Back to Simplicity
Can structure exist without rules? If you have a penchant for a more Apollonian protocol, you would answer with a passionate “no.”
What’s Best for Increasing Muscle Mass and Strength—Linear or Reverse L...
“Training is an exact science.” —Mike Mentzer
Fat Loss Without Cardio?!?
Aerobic exercise is often very rhythmic, and many people detest it because it is so boring. Every time I go into a gym, the so-called cardio section is full, and the weight area is somewhat like a ghost town.
Raising the Bar Introduction: Blast and Dust
Were you fed through a bottle, or were you fed naturally? Did you eat from plastic plates? Stand too close to the microwave? Did you grow up in the ghetto? Are you a recovering drug addict? Is your life a living hell? Are there things about yourself that you don't like? Do you procrastinate?
Reevaluation
Recently, I’ve been on a 10-week decline in the gym. It began with a powerlifting meet that I entered back in November.
ABCs of Squatting, Part I
Learning to squat properly may be one of the hardest tasks you have ever undertaken, but it is well worth the effort.
Five Random Things I’ve Learned at Westside
You see, unless you train at Westside, you don’t know Westside
Abdominal Training for the Power Athlete
The other day I had to suffer the great indignity of paying for a day pass at a commercial gym. Lifting in a commercial place isn’t all that bad. It can actually be good from time to time to expose you to new equipment or just get a change of scenery.
“Sport-Specific” Training for Youth: Athlete and Parents Beware, Part 1
“Sport-specific” is the new marketing buzzword when it comes to strength and conditioning programs for youth. Uneducated masses of parents and coaches herd their sports teams at a young age into “athletic performance” programs that supposedly address the strength, movement, and speed demands of one specific sport.
The Return of Hardcore
That’s it. I can’t take it anymore. These sissified commercial gyms and their clipboard holding trainers have just about ruined the weightlifting world.
30 Days Without Weights: Part II
In my first article on body weight training titled “30 Days Without Weights,” I spoke about the many benefits of using body weight training during a training phase.
Analogies for Understanding: Origins of Strength
Motor units, rate coding, fast-twitch muscle fibers, recruitment capacity—do you have this all down?
Periodization, Part II: The Science of Peaking
As opposed to the first part of this series, which could benefit anyone who trains seriously, this part is more targeted to an elite audience. Peaking isn’t of much interest to someone who doesn’t compete. Although deloading can be beneficial for any athlete, peaking goes way beyond deloading, and its temporary nature makes it irrelevant for non-competing athletes.
The “Devil” Bench Workout
Why is it that whenever I’m in a gym I see people benching the same weight at each workout? It usually goes like this—a person performs a few reps at 185 lbs, then at 205 lbs, and maybe at 225 lbs.
The Power of the Pack: Your Guide to Survival
When I first started seriously strength training as a sophomore in college, I did so because everyone else on my dorm floor went down together to the weight room at 4:00 pm.
EliteFTS Spotlight: Jim Steel
This week’s EliteFTS Spotlight features University of Pennsylvania strength and conditioning coach Jim Steel. Coach Steel is a former college football player with an extensive powerlifting background.
Lessons Learned from Training Young Kids
I have spent this past winter training young hockey players, often as young as 11-years-old and often by myself in groups of 12–15 kids at one time.
Making the Most of College Lifting
College is a wonderful place. It’s the transitional phase between being nestled securely at home close to your mother’s teat and being thrust out into the real world, which I can assure you, is an awful place once you truly appreciate your time in college.
EliteFTS Spotlight: Matt Wenning
The subject of this week’s EliteFTS Spotlight is Q&A staff member Matt Wenning. Matt is one of only a handful of people to total over 2600 pounds in professional competition.
My Journey into Bodybuilding
Well, the diet has started! I decided to cut my off-season down by a few weeks and start dieting. I felt like I was getting to a point where adding more weight would make getting into shape too difficult to accomplish, so I started dieting January 1.
Too Fat to Get Fit?: Addressing the Physical Development Needs of Today...
It isn’t pretty, but it’s a reality. Our youth are getting fatter and unhealthier by the day. Physical education classes are either gone or absolutely minimized in our educational curriculum. The classes that are still intact are ill-suited for the new generation.
My Journey to the Grappler's Quest: Part 2
The nerves didn’t hit until I walked into the Las Vegas Sports Center for Friday night weigh-ins.
Are you playing with a full deck?
Here is a question I was just asked on the Q and A. I do not watch or read the news in regards to political issues so my answer is based solely on the issues I deal with on a day to day basis with no BS or political agenda. It is what it is...
How to Run a Successful Gym During the Recession, Part I
The goal of this series is to give aspiring strength coaches and fitness professionals the optimism and tools required to get things rolling quickly, easily, and without a loan or business partners.
How to Receive Automatic Referrals from Your Personal Training Clients
If you don’t have a referral system in place, you’re losing dozens of potential new clients. Check out this system and learn the right way to ask for referrals. (If you do this wrong, you will lose clients!)
Periodization, Part I
This series is an introduction to periodization. Too often, I’ve come across people who don’t understand the foundations of training so I decided to fix this situation. Obviously, I’ll need to keep many details out for the sake of simplicity.
Chain Training
Initially used for accommodating resistance, chains help take into account the body’s natural strength curve. Many people have become familiar with this concept over the last few years as chains have become increasingly popular.
How to Get the Most Traffic (and Money) From Your YouTube Videos
In 2006, Google spent a lot of money ($1.4 billion) to buy YouTube. Fortunately for you, Google is a smart company and isn’t going to waste that investment.
Passion into Profit EliteFTS Small Business Conference Feb. 2009
This was certainly different. I mean, it’s not every day that I get an email from Dave Tate, and I have never, and I mean never, ever been invited to train with him. If I was excited to attend this seminar before, well, that had just been ratcheted up by a factor of eleven!
Top 11 Exercises for Athletes
Here are the top 11 movements for athletes. Add them to your rotation and work them hard.
Defending the Bench Press
The bench press is a great lift. Whether your goal is to develop a powerful overall physique or a barrel chest or just get brutally strong, the bench press can help you get there.
EliteFTS Spotlight: Shannon Turley
EliteFTS Spotlight is a new weekly feature here on EliteFTS.com where Q&A member The Angry Coach interviews athletes and strength and sport coaches from various disciplines in order to find out more about what they do, how they train and how they do business.
EliteFTS Spotlight: Julia Ladewski
EliteFTS Spotlight is a weekly feature here on EliteFTS.com where Q&A member The Angry Coach interviews athletes and strength and sport coaches from various disciplines in order to find out more about what they do, how they train and how they do business.
Strongman Versus Power Cleans for Football, Part 3: (How to Integrate S...
At this point, we’ve discovered how Strongman training can be a viable substitute for Olympic weightlifting to develop brutally strong football players who not only display explosive physical capacities but have explosive attitudes as well. If you’re anything like me, you’ve become excited at the prospect of training your athletes with the fun and highly effective exercises like tractor tire
What’s the Big Deal with Partial Lifts?
I’ll come right out and say it—I’m a big fan of partial lifts. Some say they’re dangerous while others say they’re unproductive. Why do a partial lift when you can do the whole lift?
Work Capacity: Do It Stronger, Faster, Harder, and Longer
There are many elements to strength and conditioning (S&C) training as it relates to mixed martial arts (MMA). Most folks think that it’s all about “strength” or “cardio.”
Sick of Your Gym, Part 6; Metro-Sexuals Be Damned!
As I sit here at my computer, I am battling a certain EliteFTS employee on his desire to become a Metro-sexual. Yes, the current trend of being an androgynous male has invaded the holy ground of the Compound and it is my job, nay my civic and Holy duty, to prevent this at all costs.
The Top Five Mistakes Made by Basketball Players
There is a cornucopia of training information for almost every athletic endeavor that you can imagine partaking in. This information can be found online, in books, and from seminars. You don’t have to go very far to learn about training for your sport.
What Does It Take to Be an Effective Strength Coach?
What are the attributes of an effective strength and conditioning coach? I was recently asked this question, and as I stumbled over myself for a few minutes, I thought it would make a great topic for an article.
Monolifting Made Easy: Part 1
This article applies to three different types of lifters. If you’ve never squatted in a monolift, don’t train consistently in a monolift, or do squat in a monolift but don’t feel solid taking weights out of the monolift, keep reading.
An Interview with Pat Ivey, Assistant Athletics Director, Athletic Perfo...
It might seem like I’ve been doing many interviews lately. There’s good reason for this. A few weeks ago, I did an interview for EliteFTS, and I was asked the question, “Who do you feel is getting it done in strength and conditioning?”
Hardcore Extreme Jan. 09
I’ve been fighting it for a few weeks, but I’m definitely overtraining again. I don’t do shit anymore, but I keep overtraining. One of my training partners asks me what I expect, because don’t sleep. That’s easy. I’m Chad Aichs, and I expect to train hard every day while still getting stronger.
The Steel Yard (Jan 09)
Same old, same old. Just training. I just did a meet about eight weeks ago, and I’m still feeling like hell.
Training with Spud
I moved from Greenville, South Carolina, to Columbia, South Carolina, to go to school at the University of South Carolina almost three years ago. I considered myself a hardcore powerlifter, and at the seasoned age of 19-years-old, I thought I knew what I was doing.
The Dungeon
Wabush, Labrador, Canada. A small mining town nestled in the cold and desolate woodland of northern Canada. Seven months of the year this isolated town in the middle of nowhere is covered in a deep and cold blanket of snow.
The Reintroduction of J.L. Holdsworth, and the Introduction of the FIVE ...
Hello Everyone! My name is J.L. Holdsworth and I’m an asshole.
Going Deeper into the Deadlift with Mark Rippetoe, Part 1
In the November 2006 issue of CrossFit Journal, Mark Rippetoe published, “A New, Rather Long Analysis of the Deadlift.” He concluded this breakthrough article by identifying three criteria for a correct deadlift starting position:
Ten Tips for Show and Go
I’ve trained many high school athletes. They all come to me wanting to perform better, look bigger, be stronger, and run faster. I’ve seen athletes put on 30 lbs of lean muscle, increase their vertical jump by six inches or more, and slash time off of their 40 all while increasing their
agility and flexibility.
The Power of Information
As coaches, we all know about the myriad problems we’ll encounter in the course of trying to make our athletes better. These problems are generated by everyone our players come into contact with on a daily basis. From their parents, to their friends, to the ubiquitous “guys on message boards,” our kids are bombarded with stuff that’s not coming from
Five Essential Movements for Hockey Players
Hockey is a sport of intensity, physical contact, stamina, strength, and speed.
Olympic Lifting for the Growing Gymnast, Part 2
Figure 3 exhibits an example of the progression of strength from the developmental strength workout for the compulsory age group.
How I Passed Basic Training at 235 Pounds
Before I get started here, I want to say that I am in no way, shape or form a badass. I’m simply an average guy with a little better than average genetics, and a good work ethic. I know a hundred guys that are tougher and more hardcore than I am. They just haven’t written their stories down on paper
Your First Meet Part II: Getting Diesel
Everyone starts from different points, everyone has different training backgrounds, and everyone is a little bit different from top to bottom.
So You Wanna Be a Fighter?: Part One
It’s been a while since I’ve contributed an article to this site and so much has changed.
Olympic Lifting for the Growing Gymnast, Part 1
As gymnastics coaches, sometimes we get caught up in sport-specific strength training because that’s what we know best. The belief is that if we strength train for sport-specific movements repetitiously, the gymnast will not only become stronger during those movements but will have less cause for injury. However, it is that frame of mind in which we fail as coaches.