Exercise: Stretching For Your Health

Stretching is something that most people know is important but often times have trouble understanding how it make it work to their benefit. They stretch either because they want to increase their overall flexibility, want to maximize athletic performance or get out of pain. I also would like you consider stretching for health, which is more about balancing the musculoskeletal system to allow for optimal flow of energy throughout the body. Here’s how it works: the health of your blood vessels, lymphatic tissue and nerves are greatly dependent on the tension or lack thereof in your muscles, tendons and fascia. These structures allow for a free and un-inhibited flow of life force, whether it’s blood, or nerve energy. Therefore when you stretch, consider that your results are not just dependent on your ability to tie yourself in knots. It is more about freeing up any stagnant energy areas in the body. There are many types of stretching that we’ll touch on at a later point but for now, let’s focus on muscle stretching, on ligaments, and fascial stretching. There are different types and techniques that you can use to get maximum benefit, add balance to your body and to achieve optimal health. The type of stretching that you do will vary depending on your individual needs and your specific constitution.

If It Hurts or Taste Bad You Are Doing It Wrong

Often times people don’t get started on their health and fitness journey because they believe it has to be torture. They either think that they have to starve themselves or beat themselves up with exercise. The truth is it is the exact opposite. Getting in your best shape ever will actually be more pleasurable then staying out of shape if you know how to do it right. Use the six foundational principles to get you into your best shape ever and enjoy the journey.

Sport Nutrition Tip:

Over training raises cortisol and cortisol creates chronic blood sugar imbalances. A fluctuation in blood sugar depletes your nutritional reserve, causing you to crave the wrong types of food such as sugar. You have two choices you can learn how to manage your training, lifestyle and diet or you can try to chase symptoms with supplements, medication and quick fixes. One choice will lead to long time success in your training and the other choice will lead to long term frustration.

Strength Coaches are still crunching the numbers

Crunches greatly hinder athletic performance and should be low on the priority list in a sports specific core-conditioning program. Most injuries occur in the frontal and transverse planes and with the spine behind the midline, therefore an effective core-conditioning program should be designed accordingly. Training the abdominal wall with the spine behind the midline is one of the key training variables that will reduce abdominal wall strains in athletes. ###

History Of The Kettlebell

“About the best exercise for strengthening the back and legs, and for teaching them to work together is [the kettlebell swing]. It takes considerable practice to master it; but it is worth all the trouble, because it is one of the fundamentals of super-strength.” Pavel Tsatsouline – An American Iron Game Pioneer On Kettlebell Swings and Super Strength

Kettlebell Workout Tip

When doing your strength exercises, a good general rule is to perform your most complex exercises first. For example Kettlebell swings before Kettlebell military press.

Breathing and Core Strength: Make the Connection

 

Core stabilization and respiration during high performance activity requires that the respiratory mechanism, inner unit and outer unit function properly and in sequence with each other. The activation of the outer unit is inversely related to the action of respiration and diaphragmatic excursion. Therefore the more the outer unit is contracted the less efficient breathing becomes. Therefore to insure efficient ventilation during high performance activity, there must be sufficient strength in the inner unit to allow for use of respiratory mechanics.

In plain English, what the above statement means is this; If your inner core is weak, the body will compensate by using the outer core to stabilize the spine. When this happens breathing is compromised, which causes a stress response in the body. Because breathing will always override stabilization, a tug-of-war between breathing and stabilizing occurs. This causes the body to waste energy and ultimately lose performance and in most cases get injured.

Therefore to maximize both breathing and performance, both systems need to be functional separately and also when working together. #breathingandcoreareone

 

How To Improve Your Appearance — INSTANTLY!

How To Improve Your Appearance — INSTANTLY!

By Terrence Thomas

 

How do you do that, you ask? The fastest way to improve the way you look, feel and perform is to improve your posture. It’s that simple. Simple but not easy and here’s why.

Posture is the position in which your body looks, functions and feels its best. When you are in ideal posture, all of your muscles are working in harmony with each other. When you have poor posture, your muscles work against each other.  In poor posture, one group of muscles will become short and tight while another set of muscles will become long and weak.  You develop what are known as length-tension dysfunction within the muscles.

Since muscles are extremely metabolically active. They play a major role in your ability to burn fat by boosting metabolism as they generate heat. Muscles act like mini engines of the body. When you are in ideal posture, you can increase your metabolism because all of your muscles are turned on and working in balance and unison and being used properly.

Improving posture can also boost energy levels. Think about it. What is the energetic cost of moving around in poor posture versus moving around with good posture?  You will use less energy when you have good posture and therefore use energy more efficiently and not waste it.

Cosmetically. the fastest way to get your butt lifted, your stomach flattened, your chin more contoured; all of these things happen when you focus on good posture. Many of the reasons people undergo surgery stems from having poor posture over a long period of time.  If you maintain a poor posture long enough, you create permanent changes in the structure of your body. Muscle and skin begin to sag and things start to hurt. The faster you achieve good posture, the quicker you’ll be able to get on your road to physical excellence.

How To Steal Time For Exercise

How To Steal Time For Exercise

By Terrence Thomas

Here is a sure fire no excuses strategy to getting fit. If you have a busy schedule and find it difficult to carve out a specific amount of time to exercise, stealing sets during the day is your solution. This is how it works. Pick 1 or 2 exercises a day and simply perform 1 to 3 sets an hour.  It may not seem like you are doing much but over time you can make some very good gains in overall fitness. ###

 

Awaken, Thrive, and Conquer Your Way to Physical Excellence

Awaken, Thrive, and Conquer Your Way to Physical Excellence
By Terrence Thomas

Twenty three years of coaching exercise and physical performance has convinced me that to be your best a developmental approach to fitness, exercise and physical performance must be taken. I have created a 3 step system that follows the natural developmental process of human movement and performance. I call it Awaken, Thrive, Conquer (ATC )

These three steps are critical to building a body that not only looks good but also performs at a high level. Before you can achieve optimal physical strength and performance you must first be able to awaken the body.

Awakening the body means having all of the basic reflex patterns and abilities in tact. Many of these basic reflex patterns are developed early in life. I mean really early such and pre birth and during infancy. For various reasons, these fundamental reflex patterns can and often become dysfunctional. For most people a small glitch in one’s developmental reflexes will not be a major cause for concern. However during high performance situation such as in sports or combat, developmental deficits can and often does make a massive difference in safety and performance.

The purpose of “thrive” phase of the system is to bring all physical abilities back to baseline. After the body is awakened, it can now progress to moving and performing at a level that supports life. The thrive phase develops what are known as primal patterns and biomotor abilities. The system of primal patterns was developed by Paul Chek and the gist of it is that there are 7 movement patterns that human beings must be able to perform. They are Squat, lunge, bend, push pull, twist and gait. Gait consists of walking, jogging and flat out running /sprinting. These movements were they to being able to survive and thrive in the wild. The concept of bio-motor abilities was developed by sports scientist Tudor Bompa and they are (strength, speed, power , agility, endurance, coordination, balance, and flexibility).

The “Conquer” phase of the ATC system is your where all of the advanced methods of exercising and training fit in. This phase is only warranted after you have successfully awoken your body and are thriving. If you try to Conquer while your body is still asleep and not thriving, you will set yourself up for injury and frustration from a lack of progress.

By following this progression you lay yourself a solid foundation for achieving long lasting and sustainable health and fitness. You must first awaken the body and then bring it to a point where it can thrive and ultimately bring it to a conquering aspect where you’re able to execute high performance tasks without destroying the body. This is Physical Excellence at it’s finest. ###

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