Rotational core strength – the key to knockout power

27 03 2013

In an athletic sense, rotation and indeed, counter rotation, is a key player.

Power is best generated in our bodies by using spiraling actions.

If we take a throw or a punch, we can clearly see that a right handed athlete will plant their left foot forwards, turn the hip, rotate the spine, stretching the core musculature and shooting the right shoulder forwards which propels the arm.
A runner uses the shoulders turning in opposition to the hip to both balance and develop more speed.

We’ll assume you have already developed a good level of core stability.
This means you can plank for 2mins, you can do a decent barbell squat (front or back) with a significant amount of weight and you can deadlift heavy stuff from the floor.

Now, lets talk rotation.

And counter rotation.

If you’re a coach/trainer, then you must have heard that the role of the core musculature is to prevent movement, rather than create it. In the gym, this is fine, but in the real world of athletic performance, there is more to it.
Thomas Myers, the author of the incredible text Anatomy Trains, talks about the spiral line of the body.
Here’s an illustration:

The Spiral Line of the body

The Spiral Line of the body

Now look at that line, and pay particular attention to the lines through the front of the torso and back of the hips and legs. These are the lines that real power comes from.

Not Andy Bolton powerlifting power, but Chuck Liddell knockout power.

chuckliddelpunch

The development of rotational power comes as part of a complete training program, a program that includes the basics of Squats, Deadlifts, Pull ups, Overhead Presses, Rows and Horizontal presses.
The simplest way to start the development of rotational strength is to work unilateral, or single limb variations of each of the these staples.
So try single leg squats and deadlifts, standing one arm overhead work and rows. Stick a barbell in the corner and do some landmine presses and rows.
These all ask for counter rotation, they will build on your established base of stability and help prepare for more intense rotational movements.

The top tier of rotational movements are:

  1. Heavy Bag work
  2. Medicine Ball Throws.

The problem with both these is in they require serious quality control. If you haven’t spent time under a good coach, you may be better off with other methods, but if you can get genuine instruction and have the discipline to keep to the instructions, then these are all you need.
Keep the reps moderate in order to maintain quality. As soon as fatigue becomes a factor and the punch/throw slows down, we’re no longer gaining benefit.

For everyone else, try the following (in no particular order):

  • Standing Russian Twists
    I talked about these in a previous post and received a few questions about them. So here we go in a little more detail:
    First of all, Maria, one of my regulars ans the current team captain of our Kettleheads Girevoy Sports Team, once described these as “twisty on the belly’s”, this was after her first introduction to the lift.
    That ought to tell you all you need to know, both about Maria and about the lift!
    I like these as they are performed standing, as are most athletic actions, they also require the feet and hips to turn as if throwing a punch or a ball. 
    Start with an angled barbell held in both hands. Now rotate to one side, lets say the left. Turn into the hip on that side and allow the now rearmost (right) foot to turn. The bar will come down to your left hip.
    Now quickly reverse this power out of the left leg and hip, rotate back to centre and raise the bar back to the start point. Lower the bar slowly but explode back to centre.
    Pretty soon after adding these into your training, no one will want to hold pads for you!
    Russian Twist TopDSC_5484
    Try 4-6 reps per side.
  • Plank with arm excursions
    Take a standard plank, the body held in a straight line, supported on the toes and elbows. You know, the “rest position”
    Now take one arm and slowly bring it take it of the floor and bring it across your waist. Hold this for three seconds and replace the arm. No wobbling allowed.
    You can also take the arm out the side, or the front. These double as rotator cuff drills, assuming you have the core strength to do them!
  • One Arm Push Ups
    Possibly the closest an exercise gets to actually throwing a punch. The force vectors through the body are almost identical, ie the load passes from the working arm, diagonally across the body and into the opposing leg.
    For the combat athletes training with me, this is the go to drill for both horizontal pressing strength as well as rotational power.1 Arm Push Up 4sWe mostly work these in the ladder format:
    1 rep each side, 2 reps, 3 reps and so on until we hit a max, then repeat from 1 rep
  • Kettlebell Single arm swing or snatch
    Watch this clip and pay attention to the hip and waist, see how they move in a whip like fashion to accelerate the kettle overhead, and then solidify to stabilise the bell in a lockout.

Take care with rotational work, be sure to develop a solid base first.

Regards

Dave
http://www.wg-fit.com


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , ,
Categories : Kettlebell lifting Dublin, Personal Training Dublin

Top 5 Core Strength Exercises

14 03 2013

Last week we did a fair bit talking about the core, its function and some training methods for it.

Today I want to expand on by talking about integrated core training. In other words, rather than using specific “core training” exercises, why not use exercises that tick multiple boxes, including developing the torso strength and stability of juggernaut.

Anyone who has trained with me or had a program written by me will know that I don’t really add in much specific core training, yet they always develop a damn strong torso, stiff enough to give and take serious punishment. And if combined with sensible eating, a damn fine washboard appearance.

So here we go with a Top 5 of integrated core training exercises:

1 – Turkish Get Up.
This is a big player. This requires mobility, stability, patience and strength. This is a lesson in control, particularly if you load it up.
Since Mr Grey Cook and friends used the Get Up as a movement screen I’ve noticed that people are now harping on about perfect this and slow that and keep the weight light.
Bollocks!
We’re talking about the get up as a strength training drill. It’s the same exercise Mr Cook uses, but with a different emphasis. The old time strongmen wouldn’t look at you until you could do a get up with half your bodyweight. So for me that’s the 44KG kettle.

get up 3
As always, minimum standards should be for other people, so go heavy, build this lift and I guarantee you won’t regret it.
My best so far is a 7′ barbell loaded to 55kg. I will get 60kg before long!

2 – Renegade Rows
Sometimes called plank rows. The first time I came across this, I fell in love. I love exercises that tick more than one box, and this ticks a whole lot of them!
We are talking about a rowing action, which means it is already awesome, and adding in shoulder stability and if you go heavy, a shed load of rotational stability. In most sport it is rotational strength and stability that is the key player in performance, the renegade row will get you there!

Renegade Row

3 – Everything Unilateral
Be it rows, presses, push ups, squats or deadlifts. Try them on one side only from time to time. This is easy, if you’re training military press today, follow it with some one arm presses. If you’re squatting, do some split squats, lunges or single leg squats for assistance work.

4 – Standing Russian Twist
Get a barbell, load it on one end and stick the other end in a corner, or as we do, into an old car tyre.
Now with the end of the bar held in both hands, twist and lower it to your hip, return to centre and repeat on the other side.

Russian Twist Top DSC_5484

I talked about rotational strength being of utmost importance in most sports, especially the contact sports such as MMA & Rugby. This exercise trains that rotation in a standing position. Put some weight on the bar and you’ll suffer, but the rewards are astounding!

5 – Weighted Bear Crawls
This isn’t something you’ll see very often, but you should!
The core is the foundation around which we move the limbs. Most of our movement follows and X pattern, ie, our left arm moves with our right leg.

kb bear
Be it walking, running, throwing or punching, our hips and shoulders move in opposing directions, it is up to the core to both create and resist this action. Crawling is a great way to focus in on this.
Hold a heavy kettle or dumbbell in each hand as you crawl and you’ve got a beast of an exercise.
We usually put this in the warm up or as a finisher, either way don’t be shy with the weight, but move in a coordinated fashion.

I personally guarantee adding these into your existing routine will give you an edge you never thought possible.

Have fun

Dave
http://www.wg-fit.com


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , ,
Categories : Strength and Conditioning

6 Core Training Methods.

8 03 2013

In the last post HERE we looked at core stability in a static position, which is a great place for anyone, particularly beginners to start.

Now lets add in some movement.

The role of the core musculature is to work reflexively in order to stabilise the spine. This means it must be able to respond in the blink of an eye to any force that is placed on it, be a force generated within our own body (throwing a punch) or a force being received from the outside (receiving a punch)

Any and all sporting actions, actually scratch that, any and all actions require the muscles in the core to fire. We don’t fire them consciously  they kick in as a response to whatever it is we are trying to achieve.

So why not train them with exercises that challenge them in a reflexive manner?

Here’s a few examples of how to do this:

1 – Round the World
Most kettlebell lifters will be familiar with this, but it can be done with a weight plate just as easily (maybe not quite as easily due to grip requirements..)

Simply pass the weight from one hand to the other in front of you, continue it round and swap it behind you so as to trace a complete circle around the body.
This is standard practice in many of my warm ups as it trains the body to constantly adjust to a shifting centre of gravity.

2 – Weighted carries
Dr Stuart McGill, the worlds foremost expert on low back and core training calls the farmers walk “a moving plank”

And he knows a thing or two.

So grab a kettle or a dumbell, hold it by your side and go for a bimble. Simple eh?
Do a powerclean and walk with the weight up at shoulder height as you meander round the room.
Hold it locked out overhead as you walk. Just ensure with this final variation you keep the shoulder locked down, you should feel the weight through the back rather than in the shoulder.
These three variants are super simple and require a single weight, which will load the body on one side asking for greater levels of stability from the core region.

This is how Dan John does core work

This is how Dan John does core work

But can we use two bells? Damn right!
Be aware that you now potentially have double the load, so take care, especially as you pick, put down and turn around.

Then try off setting the bells, hold one high and the other low, ie one overhead and the other by the side. Obviously swap at regular intervals.

3 – Pretty much every bodyweight exercise ever invented.
(Barring the silly ones used in your local Aerobics class)
In the last post I already mentioned that moving in the plank position is usually called a push up, this should give you a bit of a clue.
Many who first start out on Pull Ups and Chin Ups are often caught out on how much they feel their lower abs work.
Bridge for the posterior core
Roll on the floor for dynamic stability in every plane
Animal Movements, well, that’s too big a list for one wee post, but come along to my bodyweight workshop and you’ll get the idea. I must also get back working on the Animal eBook I promised….

4 – Lifting Heavy Stuff
Especially Squats, Deadlifts, Overhead press (standing), Windmills and Turkish Get Ups.
Heavy lifting requires the core to stabilise against an external force. Not only that, but a force that is changing its vector as it progresses through the lift. Perform the lifts unilaterally and core activation goes up even further.
This is particularly apparent in the Get Up, there is so much movement in the lift the core musculature really must form a solid unit in order to get yourself up from the floor and onto your feet while holding something heavy in your outstretched arm.

If it's good enough for Iron Man.....

If it’s good enough for Iron Man…..

And by the way, once you can do a Turkish Get Up, get that thing loaded and stop pansying about with babyweights. You should be able to work the Get Up with a weight heavier than you can press, and we expect you to get at least 1 rep with half your bodyweight.

5 – Hittin Fings
When we talk about the core being reactive and switching on in an instant, few things are better at creating this effect than hittin stuff really hard.

As I work out of a martial arts studio and many of my clients are martial artists, this is kind of bread and butter to us. We rarely use hitting as a core training drill as the guys spend hours hitting the bags and pads as part of their regular training. We do though have them smashing a tyre with a sledgehammer.

For non martial arts types, learning to throw a decent punch into a heavy bag is one of the most satisfying things you can do, it’s also “functional” in case you ever have to knock anyone out! But really, a punch requires the core musculature to stretch and contract to get power moving from the hips into the shoulders and then become a solid unit on impact to drive the power through the target.
A good bag session should leave you with sore abs and tired legs.

A step up again is to punch with some kind of restriction, try holding a weight in the opposite hand as you punch, or punch from a seated position  These will force you to stabilise even harder in order to generate force.You can see the punching drill with a kettlebell towards the end of this clip, in fact you can see points 2, 3, 4,and 5 all in one workout:

6 – Directional Changes
sprint absQuick changes in direction are a great way to challenge to core region. This where things like sprints, shuttles, agility ladders, battling ropes and reaction drills come in. When we move quickly we move around our midsection. A proper gait pattern will see the shoulders and hips swinging in opposite directions, meaning that the muscles in between them, ie your core, are constantly flexing and extending. The more vigorously you do this, ie sprinting, the harder then flex and extend.

Now suddenly change direction.

Assuming you have good basic strength, mobility and running mechanics, sprinting with direction changes will do wonders for your midsection. If you aren’t a runner or have tight hips, stick to the agility ladder as the smaller movements have less inherent risk than when in full flight.

The battling rope is a great core developer as well as mean cardio, to create a wave in the rope, you must first create that wave within your body and that takes control to do, especially as the arms are moving independently.

Have some fun playing with each of these suggestion.

Regards

Dave
http://www.wg-fit.com


Comments : 1 Comment »
Tags: , ,
Categories : Personal Training Dublin

Ask Dave: Why is core strength so important?

28 02 2013

Over the weekend I was over in Galway as a guest of the inimitable Sarah Smith, owner of Galway Kettlebells, where I taught my bodyweight training workshop.

The workshop is always a blast to teach, each time I run it I’m more than impressed by the level of questions that get asked.
On this one though I got a doozy.

A 17 yr old martial artist was on the course, a bright wee lad who is relatively new to the whole fitness / strength & conditioning world.
So often the best questions come from those with the least knowledge, and like I said, this was a corker.
He asked,

“So why exactly is core strength so important?”

Usually I am asked about developing core strength, this is the first time I’ve been asked one of the most important of all questions, “Why?”

To really answer, first of all we all need to be on the same page as to what exactly the “core” is, I personally use three definitions dependent on the context I’m working from.

Lets go over these three definitions:

1 – The Water Bottle Concept

This idea came to me while teaching seminar on Kettlebells to group one day. I asked the group, who were mainly young fitness instructors for their opinions on how to define the “core”
Needless to say I got a lot of blank looks followed by stumbling descriptions and a lot of pointing at the stomach.
At that moment I grabbed my water bottle and used it to illustrate a simple view of the core as a singular unit as opposed to a jumble of parts. Here’s a short version how the speech goes (for a full version, get the Level 1 Kettlebell Manual):

A plastic water bottle, even an empty one, can support a good portion of my bodyweight without any issue. Assuming I can balance on it, it can support my entire bodyweight with a degree of deformity occurring.
Now if put the tiniest hole in the bottle, or simply unseal the lid, it will collapse under a fraction of that weight.
How does the sealed bottle hold me up where an open one collapses? It is after all the same bottle made of the same thin plastic.

A sealed empty plastic bottle supporting a 10kg plate

A sealed empty plastic bottle supporting a 10kg plate

But if we remove the lid....

But if we remove the lid….

It’s the internal air pressure that supports my weight. The walls of plastic merely present the air escaping so that there is sufficient pressure to support me. As soon as the air finds a way out, through a weak spot in the plastic, the bottle collapses.
This is almost exactly how our abdomen works when we are generating high levels of force. The air pressure in the torso stiffens the body so that the hips and shoulders can use it as a platform to push from.
The water bottle even helps us with the anatomy.
The front side is our Rectus Abdominis, or “6 pack.” Directly opposite this on the back of the body is the Erector Spinea. The sides represent our obliques.
The label illustrates the Transverse Abdominis nicely as it goes around the bottle, albeit on the outside rather than the inside.
The base of the bottle is the Pelvic Floor and the lid represents the Diaphragm.When all of these elements are working together, we are strong. Individually they are pretty much useless.

How does this help us?
It shows us how the core works as a unit, stiffening to both protect the body ans also to transfer force from one end of the body to another.
For our martial artist, that means when his fist lands, the core stiffness so that the force is transferred not just into, but through his opponent with minimal recoil reverberating back through himself.

punched_face_02

2 – From the Hips to the Shoulders

I don’t use this one as much as the water bottle idea, but I find it useful for getting the contact athletes and fighters to reconsider their training needs.
It’s a simplified version of the next definition that follows this.
The way I like to illustrate this is with 2 pens and an elastic band.
Put a pen through the band and hold it steady, now put the other pen through it and start twisting. After a few twists hold that pen steady and release the bottom one. What happens?

That’s right, the bottom pen spins as the band unwinds. That’s exactly how a Thai boxer throws a kick, wind the top so that the bottom whips around.

BOOM!

BOOM!

Now if the bottom pen is out hip and the top pen is our shoulder, then the band is our core. What connects the hip to the shoulder? A whole host of muscles, including everything talked about in the Water Bottle idea and adding in the Glutes, Lats, Rhomboids, Traps and so on and so forth.
Look at thrower, be it shot put or baseball, doesn’t matter. See how the et their hip all the way around so the torso is twisted like our elastic band visual. Then, as the torso teaches its maximal stretch it snaps the shoulder through, whipping th arm out and propelling the
ball at rocket speed towards the target.
Every muscle that was involved in that stretch can be construed as the core. It’s not just your abs, it’s the entire connection between the hips and shoulders.

3 – The Spine

This is the real core.
It is a series of 33 bones, 24 of which are able to articulate against the bone above and below it. The spine can flex, extend and rotate, essentially moving in each and every plane. It also protects our spinal cord and acts as an anchor point for a huge amount of muscle.

spine
If we really want to talk about our core, we have to talk about the spine.
In the world of power generation and athletic movement, the spine is a BIG player. Let’s use throwing a punch as an example:
A punch starts in the ground, we extend our rearmost ankle and knee which pushes our rear side hip forwards. This all happens fairly fast with each joint accelerating the next.
Now assuming our abdominal muscles have enough elasticity and strength, the hip turning while the shoulder is stationary will torque the midsection, the spine will become twisted and many the muscles the attach to the spine will either become lengthened (stretched).
The spine then will unwind, releasing that stretch and literally slingshotting the shoulder forward throwing out the arm and knocking out the person opposite you.

If you get nothing from that other than the word “slingshotting” I’m cool with that, just as long as you use that word at something today in conversation. Drop me a comment letting me know how you get on….

Cue one of my favorite self defence coaches, Mick Coup, talking about the punch:

The flexion / extension of the spine in the saggital plane is used by strongman and Kettlebell lifters during presses and jerks to propel weight efficiently overhead with a whip or wave like action.
Combine the forward flexion with rotation and you have a tennis serve, reverse it and you have a suplex throw.

Really, the spine is the core. Muscles are designed to move joints and the spine has 24 articulating vertebrae, as well as the sacroilliac, the atlas and others. That’s a lot of joints, all of which needs to be controlled by muscular contraction.

Now, does the core need to be strong?

Abso-fecking-lutley!

It also needs to be mobile, or “elastic” as I prefer to think of it.
So don’t just do your strength work, be sure to do some mobilisation work too.

I hope this offers some food for thought, I’d be fascinated to hear your opinions on the topic.
I’ll talk about strengthening the core in another post.

Regards

Dave
http://www.WG-Fit.com


Comments : 8 Comments »
Tags: , , , , , ,
Categories : Ask Dave

Integrated Strength for Combat Sports

3 12 2012

punchStrength is important. We know this.

Yet how many guys do you know who are monsters in the gym yet can’t seem to apply this strength in the outside world, be it during a rugby match, a fight or any other physical endeavour?

I’ve known plenty. During the years I worked as a nightclub doorman I stood beside many huge monsters. I’d listen to them telling stories of their gym prowess, how big then benched that afternoon, numbers that I could only dream of hitting.
Yet whenever it kicked off, it was me, the smallest of the crew, that they relied on.
So why could these huge guys with massive bench presses not apply this strength to a real world scenario?

They never looked to integrate that pressing power with the rest of the body.
This is a huge mistake in my book.

Coordinated movement is powerful movement. Watch a fighter move, see how fluid they are? Do you see excess tension? No, they are graceful, cat like.
Their muscles fire in a coordinated fashion, they work synergistically, they move the way they are designed to, not the way some body building protocol is telling them to.

So in terms of upper body, coordinated strength, I don’t favour the bench press. I still use it, it’s is great for maximal strength, but it needs help. And the top exercise for real upper body power, the kind of power that travels from the feet, via a strong and tight core into a powerful shoulder, well that is the One Arm Push Up.

For a long time this was my primary upper body movement. It’s still an integral part of my own training and it is an essential part of all my fighters and rugby players routines.
Each person I’ve introduced to the drill has discovered their striking or throwing power has gone up and their injury rate has gone down.

During yesterdays Bodyweight Training Workshop I videoed the teaching points, including the progressions into the One Arm Push Up.

Here’s the clip:

 

And for your viewing pleasure, here’s me suffering through a One Arm Push Up set after a kettlebell press workout.
You’ll notice two things about this workout:

1 – I’m using the Ladder protocol, my prefered training method with this drill. A ladder set goes as follows: 1L/R, 2L/r, 3L/R. This is one set, I performed 3 sets of this. To progress either do more sets or add rungs to the ladder (1,2,3,4)

2 – I’m swapping hands in the bottom position. This amplifies the intensity of the exercise as it removes the stretch loading f0r the first rep on each change.

Here’s the clip:

I can’t recommend the One Arm Push Up enough if you are a fighter or involved on contact sports.

Regards

Dave
http://www.WG-Fit.com

 


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , , ,
Categories : Bodyweight training

Develop Cat Like Agility with Animal Movements

27 11 2012

Last week I asked my facebook members what they would like to work on in their training.
I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of people who included Agility as one of their answers.

Too many attend gyms, lift weights, get stronger and leaner and in doing so become locked into the movement patterns they train the most. It’s not just the gym population but runners, cyclists and even many martial artists.

People become locked into the movements that they train in the gym at the expense of all other natural movements.
Hence we have cyclists who can’t run or jump. We’ve Judo/Jiu Jitsu players who walk around hunched over, we have strength athletes that can’t lift their arms over head and so on, so forth.

So to hear people recognising that agility is an important part of fitness makes my heart sing!
If you play a “chaotic” sport, such as rugby, Mixed Martial Arts and a few others that require constant changes in posture, changes in direction, height changes, speed & power generation in a variety of directions, then you’re probably going to be fairly agile already. But most sports are becoming more and more contrived, meaning the people that play them are becoming more and more locked into certain movement patterns which leads to losses in mobility and as a result agility.

And that’s those who play sports. What about those that simply lift for general fitness/aesthetics?
I was at another friends gym a while ago and was surprised at her own lack of athletic movement even though her I highly rate her strength training routines and the aesthetic results they give.

But without an athletic outlet, you simply end up looking good while standing still.  For me, that’s just not good enough, we need to look good in motion. We need fluid, cat like movements, not stiff muscle bound actions.

And the best way to do this?
With animal based bodyweight drills.

Animal movements have been a staple of traditional martial arts conditioning since day dot. And for good reason.
Animals run, jump, crawl, roll and simply enjoy their bodies. Animals don’t “train” they play.
And while, yes, we do need progressively programmed training, we must never forget to spend time playing.

Animal movements invite us to get on all fours and crawl, to roll, to spin, to jump and to flow.
and while they are doing so they train the body to move in various directions, not just the saggital plane.
They are joint mobility, they are asking for strength and power to be produced in unusual directions, re wiring the nervous system, developing coordination, endurance and with gentle persistence, agility.

During this Sundays bodyweight workshop I’ll be sharing a host of animal based drills taken from the Asian martial arts that ask you to roll, crawl and jump, forwards, backwards and with a little imagination can be combined into universal patterns.
All while having a bit of fun.

There are still a few places available.

Event: Bodyweight Workshop – Equipment free strength & fitness from the martial arts and more.
Location: Wild Geese, Magennis Place, Pearse St, D2
Times: 1000 – 1600
Cost: €50pp
To Book: email info@wildgeesema.com

Regards

Dave
http://www.wg-fit.com


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , , ,
Categories : Bodyweight training

Renegade Row – Pulling Perfection and Core Control in One Move

5 07 2012

Got Back?

Many years ago one of the lads brought a “fitness” magazine into the martial arts academy where I was training. As usual it was more ads and nonsensical articles than anything useful. Except for one article.

There was one article in it that was worth the price of the magazine, in fact this article formed the cornerstone of my next training phase as I prepared for my Kenpo 2nd dan.

It was a dumbell circuit, this was the time before I found kettlebells, and it was awesome.
It had a few staples, Thrusters, High Pulls, V-Sits etc but there was one drill I’d never seen before. They called it a push up/row.

I’ve since learned it is better known as the Renegade Row.
And I fell in love with it there and then.

The Renegade Row is one of my all time favourite exercises. It is essentially an upper body pull, like any other row except that we perform it in a plank position.
While this may reduce the total weight we are able to use, it does factor in several other issues.

It asks us:

  • How stable is your core?
  • That shoulder, is it stable?
  • How brave are you?

To do this lift you must first be strong enough to hold a one arm plank. That means a torso that is stable enough to hold itself strong and steady in an unstable position. And thats before we add weight.
Once we start adding weight these demands skyrocket.

We must press all our weight through one bell, this requires the shoulder to be properly anchored and stable, it requires a straight wrist and a tight core.
Then we start to pull. Instantly you’ll feel the strain in the abs, you’ll find the weight is distributed diagonally through the supporting arm and the opposite foot, torquing the spine and trying to unbalance us. But no, we are athletes, we train to be able to counter rotation, to maintain balance under load and still perform. These are stresses we enjoy because when we throw a punch or shrug out of a tackle, these are the forces we will likely encounter.

So the renegade has been a staple of my training ever since.

I use it over a variety of rep ranges.
Lighter bells for conditioning, often combined with a push up.
Heavy bells for strength.

Progress into these slowly, but do use them. Rotate them into your pulling workouts on a regular basis and you won’t regret it.

Check the video for more and a full demo:

Regards
Dave
http://www.wg-fit.com


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , , , , ,
Categories : Kettlebell lifting Dublin, Strength and Conditioning

Stabilise the Shoulders, Strengthen the Waist and Mobilise the Hip all with this exercise

11 05 2012

The kettlebell windmill.
A very commonly performed drill, and rightly so. when done well it has many benefits not least of which are:

  • shoulder stability
  • core strength
  • hip mobility & strength

So it’s a drill worth learning, and worth learning well.

Set up as follows:

  1. Feet approx shoulder width, maybe wider if needed.
  2. Legs straight, and kept as straight as possible throughout the drill.
  3. Core braced tight.
  4. Shoulders pulled back and down.
  5. Arm on the working side pointing straight up, eyes fixed on this hand.
  6. Other arm acting as a guide following the inside of “unloaded” leg.

Simple eh?

The most common mistakes are not looking up and overbending of the legs.
If you don’t look up it becomes very difficult to keep the chest high and also stabilise the kettle if it is in the top hand. You are essentially putting the back at risk as well as running the risk of loosing control of the bell by simply not looking up.
Over bending the legs is often done as a compensation for a lack of hip mobility. While not too serious in most cases, people with poor glute function end up twisting themselves into all sorts of weird positions, knee valgus (bowing in) is particularly common. Don’t be confused, we don’t need perfect locked out knees, just try to keep them as straight as possible. If this means a reduced range of motion, so be it. Have patience and work on slowly and gradually adding depth.

But how deep should you go?
Thats down to the individual. Go as far as you can safely manage and no further. As you loosen up your range of motion will gradually improve, just have patience.

Here’s a video clip detailing and demonstrating the lift:

Take care with this, learn it slowly and carefully, it will reward patience and persistence.
Most people do well starting with the kettle in the bottom hand before graduating to the top position and finally doubles. Going too hard too soon will cause nothing but pain.

Regards
Dave
www.wg-fit.com


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , ,
Categories : Kettlebell lifting Dublin

Core Training for the Combat Athlete

15 11 2011

Core training, a phrase that the fitness marketing gurus have usurped, twisted and made a mockery of.
Shame really as training the midsection is vital for anyone involved in any sport, especially Martial Arts and the combat sports.

The core is not just the 6 pack muscle (rectus abdominis), and core training is not just about doing crunches. Ok, some of you know this and train your core with Planks, Supermans and Bird Dog exercises. I congratulate you on your education, but it still isn’t enough, especially if you intend on hitting and getting hit with any force.

This workout which i filmed earlier shows some genuine core training. It’s an example of the Power Circuit format that I use on myself and some of my fighters, but with exercises inspired by the Diesel Crew’s excellent Combat Core manual and other top conditioning coaches.

The circuit is as follows;

Deadlift x 5/4/3/2/1
1 Arm Push up x 5 L/R
Sledgehammer slams x 10 L/R
Racked Kettlebell Bag Work (See combat core for these) x 10 L/R

So what is happening in the core?
Deadlifts: Posterior chain exercise requiring the core to resist forward flexion. The heavy load of the deadlift (the video shows my last round lifting 140kg or 308.6lb) forces the entire core into action  form a rock solid platform for the power generated in the legs and hips to get to the shoulders where the bar attaches to the body. A weak core will lead to either a missed lift or a back injury.

1 Arm Push Ups: This is a plank on steroids! You have three points of balance, your feet and one hand, this means one thing – Torque.
As you raise and lower the body there is a tremendous rotational force being placed on the core, don’t beleive me, watch the video, you think you can do that with weak abs?

Stoppit! This is a party trick, not a training drill

Sledgehammer: This is a forward flexion drill, like a crunch in some respects. This trains the abs, along with the legs, shoulders and lats to generate force where the previous two drills were about resisting force.

Racked KB punching: A punch is similar to a one arm push up, the core under torque. As a punch is thrown the legs and hips generate power, the core must tighten to allow the force be passed up into the striking arm. On contact the core must be fully braced for the impact of the strike landing. Holding a weight amplifies these attributes.

So a four exercise circuit that will build strength, power and work capacity yet is centred around developing usable (as opposed to functional, which has also become a meaningless marketing term) core strength and stability.

Now obviously this isn’t for everyone, the circuit is designed for fighters, but with a little common sense you should be able to take the ideas and principles behind the workout to create your own workouts.
Perhaps substitute the deadlift for kettlebell swings. One arm push ups maybe a bit much, but you get similar benefit from regular push ups or one arm plank holds.
The sledgehammer can’t easily be substituted but V-Sits and ankle grab sit ups are a decent alternative.

Take the idea and run with it. You’ll get far more out of these drills then you will with crunches.

Have a look at the video:

Regards

Dave
http://www.wg-fit.com


Comments : 1 Comment »
Tags: , ,
Categories : Strength and Conditioning

Fascinating Facial Feedback

28 08 2011

Wild Geese Fitness Training was born out of my Martial Arts practice.
This much is no secret, I’ve often told the story of how as a teenager practising and competing in Karate I struck a patch where I was getting beaten, failing grades and generally not doing as well as previous years. My instructors advice was simple, concise and very accurate. He said, “Dave, you have to get stronger”

Over the next 20 years, this is what I’ve continued to do in a variety of ways. I’ve run, cycled, Yoga’d, Pilates’d, I’ve lifted heavy for low reps, I’ve lifted light for lots of reps, I’ve lifted Bodyweight, Dumbells, Kettlebell, Sandbags, Rock, Logs and other people.

And do you know what I’ve found to work the best?

All of them.

I’ve tried specialising on numerous occasions, marathon training, Powerlifting style training, bodybuilding training and more recently Kettlebell Sport training. Each time I did, my martial arts ability dropped which created a problem, strength and conditioning is supposed to make be better, not worse, at other things.

So, when I create programs, such the WMD training method used on the Boot Camp (still editing the book……), I use a blend of all the listed methods. In my regular classes I utilise two or three methods per class so over the course of a few weeks each gets some attention.
And it works, but I never really figured out why. Most of the stuff I read comes from coaches who specialise, but why was it never working for me, which meant I couldn’t make it work for my clients.  Why did I have to spend so much time and effort coming up with a style of training that has become known by some of my guys as “WGMA Style”?
It would have been much easier just to copy stuff, like I did at school. Since becoming Coach I’ve really had to engage the brain!

And then today, while drinking coffee and browsing Facebook, I stumble, almost by accident on the following article:

http://www.ideafit.com/fitness-library/fascial-fitness

Bookmark it, read it and read it again. It is that important.

Da Vinci's understanding of the body was way ahead of it's time

It comes from a bloke named Thomas Myers, a guy with a brain the size of a planet. He wrote the book Anatomy Trains which turned much of modern hands on therapy and training on its head.
I first heard of him through a friend of mine, top Rolfing practitioner Tony  Walsh. Tony presented here at Wild Geese a while ago and introduced us to the idea of fascia, the fascial network and some of the methods of keeping it healthy. This lead to me doing a load more reading, often way above my meagre IQ level.

Then this article from the man himself appears and it all starts to make sense.

He says:
Finding #1:Specific training can enhance the fascial elasticity essential to systemic resilience. 
The basic news is that connective tissue—even dense tissues like tendons and aponeuroses—is much more significantly elastic than previously thought. The second essential part of that news is that fascial elasticity is stored and returned very quickly. In other words, it is more like a superball than a Nerf™ ball. Thus, fascial elasticity is a factor only when the motion is cyclic and quickly repeated, as in running, walking or bouncing, but not as in bicycling, in which the repetitive cycle is far too slow to take

Tony Walsh told me, after I’d introduced him to the kettlebell, that he had come to the conclusion that the classic lifts (Clean, Snatch and Jerk) were perhaps the most efficient way to strengthen the facial network.

Finding #2: The fascial system responds better to variation than to a repetitive program

What’s In:

  • Whole-Body Movements. Engaging long myofascial chains and whole-body movements is the better way to train the fascial

    The Sandbag Halo drill, real full body training

    system.

    This is true in the wider sense also, not just in terms of fascial strength. Isolation exercises should only be used in a rehabilitation setting, or for physique purposes.

  • Proximal Initiation. It’s best to start movements with a dynamic pre-stretch (distal extension) but accompany this with a proximal initiation in the desired direction, letting the more distal parts of the body follow in sequence, like an elastic pendulum.

    In the martial arts we are told “to move left, first move right, to move up, first move down….” this activates the stretch reflex which largely a function of the fascial network.
    Even in things like the Deadlift this is applicable, watch Andy Bolton, he sets himself up, then bounces the hips up and down, once, twice and  on the third he powers the bar off the floor. He’s the first man to deadlift over 1000lb, so he knows a thing or two! Is his pre lift routine an idle habit or has he instinctively figured out Proximal Initiation?

  • Adaptive Movement. Complex movement requiring adaptation, like parkour (see the beginning of the James Bond movie Casino Royale for a great example), beats repetitive exercise programs.

    Parkour is nothing new, Georges Herbert was doing it decades ago, but there is also circuit training, which, more recently has become called “Crossfit” and has become massively popular of late,  the use of variety in the routines works.  As log as an athlete has certain benchmarks against which to test himself, why repeat the same program over and over? The only answer I can come up with is to specialise, as in Powerlifting, Kettlebell sports and the like.

What’s out:

  • Repetitive Movement. Machines (or minds) that require clients to work in the same line again and again do not build fascial resilience very well.

    This comes as no surprise, machines always suck. Use bodyweight, barbell, dumbells, Kettles, sandbags and even other people, but stay of the damn machines!

  • Always Practicing With Upper-Level Loads. Variable loads build different aspects of the fascia. Sticking with near-limit loads will strengthen some ligaments but weaken others. Varying the load is the better way.

    This is more of a Newbies error anyway. Most experienced trainees have some concept of periodisation and know when to back off. In our training here at Wild Geese we like to ensure that a variety of rep ranges are employed with the various movement patterns, partly as we aim to create all round athleticism, but also to hit every aspect of our physiology. There’s no point being massively strong if you can’t move fluidly….

  • Always Training in the Same Tempo. Likewise, varying the tempo of your

    Tempo is a point of contention amongst lifting coaches, but in my opinion it comes down to this: Lift as fast as possible, lower under control. Although we do occasionally use pauses at various point through the lift.  Of course the speed of movement and therefore time spent under load will change as the weight does. Heavy weights move slowly. I do think though i will spend more time experimenting with tempo, just to see how it affects us.
Finding #3:The fascial system is far more innervated than muscle, so proprioception and kinesthesia are primarily fascial, not muscular.
This is a hard concept for many fitness professionals to get their heads around, but it is a fact: there are 10 times as many sensory receptors in your fascial tissues as there are in your muscles (Stillwell 1957)
So when you say you are feeling your muscles move, this is a bit of a misnomer. You are “listening” to your fascial tissues much more than to your muscles

I’ve a feeling this point is one reason why I’ve heard two or three of my clients, and other coaches clients mention the fact that the best Strength & Conditioning coaches they’ve ever had all have strong backgrounds in the Martial Arts. As a martial artist you are encouraged to listen to the body, feel with the whole as opposed to relying on visual and / or audio feedback. we discover that the greater our ability to listen and understand our own bodies feedback, the better we can listen to what our opponents/training partners bodies are saying.  Many Martial Arts based coaches favour a more holistic training style, possibly because of our western formal education blended with our Asian studies through our chosen arts.

Whichever way you look at it, Thomas Myers work does suggest:
  1. The fascial network is the glue that holds us together
  2. Strengthening the facial network is as important as training the muscles themselves
  3. The fascia takes approx 6 months to respond to a training program, as opposed to a few weeks by the muscles.
  4. Vary the rep ranges, the weight and the lifts through the training program.
  5. Don’t get caught up in any Dogmatic approach to training, instead listen to you body and talk about this feedback to you coach.
This is a deep topic and one I’m only discovering myself, as I learn more, so will you.
Regards


Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: , , ,
Categories : Personal Training Dublin, Strength and Conditioning

« Previous Entries


Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 1,563 other followers