We’ll get to the logistics later; I need to type this out while it’s all fresh in my mind.

Let’s get this straight: Boston is a baseball community. We all live and die by the Red Sox.

However, it just so happens that we have a big endurance training contingent, too, given that the Boston Marathon is quite possibly the most storied endurance training event in the world each year. As a result, I’ve had the opportunity to interact with more endurance athletes in the past 15 months than at any other point in my career. I’ve trained some in-person, consulted with others in an online context, and just observed a whole lot more.

One thing I’ve noticed from day 1 was that a lot of people have ankle, knee, and hip pain that is only a problem with longer duration runs – but it’s fine with shorter sprint sessions. Now, I’ve always been a big advocate of sprinting for its body composition benefits, but never stopped to think about it as a corrective exercise modality in itself.

Then, this weekend rolled around. On Saturday, when I was speaking at the NSCA Northeast Regional clinic in Rhode Island, Steve Plisk’s presentation got me to thinking. And, on Sunday, I got this email from one of my mother’s co-workers who I had helped overcome some knee issues:

Eric and Sue,

I just wanted to let you both know that I completed my first marathon (The Maine Marathon) this weekend in 3:40. My goal was to break 4 hours, so I was pleased. Sue-I want to thank you first for having a son like Eric and for putting me in touch with him. Secondly, thank you, Eric. I was able to complete the race without any knee pain thanks to your advice (Mobility DVD, foam roller, and for encouraging me to build strength and speed training into my workouts). I truly appreciate you taking the time out of your busy schedule to help me.

Patrick

Consider this: I never actually evaluated or met Patrick in person. I was just working off of trends that I see in runners that lined up with what he told me about his knee pain. Early on, he had told me that his knee was fine with short runs, but the problem started around 30+ minutes of jogging. This is a problem I’ve seen with more than a dozen runners in the past year. Presumably, as fatigue sets in, running mechanics/efficiency change and pain kicks in. Why?

1. As the duration of exercise increases, the stretch-shortening cycle (SSC) takes on a lesser role. In other words, the longer you run, the less you rely on reflexive actions (storing and releasing of elastic energy in your tendons) and the more you start to “muscle” things.

2. Stride length decreases over time. This is related to both #1 and the fact that the muscles doing the propelling just aren’t conditioned to keep up the same level of force production.

One of the things Mike Boyle did a great job of pointing out years ago in his original Functional Strength Coach DVD set was that many people are seeing imbalances among the hip flexors. Certain classes of athletes (and weekend warriors) over-recruit rectus femoris and tensor fascia latae and don’t get enough psoas involvement. This is largely due to the fact that the psoas is the only hip flexor that continues to be active above 90 degrees of hip flexion. So, in other words, the more total hip flexion we get, the more psoas recruitment we get.

With that in mind, consider most modern cardio equipment – most notably stairclimbers and most of the ellipticals on the market; you simply can’t get enough hip flexion to balance things out. Running isn’t much different. Sprinting clearly offers an advantage in this regard.

Now, we know that foam rolling, mobility work, glute and psoas activation, and strength training are all effective in treating the problems. However, that doesn’t speak much to the modification of the running program itself. In the past, I’ve thought that sprinting was great simply because it:

a) as another form of mobility work, it gets us out of this “hip flexor trip”

b) is fantastic reactive work (helps to improve SSC function)

c) leans people out faster (less weight to lug around when running)

d) teaches people that they have to go faster before they go longer (imagine a pitcher who can barely throw 90mph then overthrowing in an attempt to throw 90mph for 120 pitches; his mechanics are going to change sooner than later)

Then, after listening to Plisk’s talk, I realized that there is an “E” as well. Steve first showed elite sprinters in slow motion during a race and pointed out that they were striking the ground directly underneath a completely upright torso at near-top speed. Nothing new here; I knew that guys needed to be strong and mobile to “naturally” create optimal horizontal propulsion to maximize stride length. Conventional wisdom among misinformed coaches is that you just have to “reach” to get your stride length up, but in reality, one winds up going heel-toe and driving with the parking brake on instead of popping through the balls of the feet. When striking directly under the body, ground reaction forces on that single leg are roughly four times body weight (one more reason to be strong!).

Next, Plisk noted that the world record marathon time is getting closer and closer to the 2-hour mark. Do the math and you’ll realize that these guys are running 4:30 miles; that’s an average of over 12 miles per hour! This is an amazing feat – and one you definitely can’t do with heel-toe technique; you have to be efficient, just like a sprinter. Sure enough, look at the elite marathoners, and they’re running on the balls of their feet and landing underneath the torso – not out in front.

Let’s look to the novice runner, though. He or she might do fine with the balls of the feet for the initial aspect of the race (when SSC function is high), but as fatigue sets in, heel-toe kicks in. That four-times body weight ground reaction force bumps up to six-times body weight at top speed in this situation. Can you see how that might be a problem for someone who already has a compensation pattern – or just flat-out weak tissues?

This is also one reason why footwear can make such a big difference – and why some foot and ankle experts can tell so much from looking at the wear on your shoes and the callus patterns on your feet. If you are in shoes that magnify ground reaction forces, you have two things working against you:

1. More deceleration to do (meaning you’re braking yourself and running slower)

2. A lot more pounding on your joints (and there are 26 bones in your foot, so that’s a lot of joints)

Now, here’s where things get pretty counterintuitive. If you ask the layman how to minimize ground reaction forces, he’ll likely tell you to make the shoe thicker. Unfortunately, the research says otherwise (this is where those of you who don’t like reading stereo instructions can fast-forward to the big section entitled “Cliff's Notes” below:

From:

Divert, C., Mernieux, G., Baur, H., Mayer, F., Belli, A. Mechanical comparison of barefoot and shod running. Int J Sports Med. 2005 Sep;26(7):593-8.

We get the following:

“In order to further compare shod versus barefoot running, 35 subjects ran two bouts of 4 minutes at 3.33 m x s(-1) on a treadmill dynamometer. Parameters were measured on about 60 consecutive steps. Barefoot showed mainly lower contact and flight time (p < 0.05), lower passive peak (1.48 versus 1.70 body weight, p < 0.05), higher braking and pushing impulses (p < 0.05), and higher pre-activation of triceps surae muscles (p < 0.05) than shod. It was concluded that when performed on a sufficient number of steps, barefoot running leads to a reduction of impact peak in order to reduce the high mechanical stress occurring during repetitive steps. This neural-mechanical adaptation could also enhance the storage and restitution of elastic energy at ankle extensors level.”

From:

Robbins, S. and Waked, E. Factors associated with ankle injuries. Preventive measures. Sports Med. 1998 Jan;25(1):63-72.

We get:

”A sense of foot position in humans is precise when barefoot, but is distorted by athletic footwear, which accounts for the high frequency of ankle sprains in shod athletes. It is unclear whether taping and rigid and semi-rigid devices protect against ankle sprains, as all of the studies suggesting this are flawed by inadequate controls. If these devices do protect the ankle, it is not through added support but rather through a partial correction of the deceased foot position awareness caused by footwear. Since taping and rigid and semi-rigid devices interfere with normal movement, there is concern that these might actually increase the frequency of injury at the ankle and/or at different locations. In this respect, taping is less of a concern because it interferes least with normal movement. The best solution for reducing ankle sprains in shod athletes is the use of more advanced footwear to retain maximal tactile sensitivity, thereby maintaining an awareness of foot position comparable to that of the barefoot state or perhaps even improving on it.”

From:

Kurz MJ and Stergiou N. Does footwear affect ankle coordination strategies? J Am Podiatr Med Assoc. 2004 Jan-Feb;94(1):53-8.

We get:

From:

Opila KA, Wagner SS, Schiowitz S, Chen J. Postural alignment in barefoot and high-heeled stance. Spine. 1988 May;13(5):542-7.

CLIFF'S NOTES

So, for those of you who got bored and stopped reading, we discovered:

1. Peak impact is lower with barefoot running than in sneakers.

2. Typical footwear changes adaptive strategies in the foot, meaning we’re better off with “more advanced footwear that retains maximal tactile sensitivity.”

3. High-heeled shoes suck and have serious ramifications further up the chain. This doesn’t just apply to stilettos; it also applies to those giant basketball shoes you just purchased.

Subjectively, I’ve seen this happen with a lot of my athletes simply from switching from the typical cumbersome athletic sneaker to Nike Frees. Frees aren’t right for everyone, but on the whole, they’ve made me much more effective at what I do. After wearing them for five months now myself, getting into another kind of sneaker feels like putting on a cinderblock.

So, am I telling you that the secret to all running problems is to buy Nike Frees? Absolutely not (although a lot of runners would do well to purchase them for wearing for lifting, sprinting, and footwear during the day).

What I am telling you is that the days of just running long distances to become a better runner are over – especially if you want to stay healthy. While you can have your distance work (if you’re healthy) to develop favorable aerobic adaptations and hit the anaerobic threshold steady-state work to get you used to the burn, to be successful and healthy long-term, you need to:

a. Strength train.

b. Do mobility work.

c. Do soft-tissue work

d. Do plyos and sprint (and that doesn’t mean 800m runs all the time; it means shorter bursts, too)

e. Do some barefoot training.

But then again, I’m just a dumb powerlifter who only runs to get seconds. What would I know?

Closing Thoughts

A big thanks goes out to everyone who attended last week’s NSCA Northeast Regional Clinic over the weekend; it was great to meet everyone and I appreciate you all making the trip.

As always, there’s plenty of material in my blog at www.EricCressey.Blogspot.com. Enjoy.

Something New for Cressey Performance - Already!

A Quick Seminar Update

Random Tips from Mike Roussell

1. During times of really heavy training when your joints are under higher than normal stresses I recommend that people take 1-2 baby aspirin with their fish oil each day (2-3g EPA/DHA).  The combination of aspirin and fish oil causes the production of an extremely potent (and cutting edge) series of anti-inflammatory compounds called resolvins.  Resolvins don't stop inflammation per se, but they accelerate the cleaning up of the damage caused by inflammation.  This is extremely important because normally NSAIDs like Advil or aspirin (w/o fish oil) actually slow down this resolution phase of inflammation.  The aspirin/fish oil combination will help clean up the inflammatory damage in your joints so you can keep lifting those heavy weights.”  Of course, you should always check with your doctor before taking any medications.

2.  Don’t be afraid to experiment in the kitchen!  Many people get bored with what they are eating because they eat the same thing day after day.  Step outside your nutritional comfort zone and start experimenting in the kitchen.

If you aren’t sure where to start then prepare some of your favorite meals in a different way.  If you have a favorite omelet then make it a scramble.  This can be done easily by adding eggs and omelet filling (minus the cheese) and scramble everything together.  Right before the eggs are fully cooked then mix in the cheese.  Sometimes even this simple change and reinvigorate your meal plan.

Sample Meal: Denver Omelet vs. Denver Scramble.

Use different vegetables.  There are so many vegetable blends available in the frozen food section you should never get bored.  If you usually eat peas and carrots with one meal then replace it with peas and perl onions or a sugar snap pea stir-fry blend (which includes carrots, sugar snap peas, onions and sliced mushroom)

Change up the herbs and spices.  You can take a simple meal cubed roasted chicken and broccoli and make it into 4 completely different tasting feasts!  Just mix together in a nonstick pan over medium high heat one of the following groups of ingredients:

Asian –Broccoli and chicken with peanut oil, minced ginger, soy sauce, and diced green onions

Italian –Chicken, olive oil, tomato paste, dried oregano, garlic, and fresh minced basil

Peanut Chicken –Chicken, broccoli, peanut butter, soy sauce, garlic, and Thai garlic-chili sauce (or your favorite hot sauce)

Indian – Chicken, broccoli, butter, tahini, curry, cayenne pepper (be gentle with this if you don’t like it hot), and minced ginger.

3. Restaurant Recon – TGI Fridays: Eating out can be a problem but learning to make smart choices and substitutions can make eating out as healthy of a choice as eating at home.  I’ve scoured over the menu at TGI Friday’s and picked out menu item with and sometimes without modifications that when chosen won’t send your nutrition into the gutter.

JACK DANIEL'S® ROASTED PORK – Double the broccoli, hold the crispy onions, hold the mashed potatoes, add a side salad (dressing on the side).

JACK DANIEL'S® FLAT IRON STEAK – Ask for broccoli (or another vegetable) instead of mashed potatoes, add a side salad (dressing on the side)

JACK DANIEL'S® NEW YORK STRIP – Hold the mashed potatoes and double the vegetables.

JACK DANIEL'S® SALMON – Hold the mashed potatoes and double the vegetables.

JACK DANIEL'S® CHICKEN - Hold the mashed potatoes, double the vegetables, ask for olive oil on the side

Friday’s Steakhouse Selects – Choose any steak cut.  Skip the butter sauces (ask for A-1 instead).  Choose the broccoli.  If you are eating within three hours of a weight training session you can also choose mashed potatoes (hold the cheese), red potatoes wedges (make sure not fried) , or Cajun corn.

SIZZLING STEAK FAJITAS – Eat as is!!

SIZZLING FAJITA COMBO – Eat as is!!

BRUSCHETTA TILAPIA – Ask for the balsamic glaze on the side.  Hold the rice and double the broccoli

SHRIMP KEY WEST – Eat as is!! – SEE IF IN BUTTER

Skewers of seasoned chargrilled shrimp topped with a sparkling citrus splash and served with a side of vegetables.

DRAGONFIRE CHICKEN – Ask for the Kung Pow sauce on the side.  Hold the rice.  Double the broccoli.

SIZZLING CHICKEN & SHRIMP – Hold the cheese.  As for a side of vegetables instead of the mashed potatoes.  SEE IF GARLIC MARINATE IS BUTTER BASED.

SIZZLING CHICKEN FAJITAS – Eat as is!!

SANTA FE CHICKEN SALAD – Ask for olive oil and vinegar instead of the Chipotle Ranch dressing.  Hold the corn salsa.

LO-PHAT CHICKEN SALAD – Ask for the dressing on the side.

SIZZLING CHICKEN WITH VEGETABLES – Hold the Cheese

4. The Ultimate Fatty Acid Cocktail: Recently, I wrote an article for Testosterone Nation extolling the benefits of increase levels of cAMP in the body.  One of the method’s I recommended to do this was combining 2-3g EPA/DHA with 50-100mg GLA.

“This combination leads to increased production of cAMP via Prostaglandin E1 (PGE1). As shown in the picture below, GLA can be converted to either Arachidonic Acid or PGE1. The fatty acids in fish oil compete for enzymes with arachidonic acid, allowing for more GLA to become PGE1.”

Here’s what I didn’t tell everyone: you can further benefit the effectiveness of this stack by adding 500mg of sesamin (extract from sesame seed oil).  Sesamin acts as an inhibitor and further increases the production of PGE1.

Mike Roussell is a nutrition doctoral student at Pennsylvania State University. He graduated from Hobart & William Smith Colleges, where he received a Bachelor's of Science in Chemistry. Mike is the founder and host of the web's premier nutrition and fitness podcast, Max-Out Radio (www.MaxOutRadio.com). He can be contacted for nutrition and fitness consultations through his website, www.MuscleandCuts.com.

That'll do it for this week, everyone.  We'll be back soon with more exclusive content.

Subscriber-only Q&A

Q: In your "Neanderthal No More" series, you seem to imply that flat feet can be reversed. Is this true? I seem to have somehow either acquired flat feet since high school (or the process at least started in high school). I am now 20 years old. I'm not sure how I acquired my flat feet, but I think it may be from a lot of vertical jump training and plyometrics that I did in high school, when I played basketball. In retrospect, I didn't know what I was doing and I certainly did not have a sufficient strength base for plyos, as I was about 5'11'' and a mere 132 lbs. at my playing weight.  I now have patellofemoral problems, including patellar malalignment, overly tight IT bands, and chondramalacia in the right knee as a result of the improper patellar tracking.

I started wearing orthotics in the summer of 2006, but don’t feel that they’re an optimal solution.  Is there a way to reverse flat feet?

EC: Yes, I think so.  For some reason, as an industry, we’ve accepted that we can improve thoracic spine rounding, eliminate forward head posture, and correct anterior pelvic tilt (all postural distortions) with exercise modalities.  Nobody has even ventured to say that we need braces for the back and neck to correct these problems; MOVEMENT has done the trick just fine.

Nonetheless, for some reason, we don’t view the feet as equally dynamic and mutable portions of our body.  They’re just those things we stuff in our shoes on a daily basis.  We’ve eliminated movement by stuffing in orthotics, wearing high heels, buying Nike Shox, and taping ankles in our athletes.  My feeling is that if a foot can go flat, it can go “un-flat.”

It never surprises me when I see flat feet in basketball players.  They tape ankles and wear ten-pound high-top sneakers with lateral rigidity and a big heel lift.  Most of them are insanely quad-dominant, which just plays into the anterior weight-bearing nature of their movement.

Don’t get me wrong: there are instances when orthotics are worthwhile.  Some people have structural foot deformities that can really be helped with these implements.  I just haven’t found these instances to be as prevalent as the podiatrists who make a living fitting people for orthotics.

My recommendation would be to make a serious effort to train more barefooted (we do a lot of our mobility drills on the turf).  Additionally, work on various ankle mobilizations that improve dorsiflexion range-of-motion.  You can find some good options (for free) from Bill Hartman HERE.  I also like to use lateral tilts and a few toe pull variations from the Z-Health discipline for pronators; I’ve found them to be very good at improving dorsiflexion ROM in cases where the issue is more of a joint “jam” than an Achilles flexibility issue.

And, as Bill mentioned, it never hurts to improve the soft tissue quality of the lower leg.

Lastly, I encourage athletes to look at their footwear.  Those with “acquired” flat feet generally respond quite well to minimalist shoes like the New Balance Minimus.  Give yourself some lateral mobility and reduce your heel lift and you’ll see some pretty remarkable improvements in a matter of 4-6 weeks.  I’ve actually seen a few athletes lose one-half a shoe size just from these protocols, as they’ve gotten their arches back.

Cressey Performance Shaker Bottles Now Available

Five Thoughts from Nick Grantham

2. Supersets: Not in the traditional sense. During the past twelve months, I've started to superset remedial exercises into the main training stimulus (e.g. A1: Squat, A2: Ankle proprioception jumps. This is a very time effective way of training and it means that I know for sure that any remedial work that is needed is actually getting done. In the past I hoped my athletes would take care of business. Now I know they do - and it's transformed the quality of training.

3. Pool Work: The pool is not just the domain of the swimmer. I use the pool all the time for athlete coming back from fitness to develop cardiovascular conditioning, strength, proprioception and balance, flexibility and even speed and power (yes you heard me correctly SPEED and POWER). In fact, don't wait until you are injured to find out the benefits of water workouts. I strongly recommend that athletes competing in sports with high impacts (pretty much everyone) should spend some time unloaded. The pool is great - especially during the competition season - as it allows you to train without the same stress on the musculoskeletal system.

4. Back to Basics: Too often we think about the 2% that will give our athletes the edge. We get so caught up searching for the 2% that we forget about the other 98%! This holds true for training and is certainly true for one of the most neglected areas of training: recovery. If you are jumping in and out of cold baths and wearing the latest compression garments, but have a crappy diet, an average training program and poor sleeping habits, get a grip because you are wasting your time. Get the basics right first, the 98%: eat well, train optimally and rest, and THEN think about getting clever.

5. Aqua Balls!: I discovered a great use for the stability ball; I filled it with water! Stay with me; this makes it a very unpredictable training tool. We have used it to great effect when rehabbing shoulders. Pressing and holding patterns are taken to a whole new level when you have a ball in your hands filled with seven liters of water! I first saw this when I was visiting the rehab centre for the Birmingham Royal Ballet; I saw the principle dancers lifting the ball overhead and thought, “I can use that with my athletes.”  And there you have it: the AQUA BALL!

Random Thoughts from Todd Hamer

2. I was put on this earth to kill the word “core.” Every day, someone says to me, “my core is weak.” The reason that I am here to kill this word is because it means nothing. Define the core? When someone says their core is weak, to me it means they are weak. We have been so overexposed to the “core” that we have forgotten how to get stronger. It has been shown time and time again that all the muscles that people call the “core” are worked in a squat, clean, overhead squat and many other multi-joint movements. So get away from the core and get strong. I promise you can get a six pack.  For more information, check out Jim Smith's Combat Core Manual.

3. Train more odd lifts. I (like many others) was to dogmatic in my approach to training athletes. People like DieselCrew.com and EliteFTS.com have helped me think more about how I am training my athletes. Why do we use barbells, dumbbells, kettlebells, sandbags ect? Why not trees and stones. It is important to get your athletes off the platform and away from the known and into the unknown. Sports are chaotic events; do not be afraid of some chaos in your training.

4. 90% of athletes overthink.  What is the training age of your athletes? This is a question that you should ask yourself about every one of the people you train. The younger the training age, the less advanced the program should be. Most athletes want the newest craziest exercise and program. The problem is that most athletes just need to get stronger and more mobile. This can be accomplished with just working hard and sticking to the basics. Most of the time if an athlete’s squat form improves, then his mobility will improve along with his strength levels. Quit looking for the Holy Grail of training and start training.

5. Extend your network.  Your network is everyone to whom you speak; make it larger. I have been lucky to be able to learn from and share ideas with hundreds of strength coaches, personal trainers, doctors, rehab specialists, and many other professionals. Each of these people have taught me something new about what I do. This is true for both business and personal facets of my life. I often hear other strength coaches say they will not listen to someone because they don’t work with athletes or they do not know what I do. So what? We must bring people in this field together if we ever want our field to grow.

Todd Hamer has been working in the strength and conditioning field for seven years and has held positions at Marist College, the Citadel, Virginia Commonwealth University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Pittsburgh, the Pennsylvania State University, and George Mason. He is now the head strength and conditioning coach at Robert Morris University.  Todd has also worked as a personal trainer and consultant in several different facilities throughout his career.  In his spare time, Todd is a competitive powerlifter with best lifts of a 545 lb squat, a 375 lb bench, and a 500 lb deadlift. A native of Pittsburgh, PA, he received his bachelor's of science degree in exercise science from Penn State in 1999 and his master's of science degree from the Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia in August 2002.

Until next time, train hard and have fun!

All the Best,

EC

Yesterday morning, Tony Gentilcore and I got out to the local track to do some sprinting work.  After we had wrapped up our 45-minute session, as we walked off the track, we noticed a 20-something year-old female runner on the ground banging out crunches in what we estimated were sets of 800.

What caught my eye even more than her elite training protocol  (insert sarcastic smirk here), though, was a knee brace so large that it looked like a giant octopus had devoured her leg.  Geek that I am, I started pondering things over.

Most people would say that she’s probably got an overuse injury from all the running.  I wouldn’t disagree.

To take it a step further, though I immediately started thinking about why she had a dysfunction/ imbalance that could be predisposing her to pain with all that running.

Think about what happens with a crunch: trunk flexion.

In most cases, when we round over at the upper back, as a compensation to keep us upright, the lumbar spine tends to become more lordotic – meaning that the natural lumbar arch is exaggerated.  Go to a more lordotic position, and you’ll “trigger” an increased amount of anterior pelvic tilt (associated with shortening/tightness of the hip flexors, including the rectus femoris, psoas, iliacus, tensor fascia latae, among others).

We know that the hip flexors play a very important role in knee health; the rectus femoris actually attaches to the patella, too.   In addition to the pull these muscles have on the leg, they also tend to force one into anterior weight-bearing (already a problem in most females, thanks to evolution and high-heeled shoes).

Subscriber only Q&A

Q: Dancers and yoga practitioners are notoriously known for their extreme flexibility, which can be a problem if not balanced with strength.  How so?

Five Tips from Joe Dowdell

2. Try to learn from as many experts in the field as you can.  Instead of going by what others may think or say about “expert A” or “expert B,” you should attend a seminar or lecture given by that individual(s) and listen to what they actually have to say.  Then, you can formulate your own opinion as to whether you agree or disagree with them. If I listened to what some of my peers said about an expert and never sat in a room with that individual, I would have missed out on some very valuable information.

3. If you are the owner of a gym and/or the Director of Personal Training at a fitness facility, you should always remember to lead by example.  If you don’t train yourself hard; don’t attend educational seminars; don’t dress like a fitness professional; don’t clean up after yourself on the training floor, etc., then how can you ever expect your trainers to do the same?

4. Many years ago while attending a seminar given by Tom Purvis, I heard two terms that have stuck with me and I have consistently applied with the training of my clients as well as myself.  They are Micro-Progression and Strategic Variation. Since that time, stuck with me when training myself and others. All too often trainers progress their clients way too fast, which often leads to compensation patterns and eventually, if left unchecked, to injury.  In addition, many trainers change their clients' programs too quickly or too often. More often than not, these changes are not the result of a well thought out game plan; but, rather, they are done in a haphazard fashion.

About Joe Dowdell

EC

Cressey Performance Updates

Five Tips from Mike Boyle

1. There are only two ways to learn: experience and reading. If you think you can get good in this field in a 40-hour week you’re crazy. If a 40-hour week is your goal, find a new field. Read Alwyn Cosgrove and Jason Ferruggia’s article “The Business.”

2. Train clients or athletes at least 20 hours a week.  This is the proving ground for your booksmarts.  Ideas are just that; see if you can implement them.

3. If you want to succeed in the field, get yourself in shape.  I frequently joke about the fact that I don’t look the part.  I’m not very muscular and am old and bald – but I’m in reasonable shape for 47.  At 27, you will NOT get the benefit of the doubt.  No one wants an overweight trainer or a skinny trainer.  They expect you to look the part.  You don’t have to be huge, and you don’t have to be ripped, but you need to look like you exercise.

4. Never ask a client to do something you can’t demonstrate.  You don’t have to be able to do exercises with huge weights, but you must master the exercises.  Beside the fact that many people learn visually, how can you ask a client to something you can’t?

5. Read one self-help book for every field-related book.  It’s called personal training for a reason. It’s about a person and his/her goals.  Your knowledge of people will be as important as your knowledge of the subject matter.  Years ago, someone asked me what the key to my success was.  I told them that it was my ability to get people to do what I wanted them to do.

Mike Boyle is one of the most sought after coaches and speakers in the area of performance training and athletic rehabilitation. In fact, Mike’s client list reads like a "Who’s Who" of athletic success in New England and across the country. Boyle has been involved in training and rehabilitation with a wide range of athletes, from stars in every major professional sport, to the US Women’s Olympic teams in soccer and ice hockey. In addition Mike has served as a consultant to some of the top teams in the NFL, NHL, as well as numerous Division 1 athletic programs.

Mike brings a depth and breadth of knowledge that is unmatched in the industry, with ten years of experience at the professional level and over twenty years at the collegiate level. Mike’s work has been featured in the media on HBO RealSports, ESPN, CNNSI, as well as in Sports Illustrated and USA today.  In both 2004 and 2005 Men’s Journal named Boyle one of the top 100 trainers in the United States.

Mike’s innovative series of live seminar DVD’s have set a new standard for industry education. Functional Strength Coach Volume 1 and 2 and Advanced Program Design continue to get rave reviews. In addition, Mike’s two books have assisted in the education of literally thousands of coaches and trainers.

How's this for a testimonial?

Hi Eric,

Adam Keller

Five Random Thoughts from David Barr

Six More Tips from Kelly Baggett

A. Make them sound smart

B. Separate people from their money

or

C. Appeal to the curiosity of readers who like to delve into the 10% that isn't covered by the basics. (note: A lot of stuff I'm writing here falls into that 10%)

If athletes are somewhat coordinated on their feet, have decent posture, flexibility, and muscular balance, are lean, relatively strong throughout their body, and can accelerate a lot of weight through either a clean or weighted squat variation, they're going to be good athletes. It shouldn't take long to learn "general" concepts related to proper flexibility, coordination, injury prevention, body composition, strength, explosiveness, reactivity, and conditioning.

7. Acid Buffers are a very useful and under-rated supplement when it comes to increasing work capacity and tolerance to high intensity activity. If you're trying to avoid or improve "neural fatigue," this is where it is. The body will maintain its PH range in a narrow range regardless of how you eat, but the important thing is what your body has to do to maintain that proper PH. Sub-clinical low-grade acidosis increases cortisol and occurs in most people due to the increased consumption of grains and reduced consumption of veggies and fruits. It also tends to naturally occur in response to stress of any kind. This includes: caloric restriction, intensive activity, and lack of sleep.

Low-grade acidosis is, in my opinion, one reason why people dieting are more prone to lose strength. So how do you fix it? Eat your veggies and fruits. One pound of green veggies per 50 pounds of bodyweight per day is ideal. Vegetable juicing is a good idea. Additionally, a couple of extra grams of sodium and potassium bicarbonate (baking soda or Alka-Seltzer) can be useful, as can extra magnesium, glutamine (a teaspoon with each meal), and l-carnosine. If you pay attention to how you feel, you can eventually get to a point where you know when to supplement with extra buffers. The acidic state is associated with a “wired out” anxious stressed out type energy. The alkaline state is associated with relaxation. If you're feeling too relaxed, lay off the buffers. If you're feeling stressed, add them in.

9. Studies showing that anabolic steroids don’t increase aggressiveness and other abnormal psychological characteristics are nearly always university studies using typical college males as subjects. Steroids are known to amplify existing psychology. If you're naturally happy, you get more happy. If you're aggressive, you get more aggressive. If you're prone to mood swings, you get more moody. The problem is, there are probably quite a few baseline psychological differences between a typical university student and a typical bodybuilder. I'd like to see a steroid study using prison inmates as subjects. Bottom line: Despite how steroid users like to point to this and that study showing steroids don't have any effect whatsoever on the “asshole meter,” in the real world, I have my doubts. People who derive enjoyment from self-inflicted torture (a.k.a.- lifting weights) aren't always exactly normal in the first place!

10. I get a lot of questions from athletes writing me asking what to do to improve their unilateral jumping. Some people simply can't jump off one foot worth a darn. As I discuss in my Vertical Jump Development Bible, although strength qualities and bodyweight do play a factor, based on my observations and experience, a lot of this is due to structural balance and posture.

Basically, it has to do with your style of gait and how that impacts your natural leverages and muscle recruitment. Some people walk and run with a tendency to pull their center of gravity. They take big steps forward and tend to walk (and run) way back on their heels. Other people have a tendency to chase their center of gravity. When they walk and run, their feet stay more under their body. There will still be some heel strike, but not to the same extent. This style of gait lends itself to better use of the hip extensors and better top running speed and unilateral jumping. If you sit in a mall or other busy place and just observe people walking it's pretty easy to see the difference in gait patterns. The point is that if you struggle with your unilateral jump you also probably do not to move well on your forefoot and activity in your hip extensors is minimized in your daily activities due to your posture.

A good way to cue correct posture is to stand on a stair step, place both heels off the edge and lower the heels, like doing a calf stretch. Push the heels fairly hard and tighten the thighs and keep them tight. Keep contact with the rail for balance. Make sure you stand up straight and you will line up in "perfect posture." What it does is bring the center of gravity where it belongs and forces the body to align itself correctly. Additionally, it never hurts to get in the habit of contracting your glutes at heel strike whenever you walk around.