Thank a lot for the information, it’s most appreciated. It’s the kind of information about creating a home gym that should be somewhere on the site but isn’t yet.
One last question on the subject, between a Sorinex all terrain-bar, a Pendlay 20 kg training bar, a York training bar and a Texas power bar, I know ultimately it’s pretty much alike, but which one would you choose (and a small “why”)?
I’m not really looking for a cost/effectiveness, because they are all about about 300, so a few dollars more or less isn’t much of an issue. I’d just want to have a few last tips on choosing, because it’s somewhat of an investment.
This is my first post! I am not sure if this is the correct place to ask, but I pretty much love all your articles and I really like the community over here at your column. Just wanna ask something, in my training program I personally like to have exercises that allows me to stretch the particular muscle that I’m working on for that session. Things like doing flies for chest and extension for triceps. The thing is, I can’t find a good exercise to stretch my middle back or rhomboids. Pull ups and deadlifts gives me a good stretch feel for lats but I can’t feel any stretch for rhomboids, and I think its just me but my rhomboids grow faster than my lats after doing pull up sessions. Hope someone could give me a general idea?
[quote]CPerfringens wrote:
Thank a lot for the information, it’s most appreciated. It’s the kind of information about creating a home gym that should be somewhere on the site but isn’t yet.
One last question on the subject, between a Sorinex all terrain-bar, a Pendlay 20 kg training bar, a York training bar and a Texas power bar, I know ultimately it’s pretty much alike, but which one would you choose (and a small “why”)?
I’m not really looking for a cost/effectiveness, because they are all about about 300, so a few dollars more or less isn’t much of an issue. I’d just want to have a few last tips on choosing, because it’s somewhat of an investment.
Again, thank a lot for all the useful info.[/quote]
I’d go with either the pendlay or york bar. The Texas power bar is a powerlifting bar and as such it doesn’t revolve as well as the other ones which are olympic lifting bars.
[quote]ab1975 wrote:
Hi coach. Could you please tell us why I awlways see in the gym most of athletes in water sports like swimming and water polo and their coaches use elastic resistance (tubes, bands) as a strenth training equipment. Most of the time they do many exercises without any free weights, machines, cables. Thanks in advance.[/quote]
The logic is that the bands provide a force curve similar to when you are swimming whereas with free weights the resistance is fixed. That having been said, while I understand the logic behind their selection, I do not agree with it. I feel that many swimmers lack muscle strength and should employ more basic free-weight lifts.
Coach,
I am looking to maintain my squat strength over summer while focusing on sprinting. I am trying to get back into high school hurdling (110m and 300m) shape and I would enjoy trying to do a track meet on some very amateur level in the next year or two.
Any advice regarding ratio of sprint training days vs. squat and/or deadlift days?
Further, what intensity could I maintain with squat/deadlift while doing hard sprinting on several other days?
Currently, I was thinking 1 squat day and 2-3 sprint days per week, with deadlifting probably every other week.
During my workouts with the Anaconda protocol I am really burping up a lot or getting some reflux issues.
This is not a typical daily problem only during training and with the protocol, but it sometimes feels like more would “come up” if I don’t stop for a second
Any thoughts??
With all my meals I use enzymes but that doesn’t make sense peri workout to me.
My training is german body comp ( i am on a biosig program)
[quote]brmnstl wrote:
Coach didn’t know where to put this
During my workouts with the Anaconda protocol I am really burping up a lot or getting some reflux issues.
This is not a typical daily problem only during training and with the protocol, but it sometimes feels like more would “come up” if I don’t stop for a second
Any thoughts??
With all my meals I use enzymes but that doesn’t make sense peri workout to me.
My training is german body comp ( i am on a biosig program) [/quote]
German body comp programs are well know for increasing overall body acidity (which is one of the reason they work). When this happens and there is something acidic in the stomach, refluxes can happen. I would actually try taking Zantac 75 or pepsid complete with your first Anaconda shake.
CT, I’m going through a deload week and did deadlifts today. For some reason I just couldn’t help myself in trying to get a PR. Anyways I ended up getting a 3rm PR and didn’t really grind through or anything (it was somewhat smooth). My question is, was this a bad idea going for a PR while deloading? My volume is lower than usuall and I haven’t done a traditional deadlift for 2 weeks prior to this.
Thib, I’ve found that squatting from pins shifts focus heavily on glutes and hamstrings rather than quads, even if high bar position and partial squats are used with very upright torso . Is this normal ?
This may be too general, and if it is I understand. I lead a team whose focus is on 72 - 96 hour missions (toughest terrain is the mountains in Afghanistan, load can be up to 120 lbs., and movements up to 20 miles daily on flat ground, only several miles in the mountains), and room clearing, which requires the speed and explosiveness to get through a door and house very quickly with about 60 lbs of gear, and the confidence in your strength if you hit a guy you don’t have to worry that he won’t hit the ground.
The firefights you don’t mean to get into usually consist of moving about 50m to 100m at a time with about 60 - 80 lbs. and last around 20 - 30 minutes. The ones that last all day are usually just several bouts of short intensity broken up by holding in position for a while. I don’t buy into the crossfit makes you ready for anything. I think it helps your conditioning, but that’s about it. I think we need to be stronger than marathon runners. I really liked your I,BODYBUILDER program (and I added some running), but I felt I lost some speed and endurance (and I understand that’s not what it was meant for).
I’m thinking something along the lines of your football program with a couple of longer low-impact cardio days (I’m not a huge fan of long distance running because we tend to have bad knees). I really appreciate any help you can give me, and I understand if this is something you don’t have time for. Thanks again.
[quote]jonmb11 wrote:
CT, I’m going through a deload week and did deadlifts today. For some reason I just couldn’t help myself in trying to get a PR. Anyways I ended up getting a 3rm PR and didn’t really grind through or anything (it was somewhat smooth). My question is, was this a bad idea going for a PR while deloading? My volume is lower than usuall and I haven’t done a traditional deadlift for 2 weeks prior to this.
Thanks[/quote]
Going for a PR at the end of a deloading week is actually a good idea. Bulgarian Olympic lifters always go for a max performance on the Friday of the deloading week.
[quote]jonmb11 wrote:
CT, I’m going through a deload week and did deadlifts today. For some reason I just couldn’t help myself in trying to get a PR. Anyways I ended up getting a 3rm PR and didn’t really grind through or anything (it was somewhat smooth). My question is, was this a bad idea going for a PR while deloading? My volume is lower than usuall and I haven’t done a traditional deadlift for 2 weeks prior to this.
Thanks[/quote]
Going for a PR at the end of a deloading week is actually a good idea. Bulgarian Olympic lifters always go for a max performance on the Friday of the deloading week.[/quote]
Cool. Good to know. Should going for a PR only be done at the end of the deload week or could I go for a PR on the rest of my deload days if it felt natural and I felt fresh. I wouldn’t try to force it.
Quick question: I may try your Canadian Bear Program later in the year to do a test run for density training (I like yours more than EDT), just wanted to clarify something. For the 6 and 3 reps per set, that is straight sets, correct, no ramping? Basically picking a load from 8-10 RM depending on how you feel (in the example for the 6 reps per set). Thanks.
[quote]jonmb11 wrote:
CT, I’m going through a deload week and did deadlifts today. For some reason I just couldn’t help myself in trying to get a PR. Anyways I ended up getting a 3rm PR and didn’t really grind through or anything (it was somewhat smooth). My question is, was this a bad idea going for a PR while deloading? My volume is lower than usuall and I haven’t done a traditional deadlift for 2 weeks prior to this.
Thanks[/quote]
Going for a PR at the end of a deloading week is actually a good idea. Bulgarian Olympic lifters always go for a max performance on the Friday of the deloading week.[/quote]
Cool. Good to know. Should going for a PR only be done at the end of the deload week or could I go for a PR on the rest of my deload days if it felt natural and I felt fresh. I wouldn’t try to force it.[/quote]
Could you offer any advise for my squat form? I have a PT at the gym I lift at who thinks I should completely drop squats and work on single leg movements, strengthen my lower back, glutes, and hams until I’m ready to squat. I guess I lose my lower back arch at the bottom of the whole.
Do you think it is wise to drop squats all together for a month or so? Or would it be safe to say that I should drop weight a little bit and try to nail form down? I really “enjoy” squatting and don’t won’t to stop it. My goal is to get as big/strong as I can and I know squats are one of the best ways of getting there.
Thibs, I am lagging in my upper chest compared to my overall chest development. I can’t find it, but I believe I read one of your posts not too long ago mentioning somewhere along the lines of “how most muscular powerlifters with big benches have great overall chest deveopment, and only perform flat bench presses”.
Do you have any tips or suggestions to bring up the upper chest? Or should I just keep trying to increase my bench, and hopefully over time the upper portion of the chest will fill out?
Thanks
[quote]Italiano wrote:
Thibs, I am lagging in my upper chest compared to my overall chest development. I can’t find it, but I believe I read one of your posts not too long ago mentioning somewhere along the lines of “how most muscular powerlifters with big benches have great overall chest deveopment, and only perform flat bench presses”.
Do you have any tips or suggestions to bring up the upper chest? Or should I just keep trying to increase my bench, and hopefully over time the upper portion of the chest will fill out?
Thanks[/quote]
Go heavy on the bench, powerlifting style. For example ramping sets of 3 to 5 reps.
Then drop down the weight to 60% of the max you reached and perform 3 sets of max reps on the wide grip bench press to the neck.
Wow, forgot about this. Oddly this program is very much in line with my current thinking. I would only change the sets for ramping sets of 3 or 5 reps on the strength exercises and might change the GPP stuff to be more strength and power focused (more focus on heavier weights and shorter distance or sets; more focus on speed)
Wow, forgot about this. Oddly this program is very much in line with my current thinking. I would only change the sets for ramping sets of 3 or 5 reps on the strength exercises and might change the GPP stuff to be more strength and power focused (more focus on heavier weights and shorter distance or sets; more focus on speed)[/quote]
Great, thanks! I re-read it yesterday and realized how applicable it is to my current goals. And I remembered Pascal Caron from this article after you mentioned him on your Random Thoughts - Modified Canadian Complex routine. He sounds like a beast!
