Home Posts tagged "Shirley Sahrmann" (Page 2)

The Lucky 13: Cressey’s Top Reading Recommendations

A few months ago, I gave a two-day seminar to just over 80 fitness professionals and strength and conditioning coaches.  Even with a seminar this long, I can never cover everything I'd like to cover - and it's generally because much of what I'd like to address relies on some prerequisite knowledge that the attendees may not possess.

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With that in mind, at the attendees' request, I sent a follow up email to all of them with a list of some of the best resources - books/manuals and DVDs - that I've encountered along my journey of self-education. Please keep in mind that this is not an exhaustive list, by any means, but it does cover what I'd consider requisite reading to get a good foundation in a lot of the concepts I covered last weekend. 1.  Any anatomy text will do, but I prefer texts that speak more to functional anatomy.  Netter's Atlas of Human Anatomy is very good, and I know of many physical therapists in the US who keep a copy of this book on hand for patient education.  Kinetic Anatomy is also a solid text that speaks to functional anatomy, and I believe the newer version comes with a tag-along DVD.  Lastly, our Building the Efficient Athlete DVD set was created in part to educate folks on the functional anatomy side of things that they may miss during a conventional college curriculum.  I know of several facilities in the US that use it extensively for staff training. 2. Anything from Stuart McGill - While there are several schools of thought with respect to low back function and rehabilitation (and I'd encourage you to check out each of them), McGill is the one that resonates with me the most.  You can find a lot of his research on Pubmed, but he also has several books (and a DVD) available that I'd highly recommend.  For those of you who are interested in some science and some applied, go with Ultimate Back Fitness and Performance.

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For those of you who are a bit geekier and want to learn a lot more about the clinical side of things, check out Low Back Disorders.  If you are going to train clients or athletes, you need to understand back pain. 3. Diagnosis and Treatment of Movement Impairment Syndromes by Shirley Sahrmann is probably the book that has influenced me more than any other in my career.  It's worth every penny.

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4. For shoulder stuff, I think that The Athlete's Shoulder is a great resource.  It is written by physical therapists and surgeons, though, so it can get very clinical at times.  Those of you who are more interested in actual practical applications would be more interested in our new Optimal Shoulder Performance DVD set, which is the video of a seminar I did with Mike Reinold, who is actually one of the co-authors of The Athlete's Shoulder.  If you enter the coupon code "reinold200osp" today only at checkout HERE, you can get the DVD set with free shipping today as part of Mike's "sale week" to celebrate his 200th post.

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5. Muscles: Testing and Function with Posture and Pain - This is a newer version of Kendall's classic text, and it's an incredibly detailed resource that you'll find yourself referring back to time and time again.  Several of the screens we use in our everyday assessments with clients and athletes were influenced in part or entirely by Kendall's text. 6. Gray Cook's work is fantastic.  If you want quick, practical tips, check out Secrets of the Hip and Knee and Secrets of the Shoulder.  Both DVDs give you some tips that you can immediately put into practice. 7. Anatomy Trains by Thomas Myers is an excellent read to get you thinking more and more about the role of the fascial system.  I saw Thomas speak this past weekend in Providence, and he was absolutely fantastic - so excellent, in fact, that I'll probably write up a blog with some quick notes from his lecture.  And, I'll be reading this for the third time this week, too!

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8. Bulletproof Knees - Mike Robertson wrote this manual and I can honestly say that I haven't seen a better product on the market with respect to information that can be quickly applied to clients with knee pain - both in terms of understanding it and correcting it.

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9. Mike Boyle has some excellent products - including all the Functional Strength Coach DVDs (#3 was the most recent).  You can always find some good reading at StrengthCoach.com.  I believe they still have the 14 days for $1 trial period, and as part of that, you get his Designing Resistance Training Programs and Facilities book for free. 10. Anatomy of Breathing - I think it's valuable to appreciate the muscles involved in respiration and start to put them into your functional anatomy framework as soon as possible.  This book is a very quick read, but you'll get that foundational knowledge and start to think about how all this stuff lines up.

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11. 2008 Indianapolis Performance Enhancement DVD set - This is a product that has largely flown under the radar because it was overshadowed by several other products that were launched around the same time.  However, the short vs. stiff discussion that Bill Hartman presented as part of it is well worth the cost of the entire DVD set. 12. Clinical Applications of Neuromuscular Techniques (Part 1 and 2) - These books read like stereo instructions, but they are insanely thorough.  I recommend them to anyone who is really dorky like I am.  They will definitely help you to collaborate with manual therapists and physiotherapists a lot more effectively. 13. Assess and Correct - Shameless self-promotion here, but I'm extremely proud of this product.  It's a DVD set and four accompanying manuals that cover 27 assessments and 78 corrective exercises we use with our clients and athletes.  If I had to recommend one of our products to a trainer, this would be it.  Stuart McGill have us some extremely flattering reviews on Assess and Correct as part of his new DVD.

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I should note that the countless journal articles I've read over the years are noticeably absent from this list, but you can easily access the abstracts of those pieces at www.pubmed.com if you search by whatever keyword relates to your area of interest.  I find myself using it daily, and I'll generally follow up on these abstracts by getting the full-text articles.  Also, in addition to the few resources I note below, you can find a more extensive collection of recommended readings on my resources page. This includes a collection of links to free blogs that I read daily.  Many of my blog readers don't know that, in addition to this blog, I have a free newsletter where readers get exclusive content and early notice on things - so you'll definitely want to sign up HERE if you haven't already. It's also been a matter of interacting with as many smart folks as possible, just making (and documenting) observations with our clients/athletes, and going to seminars.  This list should get you started, though!
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Sports Rehab to Sports Performance 2010

Just wanted to give you all a heads-up that Joe Heiler is following up last year's successful Sports Rehab to Sports Performance Teleseminar with a 2010 installment.  I'm thrilled to be one part of an incredible lineup: Gray Cook Shirley Sahrmann Robert Panariello Stuart McGill (bonus interview with Chris Poirier from Perform Better) Craig Liebenson Clare Frank Mike Reinold Greg Rose Mike Boyle Gary Gray (and Eric Cressey) In all, it will be nine awesome interviews. The teleseminar series will begin on January 27th and Joe will play one interview per week (Wednesday nights at 8 pm).  If you can't catch them that night, don't worry; he'll be putting them up on his site for another 48 hours. For more information, check out the Sports Rehab to Sports Performance Sign-up Page.
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The Best of 2009: Articles

In place of "Stuff You Should Read" this week, I thought it might be cool to direct you to our most popular pages and videos for 2009, according to our website statistics.  Presumably, these are the ones that people forwarded to friends the most, and/or the ones that caught the most people's eyes.  This excludes pages like the homepage, baseball content, products, etc.  Here we go: Medicine Ball Madness - This piece outlined some of the medicine ball work I do with both my baseball guys and the rest of our clients.  It was so popular that it actually led to me deciding to cover this topic at my Perform Better talks for 2010. Hip Internal Rotation Deficit: Causes and Fixes - This Q&A on what the lying knee-to-knee stretch does actually led to a discussion of the who, what, when, where, why, and how. Front vs. Back Squats - This is a different kind of discussion on a debate that's been going on for years. Crossfit for Baseball - Controversial?  Yup.  I got a little hate mail for this one, but on the whole, I think I was pretty fair with how I approached it. "Quad Pulls" and Sprinting Warm-ups - This article discusses how the term "quad pull" might not be the most accurate one out there - and, more importantly, how to avoid them. A Common Cause of Hip Pain in Athletes - This piece discusses femoral anterior glide syndrome, a term coined by Shirley Sahrmann. Next, we'll feature the most popular product reviews of 2009.
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Birthday Blogging: 28 Years, 28 Favorites

I turn 28 today, so in hopes of distracting myself from the painful realization that I'm starting to go bald, I thought I'd focus on the positives of my existence in contexts that would appeal to you.  Below, you'll find 28 of my favorite things - most of which are at least loosely related to fitness, nutrition, strength and conditioning, and sports. 1. Favorite Nickname: Power Alleys.  This seemed like a good starting point, as power alleys are bald spots.  Credit for this one goes to Mets pitching prospect Tim Stronach. 2. Favorite Thing About Cressey Performance: The camaraderie among the athletes/clients. I think the hard thing to appreciate about our facility without experiencing it first-hand and being there on a regular basis is that it's as much about the environment and attitude as it is about the expertise and programming.  I'm psyched that we've not only created an environment where clients can improve physically, but one in which they can thrive socially, too. 3. Favorite Book I've Read Related to Fitness: Diagnosis and Treatment of Movement Impairment Syndromes, by Shirley Sahrmann.  This book got me thinking more about dysfunction and less about pathology.  Quality of movement is often far more important than anything a MRI or x-ray can ever tell you.

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4. Favorite Book I've Read Unrelated to Fitness: This is a top-up between The Tipping Point and A Prayer for Owen Meany.  They might be taken over, however, by one of the gifts I just got for my birthday from CP Client Steph Holland-Brodney.

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5. Favorite DVD I've Watched: The Indianapolis Performance Enhancement Seminar DVD Set.  Bill Hartman's presentation on "Stiff vs. Short" alone makes this a fantastic resource, and the rest is just gravy.  I reviewed it HERE. 6. Favorite DVD I've Co-Created: The Building the Efficient Athlete DVD set.  I think I'm most proud of this resource because it's something that provided something I so desperately wanted - but couldn't get - during my college education.  Effectively, it's a resource that blends book memorization with real-world practice with a focus on functional anatomy, assessments, and troubleshooting common exercises.

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7. Favorite Seminar I've Attended: The Perform Better 3-Day Functional Training Summit.  Each year, they get better and better.  Check out Chicago or Long Beach this year if you missed Providence. 8. Favorite Athlete of All Time: Barry Sanders.  I can't imagine an guy with better kinesthetic awareness, body control, or ability to turn a complete disaster of a play into a 90-yard touchdown run - while carrying two defensive linemen on his back. 9. Favorite Athlete of All-Time that you've probably never heard of: Jerry Sichting.  He played for the Celtics from 1985 to 1988, and I'll always remember the night Sichting - at a heigh of 6-1 - got in a fight with 7-4 Ralph Sampson during the 1986 NBA Finals.  At the time, I was a five-year old shadow boxing in my living room yelling at the top of my lungs.

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10. Favorite Place to Visit: Fenway Park 11. Second Favorite Place to Visit: Gampel Pavilion at the University of Connecticut.  It's an incredible environment in which to watch college basketball, and it's also where I spent just about all my time from 2003 to 2005. 12. Favorite Exercise: was this ever in question?

13. Favorite Sites I Visit Just About Every Day: T-Nation.com, MinorLeagueBaseball.com, ESPN.com, Sports.Yahoo.com, WilliamInman.com, 38Pitches.com, ShawnHaviland.Blogspot.com, MetrowestDailyNews.com, StrengthCoach.com, MikeReinold.com, RobertsonTrainingSystems.com, BillHartman.net, AlwynCosgrove.Blogspot.com, DieselCrew.com, PrecisionNutrition.com, BrianStPierreTraining.com, Tony Gentilcore's Blog, Boston.com, BarstoolSports.com, Facebook.com, EricCressey.com.

14. Favorite Kind of Injury to See (weird category, I know): Labral Tears (SLAP lesions), or really any kind of shoulder or elbow pain in pitchers.  You've got so many potential causes that it's kind of fun (for me, not the athlete) to go through a process of elimination to see what combination of factors caused it.  There are all the classic flexibility deficits in pitchers, plus scapular instability, poor thoracic spine mobility, plus faulty mechanics, plus inappropriate training volumes, plus weak lower bodies.  It's kind of like peeling back the layers on an onion to see what shakes free.  It's also a great scenario to illustrate what I talked about with respect to diagnostic imaging in #3 from above.  All of these guys will have labral fraying and rotator cuff partial thickness tears at the very least; it's our job to fix them up and make them work efficiently in spite of these structural deficits in situations where surgery isn't warranted.

15. Favorite Class I Took in School: Gross Anatomy.  Yes, I cherished the semester I spent with a bunch of cadavers.

16. Favorite Healthy Food: Apple-Cinnamon Protein Bars from John Berardi's Gourmet Nutrition Cookbook. Admittedly, I often just eat the batter before it ever gets cooked.  Not good, I know.

17. Favorite Piece of Equipment We Have at CP: Giant Cambered Bar.  Along with the safety squat bar and front squat set-up, this bad boy has allowed me to keep squatting even though my right shoulder decided a long time ago that traditional back squats weren't a good idea.  It's also a great asset for working with overhead throwing athletes who should avoid the externally rotated, abducted position under load.

18. Favorite Thing About Having a Blog: I can write a lot more casually than in my newsletter, which tends to be more geeky.  And, I can post videos of this kid rocking out:

19. Favorite Mobility Drill: Walking Spiderman w/Overhead Reach.  I love this drill because you're covering so many things at once.  You'll get thoracic spine extension and rotation from the reach, and hip flexor and adductor length in the lower body from the lunge angle.  Keep an eye out for more new movements along these lines in the months to come as we film the sequel to the Magnificent Mobility DVD.

20. Favorite Pastime I Had to Give Up: Fantasy Baseball/Basketball.  During my sophomore year of undergrad, I finished fourth in the world in NBA.com's Virtual GM contest.  Long story short, if you want to be really good at fantasy sports with that kind of set-up, you've got to put a lot of time into it - and realize that it won't make girls like you.  You'll also find yourself watching games in which you'd otherwise have absolutely no interest. I couldn't do it half-ass (aside from the CP Fantasy Football League), so I gave it up.

21. Favorite Inedible Toy: Rubber Steak.

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Suffice it to say that Fire & Ice wouldn't allow us to eat a birthday cake inside their restaurant on Saturday night in celebration of my awesomeness.  So, in celebration of their suckiness, none of us (16 in all) will ever eat again - and I was reduced to gnawing on dog toys.

22. Favorite Birthday Excitement: Apparently, it's going to be taking my car in to get work done, buying a new laptop, and then coaching 'em upat CP.  There will also be a dominant upper body lift at CP that will undoubtedly feature Kevin Larrabee missing 300...again...and again).

23. Favorite Bench Press Celebration Spectacle: Antwan Harris, post 340 bench press.

24. Favorite Strength and Conditioning Coach Who is Having Surgery on my Birthday: Josh Bonhotal, Chicago Bulls.  I talked with Josh yesterday and he informed me that he was finally having his ACL fixed today in celebration of my birthday.  Nothing says "Happy Birthday, Buddy" like taking a chunk out of your patellar tendon and turning it into an anterior cruciate ligament.  It's kind of like planting a tree on Earth Day.  What a nice gesture.

25. Favorite Article Series I've Written: A New Model for Training Between Starts (Part 1 and Part 2).  These articles were actually picked up by Collegiate Baseball Magazine as front-page features, and I received a lot of great feedback about them.  If there is one thing I do before I retire, it's convincing the world of the evils of distance running for pitchers.  I'd put the Shoulder Savers series in a close second

26. Favorite Supplement: Fish Oil.  It's followed closely by Vitamin D.  You need both - and probably a lot more than you think. I'm a simple guy when it comes to this stuff.

27. Favorite Random Website a Buddy Texted to Me Last Week: www.EasyCurves.com.  This thing is hilarious. A special thanks goes out to Jesse Burdick for making me just a little bit dumber with that.

28. Favorite Sign of Athlete Dedication for the Month: We have two college pitchers up here from Pennsylvania for the month to work on getting bigger, stronger, faster, and more flexible in hopes of a nice velocity jump on the mound, and the obvious injury prevention benefits of such training.  That's all well and good - until you hear that they got an unfurnished apartment in Hudson, MA.  These guys are sleeping on mattresses on the floor, and all they brought were a few lamps, a TV, some books, and a whole lot of enthusiasm and motivation.  That's committment to training - and just the kind of guys we like to have around Cressey Performance.

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What kind of sacrifices are you making to get better and move closer to your goals?  I'm not sure that sleeping on a mattress on the floor is necessary, but it says a lot.

With that in mind, I'm not taking today off.  There is work to be done and I love to do it, birthday or not.

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Hip Pain In Athletes: Understanding Femoral Anterior Glide Syndrome

Hip pain - particularly of the anterior (front of the hip) variety - is a very common problem in the weight training population.

In her book, Diagnosis and Treatment of Movement Impairment Syndromes, Shirley Sahrmann discusses Femoral Anterior Glide Syndrome in excellent detail.  And, while it may seem like an obscure diagnosis, it's actually a really common inefficiency we see in a weight training population.

In order to understand this syndrome, you have to appreciate the attachment points and functions of the hamstrings and gluteus maximus.  With the hamstrings, you'll notice that they attach to the ischial tuberosity of the pelvis (with the exception of the short head of the biceps femoris, which attaches on the femur), and then run down to a point inferior to (below) the knee.  In other words, they are a two-joint muscle group.  All of the hamstrings aid in knee flexion, and all but the short head of the biceps femoris also aid in hip extension.

Conversely, the glutes attach on the pelvis and the femur; they're a one-joint muscle - and this is why they can so directly impact hip health.

You see, when the hamstrings extend the hip (imagine the hip motion that happens when one comes out of the bottom of a squat), they do so in a "gross" fashion.  In other words, the entire leg extends.  In the process, there is little control over the movement of the femoral head ("ball" in the "ball-and-socket" hip joint) - and it tends to migrate forward during hip extension, giving you a femoral anterior glide syndrome.  In the process, it can irritate the anterior joint capsule, and this irritation can give a sensation of tightness in the front of the hip.

Fortunately, the glutes can help prevent the problem.  Thanks to their point of attachment on the superior aspect of the femur (closer to the hip), they have more direct control over the femur as it extends on the hip.  As a result, they can posteriorly pull the femoral head during hip extension.  So, in an ideal world, you get effective co-contraction of the hamstrings and glutes as one extends the hip; they are a system of checks and balances on one another.  If you use the hamstrings too much in hip extension, you're just waiting to develop not only femoral anterior glide syndrome, but also hamstrings and adductor magnus (groin) strains and extension-based back pain.

As an aside, this hamstrings/glutes relationship is somewhat analogous to what you see at the shoulder with the subscapularis posteriorly pulling the humeral head as the infraspinatus and teres minor allow it to drift forward.  That's another newsletter altogether, though!

Once the femoral anterior glide issue is in place, the first course of action is to stop aggressively stretching the hip flexors.  While the issue gives a sensation of hip flexor "tightness," in reality, stretching the area only exacerbates the anterior hip pain.  A better bet is to just ditch the stretching for a few days, and instead incorporate extra glute activation work.  Eventually, though, one can reintegrate both static and dynamic hip flexor stretches.

Just as importantly, it's important to identify the causes.  We'll see this issue in runners who have no glute function, but more commonly, I'll see it in a weight training population that doesn't understand how to complete hip extension.  Here's what a hamstrings-dominant hip extension pattern would look like with squatting.

The final portion of hip extension is when the glutes are most active, so it's important to "pop the hips through" at lockout of deadlifts, squats, pull-throughs, and other exercises like these.  In the same squat example, it's really just as simple as standing tall:

Of course, this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to hip issues in athletes, but it's definitely something we see quite a bit. If you'd like to learn more, I'd highly recommend you check out our Functional Stability Training series, particularly the Lower Body and Optimizing Movement editions. They're on sale for 25% off through tonight (Cyber Monday) at midnight.

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Newsletter #2

In this update, we’ve got a review of Diagnosis and Treatment of Movement Impairment Syndromes by Shirley Sahrmann, and an interview with Mike Robertson.

With seminar appearances, helping our guys get ready for the NBA combine and individual team workouts, and my ordinary three-times-weekly trek to South Side, there isn’t a whole lot of new stuff to report in the “online world” of Eric Cressey. I did, however, have an interview with Stuart McGill published at T-Nation yesterday; check out some great information from the world’s premier lower back pain researcher in Back to McGill.

In spite of the low-key online scene, it’s shaping up to be an exciting spring and summer; I’ve got several individual and joint-venture projects on my plate for the months ahead, so definitely keep an eye out for exciting announcements at EricCressey.com in the months to come. Without further ado, let’s get to the good stuff!

Product Review: Diagnosis and Treatment of Movement Impairment Syndromes

It seems only fitting that one of my first product reviews be devoted to what I believe to be one of the greatest resources available for coaches, trainers, physical therapists, physicians, and everyday weekend warriors with a desire to understand human function and dysfunction. In Diagnosis and Treatment of Movement Impairment Syndromes, Shirley Sahrmann provides a breath of fresh air to those who are tired of following the medical model of care by simply treating symptoms. Instead, Sahrmann proposes countless functional tests and corrective exercise interventions aimed at treating the causes of the problems rather than the compensations that emerge after dysfunction has emerged.

This book has profoundly impacted the way that some of the industry’s greatest minds train their clients and athletes and themselves. To be blunt, Shirley Sahrmann has likely forgotten more than most physical therapists will ever know. If you’re serious about your own education, and have the best interests of your clients and athletes in mind, you owe it to yourself to pick up a copy of this classic.

An Interview with Mike Robertson

In light of all the projects on which we’ve collaborated, a lot of people seem to have come to the conclusion that Mike Robertson and I are the same person. I guess that’s what we get for co-authoring ten articles together and co-producing the Magnificent Mobility DVD. I figured that the best way to clear up any confusion about our unique identities would be to interview him. If it helps, read the text below aloud, and use a Midwestern drawl for Mike’s voice, and a pseudo-Boston accent for me. If you’re a visual learner, you might want to alternate an Indianapolis Colts hat with a New England Patriots one at the same time.

EC: Hey Mike, thanks for agreeing to do this. I know you like the back of my hand, but our readers don’t. Fill them in a bit on your background; I’m sure you get questions all the time about how you got to where you are. Who inspired you?

MR: Wow Eric, there’s been so many people along the way, to name just one or two wouldn’t really be prudent. However, if I had to name a few people that have significantly impacted the way I view and approach training and nutrition, I’d have to say yourself, Alwyn Cosgrove, Dave Tate, John Berardi, Mike Boyle, Joe DeFranco, Jim Wendler, Ian King, Stuart McGill, Bill Hartman, and Shirley Sahrmann.

As you can tell, I’ve got everything from physical therapists to elite-level strength coaches, but all have taught me something or significantly influenced my thinking in one way or another. In fact, I think you need to learn from as many disciplines as possible to truly understand how the body works.

EC: What frustrates you the most about this industry?

MR: Two things about this industry really annoy me. They are:

1. People who have no business training people for athletics. These people know who they are; whether they are PTs that “wanna’ be” strength coaches, to strength coaches who just don’t know what the hell they are talking about, these people piss me off. They typically get by with either “smoke and mirrors” training, or by yelling incessantly at their athletes to “work harder.” While this may sound contradictory to my next point, running your athletes into the ground doesn’t make you a good strength coach; it makes you a schmuck.

2. Lazy people. This can include people who are too lazy to train themselves, people who are too lazy to keep learning, or people that feel like others should help them “catch a break.” I have no sympathy for people like this: I firmly believe you create your own destiny by doing the right things and busting your ass.

I always say that I could write a killer training book about training hard (the REAL key to success) and no one would buy it. Why? People who are already training hard know it’s the key to their success and my book isn’t going to make a difference. People that aren’t training hard are going to think I’m full of s**t and that it’s their training or diet habits that are holding them back. In other words, they always find some other factor that’s the cause for their failure.

Simply put, hard work is the difference between people of similar abilities.

EC: What’s a typical training week look like for you?

MR: Since I had my knee scoped last June, my training has been all over the place. I was approaching (or exceeding) all my previous PRs this past December, but my body had taken on numerous compensations from the surgery. Even though I don’t feel like I rushed back into things whatsoever, between the surgery and the actual injury that caused it four months earlier, my body was getting very good at doing some very bad things.

Over the past few months, I’ve been making a concerted effort to clean up my posture and recruitment patterns so I can get back on the platform stronger and healthier than ever before. My current programming looks like this:

Tuesday: Lower Body (typically ME work)

Thursday: ME Upper Body

Friday or Saturday: Accessory Lower Body

Sunday: Accessory Upper Body

I’m currently performing a specific mobility circuit that Bill Hartman gave me on a daily basis to re-groove my squat motor pattern and get it back to where it needs to be.

EC: Now, your wife is a dietician; how has that impacted the way you eat and approach nutrition with clients and athletes?

MR: Well it’s definitely impacted my wallet and my waistline; when I met her I was a svelt 170 pounds!

Seriously, though, I’ve always been interested in nutrition, but she has the amazing ability to meld the science and the practice. She’s an amazing cook to begin with, so she has the ability to take the right foods and actually make them taste great. I think too many people think that “healthy” food has to taste like garbage, and that’s just not right. Maybe someday I’ll actually convince her to put all her recipes into an e-book for publication.

Also, I think if you’re serious about training and don’t take the steps to cover your nutritional bases, you’re pretty much setting yourself up for failure. Whether you’re a bodybuilder, powerlifter, Olympic lifter, strongman, or just someone who wants to improve your physique, you have to respect the power of nutrition and supplementation. If you don’t, please don’t expect to see exceptional results in the gym.

EC: Name five people you feel everyone should see speak.

MR:

1) Alwyn Cosgrove

2) Dave Tate

3) Mike Boyle

4) John Berardi

5) Anyone who knows more about your profession than you do (even if they don’t have the same outlook as you)

EC: How about books and DVDs? What are your top ten library “must-have” choices?

MR:

1) Supertraining – Mel Siff

2) Science and Practice of Strength Training -Vladimir Zatsiorsky

3) Functional Strength Coach – Mike Boyle

4) Professional Fitness Coach Program Design Manual – Alwyn Cosgrove

5) Magnificent Mobility – Eric Cressey and Mike Robertson (These guys are geniuses…or so I’ve heard!)

6) Ultimate Back Fitness and Performance - McGill

7) Precision Nutrition - Berardi

8 ) Gourmet Nutrition - Berardi

9) Parisi Deceleration Method - Parisi Speed School

10) Charlie Francis FAST Seminar Series

EC: If you had to pick five things our readers could do right now to become better lifters/athletes/coaches/trainers, what would they be?

MR:

1. Start getting some soft tissue work done!

As Mike Boyle says, “If you aren’t doing something to improve tissue quality, you might as well stop stretching, too.” I firmly agree with him on this point, and while it may cost a few bucks, it’s going to help keep you healthy and hitting PR’s. This could be as simple as foam rolling, or as extreme as getting some intense deep tissue massage or myofascial release done. I’ve tried it all and all of it has its place.

2. Don’t neglect mobility work!

Ever since we released our Magnificent Mobility DVD, people are finally starting to see all the benefits of a proper warm-up that includes dynamic flexibility/mobility work. However, just because you understand the benefits doesn’t mean squat if you aren’t doing it! Take the time to get it done before every training session, and even more frequently if need be.

3. Understand functional anatomy

Again, you and I (along with many others), have preached this for quite some time, but I’m not sure enough people really understand how the human body works. Hell, I think I do, and then I get into some of these intense anatomy and PT related books and find out tons of new info! Along these same lines, if you don’t understand functional anatomy, you really have no business writing training programs, whether they’re for yourself or for others. That may sound harsh, but for whatever reason people read a couple copies of Muscle and Fiction and think they can write programs. I’ve fixed enough broken people to know that very few people can integrate the functional anatomy into what amounts to functional programming (and no, that doesn’t include wobble boards, Airex pads, etc.).

4. Train to get stronger

While I’m all for all the other stuff that goes into training (proper recovery, mobility work, soft tissue work, conditioning, etc.), I think too many people want all the bells and whistles but forget about the basics. GET YOUR ATHLETES STRONG! Here’s the analogy that I use: performance coaches are asked to balance their training so that the athlete: a) improves performance and b) stays healthy. What I see right now is a ton of coaches that focus on all this posture and prehab stuff, but their athletes aren’t really that much better anyway. You have to work on both end of the spectrum. Think about it like this: Let’s say you have this huge meathead that’s super strong but has no flexibility, mobility or conditioning, then throw him on the field. He may last for a while, but eventually he’s going to get hurt, right? You haven’t covered the spectrum. But what’s the opposite situation? We have the coach who focuses on posture, prehab, etc., and the athlete has “optimal” muscle function but is weak as a kitten. Are you telling me this kid isn’t at a disadvantage when he steps on the field or on the court? Again, you haven’t covered the spectrum. In other words, feel free to do all the right things, but don’t forget about simply getting stronger; as you’ve said, it’s our single most precious training commodity.

5. Keep learning!

I’m not going to harp too much on this one; simply put, you need to always be expanding your horizons and looking to new places for answers. There’s a plethora of training knowledge out there, and what you don’t know can come back to haunt you. I believe it was Ghandi who said, “Live like today was your last, but learn like you will live forever.” That’s pretty solid advice in my book (and hopefully the last quote I’ll throw in!)

EC: What’s the biggest mistake you’ve made in your training and professional careers? Looking back, what would you do differently?

MR: It may sound cheesy, but I don’t look at mistakes as mistakes; I look at them as learning opportunities. First and foremost, I wouldn’t have tried to learn to snow ski at the age of 27! This little stunt has set me back almost a year of training and left me with 20% less shock absorption in my left knee. Not the best idea, if you ask me.

But, instead of looking at it solely as a negative, it’s caused me to really re-examine my own training and thought process. As well, I really dug in so I now have a much better understanding of the knee, as well as how to rehabilitate knee injuries (and what causes them). So while I could piss and moan ‘til the cows come home, the fact of the matter is I’m really not much worse off and I have a much better understanding of myself and the human body.

EC: Where do you see yourself in a few years, and how would you like to be remembered way down the road?

MR: Ideally, at some point I’d love to have a training facility geared toward athletes. Whether it’s my own or partnered up with the right people doesn’t really matter. This would not only allow me to do what I’m passionate about, but give me a solid place to train myself. Every day I train at the commercial gym here in Indy a little part of me dies.

However, I must admit I really enjoy all the “extra-curricular” stuff I do as well: writing articles, producing info products, and giving seminars. I feel like the personal training/performance coaching allows me to keep in touch with what works and allows me to affect people on a small, intimate scale. On the other hand, the extracurricular stuff opens the doors to a huge number of people, all of whom can directly benefit from the things I’ve learned. In my eyes, it’s the best of both worlds.

As for being remembered, I just hope a person or two out there does remember me! The best thing anyone can say about me is that I influenced their life or athletic career for the better. I genuinely love what I do and the people with whom I work, and I think people can feel that whether it’s me coaching them, writing for them, or speaking to them at a seminar.

EC: Feel free to use the space below to shamelessly plug all of your products and services.

MR: Well I’m sure we’ve talked about it ad nauseum, but if you haven’t picked up a copy of our Magnificent Mobility DVD, you need to get it done NOW. You’ll never look at warming-up the same! You and I also have a huge seminar coming up in June at the Peak Performance facility in NYC, and I’m sure it’s going to turn some heads as to how people evaluate and train their clients. Finally, I’m not even going to get into our “little book” until we make some headway!

Next, Bill Hartman and myself are working on a 2-DVD series and manual that’s going to cover a lot of upper body concepts that I don’t think many people have examined. Bill is an amazing PT, so I really feel this is going to do for the upper body what Magnificent Mobility does for the hips.

Finally, feel free to come check out my website and sign-up for my FREE NEWSLETTER, which is sent out monthly. You can check out my website at www.robertsontrainingsystems.com, and you can sign up for the newsletter by sending me an e-mail at mike@robertsontrainingsystems.com with “Subscribe” in the subject line.

EC: Lots of stuff on the agenda, and I’m sure that it’ll all be top-notch. Thanks for taking the time, Mike.

MR: Thanks a ton for having me, EC!

That’ll do it for Newsletter #2.

All the Best,

EC

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