Friday, August 31, 2007

Adding explosiveness to your bodyweight excersizes


When doing bodyweight routines there is an endless amount of leverage we can put against our body when lifting/moving it.
To make something easier we limit the range of motion of the bodyweight exercise. (for example doing "girl" push ups in stead of having a full body extension.) This makes the lever or the force put against out arms significantly less.

To make it much more challenging we need to start by having a feeling of weightlessness during the movements and then actually become airborne during a movement. (for example during a clapping push up you are required to produce much more force to get that extra 6 inches of movement in the push up without any further pushing) the clapping is just a hand speed thing.

similar to the explosive lifts the way you create the force needs to be calculated, and thought about. Just like a deadlift, powerclean, or even muscleup. The force you create needs to be getting faster and harder as the movement goes into full extension. If you explode right from the ground although you may still lift from the ground you will have wasted most of your acceleration during the portion that you should have still been pushing, But on the other hand if you begin pushing slowly and get faster and faster throughout the movement until the fastest point of just leaving the ground you will have maximum height in which you can clap your self silly.

Similar to doing a sprint workout (which is a standing equivalent) you must make sure you are properly warmed up before doing explosive work, this typically means doing the same activity at a slower speed, and completing full range of motion movements (or form work) before hand.

To give example almost any exercise can be made explosive:
pullups---- clapping pullups
squats----- jumping squats
situps------ V-snaps
and the list goes on....

As a general guideline you should have the basic movement mastered before you add explosiveness to it. because the catch position can be dangerous for an athlete without the muscular power to contract and catch their full bodyweight.

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Performance eating seminar


Coach D will be guiding all levels of athletes to maximize their potential through eating healthy. Using "Zone" principles to achieve goals. The zone diet is a life style diet, if you need to gain weight you will gain, if you need to loose you will loose, those with a health body composition will set new personal records in all aspects of fitness.
In 2.5hrs you will cover things such as reasons to choose the zone or any meal plan, GI, different levels of commitment to meal plans, weighing and measuring for your body, making a weekly meal plan, selection of foods, grocery shopping, fitness and nutrition and much more.... to finish with actually preparing a days worth of food for coach!

Cost $40

Limit 10 people (If you confirm and don't show up, you will be expected to pay the next time you come to train... zero tolerance) first come first serve!

RSVP with Coach D Directly by email/phone/facebook

Nicole Carroll's zone experience:

I never thought what I ate mattered. I was thin and muscular. My athletic performance was decent. I generally felt pretty healthy and happy. So I was skeptical about diet having any kind of real impact on anything. For my whole life I had been eating a lot of whatever the hell I wanted and seemed to be doing just fine. But I did have a sense that this wasn’t true for everyone and that as a trainer, people would be asking me questions about nutrition and diet. I knew CrossFit prescribed the Zone diet so I bought the books, read them, got my measly block prescription and tried the diet. The deal I made with myself was that for two weeks I would weigh and measure precisely. If after two weeks I wanted to go back to eating the way I was before I could. No guilt, just an experiment.

Four weeks into the Zone diet, I was stronger and faster than I had ever been. I had lost fat and gained muscle. My benchmark workout times decreased, and my pull-up numbers increased. I hit PRs in deadlift, back squat, and push jerk. I had more energy, recovered more quickly, and could push harder more often.


POST YOUR PERSONAL ZONE EXPERIENCES! or questions

Monday, August 27, 2007

heavy lift prescription

heavy lift prescription:

this is a prescription for a 5-5-5-5-5 strength workout
the first 5 sets are all warm up sets do weight almost as quickly as one can rack weight on the bar (except last set)
last warm up set and work set (5x5) take 2-3 mins between sets (as you become a stronger lifter reaching the intermediate advanced and elite level you will require more time for maximal lifts)

if the movements are new don't go for your 100% max on day one use some time to develop form.
use the warm-up to determine how much your going to lift if you don't already know.
take small jumps in weight in movements as to not reach a plateau small jumps will allow you to slowly gain more strength needed to add additional weight.

% of goal weight to lift
weight ---Reps-- Sets
45lbs -----5------ 2
40% ------5------ 1
60% ------3------ 1
85% ------2 ------1
100% ----5 ------5

Strength days a very important part of crossfit training!