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Fitness

Skinny-Fatness, Hardgainers, and High Frequency Training

You’ve surely heard the term “hardgainer” before.

Hardgainers have a difficult time gaining weight and making progress in the gym.

The prescription for their problem is almost always to train less frequently and to eat more food.

OK. I kinda get that. It kinda makes sense.

Kinda.

But the big question?

Are skinny-fat ectomorphs “hard gainers?”

IS SKINNY-FAT A HARDGAINING PROBLEM?

From the beginning of my days, I’ve been telling skinny-fat ectomorphs that they should probably do some isolation exercises and include some higher repetition work into their training program. (And by that I mean 8ish reps.) See my evidence: Solutions for the Skinny-Fat Ectomorph Part III.

My rationale for such is that skinny-fat ectomorphs are “hardgainers” of muscle. But they aren’t “hardgainers” of fat. 

The hardgainer prototype is a skinny guy that has trouble gaining weight. Period.

Hardgainers certainly exist. One of my readers flummoxed me when he asked if I had any suggestions for gaining weight. I told him to eat more (naturally), but he was already downing 7000 calories daily. Now that is a true hardgainer — someone that can’t gain anything, be it muscle or fat.

So skinny-fat guys and gals aren’t really hardgainers in that sense because they “gain” something rather easily. It just too bad that “something” happens to be fat. It’s not so much that the body can’t utilize and store extra calories (as a true hardgainer), it’s just that the body doesn’t store and utilize the extra calories in the name of muscle and looking “teh sexiness” naked.

This is a problem of partitioning, a concept that is touched on in Solutions for the Skinny-Fat Ectomorph Part IV. Needless to say, there’s a bunch of factors that effect partitioning, all of which are explained in the upcoming skinny-fat resource I’m busting my tail to finish.

In the mean time, I wanted to talk about a “hunch” I have. This isn’t something to be found in any research paper, so keep that in mind. It’s a meandering thought backed up by my personal experience. But it must just cure your skinny-fatness.

IS THERE A SECRET TO TRAINING?

The thing about skinny-fatness is that it never really goes away. Sure, I look a hell of a lot better than I used to. But the genetic factors that effect partitioning aren’t really malleable. “Fixing” it is done through training and diet. This means anytime your training or diet slips, the skinny-fat shell gets exposed. (Increased fat accumulation in the lower chest, love handles, etc…).

The generalized advice to fix partitioning is to get stronger and eat more wholesome foods. But think it goes much deeper than that (probably why the resource I’m creating is already over 100 pages), specifically with training.

Typically, skinny-fat peeps’ terrible genetics default their recovery capacity to, well, shady at best. This means they’re often handed the typical hardgainer recommendation of training more intensely with less frequency.

The first problem with this, as we now know, is that skinny-fat ectomorphs aren’t typical hardgainers. The second problem is that a generalization like this neglects the subtleties of stress and recovery.

SHOULD YOU TRAIN MORE FREQUENTLY?

I get a lot of question about my eleventh tip in the very first article I wrote on skinny-fatness.

11. Every. Damn. Day

I’m going to end on a crapshoot. Some skinny fats are soft because they’re babied. From a biological standpoint, having muscle is an artifact of living a lifestyle that demands its creation. So it may be worthwhile to try training every day to provide a signal to the body that being a skinny fat just isn’t going to cut it.

What? Is this blasphemy!? Train more ? How can that be? Isn’t recovery an issue? How can training more be better?

Calm down. Breathe in. Breathe out.

Patrick Henry once said, “Give me liberty or give me death.” For whatever reason, I like the tone of this quote and I usually translate it into an athletic fitness ultimatum that goes something like, ”Give me intensity or give me frequency.”

It’s gotta’ be one or the other. Can’t be both unless you’re a hand selected survivor of intense systems like the Soviet and Bulgarian athletes of the 70′s. In other words: can’t be both unless you’re an Olympic caliber athlete.

Out of fear of underrecovery, this usually means skinny-fat people are told to train less frequently. But to understand why this might be a mistake, you have to go back to the premise of stress and recovery. Although this was touched on in Solutions for the Skinny Fat-Ectomorph Part I, I expanded on this concept in the resource I’m working on to make it clearer as it’s the overriding tenant of training.

Basically, the body is nothing more than an adaptation from the signals it’s receives from the environment. Keep in mind you’re responsible for these “signals.” You choose what your body gets exposed to. Those 12 beers on Saturday? Yeah, your fault. (Forgiven if they were Guinness. Or Dragon’s Milk.)

I’ll repeat what I said before:

From a biological standpoint, having muscle is an artifact of living a lifestyle that demands its creation.

The more frequently you signal for the necessity of having muscle, being strong, and living lean, the better your chances are of  having muscle, being strong, and living lean. You just have to make sure you don’t exceed your capacity to recover from the signals. So more is better unless more means a failure to adapt.

Think of it like a suntan. The more time you’re in the sun, the more potential you have for tanning. You won’t necessarily burn (overtrain) from high frequency unless you combine it with high intensity. If you’re pale as sin, you have less leeway between the two (frequency and intensity).

Skinny-fats are the “pale” people of the training world, so teetering between the two has to be done diligently.

Now, let’s compare training philosophies.

  • More frequent training sends signals more frequently, albeit at a lesser intensity. (It has to be of a lesser intensity. Remember Patrick Henry?)
  • Low frequency training send signals less frequently, albeit it at a higher intensity.

But should people with pale skin crisp in the sun for three hours straight a few days per week? Or should they use shorter, more frequent, less intense exposures?

HIGH FREQUENCY SOUNDS GOOD, BUT…

High frequency sounds great, right? Skinny-fat ectomorphs, however, simply aren’t strong enough to warrant frequent training. PLP and The 40 Day Program are for people that are kind of already “strong enough.” Personally, I don’t think anyone should think about running The 40 Day Program until 60% of their 1RM for their big posterior chain movement (deadlift, for instance) is 225 lbs.

When you aren’t “strong enough,” the signal simply isn’t intense enough to produce a worthwhile adaptation. Going with the suntan analogy, strength is the sun’s brightness.

  • Being strong is like having a high and bright sun in the sky. Under these circumstances, shorter, smaller, and frequent exposures can work.
  • Being weak is like having a bunch of cloud coverage. Shorter, smaller, and frequent exposures are all for naught. In this case, a longer duration would work better.

Therefore, skinny-fat people need to gain a baseline level of strength. Using a high frequency program to gain that level usually doesn’t work because most high frequency programs aren’t systematic in their progression. They’re often used by advanced lifters because they know how to go by “feel.” Because of this, I don’t like high frequency barbell training for anyone that is better off served on a more deliberate beginner progression.

I guess it’s a good thing I advocate training methods that extend beyond the barbell.

BE SURE TO BANK ON BODY WEIGHT

I put a huge stock on bodyweight exercises. Huge. Back in February, when my little cousin started training under me, I told him he was going to hate to love chin-ups. (When he saw his arms growing, true love happened.) In a few months he went from doing three reps to eight reps per set, and he went from doing one tough-as-nails dip to ten dips per set. Progress was slow, but deliberate.

In my opinion, the chin-up is the master skinny-fat lift. You must get good at it. Must. Being good at chins represents all things anti-skinny-fat — precisely why we start out so bad at them.

Getting good at them means having a “decent” body composition and pretty good relative strength. The exercise itself sends all of the right signals. And remember: we want those signals sent as often as possible.

The chin-up, being a body weight exercise, is much easier to recover from than most barbell exercises. Since it’s the skinny-fat antitheses, it’s the prime candidate for high frequency training.

But, as usual, there’s a problem. Skinny-fat ectormophs can usually only pull off one or two chin-ups (if not zero). Remember the whole brightness spiel above? Yeah, this is a problem.

Jumping into a high frequency program — even though that’s the ultimate goal — at a sub-par strength level is suicide. Not only will your progression be derailed, but you will likely end up with elbow problems because the tissues simply aren’t yet adapted enough.

HERE’S THE PLAN OF ATTACK

While I can’t back this up with any study, I’m willing to bet a lot of my progress to this point has come from doing chin-ups at a terribly high frequency. I do them every day I train during my warm-up.

The warm up is the workout. I never touch a barbell before doing a basic dynamic warm up, thirty chins, push-ups, squats, and copious jumping jacks. Yes, even on lower body days.

- Beast Mode Training

Hell, I even do some on my off days. In my mind, they are that important for someone that’s skinny-fat, especially when done at a high frequency. You want those delicious signals being sent as often as possible. You want to them to demand the creation of muscle and the necessity of less excess body-fat. So here’s the plan:

1) Follow a program that yields slow and steady progress until you can do five or six chin-ups. This is not a high frequency program. (Yes, one will be included in the resource.)

2) You might as well throw push-ups into this mix too, so try to hit ten or twenty of those in one set. Honestly, dips would be a better choice as they are sister to chin-ups (with the entire body weight supported by the hands and all). But this could be a conflict of interest for a skinny-fat with a sub-par upper chest. For those kind of woes, check out The Best Damn Guide to Upper Chest Size and Strength.

Until you have the strength for the above two things, you simply don’t have the strength to warrant high frequency training. Diving into it will likely derail your progress, and zap your recovery for a more deliberate progression.

After you can bang out a few reps though, consider the following options:

1) Do a few “grooved” sets as a warm-up. As I mentioned, I always do at least ten chin-ups for a warm-up. Sometimes it’s twenty. Others, thirty. But never less than ten. No set is overly exhaustive either. You shouldn’t kill yourself. So if you can do five, do one or two sets of two. Pretty soon, those two reps are going to feel pretty easy. When that happens, go for three. You get the idea.

2) Try greasing the groove. Set up an Iron/Door Gym and simply do one or two repetitions every time you walk in and out of the room or something silly like that.

3) Do a high frequency program that actually gets you stronger. This is the preferred technique. There are many out there, like Pavel’s Fighter Pull-Up Routine for example.

All in all, just do something that equates to practice. For instance, after toying around on gymnastics rings, I found out just how bad my dipping strength was. So almost every day I’m just going in and doing something — not really to overly tax myself, but just enough to simply “get better” at them. That’s what this high frequency is about — getting better through frequent “practice.”

WHY HIGH FREQUENCY TRAINING WORKS FOR HARDGAINERS

There’s often talk about progressive overload being the most important aspect of training. Most of us equate progressive overload, however, with either more weight on the bar or with more reps.

But simply doing “more” also is progressive overload. Consider adding one “easy” set of three chin-ups to your warm-up that’s done four days per week. That’s an extra 12 chin-ups per week, 48 chin-ups per month, and 576 chin-ups per year.

Now, consider not doing that warm-up. That’s 0 reps.

576 reps.

0 reps.

That’s progressive overload too.

So why is this ideal for a hardgainer of muscle?

Because more frequent, less intense training is easier to recover from, which is ideal for the limited recovery capacity of a typical hardgainer. You’re also sending more signals more frequently to the body that demand the creation of muscle — you’re essentially beating the fatness out of the skinny-fat because it’s a constant hint for awesome relative strength.

Just know that there’s a fine line to be walked. Upping the frequency without proper care can lead to tendonitis and other nasty problems. As with the suntan, unguided exposure will probably leave you burned.

So save the barbell stuff for those strong enough to worry about it. Chances are, that’s not quite you yet. But once you hit the tipping point for some body weight exercises, consider a program that hinges progress on a high frequency. The results will surprise you.

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Have any experience with high frequency training? I’d love to hear your thoughts below.

P.S. Anfernee Hardaway was my favorite basketball player growing up. I love that jersey. I’ve probably had it since I was ten.

 

 

Kill Your Heroes and Own the Hell Out of Yourself

The majority of my adolescent life was spent wishing I was someone else rather than myself. Before that even, I admired and wanted to be my big brother. Although having heroes is normal, looking back, there’s something disturbing about this. It’s an open acknowledgement of hating yourself.

Yeah, weird.

Yet I, along with many others (trust me, I get the e-mails), have suffered from this.

A few weeks ago, a user commented on one of my posts. He asked something along the lines of, “Are you technically still a skinny-fat ectomorph?” My response was both yes and no.

I’m not terribly skinny anymore. (I could stand for more muscle on my frame though.) I’m certainly not fat. But it’s not like I’m different than person I used to be. I didn’t jump out of one body and into another. I’m defined by my past, just as you’re defined by yours. This is why I wrote Part I and Part II to my Solutions for the Skinny-Fat Ectomorph series, in addition to this little note.

What you did and what you’re doing affect where you’re going to end up.

The important part of that tricky sentence above is where you are. If you’re anywhere like where I was you need find a way out. Immediately. As childish and playful as wishing you were someone else is, it won’t take you far. Idolizing is dangerous, and will leave you with unrealistic expectations.

The solution?

Own whoever the hell it is that you are.

There are some things you just can’t change—some things that are unique to you.

For example: I’m tall and my pressing ability sucks. This past week, my gymnastics rings came in the mail. All went well until I tried doing dips, upon wherein my arms immediately became twizzlers.

Recently, I started posting “Athletic Fitness Tips” on my Facebook and Twitter page.

Athletic Fitness Tip #10 was:

Be yourself; trying to be someone else sets unrealistic expectations.

Athletic Fitness Tip #9 was:

 Exercises on gymnastics rings are a sonuvabitch. And that’s why you need to do them.

(I number them because I’m cool like that.) I was met with the following responses.

I found out today that the only gymnast who can properly victorian on rings is 5’2 and under 130 lbs. I never had any plans or dreams of pursuing that, but I think knowing of the whole height and weight difference thing firmly rules it out.

They [gymnastics rings] aren’t kind to lanky arms.

Now, I have a neat theory explaining why us taller, lanky folk can’t press well. (There will be a future blog post on this entitled something like, Dear Tall Guys: Why You’re Pressing Sucks Shit. If you don’t want to miss it, sign up for my newsletter using the neat little form at the bottom of this post that reads “Get Free Updates.”) Theories aside, for the most part, those with longer limbs lose when it comes to most tasks of athletic fitness. And I’m one of those guys.

According to this infographic, weightlifters have shorter limbs compared to other athletes. Gymnasts, as a whole, are pretty short too. This tool tells me I’m most likely to be a rower or water polo player despite my damndest desires of wanting to be Dmitry Klokov.

Rarely are we the person we want to be. But we can always blossom into the person we can best be: ourselves. Here are some tips.

1) Accept Who You Are

It’s trite. It’s fuzzy, warm, and cuddly. But you must acknowledge that you are yourself. If you don’t, you’re going to place the blame in the wrong areas.

It’s not:

“Well, my metabolism is slow so I don’t stand a chance.”

It’s:

“Well, my metabolism is slow so I’m going to kick more ass than everyone else.”

Your perception of yourself is more important than anyone else’s perception of you. Honeslty, I had no reason to wish I was someone else. I grew up with a great family and awesome friends. My loathing was all self-spawned.

You probably have somethings in your lap you love. Somethings that your idols don’t have. Hinge yourself on them.

You will never be anyone but yourself, so stop wishing and start doing. Start building yourself into something you love. It’s on your shoulders now. You can’t change the past, but you can certainly change the future.

2) Find Out Who You Are

Dr. Anatoly Bondarchuk once said that there were three kinds of athletes:

  • Those that responded to intensity.
  • Those that responded to volume.
  • Those that responded to variety.

Now, he also mentions an occasional fourth, but the point here is that you’re different from the next guy who is different from the next guy who is different than…

Don’t operate under preconceived thoughts. Finding out who you are — in both the training and life sense — is the toughest step because it requires experimentation on your end. My biggest results didn’t come until I ignored 98% of the things I  thought I knew about myself, because thoughts often get confused with desires.

Just recently, someone contacted me to join my personal coaching program. He said that he could only really train “heavy” twice per week.

My original thought was, “Awesome, he’s experimented enough to know some things about himself,” which immediately signals that the person is someone I want to work with. But just to make sure, I asked him the following question:

But have you ever considered that you can’t train more than two days per week “heavy” because your training hasn’t been properly programmed otherwise?

To which he replied:

That is probably most definitely true.

Find out who you are, don’t think you know who you are. You have a lot to learn about yourself.

3) Focus on Your Strengths

There’s a philosophy out there that says to prioritize your weaknesses. You know, the “you’re only as strong as you’re weakest link” type thing.

But focusing on our weaknesses forces us to obsess over things we’re already self-conscious about. We don’t need to add to the expectations and subsequent depressions. It’s a deadly cycle:

  • You suck at something.
  • You get upset and put more attention towards it.
  • You trip a mechanism that says, “More attention equals more progress.”
  • You expect, then, to progress faster.
  • You try expediting the process.
  • You plateau faster.
  • You hate yourself.
  • You safety pin the superman cape that has been hidden in your sock drawer for fifteen years to your back.

Instead, own who you are by focusing on what makes you feel good about who you are.

What are you good at? What are your strengths?

Find them and then attack them. This builds confidence. Confidence then creates a desire to get to the gym regularly. It actually becomes fun.

For me, my chest sucks. But my back is decent. So I put most of my emphasis on pulling, even going as far as constructing my training split around doing it as often as possible. My weaknesses, however, go in the crock pot.

4) Put Your Weaknesses Into a Crock Pot

The more I coach my little cousin, the more I respect this concept I call “crock pot strength.” When he came to me, he could do six chin-ups, maximum. Impressive for a sixteen year old, really.

Instead of running him into the ground, I started him off at four sets of two reps. The first workout was easy. Real easy. But I assured him we were just building momentum and that it would all be fine a few months from now.

Twice per week, we added one repetition to his workload.

Week One, Session One: 2/2/2/2

Week One, Session Two: 3/2/2/2

Week Two, Session One: 3/3/2/2

We got to fives, one rep shy of his previous previous one set max.

Week Whatever: 5/5/5/5

He handled it just fine. And that’s precisely why I reduced his workload and slowed his progression, intentionally delaying any sort of stalling point.

One day stayed consistent at 3-4 x 3-5, depending on feel. The other day, we continued adding one repetition per week.

This kind of progression is “crock pot strength.” Food doesn’t cook as fast in a crock pot as it would in the oven, but it does a damn fine job if you give it the time to do its job.

Most of your weaknesses should follow this kind of scheme. Slowwwww and steady progress over time. Else, you’ll bang your head against a wall. Repeatedly.

5) Accept What You Can’t Change; Fight Like Hell Anyway

Owning who you are isn’t a waiving of a white flag. Despite outward disadvantes, no matter what they may be, we should all try our damdest to do most things. We should try our hand at Olympic weightlifting. We should struggle on the rings. We should incline bench press, even if we suck at pressing.

Back when I wanted to be someone else, I dumped my weaknesses for a while.

But your weaknesses will always beckon. You will always be self-conscious about them. And you will always want to improve them. Somehow, someway, they will creep back into your life.

When they do, you will regret not trying to improve them earlier. This starts the dangerous cycle mentioned above.

Weakness are weaknesses. Rarely will you turn them into strengths. So just give them the breathing room they need to develop.

Over time, things will shake out.

CONCLUSION

Andreas Thorkildsen shouldn’t be able to bench press 405 pounds according to the general consensus of taller, lankier people sucking at pressing. And while I was at the University of Pittsburgh, there was a wide receiver that could bench press 330 pounds at 6’5″.

Nothing is absolute. Rules are regularly broken.

That’s why you need to find out who you are. Don’t try walking the same road as someone else. Don’t even want to walk the same road as someone else. Find your own. Better yet, create your own.

Everyone has things they are good at, and things that are not-so-good at. Don’t confine yourself based on your desires or thoughts.

Hinge on your strengths, use them to build confidence, motivation, and momentum. Accept what you struggle with, and then throw them in the crockpot.

But most importantly, fight like hell. Nothing — not even improving your strengths — comes easy.

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P.S. Drop a comment below and let me know who your heroes were. Mine? Benny the Jet Rodriguez from the Sandlot. There was a stretch of my life where I watched that every day.

The Northwood Program

Your setbacks are your fault. Don’t blame the injuries. Don’t blame the program. Don’t blame the equipment.

Blame yourself.

In all likelihood, your program isn’t failing because it’s bad. It’s failing because you think it’s bad. And then that means you’re not giving the same effort you otherwise would if you had faith in it. You aren’t going “all in.”

But in your defense, it’s confusing out here in the battlefield. The weapons are numerous. There are barbells, kettlebells, dumbbells, sandbells, and practically any other bell you have enough money to patent. And the machines? Treadmills, elliptical, rowers, and bikes. And that’s if you narrow it down to contraptions that liken us to gerbils — creatures that actually enjoy running inside of a wheel that never moves.

Let’s not forget about the techniques. Isometrics, plyometrics, concentrics, force spectrum ramping, and good old dynamic contractions. You start to wonder if there is method to the madness or just madness in the methods.

It’s no wonder you always feel inadequate. One day you’re toying around with time proven dumbbells and someone starts swinging a kettlebell in your face.

Your dumbbells don’t look quite the same after that.

I mean, they’ve been around forever. They have to be outdated, right?

And as soon as that thought creeps into your mind, your program — carrying your motivation — flutters out of the window.

You would rather be playing with the fancy toys.

But there is a similar process in nearly every field. Take writing for example. Novices try to razzle and dazzle with old clichés like, well, razzle and dazzle. They use impressive words, overlooking the ones that are common to everyday language, the ones that actually resonate with our brain.

But let’s get back to your training. The more complicated it is, the more setbacks you will have. You’ll fall to the fads only to realize that your original plan was more effective. You’ll hop from your new program back to your old, yet more effective, one. But because you abandoned it, it takes you three months to work your way back to your baseline. And during those three months, you don’t notice any progress. And for good reason.

You never really progressed. You just worked your way back to your previous level.

Since no change took place, your confidence teeters. This begins the impatience. So when you see that person in the corner of the gym doing iso-quasi-mio-plio-nano contractions, you falter again. And the cycle continues. But just imagine where you would be if you stayed on your original program for the six months that it took for all of this to transpire.

A lot of people choose gyms based on equipment. Its gotta’ have treadmills, bikes, free weights, machines – the works. I mean, you’re paying for it, right? The owner should put your money to good use.

Likewise, people create home gyms with racks, bars, plates, dumbbells, chains, bands, and the latest gadget you can think of.

But remember what I said about writing? About keeping it simple? Well, I’m going to propose to you a radical – and simple – way to achieve every goal you’ve ever had. It may sound crazy, but that’s because it is. You will, however, save yourself years of anguish.

There are two ways to execute this “crazy” plan. The first involves cleaning out a spare bedroom, basement, or garage (any extra space with head room), and buying one of those barbell sets with 315lbs of total weight. If that doesn’t sound enjoyable, then continue going to your gym, but pretend like the only equipment there is a barbell and 315lbs of total weight.

As you can guess, your training will only involve the barbell and 315lbs in weight. No power rack. No dumbbells. Just you, the bar, the plates, and the ground. Your program will be built around the overhead press, front squat, barbell row, and clean. Now, of course, you can do things like push presses and deadlifts but you’re going to narrow your sights for now because I can already see your mouth opening up for questions.

“But what if I can deadlift more than 315? Shouldn’t I use more weight?”

And if you’re legitimately asking that question right now, I suggest you go back a re-read the previous three paragraphs. Before anything else spits out of your mouth, let me explain just why this workout is everything you’ll ever need.

You’re not going to have small shoulders if you can press 225 over your head, you’re not going to have small legs if you can front squat 315, and you’re not going to have a small backside if you can clean 315.

Now there are other hidden gems in a program, like having to clean the bar anytime you overhead press or front squat. This is what I like to call hidden volume. And hidden volume adds up over time to produce fantastic results.

But let’s get serious: is it possible to hit those strength numbers without fancy assistance exercises or special techniques?

Well, I dare you to find out. I dare you to spend the next year doing one of the programs below. I dare you.

There is no superior program, just some guidelines. Guidelines like attacking the barbell a minimum of three days a week, or a maximum of five days a week. Guidelines like making sure you work the movements in question with some intensity and passion. (That’s not to say work to failure, but just make sure you challenge yourself.) Guidelines like add weight when it feels comfortable. (You don’t need percentages to tell you when you’re strong enough to add another five or ten pounds.)

If you’re a four day per week kind of guy (or gal) that likes to have one focus per session, then whipping up a program is simple.

Day One: Push presses, barbell rows, arm work

Day Two: Deadlifts, front squats (light), anything else for the glutes or lower back

Day Three: Military, rows (different grip or back angle), arm work

Day Four: Cleans, front squats (heavy), anything else for the glutes or lower back

If you’re a three day per week kind of guy (or gal), then I’m going to “steal” a little program from Dan John. He says this program works, and if I were you I’d listen to him. He calls it The Southwood Program, but we’re going to alter it a bit. I guess you can call it The Northwood Program.

It’s to be done three days per week. All exercises follow the same 8-6-4 scheme as outlined in The Southwood Program. The exercises, in order, are the power clean, military press, front squat, and barbell row.

I know you’re not going to be satisfied with this, so I have a curveball for you. Since I know you’re going to do extra work, I might as well give you permission.

“Walk in the park” one day every week, and do some calisthenics. Do chin-ups on the swing set. Climb across the monkey bars a few times. Flip yourself on top of them and do some dips. Climb down and work on your handstands.

Be an idiot and have some fun with it. You’ll likely fall in love with being outside and doing this sort of thing. I’m tempted to tell you that you can do these workouts “as often as weather permits” but I don’t want you to lose focus of the benefits a barbell brings.

Now, you don’t have to use the programs above. They are just examples. But remember, the novice writer always out-works himself. He finds ways to add to his sentences, ways to make them more lavish. The experienced writer, however, looks for ways to subtract — ways to make things simpler.

You can experience this for yourself, or you can just take my word for it.

What’s it going to be?

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I’d appreciate it if you shared this post and dropped your questions below. I’d love to hear from you.

Muscle Imbalances Revealed – Creating a Foundation for Athleticism

The barbell row is a saint confused for a sinner.

Strength imbalances don’t exist.

Muscle reprogramming is like driving to your house.

…what does it all mean?

When I was asked to contribute to Muscular Imbalances Revealed, I had mixed emotions. First, because I didn’t absolutely believe in muscular imbalances. Second, because I didn’t see myself as a “muscular imbalance” kind of guy.

Luckily, Rick (the head of the project) was cool enough to let me fly my own way.

So I took flight.

I was on the hook for a forty-five minute presentation.

Not only is my presentation twice as long as required, but I also supplemented with a bunch of videos that were shot after a tricking session of mine. For the life of me, I didn’t want to look like another guy in a collared shirt and khaki’s working on clients from one of those medical benches.

Want to know what the presentation is like? Great, thought so. Here’s a preview:

And here’s what’s further inside the interwebz box:

  • My girlfriend demonstrating some exercises. Fantasize away.
  • Assessment and Exercise for Athleticism – Introduction – Length – 2:21
  • Me doing an aerial after an awkward introduction.
  • Assessment and Exercise for Athleticism – Presentation – 1:35:01
  • Slight wind interference on a few videos because the weather god decided it would be funny to be “that guy” one the day that I shot. (But you can still hear everything.)
  • Assessment and Exercise for Athleticism – Tripod Position – Length – 2:40
  • Me wearing a backwards hat. (What else is new?)
  • Assessment and Exercise for Athleticism – Hip Flexion – Length – 2:07
  • Me probably saying “…you know…” one hundred times more than I should.
  • Assessment and Exercise for Athleticism – Remedial Hip Flexion – Length – 1:42
  • Assessment and Exercise for Athleticism – Hip Hinging – Length – 2:35

WHAT’S THE PURPOSE?

My “job” through this project was the showcase some baseline athletic assessments to sure up sloppy movement. Most of this would be pre-teaching of basic lower body human movement patterns—squat and hinging and whatnot—essentially some progressions if you’re barbell row inept.

There’s some hip. Some foot. Some reprogramming. Some of my philosophy. Some of just about everything.

It’s basically eleven years of success and failure that comes from both my experience as an athlete and a (former) coach. That in itself is pretty priceless, not to mention the emotional implications this all had for me.

And let’s not forget that I’m just one of the contributors—the product contains much much more than what I have outlined here. This is just my part.

WHERE CAN I GET IT?

I’m not a fan of pre-sales and whatnot, but I was given access to one since I contributed to the project. Like a champion, I let you know about it in a post earlier this week. But I’ll just remind you that until tomorrow, August 10th, you can get access to an exclusive call that all of us contributors are doing, in addition to some other free swag.

Since you’re an awesome reader of my blog, you’re getting access to this pre-sale which gives you automatic and free access to a coaching call. If you’re interested, click the link below.

–> Click here to check out Muscle Imbalances Revealed

Remember, those nice looking bullet points above are just what I contributed, and is only one piece of the entire product. There’s mega more than that.

So show some love, check it out, and pull the trigger if any of my recent posts have peaked your interest.

Bottom line is that:

  • If you can’t barbell row correctly, this product will help you.
  • If you have those wiring issues we talked about, this product will help you.
  • If you want to know more about how I reprogram, this product will help you.
  • If you want to hear my sexy voice, this product will help you.
  • If you want ideas of how to incoprorate reprogramming into faster movements, this product will help you.
  • It you want to know the stuff that was instrumental in my personal adventure and turning my life, health, and athleticism around, this product will help you.

As usual, I appreciate you being here. If you have any questions for me or about the product, feel free to e-mail directly. Wondering whether or not it’s a good fit for you? Just shoot me an e-mail. I’m a pretty honest dude. You won’t be misled. Wondering more about the product in general? I’m right here, dawg.

anthony.mychal at gmail dot com

And don’t forget, you have until tomorrow to snag Muscle Imbalances Revealed with the freebies. You know me — I love free stuff. That’s why both The 242 Method and The Myth of HIIT are currently available with no strings attached. So if you’re a fan of free, grab it now.

But that’s all for now. I’m off to train and then make an oatmeal volcano. Last week, I gained 20.4 pounds on my ”foregoing all nutritional habits” experiment. I can tell you this: so far, my taste buds loved me. Everything else would disagree though. Especially my love handles. That’s what happens when you eat  pizza and wash it down with a few beers for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

 

Get Your Glutes In Gear (Sample Program Inside)

The question of how to use the glutes more during a sprint or vertical jump is paralyzing. It insinuates that some conscious thought or training strategy directly and immediately alters how the body functions during explosive movement.

But we know thought kills speed. And we know that, for starters, it’s simply about driving to your house over and over and over and over. (This is an analogy for doing something for so long that your body instinctively remembers how to do it. In other words, you don’t think about how to squat after a few months of squatting. You just get under the bar and make it happen.) The trick, however, is finding the right house. Every movement is unique. Every movement has it’s own “house.”

Repatterning the glutes to increase their use in explosive movements starts basic, with traditional low intensity activation exercises such as prone leg lifts and hip bridges. Most people “know” this, so they start their workout with these exercises during the warm-up. But because these exercises are relatively “easy” and kind of boring, it’s easy to just “go through the motions.”

Don’t.

Instead, do this:

1. START BASIC…

…with close to no moving parts. For instance, I use a modified bird dog because it’s easier to concentrate on the glute without worrying about balance.

Yes, the bird dog is “too complex” for me.

Crazy, right?

But the goal is to get the glute in gear, not better some random yoga pose.

Use an isometric contraction at the finished, or “top,” position because no matter how slow of a  tempo I prescribe, you probably won’t abide by it.

Don’t worry. No many people (including myself) adhere to tempos. It’s too much thinking. It’s much easier to lift, hold for five seconds, and then lower.

Do this exercise everyday for fifty to one hundred repetitions (spread through out the day) for starters. If this seems like a lot of work, that’s because it is.

Changing processes and functions in the body is never easy. Really, you don’t want it to be easy. If humans adapted on a whim,  we wouldn’t survive that long.

2. ADD MORE…

…moving parts. Since most movement is upright, I like transitioning into standing exercises from here on out. The go-to for standing hip extension, in my opinion, is the romanian deadlift movement pattern (also known as the “hinge” movement pattern).

For simplicity, work isometric contractions at both the start and finished positions. I use something called the fundamental tip toe position, which is essentially doing a calf raise and contracting your glutes. Hold this for time — one minute is a good starting point.

The opposite end is finding a way to squeeze your glutes in the bottom position. If you have a friend, it’s probably best if they punch you in the buttcheek every five seconds while you’re down there. Again, one minute is good for a set.

Spread four of five sets of both of these through out the day.

3. BRIDGE THE GAP…

…between the fundamental tip toe position and glute beating position, making it smooth motion. This, my friends, is what it feels like to “hinge.”

If your glutes aren’t warm after ten repetitions, be worried. If they aren’t on fire after twenty-five, you’ve done something wrong. That “something” is probably an inability to keep tension on the glutes through out the range of motion. It’s going to sound weird, but you want to “grind” your glutes as you push your hips back during the romanian deadlift motion.

Think about the feel you get when you lower a weight slowly during barbell curls, maintaining a contraction in the muscle as it lengthens. This is “grind.” Finding the “grind” is tough with the hips and the hinge, so you have to work on it.

4. ADD SOME KIND OF LOADING…

…to the movement once you get the grind sorted out. Be sure to keep it slow for now. Regular old romanian deadlifts with a barbell or dumbbells are viable options. The barbell makes it a bit more difficult. Your movement is restricted by the barbell hitting your legs, but you’re going to have to get used to it anyways, so it might as well be now.

5. ADD A LITTLE SPEED…

…with something like kettlebell swings or perhaps hang cleans. Use a manageable weight.

6. ADD MORE MOVING PARTS WITH A LITTLE SPEED…

…by doing something like a lower load power clean. The power clean in itself isn’t a necessary transition, but it’s slow enough (even though it’s pretty fast) to have some control over, meaning you can “feel” things going on during the movement. This is in contrast to a vertical or broad jump, where things happen too fast to have conscious control over.

7. HOPE FOR THE BEST.

Heavier power cleans, vertical jumps, sprints, and other similar exercises will depend on the work done above. You won’t have time to “feel” or “think” during them. Instincts take over.

But if you follow the progression above — or at least extrapolate the principles — you’ll probably end up driving to the right house on a consistent basis. Just know that it takes a lot of time to get there, and you shouldn’t rush the process.

HOW THIS SEQUENCING CHANGED MY LIFE

The above process was fine tuned after my “dark years,” which was when I was stricken with debilitating knee pain. Over time, I failed on enough programs and false claims that I finally clawed my way out with my own developmental framework. During the year of experimentation, I learned a lot about movement, but specifically how movement relates to athleticism.

In short, I found out how to create a foundation for athletic movement. This sequence above is the shell of that foundation. It single handedly changed my future. I was entering into a depressive state after being debilitated with chronic knee pain.

A little while ago, I was asked to share my view on fundamental athletic movement as apart of a larger project, Muscle Imbalances Revealed. So for the past month, I worked hard to create a worthwhile presentation and awesome supplementary videos for this product. I’m proud to say that it’s finally available for purchase.

If you have any interest in athletic framework and glute programming example above, you will love my contribution to the Muscle Imbalanced Revealed project. It’s an informal walk-through of my perception of athletic movment and what it takes to form an awesome foundation for future high level skills.

Since you’re an awesome reader of mine, you have access to the early release. And the best part is that if you pull the trigger before Friday, August 10th, you will also get access to a free coaching call that myself and the other contributors will be apart of.

So it’s definately worth checking out. And be sure to get it now under this early screening before access the bonus coaching call ends.

I’ll be back in a few days to give a little bit more information about just what I did for the product.

But I’m happy that I can share this information as it was so instrumental in my personal adventure and turning my life, health, and athleticism around.

Here’s the link one more time. I hope you will check it out.

–> Click here to check out Muscle Imbalances Revealed

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I’ve done enough talking. How would YOU incorporate this information into fixing up a barbell row? Increasing athleticism? Powering a squat from the glutes?

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photo credit: Singapore 2010 Youth Olympic Games

Muscle Imbalances, Generators, Connectedness, and 3 Tips to Clean up Athleticism

It only takes one look at a lineup of athletes from different sports to realize they all come in different shapes and sizes. This reassures me of two things.

First, different body types exist. Even though somatotypes were created for psychological purposes, people do have different proportions. Not everyone follows the same rules. (This is a shout out to the Skinny-Fat Brohirrim.)

Second, the theory of muscular imbalances is a crapshoot.(This may sound odd as I just hinted to contributing to this year’s Muscle Imbalances Revealed product in my post about correct “feel” for the barbell row. But allow me to explain.) In the past, I was more vehement about this. Some of the first articles ever written for this here blog were about muscular imbalances.

To this day, I still don’t give much credence to the idea that there’s an ideal ratio to be had among muscles. When athletes are as diverse as they are, it just can’t be possible in my opinion.

An opinion which is backed by some notes of interest.

DEBUNKING MUSCULAR IMBALANCES

The crossover effect, for example, is one reason why I think the body is smart enough to prevent itself from growing wildly out of proportion to the point of danger. Train one arm in isolation and the other arm gets stronger. That’s the crossover effect.

Another reason is that of general organism strength—the theory that all training recruits a certain percentage of motor units in relation to the body’s entire pool, and the amount and extent of those recruited affects the organism as a whole.

Consider baseball players, specifically the amount of “unbalanced” rotational work they do in both hitting and throwing. Now, there are injuries in baseball, but not as many as you would think given the volume of “unbalanced training” their body is exposed to. They play 162 games from April until September, not counting spring training or playoffs. Most games involve maximal sprinting, maximal rotational swinging, and maximal throwing.

Fun fact: Chipper Jones—arguably one of the best switch hitters of all time—said hitting from both sides of the plate may have made him more susceptible to injury.

IT’S NOT ABOUT MUSCULAR IMBALANCES

At first glance, my methods can be confused muscular imbalance theories. But saying muscular imbalances exist assumes that there’s a hidden blueprint of the body. (Holy Grail, anyone?)

Every sport and every athlete has a different blueprint. What’s ideal for a center fielder won’t be ideal for a pitcher. What’s ideal for a goalie won’t be ideal for a gymnast.

Consider the differences between athletes that live around the same equipment: Olympic Weightlifters and Powerlifters. Both throw around heavy barbells and yet there’s just something “different” about the two groups of athletes. Upon testing, you would find a lot of strength differences between the two groups because the body adapts to survive, and each sport triggers different survival responses in the body.

I think (notice I’m using the word “think” here as nothing is really “proven”) most muscular imbalance problems are misinterpretations of two things:

  • Big muscles being generators
  • Small muscles being points of connectedness

BIG MUSCLES ARE GENERATORS

The bigger the muscle, more involved it should be in any given movement.

Crazy idea, right?

The hip houses the biggest muscles. As you get further away, the muscles get smaller and smaller.

The big muscles are generators. The golf swing, the baseball swing, the vertical jump, the sprint, and a host of other movements rely primarily on the big muscles of the hip.

This makes it seem like a muscle’s importance declines if it’s further from the center of the body. But this assumption ignores something I like to call “points of connectedness.”

Generators are only useful if they can be connected to something to give power to. So their usefulness depends on this connection.

In something like the vertical jump, the hips are the generator. The foot and ankle complex is the point of connectedness. If this connection isn’t up to par, not all generator power will be realized.

This may be easier to understand with an Olympic Weightlifting analogy. They artificially “enhance” their point of connectedness to the ground with weightlifting shoes, making for more efficient force transfer. They also enhance their point of connectedness to the bar with the hook grip.

When you look at the construction of the body, it goes like this:

  • Generator  (Hips, torso, shoulders)
  • Link (elbows, knee)
  • Point of connectedness (ankle/foot, hand/wrist)

In both the upper and lower body, the links (elbows and knees) function similarly. They don’t do much other than flex and extend. (The knee does rotate some and have a bit more freedom.) But they link the generator and point of connection.

If either the generator or point of connectedness is askew, the link will also be askew. The classic example for this is elbow problems.

CHIN-UPS AND ELBOW TENDONITIS

Elbow tendonitis is common amidst those that do a lot of straight bar work, specifically chin-ups and curls.

The fix is nearly always to opt for a neutral grip because the supinated grip ruins the natural neutral relationship between the wrist and shoulder. The elbow didn’t do anything wrong. It was just along for the ride.

Not that I haven’t used baseball enough for examples, but you will often hear of great hitters having either fast or strong wrists and either fast or strong hips. Rarely does anyone tout about “immaculate elbows” or “kick ass knees.”

The reason I was able to conquer crepitus and years of chronic knee pain was because I abided by one equation:

Hips + Feet = Knees

(In terms of health in relation to movement.)

We used to live in a knee-centric world. It was all about quads and hammies. While some of these muscles cross the hip, they aren’t the dominant muscles of the hip.

Things have changed. I’d say that we’re currently living in a glute-centric world. When ESPN writes a gigantic story about glutes, you know something is up.

But it’s only a matter of time before we begin to focus on the foot. Truly, the only reason I’m respecting and understanding the power of the foot is because I shattered mine to bits. As of now, I’m still rehabilitating it (1.5 years after breaking it), and I’m just beginning to realize the importance of isometric strength in the calves and the importance of dorsiflexion potential.

A lot of tricksters float across the ground, subtly bouncing in between moves. I want to say that the saying having “pep in your step” is code for “diesel isometric strength in the forefoot.”

My right foot is a lot more “locked up” than it used to be. My toes overlap and come to more of a point than compared to my left. It’s a shame that 6-8 weeks in a cast does these sorts of things. My current plan is to destroy myself with a lacrosee ball in hopes of “making space” by separating the joints in my foot.

You would be surprised at the kind of difference a wider base makes—something I realized during handstands. The narrower the fingers, the more my wrists, elbows, and shoulders got hurt. The more I splayed my fingers (to a reasonable extent), the more control I had which led to less injuries.

All things being equal, movement, balance, everything should be easier from a wider base. Most people are walking around on stilts because of the way their foot has contorted over time to fit into shoes. But I want to say the foot should fan. The more separation you have in between your big and second toe the better.

PUTTING INTO ALL TOGETHER INTO ATHLETIC MOVEMENT

As wacky as it seems, this relates to things as seemingly trivial as the barbell row. If your “feeling” the row in the wrong places, you’re wiring is likely out of whack. And if you’re wiring is out of whack, your foundation for athletic movement is likely out of whack too.

So if you want to play electrician, here’s some of my secret sauce. Use it as a launch pad.

1. Stretch the hip flexors, but stretch them correctly. This is a given in our age, but most people don’t stretch the hip flexors right. The trailing leg should be internally rotated with the toes flexed and pressed against the ground. Cross your hands behind your head and lean to the opposite side of whichever leg is being stretched. Or you can just do the super stretch shown above.

2. Find your forefoot. You can do something like front squat (or regular) calf raises, but don’t let the heel touch the ground. Teach your lower leg how to balance the body. Alternatively, you can load up a barbell, throw it on your back, and simply walk around on your tip toes.

I can’t say this is going to turn you into the next Michael Jordan, but that isometric strength is going to help you develop a better connection between your foot and the ground.

“…if calf muscles are not the most important contributors to a high vertical jump, in any case, they are important because in the execution of vertical jump they are involved as organic part of explosive legs extension movements in the last part of push up phase.

The calf rises are not the main exercise for the vertical jump height increasing but they cannot be eliminated in the training program.

Calf rise is the training mean that assures the increasing of calf muscles strength. The preliminary increasing of maximal strength of calf muscles is needed to assure the subsequent increasing of their explosive strength, starting strength and reactive ability.

Calf muscles are strongly involved in the lending shock absorbing phase of run and bounces. The preliminary enforcement of calf muscles, before the use of jumping exercises, it’s needed also to avoid legs injuries (calf muscles strain).

-  YuriVerkhoshansky

3. Get your hips firing. 

Getting the hips to fire was undoubtedly one of the most significant moments of my training career. And that’s if you want to consider a year’s worth of hard work a “moment.” It’s taken me from knee pain to knee health. Squat woes to squat triumphs. Hell, it even fixed my barbell row. (Remember, rewiring stems deep and infests more than one specific movement pattern. There’s also a general aspect to it.)

Crazily enough, it also broke my foot because I was flying through the roof during a tricking session. My moves were so high that I was seriously missing the ground on my landings, to the point of them just looking ugly because of how surprised I was. My body wasn’t going where I was used to it going because I had extra airtime.

Lo and behold, body parts ended up in wrong places, and I ended up with a cast around my leg. So let’s not forget increased the ability of the hips to increase vertical jumping power.

But before I get into how to fix the hips, I want you to digest everything else first, as the the overall scheme of motor programming and patterning can get rather complex.

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Check back on Tuesday for more goodies. And be sure to ask your questions in the interim. The comment boxes are below. It’s always a jammin’ place down there, so join the party.

Where Should You Feel the Barbell Row?

Until 2011, I hated barbell rows. No matter the variation, they just didn’t feel “right” to me.

The exercise fabled to fill the upper back was instead stressing my lower back and hamstrings. And it wasn’t one of those “you’re working the muscle, keep going, rah-rah” kind of feelings either. It was a “fwaarrkkkkk, this can’t be good” kind of feeling.

(As crazy as it sounds, barbell rows also used to aggravate my chronic knee pain. When my chronic knee pain was at its peak, a lot of stiff legged movements—despite having a small range of motion about the knee—flared up my knee. Here’s a little social proof, from back when I asked Mark Rippetoe about my issues.)

Sometime in 2009, I remember trying Yates rows. My memory of this is vivid because I was so geeked going into it. Having a higher torso angle was supposed to eliminate lower back stress and all around feelings of awkwardness.

It didn’t.

So I made the decision to stop doing any kind of barbell rows.

For a year it was dumbbell rowing. And then another year there was no rowing, save for batwings.

Around this time, I was also repatterning my lower body. You know, An Athlete’s Guide to Chronic Knee Pain stuff.

POST KNEE REHABILITATION RESULTS

After a host of glute-centric work and all of the goodness that lower body repatterning entails, I went back to barbell rows. Partly out of curiosity. Partly because I just love the dead stop “pendlay” row. (I’m well aware of the naming issues and controversy.)

To my surprise, the movement felt entirely different. But it was short lived. Not long after, I broke my foot. When I got back into training, I opted against them in favor of saving my foot from unnecessary stress.

Earlier this year, I went back for my second tour, post-repatterning, post-chroninc knee pain, and post-brokenness. Maybe the rash of injuries made me forget about my toils with them, but it wasn’t until a few weeks ago when a client asked me, “Is there anything I can substitute for barbell rows? I’m not sure I feel them in the right place,” that I remembered how troublesome they once were.

WHAT BARBELL ROW ARE WE TALKIN’ HERE?

For the sake of clarity, when I say “barbell row,” I’m referring to the standard overhand grip row done with the back parallel to the floor. If you want to get technical it can be done from either a dead stop or with a stretch reflex at the bottom of the movement. Currently, I opt for the stretch reflex version because I want it to be more of an upper body exercise as opposed to a deadlift assistance exercises.

WHERE SHOULD YOU FEEL THE ROW?

Nowadays, when I do barbell rows, I feel them in two places:

  • Mid-Upper Back
  • Glutes

I’m fairly certain those are both acceptable answers to the question of where the barbell row should be felt.

The glutes take a large load because they are responsible for holding the bent over position. This position is essentially the bottom of a romanian deadlift, and an isometric hold in the midst of a hinging movement pattern.

Failing to feel the glutes likely means you’re defaulting to the lower back and hamstrings, which is usually accompanied by an anterior pelvic tilt. This problem is very common as the coaching cues used to prevent lower back injuries almost always involve some sort of lower back over arching. This an entirely different topic in itself (again, An Athlete’s Guide to Chronic Knee Pain stuff).

 As for feeling it in the mid-upper back, I don’t abide by the uber-elbows-pinned rowing rule. I focus on two things:

  • Getting a full stretch at the bottom (this means protracting the scapula, although I don’t go as far as old Arnie — I make sure to maintain solid lower back positioning)
  • Squeezing it all together at the top (this means retracting the scapula—I like thinking “thumbs to armpits, which I can thank Dan John and bat wings for)

WHY CAN I SUDDENLY ROW?

When I was fixing my knee pain, I spent a lot of time doing isometric and “slow moving” work to get a mental connection with my hips. Firing my glutes in the bottom romanian deadlift position was, and still is, a given because all of the man hours put in.

Although I didn’t correlate it until recently, I spent an entire summer doing no rowing but bat wings. Bat wings are a Dan John-ism that are nothing more than isometric rows.

There seems to be something to repatterning and doing things slowly — even to the point if no movement — at first.

Something…

WHY YOU SHOULD BE DOING BARBELL ROWS

These days, it seems the barbell row is frowned upon. Other exercises prove more worthwhile through EMG studies, they say.

But I can confidently say the barbell row has been a huge contributor to my back’s growth, and I don’t plan on getting rid of them anytime soon.

Aside from the sexiness, the barbell row is one of those useful connect-the-dot tools.

If you can’t barbell row without your glutes afire and upper back ablazing, you probably have some wiring issues. If this applies to you, here are some things to think about:

  • Your glutes aren’t in charge of your lower body. And when that happens, you’re at risk for knee pain and other lower body trouble, not to mention decreased performance as a whole.
  • Your upper back has trouble commanding scapular retraction. And when that happens, your shoulder is in trouble.

So if you’re avoiding the barbell row, you might want to think about why to see if you’re not just covering up unresolved problems. Now, it’s not like I have room to talk as I threw them to the curb for two years. But after jigsawing this all together, few exercises provide a hit the entire backside quite like the barbell row.

The good news is that getting started is as simple as getting started. If you ditched them, un-ditching them starts with nothing more than grabbing a hold of the barbell, bending over, and getting the work done.

You will struggle a bit at first. But keep at it.

As for motivation, when was the last time someone needed less glute and upper back work?

The good news is that there’s hope for you yet. Even if you think you’re doing them completely wrong, you’re probably better off than I was at the start. Yet here I sit, now declaring man-love for the barbell row. I do them weekly, my knees are healthy, my lower back feels great, and my upper back ain’t too shabby.

If you can’t even fathom how to use your hips more and “repattern” for the row, be sure to check back over the next two weeks for suggestions. I’ll let all of this sink in before barraging you with more. And if your interest is peaked, you might as well sign-up for the newsletter (form at the top of the page) so you don’t miss any posts.

Oh, and that “project” I talked about in my blurb a few days ago — it will be released very shortly. And it might just fix your row woes in addition to to wiring issues you have.

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Where and how would you start repatterning for the row if you’re completely out of whack?

Do you do barbell rows. If not, why?

 

Self Limiting for Prolonged Progress

You and your friends go out for a few drinks on an idle Friday night. Considering you’re the health nut of the group, they trust you to be the designated driver. You accept your role as chauffeur and take your bros to the bar.

But an hour later, the Guinness is going down oh so well. Another hour and the trend continues. And another hour yet and you realize your designated duties are doubtful.

Luckily, you’re coherent enough to notice that Bob only had one drink the entire night. You turn to him, hand him the keys, and then order yourself another drink.

Congratulations.

You just self limited yourself.

Now let’s find out how this applies to your training.

WHAT ARE SELF LIMITATIONS?

Self limitations intentionally cut you off from your maximum capabilities. You can self limit a lot of things for a lot of reasons.

  • You can self limit to work around injury
  • You can self limit to promote recovery
  • You can self limit to deload
  • You can self limit to prevent injury
  • You can self limit to ensure a light training session

Now, self limitations are movement specific. For every exercise, there’s an absolute maximum performance capacity that represents total potential.

So say you’re looking to pull a maximum deadlift. You would probably:

  • Drink strong black coffee
  • Wear something that makes you feel awesome
  • Get a lot of rest
  • Pinpoint your nutrition
  • Use a foot stance and grip that allowed for lifting the most weight
  • Use footwear you are familiar with
  • Use a familiar warm-up strategy
  • Use your favorite barbell in the gym

This list can go on forever, and is transferable to different activities. Consider you maximum performance capacity as “aligning the stars,” so to speak.

WHY USE SELF LIMITATIONS?

Self limitations intentionally prevent maximum performance capacity. Back to the deadlift example: If for some reason you didn’t want to try a maximal pull (stiff hamstring, sub-par sleep, etc…), you would likely opt for a “light” day.

But “light” days often turn into “heavy” days despite noble intentions.

I’ve concluded that when I’m on the schedule for conventional deadlifs, I’m going to do damage. So for me, there’s no such thing as a “light” day of conventional deadlifts.

But there are days when I would rather not destroy myself and still conventional deadlift. Here are some ways I could limit myself:

  • Don’t listen to music

No music? Good luck getting mentally jacked. You would be surprised how much of an edge Disarmonia Mundi can give a person.

  • Don’t drink coffee

Blasphemy.

  • Use only the 45 pound plates

You have to be confident in your ability to jump 90 pounds. Smaller jumps can convince yourself that you’re ready to pull something significant even though you might not be. The jump from 135 to 225 is one thing. 225 to 315 is another. 315 to 405 gets murky. Anything above that, and you’re probably experienced enough to tackle this yourself.

  • Change the movement (same but different)

Opt to pull with a wider grip, which will stress the upper back and grip. Expose the weak links to reduce the total amount of weight that can be lifted.

YOU NEED TO BE CAREFUL

Self limitations sound great, but there is a hitch. Usually, by confining an exercise, you’re going to shift the stress to different muscles.

So while overall systematic stress is reduced, specific stress to certain muscle groups may increase.

In the case of opting to pull with a wider grip, the upper back, glutes, and hamstrings will be stressed in an entirely different way.

Likewise, opting to do power cleans instead of deadlifts presents a unique variation in the stressor. You’re moving faster, which causes a different hit to the body.

Ideally, you want to self limit with something you’re familiar with. So if you do snatch grip pulls regularly, they are a perfect substitute if you’re feeling like trash on conventional deadlift day. And you won’t accidently turn a light session into a max session (at least, from an absolute potential standpoint), which is all too common.

SELF LIMITATIONS ARE MORE THAN LIFTING

Self limitations apply to all training methods. If you’re running, go barefoot and only breathe through your nose.

But the same side effects apply. You’re going to reduce overall system stress, but you will increase the stress throughout the foot. Again, it’s best to choose something that you body is already adapted to.

SELF LIMIT TO SAVE THE LEGS

Another great self limiter is switching exclusively to front squats if you want to keep the legs a little fresher. The bad thing about front squats is that the upper back is usually the first thing to poop out, making back squats an all around superior leg exercise from an absolute loading standpoint.

But if you don’t want expose them to that kind of stress, front squats automatically reduce the burden. The quads will be hit a bit more by virtue of body position, but it won’t be as huge of a hit to the system as a whole.

HOW I SELF LIMIT

My foot is going through a nasty streak of nerve pain. My left hamstring hates me. Too many aerials. (Speaking of which, be sure to check out this post // Why Stretching Won’t Heal an Injury Correctly // over at Trick Training about injuries.) Things are “rough” right now—a killer considering the weather has been beautiful. I’m talking 100 degree heat kind of beautiful—the kind of stuff that drives people inside.

But I hate being cooped up inside as my intestines rot away, even if the heat is rather intolerable to the modern air conditioned coddled civilization. (Actually, I love training in that kind of heat.) But between my foot and hamstring, getting out there to trick, lift, and train is tough.

Now, I do, of course. But only because I know how to use self limitations. Here’s a glimpse of some changes I’ve made:

  • Replaced back squatting with front squatting– less loading on bad foot while still allowing me to train legs
  • Placed more emphasis on the deadlift over the squat as teetering out of a rack is bothersome to my foot
  • Shifted from power cleans to Romanian deadlifts – giving my hamstrings some slow and blood flushing work
  • Limited my tricks to everything but aerials – nothing else aggravates the injury, so why stop?
  • Incorporated more pull-ups than rows to keep the lower back fresher for more pulling from the floor

NON-LIMITED CONCLUSIONS

If you think I’m getting rid of my coffee and my metal, you’re out of your mind. But I still limit my performance in ways that allows me to continually progress.

Self limitations, in a sense, are responsible for most of my progress. It’s rare to be 100% fresh 100% of the time. Find ways to overcome and train no matter the circumstance.

As they say, the most important part of life is showing up. Self limitations help you do just that. So they’re kind of a big deal.

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There’s a good chance you’re using self limitations now without knowing it. Let me know how in the comments below. I’m interested to hear how you attack this issue. I’m always interested in new ideas!

 

photo credit: [cipher]

photo credit: Sharon Drummond

Learn How to Jump Higher…While Flipping Upside Down (Another Free eBook)

You learn a lot suspended in mid-air with your head closer to the ground than any other body part.

To some, doing flips, kicks, and twists — the wonderful thing we call “tricking” — in the air is “crazy.” Maybe even superhuman.

But, truly, tricking is humbling.

Because no matter how much of an expert you are, there’s always a chance of failure. There’s always a chance of having a mental lapse and crashing. There’s always a chance of breaking five bones in your foot.

I’m lucky to have grown up with tricking. It was a baby when I found it (still is, really). Part of me wants to admit that tricking has taught me more about fitness, athletics, psychology, and philosophy than any book could. And these are things that—I want to say—I would never find in a book. Even though I probably could. But at this point in my life I’m not sure I would even read it even if I found it.

Eckhart Tolle once said, “Life will give you whatever experience is most helpful for the evolution of your consciousness.” For me, “life” should be replaced with “tricking” in that sentence. The cliffnotes of this evolution would look something like:

  • Tricking helped me understand the value of “play” over competition.
  • Tricking helped me understand movement. So when I’m rolling around, stretching my hip flexors, and hanging out in squat, I’m doing it because I know what it’s like to have movement stolen from you. It isn’t fun.
  • Tricking helped me understand the relationship between specific strength movements and specific athletic movements.
  • Tricking helped me understand skill acquisition by trying to learn tricks on the non-dominant side.
  • Tricking helped me understand and embrace failure. You can say it was a painful learning experience, as “failure” often means scraping yourself from the grass. But if you’re afraid of trying new techniques, you won’t learn.
  • Tricking helped me understand sharing experimental findings with a community, even if they weren’t universally applicable. They weren’t really expected to apply to everyone because everyone had different preferences, proportions, and peculiarities.
  • Tricking helped me understand the relationship between strength training and athletics. Most strength work requires tension. Most sports require relaxation. Imagine swinging around chain links as opposed to cracking a whip. So it’s important to hop back and forth between mentalities, never letting one get too dominant in the other’s world.

It’s been a long time coming, but I’m excited to say that I’m officially launching Trick Training. The website you’re on now, AnthonyMychal.com, will continue to be updated regularly, so don’t worry about that. This place remains a safe haven for my brain’s scribbles on general athletic fitness pursuits, nutrition, and all of that fun stuff. Perhaps in the future, it will be a bit more personal and even showcase some food shenanigans I get myself involved into. (What do you know, I happen to have a sweet video of the likes below!)

Trick Training is a specific hub for those that want to learn about basic tricking and training for tricking. I’m still a little unsure about how I’m going to bridge the gap between the two websites, but I’m sure I’ll figure that out as I go. All that I know is that I had some trick-specific bits that I felt I needed to do justice to and that turning this place into a full blown tricking town wasn’t the way to go.

One of those tricking bits is how the vertical jump, and jumping higher in general, relates to better tricking. (Or does it?) With other (bad) programs out and about, I wanted to throw my own opinion out there in hopes that tricksters can continue to train safely and injury free and learn the role of the vertical jump in tricking. (More on this soon…)

Since Trick Training is a brand new website, there’s a brand new update service. Just like on AnthonyMychal.com, if you throw in your e-mail you get access to:

  • Absolutely free website updates, so you never miss a post.
  • Early releases of premium content (as I did with The 242 Method and The Myth of HIIT).
  • Catching Air: The Truth About Developing, Using, and Transforming the Vertical Jump for Sky High Tricks

Catching Air is yet another free eBook I’m shooting out into the world. (This is the third one so far, if you’re keeping count.) It’s about the vertical jump as it relates to tricking, and what’s inside may surprise you. It’s absolutely free and given as a perk for signing up for free updates.

So if you’re interested in tricking, or perhaps any of the content that might appear on trick training, here’s what you should do:

1) Sign-up for the newsletter and get your free copy of Catching Air (CLICK HERE for direct access to the sign-up page).

2) Throw the RSS feed into your reader (if you’re into that sort of thing)

3) Like it on Facebook.

That should be enough to keep you in the loop.

And if it’s not something you’re interested in, that’s cool too. I respect that, which is why AnthonyMychal.com will still kick it regularly.

I’m glad you’re here, and I hope to see you over at my second home, Trick Training.

Thanks for the support everyone.

The Best Damn Guide for Building Upper Chest Size and Strength

You know those cool polyester shirts that feel oh-so-awesome in the summer time? The super athletic ones? The ones you buy twelve of because they look awesome in the store?

Yeah, I do too.

Even though I don’t wanna.

Because, despite my seeded desires, when I wear them, I somehow grow a pair of tits. With hard nipples, to boot.

A Ron Burgundy blame-it-on-the-pleats optical illusion?

Perhaps.

But it doesn’t matter

The biggest sore spot for most guys has gotta’ be the upper chest. Wimpy arms are liveable. But being collapsed under the collar bone? Talk about a downer.

The upper chest is a life changer. It affects the clothes you wear and how confident you feel. Every. Damn. Day.

I know how you feel. Let’s fix it together.

Now, I don’t want to fool you: I don’t have a model upper chest. My pressing strength isn’t ideal either. But I’m writing this anyway because you can learn from my failures, and I’ve never seen an upper chest article that focused on principles rather than exercises.

I’ve listened to anecdotes about “just getting the bench press stronger” to fix my woes. But at my pressing peaks I was just as unsatisfied with my upper chest as I was at my pressing lows.

Writing about Evosport and long duration isometrics made me realize that I reprogrammed my glutes like a champ over the past few years.

Couldn’t similar concepts apply to the upper chest? Couldn’t it be repatterned to increase activation? Wouldn’t that then lead to greater size?

To give you a hint, I’m two weeks into this little “experiment” and my chest is the most proportionate it’s been in my life. Things are looking good. Here’s how you can say the same thing.

IS ISOLATING THE UPPER CHEST A MYTH?

Some say preferentially building the upper chest is impossible. Instead of butchering the words of Dr. Clay Hyght, I’ll just quote this piece from Building a Bodybuilder Chest:

You may have heard of the “all or none” principle of muscle contraction. Essentially, here’s what it means: When stimulated, a muscle fiber will either contract or it won’t.

Some people have erroneously adapted the all-or-none principle to mean that an entire muscle will either contract or it won’t. These confused individuals will go on to tell you that exercise variations are practically pointless when training the chest because the entire pectoralis major will either contract or it won’t.

This is some seriously misguided logic to say the least.

For starters, although still considered part of the pectoralis major, the clavicular pectoralis is actually a separate muscle with a separate nerve innervation.

Although the entire sternal head of the pectoralis major does share a common nerve innervation, the angle of the muscle fibers varies tremendously from top to bottom. For that reason, the line of pull is different throughout different areas of the muscle.

Luckily for us, your body (or brain rather) will recruit or call upon the portion of the muscle that’s best suited to perform the movement in question. So if you were to do a movement in which the lower fibers of the pectoralis major are in the best mechanical advantage to execute the movement, then those will be the primary fibers recruited to do the work —thank goodness!

So yes, you can emphasize different sections of the chest from top to bottom. But notice I said emphasize, not isolate!

So fixing the upper chest starts with repatterning the clavicular pectoralis—the triangle shaped muscle that creates the upper chest. Just like people do with the glutes, the goal is to better recruit the upper chest in every pressing movement. This hinges on two things: increasing overall activation, and using optimal mechanical positions during lifts.

HOW TO INCREASE ACTIVATION

In my X Physique article, I touch on the bodybuilder mindset.

When it comes to lifting weights, the goal is to continually overload the muscles. The easiest and most trackable way to do this is by slapping more plates on the bar. The problem with this philosophy is that the muscles become secondary to the weight.

But the muscles are what actually lift the weights.

…

But when dealing with “carving” a physique, Arnold said it best: “The weights are just a means to an end; how well you contract the muscles is what training is all about.”

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Control the weight, mentally and physically, through-out the entire range of motion. Make the muscles work in every phase. Think about them squeezing and lengthening.

Research proves that a greater mental connection with a muscle results in a greater activation. Old time bodybuilders will back that up. So instead of thinking general overload, think specific overload. It’s less about pressing and more about the upper chest. You no longer press. You power through a movement with the upper chest. Here’s how to make this happen.

1. I credit this to Frank Yang. During every repetition of every lift, picture your body as nothingness except for the muscle you’re targeting. Check out the anatomy dude above. Envision that. Seriously. Try it. It works. Close your eyes and practice it before every set. Think of the targeted muscle lighting up bright red in a sea of white.

2. Pre-exhaust the upper chest with an abundance of activation exercises (see below) before any bigger pressing movement. Yes, your performance will drop on the bigger pressing movement. No, it doesn’t matter. The goal is to specifically overload the upper chest.

3. Do unilateral lifts. Put your hand on the upper chest of the arm at work. Feel it contracting. This sensory connection helps.

4. Start with isometrics. When trying to activate, don’t go too complex too soon. You need time to think about what’s going on — time to develop the connection with the mind. Dynamic contractions don’t often afford this.

5. Keep stress on the muscle at lockout. Too often, lifts are locked out with the joints. Learn how to lockout a lift and still feel the stress in the target muscle.

HOW TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF MECHANICS

The upper chest has two main functions: flexion (think of raising your hands) and horizontal adduction (think of clapping hands together). This means  two things:

1. The elbows should be pinned to the rib cage during most (if not all) pressing.

2. It’s best to press in an upward and inward diagonal plane.

But we can’t stop there…

3. If a lift doesn’t target the upper chest, don’t do it. This means parting with both dips and bench presses. Deal with it for now. As Dan John says, “The goal is to keep the goal.” Down the line, if you even things out, go back and own those exercises.

4. Pack the shoulders in the correct position for optimal upper chest activation. Keeping them “back and down” opposes both of the upper chest’s main functions. Practice this by putting one hand on the opposing side’s upper chest, retract your scapula, and shrug your shoulder blade around. You will hit a position with the upper chest fairly active. This is your new lockout position. See #5 below for why.

5. Live on unilateral dumbbell exercises. According to Frederic Delavier, author of the Strength Training Anatomy books, “With bilateral work, both shoulders are driven backward supporting the weight, putting them on stretch and causing greater delt recruitment. Working one side at a time means using less weight, therefore the shoulder stays in place and doesn’t get as involved.” (The above information was taken from Sean Hyson’s blog post, Bodybuilding That Isn’t B.S.)

6. Shallower inclines may be better than steeper inclines. The latter tends to put more emphasis on the shoulders.

7. Don’t ever flare your elbows on any pressing.

8. Take the muscle through a fully stretched range of motion. This is a toughie that’s better explained during some of the actual exercise descriptions below.

9. On dumbbell presses, rotate the wrists when nearing the lockout so that the pinky fingers face towards the body. This adducts the arm — a function of the upper chest.

10. Try pressing in an arc. Understand the function of the upper chest: think of clapping and raising your hands at the same time. So to stretch the muscle you have to oppose this movement, which means bringing the arms down and out a bit. But to shorten it, it has to be returned to the clap position which means the arms not only have to drive away, but also up towards the head.

CHOOSING THE RIGHT EXERCISES

All of the numbered points above form the philosophy of building the upper chest. All of the exercises listed below, in some way, abide by the guidelines above. They are broken down into two categories. Activation exercises are used frequently to awaken the upper chest. Base exercises are more readily overloaded, making them better suited to traditional training guidelines.

As you read through these exercises, don’t forget mechanics and activation sections above. For instance, the elbow will always be in tight. Top half range of motion is often shorter. Remember, we aren’t pressing. We are overloading the upper chest. Flexing the arm above a certain point shifts the focus to the shoulders. That’s a no no. All focus stays on the upper chest.

CHOOSING THE RIGHT ACTIVATION EXERCISES

1. Isometric Band Work

On of the simplest ways to get the upper chest to fire is with isometric-esque band flies. I prefer hooking the band around a doorknob or something waist height, not necessarily under the foot as shown in the picture.

Put your non-working hand on the opposing side’s upper chest to make sure it’s doing it’s thang. Get maximal tension in the band and press into a psuedo-lockout. Rotate the wrist so the pinky faces the midline of your body. From here do little “pulses” bringing the band both up and across your body. Range of motion will be teeny tiny. The goal here is to increase blood flow to the area and to familiarize yourself with what it “feels” like to fire the upper chest.

2. Hyght Flies

Hyght flies are named after Dr. Clay Hyght, who has written extensively about the upper chest. Once again, I’ll let him do the talking:

My purpose for creating the exercise was to target the clavicular pectoralis with its most pure function, which is to fle (raise the arm up) and horizontally adduct (move toward the midline) the shoulder joint.

Begin by lying on your back on a bench inclined to about 60 degrees. After grabbing a light set of dumbbells. begin the movement with your arms hanging straight down and your palms facing forward. Initiate the movement by bringing your arms up and in across your body.

Think of forming a triangle with the path of the dumbbells, with the point of the triangle (the finished position) up over your nose. I have found it optimal to have the pinky side of the dumbbbells come together, forming a 90 degree angle. Make sure to perform the movement by pulling with your upper pecs, not the shoulder or biceps.

Just to note, Dr. Hyght finishes with an interesting note: pull with the upper pecs. This goes back to learning how to pack your shoulders correctly for optimal upper chest activation as mentioned in #4 of the mechanics section.

3. Modified Svend Press

Smash two plates together and hold them in front of your body. Instead of pressing them straight out, like in the regular Svend Press, press them up. Keep the elbows in tight. This isn’t really a “press.” It’s more of a front raise. Keep the stress on the upper chest.

4. Band V Press

The band v press is a great exercise because it fully stretches the upper chest at the bottom. Notice the start position. The elbow isn’t in tight, and the wrist is pronated. Focus on ripping the clavicular pectoralis from the bone to get a good stretch.

For the actual movement, bring the elbow in and rotate the wrist with the press. You can also press “out” at a 45 degree angle to get more tension on the band..

CHOOSING THE RIGHT BASE EXERCISES

1. 30 degree, Low Incline, Close Grip Incline Barbell Press

Throw away all other barbell pressing. Compared to a flat press, the upper chest isn’t necessarily recruited all that much more, but the lower chest is less recruited. Using the close grip and the shallow incline makes it all the better.

Note: The low incline is preferred to a higher incline because higher inclines tend to shift the focus to the shoulder.

2. 30 degree, Low Incline, Incline Dumbbell Press

Perhaps even better than incline barbell pressing is incline dumbbell pressing. Dumbbells make it easier to keep the elbows in tight, get a good stretch, and press in an arc up over the face.

You can also twist the dumbbells so that the pinky finger’s face each other at the top of the movement — perhaps even touching them and doing an isometric squeeze — to involve more of the upper chest.

Also, keeping in mind #5 of the mechanics section, it might be beneficial to do all of your dumbbell pressing unilaterally. Keep the non-working hand on the upper chest of the working arm.

3. 30 degree, Low Incline, Incline Fly

Flys can be good. They can also be bad if you don’t know how to pack the shoulders correctly (see #3 of the mechanics section). Keep the stress on the upper chest. Stay humble with the weight on this exercise.

4. 30 degree, Low Incline, Incline Squeeze Press

This exercise comes from John Romaniello. Squeeze two dumbbells together as hard as possible while doing incline presses. Keep the elbows in tight and emphasize pressing in an arc on this exercise. So bring the bells down to the nipple area and press them up to a position over your face.

5. Low to High Cable Fly

You can check out the interworkings of this exercise here.

6. Unilateral Dumbbell Floor Press

If I had to pick a “go to” exercise to learn how to properly pack the shoulder for upper chest activation, this would be it. Read about this exercise here.

7. The V Press

I “invented” this exercise in attempt to have a moderately overloadable exercise that would stretch and stress the upper chest in a way that met most of the guidelines above.

For this press, go through full range of motion at the bottom. Think about poking underneath of your collar bone with your thumb. As with most other exercises, keep the elbow in and only press as far as your upper chest can control.

8. Front Shoulder Raise With Thumbs Up

Raise the arms until they are 15 degrees above parallel. Do these with a plate and squeeze it during the reps.

THE INS AND OUTS OF REPATTERNING PROGRAMMING

As you know, I’m more of a minimalist when it comes to exercise selection. So don’t be confused by the wide array of exercises above.

I know that the bulk of our progress is going to come from a few things:

  • Increasing activation
  • Using and understanding proper mechanics
  • Avoiding any pressing that doesn’t preferentially hit the upper chest
  • Leveling up one or two big exercises over time

You can do all of the pump work you want, but if you aren’t continually overloading the incline press or one of the dumbbell presses while adhering to proper mechanics, your progress will be sub-par.

So the plan shakes out like this:

1) Do one of the activation exercises every day. You can rotate though if you want. Incorporate some kind of isometric contraction with each movement. For instance, do the modified Svend press with a five second pause at the top.

Something like three sets with 10-20 repetitions is ideal for these. If you want, do a different one every day. Do them more than once per day, too. When improving activation, frequency is fantastic. But, remember, the goal is always to increase the “feel” throughout the upper chest. Have your mind in every repetition.

2) Pick either the barbell incline press or the dumbbell incline press and use that as your marker of improvement. So whichever you choose, focus on progressive overload over time. This doesn’t mean busting a maximal load every session. Sometimes you will need to sketch. But over the span of your training life: More weight. More reps. Less rest in between sets. Whatever. Just make sure you’re using proper mechanics.

Putting up an extra twenty pounds doesn’t matter if you’re squirming around like a salmon under the bar. Building the upper chest is a gut check. Only those that throw their ego aside will prosper.

3) Stick with high(er) repetitions. On the big lift(s) chosen above, stick with the 6-10 range. It’s light enough to ensure form. Heavy enough to be “heavy.”

4) Consider specializing. This may sound off to some, but think about training the upper chest three times per week. Even bolder, think about training it every day. There’s a template for this below, but it comes down to doing one base lift submaximally every day. You can recover as long as you play your cards right. Trust me.

5) Take smaller jumps during a warm-up. For example, if you’re working up to an incline bench press of 185 for 6 reps, your warm up might look like this:

45×6

65×6

95×6

115×6

135×6

155×6

185×6

Then, depending on your preferred method of overload, you can do sets across at your maximum weight, drop sets, whatever. (Or just stop there as that’s a hefty workload.) But, for the most part, the warm-up is the bulk of the workout because you don’t want to take a sudden jump that makes it difficult for you to maintain proper upper chest recruitment.

NORMAL GUY SAMPLE ROUTINE

Most guys train pressing once or twice per week. So here are two workouts. If you only train once per week, simply rotate through the workouts. So the first week, do the first workout listed. Week two, do the second. If you train twice per week, you’re good to go.

Every morning: 3 sets of 15, band v press, 5 second isometric hold at maximum contraction

Pre-exhaust (done right before pressing sessions): 3 sets of 10, modified Svend press, 5 second isometric hold at top

Workout A

Incline Barbell Press, work up to a heavy set of 8

V Press 3×15

Low to High Cable Fly 1x failure

Workout B

Unilateral Dumbbell Floor Press 4×6

Unilateral Incline Press 2×15

Low to High Cable Fly 1x failure

HIGH FREQUENCY SAMPLE ROUTINE

For the high frequency routine, it’s best to have two “main” pressing sessions per week.

Every morning: 3 sets of 15, band v press, 5 second isometric hold at maximum contraction

Pre-exhaust (done right before pressing sessions): 3 sets of 10, modified Svend press, 5 second isometric hold at top

Daily Workout

V Press 3×10

-Done with a weight that could be handled for 15-20 repetitions

Workout A (Tuesday)

Incline Barbell Press work up to a heavy set of 8

Workout B (Friday)

Unilateral Incline Press 4×8

BONUS: BODYBUILDER SPECIALIZATION ROUTINE

Every morning: 3 sets of 15, band v press, 5 second isometric hold at maximum contraction

Pre-exhaust (done right before pressing sessions): 3 sets of 10, modified Svend press, 5 second isometric hold at top

Workout A (Monday)

Unilateral Dumbbell Floor Press 4×6

V Press 3×15

Workout B (Wednesday)

Unilateral Incline Press 2×15

Low to High Cable Fly 1×15

Workout C (Friday)

Incline Barbell Press, work up to a heavy set of 6

Mechanical Drop Set, 3 sets

  • Do a set of incline flies to near failure. Without putting the dumbbells down, go right into incline dumbbell presses.

CONCLUDING REMARKS (AND MY PROGRAM)

The exercises listed aren’t special by any means, but that shouldn’t be surprising. Instead, focus on the principles: Not doing bench presses or dips. Keeping the elbows tight and in. Trying to press with an arc. Getting the upper pecs to fire better. Only using the range of motion controlled by the upper chest.

And as for the absurd amount of activation work, keep it around for about eight weeks. After that, tone it down to warm-ups and perhaps a mild pre-exhaust.

For those of you wondering where to include overhead pressing, ditch the second workout on the Normal Guy and High Frequency templates. Do your overhead presses there. But the specialization routine is “specialized” for a reason. Forego the overheads for the time being if you want to walk that path.

As far as the training program I’m currently on and seeing results from — it’s essentially the high frequency program. I’m in the summer haze of lifting every day, which calls for incline pressing to a moderate intensity 3-4 times per week. But I do v presses daily along with the activation work. Very sketchy. But, so far, very productive.

UPDATES AS OF 6/11

KEEPING “TUCKED” SHOULDERS

Keeping the shoulders close to the torso (or using a close grip) activates the upper chest because it adducts the arm. Self guided research by Bret Contreras showed that close grip bench presses active the upper chest nearly as much as incline pressing.

Keeping the elbows close to the torso is difficult on barbell exercises because the wrist is pronated (to hold the bar). So try holding them to a flare of 15-30 degrees. On dumbbell exercises, however, keep the elbows in tight. No more than 15 degrees of flare.

This puts more emphasis on both the shoulders and triceps, which is fine. If you’re worried either will fatigue before the upper chest gets “enough” work, consider intensive pre-exhausting with any of the activation exercises listed above.

THE 242 PROGRAM

If you follow The 242 Method, here are some ideas:

Pick either the dumbbell or barbell incline presses as your main marriage lift.

On your low intensity days, pick any of the dumbbell exercises. Do them with a controlled tempo, short of failure. Focus on engorging the upper chest with blood. Get jacked. Simulate. Don’t annihilate. Incline squeeze presses, incline flies, unilateral dumbbell floor presses, and low to high flys all work well here. Try ‘em all. See what ones you can best get a mental connection with. Stick to higher reps .

THREE NOTES ON THE V PRESS

First, by nature of the movement, your lower back will be hyperextended. This freaks some people out. But old school pressers used to hyperextend the back a lot. I don’t find it a big deal as long as you do two things: squeeze the glutes and lock the abs. This creates a solid base to work from and will protect your spine.

Second, don’t just press up. Press out. I called it the V press because the angle of your body and arm form a “V” of sorts.  This hits another one of the upper chest’s functions: shoulder flexion.

Now, don’t go extreme. Too far out limits the weight you can use. The goal of the V Press isn’t activation, it’s overload. (As long as the upper chest is the muscle doing the main work.) This takes some experimentation, but you might only be pressing 5 degrees out of the vertical plane.

Third, don’t think of this exercise as a “jab.” Most people are jab pressers that drive movement from the triceps. If you’re privy to fighting, think of the V press as more of an uppercut. Don’t really focus on the “extension” part. Drive from the shoulder and upper chest.

Uppercut. Don’t jab. Maybe I should have called it the uppercut press?

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What do you think? Have any exercises that didn’t make the list? Any principles that I overlooked? I’d love to hear your opinion, so shoot a comment below.