trainer. <shameless self-promotion>This is by far the best option, especially if they've earned their stuff from, say, the University of Kentucky and the National Strength and Conditioning Association and have a fondness for teal. The traditional in-person trainer can provide instant feedback and correct your form, all the while yelling at you to do, like, two more reps. Or, you could try out that new-fangled online personal training, where a trainer sends you a personalized program via the internet and provides an online training log and email feedback so that both of your can keep track of your progress. </shameless self-promotion>

Fitness really is one of those life goals that rewards you for diving right in. But you have to show up and give it something as often as you can, else the fickle bastard will leave you to decay at the bottom of a flight of stairs when the elevator is out.

Go forth and lift heavy things. We're saving you a spot.

Strength Training Reduces "Office" Injuries

Despite living in a society that is increasingly sedentary (I have already typed that sentence too many times for my liking) we are plagued with chronic back and neck pain. Which is weird, because most of us associate any musculoskeletal pain with some sort of strenuous physical activity. Or we say we "slept on it wrong", because apparently that's a thing that you can do. So how can someone hurt themselves when they never pick up anything heavier than their purse?

"It's a satchel!" -  Men with purses.

The answer: You're not lifting enough heavy things. Granted, I use that advice to solve problems ranging from back pain to vegetarian lifestyle modifications, but in this case I have SCIENCE to back me up.

According to a study conducted at the University of Copenhagen and published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, women who participated in strength training on a regular basis for 16 weeks significantly decreased their self-reported pain index from the baseline of the study, compared with a control group who presumably ate tacos and watched Netflix for  four months. 

That is pretty impressive by itself, but some of the specifics of the study were surprising even to me. For example, the study not only looked at the effects of strength training, but also the effects of general physical activities like biking to work and parking farther from the store. The second group still significantly decreased their pain over the course of the study, but the group who went to the gym and lifted weights -which puts significantly more stress on the muscles and joints than taking the stairs every once in a while- still reported a greater decrease in pain. Even better, within the strength training group, those who had the greatest training volume (measured by load x total reps over the course of the study) reported a greater decrease in pain than the participants who had the lowest. 

So why does a frequently agonizing trip to the weight room actually help chronic sufferers of back and neck pain? The theory (not my theory, but the theory of those smart enough to have theories) is that strength training may help break down and subsequently reconstruct painful and abnormal muscle tissue, as well as decrease the relative workload of everyday activities by making the muscles stronger. Being hunched over in a chair all day often means that your back and neck muscles are turned off and neglected, and this leads to them withering away and failing to keep the structures they support in line. Strength training not only builds sexy lumps we can show off at the beach, but also teaches us to activate muscles that may not see much action the rest of the day. 

Many, many bad things can still happen in the gym. I myself have been hurt...we'll say three times. However, all three times were the result of me doing something stupid. Strength training, even with heavy weights, is completely safe as long someone follows proper form and has a decent program, perhaps one designed by an extremely handsome and knowledgeable trainer at one of finest facilities in Lexington. I promise the pain you think you feel under a heavy barbell is worth the pain you won't feel in the long run.

Go forth and lift heavy things!

Reference: Pederson, Mogens, Lars Anderson, Marie Jorgensen, Karen Sogaard, and Gisela Sjogaard. "Effect of Specific Resistance Training on Musculoskeletal Pain Symptoms: Dose Response Relationships."Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 27.1 (2013): 229-235. Print.

Justin currently only experiences emotional pain and also writes the blog for LIFT Fitness and Wellness

Giving Up

My boss at LIFT Fitness decided, for no particular reason, that February should be prohibition month for us and our clients. Until March 1st, we are not to consume a single alcoholic beverage. He's done this so that people can see just how much one chink in the armor of a sound diet and exercise program can hamstring your progress. Since many of our clients are very busy adults who deal with large amounts of stress on a daily basis, he suspected (and knew from personal observation) that alcohol could be a prime culprit for the lack of results some people are seeing.

I decided to participate, just as a show of good faith. Most weeks I only have one beer in the evening and maybe a few drinks Saturday night, and I don't think it's nearly enough to affect my own progress. However, I wanted to wait until after the Superbowl, because drinking beer during the Superbowl is as American as turkey at Thanksgiving.

You know who didn't drink beer during the Superbowl? Hitler. 

After giving that decision some more thought, I think I have a better understanding of why some people feel the need to put off their diet for a few more weeks.

I hesitated to do the challenge because I knew that, being a 22-year-old male in Kentucky, I am expected to drink at social occasions held by people my age, which makes me sound like an alien sent to study you Earthlings and your habits. If I didn't drink during our Superbowl party, or really any get-together on the weekends, my friends would make fun of me and give me that look. You know that look. They act like they're joking, but they aren't. That look betrays their real feelings. It says: What, you think you're better than me? You think I'm weak because I want to have a good time? Screw you, this is America, and if you're not a Nazi sympathizer you will pass me that funnel and shut up about it. 

If you can't give something up for a month, you're addicted to it. It might be alcohol, or video games, or sugary snacks, or cat memes, but if you can't drop it cold turkey for a month then you have some sort of dependency. It's a cliche at this point, but just about every addict will give some variation of "I can quit any time I want, I just don't want to." Well why not?

Alcoholism runs in my family. I know for a fact I have an addictive personality, and I do better when I cut out something completely rather than limit my consumption via sheer willpower. I used to buy cereal for when I was in a hurry and didn't have time for oatmeal in the mornings, but I found myself staying in bed longer knowing that I had that fallback option. So I cut it out, and now I always have time to fix a bowl of oatmeal. I also know that alcohol is empty calories, decreases protein synthesis in the muscle, and reduces testosterone in the body, all of which are detrimental to building muscle, which is what I'm trying to do now. And yet, I still felt the need to drink quite a few beers yesterday, simply because that was the thing to do.

I'm starting my Prohibition February a few days late, but hopefully the effect will be the same. The timing also coincides well with finishing my "2 Tickets to the Gun Show" program/contest, so I believe I will have willpower in ample supply to finish out the month. I might even make a habit out of it; every month, I'll cut out something that may be bad for me and see if I feel different.

...Or maybe we'll just stick with this for now. Daddy needs his cat memes.

Justin is a trainer at LIFT Fitness and Wellness in Lexington, Ky. He also writes the blog for liftfitnessandwellness.blogspot.com

Friendly Competition

Being an American male, nothing motivates me to be at my best quite like a good competition. As I've mentioned in my last post, I recently began Dan Trink's "2 Tickets to the Gun Show" program to give me an extra push to improve my arms, which have always been a weak point for me. Almost at the same time I started, my good friend and sometimes-client Darren has made the commitment to start working out 4 days a week at his home gym.

We really don't have choice in the matter. A contest must ensue from such a situation. 'Tis law.

For the next four weeks (starting last Monday, to be honest), we're both going to see who can improve their physique the most in four weeks. Darren has the advantage, as he is just starting out and has a fantastic trainer writing his program for him. However, I really, really want bigger arms and this is my first foray into a program dedicated to improving my area with the most room for improvement. And I do mean my arms, thank you.

So here is our proposal: we're going to keep track of our before pictures, and on Sunday, Feburary 24th, we'll take after pictures. The winner will be determined by you guys! And by you guys, I mean the couple of people who I've routed from Facebook with the sole intent of reading this post. The prize? Well...we haven't actually agreed on a prize for the winner yet (*cough* a copy of Doom 3 BFG edition *cough*), so if anyone has some good ideas let us know.

Go forth and Lift heavy things. I know I will.

Here are his before pics:

And here, once again, are mine:

See you in four weeks!






...I want a copy of Doom 3. I know it's like 8 years old but I never played it.

2 Tickets to the Gun Show

Dan John, possibly the man I idealize above all others especially where strength coaching is concerned, talks about "bus bench" versus "park bench" workouts in his book Never Let Go, and how they should be applied throughout life. Park bench workouts are where you just...work out. Get to the gym, perform the act of lifting something a few times, and go home. That's how I've been working out for the past... I don't know, five months. More, probably. I haven't kept track of my weights since summer. There is nothing wrong with working out this way, but I can't say I've made any real progress, I've only staved off regression.

Then there are the bus bench workouts. The structured, goal-oriented programs that got me into lifting in the first place. These are what get you results. Every so often, we need a clear, purposeful program to follow...and actually stick with.

I got an email from Jon Goodman at the Personal Trainer Development Center -which is usually just advice on training and marketing- about a contest Dan Trink was having to promote his new program. It's called "2 Tickets to the Gun Show" and, obviously, it is a program centered around arm development. The contest: take pictures and measurements of your biceps at the beginning and end, and whoever achieves the best results gets some training sessions and a t-shirt.

Arms have always been my weakness. So I bought it and entered.

Now, there isn't anything particularly special about this program. It emphasizes the eccentric portion of the rep, increases the volume for bi's and tri's, and includes a few finishers. That's not the point. The point is having a goal and a program to follow. The worst part is designing the damn thing, and now someone else has done the hard part for me. Now all I have to do is refrain from making excuses and following the program to the letter.

Here are my stats"

Left arm
Unflexed: just under 12.5"
Flexed: 13.5"

Right arm
Unflexed: 12.5"
Flexed: 13.75"

See you in four weeks.

The Best Exercise You're Not Doing

Here's the setup: place a thick towel or Airex pad on a loaded barbell at the center, and deadlift the bar so that the pad is pinned at your pelvis. Sit down on a bench perpendicularly, and carefully scoot forward until your upper back is on the bench. Relax your glutes and let the barbell down toward the floor. To come up, push through your heels and squeeze your glutes to drive the barbell up towards the ceiling. This is known as the glute bridge, and no one does it.

There isn't a pretty way to sell the barbell glute bridge.  It looks like this:

My expression does not add much hardcore legitimacy to the matter.

It looks like you're humping the barbell. And to be honest, that's a fair and accurate representation of the exercise.

But here's the thing: I can't think of a better motion to activate the glutes, and as an added bonus it almost completely spares the lower back. As important it is to develop the hinge, it's an easy motion to screw up without outside guidance. But with the hip bridge, it's as simple as picking your hips off the ground by pushing through your heels; there aren't many other teaching cues, at least none that I've had to use. And when you add weight, you're well on your way to a strong and gloriously sculpted butt.

So why doesn't anyone do it?

Because it looks like you're humping a barbell.

Trainers already subject their clients to unique forms of embarrassment on a regular basis, but making one of my guys or girls do a  weighted glute bridge because it's a little more effective than other, far less gawk-worthy exercises just seems....wrong, somehow. Like I'm punishing them for a severe infraction to my being.

Still, I obviously do these myself. Being a trainer myself, anything I do just looks like the next great thing in fitness (at least in my head) and I absolutely love them. I figure as long as I don't make eye contact with anyone, they're worth the trouble and tighter jeans. Wait...ew, phrasing.

Why Your Back Hurts

Statistically speaking, if you are a human between the ages of ten and dead, you are currently experiencing or are soon to experience back pain. Even in our modern society, where we work less with our hands than we do with our phones, many of us can’t bend over to tie our shoes without two ibuprofen and a heat wrap. It’s one thing to throw your back out moving furniture, but many of the clients we see here at LIFT Fitness seem to go to sleep after a quiet day of reading by the fireplace and wake up with back pain. Sometimes, the cause is something medical like degenerative disk disease, in which case the solution is beyond our realm of capabilities (vast though it may be), and surgery may be required. Most of the time, though, the problem is biomechanical, which means some pulley or lever in the organic machine that is your body isn't doing what it’s supposed to do.

Know this: as with many injuries, the cause of your low back pain is probably not the low back itself, but rather some weakness in the supporting structures above and/or below it.Stretching your lower back to relieve the pain isn’t addressing the problem, and may in fact make it worse by adding more mobility to an area that needs more stability. We’ve outlined some of the most common causes of lower back pain in modern society, and some of the things you can do on your own or with us at LIFT Fitness to help fix it. 

Cause #1: Too Much Sitting

You’ve probably heard this one before: sitting is the Chris Brown to your lower back’s Rihanna.  Good for you for working out, bonus points if you work out at LIFT, but most of us are still sitting down for the vast majority of our day, and unfortunately an hour of activity won’t undo twenty-three hours of inactivity. Sitting, especially with bad posture, puts a tremendous strain on your lower back (even perfect posture is harmful for long periods of time) by undoing the  S-shaped curve that we as a species have spent millions of years developing for the sole purpose of standing upright. Not only that, but continually keeping your knee in a flexed position for hours at a time will physically shorten the muscles attached to the back of your pelvis -that would be your hamstrings- and tilt it out of line. Your spine is on top of your pelvis, so where the pelvis tilts, the spine must follow. Hamstrings are typically the worst offenders, but the same thing can happen to the muscles on the inside, outside, and front of your pelvis, which would be like balancing a bowl of candy over your head as four angry children pull at you from different directions. 

The Fix: Stand up a lot and stretch your hamstrings. This could be the easiest solution to anything, ever, at least where your body is concerned. Stand up every commercial break, every time you get a text, every time you switch windows on your computer, any little frequent reminder you can think of to get you off your butt every so often so that your spine can get a break and the muscles attached to your pelvis don’t freeze up. If you can make it a habit to stand up as much as you sit down, your back will feel better, your weight will be more manageable, and we’ll finally see peace in the Middle East. 

 And while you’re up, it wouldn’t be a bad time to stretch those tight hamstrings. Here’s what you do: plop your heel on a chair or step, keep your back flat, your chest up, and tilt your upper body forward until you feel a stretch in only your hamstring. Don’t touch your toes. It might look like you’re stretching, but you may be ignoring your hamstrings by rounding your low back, which actually makes things worse.  A good stretch should be uncomfortable, maybe even just short of painful, and last at least 20 seconds. Come on, you’re trying to physically change the length of your tissues by pulling them apart, it can’t be easy. 



Cause #2: Weak Glutes and Bad Lifting Mechanics

Your butt (known as your glutes when they want to be take seriously) has two important jobs: filling out your jeans, and extending your hips, and if it’s bad at one it’s probably bad at the other. Proper form for picking something up involves primarily using your glutes, and to a lesser extent your quads and hamstrings, while the muscles in your low back keep things in line. If you’re bending over and rounding your back to pick up a heavy object (what we professionals call “stupid”), you turn off your potentially powerful glutes and put the stress on your substantially weaker lower back. But even with decent form, weak glutes just aren’t able to do a good job of extending your hips when things start to get heavy, and you’re left with a Tebow-Sanchez situation: you have one job that needs doing, and both of your options (lower back and glutes) aren’t very good at it, so bad things tend to happen. Jets suck.

The Fix: Learn to use and subsequently strengthen your glutes. One of my favorite exercises, the kettlebell swing, is a staple in all of my group classes and personal training programs because it gets people to use their glutes in a way that is intuitive and effective. Unfortunately, many people with back pain instinctively avoid this exercise because it looks like it puts a lot of strain on the low back. This may seem reasonable at first glance, but if kettlebell swings (or their slower cousin romanian deadlifts, also known as  RDLs) are done properly, the low back stays flat and stable, with the glutes and hamstrings exclusively working to extend the hip. Teaching proper swing and RDL mechanics -what we call a “hinge” movement- is awkward and no one wants to be seen practicing their form in public, but it does wonders for back pain (and gives you a nice backside to boot). Trust me, awkward stares while learning the hinge now are well worth the slack-jawed, lustful stares you’ll get later. 

 To hinge properly, stand up straight, keep your chest up, and push your butt back like you’re playing post defense against someone particularly attractive. If you’re holding a barbell or kettlebell, it should be against your shins. To come back up, thrust your hips forward by squeezing your butt. I could have said “extend your hips by engaging your glutes”, but I didn’t and I’m not sorry. At no point should you round any part of your back, and your shoulders should move up at the same rate as your hips. 

Cause #3: Tight Middle and Upper Back

A good 90% of my instruction on any given exercise boils down to two simple cues, “Back flat, head and chest up”. As a trainer, I say it probably twenty times a day. But out in the real world, the back twists and bends and rounds and arches and no one wants to show off perfect deadlifting mechanics when picking up a fork they dropped on the floor. 

When we talk about back pain, we’re almost always talking about the lower back...but why? There is a foot and a half of back up top that rarely seems to give anyone any trouble. Why is the lower back such a problem child when it seems to be made of the same stuff that behaves on top? Don’t fall for it. The mid and upper back are the two stronger but less flexible older brothers that break everything and blame it on the poor red-headed step-child that is the lower back. When you round your back to pick something up -and you will, so will I, it happens- your back will bend at the point of its greatest laxity. Almost always, this is the lower back. The same goes for when you twist. If we could increase mobility in the middle and upper back, the range of motion required for daily living and lifting could be distributed more evenly between each section of your spine. 

The Fix: Soft Tissue Work 

What we in the industry call “soft tissue work” refers to any attempt at physically altering either the length or density of a muscle. We can change the length of a muscle by stretching it, as mentioned earlier. But try as I might, I can’t stretch the middle of my back. I just don’t think I bend that way. So the other option is to change the density, and we do this by applying pressure to points where the muscle is so dense that it affects mobility. Your best option would be a massage, either by a professional or competent significant other. But if you’re poor and/or alone, the next best option is a foam roller, which looks like a big pool noodle. We have plenty of foam rollers here at LIFT that you can use before and after class if your back is giving you trouble, but if you want your own they’re only about ten bucks on Amazon.com. The cool thing about foam rolling is that there isn’t a whole lot of technique involved, just put the roller on the ground and roll the muscle group you want to target back and forth. For your mid and upper back, make sure to pull your shoulder blades apart to get to the muscle underneath. 8-12 rolls, nice and slow with special attention paid to any “trigger points”, should do the trick. 

An even cheaper, possibly even more effective option is to tape two tennis balls together and make a specialized back roller that would make MacGyver proud. Place the peanut a few inches above your waistband lined up with the two parallel muscles running up along your spine, and lay down on top of it. Try to completely relax for a second and let the peanut seep in, trying not to conjure too much imagery from that statement. Do three small sit-ups, just enough to put pressure on the tennis balls and feel it pressing against a segment of your spine, then roll the peanut towards your head a quarter roll and repeat. Keep going until you get between your shoulder blades. 

Just remember, go easy on rolling and stretching your lower back. I know that’s where you feel the pain, but remember, we stretch and roll areas where we want more mobility, and too much stretching and rolling of your lower back is just adding more laxity to an area that was too lax to begin with. A few rolls to loosen up is fine, but any more than that and you end up scorching the shirt you meant to iron. 

Summary

Back pain is a disease of disuse. I will be the first to admit that I love a good twelve hour session in front of my xbox, moving only when I need to eat or go to the bathroom and sometimes not even then, but too much of a good thing comes at a price. To get the most out of the body you’ve been given here in the 21st century, you have to make a real targeted effort into undoing some of the damage done by an increasingly sedentary lifestyle. That means stand, stretch, swing, and roll in the face of a hostile, uncaring world that seeks to do you harm. Either that, or develop a tolerance for ibuprofen and a familiarity with bell towers.

General Tips for Back Health

-A strong core will go a long way in keeping the spine in line. Don’t sleepwalk through your ab routines, they’re good for more than just keeping you looking good at the pool.

-Stay loose. If you come to our classes, put genuine effort into our hip mobility drills during the warm up, and go through a full range of motion on all of our exercises. For legal reasons I’m no longer allowed to use a taser to “encourage” people to reach the bottom of a squat, so for now it’s all up to you (until my lawyer pulls through).

-Stand up often. Are you reading this hunched over in your chair? Do you dive into a bag of chips when you read dieting tips? Don’t let yourself sit for more than twenty minutes at a time. You’ll be surprised at just how much better you feel all over. Seriously, stand up after you get done reading this.

-Get to class early and foam roll. It only takes a few minutes, and we’ll be there to help you if you’re not quite sure what to do. A few foam rolls combined with our dynamic warm-up will keep your back and hips mobile and healthy.

-If it hurts, fix your form and try again. Like I said earlier, hinge movements like the kettlebell swing are Doctor Jekyll when done properly and Mister Hyde when done incorrectly. But as much as it pains me to say, if you can’t do the motion without pain, don’t do it at all. 


Justin Gibson is a certified personal trainer at LIFT Fitness and Wellness in Lexington, Kentucky and a recent graduate of the University of Kentucky’s Kinesiology program. He has dealt with his own back pain more than anyone his age has a right to, and wants to give you the help he wishes he’d gotten years earlier.