It’s my blog – deal with it…….;o)

Nope, today’s post is going to have a bit more of an introspective feel or flavor to it.  Which, coincidentally, after Mint Oreo, is my second favorite flavor of ice-cream.

The impetus behind today’s post stems from something I read over on writer Jeff Goins’ site, which happens to be one of my favorite blogs dealing with the whole topic of  writing and how much of a cluster**** that can be.

Yesterday he had a pretty cool guest post by a guy named Darrell Vesterfelt on the whole notion of faking it till you make it.

Not to play all spoiler king or anything, but this guy Darrell?  He’s not a fan.

I’ll let you read the actual post if you’re interested, but to give a brief gist: in the world of social media, where some are constantly under pressure to be “on,” it often breeds an environment where there’s a lot of pressure to perform.  As a result this whole notion of faking it till you make it rears its ugly head.

Speaking honestly, I do believe there’s a time and place where this sentiment is perfectly justified. For example, with each intern class that comes to Cressey Performance, many of them, not surprisingly, are wet under the ears and a wee bit intimidated or overwhelmed when tossed underneath the proverbial microscope and asked to coach someone how to squat or to take someone through an entire training session.

Maybe even doubly so when asked to do so with either myself, Eric, or any of other coaches watching their every step.

Upon their initial orientation we let every intern understand that they’re not going to be “supervised” 24/7 and that we encourage a bit of autonomy.  By that same token we expect them to be able to coach things like foam rolling, dynamic warm-up drills, or even a push-up well on day one.

As the days and weeks progress, and we’re able to coach them up ourselves, take them through a few staff-inservices, and engage them in more one-on-one scenarios, they’ll undoubtedly gain more confidence in their abilities.

On the off chance that a scenario arises where they have no idea what a certain exercise or movement is we often use the whole “fake it till you make it” mantra with them, because at the end of the day we want to ensure that our athletes and clients have confidence in THEM.

I mean, what does it say if an athlete looks at their program asks one of the interns what a certain exercise is and then said intern looks around, utters a bunch of “um’s” and “uh’s,” and then starts hyperventilating into a brown paper bag?

Of course we don’t want them making stuff up out of thin air – before you know it, people are juggling oranges on BOSU balls – and it might just be something as simple as taking a few moments to ask myself or any of the other CP staff a quick question.

But still, there IS a semblance of confidence that serves as a nice prerequisite to it all.

On the flip side, however, I think it says a lot when someone can recognize they don’t know what they’re talking about, that they don’t have all the answers, and that they don’t pretend to be someone they’re not.

Sadly, while not always, this is a sentiment that fails to catch on in the world of the internet.  Everyone is an expert or guru or world renowned.

Please, tell me, how can you label yourself “world renowned” when you still live with your parents? Better yet, how are you able to give yourself such an acclaimed title when you’ve only been training people for less than six months?

Perusing the internet you’d think everyone out there was training professional athletes, making six figures, and writing the next best e-book on how to get the abz.

While this may be the case for some, clearly, people tend to be giving themselves a little too much credit.

Hell, I’ll throw myself under the bus.  I’m often asked how I became so successful and how I was able to build a respectable following through my blog and other social media outlets?

Here’s the cold truth:  I still have student debt (not a lot, but I still have it.  And thankfully, that’s the ONLY debt I have). I still drive my beat up Hyundai Elantra that I bought back in 2002. It’s 500 miles away from hitting 200,000 total, the check engine light has been on for the past three years, and it’s a wonder that I haven’t been ticketed for noise pollution when driving it through the city.

Based off the reaming I received my dental hygienest yesterday, I don’t nearly floss enough.  Oops.

I’m scared to death of putting myself out there and taking risks. I’m constantly asked when I’m going to be writing a book or producing my own fitness content, and while I’ve made strides to do both (ahem, Muscles Imbalances Revealed – Upper Body and Spinal Health & Core Training Seminar), there’s still half of me that seemingly bullies the other half into holding back.

I’m not infallible, and contrary to some, I’m not world renowned.  Far from it.

But don’t get me wrong, I’m good at what I do and feel I’m better than the average cat.  But I try not to pull off any self illusions of grandeur in the process.

But I think it’s that “realness” and non-sense of entitlement that often gravitates people to this blog, and my writing in general.

As Darrell pointed out in his post linked above:

Real connection happens when – and only when – you’re completely honest.

There are plenty of people out there who brag about their 400+ lb bench press.  It’s amazing how many people out there are elite benchers.  I can count on one hand the total number of people I’ve seen bench press over 400 lbs – and that includes a year of training at South Side Barbell in Stratford, CT  back in the day (circa 2005-2006) alongside some ginormous, very strong dudes.

Note:  South Side Barbell no longer exists.

Want to know something else about me?  I HATE benching. Pretty blasphemous words coming from a strength coach, right?

This isn’t to say I don’t find value in the lift, recognize there’s a lot of efficacy towards its use, and go out of my way to coach it well.  It’s just for me personally, I’d rather go to a Zumba class than bench press.

My best bench is 315 lbs, and if you held a gun to my head today I’d be lucky to eek out a rep at 285.  Paltry numbers compared to most.  Especially on the internet.

I can DL like a mofo, though.

If there’s anything I can relay to people out there reading – especially those who are looking to write a (successful) blog – it’s this:  STOP BEING FAKE!!!!!!!!

Nothing trumpets this sentiment more than THIS heartfelt, humorous, REAL blog post I came across recently by Erika Heidewald.

Erika used to write about how “healthy” she was, when what she was really doing was hiding her eating disorder from family and friends the entire time.

This parallels much of what I see in the e-world.  Where people take on another persona altogether in order to convey a certain image or hold onto some standard.

If you don’t actually train people (like, in real life) why do you write about how to train people?  Sadly, this happens more often than you think.

If you write about a certain way to eat – whether it’s Paleo, Intermittent Fasting, high fat, no fat, replacing all calorie laden drinks with unicorn tears, whatever – and don’t follow the same “rules” yourself……………..like, WTF!?!?!?!?!?

Note:  I actually know of a popular fitness personality who has written several best selling diet books who admitted – to a friend of mine – that he never follows his own advice.  Pretty shady.

If you haven’t ever actually performed the OLY lifts, why are you espousing their benefits or calling people out if they don’t include them themselves?

If you’ve never trained a female athlete, what makes you an authority on “female specific training?” Does such a thing even exist?

If, if, if, if, if, if.  I could easily keep going.

If dingle berries were diamonds, I could open a Kay Jewelers in my pants.

HA – count it!

All of this to say, sometimes, it’s best to NOT fake it till you make it and actually just own up to who you really are.  Is that so bad?

For those who aren’t familiar, here’s a brief introduction:

1.  He’s a strength coach as well as the Medical & Rehabilitation coordinator at World Health, located in Edmonton, Alberta.

2.  He’s a regular contributing author on T-Nation.com, as well as writes a pretty kick-ass blog HERE.

3.  He’s the co-contributor to several DVD compilations such the Muscles Imbalances Revealed series (both the lower and upper body versions), as well as the Spinal Health and Core Training Seminar of which I was part of as well.

4.  He can deadlift in the mid-400s (and 500 is just around the corner).

5.  His wife, Lindsay, is an accomplished tri-athlete and has recently qualified for world competition over in Europe!

6.  He owns two dogs, and loves rainbows.

Okay, I made the rainbow part up. But come on: I had to bust his chops in some way.

Dean just released his brand spankin new product, Post Rehab Essentials 2.o today, and I wanted to give people more of an inside scoop as to what to expect from it.

Unlike most sequels, which suck (yeah, I’m talking to you The Hangover Part II), PRE 2.0 really takes the information offered in the first edition and takes it to another level.

Speaking candidly, I’ve only just started to watch the videos myself, but from what I’ve seen thus far – I’m pumped that this information is going to be making its rounds.  It’s undoubtedly going to make people (and the industry as a whole) better!

I can’t even begin to tell you how much I was nodding my head in agreement as I was watching the first section. It got to the point where I was high-fiving my computer screen.

Nevertheless, below is a candid interview that Dean and I did the other day which, outside of discussing the product itself, is chock full of knowledge bombs in of itself.

Enjoy!

TG: Dean! Okay, lets cut to the chase:  I know you’re an Oilers fan, but they unfortunately didn’t make it to the playoffs.  Are there any teams left on the docket that you’re rooting for?

Side Note for a little TG Trivia: I for one, have never been to an NHL hockey game, and while the Bruins are still in the chase, sadly, the only time I’ve ever stepped foot in TD Garden (where both the Bruins and Celtics play) was for a live Star Wars in Concert event.

Literally there was a live orchestra playing music from Star Wars with a giant screen playing scenes from all the movies in the background.  Upping he geek-factor ante, Anthony Daniels (who plays C3PO in all the films) was there in person narrating the event.

Too, Lisa dressed her hair up in Princess Leia “buns,” and we had our picture taken with a live StormTrooper.

It was pretty much the greatest day in my life. True story.

DS:  Funny enough, I’m probably one of the very few Canadians who not only doesn’t play hockey but never even learned how to skate. I only started watching hockey a few years ago and didn’t even know what offside was until 2010.

That being said, I do watch the Oilers when they play because it gives some good water cooler talk while I’m training clients. Plus, I may or may not be eventually working with them directly in the coming seasons, and recently had a chance to do all the exit testing on the entire team for this current season, which was pretty cool.

I just want a Canadian team to win so that Montreal has something less to cheer about as they were the last Canadian team to win the cup back in 1994 (I think).

TG:  So, I was a huge fan of the first edition of Post Rehab Essentials, and I really felt it was a product that helped me better understand the assessment process as well as hone my programming writing skills. Like a ninja.

First off:  what was the impetus behind releasing a second, more awesomer version?

What does this version contain that the other didn’t?

And Secondly:  what do “we” actually mean when we use the term “post rehab?”

DS: Awesome questions. Much like you, I train people all day long and do things like writing and blogs on the side. I try to stay up on research as much as possible given the number of hours in a day, and try to view my own clientele as a cross section of average people, in which I can test to see if certain things provide better benefits or worse.

If something doesn’t seem to hold up across the board, I toss it out. If it’s something that’s universally effective for the vast majority of my clients, I continue to use it. When I put out the first version, my thinking of how the body worked was in one place. This current version represents the refinement of those thought process and includes a broader implementation of the concepts instead of spending as much time talking about the theory and anatomy.

That’s still there, but I wanted to make this more of a hands-on version.

For your second part, post rehab essentially means once you’ve received medical contact and have been cleared to begin a workout program in a guided setting.

Think of if you go into a chiropractor with a really sore back. They crack you, and send you out. You go into the gym not knowing whether you can do your favourite exercise program of high volume leg presses, stiff leg deadlifts and elbow to knee crunches.

What do you do? You find someone who has gone through Post Rehab Essentials V.2.0 to make sure they have tools to work with that won’t cause them to become a walking bag of fail.

TG:  Since this is a product that’s targeted towards personal trainers and coaches (and for those who are just fitness nerds in general), where do you feel most tend to miss the boat with regards to writing effective programming?

DS: Another great question. I feel that trainers have forgotten how to coach. We’re more concerned with giving the exercise than teaching the client how to do it properly. Stu McGill has said there’s no bad exercise for the spine, just contraindicated ones for the specific individual, and even then every exercise is bad if done incorrectly.

This video series brings back the coaching aspect to training and helps you understand how to get someone out of a poor spinal position with their exercises, how to hip hinge, what it means when their shoulders shrug into their ears, and how to fix that. These simple fixes can represent about 90% of every training program.

Correct exercise is corrective in nature.

TG:  OMG!!  Yes!!!  I couldn’t have said that better myself.  Whenever we start with a new intern class almost always they want to dive into assessment on day #1.  Much like you I’m under the mindset that they need to LEARN HOW TO COACH, and do it well, before we start discussing the finer points like assessing hip IR/ER or discussing the differences between flexion vs. extension based back pain.

One of the main points you covered in PRE 2.0 that really hit home for me is the whole concept of protective tension.  Put another way: people aren’t nearly as “tight” and stiff as they think more as they’re actually just really, and I mean REALLY unstable.

Can you kinda give everyone a Cliff Notes/Laymen’s terms synopsis of this whole phenomena?

DS: Muscles are pretty dumb creatures. They’re the slave of the nervous system, and if the brain says to contract, they will. If it doesn’t say to contract, they won’t. It’s really that simple. If you have a muscle that is constantly “tight” and won’t release no matter how much work you do to it with respect to stretching or SMR work, you may need to ask why it’s tight in the first place. Typically it’s trying to provide some form of stability for another area that isn’t being held tight enough.

Think of the hip flexors as a classic example. I’ve found that when people who have chronically tight hip flexors, they also tend to have very unstable spines coupled with weak abs. The same thing goes for tight posterior hips and lateral core stability.

Note from TG:  For those looking for a cool demonstration of what we’re talking about, I’d HIGHLY encourage you to watch the video below.  It’s eleven or so minutes that will blow your mind.

TG: Breathing and breathing patterns are all the rage in the industry nowadays.  I’ll admit that we use a fair share of them at Cressey Performance and that we find there’s a TON of efficacy for their implementation.

I’ve seen firsthand the kind of voo-doo magic that breathing drills and diaphragmatic correction can have on many common injuries and dysfunctions.  

What do you feel are the major benefits/take-aways that most people can gain from paying more attention to them?

DS: Core stability comes from the interplay of the pelvic floor, diaphragm, obliques, rectus abdominis, and multifidus (plus quadratus lumborum, but who’s counting). When you want to have a stable spine to lift stupidly heavy things, having the ability to squeeze your core tight between these structures is incredibly important. Likewise, recovering from hard workouts comes down to breathing through your entire lung deeply, rather than just shallow breathing through your upper ribs and shoulders.

But only under two conditions:

1.  That I’d have a fair amount of autonomy and be able to focus my writing towards universal themes such as placing a premium on strength as well as having the opportunity to teach/coach people on proper exercise technique (in addition to addressing common myths and fallacies such as squatting deep is bad for your knees or that Keanu Reeves is somehow, somewhere, considered a good actor.)

2. That they’d include a link to my blog on my bio page.  Their Alexa ranking (a site which ranks websites off of traffic and popularity) is 693 in the world!

That’s a crap load of traffic!

So, in case there’s anyone new visiting the site today – welcome! Hopefully you’ll stay around awhile…;o)

Nonetheless, I submitted my article last week and it’s already up – so they must have thought it was sorta good.

Squat Like a Boss: Learn How to Correct These Three Most Common Mistakes

So far the responses it’s been receiving has been great, and I’m really happy to see that many who have read it are on the same page as myself.

They’re obviously very smart and good looking….;o)

That said there have been numerous comments on MY comment concerning head positioning during the squat, and I’d like to take a few moments to address it.

A handful of people were a bit perplexed that I advocated to NOT look up when squatting.  Apparently all their football coaches told them otherwise, and then I had to come out of no where and ruin their world…..;o)

By that same token, some felt (and misinterpreted) that what I was actually advocating was for people to look down, which is also false.

In short, as coaches and fitness professionals, we’re constantly stressing the importance of maintaining the spine’s natural  curvature (a certain amount of lordosis in the lumbar spine, and kyphosis in the upper spine) while training.

In my experience coaching people to look up and to hyperextend their cervical spine isn’t a great idea in the grand scheme of things.  We’re always telling people not to deadlift or squat with a rounded LOWER back (which is part of the spine last time I checked) for fear of compromising its integrity and causing injury.

Why, then, is it perfectly okay to disregard the cervical spine?  Do we not want to prevent anything bad from happening in our neck?

Simply put, and as renowned strength coach and therapist Charlie Weingroff has repeatedly stated, maintaining a neutral or “packed neck/chin tucked” posture while squatting or deadlifting is a fantastic way to not only prevent injury, but it also makes you more stable, which in turn will allow you to lift more weight.

And as we all know when you lift more weight, you’re more capable to fighting off zombies when they inevitably attack. It’s standard procedure, really.

This teeny tiny deviation from the norm may throw people off guard, and it will definitely take some practice and some getting used to if you’re not accustomed to it, but in the long run it will pay huge dividends as far as overall squatting performance.

Outside of that, give the article a read and let me know what you think!

I’ll admit, though, I often caught glimpses of Star Trek: The Next Generation on tv and thought Capt. Jean Luc Picard was pretty bad ass. But alas, he was no Han Solo.

Suffice it to say once I heard (back in 2008) that the nerd of all nerds, JJ Abrams, was going to helm the next reboot of Star Trek I was intrigued.  To me Abrams can do no wrong, and like the baller that he is – he delivered.

His re-envisioning of Star Trek – updating the characters (albeit maintaining the quirks and inside jokes of the old series) along with all the mind-blowing special effects – really revitalized a dying franchise and won over a treasure trove of new fans.

Myself included.

I’m sure at some point this weekend Lisa and I will be making a cameo appearance at the cinemaplex.  The only question remains is whether or not she’ll allow me to wear my Spock ears to the showing?

Totally not kidding.

Alright, lets get to the stuff you should read.

Oh, before I get into that I want to remind everyone that you only have until TOMORROW (Saturday, May 18th) to take advantage of the sale (48% off the regular price) that Eric Cressey has placed on his renowned program, Show and Go:  High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better.

If you’re in a training rut, in a programming flux, or are just kinda going through the motions, this program is about as close as you can get to training at Cressey Performance without actually training there.

Well that, and techno Thursdays…..;o)

Okay, for real this time – here’s some stuff you should read:

Food Freakshow – Brian St. Pierre

Here’s a very interesting piece written by former CP coach, Brian St. Pierre, on the current state of affairs of our food – as well as what’s in store for the future.

Meat grown in test tubes?

Insects as an awesome source of protein?

Cows modified to produce human breast milk?

Surprisingly, this is NOT science-fiction, but things that are actually happening or going to happen.

The Truth About The 7-Minute Workout – Adam Bornstein

This was an EXCELLENT rebuttal/dose of reality written by Adam (with a supporting role by Brad Schoenfeld) on the shadiness behind the current “research” regarding the 7-Minute Workout craze that’s currently making its way through the mainstream media.

By now many of you have undoubtedly heard on the news or in the magazines that all you need to do is “workout” seven minutes a day in order to attain the body (and health) you’ve always wanted.

Adam and Brad peel back the stupid and let it be known that there’s a litany of flaws with this so-called “study,” and that all it takes is a little common sense to smell the BS.

“All I Do is Teach People to Pick Up Heavy Things” (Yeah Right:  You’re Doing So Much More Than That) – Dr. Justin Rabinowitz

In this article the good Doc uses a nice parallel between the book The Power of Habit (which I’d HIGHLY recommend to everyone) and how what we do as fitness professionals has far more reaching benefits than just teaching them to exercise properly.

SPOILER ALERT:  this is going to be one of those rants.

I’ve been working as a trainer and coach for well over a decade now working with various females – short, tall, skinny, overweight, athletic,  blue-collar, white-collar, Team Jacob, Team Edward – helping them achieve “the look.”

What “the look” entails I’m not exactly sure, as different women have different goals and different viewpoints on what they’d prefer to look like.

More often than not, though, for most, it just comes down to feeling and looking better, and not being bashful at rocking a strapless dress whenever the time calls for it.

Or, to put it more succinctly (and a tad less narcissistic):  just becoming the best version of YOU that you can be regardless of sexiness factor or societal standards.

If I had to narrow it down to one celebrity who gets the most “Yeah, I want to look like her” nods it would undoubtedly go towards Mrs. Justin Timberlake (AKA: Jessica Biel), circa whenever it was she did that redunkulous spread in GQ Magazine.

Don’t shoot the messenger!  I’m just stating that in my experience this is “the look” which many women I’ve worked with have gravitated towards.

But again, it’s just one example and doesn’t represent a universal mindset – so please, please, PLEASE don’t mistake this as me saying “hey ladies, this is what you should look like!”

Because at the end of the day, it’s about you, not me.

But here’s the deal: it’s a fairly well known fact that Jessica is a very active person who routinely lifts weights, plays sports, and leads a healthy lifestyle.  Or, at least that’s what all the magazine articles and interviews tells us.

Her celebrity status aside, I look at her and see a full-figured, athletic woman who doesn’t look frail, weak, emaciated, or the second coming of that creepy skeleton looking guy from Tales of the Crypt.

Unfortunately, many (not all) women are under the impression that in order to achieve said look they have to diet for months (if not years on end), do copious amounts of long-duration, steady-state cardio, and avoid lifting weights like the plague.

To justify my point – especially with regards to the dieting side of things – Elizabeth Walling had an amazing guest post over on Nia Shanks’ blog the other day on the stress and damage caused by chronic “dieting.”

To steal a quote:

We’re often given the impression by the diet industry and mainstream media that dieting and metabolic health go together like peas and carrots. But in reality, most diet plans that claim to boost your metabolism are really just low-calorie deprivation diets in disguise. Just a quick internet search reveals a disturbing trend: these diet plans that promise to raise your metabolism often recommend eating as little as 1000-1400 calories a day.

I don’t think it’s wrong for me to say that many women fall into this trap (guys do too, by the way) and often end up stuck in this never ending cycle of dieting, feeling like poop, not getting ideal results, dieting some more, feeling even more like poop,  not getting results, and well, you get the idea.

They’ll hop on the scale – as if that’s somehow the end-all-be-all panacea of health – and see that they’ve made little (if any) headway in terms of the number going down, feel even more desperate and frustrated and repeat the cycle over and over and over again.

Why doesn’t dieting typically work?  To steal another quote from Elizabeth:

Because the body views dieting as a famine (it doesn’t know what a bikini is or why you’d want to starve yourself to wear one). The body detects a lack of energy coming from food, so it turns to alternative energy sources to cope with the shortage. And how does the body access alternative energy sources? By releasing stress hormones.

And while it’s much more complicated than this (I’m going to refrain from going into the actual physiology), the body will go into “preservation mode” and start storing fat to stave off a perceived threat.

As such, many women will continue this perpetual cycle, jump on the scale expecting that all their suffering will somehow lead to weight loss, only to be disappointed, pissed off, frustrated, and thiiiiiiis close to punching a kitten in the mouth.

True story.

On the training side of the equation, we typically have the treadmill/Zumba class/step-aerobics/ avoid lifting weights at all costs camp.

Listen, I’m not here to bash “cardio.” I recognize that it’s part of the equation and that any well-rounded fitness/health routine will include some (key word: some).

That said, 100% of the time I feel it’s drastically overemphasized and could be more deleterious than beneficial.  While I don’t want to go into the semantics here and start WWIII, I’ll just defer to an excellent (albeit controversial) article that John Kiefer wrote a while back titled Women: Running Into Trouble.

With that little song and dance out of the way I’ll admit it:  I’m biased.  I’m a strength coach, so of course I’m going to be adamant that women actually lift weights.  Appreciable weights.  None of this soup can/pink-dumbbell high rep nonsense.

Listen: If you want to change how your body looks – like, in a “holy shit, did I go to high school with you?” kind of way – you actually have to put forth some effort.

You need to actually provide enough of a stress to make it change.

Deep down, do you really think that lifting a weight that weighs less than your purse is going to do anything as far as body composition goes?

Come on, really?

No seriously, really?

You get out of it what you put in. If you lift light weights, your body is going to represent that fact: You’ll look frail and weak.

Maybe that’s what you want.  And if so, more power to you. I guess.  But I doubt that’s the case.

Now I’m not saying women have to lift weights so that they can win a knife fight in a back alley or challenge The Rock to an arm wrestling match, but I can’t stress enough how crucial it is to, you know, actually challenge the body and work.

Only then will you see the fruits of your labor.

Which is why I’d much rather see women focus more on strength/performance based goals rather than the scale to gauge progress/success.

Without getting overly technical, one lb of muscle weighs the same as one lb of fat, albeit takes up 25% less space. This is why you will often see contestants on the television show “The Biggest Loser” weigh the same as many professional athletes, despite being the twice the size.

Following a resistance training program helps build muscle which increases strength and firmness. Aside from that, muscle is also metabolically active tissue which will also helps you burn more fat. In essence, someone might see very little overall weight loss or even GAIN weight in order to achieve “the look.”

The latter is especially true for petite women.

As an example, a 5 foot 4 ,140 lb woman with 25% body fat wants to look leaner and achieve that “toned” look. I just threw up a little in my mouth using the word toned, but I’ll run with it to get my point across.

She wants those flabby arms to go away and she wants to fit into those pair of jeans that she used to wear back in college. To do so, this particular woman feels she should lose weight and get down to 110-115 lbs through restrictive dieting and copious amounts of cardio. If she takes that course, she may look thinner, but at the expense of looking like a smaller, weaker version of her original self.

Conversely, let’s take the right course instead.

Six months later the same 5’4” woman has followed a resistance training program (which is also great for strengthening bones and preventing osteoporosis), changed her diet to include more healthy fats (fish oil, nuts, avocado, olive oil, butter, coconut oil, etc) protein (ie: chicken breast, lean beef, eggs, cottage cheese, whey protein shakes) and less refined carbohydrates (ie: cereal bars, bagels, 100 calorie snack foods), and most importantly, she threw away her scale.

She made more QUALITATIVE goals and challenged herself to work up to being able to do five, un-assisted chin-ups as well as deadlift 200 lbs.

Mind you:  when she started, she wasn’t even close to doing ONE chin-up, and could barely deadlift 100 lbs without shitting a liver.

Now she’s 135 lbs with 18% body fat. She lost eleven lbs of fat and gained six lbs of lean muscle, for a net loss of only five lbs.

But she looks like she lost 15 lbs. She’s not “skinny-fat.” She’s stronger and healthier. And she can fit into those jeans no less!

Using a more real life example, here’s a before/after pic that’s made its way around the internet which I feel gets the message across pretty concretely:

Most women would faint at the notion of GAINING nine lbs, but try to tell me that the after picture doesn’t look like she LOST weight?

You see:  the scale only measure QUANTITATIVE progress.  For some, especially those who are morbidly obese and need to lose weight for health reasons, it makes sense to track weight using the scale.  For everyone else, however, it’s nothing more than mind f***.

Seeing the number on a scale go down doesn’t really tell you the QUALITY of weight being lost. As noted above, many will sacrifice muscle – which I’d argue you want to keep as much of as possible – in lieu of just seeing a loss. Any loss.

Hell, losing weight is easy.

1.  Don’t drink any water for a day.

2.  Go to the bathroom and drop it like it’s hot.

Problem solved.

See what I mean? Seeing a number dip on the scale doesn’t tell you the quality of the weight being lost.

And just to save face, as I noted above, for some, using the scale makes sense. Those who need to lose weight for health reasons would be high on the list.

Likewise, I’d even go so far as to say that those who take more of a Curious George approach and are very inquisitive or “in tune” with their bodies (think: physique athletes) would fall into this camp as well.

For most, they just want to see what variables – following a certain diet plan (low carb/high carb, intermittent fasting, Paleo?) or exercise routine (5/3/1, body part splits)  - will do as far as fluctuations in their body weight.

This even applies to those who don’t compete, too.

As an example, I was having this conversation with one of my female clients, Claudia, who mentioned not too long ago how if she has a heavy salted meal the night prior, it’s not uncommon for her weight to go up 5 lbs (or more) the following day.

She likes to fiddle with “stuff” and see what affects her weight.

But she knows better and won’t jump in front a mack truck if she sees the scale go up a few lbs. She understands that if she gets back on task, the weight will go away after a few days.

To her credit, Claudia, who’s 48, always (and I mean always) stresses performance based goals over the scale.  Here she is crushing an EXTRA set of softball grip pull-ups after performing four sets prior:

And you know what?  I garner a guess that there’s plenty of women HALF her age who would kill to have her body.

Did I mention she’s 48?

She’s 48.

[And yes, I had permission to divulge her age]

Closing Up Shop

Many women make the mistake of equating progress with the number on the scale going down. If they don’t see the number going down on a weekly basis, they feel they’re failing. Let me make this simple. The scale can be very misleading and in a lot of ways, invalid.

How do you know the weight you’re losing is fat and not valuable muscle?

You should be more concerned with what the mirror is telling you. Are you losing inches around the body? Do your clothes fit better?  Are you lifting more weight now compared to two months ago?  Can you bang out ten crisp push-ups whereas before you could barely do one?

Perhaps these results are less quantifiable and harder to notice, however, the sooner you realize that these are better indicators of progress, the better off you will be.

This isn’t to say the above is an all encompassing mentality either.  I realize that there are extenuating circumstances, and that utilizing the scale does have some merit. But for 95% of the women who are reading this post, it doesn’t correlate to much.

Actionable Item

Do yourself a favor:  for TWO months ditch the scale.  Give yourself a goal. It could be squatting “x” weight for “y” reps, improving bench press technique, performing your first chin-up, doing a handstand!  Anything!  Whatever you do, just focus on that instead.

Don’t let the scale dictate your mindset.

Two months. Thats it. (<======= DO IT!!!)

As a funny aside, speaking of contact sports, I had a very brief history playing football back in the day.  I tried out for the football team in 7th grade and lasted a week.

After getting crushed for five straight days I handed in my helmet and pads and decided I’d rather collect baseball cards and play wiffleball in my backyard.

Nonetheless, Shannan offered to write a guest post and thought the theme he came up with was spot on to a lot of what I write about on this site.  Which is:  yeah, you’re hurt.  But that doesn’t mean you still can’t train.  Learn to make lemonade out of lemons!

Enjoy!

It’s 3.45pm and you receive a call.

Client

“I am just calling to let you know that I got crunched at training last night and am only just able to walk. I am going to have to cancel todays session at 4”

A few things go through your head…

-Is this just a cop out?

-Hmmmm, it is lower body day? I’ll go to hell if he doesn’t deadlift.

Your response

“That’s ok mate, come on in I will tweak the session for you”.

Being able to adjust on the fly or even plan in and around injuries is an extremely important aspect of a coach’s job. Tony has brought it up before on here, and I am going to shed some further light into creating a positive training response while recovering or dealing with the mud that life throws at you.

As with the above example, to have the session off and do nothing would rarely be the best option.

Life is going to get in your way.

I don’t have much energy today, My car broke down, My knee hurts, My nose is snuffly, I am still sore from Monday, My Doctor said to rest, my mum said I’m special, I think I’m coming down with something, I finished work at 5.10 instead of 5, I think I slept on my arm weird, my neck hurts……………And it goes on..

I think we all can relate to something above, I know I can. Mainly the special one!

Each and every individual is unique in what they present, and that is how programming should be approached.

Now just so you know upfront, I am not a physical therapist or a physio and therefore do not treat pain. I work with other professionals to get the best outcome for everyone we have contact with. It is always best to understand what the actual injury is, or what the limitation is before you start tinkering with exercises. So if in doubt seek professional advice initially and build from there.

What I can do is shed some light on is how to incorporate smart training and programming while you feel all busted up and helpless or just in need of some immediate action points that you can incorporate to keep progressing and moving forward.

Quick Story of a client of mine.

-Debilitating and season ending low back injury from over arching and sharp movement of throwing a football.

(Not quite the same throw in, but amusing anyway)

There wasn’t much initially that didn’t hurt. Bending, leaning, twisting, running all aggravated and stopped him from playing.

12 months later he is 10kg heavier, broad jump and vertical jump has increased, deadlifting and squatting is completely pain free and now a dominant figure sitting smack bam in the mid field. Cutting, turning, jumping, sprinting is all fair game.

Below I will outline some tips for you not just in how I approached the above client, but how you can do so with yourself and your injury/mishap.

Because, as Tony always says, you can ALWAYS train around an injury.  Always

Whatever you do it must be pain free

I think this goes without saying, but it does warrant a mention. I have heard it time and time again, and I will also say it.

IF IT HURTS, DON’T DO IT…

It does not matter if it is the number 1 exercise that your specialist or favourite guru said you should be doing. If it causes you pain or discomfort, stop it….Now!

There is always an alternative.

It won’t put you right off track if you need to sub in some Barbell hip bridges instead of your beloved deadlifts. If it means pain free, and creates a positive effect, well I am all for it.

For example do lunges hurt your knee? First off: try doing them properly. That’s a novel idea, right?

A lot of the time this alleviates some issues. I won’t go into correct form in this post, but it’s safe to say that there is a ton of info on this site that you can go back through.

Note from TG:  In fact, you can always perfect your RDL….(hint, hint).

If that’s still no good, go through a pain free range. Or as an example try these Low Co-Contraction Lunges with Anterior Pull. These allow you to feel more controlled and keep more of a vertical tibia therefore performing the exercise more effectively.

Start Point: With your right hand on Vastus Medialis (teardrop shaped muscle) and left hand on your glute and your right butt cheek squeezed hard, lift yourself off the ground a few cm.

Mid Point-End Point: Raise up stopping shy of lock out. This will keep tension throughout and reduce the range. Be prepared for the burns, and an intense stretch through your trail leg. This is fantastic to engrain 90/90 position and give instant feedback on what muscles should be working.

The point is even if it’s a magic exercise, it’s not magic for you if it hurts or aggravates an issue.

Focus on what can do, rather then what you can’t

This piggy backs on the above, but it definitely is worth mentioning.

Accept that you may not be able to perform your heavy squatting pattern for the time being, and focus on what movement you can do to create a training effect.

This is exactly the process that I went through when I broke my fibula and dislocated my ankle being tackled. Write down a list of movements that can be done pain free, and focus on these.

Can’t squat/deadlift/lunge due to injured/stiff/recovering ankle: Maybe it’s a time to hammer on your glutes and hamstrings through various supine based exercises. Lean on the cautious side and build up.

I recently just had a client who outstretched to catch a ball and his ankle blew up to balloon status. We had sumo deadlifts programmed, but ended up starting out with plenty of upper body as well as quadruped glute work, glute bridges, single leg glute work, strap leg curls and went up from there.

After a few weeks we worked up to barbell glute bridges, and now as ankle mobility has nearly been regained I am confident, as he is to slowly incorporate some standing work.

Here he is with some warm up sets on the BB glute bridge.

Try incorporating some DB pressing variations and a lot of pushup progressions, while hammering and bringing up your back strength. There is hyuuuggeee variety to use.

For example we have successfully regressed back to single arm fat grip floor presses with a neutral grip (mouthful I know) pain free. This still lends itself to some heavy lifting, while respecting the body.

Pushup variations allowing the scapula to freely move are an integral part of a complete program as well. You won’t die if some extra pushups are programmed. You may actually feel better.

It never hurts to incorporate more back/upper back work into the mix all year round too. A 2:1, sometimes a 3:1 ratio of pulling to pushing can help regain some normality in your posture and any strength deficits you may have.

Some pressing variations that tend to give the shoulders a bit more room to breathe and be a bit more joint friendly are DB floor pressing variations, Tucked neutral grip pressing exercises, ½ kneeling cable/band presses, standing split stance cable/band presses, ½ or tall kneeling corner presses. There’s more this just gets you to think outside the norm.

This variation is great as the resistance is low on the shoulder, and it is an angled press. So therefore we get a fatter grip, neutral hand position and varying resistance all while the glute is on and we get a bit of anti-extension throughout. Perfecto!

Don’t forget the other limb

There are times when being couch or bed ridden is unavoidable. Although when you are able to be up and moving around, there is then also the chance to begin to start the process in moving forward.

When we injure ourselves, or something doesn’t go quite as planned we can feel quite defeated and mentally drained.

With my ankle injury I wasn’t going to let both my legs turn to jelly and lose everything I had gained. Having 3 surgerys over a 12 month period I needed some avenues to keep me mentally and physically on top of things.

The results of the carry over were positive. Training the other limb has a slight carry over in strength and muscle control.

Choose exercises you can do, and do so with a slowly progressing volume. Most exercises can be done single side loaded or off set loaded.

On a note on stretching here is a hip flexor stretch I had to use when I couldn’t put pressure on my left foot. It worked a treat, and I used it frequently.

(All the pressure is taken off the front foot).

Hit the other half of your body hard

If you are someone who trains 4-6 times per week and can’t bare the thought of missing scheduled training sessions, then don’t.

What we can forget is that although we are injured, and recovery is number one at times, we still have 80-90% of our body to train. That’s a big chunk to me. Don’t let 10-20%  get you right off track with everything.

Get your meathead on and add in a varying upper body session. Alter the rep ranges, and go for it. Maybe even add some arms in there. I won’t judge.

If it’s your upper body, add in a lower body conditioning session, or some extra lower bodyweight exercises.

If your ankle/knee is playing up and you can’t join in team training sessions, try incorporating some battle rope conditioning sessions to jack the heart rate, and minimise joint stress.

Try these battle rope variations to keep it interesting and challenging. Not all will be able to used if you can’t walk forward or backwards but you get the idea.

Check List to kick A#*when injured and recovering

I wanted to provide you with a list to go over and sift through, and take note of what you are doing/can do/and will do to make the transition from where you currently are, to where you want to be.

- When in doubt, seek professional advice and determine your injury/restriction

- Focus on what you can do, what you can’t is not important and irrelevant

-List movements you can do pain free. Think in terms of horizontal push/pull, vertical push/pull, squat, hinge, isolation.

-What would you like to achieve in the next 2,4,8,24,52 weeks that you may be recovering etc

-Do you have any weaknesses/imbalances that you can work on and bring up?

-How many days per week do you want to train/ or can train?

-Do you have some opposite limb exercises to perform to carry over to the injured side?

-Omit the days of your current program that you can’t do, or tweak the exercises so you can do them

-Add in some pain free conditioning/metabolic methods to utilise if this is what is needed

-Surround yourself with positive people, and a powerful network that can help you when necessary

-Remain positive and know that this is short term and you can get back to your normal regime when it’s time.

Being injured and recovering takes a new skill set and different approach to training and lifestyle. Some small tweaks to your current plan, and you can remain on track, keep some normality and sanity and in general feel good that you are doing something to benefit not hinder the process.

If you have any questions, pop them below.

About the Author

Shannan Maciejewski is a strength coach from Australia and the founder of Raw Fitness and Sports Training located in Ballina NSW.

He has a strong passion for developing on and off field performance for football(soccer)players, and his no-nonsense approach and methods  produce long lasting results for many regular joes, individuals, athletes, and teams he works alongside.

He does not share the same passion for Star Wars as Tony though. Sorry!

Be sure to follow him on:

Website www.shannanmaciejewski.com

Facebook www.facebook.com/shannanmaciejewski

Football Specific Page www.facebook.com/footballperformancesystem

While all of those things would be pretty awesome, what I have to share today could very well tear a hole into the space-time continuum and alter all of human existence.

Slight exaggerations aside, Dean Somerset and I are tentatively planning an East coast/kinda Northwesternish (like way up north, like where it’s only warm like twelve days out of the year north) coast two-day workshop later this summer and fall.

We’re shooting for a two-day workshop here in Boston later this summer (and again, up in Edmonton, Alberta in the fall) where we’ll target personal trainers, coaches, and fitness enthusiasts and open up Pandora’s Box to discussing everything from assessment to corrective exercise to program design. But more importantly our goal is to make this a very hands-on (non-creepy) workshop where we have minimal lecture and place more of a premium on coaching!

In Dean’s words:  ”We want people who attend to leave knowing about what we discussed, not just intellectually, but how to put it into action immediately when they return, and with enough competence to not have to refer back to notes while doing so.”

Like I said, we’re still in the initial planning stages but we’re excited as shit.  Read:  pretty excited.  I mean, Dean can’t contain himself!

That said, I’d still love for people to sound 0ff on this and let us know if there’s enough interest?

Due to space we’re going to keep this pretty exclusive and limit it to like 30-35 people.  Some candles, a little Sade playing in the background, some Femoral Acetabular Impingement talk.  Who knows where it will go…..;o)

Seriously though, who’s in?

More details to follow soon.

2.  Some other cool news.  For only the second time since its release, Eric Cressey is placing his flagship program, Show and Go: High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better on sale all this week until THIS Saturday (May 20th) at midnight.

Not that I need to sing its praises or anything, but the program is the bees knees.

I’ve seen with my own eyes countless people transform their bodies and make progress in the gym they never thought possible.  So if you’re still one of the few who have balked at trying it out for yourself, at 48% off the normal price you really have no excuse not give it a whirl.

3. As someone who routinely trumpets the message that women should can the Zumba classes and lift heav(ier) things, I’m always trying to relay top-notch, informative, POSITIVE material to the masses to help convey that same tone.

HERE is a fantastic blog post by Dave Hedges on why there’s really no such thing as a “women specific program.”

Fantastic job Dave!

4. And since I recognize that a fair share of women visit this site on a regular basis, here’s a litte Ryan Gosling for you.

I don’t know about you, but that video cracked me up!

5. And finally, keep your eyes peeled for a future TG original piece on BodyBuilding.com. The higher ups reached out to me last week asking if I’d be interested in contributing some content on a monthly basis, and I jumped at the opportunity.

Of course, my one prerequisite was that I’d be able to discuss the importance of getting stronger and that I wasn’t going to write about pec blasting, bicep pulverizing, or any other broscience shenanigans.

To that end, I just submitted my first article to them last night titled Top 3 Squat Mistakes.

Mistake #1:  What You Think is Proper Depth, Ain’t Even Close…….;o)

He asked if I’d be willing to provide some common cues I use given certain “issues” people have when trying to deadlift which would aid in correcting their technique.

[Places finger over said student's mouth]

Shhhhhhhh, you had me at deadlift.

What follows below is a candid/informal list I sent back highlighting my thoughts on more of the cueing side of things rather than the actual “correctives” (Ie: mobility drills, soft tissue restriction, chewing with your mouth closed, etc).

At the very least I figured it was something that could potentially help out others who may be looking to clean up their own technique.

And if it doesn’t, my bad.  I tried.

Lumbar Kyphosis

Depending on one’s kinesthetic awareness, this one can be tricky.  For those completely unaware of what their body is doing in space I’ll most likely take a more “hands-on,” non-Creepy McCreepypants approach – akin to what I call Play-Doh coaching.

Lets just say I’ve seen some trainers and coaches get a little too hands-on, if you’re catching my drift.

More often than one would think, you’re going to tell someone to “arch their back,” and then they’re going to look back at

you as if you’re speaking Klingon or have an extra nipple or something.  Not that you’d be showing off your nipples or anything, hence the whole creepy comment above, but I’m just trying to make a point.

They’ll literally have no idea or differentiation between lumbar flexion and what it means to arch their back.

FAIL========>

One trick I like to use is to place them on the floor in the quadruped position and have them perform the cat-camel.  I’ll have them round their back as much as possible and tell them that’s what I DO NOT want.

Sometimes, depending on the severity, I’ll place my hands on my head, scream as loud as I can “no no no no no no NO!” and then jump through a pane glass window.

You know, for a little more effect. That’ll get their attention…..;o)

Back in reality, though, I’ll then have them bring their spine back to neutral and tell them that’s what I’m looking for.  I’ll have them perform a few rounds of this just so that they’ll get a feel for what I want and who I’ll want them to set up to deadlift.

It’s pretty effective, and will work for most trainees.

Another one I’ll use is to tell them to emulate what a basketball player does on the court when he’s tired (bends over and places his hands on his knees). Almost always, they’ll drop right into a neutral spine position and then I’ll be like, “there!”  Now, keep that same spinal position and grab the bar.

Another thing to consider is just using a deadlift variation which allows them to be successful. I’ve long championed that what makes the deadlift so awesome is that it can be so easily catered to the lifter, and not vice versa.

This is a huge reason why I love the trap (hex) bar so much, as it lends itself to be a bit more user friendly compared to other deadlift variations.  This is especially true for those who lack ample ankle, hip, and t-spine mobility to get into proper position in the first place.

With the elevated handles (and the fact that their center of gravity is inside the bar), the trap lends itself very appropriately to beginners or those with postural limitations.

Anterior Weight Shift

The main culprit here is people wearing those cement blocks that they call shoes.  Many have a significant heel lift which shifts the body anteriorly and makes it much harder to engage the posterior chain (glutes and hamstrings).

In addition, wearing shoes also increases the distance the bar has to travel, so it bodes in one’s favor to just ditch them altogether.

If for some reason they train at a gym that sucks and won’t let them deadift barefoot, I’d highly recommend things like Chuck Taylor’s or the New Balance Minimus (which, as the name implies, is more of a “minimalist shoe).

Outside of that, much of the resolution here is engaging a proper hip hinge pattern.

Having the ability to break with the hips and engage a hip hinge pattern – without losing spinal position – is HUGE in this context.

My go-to drill is hinging with the dowel rod.  We’re looking for three points of contact – back of the head, in between the shoulder blades, and the sacrum.

If at any point the dowel rod loses contact with the body, you’re doing it wrong.

I may have them perform a set of 8-10 reps with the dowel rod, and then immediately have them walk over to the bar and try to emulate that same motion. We need to CEMENT the pattern with strength training.

Along those same lines, another drill I use sporadically is where I tell them to pretend I have a rope tied around their waist and that I’m standing behind them and when they start their descent to imagine that I’m pulling their hips back with the rope.

It sounds weird and far too simple – but it works.

Limited Dorsifexion

This is an often overlooked limitation, as you need roughly 15-20 degrees of ankle dorsiflexion in order to perform a squat, lunge, and deadlift pattern without any major compensation up the kinetic chain.

Your garden variety ankle mobility drills are going to work wonders here.

Knee Break Ankle Mobs:

Wall Ankle Mobs:

Band Hip IR/ER with Ankle Mob (kill two birds with one stone here):

Some other things to consider, however:

1.  We live in PLANTAR flexion. Think about all the women who wear high-heels day in and day out, not to mention the aforementioned “cement shoes” that a lot guys opt to wear.  I love high-heels as much as the next guy (looking at them, not wearing them.  Just wanted to clarify).

Oh……my……..god…..I love them so much…

…..but I can’t even begin to describe how much of a train wreck they are in terms of the compensation patterns they elicit. Everything from chronic low back pain to plantar fasciitis to bone spurs.

It’s pretty telling how much they mess women up, and I’m often advocating for most, when they can, to ditch the high heels in light of wearing a flatter shoe.

Likewise, for dudes, purchasing a more minimalist shoe will work wonders in the long run.

2.  Dedicated stretches for the gastrocs and soleus muscles are going to be imperative here as well.  Standing around in plantar flexion all day is going to light these muscles up, so taking some time to do some simple stretches would be advantageous.

3. On that same note, I’m willing to bet that most even sleep in plantar flexion!  It sounds excessive, but even something like utilizing a Strassburg Sock - which encourages more DORSIflexion while you sleep – pays huge dividends in the grand scheme of things.

As an aside, I’d also gravitate more towards trap bar and sumo variations for those with limited ankle dorsiflexion and those will be less problematic postions to get into.

Limited Glute Activation/Weakness

This one is pretty easy. I’ll often defer to my good friend, the glute-master himself, Bret Contreras and place a premium on glute activation drills prior to training whether it’s supine bridge variations, single-leg variations, etc.

In my mind, glute activation drills is something that most people can’t get enough of so I have no qualms telling people to do them every day, several times throughout the day.

The key, of course, is to ensure that they’re doing them correctly.  Again, proper coaching comes into play here.

Moreover, in the context of deadlift technique, you have to be cognizant of a few things as you’ll inevitably come across two common errors.

1.  Incomplete or no hip extension what-so-ever.

Note:  for some reason I didn’t have a video available for the DL, but Eric does a good job of showing incomplete hip extension with this squat variation.

2. Excessive HYPERextension (essentially using lumbar hyperextension for hip extension)

In both cases proper cueing is going to be paramount.

For the former I’ll typically tell them to “finish with glutes” or “hump the bar,” which usually gets the job done.  Also, depending my rapport with the client, I’ll literally place my hands around their pelvis and try to encourage more posterior pelvic tilt.  Too, I may gently tap their glutes to help them fire.

In the case of the latter it’s a bit trickier, but I like to tell them to “finish tall,” and again, depending on the rapport, I’ll place my hands around their pelvis to help them but on the brakes (and prevent them from going into too much hyperextension).

Thoracic Kyphosis (keep in mind we’re just using the movement to influence lumbosacral movement, not trying to lift maximal weight)

Honestly, the dowel rod drill from above is going to be great here.  As well, I’ll cue guys to make sure they stick their chest out upon the initial set-up which will encourage a bit more t-spine extension

I pretty much shot from the hip on all of these, but hopefully they all made some sense and help a few people out.

Seriously though, I love high heels.

And for the record:  while I definitely lean more towards a “Paleo(ish)” style of eating, I also recognize that Gronk and his kin weren’t crushing broccoli and asparagus back in the day.

So back off Paleo peeps!

Secondly, I have a lot of very smart friends in this industry that I can defer people to if needed. As soon as someone reaches out to me and starts busting out verbiage like Glut-4 receptors, gluconeogenesis, or any number of similar big words, I point them in the direction of people like Brian St. Pierre, Dr. Cassandra Forsythe, Dr. Mike Roussell, Dr. John Berardi, Alan Aragon, and Gandalf.

Because, you know, Gandalf knows everything.

But really I just like to keep things as simple as possible.  At the end of the day it generally comes down to a handful of things:

1. Helping people make better food choices.

2. Helping them get over some behavioral humps which block success.

I mean, it’s not rocket science that crushing a bag of chocolate covered pretzels right before bed isn’t the best choice and that it probably won’t help in one’s fat-loss endeavors. But people do it anyway despite knowing better.

Much of the time it’s about helping people set themselves up for success and come up with specific behavioral strategies that will keep then on task.

For example:  how about not having the bag of chocolate covered pretzels in the house in the first place?

Nonetheless, I don’t want to get too off-track because I actually do have something I want to bring to light today.

Lisa and I joined a CSA!!!!

This is something we’ve both discussed doing together for at least two years now (since we moved in together), but for some reason have been putting it off for whatever reasons.

Whether it was cost, too long of a waiting list, busy schedules, some Star Wars convention that got in the way, what have you, we made excuses.

Which is weird because we’re both very health conscious, and go out of our way to buy a metric shit-ton (ie:  a lot) of greens, organic this, gluten-free that every week when we do our grocery shopping.

Whenever we walk into Whole Foods and Lisa sees something she’s never seen before (OMG rutabaga is on sale Tony!!!!) her eyes immediately widen and she’s like Charlie in the Chocolate Factory, sans the creepy Oompa Loompas.

So a few weeks ago we decided to nip things in the bud and join our very first local CSA here in Massachusetts.

For those scratching their heads and wondering what the heck CSA stands for, it’s Community Supported Agriculture.

Essentially the nuts and bolts is this:  it’s a commitment between individuals or families and farmers, where people pay a lump sum into a farm as members at the start of the growing season, and in exchange receive a weekly “share” of the farm’s harvest.

What’s cool about the one Lisa and I joined is that it offers several different options like a vegetable share, egg share, flower share, and fruit share.

We opted for the vegetable share, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I try to snake some eggs and fruit into the mix on occasion.

Additionally, to sweeten the pot our CSA is one that delivers to area Whole Foods markets throughout Mass. and Boston. So all we have to do is show up between “x” hours on a specific day at our local Whole Foods parking lot (which is less than a mile away from our apartment) and pick up our basket of locally grown, fresh, organic, veggies.

So with that I figured I’d give what I feel are the top FIVE reasons to join a CSA.

1.  You Support Local Agriculture

More to the point, you KNOW where you’re food is coming from. While I understand people have great intentions when buying organic at their local supermarket, does it really make any difference if the food is being shipped from half-way across the world in order to make it to your dinner plate?

When you support local agriculture, you’re supporting your LOCAL economy and ensuring that your local farms will prosper and continue to produce delicious, nutrient-dense foods in the long-term.

And this doesn’t even take into consideration the substantial reduction in the carbon footprint when you purchase locally.

2. More Nutrient Dense

How “nutritious” is that head of kale or romaine by the time it’s shipped from 2,000 miles away to your market? This isn’t to say that you’re still not going to get a bevy of nutrients, but I’d garner a guess that buying more local produce is a heckuva lot more nutritious in the long run.

3. It Tastes Better

I think this one goes without saying. Once you’ve biten into a locally grown apple fresh off the tree, you’ll understand that those apples you’ve been eating from Whereeverthef*** taste like sandpaper dipped in lice poop.

4.  You’ll Eat More Seasonal Produce

We’ve grown accustomed to having the opportunity to eat what we want, when we want, all year round. While this is great – hey, I want my bananas year round too – it pigeon holes us into not venturing out and trying new things.

Joining a CSA forces you to try more seasonal foods, and opens up your “foodie” repertoire.

You’ll just die when you try your first roasted parsnip.

5.  It’s Cheaper!?

I know some may balk at the price-tag of some CSAs – and admittedly, some are pretty expensive.  But I’d venture a guess that most will end up saving money in the long run.

It’s not uncommon for Lisa and I to spend roughly $50 per week on produce alone between Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s. Take a peek into your grocery cart and you’d think we were feeding an army of rabbits.

The CSA we joined has 24 total distributions starting in early June running all the way through early December, which is going to significantly reduce our weekly grocery bill.

Holla!

Those are just a handful of course, and certainly don’t represent all the benefits of joining a CSA. I also heard through the grapevine that joining one increases t-levels by like 47%.  Give you take.*

Either way, I’d love to hear everyone else sound off. Do you have your own CSA story to share?  Did you like it?  Hate it? Felt it was a waste of time or the best thing since sliced bread?

Please, share your comments below.

* = For the record: I completely made that up.  It’s more like 49%

When I was originally contacted and asked if I’d be interested I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to write about.  Then it hit me:  Um, dude – you work with a crap ton of baseball players, why not start there?

Seemed like a logical course to take, and that’s exactly what I did.

Now understandably, not everyone who reads this site is interested in throwing a baseball 90 MPH and could probably care less about “arm care.”

Besides chicks dig the long ball, right?

But I’d venture a guess that even though this article is geared towards baseball players, there are some universal nuggets dealing with shoulder health that has a lot of applicability towards the general population as well – especially with regards to the “true” function of the rotator cuff (and how to train it) and how the anterior core enters the equation.

That said, I want to demonstrate to Stack Magazine that the TonyGentilcore.com entourage can reach P-Diddy levels.

I’d really love for everyone to check out the article, give any feedback (positive or negative; hopefully mostly positive), and if you feel so inclined, “Like” it and share it on Facebook and Twitter.

Snuggles!

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