Top 10 Exercises That Should Be In Every Training Protocol
If you could only do 10 exercises these should be them. These exercises should be the core of any training program because they execute functionality and recruit the most muscles in one movement. Be advised, these exercises require some training to execute properly and should be approached with a base of knowledge before attempting.
- Squats
- Dead lifts
- Cleans
- Jerks or Military Press
- Bench Press
- Pull Ups / Chin ups
- Rows
- Dips
- Planks
- GHD Sit Ups
The Squat is the one of the most hated and loved exercises of all time. It recruits the glutes, quads, Hamstrings, and requires stabilization of the spine by the entire posterior chain of back muscles and transverse abdominus. There are a couple of variations that people on both sides swear by. The front squat requires the bar to be held on the anterior delts and the back squat requires the bar to be held on the traps. If lower back pain is a problem then front squats are a safer choice. Either variation is an amazing exercise.
Dead lifts recruit most of the same muscles that squats do with a more emphasis on the ham strings and lower back. It also recruits the muscles of the shoulder to stabilize the joint and the muscles of the forearm to hold the weight. The romanian dead lift is a great variation for ham development. Again, technique is major issue with this exercise.
Cleans can be done from the floor to emphasize the glutes, hamstrings and lower back or from a dead hang to emphasize the traps, rhomboids, delts, and glutes. I like the dead hang more because it is a great developer for the said muscles. This is a exercise that takes years to perfect the technique, but is a great functional movement.
This is a great exercise for deltoid development. The jerk is basically a military press with a hip thrust. It also secondarily recruits the triceps. When done from the standing position it recruits the core to stabilize the spine.
“Hey bro, how much ya’ bench?” Who hasn’t been asked or asked that? The bench press seems to be the measuring stick of strength. I would put the squat, deads, or cleans in that position, but the bench press is a great exercise for chest and tricep development and should be included in one way or another in every training protocol.
Pull ups are great for upper back development and highly recruit the lats and biceps. I love this exercise because it can be done pretty much anywhere – a gym, park, doorway, or anything you can hang from.
Rows are good way to develop the lower traps and rhomboids. It can be done on machines specifically for them. They can be done bent over with a barbell or dumbells. And my favorite is body weight rows done hanging from something like a bar on a smith machine. They also recruit the biceps.
Dips really help a lagging bench. They mainly recruit the triceps and help push through the sticking point on the bench press. Again, these can be done pretty much any where you can hang your body between.
This is just a great core exercise. It recruits the transverse abdominus to stabilize the spine. Also can be done any where you want.
One of the best core exercises ever. Unfortunately, you need a Glute / Ham Developer, but if you have one then do sit-ups on it. The GHD gives you a much larger range of motion than traditional floor sit-ups. Sit-ups also recruit the hip flexors making it a much more functional movement than the crunch which isolates the abs in a singular movement. Russian twists can also be done on the GHD to target the obliques as well as the rectus abdominus.
I’v laid out 10 of the best exercise out there. On top of muscle good development qualities, they are some of the most functional exercises available and translate to real life movements very well. What do you think should be included in this list. Comment below on 5 exercises that should be included in a training protocol.
Movie Review: I love you, man
John Hamburg’s new flick I love you, man starring Paul Rudd and Jason Segel was rumored to be the best capture of the modern American male condition since Fight Club. Peter Klaven (Paul Rudd) is a real estate agent about to get married, but finds that he has no friends for a groomsmen or best man. He then sets out on a number of “man dates” to find one and finds that male bonding is a difficult process that requires as much work as romantic relationships. Enter Sydney Fife (Jason Segel), successful investor and a charismatic dichotomy of Klaven. The two instantly bond and as the bro-mance elevates, struggles with Klaven’s fiancé (Rashida Jones) rise as well.
There are a number of relationships that seem to be dichotomies, but turn out to work in a synergistic fashion to edify each other. Klaven and Fife themselves are polar opposite personalities, a characteristic that appears to be a catalyst in forming their relationship. Klaven’s relationship to Fife and his fiancé – male plutonic/female romantic dichotomy – begin to cause friction as Fife moves into Klaven’s life. As a result he has to choose between his romantic relationship and his friendship. As the story progresses he finds, with the help of his fiancé, that he needs male friendship to be a better man and husband.
The modern American male is filled with frustration, anger, and fear and as the demands of family and work take precedence he becomes more and more alienated from male friendships. Most women wonder where their men went. The shell of the man that they fell in love with has been beaten down and molded into a nice little suburbanized employee. They haven’t been pursuing the male friendships that alleviate that frustration, anger, and fear. They haven’t tapped into the source of energy that male bonds provide. Our society brings us an ultimatum at the alter of marriage – wife or friends. It’s a sad conclusion that most men accept dogmatically and most women stand behind. While the reality is that marriage takes a lot of work, the more subtle reality is that it takes work and a lot of help. Friendships are that help. They rejuvenate a man and facilitate a healthy marriage. It was encouraging that this movie came to the same conclusion. Oh, and it’s a pretty funny movie.
Home Made Gymnastics Rings
Hopefully, this will help the starving college students out there save some much needed mula. What you need to make durable gymnastics rings is PVC pipe (1-2 inch diameter), A large pickle jar (the kind you buy at Sam’s that could feed a small orphanage for 6 months), 1/4 inch rope, duct tape, sand, an oven, and some thing to string the rings from a rafter – I use adjustable cargo ties.
Directions:
Measure the circumference of the pickle jar and cut the PVC pipe 2 inches short of that measurement.
String the 1/4 inch rope through the PVC pipe.
Stuff sand into the pipe with the rope still in it very tightly and duct tape the ends shut.
Preheat the oven to 300*
Put the PVC in the oven for 8 minutes.
Take the PVC pipe out and wrap it around the pickle jar. Tie the end of the ropes to hold it tight.
Let it sit for 15 minutes or until cooled off.
Empty the sand and tie ends of the rope well and you have some great gym rings.
Fish oil = less cow flatulence
Apparently, fish oil supplementation can reduce the methane exuding from the north end of a south bound cow. Methane is a more powerful greenhouse gas than CO2. Not exactly the best remedy for global warming, but it’s a start. Check out the full article here
Automate your income. Finding the 4HWW “Muse”.
Timothy Ferriss’ book the Four Hour Work Week is a revolution. If you haven’t read the book yet you should buy it immediately. One of the main ideas of the book is the idea of creating systems of income automation in order to finally divorce time from income. In other words, one no longer has to trade a body for money in a modernized form of slavery with twelve bosses driving the labor. This idea represents freedom for the grossly overworked and underpaid American. It frees time to do things of value to the person and allows the freedom to decide when and where and how to work. It displaces the myth that more work is better than productive work. Ferriss calls these systems “muses”. I am on a quest to discover my muse and have discovered that it’s not that easy. It requires a lot of creativity, but I think I have found the muse. And after the initial testing of the idea, I plan to market it aggressively until the muse has become systematized and automated. I’v noticed that other 4HWW devotees have struggled with finding a muse as well. Some of the common barriers include mainly money to either start the muse or to maintain your living expenses while the muse is building. To be honest, I can’t seem to find a one size fits all formula for the process – there are just too many variables and the process is such a creative endeavor that it requires unique solutions. Any ideas? Comment below on the 3 best solutions to finding a muse or ideas for a muse.
Intermittent Fasting
Generally, to lose fat and/or gain muscle one has to eat 5 to 6 meals per day with plenty of high quality proteins and fats while moderating carbohydrate intake. This dispersal of caloric intake and carbohydrate moderation is done, mainly, to maintain consistent blood glucose levels which will regulate insulin release – a fat storage hormone, among other things. And so the majority of nutrition literature says. As many know, humans are here because somewhere along the way we were genetically embellished from our precursors to survive in what ever environment we might be in at the time. That being said, diet played a major role in that evolution. I could just see our paleolithic ancestors eating six meals a day with paleolithic tupperware packed and ready to eat at the all important 3 hour feeding time. The fact is hunter/gatherers did just that – hunted and gathered. Some hunts were unsuccessful i.e. they fasted and some hunts were successful at which point the food, high in protein and fat, was eaten and what was not eaten was left to rot as no freezer was available. This is the environment in which humans survived and evolved. So why is the prescription for optimal health to eat six times a day, which was a pure fantasy for our ancestors? Could there be some benefit to eating at interval windows that mimic our fasting paleo past and further more could there be a benefit to following a diet that our precursors were evolved to eat?
Enter IF or intermittent fasting and Paleo nutrition. Before I get into the meat of these philosophies check out the blogiture on these great sites The IF life and Modern Forager. Intermittent fasting is not to be confused with starvation patterns it is simply letting the body take time off of digestion and incorporating that into a lifestyle. There is a growing body of research that supports this lifestyle choice and some of the benefits include the following: “improving insulin resistance (which you will hear alot about as being the #1 key marker in so many health factors including weight loss, muscle gain, performance, recovery, anti-ageing and disease prevention) and giving the body a chance to do some internal cleaning (or housework), which can lead to improved immune function and overall health.” (from IF life website) Check out some of the academic research here. The benefits are amazing and it releases you from the slavery of tupperware and eating six times a day. It just does not make sense academically and personally that the body needs that constant supply of food to be healthy. This way of life resonates with me personally and I will definitely give it a try. I’ll try to keep you posted on the progress!
Higher Education. Extended Adolescence?
“Ambition is the last refuge of failure.”
Oscar Wilde
I’m 4 months into the real world. College is over and student loan payments loom in the horizon. With the stress to make money, get married and have 2.3 kids, there is the desire to make something of value come from my education and time. Education? I wonder what I really learned through those 4 years + 1 of tests, papers, and the drunken haze in between. Some call college life an “extended adolescence” and I tend to agree with them. Don’t get me wrong, I am all for an educated mind but, a system that holds up a promise of a bright future for all who pay the right price is beyond my breaking point. To quote my school’s president on his reasons for raising tuition once again by 12%, “a college degree will serve the student for the rest of his life.” When does that start? Because the only thing that my $40,000.00 has given me so far is a purpose identity crisis. The tragedy is that the education we are promised is clothed in a purpose suit waiting for well intentioned, driven individuals to bite. I worked hard on my education. I graduated with honors in biology from the university of alabama with absolutely no marketable skills except the ticket to get into graduate school. I find my self extremely discouraged, depressed, angry at a system that is driven by greed, and most of all hopeless. How does one find purpose? How does one justify losing 5 years of hard work. I know I’m not alone. Millions of graduates are faced with the same dilemma. Without a sense of direction, I have been thrust into a sink or swim world and best advise they can give is “just get a job”. To resign myself to a J-O-B just for the sake of it, is not only soul draining it’s down right wrong. There is a longing in me for something more than mediocrity, something of value to do with my time and I hope the “real world” or people’s opinions on what I should do don’t rob me of that desire for more than “normal”. I don’t regret going to college but, I would do things differently. I would spend more time on purpose than papers. And diffuse the myth, at least to myself, that this time spent learning numbers and words will bring fulfillment and direction.
Solar luvin’…getcha some!
Going green, however media and marketing driven it may be, is both an environmental responsibility and a financial burden. As a biology student, I’v been both amused and infuriated at the reaction of people to the wealth of information concerning global warming’s impact on our world’s biodiversity. At best, I’v been told that, although people want to go green they just can’t handle the initial financial impact. At worst, they write it off as liberal antics. As this video shows, solar panels can be quite expensive. But hope is on the horizon with a solar ink that, hopefully, can be printed on rolls of solar luvin’ that will not only reduce our carbon footprint but, will save the consumer some seriously needed dough in a tough economic downtime. It seems we could be in a unique position that could pacify the economic concerns of the consumer and ecological concerns of the tree hugin’ hippies.
2012…AAAAAAH
So, I recently came across this whole 2012 fiasco and I decided to do a little research on it. The year 2012 and specifically December 21, 2012 is the abrupt end of the Mayan astronomical calendar – sited to be THE most accurate calendar to date, no pun intended. The Mayan people were obsessive sky watchers and based there calendar on the cyclic nature of the cosmos. What interested me in this abrupt end to their calendar was that the I Ching – one of the oldest chinese text and set of predictions represented by a set of 64 abstract line arrangements called hexagrams - came to the same abrupt end on December 21, 2012. How did two cultures on separate sides of the planet come to this same conclusion? What is going to happen to life on this winter solstice in 2012? No one knows – does NASA? Well, it turns out 2012 is a pretty significant date for our little solar system. On 2012, our solar system is scheduled to intersect the galactic equator of the Milky Way galaxy which could lead to a polar shift – north becomes south and vice versa. There will also be four lunar eclipses, also known as blood moons, and two solar eclipses. All of the eclipses fall on the start of jewish religious feasts. An interesting verse in Revelations evokes an erie foreboding – “I watched as he opened the sixth seal. There was a great earthquake. The sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair, the whole moon turned blood red…” Revelation 6:12 (emphasis mine). CRAZAY!!! I know, it freaked me out to. What is of the most concern is the expected polar shift that in some way is already under way and expected to culminate as we pass the galactic equator. This polar shift coupled with a predicted intense solar storm cycle could lead to some massive global disasters. Check out the video to get some interesting info on the polar shift and solar storms.
My initial reactions to this information concerned me and made me examine life a little closer. First, I was oddly excited about the end of the planet. This strange human characteristic is predicated in the fact that we approach life in finite terms. We have a beginning and an end and we simply want to know what happens at the end. We see this same phenomena in the Y2K scare. People, on some level, wanted to see what happens to life after impending doom. Second, the idea made me ask, “What I would do If there was only four years left to live?”. This changes everything from love to work. Material wants lose any significance they once had. I started to hold an outward focus rather than a hedonistic inward ambition. The jury is still out on whether life is over in 2012 and I will continue to post as info becomes available, but for now consider the deeper questions that the apocalypse concept evokes.
