"Fatigue makes cowards of as all,” but how do you measure it ?"

"Fatigue makes cowards of as all,” but how do you measure it"?
 
The quote is from famed football coach Vince Lombardi, and it is so applicable to training and sport. But if you want to get maximum overloads in your workouts, the real question is how you measure the fatigue more effectively?

When you are performing your deadlifts, you can feel the burn in the muscle. Once you stop the burning stops and your body begins to recover. This is called peripheral fatigue. But is there more going on?


Your body makes changes based on stimulus or stress to a particular energy system. What we know is that when performing deadlifts your body becomes overloaded by a stimulus that is out of the normal range of work. This overload can typically come in the form of higher intensity of the exercise or greater volume, less rest, more reps, etc. We also know that volume decreases as intensity increases. Remember, small incremental overloads undertaken on a regular basis will result in an adaptation that will increase your performance. The modulations of these overloads are of great importance. As the athlete matures and reaches a higher level of fitness it is my responsibility as a coach to determine what overload will be most effective in eliciting the desired response in his or her body. As higher levels of fitness are achieved, determining and obtaining an overload becomes much more complicated.

We know that a greater stimulus will result in fatigue, followed by the body compensating for this fatigue, followed by super compensation, and a resulting improvement in performance. But if the stimulus is always the same this cycle does not result in improved performance.
On the surface this seems simple. Where it gets tricky is that most athletes have a “Type A” approach to training. More is better and much more is even better than that!  If an athlete does not measure fatigue effectively, the slippery slope of overtraining is only a step away.
What is harder to measure well within this cycle of adaptation is how you measure the fatigue. Beyond the muscle soreness there is also another fatigue at play.

Fatigue is generally classified as the direct mechanical fatigue on muscle contraction capability during an exercise. This fatigue is peripheral. In other words, when do you reach the point where you are unable to execute a particular exercise? But there is also a great level of Central Nervous System (CNS) fatigue, which is very important to monitor in training. This type of fatigue is insidious and can lead to a lack of enthusiasm, burnout, sleep issues, etc. It is typically the type of fatigue that creeps up on an athlete over time. You just feel tired and burned out all the time. Performance drops off, and it becomes harder and harder to obtain the type of outputs you were easily accomplishing in the past. Athletes will say they “feel flat”. The problem is that if an athlete accumulates too much of this type of fatigue, it takes some time to recover and can lead to major setbacks in training. Therefore it is very important to monitor this closely.
Exercise scientists are still trying to determine how to better monitor this type of fatigue. BCAA’s (Branch Chain Amino Acids) have been shown to help, but the jury is still out on their long-term effectiveness. Sleep and proper nutrition will always be a part of the process and should be monitored. Different athletes respond to different levels of intensity and volume in exercise differently. Serotonin levels are at play in this overall fatigue. Many endurance athletes are now using pulse oximeters to measure O2 in their blood to see if recovery has taken place. Healthy humans typically carry 97 to 98 percent oxygen in their blood. If you wake up and see 97 or lower, that’s a strong indicator that your body has not recovered.
As a coach, I monitor a core group of exercises for each athlete dependingon the sport. If an athlete begins to drop off 15 percent or more on a regular basis, we pay close attention and reevaluate the training to determine how to taper the workload down and incorporate longer recovery times and rest. Since we cannot look into the body and see the level of fatigue on the central nervous system we have to look for markers outside of the body. As an athlete becomes fitter, these markers become much more important to observe. I am constantly asking my athletes how they feel in an overall sense as well as observing the performance markers we have established.

One of the most important contributions a coach can make to his or her athletes is to tell them to rest. If the coach tells the athlete to rest there is no sense of guilt on the part of the Type A athlete. I also incorporate play into the equation. This reduces the mental stress associated with high levels of training. Weekend warriors generally do not realize the impact of daily stress on their performance.
So the takeaway is that you should give yourself markers of performance and measurements of feel to help you monitor the impact of overall fatigue on your body. Be aware that fatigue is not just your inability to perform an exercise in the moment.

Truth in fitness,
Jacques

 

Are You Performing Your Intervals Correctly?

 There is a ton of research in the last few years that has lead everyone to believe that intervals are the cure of everything.  They definitely should be a regular part of your training.  The hormonal response and gene expression that comes from intense efforts for short periods of time have proven that they have a roll for all clients.  The problem in fitness is that the industry takes a small amount of science and markets it to create programs that are just shorter, but not necessarily better. 

Many programs claim that only doing intervals is all you need for long duration cardio events.  This is not true although some of what you read would lead you to believe that intervals will solve all the problems of any fitness program. 

Intervals can definitely improve a cardio competitor’s maximum sustained power but the longer duration energy system still needs to be taxed on a regular basis and properly developed.  However, in tandem one could achieve improved results.  

The other problem with many interval training sessions is that they are no longer intervals but just harder than normal cardio for short periods.  This is because of inadequate output levels and poorly timed rest between intervals.  We are in a fitness world where harder is always considered better.  This is so wrong!   As you get fitter you need to increase intensity, but you have to build in greater rest in order to increase intensity.  If done correctly 6 to 10, 30 second intervals completed in a half hour can be brutal.  However, many would look at this as too short of a workout.  This is because they are not measuring the output to make sure there is an overload in the efforts.  5 min of total work time can be one of the hardest workouts of the week. 

Our FUBAR Versaclimber workouts have utilized the science behind intervals very effectively and the Versaclimber as a machine is perfect for these types of overloads. 

When starting interval training spend time on developing baselines so that you know what type of output you are capable of in a maximum effort.  These baselines are dynamic, so as you get fitter they change.  Pay attention to these changes and make adjustments.   If you want the most sophisticated measure you may find lactate testing and VO2 max testing helpful in determining these baselines.  I find that power is the easier and most effective way to measure output.  You spend time identifying power outputs at different levels of intensity.    You have to have a good understanding of your capabilities before you can determine the interval time and intensity.   

This leads me to one of the most important parts of utilizing intervals.  Measurement of output!  Typically this is where the wheels come off the workout.  You must measure the amount of output!   If you do not, then the intensity of an interval late in a workout will diminish in output to such a point that there is little value.  I call this no man’s land.  It is not hard enough for overload, but leads to overtraining and valueless fatigue.  Without measuring output you cannot determine if the time of the interval and rest period is adequate.   Utilize power as your primary measurement tool.  This eliminates most other issues that may be impacting performance.  In our Fubar classes we put output on the board and look at pacing to help the client determine appropriate outputs based on their fitness level. 

How do you measure output of an interval?  Time and distance is the poor athlete’s power meter.  For example you are doing sprint intervals for 20 seconds on the track.  You want to measure the distance you are covering during these intervals. This will tell you whether you are producing more power than the previous interval.  On the Versaclimber we look at time and distance.  If in a 30 sec interval the total feet increases more power needed to be produced if all else is equal.   On a slide board we use number of touches in the time of the interval and record it.  More touches mean more power produced and now you have a way to measure improvement.  It also allows us as coaches to determine if the interval should be shorter/longer, or should there be more rest between the intervals and also how many total intervals to perform.

The quality of the interval is of great importance. Poor output in your interval sessions will just make you fatigued with little performance value.  This can lead to the start of overtraining.  This is typically the problem with poorly coached group cardio workouts.   Intervals are also an excellent window into your fitness.  If you have in the past been performing much greater power outputs than the interval currently being performed then maybe you have not had enough rest since your last workout.  If we observe this lack of output we would skip these intervals and pick them up again after the athlete has had adequate rest to perform at the desired output.  The interval is a great barometer of how rested you are and the speed of your regeneration and health.

If you are going to perform intervals in your training one of the first things you need to think about is determining your baselines and then coming up with a method for recording the output on an ongoing basis.  This will allow you to see what type of training outside of your intervals is adding or subtracting from your performance in an interval and also what type of intervals are adding to your performance outside of the intervals.

TRUTH IN FITNESS:

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

 

If you want to get lean, you better know about Fat Set Point.

Over the last 7 years I have successfully coached hundreds of women and men on weight loss and how to change body composition and seen hundreds of food journals.  I hear the following comments with regularity. “ I don’t agree with your diet,  the food journal is hard, nothing works for me, I don’t want to get big, if I lift heavy I get huge, why am I not losing weight faster, why can’t I have cheat days, you are trying to do (x) to me.” 

With this in mind I thought it would be good to discuss how we coach our clients on food.

First let’s talk about association, observation, correlation, and causation.  The rooster crows and the sun comes up.  Does that mean the rooster causes the sunrise?  Of course not.  However many people look at changes in their bodies and use the same reasoning.  They use observations and associations and leap to causation.  This is a flaw of our brains.  We try to seek the most readily available answer based on the information.  We all want clean easy answers to complex questions.  However, fitness and weight loss may seem simple, but they are extremely complex and requires some critical thinking to figure out how our bodies respond to different environments. 

Without completely isolating someone in a lab and measuring every gram of food on both a micronutrient and macronutrient basis it is very difficult to determine how your body responds to food.  In our program at Sirens and Titans Fitness we use an online food journal to give us a better understanding of how food impacts an individual’s health, energy, and body comp.   With enough data and monitoring of body comp and energy level one can have a better understanding of the impact of food on a body.  Most people realize that body composition is impacted more from food than exercise, but everyone spends all their time quantifying the exercise and very little time quantifying food intake.   Without any measurement at all it is almost impossible to identify what foods cause you to gain or lose weight. 

Let’s discuss Fat set point and how this ties into weight loss and gain and why weight loss can be so difficult for so many people. I always counsel clients that we have to first find what changes in your eating trigger weight loss or body composition changes and then determine how to make it sustainable.  It is usually easier to know what does not work than what does work. 

What is the Fat Set point theory

Let me start by explaining this internal thermostat that regulates how much body fat is stored.   Much of weight loss, and believe it or not, weight gain is impacted by this concept. This thermostat for body size is in your brain. 

Our bodies are very clever at trying to maintain an equilibrium based on external environments.  The easiest to see example of this is body temperature.  When we get too warm we start to sweat to cool our bodies, and when we get cold we begin to shiver to try to increase the body temperature.  Why do some of us do better in heat and some in cold?  Our genetics have an impact on our ability to adjust to changes in our environment.  It does not say that we cannot get better at adjusting, however some of us just feel more comfortable than others in different environments. 

“Fat set point theory” is similar. In the simplest form we all have a particular range of weight that our bodies will hover around.  This range may change over time.  Most of the science points to a range of plus or minus 10% of body weight.  Movement within the range is considered normal, but once we start getting beyond the range the body will start to make changes.  The body will start to shiver or sweat in a weight loss manner.  This is the body’s way of taking you back to homeostasis.  This applies to weight gain as well as loss.  There are a lot of factors that can disrupt this homeostasis.  In today’s crazy world the list is long and can make weight loss very difficult for some.  Disease, diabetes, thyroid issues, adrenal burnout, depression, medication and yoyo dieting, stress etc. can all impact body composition.  Some people gain weight when stressed and some lose weight.  

So this brings me back to why understanding this theory is important.  Most people have great difficulty losing weight and keeping it off.  How are people successful at overcoming this fat set point?

When coaching someone on weight loss, I first have them fill out a food journal and we can see what type of food is currently maintaining their homeostasis.  It is similar to developing a strategy for athletic performance in a sport.  We establish the starting point and then identify strengths and weaknesses.   From a great deal of science of sport, our experience training other athletes, understanding the needs of the particular sport, we identify strengths and weakness of the athlete and then create an overarching strategy that is tactically dynamic so that, dependent on individual responses, it will give the athlete the greatest amount of improvement in the time we have to train with them.  All of these strategies must be dynamic.  We may try squats with one athlete and find that deadlifts are more appropriate with another athlete based on biomechanical individualities. 

Our coaching methodology with eating is not dissimilar.  We understand that everyone is different so we do not recommend a specific diet to anyone.  What we do is establish their start point and initially just try to eliminate as much of the processed food and refined sugars and flours.  Most of this food is nutrient vacant and typically promotes weight gain dependent on activity level and age.  Once we begin to make these changes we try to establish where the tipping point for weight loss occurs.  In some cases these initial changes will result in body comp changes.   Our goal is sustainability so we initially do not focus so much on calories.  We also try to incorporate foods that the client is already comfortable eating.  This helps in making the changes sustainable.   We look at calories to make sure the client is eating enough based on BMR and activity level.   We cannot determine this tipping point and what changes caused this without a food journal.  Weight loss is very elusive for most because they think they know what may cause changes in their weight based on changes in how much they eat.  These changes may have an impact but not be the cause of the weight loss.  In other words if you eat 3000 calories a day and you cut your calories to 1500 calories and all else is equal you have not only cut your calories, but all of your micro and macro nutrients as well.  So the loss of weight may have been a result of the calories but also were impacted by the macronutrients and how a body responds to the food.  The sticking point with calorie restriction is that in a short amount of time your internal thermostat will slow metabolism based on the lower amount of calories.   Through a process of making changes and seeing how an individual responds to these changes we are usually able to see where this weight loss tipping point exists, based more on causation not on just observations or associations. 

The issues with clients typically arise with filling out the food journal.  They think they can just “pay attention to what I eat” and that will tell them everything they need to know.  The clients who are successful at weight loss are the ones who make the commitment to diligently record their food for 6-8 weeks.  After recording food for this time clients have usually figured out how they lose or gain weight based on the amount of food and types of food. 

Once this first step is established we then have to come up with tactics to make it sustainable.  This is typically where people run into problems with most weight loss programs.  They have the initial success and then cannot sustain the diet.   We try to create a way of eating that coupled with exercise, is sustainable and fits into one’s lifestyle and also deals with your internal fat set point more effectively.   It typically means that it is a slower process for some, but we believe it is a much more sustainable approach.  The client really learns how their body metabolizes food and how this translates into health, energy level, and body composition. 

Now back to the Fat Set point.  The irony of weight loss is it gets harder as you lose more weight.  Part of this is every pound of weight lost is a greater percentage of your body weight and your internal thermostat begins to work against you.     We try to get our client’s to focus on body composition.  This aids on two fronts.  One is that you will look better which everyone wants.  Your clothes will fit better, you are healthier with more lean body mass, you are physically stronger and more powerful, and because your body’s thermostat is trying to keep your weight in a certain range it is easier to accommodate your genetics. 

When we lose weight your body will accommodate this loss to a point and then it will start making changes to get you back to your fat set point range or previous homeostasis.  It does this by slowing metabolism, changing your desire for certain foods and in some instances changing the overall set point.  There are also hormonal changes in leptin (the hormone that makes you hungry) and ghrelin (the hormone that makes you feel full). This is why some people get even heavier after a diet. 

So Fat Set Point Theory can be an issue, but one that can be addressed best by not starving yourself, determining foods that cause you to gain weight, adding exercise to maintain a higher metabolism, adding lean body mass, and focusing on body composition instead of weight, and staying consistent.  These tactics can create an environment for sustainable weight loss.   Patience, patience, patience is key when overcoming your bodies desire to maintain homeostasis.  I always remind clients that if they have been this weight for some time, it will take some consistency in your changes for their body to recognize that the changes in eating and exercise will be the new homeostasis. 

In summary: A good strategy for weight loss and improvement in body composition is to journal your food and determine a weight loss tipping point.  Once this is accomplished develop eating habits that can fit into your lifestyle and allow you to maintain this tipping point.  Both of these require tracking food for about 8 weeks.  Some people are able to figure this out quicker than others.  If you do not account for the food your odds for success drop dramatically. 

Combat your Fat Set Point by not restricting calories and semi starvation, focusing on adding lean body mass through exercise, focus on body composition and not weight.  All of these will help you maintain the highest possible metabolic rate which will help you to overcome your current fat set point.

When you are really ready to start training let us know. 

Truth in Fitness

 

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

What You Need to Know about Overload/Adaptation if you want Success in Fitness and Weight Loss:

I recently saw a post that said something about Usain Bolt working for 4 years to produce an effort of less than 10 seconds on the track.  It said something like it took 4 years for the 10 seconds and you are wondering why after a few workouts you do not have a six pack yet?  We are in a culture that wants instant results.  Unfortunately, our bodies do not cooperate and cannot be controlled like an Instagram post.   People have a distorted understanding of how the body makes change. 

We have regular educational meetings for the trainers at Sirens & Titans.  The objective is to bring new ideas and further the education of the staff.  One of our recent meetings discussed overload and adaptation and how to optimize this concept for maximum sustained power.  We were focused on the concept as it applies during a workout, but it warrants a further review of the entire concept of overload and how the body adapts. 

Most people’s perception of training is very simplistic.  For example: People think if they start training for a marathon that their heart and lungs get stronger because they are performing more work and this mechanical work results in the cardio system getting physically stronger.  In other words the adaptation (improvement) in running comes because of the heavy breathing and increased beating of the heart.  What really occurs is that once you have an overload in work output over and above the norm your homeostasis is disturbed.  This results in messages being sent to the DNA in the cell.  In many cases this results in an immediate change at the genetic level.  If this disruption is repeated over and over again then eventually the adaptation becomes the new norm.  So in simple terms, going back to my first example of marathon training, the adaptation (improvement) is a result of the stress on the body which results in a message being sent through a signaling pathway to your genes.  This signal is what results in a change in your ability to better deliver and carry oxygen to your legs and run faster. 

At Sirens and Titans I coach many members on body composition and weight loss.  What most people do not realize is that what goes in your mouth will result in an adaptation as well.  If you have been nutritionally stressing your body by poor choices for a number of years then in order to make change you have to have a change in your homeostasis.  It is no different than the change in homeostasis that exercise places on the body.   So if you look at nutrition in a similar fashion you will realize that eating can be a stimulus (good or bad) which sends a message through a pathway to your DNA and results in an adaptation.  Gaining weight is the body’s adaptation to a stimulus that is a result of what and how much you eat.  The problem is that most people realize that to train for a marathon will take many months and to become really proficient will take years.  Unfortunately, most people do not look at weight loss in a similar fashion.  If your current homeostasis has been in place for years, then making a change in your body that is permanent will take some regular and consistent attention to your eating. 

So let’s go back to exercise and see what we can do to shape the resulting adaptations.  I will come back to the weight loss side of the equation.

As a coach it is important to determine what adaptation you are trying to achieve.

At Sirens and Titans we start this process by determining what are the strengths and weaknesses of our athlete and how they apply to their particular sport.  We are determining the athlete’s current homeostasis across the spectrum of fitness.   In the weight loss industry most would refer to this homeostasis as a fat set point.  This fat set point is the composition your body has most comfortably established.   In other words what is the current homeostasis?    As an athlete and coach it is important to revisit this idea because it is a dynamic concept that is constantly changing.  This change takes place on both an inter and intra seasonal level.  In other words, season to season changes as well as changes during the season training. 

So this brings me back to the in service we recently had with our trainers.  At Sirens and Titans we establish primary objectives for each of our workouts.  I instruct the trainers that we have a primary objective so we know what is most important for the athlete to walk away with from this particular workout.  In other words what is the most important training stimulus we are attempting to generate during the workout?   I consider the workout a success if we are able to generate a training stimulus that perfectly matches the adaptation we have determined is most important to this athlete at this point in time.

Here is where it gets tricky.  What if your stimulus objective in a workout is the heaviest 3 rep dead lift the athlete can execute?  The athlete starts the workout feeling kind of crappy and the performance is not where we want it.  If the trainer continues the workout at a suboptimal performance level then the stimulus being produced is not enough to send a message through the pathway to the gene that results in an increase in strength. This is what I call no man’s land training.  The stimulus is not hard enough for an overload or disruption of homeostasis but hard enough to tax the athlete so that subsequent workouts are impacted negatively.  The better decision would have been to change the current training stimulus in the workout that would have allowed the athlete to revisit the initial overload objective in the shortest period of time in the future.  This is typically where the start of overtraining an athlete begins.  Most athletes and individuals spend way too much time in no man’s land training. 

I always say that what a great strength coach really gives an athlete is time.  In other words the athlete is fitter sooner in their careers so the diminishing asset of age has less impact on their reaching their highest levels of performance when they are chronologically most capable of great performance.

So now you have the simple version of overload/adaptation. It is important to identify the appropriate stressors for performance gain it is also important to look at how to speed the adaptation.

Nutrition is a huge contributor, not only from a long term perspective but also in accomplishing appropriate stimulus during a workout.  Try to understand where your body performs optimally and what you eat before during and after a workout.  Athletes can easily articulate to you max lifts for most exercises in the gym, 100 meter times, 40 yds. etc.  However, try asking them the macro and micro nutrient composition of breakfast and most will have a blank stare.  POOR NUTRITION IS A STRESS.  You should keep a food journal until you know how it impacts your performance. 

Knowing your primary objective helps you to create a workout environment that best reflects the desired adaptation.  Is today a strength day, anaerobic fitness day, aerobic day, and how do those different workouts impact your adaptation objectives.  Is the workout conflicting with your performance goals both short term and long term?  What is the specific sport and how does your program design impact the performance objectives of the sport.

In addition more and more science both in weight loss and sports performance is looking at sleep, daily life stress, arousal before and after a workout, and of course nutrition.  All of these stresses send messages to your genes that will impact or shape the adaptation. 

So if you want the most effective and fastest adaptation for both fitness and weight loss, understand that everything you do impacts this process.

Remember:

Stimulus > Message Sent>Signaling Pathway>Genetic Expression>Adaptation.

You can control a large part of this equation to give you the quickest and most desirable result.

 

When you are finally ready to start training let us know. 

 Truth in Fitness

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

 

 

“Why are we so good at training for Strength and so Poor for Training for Power? If sustaining maximum power is so important to winning why do so many focus only on absolute power? “

I was just watching the NBA finals and watched the game come down to the final minute all tied up. Two great teams come back to the start of the game score of zero to zero at the end of the game. Winning at this point comes down to execution. Both mentally and physically. Who has the most left in the tank to pull down the rebounds, stay explosive, really dig mentally to execute effectively after a brutal contest? The risk of mistakes are high when fatigue sets in.

I ask players in all sports this question. “If you could be as fresh at the end of the game as you were in the beginning of the game how much more would you win?” The answer is always that they would a much greater percentage of contests. So what does that mean for training and are we getting it wrong?

Let me explain. What are the physical components of success in sport? Success in most endurance sports are not who is the fastest in the short term, but who can sustain the highest percentage of that speed in the longer term.

For example, basketball requires the ability to be able to jump high or else be really tall so you can control the ball more effectively than your opponents. The hoop is 10 feet high and so taller players or the ability to jump really high is a big component to success. Lots of money and time is spent on how to increase vertical jump if you are not 7 feet tall.

How do you jump higher, run faster, better lateral movement, better forward and backward? All of these movements for winning in a sport go back to the ability to generate power in these planes of motion. Of course bio-mechanics technique, etc. all play a role, but if all else is equal. Power is the component you as an athlete have a lot of influence to change. So if it is so important why do we not spend time trying to train our bodies to hold the greatest amount of power the longest?

I am amazed at how good the sports performance industry is at delivering improvements in strength. There are a ton of programs and coaches that will help you get stronger. “Improve your Squat” “Dead-lift 2 x your body weight”, “Improve your bench”. Don’t get sand kicked in your face and be a weakling. This type of training can readily be found today. Some of it is good and some not so good. Remember strength is your ability to generate a force. That coupled with velocity is what translates into moving your body through space at rapid rates of speed. This is power! Even though strength is of great importance in all sport and human movement, at what point does adding greater strength add to more winning performances? With power to weight sports the increase in strength past a point will require more muscle and body weight to be added. This is something that cyclists and elite runners do not want. In most sports strength, mobility and stability are the foundation of the movement, and power movements are the end result. If I was to ask most athletes and coaches how they train for power, they would say they use kettle-bells, Olympic lifts, plyo jumps etc. These are your typical go to power exercises. All are great exercises for developing absolute power for athletes. But how do you develop greater amounts of maximum power longer. In other words if winning is about producing power at the highest level the longest why do we not spend more time training for this result. Misunderstanding power. Program design is the real reason. The most common program design for absolute power development is a few sets of absolute power work of 6 to 8 repetitions at maximum power output followed by some form of endurance repetitions. The endurance repetitions have to be executed at a lower power output in order to execute the greater volume of repetitions in a row. The problem with this model is that you are not training your body to hold higher percentages of maximum power. You are training your body to produce sub-maximal power for longer periods of time. So if your ability to produce the highest percentage of your maximum power late in a game, why do you train for sub-maximal power in your training? The big problem is that most program design does not do a good job at measuring power output. How do you measure maximum power output in a kettle-bell swing, Power Clean, Box Jump? It is difficult to measure power in these efforts so a lot of time is wasted training endurance and not maximum sustainable power.

Time and distance or time and repetitions at a particular weight is the poor man’s power meter. Track coaches are always measuring power because they are measuring time and distance. If an athlete covers the distance as a greater speed and nothing has changed in body weight or wind then the power has improved. In our center we use the Versapulley. The Versapulley utilizes inertial flywheel technology and measures the output so I can see what the power output is rep by rep. This is invaluable in me developing maximum sustained power.

Maximum Overload’s goal is to produce Maximum Sustained Power. We improve force production, improve velocity and improve the absolute power of the athlete. Then we have athletes perform the exercise at maximum power for 3-6 reps. This is followed with a rest between the reps designed to provide enough rest so that we can continue with another effort (typically a 5-10 second rest) at maximum power again.We keep extending the time so that the body adapts to producing maximum power for large amounts of time not sub-maximal power for longer periods.

So if power is the Holy Grail, and being able to sustain it wins games, why not focus on a training program that produces maximum power the longest.

You will find a lot of people who are training for absolute power and then some form of power endurance at sub-maximal efforts. We focus on what wins. Developing maximum power the longest. It will change your game.

More to come....

If everything we know about fitness and nutrition today was wrong, how would you eat and train?

Woman in her 30s comes in to my center and wants to change body composition and get fit.  The fitness of her 20s is harder to maintain and she wants to get on back on track.  She exercises a lot, but does not seem to be making any changes.  She hears that we are good at coaching clients for change.   The first thing she tells me is she want to get toned.   She is open minded about resistance training for women until we get to the evaluation.  I am evaluating her pulling movement capability so start with a light dumbbell row of 15 pounds.  She rips off 15 reps with no problem.   I am trying to establish a baseline of strength and so based on how light the 15lb dumbbell was I bump her to 20.  She immediately says “that is way too heavy”!  Now I just watched her easily move the 15 pounder with great form and no distress.   So she can easily lift a much greater amount of weight.  However in her mind she still believes that by lifting heavy she will get bigger.  She wants to be “toned”.  Toned is muscle!  You want to get stronger if you want to get toned.  However, she is still wedded to an old ideal of women and weights and that if she just lifts lights and eats zero fat, and less than 1200 calories a day she will get skinny.  She will fight me tooth and nail to stay true to this old belief.  So like a parent trying to get their kids to eat their veggies I will cleverly figure out how to get her to come around.   

Old myths die hard. 

The exciting thing about strength and conditioning, weight loss, medicine etc. is that it is constantly changing.  It is a never ending multidimensional jigsaw puzzle that changes shape over time.  Probably half of what we believe today will be outdated or wrong 5-10 years from now.  This issue of relevancy also means that much of what we believed 10 years ago is open for review today or may be wrong.

Too much of what is done with clients in training today is often times based on myth and rumor.  If you were in medical school 20 years ago, much of what you were taught has been modified or completely changed.  The analysis of cholesterol is a great example. They continue to figure out better ways to understand how your body produces plaque in your arteries and doctors have modified or completely changed what they believe is good cholesterol today.   Studies in weight loss and obesity have changed dramatically as well over the last 10 years.

So how do you manage your health and fitness and training knowing that what you are doing today may be wrong tomorrow?  You must find a coach who is constantly questioning the efficacy of training protocols and find someone who is willing to ask why, and if changes should be considered.

As a Strength Coach I am regularly reviewing research and then try to bridge the gap between science and application.  Sometimes the science may point one direction and the application is just too difficult to make it usable.    I am also regularly playing Dr. Frankenstein and spending a ton of my own training time thinking about and experimenting on my own body to see ways to better apply science that comes to my attention.  I also take my experience with one athlete and carry that knowledge into the future to broaden my understanding of future athletes and clients.  I am constantly trying to broaden my database of training knowledge.   I do this to better understand how to marriage the science with the practical application.  In addition to the practicality of new research, one must also consider the risk reward of trying to apply new research that may be impactful.  The risk of time spent, potential injury, cost of implementation, and return on the exercise all need to be weighed and considered.

The other way to deal with this constant change is to never stray too far away from the fundamentals of exercise science that have passed the test of time.  Multi Joint exercises that are functional in nature will always be the foundation of good training.  Squats, dead-lifts, Olympic lifts where appropriate, power movements, and a good understanding of the energy systems most important to your particular sport will be part of this foundation.  How you incorporate these exercises will change but the fundamentals are always there as touchstones to reference. We all have two arms and two legs and move in different planes of motion.  Volume and intensity and our understanding of how to gain greater gains faster will continue to evolve.  The role of aerobic fitness in non-cyclic sports is evolving. Resistance training for the aerobic athlete has also changed considerably.  

One thing that will not change is that we walk upright ergo hip extension is a major part of all human movement.  Most sport is based on this basic human movement so these multi joint hip exercises will always be part of any great training.

This type of training has passed the test of time.  Many people stray from these fundamentals because something comes along that they think makes them look innovative.  Trends in fitness need to be analyzed and evaluated not just copied. Ask why and then understand if a change to something new should be adopted.  On the other side of the coin traditions in training can be restrictive and have to be regularly analyzed and improved. 

Our eating is even more difficult to understand.  Low carb, high carb, high protein, vegan, vegetarian and every other diet that comes to our attention makes the choices difficult.  This discussion is almost worse than politics today.  People are so wedded to one belief or another that discussion can often times become heated.

I try to advise people that the no label diet seems to make the most sense.  Of course you can focus in on recovery and pre workout meals to move your training along faster.  However, if the foundation of your eating is that you try to eat real food that has no label you are 95% of the way to a very healthy diet.  I have my clients keep a food journal for a month to 6 weeks at minimum so they can better understand energy levels and the impact of food on performance.  Most coaches keep close track of training benchmarks, why would you not do the same with what you eat.   In addition, for many sports and weight loss, this food journal is extremely important as we all have different reactions to food and how we metabolize what we eat.  Food can be a stress just like exercise.  Our bodies adapt to this stress.  So you need to pay attention!

Plenty of color with veggies, organic meats and fish, fruits in moderation or seasonally. Stay away from the processed sugars and flours.  These processed foods can add to the inflammation in your body.  This is the opposite of what you want after exercise.   This no label eating typically results in a much lower amount of refined carbohydrates in your diet.  Eat healthy natural fats and stay away from the Trans -fats.  All that is fried and brown is not to be eaten if possible.  However, you want to make eating sustainable.  A few French fries are not the end of the world.  Just do not make these choices the majority of your calories. 

The lesson here is to open your mind to any intellectual possibility. This open mindedness is even more important with something as dynamic as the human body and exercise science.  Start with the fundamentals and then customize the training based on your individual response and relevant science.  However do not lose sight of the fundamentals. These will always serve you well.

When you are finally ready to start training, give us a call. 

Truth in Fitness!

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

 

The Holy Grail of Fitness. How is your search going?

 

SIRENS & TITANS FITNESS·FRIDAY, JULY 15, 2016

What is Sirens and Titans Fitness? It is a 20, 30, 40, 50+ person who is in search of a result. Athlete and non-athlete alike. They are looking for a major change in fitness or body. Most want better strength to weight and power to weight. They want to be fit without adding size. Better movement and athletic performance. They sweat it out in a Spin Class, Boot Camp, Met Con workouts, group X workouts, and personal training sessions. They are in search of the answer to why they are not seeing a result and hope that by trying something new they will find it. So they bounce from thing to thing thinking that if they just do more it is better. They do not realize that most of the time they are doing the same thing, just in a new wrapper. We have never had more fitness available to the public in the history of mankind with lesser results. Why? Are these people lazy or undisciplined? In most cases no. They are just unaware and think that solving this riddle is a simple equation of exercise more and eat less. They will find the Holy Grail of Fitness! Of course as humans we always look for the simplest answer. People will come in and want a trial workout to see what we are about.

They are asking the wrong question. We are happy to provide a trial. But if your problem is mobility and we perform a trial, the workout may be so easy that you go home thinking that it was a poor workout or worse yet if we do not pay attention to your mobility issues, you may injure yourself. . People equate hard with greater value. The right question is what type of strategy will we develop to get me to my goal and why that is the strategy that we think will work for you! A trial workout really is a tactical view of what we do. A snapshot of a much bigger album. If you were driving from LA to NYC and had 3 days to get there, you would not stop at every gas station along the way and ask for directions. You would pull out a map and plan out a route. This route would be dynamic and would have to deal with potential setbacks along the way. Now let’s make it even more interesting and start you without even knowing where you are starting from? You do not even know you are in Los Angeles. This would be difficult to plan, however this is how people determine their strategy for obtaining a result in health and fitness. So new clients come into my office depressed, frustrated, unfit, over trained, overweight, biomechanically unsound, unsuccessful at obtaining the result they want and hear we are good at getting these results. I then let them know that we can really help them but the first thing we have to do is an evaluation. It is 1.5 hours with me to determine goals, gaps in their current strategy, and establish a baseline of fitness, nutrition, and health. In most cases these same people tell me they do not need an evaluation. They are very fit and this is a waste of their time and money. They eat well and know how to train well. This may be true, but this strategy may be good, but not good for their goal. They want me to not even know what city we are starting from on this trek.

I then tell them that the fitter they are the more important the evaluation. As you get fitter the strategy and tactics to obtain a gain is more difficult. It is much more difficult to get Usain Bolt to run faster than it is to get someone who has never really trained that much. It is much harder to get body composition down when it is already below the average.

So if you do not want to be the 20, 30, 40, 50+ person who is endlessly trying to search for this elusive level of fitness, start by doing it different. Be smart and determine where you are starting from and lay out a plan for where you want to go. If your time is valuable then look at fitness as an investment and not a cost and be wise about developing something that is different from just a random approach. Most people would not do this in their professional life, but when it comes to fitness they think that they got it. The fitness industry is counting on this type of mentality and count on it to build their business. Who is Sirens and Titans Fitness? We want to get you a result, and will stay with the ideal of “Truth in Fitness” So when you are finally ready to really train, come and see us.

Truth in Fitness

Jacques DeVore

Coaches Corner:

“It’s training, not just exercise.” 

That’s what I always have to keep reminding my staff and my clients. It’s the reason why I got into this business, and why people from pro athletes to 68-year-old grandmas seek out my services. Because training and exercise are not the same thing. 

I want to train people — for performance and for life. I want to make them better — now and a year from now. You want mere exercise?  Go to a Group-X class at your local gym and jump aup and down for 50 minutes. Work up a good sweat. But do you want learn a system that’ll make you faster, fitter, better — and teach you how to stay that way long after you stop paying me?  That’s training — and that’s what I always wanted to do, starting with myself and my friends nearly two decades ago. 

Maximum Overload is the end result of all my years oftinkering and strategizing about training, of objectively evaluating the body’s strengths and weaknesses, assessing progress from one point in time to another. It came about because I dared to ask the question “why?” Why, I wondered, are we just doing what has been done in the past? Why do people in the gym do 3-sets- -of-10? Why do cyclists train the same way cyclists did 30 years ago — and never touch a weight? Why do aerobic athletes only do aerobic training? Why do athletes add strength but ignore power, the thing that they really need to win the race?  

Because they don’t ask why.

Knowledge gets passed down from generation to generation — but how sensible and effective is that knowledge to start with?   The “why” is often times never really understood. So I insist that my coaches and clients understand the “why.”

Maximum Overload is a work in progress that I’m hoping will spur knockoffs and improvements. But I think its big idea— that weight training is essential for building an endurance athlete’s maximum sustainable power — is undeniable. Here’s why

Endurance athletes, and particularly cyclists, require a high power-to-weight ratio.  Most endurance coaches focus on the aerobic engine and how to sustain the highest percentage of an athletes Vo2max (absolute aerobic power) for the longest period of time.  Little attention is spent on how to produce more sustainable power in the muscles, particularly the legs.  If you can train your legs to produce greater amounts of power on over long periods of time, you don’t deteriorate as fast. That, in a nutshell, is the goal of the Maximum Overload program. 

Again, why look only at Aerobic Power?  Why not see if our bodies with proper training design will be able to produce greater and greater amounts of power?  Could you train less? Could you be a better version of your current highly-fit self?  Could you take power outputs to a level you never thought possible?  This book, the Maximum Overload philosophy and the relentless pursuit of maximum sustainable power are based on these“whys.”

Ultimately, There’s no compelling reason to ask why if all you want is exercise. Just lace up your shoes and go for a run or do a boot camp.  But if you want to be a better bike racer, a better masters athlete, a fitter, more functional, more robust grandparent who lives life to the fullest while your peers are locking themselves in prisons of inactivity, you must be trained. Maximum Overload is your training.

Coaches Corner:

Preview from Jacques upcoming book.

 Why are we so good at training for Strength and so Poor for Training for Power? If sustaining maximum power is so important to winning why do so many focus only on absolute power?

 I was just watching the NBA finals and watched the game come down to the final minute all tied up.  Two great teams come back to the start of the game score of zero to zero at the end of the game.  Winning at this point comes down to execution.  Both mentally and physically.  Who has the most left in the tank to pull down the rebounds, stay explosive, really dig mentally to execute effectively after a brutal contest?  The risk of mistakes are high when fatigue sets in. 

I ask players in all sports this question.  “If you could be as fresh at the end of the game as you were in the beginning of the game how much more would you win?”

The answer is always that they would a much greater percentage of contests.  So what does that mean for training and are we getting it wrong?

Let me explain.  What are the physical components of success in sport? Success in most endurance sports are not who is the fastest in the short term, but who can sustain the highest percentage of that speed in the longer term.

For example, basketball requires the ability to be able to jump high or else be really tall so you can control the ball more effectively than your opponents.  The hoop is 10 feet high and so taller players or the ability to jump really high is a big component to success.  Lots of money and time is spent on how to increase vertical jump if you are not 7 feet tall. 

How do you jump higher, run faster, better lateral movement, better forward and backward?  All of these movements for winning in a sport go back to the ability to generate power in these planes of motion.  Of course bio-mechanics technique, etc. all play a role, but if all else is equal.  Power is the component you as an athlete have a lot of influence to change.  So if it is so important why do we not spend time trying to train our bodies to hold the greatest amount of power the longest?

I am amazed at how good the sports performance industry is at delivering improvements in strength.  There are a ton of programs and coaches that will help you get stronger.  “Improve your Squat” “Deadlift 2 x your body weight”, “Improve your bench”.   Don’t get sand kicked in your face and be a weakling.  This type of training can readily be found today.  Some of it is good and some not so good.  Remember strength is your ability to generate a force.  That coupled with velocity is what translates into moving your body through space at rapid rates of speed. This is power!

Even though strength is of great importance in all sport and human movement, at what point does adding greater strength add to more winning performances? With power to weight sports the increase in strength past a point will require more muscle and body weight to be added.  This is something that cyclists and elite runners do not want.   In most sports strength, mobility and stability are the foundation of the movement, and power movements are the end result. 

If I was to ask most athletes and coaches how they train for power, they would say they use kettlebells, Olympic lifts, plyo jumps etc.  These are your typical go to power exercises.  All are great exercises for developing absolute power for athletes.  But how do you develop greater amounts of maximum power longer.  In other words if winning is about producing power at the highest level the longest why do we not spend more time training for this result. 

 

Misunderstanding power.  Program design is the real reason.   The most common program design for absolute power development is a few sets of absolute power work of 6 to 8 repetitions at maximum power output followed by some form of endurance repetitions.  The endurance repetitions have to be executed at a lower power output in order to execute the greater volume of repetitions in a row.   The problem with this model is that you are not training your body to hold higher percentages of maximum power.  You are training your body to produce sub-maximal power for longer periods of time. 

So if your ability to produce the highest percentage of your maximum power late in a game, why do you train for sub-maximal power in your training? 

The big problem is that most program design does not do a good job at measuring power output.  How do you measure maximum power output in a kettlebell swing, Power Clean, Box Jump?  It is difficult to measure power in these efforts so a lot of time is wasted training endurance and not maximum sustainable power. 

Time and distance or time and repetitions at a particular weight is the poor man’s power meter.  Track coaches are always measuring power because they are measuring time and distance.  If an athlete covers the distance as a greater speed and nothing has changed in body weight or wind then the power has improved. 

In our center we use the Versapulley.  The Versapulley utilizes inertial flywheel technology and measures the output so I can see what the power output is rep by rep.  This is invaluable in me developing maximum sustained power. 

Maximum Overload’s goal is to produce Maximum Sustained Power.  We improve force production, improve velocity and improve the absolute power of the athlete.  Then we have athletes perform the exercise at maximum power for 3-6 reps.  This is followed with a rest between the reps designed to provide enough rest so that we can continue with another effort (typically a 5-10 second rest) at maximum power again.  We keep extending the time so that the body adapts to producing maximum power for large amounts of time not submaximal power for longer periods. 

So if power is the Holy Grail, and being able to sustain it wins games, why not focus on a training program that produces maximum power the longest. 

You will find a lot of people who are training for absolute power and then some form of power endurance at submaximal efforts.  We focus on what wins.  Developing maximum power the longest.   It will change your game. 

TRUTH IN FITNESS,

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

Sirens and Titans Fitness

Strength vs Endurance Training: How do you mix oil and water?

“I feel like crap, but my watts are up”  “I feel great but my heart rate was so high” I drive my athletes crazy with always asking them how they are feeling.    Technology is giving us greater and greater methods to track this data, but the greatest one is learning how you feel. I have seen so many cyclists become prisoners to data.   I know it is subjective, but the mind is the ultimate fitness tracker and so teaching an athlete to establish bench marks to measure feeling and exertion are very important. 

The Maximum Overload’s program goal is to increase your ability to sustain your maximum sustainable power output on a bike.  This is what will win the race most of the time.  However, if you have not lifted much in the past and then follow with a ride at first it will be trying.  You will feel sluggish, heavy in your legs, sore, slower, etc.  This will typically pass after 3-4 weeks of consistent training.  Shortly you will see gains in power, your rides become more effective, efficiency increase, ancillary fatigue in the lower back, shoulders etc. diminishes, all of this by doing something that in the scheme of a cyclists training calendar takes very little time and returns such a boost to your performance. 

There is a lot of discussion in the strength and conditioning circles about how much time “endurance” athletes should spend strength training and vice versa.  So it is not just endurance coaches that are hesitant to lift weights.  The power sports are afraid of any adding longer duration endurance training to their routines. 

The timing of training for one outcome can negatively impacts the other.  So there are a few things to consider.   At Sirens and Titans we train a number of athletes both endurance and non endurance strength and power athletes.  We are constantly working on better ways to take parts of one type of training to enhance the other.  It is even more important when you have limited amount of training time with an athlete today.   In the strength and conditioning circles there tends to be a perception that you can only do one or the other.   Take a look at premier league soccer players today versus 10 years ago and you see how much bigger they have become andyet they can still run for a 90 minute game.  Some of them look like rugby players, yet soccer is considered one of the most aerobically taxing of sports.  Today’s sportsmen both endurance and non endurance have to be both strong and be able to produce power at extremely higher levels for longer and longer periods of time. 

So what is concurrent training and how do you most effectively utilize what we have learned in the training of both types of athletes to get the most from Maximum Overload Training.  Concurrent training is the mixing of strength and power training in the gym with endurance training on the bike. 

Training time is more and more valuable so concurrent training is something that needs to be considered.  I have seen how adding a mix of this training can improve performance and reduce training time. 

Having a primary objective for each workout is of great importance.  This is even of greater importance if you are concurrently training as a cyclist.  

Many strength coaches training big power athletes believe that any amounts of endurance training will diminish the ability to produce strength and power.  On the face of this it does not make that much sense.  If this was the case then why does it take so long to make gains if all you do is strength and power training?   You are not going to change fast twitch muscle fiber to slow twitch and vice versa with small amounts of training in the other area.  An endurance athlete can improve Maximum Sustained Power output on longer term efforts by adding short term strength and power training without adding body weight.   This also will result in the athlete being able to obtain bigger overloads in the aerobic energy system in subsequent training on the bike.  I call this “opening the window” to other areas of fitness that are positively correlated and improve and support your training on the bike.

 I have seen cyclists that will go months without any short term intensity because of some conventional training methods that dictate this in the winter.  They seem perfectly fine with this idea.  However, when I ask them what they think would happen to their fitness for racing a bicycle, if they did nothing but 100 meter sprints for 4 months?  They usually respond with a gasp and they would lose all of their fitness.  Then I ask them what they think happens to their ability to go hard if they don’t go hard for 4 months straight!  So, you must open the window to all the necessary energy systems necessary for your sport.  At some times the windows are open wider and other times not so much.    I have looked at this principal from a completely different perspective than most endurance coaches.  The point is you need regularly question tried and true training conventions. 

Coming back to concurrent training there are some definitions necessary to better understand how strength and endurance improvements come about, and the primary enzymes that impact these improvements.

AMPK- Activated protein kinase.  Without going into all the physiology involved understand that this enzyme is activated when large amounts of ATP are needed for exercise that is long in nature.  ATP is necessary to fuel this type of exercise.  AMPK increases your ability to uptake substrates of sugar and fat to fuel the exercise.  You also see the role of epigenetics involved in giving your muscles more endurance as a result of this enzyme being regularly present.  Greater capillary density and mitochondria are evidenced when longer amounts of endurance training take pace with the activation and presence of AMPK.  Higher intensity intervals increase the levels of AMPK.   Many trainers think that High Intensity Intervals provide a halo effect that bumps the metabolism and results in weight loss.  However, AMPK increases fat metabolism and sugar uptake as a fuel source for supporting this type of exercise and will make changes in the gene expression.  (Exercise &AMPK Activation, Derek Beast, Charlebois Feb 2005)

MTorc1-mammalian ‘target of rapamycin complex 1   

MTorc1 activity is required for muscle growth and increased strength.  It is most active during resistance training.  This enzyme regulates protein synthesis.  As it increases, there is an increase in protein synthesis and subsequently muscles get stronger and bigger.  So if you want to increase strength you need to increase the presence of this enzyme.    Amino acid supplementation activates this enzyme and that is why adding this to a post workout recovery drink and prior to resistance training can be helpful in developing strength.  Your body has a way of seeking homeostasis so you can’t just keep adding amino acids and expect strength.  So adding amino acids before and after heavy resistance exercise is helpful in maximizing strength gains.  If you do not time the amino acids effectively your body will reduce the activation of mTorc1 to seek equilibrium.  You want mTorc1 as high as possible for as long as possible for maximum effect.   (Sports and Exercise Nutrition pg. 126. Susan Lanham 2011)

So how should you think about both of these enzymes and the interaction?  The problem lies in the fact that one enzyme turns off the other.  This is why strength coaches are so opposed to doing both.  However, you can strategically incorporate these together effectively by following a few rules.  What we have to do is reduce the impact of one enzyme on the other.  AMPK is increased with high intensity intervals efforts.  You can increase this further by training in a low glycogen environment.   If you are going to follow your endurance training with a strength session add some carbohydrates to your diet after the workout.  Higher glycogen will reduce AMPK after the workout to help negate the impact on mTorc1.  Make sure that the strength portion is low on volume and high on intensity.  This is also tactically easier to accomplish for most athletes as intervals can be mentally and physically very taxing.  Higher glycogen will reduce the impact of AMPK on mTorc1.  You can also add a pre resistance workout protein drink to activate mTorc1.  This can also be switched around when the desired result is focused more on the endurance side of the coin. 

All sports have a power times an X factor.   The X factor is the level of power needed how many times (X) to be most competitive in a sport.  Cycling has a very high X factor.   When looking at training both strength and endurance simultaneously you need to look at the X factor of the sport and the needs of the athletes to take the best advantage of these enzymes and the impact on endurance and strength.  

Understand there may be a time when your training is highly focused and you will not perform any concurrent training, however if used strategically it can enhance your ability to perform the primary training objective for your sport and better utilize limited available training time.  

 

Train smart, have fun, and you will prevail!

Jacques DeVore, CSC

Are You Designing Your Workouts To Maximize Gains? Training Windows. What are they and why are they important?

Some of you may be familiar with the author Tim Ferris.  He wrote the 4 hour work Week and the 4 hour body.  In the 4 hour body he talks about the bike shed effect. 

He more or less said that if you were at a party and went around the room asking people how to build a bike shed most people would have an opinion or some very specific thoughts.  People would ask how big, what kind of windows, type of doors etc. However, if you asked them how to build a 50 story office building most would have no clue.  He goes on to say that the problem with fitness and getting performance gains out of your body is that most people see their body like building a bike shed and therefore think it is a simple task, having some idea how to accomplish this task.  However, the problem with the bike shed effect is that most people do not realize that their body is very complex, like a 50 story office building.  They don’t know what they don’t know. 

I spend countless hours trying to better understand how to build this 50 story office building which is your body.  Program design is a major part of success in building your body.  I design and write close to 20 workouts per day every week all with different objectives in mind. 

The workout design is a part of an overall program design strategy.  The strategy is developed first by establishing a good understanding of the current fitness of the athlete.  We also look at maturity in fitness, age, current fitness levels, biomechanical issues, needs of the sport, as well as a number of other data points. 

This baseline of an athlete’s fitness is dynamic, and even though experience gives me some ideas of adaptation time to new stimulus this component can be very different between athletes.  Age, genetics, past training, etc., will greatly influence how individuals recover and adapt to a new exercise stimulus.  Training, recovery, adaptation, progression.  These are the components that need to be designed for maximum improvement in the shortest time without injury. 

Training with Windows

I look at training like a wall of windows.  Each window represents an energy system, or aspect of fitness necessary to rise to the highest level of one’s genetic performance.   One window may represent biomechanical soundness, lower body strength, upper body strength, strength endurance, power, power endurance, mental strength, recovery etc.  There are a large number of training windows but all of them are not open at the same time.   At different points in time some windows are closed, some wide open, and some just cracked.  So when I am designing a workout I am looking first at what windows are needed to be open at a point intime and what type of physiological response I am trying to elicit.  Is the response I am trying to obtain an increase in strength, power, anaerobic endurance etc.?

Most of the general public judge the value of a workout by workout intensity. Rarely is regeneration/recovery considered part of training.    Higher intensity is better in the eyes of the unknowing trainer or individual. This is the bike shed effect in full force… however, I am trying to build a 50 story office building not a bike shed.   I see so many programs marketed today that only have one or two windows completely open all the time with the belief that fitness gains are derived by high volume moderate weight, high heart rate training.  “Burn 600 calories in an hour” is typically how the ad reads.  Ask the best athletes in the world if they are concerned with how many calories a workout burns?  They are more concerned about what part of their 50 story office building does a workout improve or create and how do they speed recovery from the effort.  

I ask cyclists I coach what they think would happen to their aerobic fitness if for 4 months all I had them do was 8x 100 meter sprints every day.  They look at me with eyes wide open and say they would never consider that because they would lose so much of the fitness they need for cycling.   In the next breath I ask them what they think happens to their anaerobic endurance if for 4 months of the winter they never do any intensity.  Some windows are open more and some are just cracked open.  In fact some windows cannot be opened until other windows have been open for a period of time.  This is how you build a fit body.  

So when thinking about the windows of fitness, think about each window representing all the components of building a 50 story office building.  All the questions that go into designing a building go into developing a body for optimum performance.  These questions will range from use, environment the building will be exposed to, sustainability, efficiency, etc.  Determine what the building’s form and function need to be, and then determine what training windows are most important at different points in time for the proper development of a particular type of building. 

I have developed strategies and tactics for hundreds of world class athletes from a myriad of different sports.   We put this same experience, understanding, and response to different types of training into every client we train, not just our world class athletes. 

We develop very dynamic programs for our athletes and we use the same science for the non-competitive athlete.

So if you are interested in the WHY of a particular workout, or series of workouts, ask and we will provide you a better understanding.  Even if you are not interested in the Why know that we are interested in the Why.  You will benefit from this interest by the improvement in your own personal fitness and performance. 

Truth in Fitness!

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

CEO Sirens and Titans Fitness

 

Coaches corner

I always tell our coaching staff that you have to understand the “whys” of fitness in order to design and develop programs that deliver both short and long term results.  I have developed the Maximum Overload training program from that philosophy.  Most of the fitness programs today are exercise.  Not to say there is anything wrong with exercise, but just as your body is a dynamic organism you have to have a dynamic design to your exercise in order for it to be considered training.  You have to develop a strategy that evaluates where you are starting, strengths, weaknesses, and then a plan to get you better. 

The problem with most programs developed today is that they do not answer the “whys”.   Most designs for strength and power training is based on someone doing what has been done in the past and just passed down from generation to generation.  The why is often times never really understood.

The decision to write this book was based on this concept of both why and why not.  Why not really develop a strength and power program that does not just “strengthen the core” or just adding strength with no regard for both absolute power and Maximum Sustained Power. This book is based on answering so many “whys” over a long evolution of thought and training that originated back in the late 1990s. 

So why Maximum Overload Training and what is it?  As you will read in the following chapters all roads in sport and movement lead to the concept of power.  Not only on an absolute basis but then subsequently   improving your ability to win races by dramatically improving your ability to sustain the highest percentage of your Maximum Power the longest!  This is defined as Maximum Sustained Power and is the ultimate goal of the Maximum Overload training program. 

Endurance athletes, and particularly cyclists, require a high power to weight ratio.  Most of the coaching community in endurance sports focus most of the time on the aerobic engine and how to sustain the highest percentage of an athletes Vo2max (absolute aerobic power) for the longest period of time.  Little attention is spent on how to produce more sustainable power in the muscles, particularly the legs.  If you can train your legs to produce greater amounts of power on both an absolute basis and also the highest Maximum Sustained Power, your wattage goes up, your overloads on the bike are improved, and your ability to hold the highest percentage of maximum power (functional threshold power FTP) skyrockets. 

Why look only at Aerobic Power?  Why not see if our bodies with proper training design will be able to produce greater and greater amounts of power?  Could you train less? Could you be a better version of your current highly fit self?  Could you take power outputs to a level you never thought possible?  These are the “whys” of this book and this is the foundation of Maximum Overload training to develop Maximum Sustained Power. 

 

 

Are You Developing Routine and Rituals in Your Training to Produce Peak Performance?

Training can be boring at times because of the repetition that is sometimes necessary dependent on sport, level of fitness and training objectives.  Overload and adaptation lends itself to routine.  However, there is an important place for routine and ritual in training.  It is astonishing to me the number of clients that get so concerned about doing the same exercise two days in a row.  This is based on a ridiculous belief that your body will adapt after one day of an exercise.  In addition there are so many combinations of reps and sets and rest and weight that you could do the same exercises but never really do the same exercise.   The exercise itself is not as important as the design that supports the exercise. 

 When training our athletes early on I want them to go through a mental checklist or routine prior to executing any particularly difficult exercise.  In competition, preparation instills confidence and confidence produces winning performance.  This applies not only to sport, but to anything in life.  They call it the practice of medicine for a reason.  It is something that is practiced ongoing.  The last thing NASA says before liftoff of a space shuttle is "All systems are go".    A lot can be learned by this systematic check list in both training and competition.  It also reduces the risk for injury and reinforces good movement patterns.  I want the client to focus on the excellence in the movement not the win of a heavy lift.  That will come with excellence in execution.

 With that in mind let's say an athlete is performing a heavy dead lift at Sirens and Titans www.sirensandtitansfitness.com .  I encourage the athlete develop and execute the same routine prior to every lift.   How they approach the bar, visualizing a successful lift, how they grab the bar.  It may be left hand first, then right hand, foot position, breathing, etc.  It doesn't really matter what is in the routine.  What is important is that a conditioning response system is developed that prepares the mind for success in training.  Do not forget that the idea of training is not just strength, power, endurance, etc.  It is also the time that you learn to take risks without anything at stake.  

 To create an environment that is comfortable so that when game time comes around you know you are prepared and you have already been at this point many times before.  You do not know how many times I have seen great athletes make major changes in things very close, or immediately before competition.  This is a result of lack of confidence and poor preparation.  Including rituals and routines prepare you mentally during training so that game time is relaxed and you play at your best.

 So next time you approach an exercise, develop your own personal routine.  Stick with it, and utilize it to get great gains in training and also on the field.Sometimes routine is not so boring.

 TRUTH IN FITNESS

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

CEO Sirens and Titans Fitness

Sirens and Titans Equipment Highlights:

Most people that are new to training with us are pretty unfamiliar with much of the equipment we utilize to train our athletes and clients.  The equipment we utilize supports the sophisticated design of our programs for all of our clients. 

There is a lot of equipment out there for sale and as a purchaser of the equipment you have to evaluate what is useful and what is not.   When you come into our center it does not resemble a typical gym.  Of course you will have dumbbells and weight plates, squat racks, and bars etc.  However you will see very little else that resembles what you see in most fitness centers.  This is a result of our focus on movement and function and athletic performance. 

I thought it may be interesting for the reader to discuss the benefits of the equipment.  

2 MVP Shuttle Jumper:  The MVP is used mostly in rehabilitation settings.  It is used in rehab because a client can be completely unweighted in a lower extremity exercise.  We like this equipment because we can execute a number of athletic movements under both lighter loads for power to heavy loads for strength.  We can perform unilateral (one leg) work and also perform jumps and different angled jumps and landings.  Because we are able to completely unweight the client we can utilize this equipment for any level of fitness.  http://www.shuttlesystems.com/product_listing/1/shuttle-mvp

 

18 Versaclimber:  This is one of my personal favorites.  I think it is the best piece of cardio equipment available today.   There is zero impact and is perfect for both intervals and long cardio.  It is metabolically taxing because you are carrying your entire body weight and incorporating both legs and arms in the movement.  It will tax you more than treadmills, elliptical, bikes etc.  It burns up to 23 calories per minute.

In our evaluations of new clients we have a one minute fitness test which gives us a snapshot into a client’s overall cardio baselines.  http://versaclimber5.reachlocal.net/

 

2 Slideboards by Ultraslide, http://www.ultraslide.com/   we utilize this piece of equipment for all types of exercises.  Great for core cardio, legs, shoulders. The slideboard is great for lateral movements and has great versatility.

 

1 Go2Altitude Simulated High Altitude http://www.go2altitude.com/  this is a wonderful piece of equipment for improving cardio capabilities.  It can simulate over 20,000 feet of altitude.  You intermittently put a mask on and off breathing hypoxic air.  Great for endurance athletes and before you go to altitude for climbers.  It is great when an injury takes place and the client wants to maintain cardio fitness while the injury heals. 

 

Westside Barbell Reverse Hyperextension: Louie Simmons and Westside Barbell is the mecca for the strongest lifters.  http://www.westside-barbell.com/index.php/professional-health-care-reverse-hyper .   This equipment is wonderful for improving and minimizing lower back risk and allowing heavy lifters to lift with less lower back issues.  We like to get clients to lift heavier loads and this equipment allows us to minimize the risk for injury.

 

Versa Pulley https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozvT_WcdXrc .  This is one of the most versatile pieces of equipment for training athletes and movement for all our client’s.  It allows us to get eccentric loads in almost any plane or movement.  The machine is a wonderful addition for training all levels of fitness.  http://versaclimber.com/versapulley/

 

Glute Ham Machine http://www.muscleandfitness.com/workouts/legs-exercises/how-master-glute-ham-raise

This is a great posterior chain exercise machine.   Posterior chain is lower back, glutes, hamstrings, and calves.   We combine this with bands and weights to increase or decrease the load.  It is also great for clients that have knee issues and still want to train strength and power in the posterior chain. 

 

Deep Muscle Stimulator (DMS) - http://d-m-s.com/

The DMS provides deep muscle tissue with kinetic forms of deep, rapid, short-duration percussion vibration, which allows the client, patient or athlete experience a number of benefits: pain relief, increased circulation and lymphatic flow, the break-up of muscular scar tissue, soft tissue release and regeneration, and reduced lactic acid build-up. This, in turn, increases recovery, allowing you to maintain your active lifestyle.

The DMS can also be effective in managing acute and chronic pain from tendonitis, bursitis, edema, frozen joints, carpal tunnel syndrome, and even migraines.

This group of unique equipment, coupled with great program design and nutritional coaching brings rapid results for both athlete and non-athlete alike.

 

 

Truth in Fitness

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

 

Are You Performing Your Intervals Correctly?

There is a ton of research in the last few years that has lead everyone to believe that intervals are the cure of everything.  They definitely should be a regular part of your training.  The hormonal response and gene expression that comes from intense efforts for short periods of time have proven that they have a roll for all clients.  The problem in fitness is that the industry takes a small amount of science and markets it to create programs that are just shorter, but not necessarily better. 

Many programs claim that only doing intervals is all you need for long duration cardio events.  This is not true although some of what you read would lead you to believe that intervals will solve all the problems of any fitness program. 

Intervals can definitely improve a cardio competitor’s maximum sustained power but the longer duration energy system still needs to be taxed on a regular basis and properly developed.  However, in tandem one could achieve improved results.  

The other problem with many interval training sessions is that they are no longer intervals but just harder than normal cardio for short periods.  This is because of inadequate output levels and poorly timed rest between intervals.  We are in a fitness world where harder is always considered better.  This is so wrong!   As you get fitter you need to increase intensity, but you have to build in greater rest in order to increase intensity.  If done correctly 6 to 10, 30 second intervals completed in a half hour can be brutal.  However, many would look at this as too short of a workout.  This is because they are not measuring the output to make sure there is an overload in the efforts.  5 min of total work time can be one of the hardest workouts of the week. 

Our FUBAR VersaClimber workouts have utilized the science behind intervals very effectively and the VersaClimber as a machine is perfect for these types of overloads. 

When starting interval training spend time on developing baselines so that you know what type of output you are capable of in a maximum effort.  These baselines are dynamic, so as you get fitter they change.  Pay attention to these changes and make adjustments.   If you want the most sophisticated measure you may find lactate testing and VO2 max testing helpful in determining these baselines.  I find that power is the easier and most effective way to measure output.  You spend time identifying power outputs at different levels of intensity.    You have to have a good understanding of your capabilities before you can determine the interval time and intensity.   

This leads me to one of the most important parts of utilizing intervals.  Measurement of output!  Typically this is where the wheels come off the workout.  You must measure the amount of output!   If you do not, then the intensity of an interval late in a workout will diminish in output to such a point that there is little value.  I call this no man’s land.  It is not hard enough for overload, but leads to overtraining and valueless fatigue.  Without measuring output you cannot determine if the time of the interval and rest period is adequate.   Utilize power as your primary measurement tool.  This eliminates most other issues that may be impacting performance.  In our Fubar classes we put output on the board and look at pacing to help the client determine appropriate outputs based on their fitness level. 

How do you measure output of an interval?  Time and distance is the poor athlete’s power meter.  For example you are doing sprint intervals for 20 seconds on the track.  You want to measure the distance you are covering during these intervals. This will tell you whether you are producing more power than the previous interval.  On the VersaClimber we look at time and distance.  If in a 30 sec interval the total feet increases more power needed to be produced if all else is equal.   On a slide board we use number of touches in the time of the interval and record it.  More touches mean more power produced and now you have a way to measure improvement.  It also allows us as coaches to determine if the interval should be shorter/longer, or should there be more rest between the intervals and also how many total intervals to perform.

The quality of the interval is of great importance. Poor output in your interval sessions will just make you fatigued with little performance value.  This can lead to the start of overtraining.  This is typically the problem with poorly coached group cardio workouts.   Intervals are also an excellent window into your fitness.  If you have in the past been performing much greater power outputs than the interval currently being performed then maybe you have not had enough rest since your last workout.  If we observe this lack of output we would skip these intervals and pick them up again after the athlete has had adequate rest to perform at the desired output.  The interval is a great barometer of how rested you are and the speed of your regeneration and health.

If you are going to perform intervals in your training one of the first things you need to think about is determining your baselines and then coming up with a method for recording the output on an ongoing basis.  This will allow you to see what type of training outside of your intervals is adding or subtracting from your performance in an interval and also what type of intervals are adding to your performance outside of the intervals.

TRUTH IN FITNESS:

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

 

Do you have a Primary Objective for your Workouts? You should!

At Sirens and Titan www.sirensandtitansfitness.com we not only look at the long term strategy of the training based on a well-developed evaluation of the athlete, we also spend a lot of time on the tactics of each training session.  The long term or grand strategy evaluates the long term objective of the athlete for the off season training and beyond.  If someone is not an athlete we like to create seasons for them.  This allows them to “peak” at different points in the year and give them psychological breaks from training year round. 

Each individual training session is another rung in the fitness ladder.  In order to make the next step up in fitness each of these sessions must be developed in a thoughtful manner.  At Sirens and Titans we have primary objectives for each training session.  The Primary Objective may be lower body strength, power, stability etc.  The Primary Objective may be active recovery.  The point is that if you do not have a primary objective you may want to look at incorporating this concept into your workout.  The Primary Objective of a workout allows our training staff to focus on one area of training that is the most important part of the grand strategy for that day. This will improve performance and move the athlete forward at the most rapid rate possible.   The Primary Objective must be dynamic.  In other words if the Primary Objective was to obtain an overload in lower body power utilizing plyometric exercises and the athlete was not able to perform at a level that produced the overloads necessary we would change the session and revisit the primary objective after the athlete has had enough recovery time to perform at the appropriate level to attain the output necessary to meet our objective.  It also gives you a goal for the specific workout.   There are often workouts where you just are not on your game.  Having an objective will allow you to focus and eliminate the secondary objectives and cut the workout short while still making progress. 

Time is the real enemy of an athlete and non athlete who wants to improve the performance of their body.  Establishing Primary Objectives for each workout insures that workouts are not wasted or contributing to overtraining. 

Truth in Fitness

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

Are you performing high force activity on legs prior to training for lower body power? If not you should be!

Yesterday I had a conversation with a talented basketball player about the Whys of fitness.    My last blog entry discussed this concept and I gave him the example of how we will train his legs with high force production exercises prior to leg power workouts and he asked “Why?” 

I told him that it is based on the principle of Post Activation Potentiation Principle or PAP.  As athletes become fitter and fitter it becomes harder to get overloads when training.  PAP helps to increase the ability of an athlete to produce greater amounts of power in exercises subsequently to a high force activity. 

Most of the research has revolved around jumping.  The act of jumping is a good measurement of power production in an athlete’s lower body.   The research looked at performing hack squats at 90% of the athlete’s one repetition prior to jumping.  Subsequent ability to jump was increased when the intervention was utilized. This also has validity in a number of other power exercises.   The optimum time between the heavy lift and the power exercise seemed to be around 12 minutes.    Andy V. Khamoui, MS, CSCS, Edward Jo, MS, CSCS,and Lee E. Brown, EdD, CSCS,*D, FNSCA )  At Sirens and Titans Fitness we utilize this science in training the body for many different types of power production training.

Keep this idea in mind the next time you perform your plyometric workouts both for upper body and lower body exercises.   The practical application of the science allows a strength coach to experiment with different types of loads and rest dependent on the athlete and the part of the body you are training.  This can also be reversed to improve maximum strength exercise performance.  The order is reversed.  The power is done on the front end to elicit a bigger lifts in the subsequent lower body lift on the strength side.   

Truth in Fitness

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

Why would you execute a deadlift over a squat if you take out the differences in the biomechanics?

I have recently been interviewing for new coaches to add to our staff and through the interview process I get a good understanding of the state of the fitness industry. This industry has a low barrier to entry and often times the learning stops after someone is certified. Very few trainers in this business really understand why they do something. Typically the answer is someone told them to do it that way. The human body is amazing in how it adapts to new stresses, so often any change can elicit a change in someone’s body if the change is big enough and consistent. However, understanding why the change takes place and how to manipulate the change is often lacking. If you start asking why 3 sets of 10, or why not 5 sets of 5 or 2 sets of 20 things start to breakdown. When training world class athletes (or exercise junkies) it takes a much greater understanding of the science at play or as I like to call the WHYS OF FITNESS in order to get the desired result! So that brings me back to the title of this entry.

Why would you do a deadlift over a squat if you take out the difference is the biomechanics?

All of our new coaches’ intern with us for a period of time until they are up to speed on our methods and have an understanding of the high level of training we want to deliver to our clients. We discuss with our coaches what makes a great coach vs. a mediocre coach. We conduct in house continuing education where we discuss the “whys” of strength and conditioning.

Deadlift vs Squat.

If you take out the bio-mechanics of the movement what are the primary differences? There is a thing called the stretch shortening cycle. What occurs is there is an active lengthening or stretch of the opposing muscle group that is immediately followed by concentric or shortening of the muscle to create more force. In a squat this Stretch Shortening cycle is occurring when you un-rack the bar and descend into the lift. All of the muscles are firing in order to hold the bar up and not collapse to the floor. As you descend there is an eccentric (negative) lift taking place where muscles are actively lengthening to hold the weight up as you descend. This energy is stored and released when you start to rise into the lift. In the Deadlift you start from a dead stop from the floor. Hence the name deadlift. They do not call it a dead squat. When your body starts a movement with no muscle tension their needs to be a high rate of force development in order to begin the movement upward because there is not eccentric load into a descent like the squat. This type of contraction is an important component in sport and should be trained. However, if you do not unweight the weight to the floor for each rep the Stretch Shortening Cycle kicks in for the deadlift as well and then will act more like a squat. How can you make a squat have a high rate of high speed muscle contraction like a deadlift and eliminate the stretch shortening cycle? Execute a box squat. This is why powerlifters like box squats. If you want to increase force production, lifts from a dead stop are great additions to bump your strength. You do your normal squat, but at the low end of the lift you sit on a box or bench so that you are unweighted and then proceed to rise from the seated position. This requires a huge amount of muscle contraction to execute the lift. (Note: be really careful of lower back integrity in a box squat and you will need a lighter weight than your normal squats). If you get creative you can incorporate this idea into a large number of other lifts.

The answer to these questions and understanding the science behind the answers is typically where the wheels come off in training today. If you are looking for the best use of your training time you better start asking why you are performing a particular exercise. Ask a trainer and you will be surprised at the answers or lack of answers. In many cases it is similar to when you were a child and your mom or dad did not have an answer so they said “because”. Intensity of a workout is oftentimes the smoke and mirrors and the “because “of poor training. Many trainers make a workout so hard that you will crawl out of the session and the perceived value will be greater so you will not ask why.

Developing higher levels of human performance is a dynamic process. There are so many variables that affect the progress of an individual that if a coach cannot answer the why, progress will slow dramatically.

Truth in Fitness,

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

 

Are you Fit enough to get really fit?

At Sirens and Titans Fitness (www.sirensandtitansfitness.com) I always tell our clients that I have to get them fit enough to get really fit.  The majority of people’s fitness stops at this level because they just exercise and never develop a training strategy.  They finally start to see improvement and ease up oftentimes giving up all the hard work.  If you can get over the hump and move to the next level then maintenance of this level is actually easier than getting to the level.  This is because there is now a base of fitness and as long as you at minimum maintain the base you can slow the regression.  Also the workouts become more enjoyable and actually take less time because you are able to elevate the intensity.  You become one of those people who are envied by many because you can work out so little and with proper nutrition maintain a fit and healthy physique. 

I was recently working with two women who are fit enough to get really fit and their training is reflecting this fact. As a strength and conditioning coach it was enjoyable to train them because we can create workouts and long term strategies that allow them to make great strides in improving their fitness.   In addition they can execute an hour workout that would bury the average person and then head off to the rest of their day feeling great about what they just accomplished.  So how do I measure this level of fit enough to be fit fitness?

In all honesty fitness takes some work and a measured amount of suffering.   Those of you who are training at a level that never gives you some higher level of stress on the body will walk into the no man’s land of fitness year after year.  The main culprit is the marketing of fitness today and a number of myths that harder is better and sweating more is the path to great fitness.  Most individuals want a magic coach that will tell them that they do not have to work hard in order to accomplish their goal.  This person can magically transform their client’s body into the body they want without any real work.  It is a bunch of nonsense.  What a great coach can do is regulate the progression of the training to ease some of the pain and lower the risk for big injuries and also nagging overuse injury in order to elevate to a base level of fitness to build from. 

The evolution that I have seen with our athletes and our non-athletes is that first we must obtain a general level of fitness.  That means that the body has the ability to stabilize and mobilize.  This takes a minimum level of strength, balance, flexibility, power, and cardiovascular fitness in order to perform certain minimal exercises and reduce the risk of injury.    We define minimum as the ability to control the body with body weight only.    We utilize a dynamic warm up (Peak Performance Online has a great explanation of a dynamic warm up, http://www.pponline.co.uk/encyc/warming-up-the-dynamic-alternative-to-static-stretching-1051 ) S&T Fitness dynamic warm up would be considered by some as a workout within a work out to prepare the body for more intense forms of movements.  After we have established that body control is sound then we start to focus on the ability to produce more intensity and volume in the movements.  Intensity can be defined as movements that are more complex or at higher speeds or under greater loads.  These speeds require a minimum level of strength and power production as well as the ability to stabilize the body so that the athlete is not injured.   We want the ability to stabilize effectively.  Bracing the core, adequate balance, strength, and power. 

There are very few movements of the body that do not employ the core in stabilizing the body.  However, the type of complex multi-joint exercises we utilize are regularly taxing the core and forcing a client’s body to stabilize effectively or the exercise is too advanced.   Imagine a 100 meter sprint on your bicycle and you have to sprint without your hands on the handle bars.  You would be hard pressed to beat your opponent without gripping the bars.  Once you grab the bars you have a kinetic chain that starts from your hands and travels all the way to your feet and back.   If your wrist was injured the kinetic chain would be compromised and your performance would be affected.   This is a good example of core strength.  It does not just come from your torso.  It is the coordination of multiple muscles that all tie to the center of mass in a movement.  The contact points are sometimes different and in some cases we see examples of body control by elite athletes in midair that are absolutely incredible and leave us jaw dropped with the body control displayed.

Volume is the amount of a particular exercise that is performed.   It can be measured in repetitions, time, foot pounds of power, wattage, miles, feet etc.  I like to define it as total time in the zone.   The zone to me is the training goal of a particular exercise and how much time you spend producing an effort in that particular goal.  For example you are doing short intervals on a bicycle of 1 min at a power output of 350 watts.  The volume would be the total time spent at 350 watts.  If you did 10 of these intervals then the time in the zone or total volume would be 10 min at wattage of 350.   So volume must be measured and tied to the intensity in order to have any relevance in your training.  It is for this reason that recording workouts is so important. 

I have talked about the no man’s/woman’s land of training where many spend hours and hours of training time.  This is a training level that is too hard for recovery and not hard enough for an overload.   Without recording volume and intensity most fall into this type of training.  Most group workout have little measurement of performance, or are always super intense across the board, not allow for overloads in any particular movement. 

When we train a professional athlete they typically have an adequate general level of fitness that is very high.  However, even the best athletes of the world have dimensions of their fitness that need to be addressed to lower the risk of injury in the future. 

 

FIT ENOUGH!

 

Once you have obtained this general level of fitness the workouts change and the focus begins to narrow.   Both intensity and volume can now be increased and major changes in fitness can be obtained.  We incorporate exercise that will focus on energy systems necessary for a particular sport.  We begin to stair step up to higher and higher levels of fitness.  Periodization and long term strategy become very important as well as individual workout tactics to produce greater and greater overloads as the client becomes fitter.  Just going harder does not always result in greater levels of fitness.  Sometimes complimentary exercises must be the focus to aid in the performance of the core movement patterns. 

All of these are wrapped into a dynamic training package that allows a client to become really fit and not just what I call average man fit.   When you get to this level of fitness you will know it.  People will call you a fitness nut and you will start looking at yourself as an athlete, not just someone who works out.  You will then be training and not just exercising. 

 

Truth in Fitness

 

Jacques DeVore, CSCS

Functional Fitness, Mobility, Stability, Strength, Power, Power Endurance…

My definition of functional fitness for an athlete is really no different than the definition for the layman.  The difference lies in the fact that the layman’s sport is everyday physical challenges that present themselves and the athlete’s ability to function is tied to an athletic challenge. 

For an athlete the idea of being functionally sound is of great importance.  At Sirens and Titans Fitness www.sirensandtitansfitness.com we spend a lot of time and effort into making sure that our athletes and clients are functionally sound before we begin higher levels of volume and intensity in training.  Unfortunately a Thoracic Spine mobility exercise does not make for an exciting Instagram moment.

Functional capabilities in any client are demonstrated in the ability to move the body through space with a strong base of overall body control.  This control comes from overall body mobility, stability, flexibility, strength, coordination, and endurance.  This control of the body allows this movement to take place with a minimal amount of stress to the body.  In other words, if an athlete cannot adequately perform certain multi joint combination movements then we have to determine where the gaps are in their fitness and take the proper steps to improve those weaknesses.  Gray Cook and Lee Burton developed the Functional Movement Screen (FMS) as a tool to gather objective data on an individual’s ability to perform movement patterns and identify areas of weakness and prevent injury.  This is a good tool, however we believe it has to be coupled with a good eye for movement patterns and identifying gaps that could lead to future injury. 

At Sirens and Titans Fitness we utilize a number of tools in assessing fitness to help identify potential problems.  Our dynamic warm up will often times expose issues in a client’s movement. Looking for muscle imbalances in different movements can tell us much.    The functional movement screen (FMS) also helps us establish a starting point for developing the overall strategy of training an athlete or non athlete.  The data generated from this screen coupled with additional fitness evaluation gives us a good window into the fitness of an individual prior to the start of training.  This is VERY important information.  Any individual starting a fitness training program should spend time gathering this data. 

The screening we do helps to reduce injuries, identify muscle imbalances, provides benchmarks for evaluating training, and areas where a particular sport may be leading to chronic injuries or movement impairments. 

In the last entry I spoke about periodization and how you need to develop a long term strategy to insure success.   The start of all of our periodization is functional movement and fitness capabilities.   Depending on the individual’s ability to perform functionally will determine the amount of time in the periodization devoted to correcting imbalances that are discovered in these screens.  Even if an athlete is determined to be functionally sound all of our training is driven by a foundation of human movement and the ability of the individual to perform movement at higher and higher levels of output for the given sport. 

 

Truth in Fitness

Jacques DeVore, CSCS