This is the bit I don’t understand - how is squating on a stability ball functional, and a deadlift isn’t? How is doing anything on a bosu ball good for you (outside of rehab)?
The real question I want answered is “where can I buy a donut tree?”.
I don’t even mind fat strength coaches, as long as they move an ass load of weight and know their shit. If you’re fat, you better prove that you know your shit by squating 900lbs or otherwise earning the respect of the crowd as you present.
I feel that the main problem is that people look for the weight room alone to improve their athletic performance. The weights help with strength, flexibility, explosiveness, and balance but you still have to play your sport a lot to get any kind of carryover from the weight room. For example if you lift weights and thats all you do then it won’t help you on the basketball court, but if you lift weights and play basketball and spend about equal time on both then the wieght training will have a tremendously positive carryover. And bowhunting in the woods is going to make you better at bowhunting in the woods, not playing a sport. And for the record I will put my athletes against any “functional” trainers athletes and kick their asses!..at anything except for squats on a ball, we would just push the other guys off and see how functional they are.
[quote]Massif wrote:
I don’t even mind fat strength coaches, as long as they move an ass load of weight and know their shit. If you’re fat, you better prove that you know your shit by squating 900lbs or otherwise earning the respect of the crowd as you present.[/quote]
True. I have seen plenty of fat guys who are exceptionally strong.
The underlying factor is that the guy would not have been functional himself. He was 5-10 and about that wide. Surely in the true sense of the word functional, he would not match up. When chasing down a deer in the forest, I think his 30% bodyfat would be something that holds him back.
[quote]Massif wrote:
This is the bit I don’t understand - how is squating on a stability ball functional, and a deadlift isn’t? How is doing anything on a bosu ball good for you (outside of rehab)?
[/quote]
Sorry, I should have replied to this one earlier too!
I think swiss balls have some place in strength and conditioning. And they have a big place for rehab and etc. Same with the Bosu.
I went to FILEX (Fitness Convention in Sydney) and spent a day with Peter Twist in ‘Training for Speed, Agility and Quickness.’
We did heaps on the agility ladders and Bosu’s. There were some good exercises that I think might transfer to the sporting arena but on the whole I felt it was a gimmick. I wouldn’t go investing in any for my team that is for sure.
[quote]WhiteGorilla wrote:
I feel that the main problem is that people look for the weight room alone to improve their athletic performance. The weights help with strength, flexibility, explosiveness, and balance but you still have to play your sport a lot to get any kind of carryover from the weight room. For example if you lift weights and thats all you do then it won’t help you on the basketball court, but if you lift weights and play basketball and spend about equal time on both then the wieght training will have a tremendously positive carryover. And bowhunting in the woods is going to make you better at bowhunting in the woods, not playing a sport. And for the record I will put my athletes against any “functional” trainers athletes and kick their asses!..at anything except for squats on a ball, we would just push the other guys off and see how functional they are.[/quote]
Are people training to be in the circus or the sporting arena. Squats on a ball are a joke.
Besides, I know this cowboy trainer who after a group session decided it would be a good idea to see how long his athletes could stand on the swiss ball for. One guy fell off and broke both wrists putting him out of action for a very long time.
[quote]Velvet Revolver wrote:
Hold on there a minute.
Aint that iggy pop? Dont be doggin on my hometown boy.
[/quote]
Sorry man. He was the first person that popped into my mind when I was thinking about Twig.
Wow - that is insane.
When I work with clients, and I say functional strength, I mean squats. If you’re an athlete, functional training would be training for your sports. It means cut the bullshit with coming to the gym and doing 20 isolations, get some heavy weight, and do a squat.
People who come to the gym to look good and for health reasons need squats, and losing your squats is the most humiliating experience a person can get as they age. There is nothing worse than not being able to go to the bathroom on your own. I teach them now so they’ll have their squats (and independence) later. That’s functional. If you don’t chase a deer in day to day life, how the hell is it functional to train like you do?
I am amazed when I get a 30 or 40 year old female client who can’t do a lunge. Her functionality in life depends on her ability to age gracefully. I get younger clients, I get older ones - but they all learn to squat and lunge first.
And yes, I teach clients to get on a BOSU and also to stretch - because, you know what? Breaking a hip is a life sentence when you get older, and balance is half that. Moving like a zombie is no life when you get old, and that’s what flexibility is about.
[quote]Gimli wrote:
DTak wrote:
Coach Mack wrote:
Why not be 6, 135 and wield a chainsaw with one hand?? This guy was a clown. On the football field Arnold and Twig are charging head on at 25 mph each. They collide at the same pace, who wins? Our boy, Arnie every time.
oooh I know this one.
25 mph is roughly 11.2 m/s
135 lbs is roughly 61.2 kg
240 lbs is roughly 109 kg
Inertia is M*Velocity.
Twig inertia = 685 kg.m/s
Arnie inertia = 1221 kg.m/s
So if twig could suddenly run 20 m/s they would each feel the same impact. Of course thats 45mph.
Sorry quantum mechanics final coming up.
Umm… dude. inertia is mass. MV is momentum. They’d both feel the same impact but Twig would fall down and Arnie wouldn’t. Good luck on your test.[/quote]
Firstly, Dtak, you’re not impressing anyone with your “quantum mechanics” wizardry - How old are you? 14? Sitting your SATs? Well done on the basic mathematics.
Secondly, Gimli, mass is mass, inertia is inertia. MV is indeed momentum though, have a biscuit.
[quote]FairDo wrote:
Well, this is not to defend Chek-mania, because I do have some major issues with his followers.
In opinion, probably most of them are just a stuck-up idiots, that if it was not for this temporary hype they would never make it in strength/sports/fitness training. I am yet to meet a chek practitioner who’s got some REAL background in S&C or comes from COMPETETIVE sport and actually achieved something with regard to his/her physical performance and knows how to get there.
Unfortunately, all I found so far were ordinary “pencilnecks”.
Nobody likes a pencilneck to tell you how to train!
[/quote]
Well this guy is a CHEK practitioner and looks like he knows a thing or two about strength and conditioning:
[quote]DPH wrote:
ZEB wrote:
-How did this dude get to be 30% body fat just eating greens and berries? He must have found a doughnut tree in the woods huh?
I have a hostess cupcake tree in my back yard…
it’s the only thing holding me back from 8% bodyfat…[/quote]
ROFLMAO!
Ok I had to read this because I was put through functional training. My views on functional training it’s a bunch of HORSESHIT! I am a little bitter because I went to a trainer and told her of my goals to do a figure comp. and she put me through months of this shit. Finally, after getting fed up with no results and my strength dwindling and NO RESULTS… I bought the encyclopedia of BBing by Arnold and started learning and learning…and needless to say I was done with that trainer and not to mention pissed!
So yes I share in your laughter about functional training.
[quote]Coach Mack wrote:
harris447 wrote:
I just started picturing some of my students running around the forest shooting arrows at one another and actually laughed out loud.
Good work, coach.
I would bet my house that if I took 20-30 students out into the forest with Longbows, someone would get shot.
[/quote]
Some-ONE? Wow, you must have much brighter students than I do.
I would have at least fourteen kids down in the first five minutes, including one or two that somehow managed–despite the laws of physics and physiology–to shoot themselves in the face with a bow and arrow.
(Is it wrong that the mental image stil makes me giggle like a schoolgirl?)
I would like to go on the record to say that I also hate functional training.
Can we please just retire the word? It doesn’t have shit for meaning.
Seriously.
Please?
I would have asked him to go over and perform as many pull ups as he could. When he failed to do one I would have excused myself from the discussion.
Monkey bars and a see saw? Thanks for the laugh.
Cavemen didn’t have bosu balls, so why use them. Most traditional free weights and strongman equipment are closer to what a caveman would have, than some instability surface.
IMO guys like this should emulate a time even before the cavemen, make like a single celled organism and split them selves in two. The only problem is that he’d have to accomplish it using arrow heads. I wonder if he’ll ask his surgeon to use stone tools when he goes in for his triple bypass.
I like how using a chainsaw one handed is functional, even though the amount of times you will ever need to use a chainsaw one handed at all in your life (unless your name is Ash and you’re in the Evil Dead series) is pretty much going to be zero.
[quote]gi2eg wrote:
Can we please just retire the word? It doesn’t have shit for meaning.
Seriously.
Please?[/quote]
+1
train for your own goals.
embrace progress, people are living longer because of it.
and if someone is going to present a training program of any type - prove that it works by at least “looking” strong…
[quote]miroku333 wrote:
gi2eg wrote:
Can we please just retire the word? It doesn’t have shit for meaning.
Seriously.
Please?
+1
train for your own goals.
embrace progress, people are living longer because of it.
and if someone is going to present a training program of any type - prove that it works by at least “looking” strong…[/quote]
Totally with you on the first part.
But on the second?? If you are meeting your own goals, and your training is helping YOU, and you ARE strong/capable…then don’t worry about “looking” strong unless it is also one of your goals. If you’re training for performance, prove that it works with…performance.
9 times out of 10 it will happen anyway (although looking strong is largely subjective and relative).
I’m going to put my money on Arnold being able to wield two chainsaws in one hand, but that’s just my vote.
[quote]gi2eg wrote:
miroku333 wrote:
gi2eg wrote:
Can we please just retire the word? It doesn’t have shit for meaning.
Seriously.
Please?
+1
train for your own goals.
embrace progress, people are living longer because of it.
and if someone is going to present a training program of any type - prove that it works by at least “looking” strong…
Totally with you on the first part.
But on the second?? If you are meeting your own goals, and your training is helping YOU, and you ARE strong/capable…then don’t worry about “looking” strong unless it is also one of your goals. If you’re training for performance, prove that it works with…performance.
9 times out of 10 it will happen anyway (although looking strong is largely subjective and relative).[/quote]
that’s what I meant, but you said it more succinctly.