I can't tell you how many times I want to scream after watching some one walk right up the stairs hop on to a machine and start busting out some poorly executed reps or grabbing a pair of dumbells and tearing up their rotator cuff. For your body to properly function at maximal performance it must first be warmed-up. Most warm-ups that I see common gym goers perform when I do see any actually performed is the common swing your arms back in forth or jump up and down a few times. This is not a warm-up it is merely some one wasting time. A proper warm-up should both prepare the muscles for strain by activating and stretching as well as begin pumping blood throughout your body at an above resting level. Allowing for nutrients to be brought to inactive muscles to prepare them for exercises. The newest article on Intellectualfitness.org will be discussing the reasons why as well as the proper way to warm-up before any exercise check it out on the training page of thew
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I have a tradition I have started with my clients. When they perform a workout with such effort and never say die will that it reminds me of a warrior I reward them with a t-shirt that includes them into a select club of my clients who I hold a lot of respect for and I believe I have succeeded in making a change in their life. These workouts that I am talking about are what I referred to as a lifechanger. As a former athlete I myself have experienced such workouts and there is nothing like it and if you are someone who has been to this point you can recognize when its happening to someone else. Its that workout when your halfway through and you feel pinned to the ground and you'd rather quit then go that extra minute or set but you for that brief instant you find out what your made of and you choose to continue that moment changes an individual it makes them stronger more determined and it carries over into all aspects of their life its one of the most amazing things felt or experienced and I always recognize it and praise it when it happens to one of my clients because its the result of the individual themselves deciding to push there current limits through the ceiling and through their old expectations out the window. There is a favorite quote of mine that describes this moment better than I ever could here it is its from the 2006 Rocky Balboa movies if I haven't ever said it before Rocky Balboa is one of my heros! Yo Adrian! If I haven't mentioned it before I love my cup of coffee I usually drink a cup in the morning and a cup at night I try to use as little as possible most of the time I sweeten it with a little honey and a sprinkle of sugar and use low fat milk for my creamer, but I love to occasionally have a really sweet cup of coffee. But enough on my own taste for coffee. The real reason I am mentioning this is because I love the number of benefits coffee has not only can it provide you will an awesome amount of antioxidants, but it has been shown in recent studies to have numerous benefits to fight against illness (guess the antioxidants are doing their job lol). A study reported in the annals of family medicine found that people who frequently drank coffee had much lower risk of carrying or contracting MRSA. Another study from the University of South Florida showed that drinking caffeinated coffee can help prevent or at least delay the onset of Alzheimer's Disease. So give it up for coffee its working hard fo
Here is a video from eric cressey discussing on how to properly perform the Ab-Rollout which is such a popular exercise but to often performed incorrectly and becomes a hard bad habit to recoach so take a look and try it out the proper way! Too many times as human beings we worry about the wrong side of things we worry about what if something had gone wrong instead of celebrating the fact that we were successful! So try to be a little more optimistic and focus on succeeding and to the hell with the rest!
One of the biggest principles I preach to my clients and anyone willing to listen is that they must have the ability to run with the unexpected. Such as your away on vacation you really need to get that saturday workout in, but you only have some 8lbs dumbell and your bodyweight now if you are one of my clients I would hope you would be able to put together a kickass workout with this limited equipment. This is an ability everyone should try to obtain. Eric Cressey wrote a great blog about this ability here it is the originally appeared at ericcressey.com
Strength and Conditioning Programs: The Most Important Benefit Written on July 12, 2011 at 6:16 am, by Eric Cressey This past weekend, my wife and I headed down to Pennsylvania for some friends’ wedding. On Saturday morning, I awoke at 7AM to her standing next to my bed absolutely covered in sweat and wearing her workout clothes. As it turns out, knowing that the weekend would be full of not-so-healthy food and limited opportunities to exercise, Anna had taken the bull by the horns and hit up the hotel gym at 6AM to kick her day off right. It’s no surprise, as she spends quite a bit of time at Cressey Performance. That, in itself, isn’t a particularly riveting story to kick off today’s blog – until I discovered that the only thing this hotel gym had was an elliptical, recumbent bike, and treadmill. And, to take it a step further, Anna discovered that there was no power for any of them, meaning that they were essentially just places to rest her water bottle. What to do? She could have said screw it and gone back to bed. She could have woken me up and asked me to write her a body weight program. She could have tried to run on the side of a busy road, or find a place to sprint in a town that wasn’t familiar to her. Instead, though, she used the knowledge and experience she had to construct her own body weight training program. Anna’s an optometrist, not a trainer – but her skill set from asking questions, being in the right environment, and performing dozens of programs put her in a position to handle the curveballs life threw at her. Coincidentally, a strength coach from the Cape Cod Summer League came up to observe at CP last week, and we got to talking about how you never quite have the continuity you want with training athletes because they go in-season for a big chunk of the year, and because you’re always working around competition and travel schedules. To that end, he asked me what the single biggest thing is that we focus on when we may only have someone for a short period of time. My answer? “It’s the same thing we focus on when we have someone for a longer period of time: education. It’s our job to make athletes informed consumers who know how to listen to their body, adapt to their surroundings, eat the right foods, get the right amount of sleep, and do the correct programs regardless of what’s going on around them.” You might think that your #1 job as a trainer is to strip 15 pounds of body fat off someone in two months. Or, maybe it’s to put four inches on a guy’s vertical jump prior to a scouting combine. In reality, though, your #1 priority is to educate them so that they’re prepared for the days that they’re on their own. Education needs to be different for everyone, though. A true beginner needs to be educated on everything from what to eat during/post-training to how to perform the actual exercises. If you teach a female client to have a protein and carb shake around a session in a weight training program, then chances are that she would eventually know to grab some Greek yogurt and a piece of fruit if a shake isn’t handy when she’s on the road. Or, if you teach a young baseball player how to do a dumbbell reverse lunge and a front squat, then he’ll be able to perform a barbell reverse lunge with a front squat grip someday when he needs a good single-leg exercise, but only has barbells at the exclusion of dumbbells. A more advanced individual might want to know more about his/her unique muscle imbalances and what corrective mobility and stability drills to stay on top of to prevent problems from arising. Or, these folks might just want to make use of your network to find great gyms and manual therapists in other parts of the country so that they can stay on top of their workout routines while on the road. Results are fantastic and obviously an absolutely essential part of a successful strength and conditioning program. However, if you aren’t educating folks along the way, then you’re not cultivating the long-term fitness success they really need, even if they don’t think to consider anything beyond short-term results. What do you think are the most important things we absolutely have to teach our clients and athletes to ensure long-term success? And, what are the most overlooked things they need to learn to be successful over the long haul? Post your comments below! Here is a link to a great thorough video on how to perform a deadlift properly from Mike Robertson even if you already use deadlifts in your own training check this out and check if your form is in line with the correct technique here is the link.
Hey I like to add alot of my own personal information on facebook and twitter that the intellectualfitness team sometimes doesn't get a hold of so follow me on twitter @sfreeborn7 and friend me on facebook stevan freeborn
We are already past the half way point for 2011 its time to take a look at where you stand on those new years resolution and rededicate yourself to accomplishing these goals. Retake this year and remember it never matters how you start its how you finish.
Happy Fourth of July I hope everyone still has ten toes and ten fingers. =)
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Stevan FreebornHi I am ACSM Personal Trainer who has a passion for spreading the knowledge of healthy living. I will do my best to give you the information you need and want. If there is any topic you wish to know about please ask and I will share my full scope of knowledge on that topic and point you in the right direction to further your understanding. I hope you enjoy the site. Archives
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