As promised, today, we've got a guest blog from Kelly Baggett, one of the brightest minds in the field of high performance training for athletes.
Today I’d like to talk a little about some of the common problems I see in athletes that prevent them from being as fast, quick, and explosive as they could be.
You need a good combination of optimal movement patterns and force. Movement patterns are affected by things like your posture, muscle balance, mobility, and coordination. Force is affected by your strength and power.
You can be strong with the ability to exert lots of force, but if your movement patterns are off you won't transfer that force efficiently, and thus won't move very fast and explosively.
You can have great movement patterns, but if you don't have force behind those movement patterns, you wont move very fast and explosively either - so the key is creating the balance. Now that I've talked about the type of problems, let's get to the problems themselves.
Problem #1: Bad Feet
For years, coaches in a multitude of sports have belabored the key, "Stay on your toes!" Although literally being on your toes is a bit of an exaggeration and is likely to lead to a trucked toe, staying on your toes really means you drive off the balls of your feet and less on your heels.
Watch many great athletes when they accelerate or sprint and their heels barely seem to hit the ground. This is without any conscious input on their part. Most people are rearfoot dominant, which means they carry too much weight on their heels when they walk, run, or move in general.
Moving more towards the mid and forefoot favors quicker, more efficient, less stressful movement, and also makes it easier to activate the powerful hip extensors, which have the capacity to really make you fly. If you want to be a good athlete, you need to get off your rearfoot and onto your mid and forefoot.
How do you do that? Well, unfortunately you’re unlikely to find much in the way of relevant scientific or laymen’s information specifically delving a great deal into this topic. That doesn’t change the fact that there are no shortage of gimmicks out there that promise this. There are even products like jumpsoles out there designed to make you move on the balls of your feet.
The problem is the verbal cues and training aids are relatively worthless because most people don't have the inherent muscular recruitment patterns and strength to move in this posture naturally. If you have to think about it or force yourself to move a certain way it's generally not gonna be very effective.
The key is optimizing your muscle development and movement patterns so your body inherently takes an "on the balls of the feet" posture without you having to voluntarily force yourself to get in that position. When that happens it'll feel natural and efficient. I’ll talk about how to do that in the next installment. Now let’s get on to some of the other problems.
Problem #2: Lack of Glute Dominance
When the hip extensors are strong, they tend to "want" to drive your movements a bit more than someone who's glute deficient. Generally speaking, walking, running, jumping, and most other athletic movements can be driven primarily either from the muscles acting on the hip or the muscles acting on the knee.
When referring to muscles that act primarily at the hip, I'm referring mainly to the glutes and psoas. Muscles that act more at the knee include the quads, rectus femoris, and tensor fascia lata. When movement is primarily generated from muscles acting higher on the hip, it promotes a more efficient and less stressful movement pattern.
When movement is primarily generated by the muscles acting on the knee, it tends to promote more rearfoot dominant movement as well as knee pain, hip pain, and a ton of other common problems. Guess which pattern fast and slow athletes favor, respectfully?
Have you ever noticed that really fast athletes often hardly even look like they’re trying? They’re quiet and effortless when they move. Slower athletes often sound like a bull when they move. Their feet SLAP the ground like a pancake and you can hear their tension a mile away.
A large reason for that discrepancy is one group is using their hips to drive their movements while the other group is using their knees. Knee dominant movement is typically inefficient, loud, and it often hurts. Hip dominant (glute driven) is quiet, fast, and smooth.
Problem #3: Lack of End-Range Strength in the Psoas
The psoas works in concert with the glutes to control the femur from the hip. A strong psoas promotes optimum hip and foot mechanics. Everyone has heard coaches yell, "High knees, high knees!!"
Some athletes inherently run with high knees while others barely lift their feet an inch off the ground. Those who don't do it naturally aren't really helped much by the cue. The psoas is the muscle responsible for raising your knee up to 90 degrees and above from a standing position.
When the psoas is weaker than the rectus femoris and tensor fascia latae you will have a more difficult time getting proper knee lift when you run, and also, due to the influence on the posture of your hips, also be succeptible to overuse injuries like IT band issues, knee pain, and plantar fasciitis.
Problem #4: Lack of Mobility in Key Muscle Groups
The quads, rectus femoris, ankles, and hip flexors often tend to be tight. This favors improper/faulty movement and prevents the optimum transfer of power through the lower kinetic chain. It also favors common injuries like patellar tendonitis or plantar fasciitis.
If you’ve had knee or foot pain, chances are you have at least one of these mobility impairments. Anyone that has considerably increased the muscular development of their thighs will have a tendency to lean towards having tight quads.
That's not to say that muscular development of the thighs is a bad thing by any means, but one must pay attention to mobility.
Problem #5: Lack of Strength/Power in Relevant Contributing Muscles
This is the simplest problem of all - and also the one that will arguably have the biggest impact of all. It encompasses the "force" part of the speed and quickness equation. The more force you exert against an object, the faster you can move that object. In the case of speed and quickness, the moveable object is your body and the object you're applying force to is the ground.
The problem is most people are too weak to be explosive and quick. I’ll give you all the information on how to address and fix that and the other problems in Part II of this article series - which will run tomorrow.
Tomorrow (Monday) at midnight, Kelly and Alex Maroko will be releasing The Truth About Quickness at a huge introductory discount. I've reviewed the product and can say without wavering that the information it contains is outstanding; this resource will make for an excellent addition to any coach or athlete's library. For more information, head over to their early-bird discount page HERE.
Today, I'm psyched to have my old friend Kelly Baggett on-board for an EricCressey.com exclusive interview. Kelly and I go back about ten years, and to this day, he stands out in my mind as one of the brightest guys in the business of making people more athletic - and he's also a heck of an athlete himself.EC: Thanks for taking the time to jump in with us on this interview today. Let’s talk first about where the “need” for this product came about; what made you and Alex decide to create it?
KB: Several years ago I had started using a particular style of movement work with my athletes designed to boost what I like to call “movement efficiency.” The premise was to rapidly and economically get people moving faster, quicker, and more efficiently on their feet without spending a lot of time doing so. Each workout would start off with this movement work, which was a short ~10 minute section of the workout.
Alex was actually a client of mine back when he was just out of high school. He went through some these workouts and really seemed to benefit from them. Well, a few years later he’s coaching people himself and is nearly out of college. He had taken the workouts I’d given him several years before and continued doing parts of them and expounded upon them with an emphasis on really boosting his first step in basketball. I had always believed that quickness and explosiveness weren’t necessarily the same thing. A person can be “quick” without being explosive and vice versa. Alex was a perfect example of that. He has some videos somewhere out there of him with a basketball: I don’t know if he’ll ever be all that fast and explosive, but you’ll be hard pressed to find anyone quicker with the ball in his hand on the basketball court.
Several years after he was a client of mine, Alex is now a coach himself and has a pretty good training business going. A little while back, he calls me and tells me how he’d been using these movement progressions with athletes and how well they’ve been working – and, in the process - comes up with the idea of putting the concept into a product based on “The Truth About Quickness.”
The first thing was to address some of the common myths surrounding quickness training and talk about the difference between quickness and explosiveness. The next was to introduce simple progressive quickness promoting exercises that don’t take a lot of time that can be incorporated into any existing program. The foundation for that were the progressions I had started using several years prior.
EC: Let’s talk about your “evolution” as a coach. What were you doing a decade ago that you thought was high performance training that you realize now just wasn’t cutting the mustard when it came to making people more athletic?
KB: When it comes to actual sprint, agility, and plyometric work, nowadays, I’m sort of known as a low volume guy. It’s all about quality over quantity. However, believe it or not, I used to be one of those coaches who would run guys to death. I spent too much time focusing on sport-specific movements and not enough on foundational training and recovery. I was one of those coaches who believed that if you wanted to get faster, you needed to do a ton of running. If you wanted to be more agile, you needed to do a ton of agility and SAQ (speed-agility-quickness) work. If you wanted to jump higher, you needed to do a lot of plyometrics. The result was that my programming wasn’t near as efficient as it could be.
I guess sometime around the late 1990s, I started discovering by accident that most people could substantially improve sports specific movements without much focus on them. I’d get these athletes that would come to me and say something like, “Hey I’m not going to play football or basketball anymore, but I still want to look good. I want you to train me to get me big, lean, and strong”. So, I would. Then, two months later, the guy goes out and hits a personal best vertical jump and 40 time.
I had experienced that myself in my own progress as an athlete but I always thought I was sort of an anomaly because I wasn’t doing what was considered “traditional” explosive power and speed training. But then I experienced it many, many times with other athletes. From there things sort of evolved into a challenge of finding the right volumes of movement and strength work, discovering why certain approaches work for some athletes and not for others, and tailoring the approach to the athlete.
EC: It doesn’t sound altogether unfamiliar with the approach I took in The Ultimate Off-Season Training Manual, a program that a lot of people worried was too low in “SAQ” volume. Without getting off topic too much, it’s my humble opinion that the “need” for more and more SAQ work was a provider-induced demand initiated by training facilities that realizes that they could get more young athletes through and make more money by running them ragged and messing around with agility ladders than they could with actually individually assessing kids, addressing imbalances, and getting them stronger. They traded development for babysitting.But anyway, along those same lines, what are you thinking is a better bet instead for nowadays?
KB: Establish proper movement patterns (which include optimizing recruitment/compensation patterns and optimizing coordination), then simply increase the horsepower behind the movement pattern. You’re obviously one of the masters at establishing proper recruitment patterns and I have a ton of respect for your contributions to the field in those areas. The recruitment aspects would include anything done with the focus of getting the body to operate more efficiently - stuff like corrective exercise, activation drills and stretches.
You then have to engage in enough sport-specific movement training (sprints, agility, jumps etc.) to optimize intra- and inter-muscular coordination in those tasks – and honestly, since those are gross movement patterns, it really doesn’t take a ton of volume. Then, it’s just a matter of maintaining those things while progressively increasing the power of the relevant contributing muscles – which is easily done through strength training. Put all that together into a plan that properly addresses recovery between all the elements and you can’t help but get better as an athlete.
EC: Just because this is fun, let’s talk about a few things you see in everyday programming from some strength and conditioning coaches that isn’t blatantly terrible (e.g., squatting on stability balls), but rather only marginally effective – and far from optimal?
KB: I guess one of the biggest things is all the complex training I see. Don’t get me wrong; I like complexes for some purposes (like fat burning and time-efficient training), but I don’t think they should make up the entire workout for athletes looking to build a foundation. For example, yesterday I saw some people doing step-ups with a curl and press. The step-up is good, the curl is good, and press is good but when you combine them altogether the effect is rather limited. My motto is if you’re going to load an exercise with the purpose of building strength in that exercise (and in the relevant muscles), then put your body in a mechanically advantageous position to do so.
EC: How do your recommendations change from a relatively inexperienced 15-18 year-old athlete versus an athlete who is older and has more experience?
KB: The goals don’t change but the focus on the elements does. For the older athlete, I REALLY focus more on corrective exercise, stretches, and recovery. Older guys tend to have so many recruitment impairments, flexibility issues, and pre-existing injuries that they can be a disaster waiting to happen unless those issues are addressed. They not only tend to have more recruitment and compensation impairments than younger athletes, but their tissues also don’t tolerate these issues as well. While a young athlete can often overcompensate for years and get away with it, older athletes will toast themselves the first trip around the bases at their first weekend softball game. With movement work, I work them into it gradually and also limit the effort. A young kid can go out and run max sprints or max jumps no problem. But with older weekend warriors, I like to work them in gradually as far as their rate of perceived exertion goes.
EC: This question is more for me than my readers, but I’ll ask it anyway. Say you’ve got a 14-year-old kid who has never lifted a weight in his life – and he comes to you on his first day of training. Do you do any sort of sprinting, agility/change of direction, or jump training with him? Or do you stick purely with resistance training?
KB: The movement work would be VERY limited and would be incorporated into part of his warm-up. It’s the basic concept behind The Truth About Quickness. The movement part of the workout likely wouldn’t be more than 10 minutes – tops. It’s enough to warm him up and give him a bit of movement stimulation, but not enough to fatigue him for the rest of the workout. Short, sweet, and effective.
We’ll be back in a few days with a guest post from Kelly in conjunction with the launch of The Truth About Quickness.
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1. I'm happy to report that I not only survived our wedding festivities, but that Anna actually said "I do" (actually, "I will"). Kidding aside, it was - without a doubt - the single best weekend of my life; we had an absolute blast.
2. For those who are wondering, I did, in fact, eat the cake (actually, I ate a lot more than just cake; we had a sweet buffet):
3. Speaking of cakes, my fiancee wife had an extra one made in the shape of a dumbbell with our initials on it. We're both bummed that we never had a chance to try a piece, but at least it looked great - and hopefully some people enjoyed their slices.
Enough with the wedding stuff, as these aren't even the wedding photographers pictures - and you are probably more interested in me talking about lifting heavy stuff and the like!
4. Brian St. Pierre - who happened to be in attendance at the wedding (like that transitional material?) - just had a great article published at T-Nation that I think you'll really like: 10 Forgotten Muscle Building Foods.
5. A while back, I contributed on an article by Bret Contreras - and it was just published yesterday. Check it out: The Best Assistance Exercises for the Three Big Powerlifts. It's a good one if you are wondering which strength exercises will have the most carryover to squat, bench press, and deadlift.
6. I have an AWESOME interview lined up with Kelly Baggett for later this week. Kelly and I go back quite a few years, and he's one of those guys that I always learn something from when we connect. If you are interested in athletic performance improvements, he is a great guy from whom to learn. He actually did a interview at this site a while back, if you want to check them out:
Baggett of Tricks: An Interview with Kelly Baggett: Part 1Baggett of Tricks: An Interview with Kelly Baggett: Part 2
Kelly recently collaborated with Alex Maroko on a product called The Truth About Quickness, and it came out really well.
7. Last, but not least, if you are a Red Sox fan (or any sports fan, for that matter) and didn't see this on ESPN last night, you missed an awesome hour of television. I had goosebumps the entire time.
Sorry for not having any unique "EC content" for you today, but we're doing all sorts of post-wedding stuff - from unpacking, to writing thank you notes, to
Today's guest blog comes from current Cressey Performance intern, Conor Nordgren.
We’ve all heard those stories about the training regimens of celebrities and how they do 500 crunches first thing in the morning and 500 more right before bed to get that perfect six-pack of abs. Many of you have probably also seen that infamous video of T.O. performing crunches while conducting an interview with reporters.
While exercises like crunches and sit-ups can bring out those abs and sculpt a nice six-pack, is this the safest method to train the core? Top strength and conditioning coaches like Eric Cressey, Tony Gentilcore, Mike Robertson, Mike Boyle, and Jason Nunn have recently written and talked on the subject and say that it is not.
As an intern at Cressey Performance, I’ve been exposed to a ton of programs and not a single one of them has included a crunch or a sit-up. Here’s why:
If you’re familiar with Mike Boyle’s joint by joint approach to training, you know that the lumbar spine requires stability as opposed to mobility. Think about the execution of a conventional sit-up: what is your lumbar spine doing? That’s right, it’s flexing. The lumbar spine is not designed for a great deal of movement (whether it is flexion or extension), let alone repetitive movement. Our spine as a whole is not meant for a ton of flexion or extension, either. While you may “feel the burn” in your abs when performing a set of crunches, you are essentially training spinal flexion. World-renowned low-back researcher Dr. Stuart McGill says that we have a finite number of flexion/extension cycles in our back until injury is caused. That number is different for every person, but the bottom line is that by performing exercises like crunches and sit-ups, you’re increasing your risk for injury with every rep! Dr. McGill has actually done experiments where he’s put pig spines in a crunch machine and after a certain number of crunches, or flexes, spinal disks explode.
Crunches and sit-ups also promote a kyphotic, or rounded back, posture. Visualize someone in the top position of a crunch or a sit-up. Now, keep that visual of their upper-back, but picture them standing up. Hello Quasimodo!
Would you consider this good posture? Of course you wouldn’t (well, hopefully not). So why would we want to reinforce it?
James Porterfield and Carl DeRosa have written that the core musculature is primarily designed to transmit force, not to produce it. While crunches and sit-ups are promoting flexion of the spine, our core should instead be trained in preventing movement. If we train our core to be rigid and prevent movement, the stronger it will be; this translates to more overall force production throughout the whole body which will allow for bigger lifts. Sounds pretty good, huh?
Thanks in large part to Mike Robertson, we’ve been introduced to four acceptable movement patterns that should be utilized when training the core. They are anti-rotation, anti-extension, anti-lateral flexion, and hip flexion with a neutral spine. While there are several variations of the following exercises, here are some of my favorites:
Anti-rotation: Tall Kneeling Pallof Press – the kneeling version really forces you to use your glutes and your core, since your quads are taken out of the picture (this exercise can also be done on a cable machine).
Anti-extension: Ab Wheel Rollouts – progress to band-resisted or off of a box for added difficulty.
Anti-lateral flexion: Waiter Carries – can also be done with a kettlebell.
Hip Flexion with a Neutral Spine: Prone Jackknifes with a stability ball – you may find this to be one of the more challenging movements, so really focus on keeping that core tight!
Some of you may have a hard time imagining your workout without any crunches or sit-ups. You might be skeptical that the above exercises may not get you the results that you desire. Well, Tony “The Situation” Gentilcore performs these movements on a regular basis, and when he voluntarily and superfluously flashes his abs at us interns every day, let me tell you, I could wash my clothes on those things! But seriously, change is hard and not an easy thing to accept. However, the good thing about change is that it can be for the better. I’m not demanding that you immediately stop performing crunches and/or sit-ups; that choice is yours. It’s my hope that you think about how you’re currently training your core and ask yourself if this is the most optimal, functional, and above all else, SAFEST way to do so. This may help to keep you injury-free down the road so you can continue hitting the iron hard.
Conor Nordengren can be reached at cnordengren@gmail.com.Sign-up Today for our FREE Newsletter:
As you read this, I'm probably in a post-wedding stupor somewhere in Maine - but luckily, I had the foresight to take care of blog posts for Mon-Wed before I departed for the big weekend. With that said, check out today's list of recommended reading:
Troubleshooting the Scapular Push-up - Here's a video-based blog that goes over a common technical mistake on this population scapular stabilization exercise. It also leads right into another great blog: A Quick Fix for Painful Push-ups.
Consumer Reports on Dangerous Supplements - Here's a great blog by Dr. Jonny Bowden that talks about Consumer Reports' September issue, which highlighted the most dangerous supplements - and those that it recommended.
An Interview with Dr. Charlie Weingroff - This is an excellent interview that focuses on the foot, and Charlie doesn't disappoint; he is a machine when it comes to kicking out great content.
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As many of you know, I'm getting married on Sunday - which, of course, means that I had to be fitted for a tuxedo. I'm about to head out to try it on one final time, and if it's all good, bring it home with me. And, I can assure you that it will still feel as stupidly big as it did the first time I tried on a jacket at the store. What am I getting at?
Suits and tuxedos are not made for people who actually have muscle.
If you go with the smaller of two sizes, you need three groomsmen to help you get your arms and upper back into it - and you can plan on not being able to reach anything above nipple level while wearing it.
If you go with the larger of two sizes (which I did), you wind up swimming in it. I'm 5-9, 195 pounds - and will be wearing a jacket that was probably made with somebody who was 6-0, 220 with 40% body fat in mind. I'm the opposite of Chris Farley's "Fat Guy in a Little Coat."
In fact, after my fitting, my fiancee told me that I was not allowed to lose any weight before the wedding. So, while she was crushing it in the gym and watching what she ate to prepare for her wedding dress, I simply continued to lift heavy stuff and eat normally. The truth is, though, that I could have gone with 10,000 calories a day and just sat on the couch - and the jacket still would fit just fine.
This could just be a rant that ends here, but instead, I'll make you think a little bit. Every suit I have had to buy in the last decade has been a big and tall version - where I had to have the pants taken up by a tailor.
If we are concerned about the obesity epidemic, why do we only make suits and tuxedos for fat dudes?
If we know the body mass index (BMI) is a foolish way for doctor's and insurance companies to determine healthy weight, why do we only make suits for guys who are 6-5, 165 pounds?
And, do you think Tony and Pete will look as good in these suits as the guys in Dumb and Dumber?
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Based on feedback on Show and Go: High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better, one of the most popular components of this strength and conditioning resource has been the exercise modifications section. This section features recommended modifications for everything from mobility deficits (e.g., can't squat deep without rounding the back) to equipment limitations (e.g., no cables or squat rack).
That said, I know it's never possible to use a single chapter to cover absolutely every equipment modification one will encounter, so I wanted to get a series going here that highlights some quick and easy substitutions that you can use in your strength training programs. To that end, here is the first installment of High Performance Training Without the Equipment. Today's focus will be what to do in your home gym if you don't have access to dumbbells.
If we're talking about regular bilateral dumbbell pressing, the modification is quick and easy: just use a barbell, and get your variety by using a collection of floor presses, board presses, full range-of-motion presses, and various inclines and declines.
If we're talking about either unilateral or alternating dumbbell pressing variations, then try out the 1-arm push-up. You can make the exercise easier by performing it off the pins in a power rack - and as you get stronger, gradually move the pin down lower.
On the "flip side," you can obviously use barbell rowing variations to replace dumbbell rowing variations. One that I particularly like is the 1-arm corner row, in lieu of the 1-arm DB Row. You just stick the end of a barbell in a corner.
Or, you can just do the 1-arm barbell row - which requires a ton more grip and forearm strength to keep the bar from tipping.
Of course, there are plenty more options in this regard; your imagination is your only limit!
Without a doubt, the chest-supported row is one of my favorite strength exercises. It is a great upper-back-builder and shoulder health exercise to include in strength training programs because it keeps folks strict with their rowing by forcing them to keep the chest in contact with the pad.
And, while I absolutely love the fact that we have a specific chest-supported row set-up at Cressey Performance, I understand that not everyone has access to one of these bad boys. Fortunately for those of you in that position, though, we have a few excellent substitute strength exercises for the chest supported row that you can use that offer similar benefits without the "cheating" you often see with a traditional bent-over barbell row.
First up is the chest-supported dumbbell row. While you can't use a pronated grip here, it still keeps you honest. The only potential problem is that some benches have cumbersome "leggings" on the outsides that get in the way of ideal range-of-motion. Most work out just fine, though.
Your second option is one you can do just about anywhere: the head-supported dumbbell row. While you don't have the chest in contact with anything, you do have to put the head in contact with the pad at all times (you can use an incline bench, glute-ham raise, or other set-up at that height). Just make sure that you keep a neutral spine and tuck the chin so that the cervical spine is in a neutral position.
Both these modifications are featured in the "Exercise Modifications" chapter and accompanying video database in my e-book, Show and Go: High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better. With over 175 exercises in this video library, one of the central pieces of Show and Go is that it's versatile - and I'll help you to make modifications to the program (2x/wk, 3x/wk, or 4x/wk) based on your equipment restrictions - whether you train in a commercial/university gym, at home, or in a souped up high-performance training center. For more information, check out www.ShowandGoTraining.com.
Everyone likes to think that they bust their butt all the time in their strength and conditioning programs. The truth is that deep down, we all know that we dog it sometimes. Nobody can give 100% every single day (or 110%...ever; I hate that adage).
Along those same lines, here is a pretty amusing study that shows just how much your mind can get in the way of the efforts you SHOULD be putting out in your workout routine. Researchers had three groups each perform ten 6s sprints on a cycle with 24s rest between sets. The first group (control trial, or CL) knew they were doing ten before the session. The second group (deception trial, DC) was told they were only doing five - but then informed that they had five more to go after the fifth sprint. The third group (unknown trial, or UN) weren't told anything; they were just stopped after ten sprints.
When researchers examined the total work performed over the first five sprints, they found that the deception trial group was 6.5% greater than the control and unknown trials. The others had paced themselves because they knew the ending was further off. People are going to pace themselves and hold back a bit whenever you give them a reason to do so - so plan accordingly in your exercise prescriptions.
What's one way to work around this if you aren't being coached in-person? Make yourself accountable to a program. There is a tendency to want to skip the last set or strength exercise when you design your own programs, but when you're answering to someone else's program, you're more likely to stick to it. Show and Go: High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better is a great resource to check out in this regard. Just ask James Cipriani, a personal trainer who used the program to kick his own personal gains up a notch:
“I just read your recent blog post in which you mentioned sending Show and Go testimonials. Well…it would be a travesty if I didn’t give you a shout out.
“I’m a personal trainer myself. And after over 23 years of training myself and 16 years of training others, to say I grow “bored” with conventional weight training programs would be an understatement. I first trained to augment sport (football), then I got into powerlifting, and really became addicted to it when I started bodybuilding. I competed for eight years in the sport and did very well. But…I outgrew it. Yes…I was bored.
“I, like many others that I train, look to other sources to not only motivate me in my own training (mentally more than physically), but also to broaden my horizons as a trainer. That is what led me to purchase your Show & Go program. I have to say, Eric, it is the most comprehensive, integrated program I have ever used. From the warm-ups, to the strength exercises, to the stretching, to the cardio enhancement….my strength, flexibility, conditioning, and muscularity all improved ten-fold. And my bodyfat level went noticeably down without me tweaking my normal diet. I even had nagging shoulder and low back pain that inhibited me from doing certain movements that are now gone. I was able to deadlift weight I haven’t been able to use since my powerlifting days. Plus, a couple of the core movements you include are ones I have never seen or done and I loved them! I now use many of them with my own clients.
“One last thing to note…I very rarely get through a 16 week program. I tend to grow bored and need a different style of training. That never happened. Not only that…I am starting a second go-round this week of it with a few of my own personal tweaks to it. Great product, Eric! Thank you so much!”
James Cipriani - CFT, CSCS, NS
Brookfield, CT
A few questions from one of our pro baseball guys inspired me to create this video "tutorial" on how to develop power. It starts general, and progresses to specific. Think about how it applies to YOUR sport and your training history.
For more detail, check out The Ultimate Off-Season Training Manual.
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