Weightlifting is a physical manifestation of what I call the "Eternal Revolution." When I speak of revolution I don't necessarily mean a revolution like we think of when we consider Hollywood. I'm thinking of something that is much more grand, like the American Revolution and those who pushed it along.
In the beginning of the American Revolution I think that most scholars would agree that the majority of the inhabitants of the colonies would've rather just put up with the harassment of the British Government and stayed British. But there were those few who saw the truth. There were those few who saw the potential for freedom. There were those who could see the iceberg and tell you exactly how big it was. It is in their spirit that I speak of "Revolution."
The founding fathers had the ability to turn mole hills into mountains. They knew the long term consequences of the tyranny that Britain was imposing upon them and their countrymen. Even if the majority of the people couldn't see it they knew that they had to act, and so it is in our sport.
There are so many things that can go wrong at any given moment in any given lift. Let's say that while you are extending through on your pull that your shoulders end up behind the bar a fraction of a second too early. What happens? Well you probably end up with an attractive bruise on your pelvic bone, your bar path will look like you're trying to make smoke signals, and if I'm around you;ll probably get a look that says more than words.
So what if it happens ONCE or even TWICE? Well it matters because in the words of Kirksman Teo, "If you're not learning perfection you're learning imperfection." This is not something that is acceptable, and why would you want to waste your time getting worse?
Was it necessary to throw the tea into Boston Harbor? Maybe not but they got their point across and no one has forgotten it. Which is the way that we need to approach the way that we are lifting, training, and living. We are all going to make mistakes. That mistake may only result in a missed lift that literally no one sees because you are lifting alone. On the other hand it may result in a blown back and knees. So we must be hyperactive in our progress. That doesn't mean that we need to be throwing up a PR every other day but it does mean that we need to be perfecting everything that we can perfect. Your snatch may not be perfect now or ever but that doesn't mean that your starting position can't be perfect every time that you address the bar. Your clean might not be perfect but that doesn't mean your front rack can't be. For that matter your life might not be perfect or anything every remotely close to it but that doesn't mean that your commitment to excellence shouldn't be.
The fact is there will always be deficiencies in everything that we do and this is something that we should all be celebrating because we can break everything we do inside and outside of the gym into infinitely small pieces to be perfected one at a time. That's what keeps me under the bar, no matter now imperfect I am or my day was, I can be perfect at something.
Thursday, August 27, 2015
Thursday, August 20, 2015
The Nervous System and Weightlifting Part III: Supplementation.
The use of supplements for this discussion in it's simplest form is essentially stress management. When we go do basically anything we create a stressful environment for something in our bodies. This ranges from picking your singlet wedgie to a max clean and jerk followed by 5x5 pause front squats. Of course that means that there are varying degrees of stress and thus recovery that are necessary for the given situation. The kicker is that there is always a way to be able to get more out of what you are doing. Which I believe is the mindset for most people that are competitive in anyway. I mean if we didn't think that we could get better at what we are doing then why are we training? This goes for anything whether you plan to compete or not. Say you're just that weird old guy that shows up at handball courts and plays the high school kids occasionally even winning. You know that handball isn't going to turn your dead end job around, but the exercise and camaraderie will definitely enrich your life an help you make it to the weekend. Which is why the supplementation industry is making a killing every single day, they know you want the most out of what you spend your time on that makes you tick. In other words they want to hijack your passion because it's an easy route into your bank account.
I personally have tried just about everything that there is to try at one point or another. While I was bodybuilding I think that I bought every single product that MuscleTech makes, not to mention BSN, Muscle Pharm, Labrada, and Muscle Milk. So I decided to take a step back and reassess my supplementation strategy which had become, lets throw literally everything but the kitchen sink in there and somehow it's got to work. I guess from a certain point of view it did work. I won my weight class in the only bodybuilding competition that I ever did so that goal was accomplished. Turns out though that is about the only goal many of those companies have in mind while they are producing their products. Some of which are obviously of dubious origins, but sought to satisfy the narcism of the masses.
This is a problem when your primary goal is performance instead of physique, and recovery trumps bathroom selfies. This again took me to the nervous system for answers. Don't get me wrong a quick digesting quality protein and some solid carbs do wonders for preventing muscle soreness. I personally use SFH Pure and love it. But there is so much more to the story of moving effectively than just the condition of your muscles and tendons. If your nervous system you are essentially a wonderfully carved marionette with nothing but spider webs holding your arms and legs up, and as soon as there is any quick or complex movement the strands will give out and your ability to perform goes down the crapper. I guess you could say from the above analogy that I felt so limited by my recovery that I had become a puppet to it.
So how did I or how can any of us cut the strings and find independence in recovery instead of restriction? I'm personally not a huge fan of western pharmaceuticals so I didn't want a magic pill that would help me lift like an animal but kill me before I hit 30. I also don't like to miss training days, ever. So what is a bearded man to do?
How about ask a herbalist? I know weird right? Herbalists in the USA at least seem to be looked down upon by everyone except equine trainers. My first exposure to the idea of herbal based supplementation was while I was having a conversation with a doctor of Naturopath who mentioned that they were using the same methods he uses to diagnose people to booth race horse performance. So I figured hey if it works for horses people don't have that different of biochemistry so it could work for me too right? That was a gross simplification of the basically 2 years between that conversation with the doc and sitting down with the herbalist to put together a tincture.
I found as I talk to people in the herbal world that they are very willing to share their knowledge with just about everyone that will listen. But because of the lack of available information to people who care, and lack of flashy commercials few people seem to take them seriously. Oh yeah excluding, Russians, Chinese, and mommy bloggers. Excluding the mommy bloggers the Russian and Chinese combo seem to make up a large number of podium spots not that I'm inferring anything.....
Nitty gritty time. These herbs that are used for increasing performance are called adaptogens. Adaptogens are herbs that when used help to bring the body back into balance, or you guessed it, adapt. Adaptogens were formally discovered by Israel I. Breckhman a Russian research pharmacologist and physiologist. Although his discoveries had been made earlier the bulk of the research wasn't made available outside of the Soviet Union until much later. In reality though most of the research that he did was just formalizing traditional uses of many different herbs that had been used for thousands of years and "stacking" them if you will to boost performance.
What is unique about adaptogens is that instead of "giving" your body everything to skip steps and boost performance like say steroids, they simply facilitate by creating a favorable environment. Which means instead of contorting your biochemistry to fit into a mold imposed by stress like basically every banned substance adaptogens adapt the environment of your biochemistry to break the mold and thrive independently of stress. (Most info found here)
So the question is if these compounds are so effective then why aren't they used more? First of all they are used very extensively in basically everywhere that is on the same side of the world as Asia. Reason 1 we live in a consumer world. If there is something good or useful most people assume it will be available in flashing packaging on a store shelf. Reason 2 is related to reason 1 people are sheep. They follow crowds and quite simply because of the pharmaceutical infrastructure it is easier to produce the types of supplements that are currently flying off of shelves and few people want to disrupt that. Granted there are a couple companies that are selling basically Breckhman's formula but they are either super expensive, or very hard to get because they must be ordered from crazy places, or they are un willing to share the level of dilution of their products. Let's say that you did just buy exactly what Breckhman used in his formula and used it. I have no doubt that you would see impressive gains but also great improvement in cognition. But this is where a herbalist comes in very handy because everyone is different. Everyone has different needs because of their respective deficiencies., which is actually very exciting. That means the collective wisdom of thousands of years of traditional eastern medicine, compounded with Breckhman's performance based research from 60 years ago, are culminating now in individual personalized formulas available to anyone with access to an herbalist.
So now for my personal experience. The first single herb that I used that is an adaptogen is Eleuthero Root which is sometimes referred to as the the king of adaptogens. This herb while it has some anabolic properties works wonders on the nervous system. I found that most of the time in my training when it was less than what I thought it should be it was because by head couldn't keep up with my body. In other words my focus under extreme pressure was less than laser like. Eleuthero root helped to mitigate this immensely. What ended up happening was that instead of my mind crapping out and my resolve withering under punishing loads,was that I was able to push my body to places it had not been before. I guess that was one thing in between that two years that was pretty noteworthy. That was when I actually approached my brother about putting together a formula which was more far reaching as to it's effects. It's definitely paid off in performance, recovery, and body composition. In other words number have went up and quality of life has improved as well.
Since access to those who are knowledgeable and skilled in adaptogens is very limited we want to make this available to more people because of the experience I've had. Contact me if you would like the opportunity to give it a shot.
I personally have tried just about everything that there is to try at one point or another. While I was bodybuilding I think that I bought every single product that MuscleTech makes, not to mention BSN, Muscle Pharm, Labrada, and Muscle Milk. So I decided to take a step back and reassess my supplementation strategy which had become, lets throw literally everything but the kitchen sink in there and somehow it's got to work. I guess from a certain point of view it did work. I won my weight class in the only bodybuilding competition that I ever did so that goal was accomplished. Turns out though that is about the only goal many of those companies have in mind while they are producing their products. Some of which are obviously of dubious origins, but sought to satisfy the narcism of the masses.
This is a problem when your primary goal is performance instead of physique, and recovery trumps bathroom selfies. This again took me to the nervous system for answers. Don't get me wrong a quick digesting quality protein and some solid carbs do wonders for preventing muscle soreness. I personally use SFH Pure and love it. But there is so much more to the story of moving effectively than just the condition of your muscles and tendons. If your nervous system you are essentially a wonderfully carved marionette with nothing but spider webs holding your arms and legs up, and as soon as there is any quick or complex movement the strands will give out and your ability to perform goes down the crapper. I guess you could say from the above analogy that I felt so limited by my recovery that I had become a puppet to it.
So how did I or how can any of us cut the strings and find independence in recovery instead of restriction? I'm personally not a huge fan of western pharmaceuticals so I didn't want a magic pill that would help me lift like an animal but kill me before I hit 30. I also don't like to miss training days, ever. So what is a bearded man to do?
How about ask a herbalist? I know weird right? Herbalists in the USA at least seem to be looked down upon by everyone except equine trainers. My first exposure to the idea of herbal based supplementation was while I was having a conversation with a doctor of Naturopath who mentioned that they were using the same methods he uses to diagnose people to booth race horse performance. So I figured hey if it works for horses people don't have that different of biochemistry so it could work for me too right? That was a gross simplification of the basically 2 years between that conversation with the doc and sitting down with the herbalist to put together a tincture.
I found as I talk to people in the herbal world that they are very willing to share their knowledge with just about everyone that will listen. But because of the lack of available information to people who care, and lack of flashy commercials few people seem to take them seriously. Oh yeah excluding, Russians, Chinese, and mommy bloggers. Excluding the mommy bloggers the Russian and Chinese combo seem to make up a large number of podium spots not that I'm inferring anything.....
Nitty gritty time. These herbs that are used for increasing performance are called adaptogens. Adaptogens are herbs that when used help to bring the body back into balance, or you guessed it, adapt. Adaptogens were formally discovered by Israel I. Breckhman a Russian research pharmacologist and physiologist. Although his discoveries had been made earlier the bulk of the research wasn't made available outside of the Soviet Union until much later. In reality though most of the research that he did was just formalizing traditional uses of many different herbs that had been used for thousands of years and "stacking" them if you will to boost performance.
What is unique about adaptogens is that instead of "giving" your body everything to skip steps and boost performance like say steroids, they simply facilitate by creating a favorable environment. Which means instead of contorting your biochemistry to fit into a mold imposed by stress like basically every banned substance adaptogens adapt the environment of your biochemistry to break the mold and thrive independently of stress. (Most info found here)
So the question is if these compounds are so effective then why aren't they used more? First of all they are used very extensively in basically everywhere that is on the same side of the world as Asia. Reason 1 we live in a consumer world. If there is something good or useful most people assume it will be available in flashing packaging on a store shelf. Reason 2 is related to reason 1 people are sheep. They follow crowds and quite simply because of the pharmaceutical infrastructure it is easier to produce the types of supplements that are currently flying off of shelves and few people want to disrupt that. Granted there are a couple companies that are selling basically Breckhman's formula but they are either super expensive, or very hard to get because they must be ordered from crazy places, or they are un willing to share the level of dilution of their products. Let's say that you did just buy exactly what Breckhman used in his formula and used it. I have no doubt that you would see impressive gains but also great improvement in cognition. But this is where a herbalist comes in very handy because everyone is different. Everyone has different needs because of their respective deficiencies., which is actually very exciting. That means the collective wisdom of thousands of years of traditional eastern medicine, compounded with Breckhman's performance based research from 60 years ago, are culminating now in individual personalized formulas available to anyone with access to an herbalist.
So now for my personal experience. The first single herb that I used that is an adaptogen is Eleuthero Root which is sometimes referred to as the the king of adaptogens. This herb while it has some anabolic properties works wonders on the nervous system. I found that most of the time in my training when it was less than what I thought it should be it was because by head couldn't keep up with my body. In other words my focus under extreme pressure was less than laser like. Eleuthero root helped to mitigate this immensely. What ended up happening was that instead of my mind crapping out and my resolve withering under punishing loads,was that I was able to push my body to places it had not been before. I guess that was one thing in between that two years that was pretty noteworthy. That was when I actually approached my brother about putting together a formula which was more far reaching as to it's effects. It's definitely paid off in performance, recovery, and body composition. In other words number have went up and quality of life has improved as well.
Since access to those who are knowledgeable and skilled in adaptogens is very limited we want to make this available to more people because of the experience I've had. Contact me if you would like the opportunity to give it a shot.
Saturday, August 15, 2015
Competition Prep 6 week cycle.
Reps for accessory movements per set are as follows. Unless otherwise written or specified. (Full complex counts as one rep)
Week 1=4
Week 2=2
Week 3=3
Week 4=2
Week 5=1
With the above rep scheme laid out you will be working up to AHAP (AS HEAVY AS PERFECT). That means perfect if there is an elbow bend that shouldn't be there, or a stumble, or an illegal press, or poor posture/positioning you will not go up in weight. If you do so help me you will literally vomit your soul out from copious burpees. Yes you will clean up your own soul vomit...
Monday
20 min 5x1 snatch (3rd attempt should be your opener for those going to University Nationals)
10 min Muscle snatch
15 min Snatch deadlift+panda pull w/3 second pause at knee.
15 min BTN snatch push press w/2 second hold at top
80 v-ups
Tuesday
20 min 5x1 clean and jerk (3rd attempt should be your opener for those going to University Nationals)
15 min Clean pull from floor first 7.5 min control weight on the way down. Second 7.5 min weight may be dropped to the floor
15 min 3 Front squat+jerk
10 min split position squat
100 sit ups
Wednesday
15 min front squat
15 min back squat
15 min jerk (since you will be gradually increasing weight start with push jerks then go to split when the weight necessitates.)
10min
A Pendlay row
B Upright row
C 8 wide grip pull ups
10 min snatch @ 60% of max
If you are headed to nationals this day will be be slightly different. I will talk to you individually about what you'll be doing.
Friday
15 min BTN push press
15 min 3 dips+Power jerk w/3 sec pause in dip
10 min 6's seated good morning
10 min Clean and jerk @ 60% of max
50 Stick sit-ups
Saturday
3x1 snatch up to max
3x1 clean and jerk up to max
3x3 3 sec pause front squat
The week before U Nats' (week 6) will be a deload week.
That will be posted the Saturday before the week starts.
Those of you going to State will have a few differences in what you are doing which I will go over with you.
Thursday, August 13, 2015
Weightlifting and the Nervous System part 2: Nutrition
In my last post I laid out a short argument for the reasons that we need to focus on the nervous system. That is if we are going to reach peak performance in weightlifting or for that matter anything that requires any sort of coordination at all. Because let's face it you may have 20 inch biceps but if you can't move any faster or more effectively than my grandmother than you are probably about as useful as that 200 pound curl you've been dreaming about....ie useless and your legs are probably tiny.
So I promised that I would lay out some basics on nutrition when it comes to making sure that your nervous system is up to par. While I am by no means a neuroscientist I have had my own experiences with the nervous system that have proved to be very influential in the way that I approach my nutrition and training.
If you were to google things along the lines of nutrition and the nervous system, dietary needs for neurotransmitters, etc you will get a huge slew of information. As always google will return a substantial amount of information that is eerily redundant. It's like someone read a study then wrote an article and everyone else who was interest in the same subject copy and pasted the original article onto their blog or social column and said, "That is good enough! I will now move on to more things that I don't understand or really care about because I need more content for my site so I can start making money off of ads."
Now that I have that out of my system let's examine what most of those articles will say. "Consume tyrosine it will help you be more alert because it is a component of dopamine." There I just saved you 2 and a half hours of reading the same thing over and over again. But what does it mean? There actually seems to be a lot of validity to this statement but I want to dumb it down quite a bit here. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter or in other words it is a signal molecule. People often think of the nervous system of a series of long wires all of which are directly wired into the spinal cord which then acts like a conduit to the brain. While that isn't necessarily the worst way to think of the nervous system it leaves out on very important attribute of the nervous system, there are gaps all over in those wires that connect our body parts to our brain. It doesn't stop there either, there are gaps all over throughout our brains. Unless we can bridge those gaps nothing, literally nothing can happen. There is no real cognition, breathing, movement, nothing. That is except that last time you lay an egg when you die, but that turd comes about because of your brain stopping the transmission of "holding it in." So I guess there's always that to comfort yourself.
The way that we bridge those gaps is through neurotransmitters. They are literally little messengers that in essence carry "messages" to tell your body to do whatever is needed. Here is a VERY rudimentary example, say I am all set about to pull clean from the floor.
Lets cover the transmitters first as they seem to be the more common offenders. Which isn't surprising because they are always being created and destroyed. This is also the portion of the nervous system that I have had my own troubles with in the past. One of the times that I have been the sickest in my life was when for whatever reason I was unable to produce enough serotonin. What the doctor said was that because of me being sick I couldn't absorb hardly any nutrients I was taking in and therefore my body wasn't able to synthesis basically any serotonin. Serotonin is the happy transmitter. So basically I was chemically unable to experience happiness for 3 months or so. Luckily for me deficient neurotransmitters is much easier to fix than say MS (a degenerative disease of the conductive sheath that transmits signals along nerves.) What happened in my case was that I was given some supplements to get me going while I put my diet in order and now I'm tip top. From experience I can say that it is much easier to maintain nervous system health (mental health for that matter as well) than it is to regain it. So to the reason you slogged through the rest of this post, what should you eat to make sure you have the proper balance/sufficient neurotransmitters?
This is where it gets all anticlimactic most neurotransmitters are synthesized from or at least have their base in amino acids. Where then do amino acids come from? PROTEIN! This may be why there seems to be a disproportionately large number of insane and emotionally unstable vegans.... just saying.
Ok I'm kidding sort of, because for you to have a balance of all the difference neurotransmitters then you have to have the building blocks to create them. For example tyrosine is a component of dopamine, or tryptophan a precursor to serotonin, or choline the base of acetylcholine, all of which play their part in the nervous system from balanced brain chemistry to effective muscle contraction. So here is a list of foods (besides just saying protein) broken down by transmitter and as I mentioned I am no neurologist I am just going to list them for the three above mentioned neurotransmitters since they seem to be the most pertinent to weight lifting and most likely to get out of whack.
Serotonin:
Most wild game (especially arctic)
Spirulina
Spinach
Egg whites
Sesame seeds
Crustaceans
Halibut
Quail
Turkey
Tuna
Pumpkin and squash seeds
Dates
Mozzarella Cheese
Oats
Green leafy vegetables
Dopamine
Parmesan Cheese
Lean Beef
Lean Lamb
Pork Chops
Salmon
Turkey
Seaweed
Game meat
Egg whites
Green leafy vegetables
Acetylcholine
Egg yolk
Beef
Caviar
Veal
Chicken liver
Duck
Goose
Quail
Pork liver sausage
Salmon
Whey (that's convenient)
Milk
For the nerves themselves there is a whole host of things that can go wrong but many of them seem to stem from the myelin sheath or in other words the part of the nerve that makes it so the message actually gets from say the brain to the end of the nerve where your neurotransmitters can actually do their job. Understandably then it's important to protect it.
Myelin sheath foods
Liver
Vitamin C foods (you know them)
Oily fish
Walnuts
Olive oil
Basically anything that has anti-inflammatory properties.
Obviously if there is stuff to put in our faces that makes the nervous system function better then there most definitely will be some that harm the nervous system but I'm going to make it easy for you.
CRAP
Sugar
Caffeine
Anything inflammatory (if it is processed then don't eat it).
So let me sum it up for you and I will give you the same advice that I give almost everyone that asks me what they should eat........drum roll......
If it doesn't have a label then you are probably ok. (does not apply to things cooked up by lunatics wearing yellow hazmat suits)
If there is more than one ingredient you can't pronounce put it down.
Next post is the supplementation side of things for the nervous system, because sometimes good just isn't good enough.
Nutrition data from here and here and here
So I promised that I would lay out some basics on nutrition when it comes to making sure that your nervous system is up to par. While I am by no means a neuroscientist I have had my own experiences with the nervous system that have proved to be very influential in the way that I approach my nutrition and training.
If you were to google things along the lines of nutrition and the nervous system, dietary needs for neurotransmitters, etc you will get a huge slew of information. As always google will return a substantial amount of information that is eerily redundant. It's like someone read a study then wrote an article and everyone else who was interest in the same subject copy and pasted the original article onto their blog or social column and said, "That is good enough! I will now move on to more things that I don't understand or really care about because I need more content for my site so I can start making money off of ads."
Now that I have that out of my system let's examine what most of those articles will say. "Consume tyrosine it will help you be more alert because it is a component of dopamine." There I just saved you 2 and a half hours of reading the same thing over and over again. But what does it mean? There actually seems to be a lot of validity to this statement but I want to dumb it down quite a bit here. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter or in other words it is a signal molecule. People often think of the nervous system of a series of long wires all of which are directly wired into the spinal cord which then acts like a conduit to the brain. While that isn't necessarily the worst way to think of the nervous system it leaves out on very important attribute of the nervous system, there are gaps all over in those wires that connect our body parts to our brain. It doesn't stop there either, there are gaps all over throughout our brains. Unless we can bridge those gaps nothing, literally nothing can happen. There is no real cognition, breathing, movement, nothing. That is except that last time you lay an egg when you die, but that turd comes about because of your brain stopping the transmission of "holding it in." So I guess there's always that to comfort yourself.
The way that we bridge those gaps is through neurotransmitters. They are literally little messengers that in essence carry "messages" to tell your body to do whatever is needed. Here is a VERY rudimentary example, say I am all set about to pull clean from the floor.
As I apply pressure through my legs can contract muscles to extend my hips and knees acetylcholine is released at every single junction that nerves meet those muscles which cross the posterior side of the hip joint, and the anterior side of my knees. Not only does that happen everywhere a muscle has to contract in my body but it has to happen in perfect synchronicity. Without that synchronicity there is no coordination and therefore no functional strength let alone power. Now there is also the other side of the same coin in which the muscles have to relax but that is worth a discussion all on it's own and not super important right now.
So how can we properly fuel ourselves to optimize the performance of this complex symphony of electricity that is orchestrating literally every single move we make, breath we take, and nights you make it through the night without wetting the bed and pissing off your significant other? From my experience there are two major fronts that need to be addressed the neurotransmitters, and the nerves themselves. If you were to only focus on one that would be akin the putting a modern roller coaster train on an old wooden roller coaster from Chernobyl or vice versa.Lets cover the transmitters first as they seem to be the more common offenders. Which isn't surprising because they are always being created and destroyed. This is also the portion of the nervous system that I have had my own troubles with in the past. One of the times that I have been the sickest in my life was when for whatever reason I was unable to produce enough serotonin. What the doctor said was that because of me being sick I couldn't absorb hardly any nutrients I was taking in and therefore my body wasn't able to synthesis basically any serotonin. Serotonin is the happy transmitter. So basically I was chemically unable to experience happiness for 3 months or so. Luckily for me deficient neurotransmitters is much easier to fix than say MS (a degenerative disease of the conductive sheath that transmits signals along nerves.) What happened in my case was that I was given some supplements to get me going while I put my diet in order and now I'm tip top. From experience I can say that it is much easier to maintain nervous system health (mental health for that matter as well) than it is to regain it. So to the reason you slogged through the rest of this post, what should you eat to make sure you have the proper balance/sufficient neurotransmitters?
This is where it gets all anticlimactic most neurotransmitters are synthesized from or at least have their base in amino acids. Where then do amino acids come from? PROTEIN! This may be why there seems to be a disproportionately large number of insane and emotionally unstable vegans.... just saying.
Serotonin:
Most wild game (especially arctic)
Spirulina
Spinach
Egg whites
Sesame seeds
Crustaceans
Halibut
Quail
Turkey
Tuna
Pumpkin and squash seeds
Dates
Mozzarella Cheese
Oats
Green leafy vegetables
Dopamine
Parmesan Cheese
Lean Beef
Lean Lamb
Pork Chops
Salmon
Turkey
Seaweed
Game meat
Egg whites
Green leafy vegetables
Acetylcholine
Egg yolk
Beef
Caviar
Veal
Chicken liver
Duck
Goose
Quail
Pork liver sausage
Salmon
Whey (that's convenient)
Milk
For the nerves themselves there is a whole host of things that can go wrong but many of them seem to stem from the myelin sheath or in other words the part of the nerve that makes it so the message actually gets from say the brain to the end of the nerve where your neurotransmitters can actually do their job. Understandably then it's important to protect it.
Myelin sheath foods
Liver
Vitamin C foods (you know them)
Oily fish
Walnuts
Olive oil
Basically anything that has anti-inflammatory properties.
Obviously if there is stuff to put in our faces that makes the nervous system function better then there most definitely will be some that harm the nervous system but I'm going to make it easy for you.
CRAP
Sugar
Caffeine
Anything inflammatory (if it is processed then don't eat it).
So let me sum it up for you and I will give you the same advice that I give almost everyone that asks me what they should eat........drum roll......
If it doesn't have a label then you are probably ok. (does not apply to things cooked up by lunatics wearing yellow hazmat suits)
If there is more than one ingredient you can't pronounce put it down.
Next post is the supplementation side of things for the nervous system, because sometimes good just isn't good enough.
Nutrition data from here and here and here
Friday, August 7, 2015
The Nervous System and Weightlifting. Part 1
Lately I have been really amazed at the way the human nervous system is able to adapt to incredible amounts of stress and in turn mold the body into a machine efficient enough to do truly mind blowing things. For example the world record for the women's 48kg snatch is 97kg! That's basically 105 pound woman (my size Barbie) snatching 215 pounds (high school lineman). Obviously this is not done by packing on slabs of muscle and flexing in the mirror pretending like your strong because you are "pumped" have your non sweat stained hat ripped, big head phones, tank top, and you just bought a new pre-workout. No this is done by years and years of carful training. With surgical precision goals and extreme mental fortitude. The truth is basically anyone can get big if they just stick to a basic bodybuilding routine and are willing to eat a pant load of half decent food.
I don't say this in a disparaging way about bodybuilding but the truth is you will never get the level of adaption necessary for high level power output performances in you are following the stuff that has been hashed and rehashed in every bodybuilding magazine since 85', it's flat out too passive.
Most of of you reading this will probably nod their heads in agreement with that statement not knowing that I am in fact talking to you, yes you. Stop looking around behind you I mean you. The problem with most of us americans is that we have been programmed to focus on aesthetics so much that we have begun to gauge fitness, and sports performance on what it looks like or what we look like while we are doing them.
Do you think that while Nurcan Taylan was setting that record she was worried about if her shoulders looked like Cameron Diaz or her butt was just the right amount of juicy? If you answered yes to either of those questions don't look in the mirror for 24 hours you'll be ashamed. This may sound like I'm going to harp on women now but in reality men are just as bad. They ask, "Will doing these oly lifts get rid of my gut? Because I don't think so, I have to do crunches every day.... and that's what I've been doing for a month!" Well obviously it's worked because you don't still have a gut....
Anyway sarcasm aside what I'm trying to say is that we need to stop looking at diet and exercise as a means to an end for satisfying our narcissism. I know some people lift for the fun of it and some just want to be healthy, that's fine. I'm talking about athletes, real athletes who want to be the best at what they do. Or at least make the most of what God gave them, even if the genes aren't ideal.
I believe the best way to do this is to drop forget everything that you think you know about what an athlete is, what they do, and what they eat. Because the western lens that we view those things through distort the truth. So I'm offering up a new lens, a fresh lens. Ok it's not new per-say but it is quite novel to some people.
I propose that we focus all of our training, eating, sleeping, and supplementing; on the nervous system. So what does that look like? When you're training what are your goals? Does everything you do have a specific purpose? If I asked you why you were doing a certain exercise directly after you finished up working a classic lift for that day could you tell me? Could your coach tell me? When you're eating what are you eating for? Are you simply fueling muscles and vital organs, or are you ensuring you have the all of the building blocks available for necessary neurotransmitters, or are you just counting your macros and patting yourself on the back. When you go to sleep have you set the alarm far enough into the future that you actually experience all sleep has to offer, REM cycle and all? Does your supplementation support all of these things by filling in the cracks like mortar between bricks as it should, or is it a foundation because you're too lazy to cook and you want to watch Netflix until it's "tomorrow?" The phrase eat to perform isn't too far off but it is vague. I like "Eat to Adapt" much better. That is what we want. We want to be transformed. We want to unlock potential. That potential is stored in the nervous system and the only way to unlock it is train, feed, properly recover, and supplement the nervous system. Let's be honest if you want to be great you're going to have to romance that greatness out of that nervous system, and I'll be honest she's stubborn.
I will be writing more extensively on ways to focus eating, training, recovering, and supplementing on the nervous system in a 5 part series of posts so stay tuned.
315 power jerk recovery. Making sure that the old neurons are firing on all cylinders.
Monday, August 3, 2015
Are you playing the long or the short game?
When people talk weightlifting it is inevitable that some bit of ego comes up. It is the nature of us to compare and try and best those who we consider our peers. I believe that as long as you maintain a bit of stoicism this is one of the greatest things in the world. You see without pressure there is no progress. Without someone or something nipping at your heals most of use fall victim to our own comforts and self "pats on the back." Without the fire that competition breeds within us there is no steam to drive the wheels there is only mediocrity. I doubt that anyone wants to be remembered for mediocrity.
The problem that arises is that we as weightlifters get consumed by it fairly easily. Because the feedback loop between our training and our performance is so fast we often fall victim to the, "I want it now because I deserve it now" mentality. A brief example to illustrate my point that I think every single one of us has been in. The program calls for say 85% you feel good and end up working at 92% for the whole set. Then the next exercise comes up on your program for the day and you aren't able to come within 15% of the prescribed numbers. But you were feeling so good, what happened? In my mind this is like reading the first chapter of a good book and then skipping to the last chapter and expecting to know the story. Granted that may work with something like Twilight or Pride and Prejudice. Not so much with real works of art like the Odyssey, or anything written by Emerson or Thoreau. The reason being is that the real flesh of what we do is not the beginning or the end but the work as a whole. Yes the big attempts and PR's are an end result but they are none existent without the intricate web of support that is gradually woven every single day you walk into the gym and decide to put your shoes on.
I suppose that weightlifting isn't skin deep but when all you do is chase training PR's that is what you make it. That is when you lose your vision and start playing the short game. This is akin to the genius that wins the lottery and is bankrupt the next year. I mean seriously how do you spend like 130 million in a year without being stoned for that whole year? So the question is do you seek the thrill of the moment or a lifetime?
I vote the thrill of a lifetime! When you are patient and trust the process your coach is putting you through, (assuming your coach is worth the air they are breathing and the money you're paying them) you are setting yourself up to have so much more than a skin deep experience with weightlifting. Your are setting yourself up to be one of he few with bones of iron and an indomitable spirit. Why? Because you are being "fleshed out" (pun intended) just like those great works of literary art that endure the test time. You earn your substance, and your confidence. You give everything and get much more in return. So next time you decide to try and throw up a new PR ask yourself, "Have I built a house to support this?." I pray that when you do ask the answer is a resounding YES for if it is there is nothing that can stop your success.
The problem that arises is that we as weightlifters get consumed by it fairly easily. Because the feedback loop between our training and our performance is so fast we often fall victim to the, "I want it now because I deserve it now" mentality. A brief example to illustrate my point that I think every single one of us has been in. The program calls for say 85% you feel good and end up working at 92% for the whole set. Then the next exercise comes up on your program for the day and you aren't able to come within 15% of the prescribed numbers. But you were feeling so good, what happened? In my mind this is like reading the first chapter of a good book and then skipping to the last chapter and expecting to know the story. Granted that may work with something like Twilight or Pride and Prejudice. Not so much with real works of art like the Odyssey, or anything written by Emerson or Thoreau. The reason being is that the real flesh of what we do is not the beginning or the end but the work as a whole. Yes the big attempts and PR's are an end result but they are none existent without the intricate web of support that is gradually woven every single day you walk into the gym and decide to put your shoes on.
I suppose that weightlifting isn't skin deep but when all you do is chase training PR's that is what you make it. That is when you lose your vision and start playing the short game. This is akin to the genius that wins the lottery and is bankrupt the next year. I mean seriously how do you spend like 130 million in a year without being stoned for that whole year? So the question is do you seek the thrill of the moment or a lifetime?
I vote the thrill of a lifetime! When you are patient and trust the process your coach is putting you through, (assuming your coach is worth the air they are breathing and the money you're paying them) you are setting yourself up to have so much more than a skin deep experience with weightlifting. Your are setting yourself up to be one of he few with bones of iron and an indomitable spirit. Why? Because you are being "fleshed out" (pun intended) just like those great works of literary art that endure the test time. You earn your substance, and your confidence. You give everything and get much more in return. So next time you decide to try and throw up a new PR ask yourself, "Have I built a house to support this?." I pray that when you do ask the answer is a resounding YES for if it is there is nothing that can stop your success.
Saturday, August 1, 2015
The weightlifting paradox.
I seem to get a lot of my inspiration from one liners. Ironically most of those one liners come from crappy movies. Case in point is the new Hercules movie with a line from the fortune teller dude. "The gods are generous on hints and cheap on specifics." I think that is a pretty profound insight to quite a few things in life. There are so many hints as to what we should do in life. Wether it is a small spark of divine inspiration, or when you just know what you need to do there are always hints but rarely specifics. Weightlifting is the opposite it's all specifics and no hints. Time for an example, on the snatch you have a nasty habit of slamming your hips into the bar so forcefully and in such a way that it leaves you with an attractive bruise the size of a grapefruit square on the center of your pubic bone. Your coach is watching you and notices that your shoulders are getting behind the bar far too quickly, turning your hips into a bullet train slamming into a wall instead of a smooth easy slingshot. What does your coach say? Here I'll fill in the blank, "Keep your shoulders over the bar_____(insert insult, or encouraging follow up depending on your coach____)."Weightlifting being the precision sport that it is doesn't allow for much more than succinct straight forward directions.
The problem is that we humanoids are feelers. We are used to having to use the hints to get to the specifics instead of the other way around. Therefore the way that we get around the roadblocks that so inevitably come in weightlifting is to teach/learn by feeling. For example I had a lifter who was having a hard time getting consistent hip contact on the snatch. Sometimes is was there and sometimes it was like there was supposed to be some sort of teleportation device that sent the bar from thigh level to over head. So I gave her the usual cues that I often give my lifters with this problem but to no avail. What we did instead was I stood a couple of feet in front of her with a band wrapped around an empty bar. She then got down into her snatch position and pulled. What happened was as the bar rose the band tightened as it approached her hips. This caused her to have to engage the lats and set the shoulders correctly. Thus causing her to sweep the bar into the hips out of necessity.
Guess what the next rep with weight on the bar....Boom, money... nearly perfect hip contact. Why? She felt the way that it was supposed to feel. If you're wondering, no her hip contact isn't always perfect. But now since she knows how it feels so she can have a bearing to work from when cues are given. Although helpful as an example this is from a coaching perspective and as it is most of the people who read this are not coaches. So lets approach a similar problem from the lifters point of view.
Let's say that I am working on my cleans and I've been lifting for about a year. I can move a decent amount of weight in my opinion and I'm just chomping at the bit to go heavier and heavier whenever my coach isn't looking, problem is my receiving position is terrible as weights get high. I catch the bar low on my shoulders, causing my back to round, and if I don't drop it my weight shifts 100% to my toes. One day coach sees me trying to PR when I'm supposed to be working at 80%...CRAP. After getting chewed out he says, "You aren't following all the way through with your pull. You don't stand all the way up so the bar doesn't reach it's maximum speed." He shows you the covertly taken video he took of the last rep and sure enough the hips are still partially closed, and you try to ignore the stifled laughter on the video." He tells you to drop back to 70% and fix it and goes back to helping a teammate.
How can fix what you didn't know you were doing in the first place? The answer is almost always to feel it out. Why are you at 70% now instead of 80%? So that you don't have to think about any of the other things that are going on. At 70% everything can basically be on auto pilot and you can focus on the feeling of perfect hip extension and the added power that you receive from it. You can feel how long it takes for you to stand up fully. You can feel the bar location and speed. Because you felt you can now know.
I believe it takes a special kind of person (or robot) to be able to just do exactly what they are told without a corresponding physical experience. Truth is I'm not one and none of the people that coach are because most of us just aren't wired that way. So next time you plateau or you have something that you just can't seem to dial in. Step back and FEEL it out.
The problem is that we humanoids are feelers. We are used to having to use the hints to get to the specifics instead of the other way around. Therefore the way that we get around the roadblocks that so inevitably come in weightlifting is to teach/learn by feeling. For example I had a lifter who was having a hard time getting consistent hip contact on the snatch. Sometimes is was there and sometimes it was like there was supposed to be some sort of teleportation device that sent the bar from thigh level to over head. So I gave her the usual cues that I often give my lifters with this problem but to no avail. What we did instead was I stood a couple of feet in front of her with a band wrapped around an empty bar. She then got down into her snatch position and pulled. What happened was as the bar rose the band tightened as it approached her hips. This caused her to have to engage the lats and set the shoulders correctly. Thus causing her to sweep the bar into the hips out of necessity.
Guess what the next rep with weight on the bar....Boom, money... nearly perfect hip contact. Why? She felt the way that it was supposed to feel. If you're wondering, no her hip contact isn't always perfect. But now since she knows how it feels so she can have a bearing to work from when cues are given. Although helpful as an example this is from a coaching perspective and as it is most of the people who read this are not coaches. So lets approach a similar problem from the lifters point of view.
Let's say that I am working on my cleans and I've been lifting for about a year. I can move a decent amount of weight in my opinion and I'm just chomping at the bit to go heavier and heavier whenever my coach isn't looking, problem is my receiving position is terrible as weights get high. I catch the bar low on my shoulders, causing my back to round, and if I don't drop it my weight shifts 100% to my toes. One day coach sees me trying to PR when I'm supposed to be working at 80%...CRAP. After getting chewed out he says, "You aren't following all the way through with your pull. You don't stand all the way up so the bar doesn't reach it's maximum speed." He shows you the covertly taken video he took of the last rep and sure enough the hips are still partially closed, and you try to ignore the stifled laughter on the video." He tells you to drop back to 70% and fix it and goes back to helping a teammate.
How can fix what you didn't know you were doing in the first place? The answer is almost always to feel it out. Why are you at 70% now instead of 80%? So that you don't have to think about any of the other things that are going on. At 70% everything can basically be on auto pilot and you can focus on the feeling of perfect hip extension and the added power that you receive from it. You can feel how long it takes for you to stand up fully. You can feel the bar location and speed. Because you felt you can now know.
I believe it takes a special kind of person (or robot) to be able to just do exactly what they are told without a corresponding physical experience. Truth is I'm not one and none of the people that coach are because most of us just aren't wired that way. So next time you plateau or you have something that you just can't seem to dial in. Step back and FEEL it out.
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