I’ll let you in on a little secret. No one knows how to program for functional fitness. Even coaches for top athletes will be the first to tell you they don’t have everything figured out. There are several reasons for this; however, the real reason is functional fitness has not been around long enough to have been well researched by the scientific community. This leaves us stealing bits and pieces from a variety of sources to help us program workouts, in order to achieve our fitness goals. Keep reading to learn a simple method that I use to program for my athletes.
Natural Muscular Limits of the Functional Fitness Athlete
Most people came to the gym because they want to become healthier, look better, and have more self confidence. Often times they first learn about functional fitness from Youtube, or watching fitness competitions on ESPN. These top level athletes have amazing physiques, rivaling natural bodybuilders. This leaves most athletes wondering how muscular they can become. Keep reading to find out where the sport is heading in terms of natural muscular limits, and the timeframe to achieve that type of development.
Predicting Maximal Strength of the Functional Athlete
The fitness industry has changed enormously over the last several years. Initially it started out as a training methodology, and now it has become a popular strength and conditioning sport. As any athlete knows, it requires huge amounts of work, conditioning, and strength, but just how strong is the top level athlete, and how strong can they become? Keep reading to find out where the practical strength limits are for both top level athletes and for the above average athlete in the gym.
Fitness Supplement Review: Blonyx HMB+Creatine
Normally I’m very skeptical of supplements. I’ve always felt that many companies are less than scrupulous, and many of their products leave much to be desired. It was with this in mind that I contacted Blonyx after my review of supplement research indicated that HMB and Creatine were the only supplements that have broad scientific validity. They were kind enough to send over a sample of their HMB+Creatine product for me to conduct a 30 day self experiment. Spoiler alert, it works, but not exactly how I thought it would.
Functional Fitness Strength Training with Bands and Chains
Anyone experienced in the iron game can tell you that after a certain point, doing the same old thing will stop yielding results. Most of the time, we then try to change a few details of our training plan, vainly hoping that will put us back on the gainz train. I’m here to say that isn’t enough.
If you’ve spent some time under the bar, and aren’t making progress, then you need a change. You need some variable resistance, in the form of bands and chains. Not only do they look badass, they can give you nearly twice the results in the same time period. Read on, to learn how to implement them into your training plan.
Absolute Strength: Stronger Than You Think
If you are reading this article you are stronger than you think. Most people do not have a realistic understanding of how strong they really are. This occurs because we can see videos of extraordinary athletes moving mountains of weight as easily as typing “strong dude” into a youtube search bar. This phenomena is known as the availability heuristic, which means that because of the many instances of seeing something, you assume that it is the norm. Nothing could be further from the truth, especially when it comes to strength training. This article will show you how strong you really are compared to novices and elite athletes, using actual data, not broscience.
Fitness Programing: Invictus Analysis
In the last several years functional fitness has changed from a fringe exercise cult with a puking clown as it’s mascot, to a world wide phenomena and competitive sport televised on ESPN. As it has become more popular, the cream of the fitness community has risen to the top, with a few gyms producing many successful athletes. Crossfit Invictus is one such gym, but what is the secret to their success? This article will break down their programming style, showing you the principles behind their programing and the reasons why they are so successful.
Supplement Review: HMB, Creatine
The first rule of supplements is, don’t take supplements. By definition, they only supplement an already sound diet, which sad to say, doesn’t describe most people. If you do have a good diet and exercise program, and have been consistent with it for more than a few months, then you might consider taking some supplements to enhance your performance. This article will be for those people, and will cover scientifically validated supplements that will enhance your performance as an athlete.
Bodybuilding for the Functional Fitness Athlete
Few things cause as much angst for functional fitness folks than the prospect of bodybuilding. Since it’s inception there has been a natural tension between these two different tribes of gym bro’s. On one hand, bodybuilders couldn’t care less how functional they are as long as someone’s mirin’ on their instagram. Where as functional athletes spend the majority of their time talking about metcons, paleo diets, and rolling their ass’s on pieces of foam. You might think that these two groups have very little in common, but you’d be wrong. This article will cover recent research on increasing muscular size, hypertrophy, and how this applies to us, because lets face it guys, secretly we want to be jacked and functional.
A Fat Loss Plan for Functional Fitness Athletes
The reason you aren’t losing weight isn’t because you can’t, it’s because you won’t. The science behind weight loss is straight forward and it is well known to anyone who knows how to operate google. You must create a caloric deficit to lose weight. So what’s stopping us? We are. We find it easier to keep doing what we are doing, vainly hoping for an easier way to lose weight, a magic pill, a new exercise routine, anything. We do this because we know that dieting is hard, and even harder to do consistently. This article will cover recent research on weight loss, it’s implications for functional fitness and strength athletes, and methods to increase adherence to a simple weight loss plan.
