How does 38 feel?

How does 38 feel?


In a Word:


AWESOME!!!!

In honor of turning 38:

In honor of turning 38, here are 38 handstand push ups!


I originally wanted them all in a row, but I had to shake out my arms after the first 30 reps, lol!

A quick thought and a quick question

As I was outdoors practice this morning I was thinking. Growing up, my family owned racehorses that raced around the country. Now, it seems that every owner and trainer in horse racing is looking for that one in a million horse. That Secretariat for this generation, if you will. Now, if some owner and trainer actually got that diamond in the rough, how would they treat it?

Would they feed it the best feed and hay that they could? Of course they would. They'd make sure that the horse didn't fill it self up with crap!

Would they make sure that they brought it to the track and exercised it everyday, so it would continue to grow stronger, faster and healthier? Again, without a doubt they would.

Then I started thinking about all of the people that I know that love their cars. Regardless of the quality of the car, they baby the crap out of it. They rub it with their shammy so it doesn't get dusty. They wash it regularly, get it tuned up, put in the best fuel, change the oil and do everything that they can to take care of it.

And, I've also seen tons of people do the same type of things for their phones, their televisions, and their computers.

Now, if these people treat their horse, dogs, cats, cars, computers, televisions, phones and what not with such amazing respect and love; why then don't they do the same thing with their bodies?

You only get one body on this go around we call life, why wouldn't you treat it with the same respect an love that you'd treat the other, much more trivial things in your life?

A few weeks ago one of my friends on facebook had a great post that went something like this:

I Don't Exercise And Eat Right Because I Hate My Body!

I Exercise And Eat Right Because I Love And Respect My Body!

All that I can say is how true that is!

If you truly love and respect yourself, why don't you start treating yourself as good, or even better than you do your car, television, phone, etc.?

I think that's a great question.

Don't you?

Now, go train hard, heavy and smart and create your greatness.

Yours in strength and health,
Brett

I'll admit it!

I'll admit it. This picture is posted out of spite!

As I'm currently one week away from my 38th birthday this picture is dedicated to all those that told me, when I was in my 20's, that once I reached 30 it would be impossible to stay limber and flexible.

Hmmmmm.........I think this picture proves you all wrong!

A little bit of the Y-scale

A quick picture from the end of this morning's practice. A pretty decent Y-scale on the left side.

Love the improvements in the gymanstics bridge

From Friday morning's practice (7-18-2014): After 3 sets of Yoga bridges, 3 sets of wrestlers bridges, and 3 sets of gymnastics bridges; here's the 4th and final set of gymnastics bridges for the night. I love the improvements. Not perfect yet, but soooooo much better than they used to be.

You always have to love seeing improvements in the basics

Working on a basic press up to handstand hold. It's always nice when the foundation improves!

Some v-sit holds

Here's the final set of v-sits from last night's training. These are coming around nicely. Feeling stronger and stronger, and getting the legs higher.

Freestanding Handstand Push up practice

My 5th of 6 sets of freestanding handstand push up practice on the parallets. Not worried about the number of reps, but focusing on the range of motion, technique of the handstand and     doing them properly and on balance. Feeling pretty awesome.

Butterfly kick practice

My first session working on Butterfly kicks from Wushu. Feeling really fun, I love them.

Aerial practice from this morning

My first day working my aerial cartwheels. Not to bad. I like the back step into them, it feels powerful. I like my first attempts and I'm looking forward to seeing how much better they get with practice.

Busted-up weightlifter's syndrome: Real or BS?

Over the years I've had the privilege of studying under masters of all types of physical culture. From bodybuilding to gymnastics to martial arts to Olympic weightlifting to Powerlifting to strongman training to club swinging and more. And it's been one hell of an amazing journey. I've also, through those studies been able to get to know people of all walks of life and all ages that used these methods. And that's been even more amazing.

One of the things that I noticed during my in depth research of various methods of bodyweight training was the constant talk of "busted up weightlifter syndrome." It's funny how many bodyweight only trainers talked about this supposed syndrome and made it sound like anyone that's ever lifted a weight in their lives had come down with huge problems ranging from blown out backs, to bad knees, to crippled shoulders. They all talked like it was some sort of a given, that if you used weights you'd end up in a ton of pain with a bunch of joint problems. Then they'd talk about how bodyweight training would never cause any of these types of problems.

Now, I'm a huge bodyweight training enthusiast. I love it. It's probably my overall favorite way to train. Calisthenics, Charles Atlas style Dynamic Tension, Visual Resistance, Self resistance, Isometric and gymnastics training all happen to be a huge part in my own personal programs as well as those that I design for my clients. However, bodyweight training is only one of many tools that I use for myself and my clients.

That being said, is what those bodyweight only trainers saying about "busted up weightlifter's syndrome" true?

I've spent the past decade looking into that very question.

It's funny, I've met many men and women in their 70's, 80's and 90's that started training with weights in their teen age years and have continued on for their entire lives, that have no signs of "busted up weightlifter's syndrome." And these guys and gals weren't fooling around. We're talking men and women well into the golden years that aren't just ripped and chiseled, but are still tossing around awesome weights. 700 and 800 pound squats and deadlifts. 300 and 400 pound clean and jerks. 150-300 pound snatches. Good strong weight, yet none of them had bad backs, bad knees, bad shoulders or the other maladies that they were supposed to have. In fact, these men and women had some of the healthiest joints and back of anyone I've ever met.

Yet, at the same time, I knew bodyweight training practitioners that suffered from bad knees, bad shoulders, and bad backs.

Hmmm........what's going on here?

Yes, I've also met some bodybuilders and lifters that did definitely suffer from those same maladies as well. And I've known many bodyweight only people who had incredibly healthy joints and backs.

So, what' going on?

Very simple.

The problem isn't so much in whether someone used their own bodyweight or if they use barbells and kettlebells. The problem comes from the methods in which people go about their training.

In my studies and experience I've found that the busted up people never seem to warm up. Yet the people that aren't busted up and beaten to hell all spend a good amount of time warming up their bodies before they train.

Also, every busted and beaten up person that I found trained using "isolation" methods and body part splits. They had a day of training set aside for chest, one day for shoulders, one day for back, one day for arms, etc. And they'd do things like 3-5 exercise for their front deltoid, 3-5 for their lateral deltoid, 3-5 for their rear deltoid, etc.

On the other hand, everyone that's not busted and beaten up trained either with full body workouts, or at the most an upper body emphasized and lower body emphasized or push/pull split.    I say emphasized, because there's always going to be some lower body work on an upper body day and vice versa. Also, they didn't try to "isolate" the body parts, but rather they worked to use the body as one unit.

I also found that the busted up weight trainers tended to use a lot of machines. Those of you that read my stuff regularly will know how I feel about the machines, lol. While the non busted up people used their bodies, barbells, clubs, kettlebells, dumbbells, and other free weight style  movements.

Also, after they had trained, the people that weren't busted and battered tended to use a cool down while the battered people tend to not cool down at all.

Between training sessions, I've found, that the battered population tends to not worry about their sleep, their recovery, their stress levels in daily life or their nutrition.

Yet all of the non battered people focused on getting their 7-9 hours of sleep, working on various recovery methods such as chiropractic care, massage, stretching, foam rolling, mobility work etc. They also minimized their daily stress and ate a nutritious and clean diet.

All of this led to healthy bodies rather than beaten up bodies.

Mix this with many other factors like not seeking out muscular failure on a regular basis, not using forced reps all the time, and more and you'll start to see why there really is no such thing as "busted up weightlifter syndrome." But, instead there's bad training habits and good training habits.

When we look back to the old timers like Sandow (pictured at the top of the page), Maxic, Saxon, Klien and the rest you'll see a number of men and women that (in a time when the average life span was only 55 years or so) lived long and healthy lives keeping not only their strength and physique, but also their healthy joints. Start to emulate their training methods and you two can have healthy joints for life even while moving a shit ton of weight.

I could go into further depth, and probably will in the future. But, I think that's enough for now. Talk with you all soon.

Yours in strength and health,
Brett

A wonderful upper body circuit from Saturday

Here's an amazing strength and conditioning circuit from Saturday night's training. Aim for 3-5 rounds. Hit 2 cast wall walks, 7 handstand push ups, 2 cast wall walks, 5 rings dips, 2 cast wall walks, 5 pseudo planche push ups, 5 l-sit rings pull ups. Awesome stuff.

An awesome circuit from Friday's training

Here's an awesome circuit from Friday night's training. Great for burning fat, building muscle, gaining strength/ speed/ power, awesome cardio, great for so many things.

1-arm cartwheels from Monday's practice

My third practice session working on this particular version of the 1-arm cartwheel. It's a slightly different way to get into the cartwheel, but I like it. It feels like there's a ton of power.

Tucked Planche Push ups

The final set of tuck planche push ups on the prallets from last night's training. Super setted with Front lever holds and scapula depression and retractions. These are feeling stronger, better body position and deeper range of motion.