L.I.F.T.

Chris at Conditioning Research posted a great entry about the different benefits of squatting and deadlifting.

What really caught my attention was this quote from Matt Metzgar, taken from a post on his blog:

“Toddlers squat constantly, but it is all “mobility” work. The squats are done for the purposes of movement, not for the purposes of lifting a weight. If a toddler wants to lift a weight, they shift into a deadlift position.”

we all used to do it...what happened?!

The Back Squat

As far as squatting goes, there are a ton of squatting types/forms.  What the authors above are talking about is a natural full-squat position, similar to the resting/seated position used by most people in most “undeveloped” countries:

many still do...

The exercise called “the back squat” involves placing a bar across your upper back, and squatting with it.  As the authors mention (and Mike Boyle harps on), this can cause injury if proper form isn’t maintained – that is, if you progress too fast in weight.

The body is only as strong as its weakest link, and, in most “modern” people the lower back is a very weak link.  When you put that weight on your shoulders, and squat down, if your mobility sucks, you bend forward, and all of that weight goes to your weak link.

Then the weak link breaks.

The “back squat” though, is called the “back squat” not just because you put the weight on your back, but because it is a back exercise.  The back squat, traditionally, was thought of more as a strengthener of the back than of the legs.  The deadlift, as the authors above mention as well, was traditionally a leg exercise – though not even the “predominant” leg exercise…that was the “front squat.”

The Front Squat

The front squat involves supporting a bar across the front of your shoulders, and squatting with the weight held there.

The front squat usually allows for a much greater range of motion than the back squat, because the weight is ahead of the individual.  It also uses the quadriceps much more than the back squat, and can take a lot of the loading off of the lower back, as the back is necessarily kept in a more upright position (to avoid falling over).

This is the squat used in Olympic lifting, where lifters frequently achieve weights in excess of 3 or 4 times their bodyweight.  And it uses the “full squat” (“mobility”) position.

The Deadlift

The deadlift was called “The Health Lift” by most writers before 1970.  It was considered the single best lift for achieving total body strength.  I think it still is.

However, the deadlift has its own problems, which are, or can be, very similar to those encountered in the back squat.

If form is sacrificed in the traditional deadlift, and the lumbar spine rounds, the load, again, is transferred to that spot, and the weakest link goes.

The Goal – Maximal Strength within Proper Technique

The problem with all of these discussions is that they try to make a claim that one exercise is “better” than another.  That “better” can mean “builds more strength,” or “is less dangerous,” or “has a higher functional carryover.”

But there is no absolute truth…except, maybe, this:

If you do any exercise with proper technique, to the current limit at which you can sustain proper technique, and progress as you are able, you will be fine.

No exercise is “better” than any other.  They’re all good.  They all have their time and place.

The problem happens when people try to rush things, and sacrifice technique for “success.”

Sacrificing technique for success = failure.

Write that on your whiteboard.

I haven’t done a “cookie-cutter” weightlifting program in years.  Probably not since I bought Ross Enamait’s excellent book “Never Gymless.”  I think that was in 2006.

Since then, I’ve created my own training programs.  I’ve vacillated wildly between types of training – weightlifting, bodyweight, o-lifts, Crossfit and Crossfit-style workouts, rings/gymnastics, etc.

Too much stuff!

I feel like I’ve learned some things since then, and figured I’d share some of those lessons.

1. Cookie-cutter programs aren’t all bad.  Hell, I and most of my friends learned everything we knew about the gym from magazines, and from trying out programs in those magazines.  I still like to try people’s programs, to see how they affect my body.  While I might fiddle with them a little, I try to adhere as closely as possible to the program as-is, to see what happens.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll pitch it again, because I think the guy has a ton of integrity.  DeFranco’s “Built Like a Badass” program is fantastic.  It’s based on the “core lifts” (bench press, deadlift, squat, overhead press), is based around the individual’s current single-rep maximum, and progresses up nicely.  I don’t know how it would work with a pure “beginner,” but it’s working great for me.  Try it out if you’re looking for something new.

2. Related to the above, I feel more and more like strength is built in the gym, but skill is built on the field of practice.  Modern “functional training” has athletes doing a lot of stuff that is not related to strength training in the gym.

3. Strength is best built using the “classic lifts”/”fundamental movement patterns,” and adhering to the guidelines of good form.

4. This is where “functional training” or “corrective exercise” come in.  When an individual has a limitation that doesn’t allow them to perform the “classic lifts” or fundamental movement patterns in a way that is biomechanically sound for them, you have to start incorporating the lessons from functional/corrective training methodologies.

5. If the individual’s form is breaking down because the weight is too heavy for them, you have to evaluate the risk/reward equation for them.  Is it worth it to possibly get injured in the gym, in order to lift more weight that day?  Maybe.  Maybe not.

6. There is no “perfect” anything.  There’s no “perfect” form.  There’s really good form for a particular individual at a particular time.  There’s no “perfect” program.  There’s a really good program for an individual at that time.

7. Athletes need specificity.  The general person needs general movement.

Let me be more clear.  When you have specific tasks or demands that you have to accomplish, you have to be very specific with the type, frequency, and intensity of the movements you engage in.  When you don’t have anything so specific, you have free reign to do whatever you want to.

That being said, while the athlete’s “skill” training (aside from the “skill” of strength) will be specific to their sport, position, or event, the general gym-goer will benefit from playing more to develop skill.

8. Rhythm is critical to success.  As the saying goes, “timing is everything.”  I’d make it more specific – “rhythm is everything.”  Find the rhythms in your life and synchronize them to your best advantage.  Use rhythm in your training, both in terms of programming, and in terms of practice itself – engage in rhythmical movement more frequently.

Ok, that’s all folks…more later.  Appreciate any thoughts on the above…

The first person I ever saw use the phrase “strength is a skill,” was Pavel Tsatsouline.  His method of “greasing the groove” – repeating a movement pattern (like a pullup, for instance) very frequently throughout the day, but with very low duration/repetitions – summarizes this idea, and has helped a lot of people achieve levels of strength they thought were impossible.

It struck me today, after my workout, that this is really true, but in a different way than I had understood before.

It seems like the type of strength you practice is a skill.  I mean, like a skill, strength is highly specific.

I’ve long been an admirer of Digby and Sale’s SAID Principle – Specific Adaptation to Imposed Demand.  But I guess I never really felt it in my own training till today.

I started a weightlifting program about a month ago.  Specifically, DeFranco’s “Built Like a Badass” program (more on that later).  It had been a while since I’d done any regular, scheduled weightlifting.  My workouts for the past six months or so have been bodyweight stuff.

Today I was doing some heavy one-arm rows, and realized how different I felt versus the first week of the program.  It wasn’t just strength-gain/adaptation.  I felt accustomed to the whole thing – the movement pattern, the intensity, the stance, etc.  It was something I haven’t felt for a few years…since the last time I did one-arm rows on a regular basis.

I realized that that type of strength was a skill I had stopped practicing.

And I know that when I go back to bodyweight movements, there will be a (re-)learning curve there as well.

Seems like Pavel, Digby, Sales, and everyone else who said it was right…strength is a highly specific skill.

When you’re training, anything – martial arts, weightlifting, tae bo, Pilates, etc. -  it’s important to train within yourself.

What do I mean by that?

I mean, be fully present in your body, in the experience in the immediate moment.  Be as aware as you can of what you’re doing, what’s happening inside your body, and how that is expressing into the environment around you.

But why is that important?

There are a few reasons.  The first is, that no real progress is made by ignoring the body.  You may see changes, but those changes will be divorced from you, separate.  They’ll be ephemeral, unreal.

It’s like Maxwell Maltz says in the book “Psycho-Cybernetics.”  He had patients come to him for plastic surgery.  After the procedure, once they’d healed, they would all say “Yes, I can see that I look different…but I don’t feel any different.”

They had succeeded in changing their form, but had been divorced from the process of that change.

And that’s where shortcuts come in.

When you train properly, within yourself, as a method of realizing your full potential – as “self-actualization” – there are no shortcuts in that method.

The method of shortcuts, shortcuts you out of the equation.  It creates a thing.  A thing that is, by definition, not you.

Feel more deeply within.  Observe that within interacting with what is “outside.”

For guides, go find a good Autogenic Training program.  I’m going to put on one iTunes within the next couple of months.  You can buy that one.  Or, go get Eckhart Tolle’s book “The Power of Now,” and do it.

The trick is, neither shortcuts nor process matter if you don’t do them.  Do nothing…get nothing.

GO!

My response to a reader about my most recent blog post sparked something in my brain.  I remembered having read something about the difference between what I referred to as “goal” and “process” orientations.

That is, whether you’re the type of person who likes to focus on the long-term (or short-term) definite goals, or whether you’re the type who likes to focus on the process itself.

Turns out, my terminology was off.  Both “types” are goal orientations.  That is, there is a “goal” in both cases (though I slightly disagree with this…more about that in a second).  The difference is whether you are “outcome” focused, or “process” focused on the path to your goal.

My disagreement with the terminology is this – an “outcome” is a desired end-state.  A “goal” is a particular moment/achievement in time.  There are ultimately “final outcomes” for both “types,” and different ways of keeping the individual on track toward those outcomes.  But one type focuses on finite “goals” to get to their desired outcome, and the other focuses on process.

Now, I will say this – I think that people who are “process” focused are rarely “goal-thinkers.”  That is, they are immersed in the flow of the process.  They don’t tend to see the big goal as a point-in-space/time.

And definitely not the way what I would call the goal-focused (“outcome-oriented”) people are.  Those folks need goals – long-term, short-term, mid-term – to help themselves feel “on track.”  The process folks are much more “along for the ride.”

In my experience, everyone is different, and responds predominantly to one or the other of these approaches.  Trying to get someone who is goal-oriented to focus on immediate processes is like pulling teeth.  Instead, you set smaller, more immediate (mid- and short-term, goals for those people.

Similarly, trying to get a process-person focused on goals is like getting an ADHD kid to focus on building a model airplane.  Hard to do, and the results will be less than optimal.  Instead, make sure the process person is always checking in with their course of action in reference to a desired end-state (still a goal, but not a permanent, looming object…something that can shift a bit).

A lot of research has been done on these two types of people, and their tendencies in different situations.  This paper, in particular, focuses on these two types in conflict situations, stating that:

“Outcome oriented parties tend to focus on positions, often becoming increasingly locked in to one position. Process oriented parties tend to focus on finding the best negotiation strategy to resolve the conflict.”

One of my reasons for writing this post is that it has been a topic of discussion between me and a few friends quite a bit recently.  The topic of those conversations has largely had to do with the physical training of clients/students, and ways to get them motivated and keep them on track.

Standard training methodology says you set goals.  “I want to bench press 2x bodyweight,” etc.  “I want to run a sub 4-second 40.”  You set your goal, write it on your forehead, write it on the mirror in the gym, write it on a 3×5 card that you keep in your wallet, write it on your wife and kids, etc.  then you go for it.

You “keep your eyes on the prize,” as they say.  Stay focused on the goal.

But I think something, or several things, get lost with this approach.

The goal-focused lose track, oftentimes, of how their body is actually feeling.  They’re so focused on the end-state that they forget to check in.  They go too hard, too fast.  They break down.  The process folks can, sometimes, be the opposite.

I might even classify these orientations by the types of activities the person chooses.  Most goal-oriented folks are hard-driven.  They prefer competitive environments, sport leagues, and all-out-effort activities.  Process-oriented folks tend to prefer cooperative environments, group/community settings, and longer/slower activities.

However, the goal-orientation tends to be more of a finite-game player.  That is, they tend to play to win.  Process-oriented people, in my experience, are much more infinite-game players.  They tend to play to keep playing.

The question, ultimately, is how to manage both types of person, and whether or not it’s in the interest of anyone to try to change a person from one type of orientation to another.

I’ll leave that up to you.

Everyone who comes to see me, who comes to train with me, wants me to record numbers.

They want to record their weight.  Their bodyfat level.  Their heart rate.  Their VO2max.

They want me to record the weights they use.  The number of repetitions.  Their speed.

And that’s fine.  I’m happy to oblige.

But I’m not always happy with what lies beneath those requests.

When I’m unhappy about it, it’s because my clients are looking only at their numbers.  They’re succumbing to the externally-focused drive of our culture.  They’re looking at magazine cover-models, movie stars, their neighbors and friends, or anything other than their own bodies.

It’s fine to track your progress with different measures.  However, the primary concern of anyone engaging in an exercise program should be to become more who they are.  To be more in their own body – to learn how to move, to build strength, and to feel the full measure of that strength-in-movement within.

When a month has gone by, and the weight on the scale has gone up, it’s usually because relatively heavier muscle is replacing relatively lighter fat in the body.

But the externally-focused individual just sees the higher number.  And that blocks them from feeling themselves what the effects of the exercise have been.  Do you feel thinner, more fit, happier?  Do your clothes fit more loosely (or more tightly, in new areas, like the shoulders and thighs, perhaps)?

The other thing that happens is that people become fixated on strength goals.  “I want to bench press 315.”  Ok, great.  What happens when you plateau at 285 for a few weeks?

The externally-driven person will tend to want to push past this plateau, instead of allowing what the body actually needs at this point – more time.

There are many methods for getting past plateau’s – focusing on the eccentric (lengthening) portion of the movement, doing partial reps, overspeed/power work, etc.

But usually, what the body needs when it hits a plateau (that is, if you’re still applying the same level of mental intensity to your lifting), is some time to accommodate to that load.  The plateau is your body speaking to you.  It’s saying “give me eight or ten weeks at this load,” “play with this weight for a while,” or even “back off.”

If all you can hear in your head is a number (315), you won’t be able to hear that voice, telling you what you really need to be doing.

This tendency is cultural.  We put the Type A personality on a pedestal in this country.  To our own detriment.  It is also a choice.  You do not have to push things all of the time.  You can choose to slow down and listen.

However, that’s extremely difficult, because everything around you says you should push.

The tendency for people to constantly quote scientific research to support their claims, and the equally damaging tendency to believe people who do that, is another example of this external-focus.

Science is based on the law of averages.  It is not concerned with the individual.  And you are an individual.   You are not an average.  Nor are you average.

First, listen to yourself.

I posted a couple of days ago about Mike Boyle’s claim that people shouldn’t do bilateral barbell (especially, back) squats anymore.

His reasoning is that the back is a bad “transducer” of force from the legs to the upper body.

While I disagree with this use of the word “tranducer,” we won’t go into that here.

Instead, let’s talk about what Coach Boyle wrote on his blog today.  At the bottom, in the post script, it reads:

PS- We haven’t stopped doing bilateral exercises or, lifting heavy weights. We still Trap Bar Deadlift and Olympic lift. I also think that bilateral exercise is crucial for beginners. However, if you have experienced athletes and you want to keep them healthy and get them strong consider the Rear Foot Elevated Split Squat.

Wait Coach Boyle…your athletes still do the Olympic Lifts and deadlifts?!  But I thought the back was a bad “transducer” of force from lower to upper body – the limiting factor in people’s ability to move force with their legs!

What lift requires more “transduction” of power than the Olympic lifts?!  What lift requires more transduction of force than the deadlift?

So you don’t do backsquats anymore, because the back is the limiting factor in gaining leg strength?  So your athletes with weak backs go from their single-leg squats to deadlifts and O-lifts?

I’m confused.

For one thing, it’s potentially dangerous to have legs that are inordinately stronger than your back.  The back is the place where force is transferred from legs to upper body.

As anyone knows, who ever watched “The Weakest Link” – the weakest link goes first!

In this case, the weakest link is Coach Boyle.

I have nothing against you Coach, but it’s this type of thoughtless sensationalist self-aggrandizing bullshit that’s destr0ying the physical training industry in this country and getting people hurt!

So STOP IT.

1. Stop the reductionism.
The body is not a bunch of independently moving limbs connected by “transducers.”  The body is a single unit.  Any effect to one part of it, effects all of the rest of it.

2. Stop the stupid/sensationalist claims for specific exercises.
There’s no “magic exercise” for any bodypart or for the body as a whole.  The body cannot be pigeonholed, as much as you might like to do that.  You have to work the whole thing, you have to do it all, you have to figure it out.  You have to break it down and let it rebuild itself.  Strictly “anaerobic” training (which is a misnomer anyway) will make you a fumbling oaf.  Strictly “aerobic” training will make you a sickly Auschwitz-victim-looking ghost of a human being.

Stop pushing this bullshit information.  Learn the basics.  Practice the basics.  Preach the basics.

In case you don’t know what I mean, I’ll give you a brief outline of what the basics are here:

Basic Human Anatomy/Physiology – learn it.

Basic Biomechanics – force-transfers

Basic Exercise Physiology – things like “progressive resistance,” allo-/homeo-stasis, overload, adaptation, etc.

Basic Dietary Facts – so simple that a child knows them naturally…

Basic Games, Basic Play – if you shut your chattering brain down for a few minutes, you’ll be able to remember these yourself…you don’t have to pay anyone or read anything.

Basic Psychology – Know Thyself.

Six things.  Figure them out.  Take a class.  You can download/view/listen to most of that information for free on the internet (check out Wikipedia, and the iTunes University site).

I think that’s it.  Is there anything else?  Anyone out there in Readerland?

Here is another sequence of quotes from James Carse’s book, “Finite and Infinite Games.”

“We make use of machines to increase our power, and therefore our control, over natural phenomena”

“As the machine might be considered the extended arms and legs of the worker, the worker might be considered an extension of the machine.”

Who is in control?

“All machines, and especially very complicated machines, require operators to place themselves in a provided location and to perform functions mechanically adapted to the functions of the machine.”

You can't do this without me here.

“To use the machine for control is to be controlled by the machine.”

You may only move like this.

“To operate a machine, one must operate like a machine.  Using a machine to do what we cannot do, we find we must do what the machine does.”

You did not obey the machine.

“Machines do not, of course, make us into machines when we operate them; we make ourselves into machinery in order to operate them.  Machinery does not steal our spontaneity from us; we set it aside ourselves, we deny our originality.”

Screw those machines! Let's have fun!

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Just finished reading James Carse’s book “Finite and Infinite Games.”

Finite and Infinite Games

I can’t recommend it highly enough.  It’s incredibly dense for such a short paperback book (177 pages).  It might take a while to get through, but it’s worth the consideration and effort!

The  book isn’t strictly about “games” in the sense that we usually consider them, but applies the concept of play to human life in general – one of the things I like most about it!

Regarding fitness and health, here’s a nice quote for you:

Physicians who cure must abstract persons into functions.  They treat the illness, not the person.  And persons willfully present themselves as functions.  Indeed, what sustains the enormous size and cost of the curing professions is the widespread desire to see oneself as a function, or a collection of functions.  To be ill is to be dysfunctional; to be dysfunctional is to be unable to compete in one’s preferred contests.  It is a kind of death, an inability to acquire titles.  The ill become invisible.  Illness always has the smell of death about it: Either it may lead to death, or it leads to the death of a person as competitor.  The dread of illness is the dread of losing.
One is never ill in general.  One is always ill with relation to some bounded activity.  It is not cancer that makes me ill.  It is because I cannot work, or run, or swallow that I am ill with cancer.  The loss of function, the obstruction of an activity, cannot in itself destroy my health.  I am too heavy to fly by flapping my arms, but I do not for that reason complain of being sick with weight.  However if I desired to be a fashion model, a dancer, or a jockey, I would consider excessive weight to be a  kind of disease and would be likely to consult a doctor, a nutritionist, or another specialist to be cured of it.
When I am healed I am restored to my center in a way that my freedom as a person is not compromised by my loss of functions.  This means that the illness need not be eliminated before I can be healed.  I am not free to the degree that I can overcome my infirmities, but only to the degree that I can put my infirmities into play.  I am cured of my illness; I am healed with my illness.

(pp. 91-92)

The crux of this book is critical for those of us who want to change the way fitness is approached – by ourselves or by the “industry.”  “Functional” fitness, all the rage nowadays, is part of a larger outlook on life that confines individuals to boundaries, and attempts to confine Nature similarly.

In order to create change, we have to change the way we speak about things.  We need perspective.  This book will help.  Get it!

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I went to the field where I lead a play-based fitness group the other day, and saw this at the baseball diamond:

HOME! NO! BACK! NO! WAIT! RUN!

If you can see it, someone got creative with the chalk lines the day before, and basically scribbled all over the field!

Immediately I imagined two teams coming to the field that day, ready for battle, finding the rules slightly changed…

Then I thought of how much fun it would be to play on a field like this, especially after weeks or years of the same old straight lines connecting first, second, third, and home.

My friend Charlie Reid was at this park with me a few days prior to the development of the new baseball rules, and we watched a little league team playing.

“How boring,” I said.  All of the kids stood in the outfield and waited in line for their coach to pop fly balls out to them.  I presume it was for practice, but it could’ve been some kind of weeding process as well.

“Yeah,” Charlie said.  “It would be so much better if you rotated positions every play, like you do in volleyball in high school.  If no one had a set position, everyone would have to adapt to the demands of new positions.  No one would get stuck in the outfield, or on the bench.”

“Wow!  That’s a great idea!” I said.

We watched the kids in the outfield, standing in line, waiting for fly-balls…

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