Fuel and Material: a Conversation on nutrition

I like to refer to the 3 pillars of success in fitness. The 3 wise men as I like to call them. I feel that the three factors that you must consider if your goal is to get into elite condition are: Resistance training, Cardio training, and Nutrition. 2 out of the three you need to be a rock star at, but you must pay homage to all three.

All three are uniquely connected by their relationship with each other. Resistance training allows you to build the body that you’re trying to reveal with cardio training and the nutrition supplies the materials and the fuel necessary for the construction.

That could be the end of the article, but we’ll go into aspects of the 3 pillars because it’s important to understand them on an individual level to see how synergistically they’re important to each other.

The star of the show in my opinion is Resistance Training. Yes, I’m biased but my argument for that is the fact that Resistance Training or Strength training, as it’s often referred to as, gives you the most control of how you actually look. It’s the actual construction and redesigning of your physique.

This process puts you in the driver’s seat of the project. If all you do is diet down and do cardio, your body will get the idea that you’ve prioritized those programs and to allow you to be better at those the aspect of performing cardio it will begin to jettison muscle.

The body operates under a use it or lose it protocol. Without the stimulus of work, your muscles will cease to function. Programs like hinging, squatting and other lifting task begin to atrophy like the muscles that perform them.

Your base metabolism will drop. It’ll start to become harder to lose weight and to keep it off. Base metabolism is how many calories you burn in the state of rest. Understandably the amount of calories you’re able to burn while active will also drop.

The process of building muscle cost calories. The initial construction in session but out of session as well. Those 2 to sometimes 4 days you carry that residual soreness, you’re burning calories at an accelerated rate while your body reconstitutes itself. The little nano machines that run around restitching you up and making you whole again cost energy. They cost fuel.

Cardio is the great revealer. It gives you the means of excavating all that muscle you’ve been stock piling. There are a lot of different types of cardio but let’s just set the baseline of our understanding around this current conversation.

When we do stuff it cost calories. The muscles store sugar as energy. Fat is also stored energy. When we use our larger muscles for strong or explosive type movements that are shorter in duration, we use the potential energy that’s stored in the muscles. When we do cardio (any activity done rhythmically over a longer duration of time which triggers your body  switch over to the cardiac energy system in which oxygen is used as fuel) fat is used as a catalyst to transform oxygen to energy. Less explosive, less intense, and for longer duration.

Entering the discussion of the third pillar, we understand that in order to craft the body of our dreams we need the building material to do that. Protein and Essential amino acids are the building blocks of that body. I recommend calculating your number by shooting for somewhere in the range of 1-1.5 grams per lb. of your estimated desired body weight. If you don’t pick a target to shoot for, you’ll more than likely miss more often than not.

The entire project is run on fuel. Fuel can be a muscle saver but if over supplied then it’ll be stored. Fuel is our carbs, our sugars and our fats. Your body loves to use carbs in the strength training phase, and it shifts to fat in the steady state cardio phase. The key is to find the right ratio of energy to do the work and still have energy to do all the things required in your life. In my opinion the best way to do that is to change your relationship with food.

Food is neither good nor evil. It’s a valuable tool for that is of the utmost importance for you to achieve the goal of becoming a better version of yourself. It’s the fuel for the project and the material to build it how you envisioned it.

There are all kinds of different nutritional strategies and lifestyles that can add in maintaining the optimal levels of Fuel and Material but I believe that having a clearly defined understanding of what it is can help with that.

When you start to engineer a healthy lifestyle, you’ll need to start to factor in consistent levels of training and figure out how much protein you need. You can then divide that down into your 2-4 meals. Include shakes with that. It’s an easy way to add to your material total without adding too much fuel. For your meals, have a protein heavy plate and divide create a ratio that over the course of the week allows you to be energized but doesn’t allow much surplus.

Think about nutrition as both a daily cycle and a weekly cycle, just like your training and your cardio. After all you’re using the fuel to power (you and) the project, and you’re using the material to change the structure and you’re etching away the excess with your cardio training.

This can and should be the most enjoyable part of the process. Think about it. You have to eat to succeed. I got a saying the better you can cook the better you can look. I just self edited that from the more you cook the better you look. Then all you have to do is find things in the fuel and material category and check those boxes as consistently as you can in the right time frames and the project just keeps humming along in the right direction.

Using posture as an anchor: Part I

Using posture as an anchor: Part I

Form is everything. The muscle is form manifested. Form gives you a means to focus the energy of the movement towards the muscles you are trying to effect. Now we've talked about how force is generated by working against earth's gravity. Wither your running jumping performing a squat or a press, forces is generated by your muscles working against that force that would rather everything lay down right where it's at. The topic of today is how activating your postural muscles can aid you in keeping to the form and focusing even more energy into the targeted muscles. It's possible to have good posture without actively activating your postural muscles. If your shoulders slightly or aggressively roll forward then it might be a good idea to concentrate on having a slight activation of your postural muscles throughout the day. Not to activate your posture you retract and depress your shoulder blades. You can think about it as opening your chest and tucking your shoulder blades into your back pockets. This activated postural position is the optimal position for most resistance exercises. This is going to allow you to drop most of the energy generated from the movement into the targeted muscles and avoid energy bleed. Energy bleed is energy lost to body sway that doesn't go towards training the muscles. By anchoring yourself to your posture through upper body exercises  you stand lay or sit elongated with a tightened core. You then sink and slightly pull back your shoulder blades so you can feel your back spreading and your chest coming slightly in front of your shoulders. You try and cast that position. An visualization I like to use is that you allow you muscle to hang down and around your the top of your sternum or Chest bone. This is a great way to achieve proper leverage with curls and triceps extensions. Even if you lean forward on your extensions, It helps keep your AC joint from getting to active. It puts you in a great posit to work vertically. Pushing and pulling. Great for unbroken energy flow throughout the entire movement. You can really feel the muscles of the lateral delts firing when you build the strong open position and lower the weight around you. By creating the pillar of strength with the postural anchor you'll feel your core working throughout the entirety of the movement but the lateral raise you really feel it on the negative portion of the movement. The bench is a learning  tool for horizontal pushing and pulling. The contact of the bench on your back side gives you feed back on how open and drawn down you can keep your shoulder blades. When you lye focus on creating the strong base before attempting to move the weight. Flatten out your shoulders against the bench then tuck your shoulder blades towards you back pockets. Activate from there. Now your ready to work. This position mimics itself on rows. Machine or not. Push-ups planks, chest flys and reverse flys. If you have a hard time holding the position when you start to move around and generate force.The scapular depresion is a great way to strengthen those muscles and the position. Pictured it the vertical depression, what you don't see is the slight retraction of the muscles. You can always do the inverse of this move by using a horizontal pulling machine and allowing it to pull your shoulders forward and then after the stretch rebuilding the strong postural position. These work great as warm ups correctives or even strength exercises. In the 2nd part of this series I'll discuss how leg training and core training can be maximized with proper postural activation.

Name of the Game

The name of the game in fitness is muscle. Building and conserving quality muscle ultimately creates the physique that most people desire from the process of working out. I say most people because there is a select group of people who don't even consider training working out at all. That group just consider it play for the sake of play. Others move around and train to regain function or continue to the function of moving. People in rehabilitation and the elderly. More power to them and bless them. Most other people have a method to their play. They move in a way they like but with and additional benefit of enabling them to look a certain way. Wither your mode of training be power lifting, Dance, Martial arts, Yoga, Spinning or Power walking most people have an expectation of how their body will perform and look based on their efforts. By adding in strength training and adopting a diet and mentality that prioritizes development of quality muscle you take a more proactive approach in the evolution of your physique. The strength work will aid your performance in your sport and the shift in focus toward more of a protein based diet will help you keep some of that metabolism boosting muscle. Some might argue that they're not trying to get too bulky. To that I'll say, fear not. It doesn't happen over night. You don't have to look too far for an example. That guy at the gym who you see everyday and looks exactly the same. Could be he's only replacing the muscle he's breaking down in his workout and not supplying enough materiel to advance his construction project. When you see someone with a ton of muscle, know that your looking a well executed version of plan A. Two things to consider. The first one being to look to Incorporating a strength training regimen into your workout schedule if that part of your program is lacking. The other thing to consider is to make sure that you replace the protein lost due to exercise so that the more of your dietary protein can be used towards advancing your physique. One strategy is to include a post workout protein shake if you haven't already. If your already doing that then you might try adding an additional half serving. This change in dietary focus and training additions should help pushing your gains and training into the next gear.

Core is everything Part III

Today we're going to talk about one move and a couple of important concepts in core training. The move is The Elbow plank with band resisted lateral step. The first concept is going to be the plank. The plank is a stabilization move and from the hips to the shoulders a basic starting position to most exercises. Remembering that we generate force by tapping into earth's gravity so the first thing we do is think about what's in contact with the earth. Our elbows and our feet. We start off by feeding energy into those points. Next we solidify that position by depressing and retracting your shoulders. Pulling them back and down. You want to create a flat back not a hump. Squeeze your abs and butt and make like a statue and now your planking. If your sitting down reading this flare your elbows out a couple inches from your side, sit as tall as you can in your seat and pull the tips of your elbows towards the ground. Notice the effect if has on you lats and serratus muscles. Now extend your elbows in front of your shoulders and do the same thing while pulling your shoulders back. You've just taught yourself how to create the upperbase of the plank. Back to the ground, once your plank is built and your upper base is activated you've going to move use that as a position to drive the leg away from. With a band attached to your ankles take a lateral reach step. Feed additional energy into the base leg to hold the height of the hips move away from the base tap the ground pause slightly, and return to the plank.You're going to want to keep tension on the band throughout the set. Now with or without the band this is a great move. However I feel that the band really helps to challenge the muscles or the hip that lead into the lower obliques. That coupled with the strong base synchronizes the entire flanks contraction. Try this one out, take your time. Think about the moving and the non moving parts and you'll learn a lot from it.

Everything Core: core is in everything

Everything Core: core is in everything

can be interchangeable. Once the tool is selected you establish a working weight and angle of force. In the image I have a high to low angle. There are a lot of strategies to doing the pallof  press but today we're going to use it as a means of training your core while simultaneously strengthening your horizontal presses. This angle works through the front delt and into the peck in a decline chest angle while training the oblique and hip complex. Place the working hand on the handle, the off hand covers as a guide. Adopt a staggered stance with the working leg slightly back. Working hand and leg refers to the side operating. Create your base by feeding energy into the working leg. Sink and retract your shoulder blades. Rite now you should look to be connected as possible with the earth. Your a pillar of strength.  Proceed to press your hands out as far as you can while keeping your shoulders in the retracted and depressed position. hold for 2 to 8 seconds and retract. Shoulders back and down is the optimal pressing position. When your in the working position you want to breath out and keep everything as stable as possible. That's the rep. Stability is a hard thing for some people to grasp but when you learn to be stable your going to have a much better time directing energy down the line and that's the key to results. Being able to focus and direct your efforts and limit energy bleed. Thanks for your time I hope it was beneficial and I hope you join me next time for my next core update, the plank saw. Until then, be well.

Everything Core:core is everything Part 2 Suspension Wax Off

Everything Core:core is everything Part 2 Suspension Wax Off

  There are a lot of different ways to train core. The title of this blog states that the core is at the center of all exercise. The best way I can describe how to access that in broad terms is to say stabilize yourself and focus on what your targeting and make the transfer of energy from the ground to the target region a priority of the exercise. That force transfer should be 1B if the contractions termination point is 1A. Example being standing straight barbell curls you should feel the energy rising up from your heels through your trunk into your back as it deposits into your biceps. Later we can talk about picking the perfect weight to challenge the bis and limit the energy bleed from the rocking swaying and swinging but that my friends is a blog for another day.



         The move of the day is an advanced move called suspension Wax Offs that targets and teaches several things. The main target is going to be the trunk. The obliques to be specific. The secondary targets are the Chest, front and rear delts bis, lower traps and rhomboids. The back musculature is activated by placing a priority on keeping the chest open and shoulders depressed. The postural muscles and the shoulder girdle a important part of the core and this position needs to be maintained in order to optimally  complete most exercises. Wither your pressing, pulling, turning. Moving weights up or down with your arms or legs.



         The move begins from the hanging plank position. Basically leaning back with a suspension trainer in a inverted push up position. You can move your feet forward or backward to adjust the weight. You begin by tugging yourself into motion a slight pull to gain momentum then you activate your rear delts in a rotation and you press the far hand across trying to spread and not fold your chest and keep your hips in line as you turn. I've found that having the Press hand up works better for the peck activation and overall flow. The longer you can stick the hold the more your obliques will be challenged. Return to the initial start position and flow to the other side. With this movement it's a great teaching method for shoulder depression and retracting but also to feel and actively transfer energy through your core and thus dictating the work on your core. I love the movement of the Wax Off  I guarantee you'll see it make an encore appearance in this blog or some other forum I'm participating so play around with it and you'll be used to the flow and able to adapt to all other variations of it.

the Full Mount: Dominate your life

the Full Mount: Dominate your life

The full mount, it's a dominant position. Needless to say that you'd rather be the mounter as opposed to the Mountie. If you happen to be the Mountie there's a pretty good chance you well on your way towards being dominated..... Moving right along, to the current topic of discussion,the weekly evaluation of your life using Brazilian Jujitsu terms. Are you in the full mount, are you in guard. Have you managed to get in half guard. Have you turned the tables and got life's back? For those who don't train, we'll stick with full mount, guard and being mounted. Guard is a push. You can hold ground and defend. Your still on the defensive but the opportunity arises and you can reverse your fortunes. Being mounted sucks. Your really close to getting you skull crushed. When your in the top position in mount your virtually in control, but don't get to reckless you can end up snatching defeat from the jaws of streaking victory. A simple glance at a week in the life of  you will reveal how good a job you've done in your world beating. Now this exercise is between you and your world. If you feel like your world's kinda kicking your ass then adjustments need to be made stat. Now when your in this situation quick action is crucial. What we need to have you do is find a way to better your position from your current position. You may not be able to instantly win the fight from this next step but we need to create a better opportunity. If your in guard or The coveted mount position then the next step is trying to finish this fight, and move on to the next. Preserve the position and conquer the opponent. Simple principles. Assess, adjust and advance. Make it a happen to take the time to really assess your position with and objective eye and respond accordingly.