Looking at Increases in Strength a bit Differently

The past few months, since kick starting my journey to be awesome at CP, I have been able to work around my "injuries" and have been able to get a training effect.

With all of the issues I have dealt with, torn left labrum, chronic left big toe pain, severe left anterior hip tightness, occasional  right anterior knee pain, right jammed ankle, one would think that I would be relegated to only training my right arm. However not the case. Working with all the coaches at CP I was able to find exercises that I could do without pain. If I did them correctly. When talking with Eric about it he did tell me that a positive of my shoulder pain was that if it hurt during specific movements, I was doing it wrong. Honestly, I had never thought of it that way before.

That one statement made me actually think about what I was doing in the weight room, and probably overthink, to make sure that I would relearn movement patterns correctly.

Doing this was and still is a humbling experience. For most upper body exercises I had to crank down the weight to relearn the patterns. I had to took my ego out of lifting. It helped. Slowly and steadily over the past 5 months I have been working on getting my movement patterns back and increasing my strength. I have gotten back to a solid weight of 193lbs and increased my lean tissue that I lost over the summer.

However, by the looks of my numbers on my logs you wouldn't really say my strength has been increasing, even though they have. Given the state that I have been in I have to judge my increases in strength a tad differently. Because of the shoulder pain all vertical pressing or rowing has been taken out (on my left side). Leaving me to rely on horizontal rowing variations, bilateral and unilateral, and mostly pushup variations.

In the past 2 months I have been able to go up 5 pounds in a standing 1 arm cable row on my left side. That is pretty weak for a baby boomer let alone a 23 year old fitness professional, but the quality of the repetitions  I have been able to do have increased dramatically. My rowing pattern has started to get synced up so that scapular retraction will initiate the movement allowing me to use my lower trapezius to stabilize my shoulders and letting me keep my core tight throughout the movement. So even though my traditional number of how much weight I can do is still very low, I know that my strength and coordination is increasing because my pain levels have decreased and the quality has increased.

Think about assessing the quality of the exercise next time you are in the weight room and you have gone up in weight, not just making sure you have good form, but actually getting a sense of what your body is doing during the movement. You will see that the high number isn't everything.

Take the ego out of it.
Do it well, then do it heavy.

Using Your other 23 Hours to Your Advantage Part 4

Sorry for the delay, my computer crashed right before Thanksgiving making it a pain to recover all that was on it to transfer to my new one

13.    Bulk it up

Get things you use the most in bulk and keep an organized pantry or freezer. Even if you have little storage space for food having your staples on hand will allow you to be prepared when run out of an ingredient and if you stock up when the items are on sale, it can save you a lot of money over the long haul.

14. Sit up Straight!

You posture imbalances won’t get fixed by doing your mobility work and warm up alone. You need to focus on having good postural habits throughout the day to help reinforce good postural habits. For example, if you are a person who is kyphotic and has to sit at a desk all day prop your computer up on a few books to get it to a better height to decrease your forward head posture. ( I started doing this a few years ago when I was having neck issues and it improved them drastically)

15.   Bag your supplements

Go out and buy a pack of snack size plastic bags and lay them out to your supplements for the week. If you take your supplements three times a day lay out 21 bags. Then count out everything you take daily and stuff them in the bag. This lets you have everything in one place when you go to take them and it allows for you to grab a bag when you are in a hurry or late to work, instead of trying to bag it at the last minute or skipping them.
16.   Time out

Set specific days of the week for certain household chores such as laundry or cleaning the house. This helps make sure you will have the things you need or that your home looks well all the time instead of getting to be a danger zone during the times when you don’t have much time.

Keep on keeping on in and out of the gym I will be back soon with the next update!

Using Your Other 23 Hours to Your Advantage Part 3

9. Get on a regular sleep cycle

• Keeping yourself on a regular sleep cycle will keep your body balanced and help you develop good habits to help keep you healthy and in the gym. I’m no scientist but there is plenty of research out there to support it so… check it out. Set a time for you to go to bed and get up each day, try and make it the same every day ( try and make it 7-8 hrs). After a few weeks you won’t regret it.

10. Organize your web information

• In the age of take advantage every second and instant media, the internet can slowly suck away a lot of the time you have.  Therefore use a web organizer to help follow all of the blogs and news stories that are important to you. I use Google Reader to organize the blog posts of the people I follow. I check it at least once a week which allows me to stay current with the information but not have to worry about missing a good article.

11. Get accountable

• Get a partner or multiple people to help you keep your goals a reality. Talk about your goals therefore when you might be slipping away from eating healthy or getting yourself to the gym (don’t let that happen) you have plenty of people to get yourself in check. They may be telling you something you don’t want to hear all the time but some tough love from the right person will help you get back on the horse.

  

12.  Find a new place to concentrate

• I find when I really need to concentrate on a project or a study session I am unable to do so at my desk because there will always be some distraction that comes along drawing my attention away from what I am doing. I find going to a coffee shop or library helps me concentrate on my work to eliminate the distractions of the house.

Using Your Other 23 hours to Your Advantage Part 2

Here is part 2 (tips 5-8) of using your other 23 hours of your day to help keep your life from interfering with your precious time in the gym.

  

 5. Get your nutrition in order

I will admit when it comes to nutrition I am not an authority figure.  However I take any opportunity I can to learn from those that are to keep my nutrition on the up and up. Take this guest blog from Chris Howard the nutrition specialist at Cressey Performance talk about getting your nutrition in order.  

 

6. Foam roll while watching Televsion

Chances are even in your busiest weeks you have a few favorite television shows that you watch every week, for me it is How I Met Your Mother and Parks and Recreation. However I hate wasting time so within those 22 minutes (from the DVR). I try and be efficient by getting on the floor and foam roll while watching them. I hit all the major muscle groups and go a little longer on the sore spots to help improve tissue quality. Be honest with yourself you can always have better tissue quality.

7. Delegate out

No matter how much control over your life you have you can not do everything yourself. Use your resources to your advantage and delegate out some aspects of your life. If you have trouble planning your workouts hire a personal trainer. It could be an online trainer, look to see if they are a good fit for you, or use one at your gym if you feel you need more hands on instruction. Giving this little bit of control to another individual will help decrease your stress levels because it will be one less thing you have to worry about.

 

 8. Meal lists are your best friend

Having all of your meals planned out for the week is the best way to hold yourself accountable for eating well to help your gym time throughout the week. Take a few minutes and look to see what is in the cabinets and refrigerator that you can build your meals around for the week then check the specials at your grocery store and make a menu for the week. Go to the grocery store to get the necessary items and start cooking! Sticking to this menu will help you save money from eating out and will help you plan out calories based on your nutrition needs. 

Using Your Other 23 hours to Your Advantage Part 1

You are a working parent to 2.2 kids, a dog, and suburban house with a white picket fence that juggles everything from homework to work. Or you are a 40+ hour a week desk jockey that can’t ever seem to put their phone down. Whatever the scenario you only have 1 hour as little as 3-4 times a week to get your foam rolling, mobility, strength training and cardio in.

It may seem like an impossible task to manage all of the responsibilities of life and get work in. In this series I hope to shed some light on using the other 23 hours of the day to your advantage in 23 tips so that you can get the most out of your time that you do have in the gym.

1.  Plan out your time

If you don’t make room to schedule working out then you can’t get yourself to the gym and workout. Use your google calendar, a sticky note on your mac, an alarm on your phone, whatever organization tool you use to put in your time to go to the gym. Then do not let anything interrupt that time. 

2.       Get your items ready the night before

This goes along with planning. If you are like me in the fall and winter months then when your alarm goes off you want to stay under the warm covers for just a few more minutes (nothing like starting the day with procrastination) then you realize that you can’t find a document you need for work and after spending 5 minutes searching for it you are late for work. Organize what you need the night before (gym bag, briefcase, food etc.) so that you have a fluid morning routine.

 3.       Keep a notepad with you

When you have a thought and say to yourself “ I should write that down” or “don’t forget to go to the dry cleaners” and then you don’t write it down and you get home with no dry cleaning, you end up forgetting a great idea and have to make a special trip to get your clothes. Keep a notepad, (or note app on your phone) and keep the list of ideas thought of at inopportune times so that you can capitalize on them, and write down the things you need to do on the way home from work so you don’t have to make special trips for errands that would  sacrifice the little time to go to the gym you have.

 4.       Keep a tennis ball/lacrosse ball at your desk or around your house

I have lacrosse balls scattered in about every room of my place (luckily my dog doesn’t chew on them). This is beneficial so when I feel some tightness in my feet or upper back I know one is around and I can roll the knot out immediately and quickly helping to improve my tissue quality.Working with the lacrosse ball/tennis ball in short frequent durations will help improve your tissue quality in the long run so you can spend less time on the foam roller or ball during warm up in a training session, maximizing the time you have.

Here are the first few ideas to help you get your life under control to maximize your time to workout. I will be back with tips 5-8 in a few days.

Whole ass

One of my favorite shows on television is NBC’s Parks and Recreation. My favorite character among the mix is Ron Swanson. Other than Ron looking exactly like my uncle, Ron's quick wit, slow delivery and dry humor make me excited all week long for Thursday nights. Recently, when I was watching through last season episodes again on Netflix, one of Ron’s quotes really resonated with me again.

“Never half ass two things, whole ass one thing” –Ron Swanson

No matter how talented a person is at multitasking  work, training, social life, finances, personal time, things will slip through the cracks. The more things that come on to a person’s plate the greater the chance for a half ass job of completion. Until recently I was balancing 3 part time jobs and finishing my masters degree. Needless to say there were times where I had forgotten something or missed out on an opportunity for fun, even with countless sticky notes all over my desk and computer reminding me to do my work. The jobs ended up being half assed.

I have had the luxury of being able to start whole assing jobs due to my new position. I have also made it my top priority. To help ensure that a task is being done whole assed total focus must be done for that task until it reaches a stage of completion. For example when I am lifting, I am lifting. I’m not working, cleaning house or talking on the phone. My undivided attention is at the task at hand. When I truly study I shut down the distractions around me (turn my phone off and don’t have facebook open on the computer) so I can whole ass the material in front of me.

A person may have a billion things to do on their to do list and if they all try to get done at the same time they might not turn out as well as hoped. But if those tasked were checked of singularly with full attention to them they would be done completely and well.

A few options to whole ass life.

• Make a list of big projects and complete one item entirely before going on to the next
• Shut yourself out from the outside world for the duration of time for a task (the world will keep spinning if you aren’t connected to your twitter, promise).
• Get away from your normal surroundings to get a task done (go to a coffee shop or park or library or where you can focus on the task fully).
•  Don’t take your cell phone into the gym to lift (or in any area of the gym for that matter)
• Stick to a plan of getting stronger in the gym instead of trying to bulk/cut weight/ gain running endurance at the same time
• If you have multiple jobs devote certain days and times to one of them and don’t allow the other to interfere.

Whole ass jobs of one item provide much better results than half ass jobs of multiple things at once.

So does trying to be awesome like Ron Swanson.

Try, Fail, Learn

When you talk to any person about what their goals are they talk to you about what they want to be successful at. However what sometimes gets failed to be mentioned is what that person has failed at along the way to finding that success.

Failure is an integral part of finding success, everyone fails at something, some people fail at things once, some multiple times and some never truly find the success they were looking for. But when used properly failure can be the biggest determining factor in creating success.

What determines failure being the determining factor for success or what the biggest hinderance for success?

The outlook on failure.

If a person fears failure because of social or personal perceptions than it will paralyze them into never finding success. On the other hand if a person tries a task, fails at it, and then looks at the situation to see how they can change it to better set themselves up for success they increase their odds.

So I challenge you to be the person who looks at failure differently as a positive, instead of a paralyzing fear. You might even find that failing can be rewarding as finding success.

Try, Fail, Learn.