All movement, skill, thought, and everything that makes you, you is encompassed in this 3lb organ.

All that you have ever experienced, will ever experience, all the exercises or personal bests you have ever pulled off have started and ended in your brain.

All movement, skill, thought, and everything that makes you, you is encompassed in this 3lb organ.

• How does your brain know what to do at any given moment?
• How does your brain gather information?
• And of the information it gathers, how does it decide what to do with it?
• More importantly, does the way your brain gathers information and what it does with it have an effect on your training, performance or recovery?

You bet your arse it does!

Now, this isn’t a neurology lecture but before we get into how important the way your brain gathers information is and how to improve it, we need to, in a very basic way understand how the brain works.

Brain Basics

Your brain uses sensory inputs to gather information. These sensors receive input and the peripheral nervous system (PNS) and the central nervous system (CNS) sends these signals to the brain which then basically decides the action and then creates motor output relevant to whatever was decided.

At a very basic level that’s it.

The brain has three ways to gather information or inputs:

1. Exteroception: monitoring the outside world
2. Interoception: bodily awareness and feelings
3. Proprioception: awareness of the body and limbs in space

These inputs are then integrated together to build and update the brain’s map of everything. Of you, the world around you and how you are moving through it. The brain updates previous experiences, senses, and predictive processes to make decisions that drive the body’s actions.

Now that we broadly understand how the brain does things, we need to figure out why it does them.

Well, the answer to that one is easy: survival.

Your brain’s goal is to keep you alive. Full stop. Not keep you alive ten years from now but right now, today.

How it does this is through prediction. Our brains are masters at pattern recognition. Every second of every day the 120 billion neurons in the brain are processing information based on previous experience to predict outcomes to actions, this is your brain using pattern recognition to decide actions.

There is a hierarchy to the inputs your brain uses to move through the world:

1. Visual
2. Vestibular
3. Proprioceptive

If these sensory inputs match (i.e. there is clear information from all three systems and there is good integration in the brain) your brain will allow you to function well and perform when it matters. Whether that’s CrossFit, powerlifting, or just picking something up of the floor.

When there is a mismatch is when we run into problems. If there is bad information informing the brain maps and pattern recognition abilities, then I am afraid it is going to try to limit the chances of death—usually by generating pain to draw attention or inhibiting movement.

In this article, I am going to focus on exercises to improve your visual system as 70-90% of all sensory input is visual.

The Role of Vision

There are two classifications of vision in humans:

1. Gaze stabilization: A foundational element of all other eye movements and allows us to see objects and to interpret the visual scene to create perception.
2. Gaze shifting: This allows us to keep the focus on a moving target. Think that ball hurtling towards your face on the pitch.

There could be any number of things affecting these two patterns and hindering your visual system, which in turn could be dramatically holding your performance back without you even knowing it.

The key to training your visual system for performance is training the musculature of the eyes to function correctly. After all, poor muscular function will cause problems in gaze shifting and gaze stabilization.

We are going to cover one drill for stabilization and one for shifting. Reference my video for a demonstration of each drill.

I recommend you record yourself performing the drill and watch it back to see how you perform. That way, you can adjust accordingly.

Drill 1: Gaze Stabilization

1. Stand in a neutral stance.
2. Hold a target (pen) at arm’s length directly in front of you. Stare at the target for 30 seconds.
3. You must remain focused on the target because an inability to do gaze stabilization usually means very small, fast movements of the eyes off the target and then back onto it.
4. When watching yourself back try to notice excessive facial tension, eyelid flutter, excessive blinking, or watering of the eyes as you attempt to keep focus on the target.
5. Once you have performed this assessment in a neutral position, you will then perform the same test in each of the other four positions. Up, right, left and down.
6. Take special note, as it is highly likely that you will find one or more positions in which you struggle with your gaze stabilization.
7. It is vital that the target remains in focus at all times. If it goes out of focus reduce the distance away from neutral, you hold it.
8. Do this drill three times through each position.

Drill 2: Gaze Shifting

Stand in a neutral stance holding a pen out in front of you in a neutral position.

Try to smoothly follow the pen as you move it from neutral into one of the eight positions below and then back to neutral:

1. Up
2. Down
3. Right
4. Left
5. Up and Right
6. Up and Left
7. Down and Right
8. Down and Left

You should repeat this test three times in each of the eight positions. You will be looking for two things when you watch the drill back:

• Excessive body sway.
• Badly coordinated movement of the eyes. This will usually be seen as a ratcheting or jumping type of motion that stops them from smoothly following the target.

Each of these can indicate poor visual-motor control.

Get Your Vision Straight

The aim of these drills is to get your eyes functioning properly so the information your brain gets is as clear as possible. That way your brain won’t be afraid to let you move fully in all of your available ranges of motion.

Remember, when the brain can predict, you can perform.

References:

1. Gaymard, B., & Pierrot-Deseilligny, C. (1999). Neurology of saccades and smooth pursuit. Current Opinion in Neurology.

2. Hughes, A. E. (2018). Dissociation between perception and smooth pursuit eye movements in speed judgments of moving Gabor targets. Journal of Vision.

3. Ingster-Moati, I., Vaivre-Douret, L., Bui Quoc, E., Albuisson, E., Dufier, J. L., & Golse, B. (2009). Vertical and horizontal smooth pursuit eye movements in children: A neuro-developmental study. European Journal of Paediatric Neurology.

4. Krauzlis, R. J., Goffart, L., & Hafed, Z. M. (2017). Neuronal control of fixation and fixational eye movements. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.

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Or have you really pushed to your limit?

What if I told you that you have never actually truly maxed out during a workout because fatigue is mostly just an emotion holding you back from pushing harder?

Consider this for a definition of fatigue:

Fatigue is a brain-derived emotion that regulates the exercise behavior to ensure the protection of whole body homeostasis.

This essentially means your physical abilities (i.e. your performance) is not actually dictated by your actual physiological state. It’s dictated by your brain protecting you from going to failure.

In an article written by Tim Noakes—a South African scientist and exercise science professor at the University of Cape Town—he sets out to answer the question of why athletes stop before they reach their physical limit.

“The presence of the noxious symptoms of fatigue must indicate that exercise cannot be regulated solely by an inevitable and unavoidable failure of skeletal and or cardiac muscle functions,” Noakes said.

Thus, Noakes developed a theory—the Central Governor Model for fatigue—which basically argues that when it comes to fatigue during exercise, it’s all in your head!

In fact, he argues that other common performance influencers, such as sleep, yesterday’s training volume, fluid loss, heat, thirst, hunger, motivation, what you ate that day, if you drank the night before, glycogen storage, etc., aren’t as influential on your performance as your brain and your perception of fatigue.

Your Brain May Be Fooling You

He might be onto something: After all, you never actually recruit all of your skeletal muscles during a workout. You use between 35 and 50 percent of them during endurance training and only around 60 percent of them when you’re supposedly maxing out.

This isn’t to say there aren’t physiological changes happening in your body when you become overcome with fatigue, because there are.

It’s only to say your brain, and the emotions associated with fatigue, are likely holding you back more than you realize. And if you have ever misloaded a barbell and PR’ed by accident, you know what I’m talking about: Your perception of what you think you’re lifting clearly affects your performance!

What about the fatigue I feel from not getting enough oxygen to my muscles?

What about when I’m breathing so hard at a 180 heart rate? If I keep going at the pace I’m at, won’t I pass out because not enough oxygen is getting to my muscles?

Not true. Your perception that you need all this extra air or you might die has little to nothing to do with your physiological respiratory needs in that moment. It’s but a panic response in the body.

In fact, many of us breathe more than we need to during a workout, and sometimes this actually makes things worse, as you can actually get rid of too much CO2 in the process. At the extreme end of this is hyperventilation.

The thing is your blood is almost always fully oxygenated and you need CO2 to get oxygen to your tissues. So it’s possible for your blood to be fully oxygenated, but if you’re burning off too much CO2 from breathing too much, then the oxygen doesn’t always get to where it needs to go—to your muscles and tissues.

While knowing this information is helpful, unless you learn how to breathe more effectively, you’re likely going to continue feeling panicked by the idea of not getting enough oxygen and slow down as a result.

The Air Hunger Drill

In light of this phenomenon, here is a drill you can do to improve your breathing and help calm you down so your perception of fatigue stops killing your performance.

You can do these with various movements, but let’s choose a simple one first: The push-up.

In short, air hunger drills help you practice and improve your recovery, as well as teach your body to relax when it feels overcome by fatigue.

“Air hunger” is simply that feeling you get when you feel like you must breathe soon, or else doom is around the corner.

• Step 1: Breathe deeply and exhale fully.
• Step 2: After you exhale, begin doing a set of push-ups with the air out of your lungs completely. Don’t breathe as you’re doing your set of push-ups.
• Step 3: Keep going until you feel a moderate degree of air hunger. Stop before full blown panic sets in.
• Step 4: Take two or three deep breaths to regain control of your breathing.

The more you do this, the better you’ll get at using just two or three breaths to fully recover, and the better you’ll get at realizing that the feeling of air hunger doesn’t mean panic needs to occur.

The easier this gets—via push-ups or air squats or even a 400 meter run—the more it will translate into metabolic conditioning workouts, and the better your performance will be.

The post Fatigue: It’s Just an Emotion appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Photo by Bev Childress

Let’s say you have been working out for a long time, by yourself. You are extremely self-disciplined and feel confident following programs that use basic movements you are familiar with, but you aren’t sure how to learn new skills. You are worried about your form, you don’t know how to figure out whether you’re doing it right, and you are unclear about timelines. You don’t have access to a coach, either because you live in a place where coaching isn’t available, you aren’t in the financial situation to pay for a coach, or you simply don’t like being coached. How can you learn skills on your own confidently, without risk of injury?

Learning can be broken down into three stages. Stage one is the awkward stage. It’s kind of like puberty—nothing is easy, everything feels like work, and you feel like you are going to be stuck there forever.

Stage two is kind of like college. You feel a little more confident in your abilities, you still make the occasional snafu, and even though once in a while you think you have it all figured out, something happens to remind you that you really don’t. You contemplate quitting once in a while because it’s harder than it seems like it should be.

Stage three is kind of like nearing retirement. You have attained a level of confidence you never actually thought you would have, you are well practiced at the skill, and you are fairly certain you could actually perform it on demand under almost any circumstance.

To get from stage one to stage three requires making mistakes, learning from them and trying again. However, it’s easy to get discouraged and feel like you aren’t making progress. Maybe you abandon the skill, or you stop exploring new ways to approach it, or a nagging irritation/pain occurs that deters you from working on it with the same enthusiasm you had in the beginning. How do you successfully maneuver your way across the stages?

Let’s use the L-sit as an example. The ability to L-sit can come in handy for a variety of bodyweight skills, but there is technique involved and it can be difficult to feel whether or not you are actually performing the skill in a way that would be considered technically proficient.

So what do you do?

• Break down the skill into mini skills. What steps do you need in order to eventually L-sit?
• Periodically film yourself performing the mini skills and watch the playback.
• Give yourself honest feedback regarding what you see. Does what you are doing feel like what you are doing? Is there anything you could do to make the skill more efficient?

If you aren’t sure what you see, watch others performing the skill and see if you can identify what they are doing. If you really want to improve, you need to take the time to understand what is happening.

The Mini Skill

To continue with our example, a mini step for the L-sit requires straight arm pressing, scapular depression, and hip flexion. In less technical terms, you need to be able to push the floor away from you, your shoulders and shoulder blades need to move down when you do this, and you need to be able to sit with your legs straight in front of you. If any of these pieces are missing, you won’t be able to execute the skill efficiently.

Right about now, you might be thinking, “that’s a lot of thought to do a (relatively) basic skill. I don’t want to think about all of those things, I just want to be able to do it.”

Fair enough. But if you want to be your own coach, you need to think like a coach. Part of thinking like a coach means you are able to troubleshoot and figure out the weakest link.

Video Your Skill

Let’s say you feel like you understand how to press down, but you aren’t exactly sure where your shoulders are and you don’t have the mobility to extend your legs out in front of you so you are currently working on the tuck position. Unless you are participating in a tech revolt and refuse to have a smartphone, chances are high you have the ability to video yourself with your phone. I totally get the irritation with filming—you have to set it up, if there are other people in the gym you have to carve out a little space to do it where you aren’t in anyone’s way, you have to remember to hit record, and you can only cross your fingers and hope that you actually end up in the frame. I promise it’s worth it, and it gets easier.

For those of you thinking, “I will just look in the mirror,” research and my own experience suggest mirrors don’t work.¹ In fact, research on motor skill learning actually shows less feedback is better for learning, so looking in the mirror on every single skill attempt isn’t going to speed up the learning process.²

Pure and utter blasphemy in a culture that’s obsessed with appearance, I know. The thing is, if you want to get better at a specific skill, you need to reconcile what you feel like you are doing with what you are actually doing. Mirrors take you out of what you are experiencing by making the skill more reliant on your eyes rather than your inner sense of what’s happening. They also don’t fully show you what you are doing, unless you turn sideways and crane your head in a weird position to see what’s going on, and what does that feel like? Video keeps you honest and allows you to watch the feedback after the execution and before you try again. The lag time is important for processing and learning. When you try it again after you watch the video feedback, your image of what you look like will be more clear and whatever feedback you gave yourself, you will be able to apply.

You don’t need to film yourself every single set. I usually film twice a week, I pick one of the middle sets so I’m warmed up, and I watch the feedback between sets. I try to internalize what it looks like and how it could be better and I don’t film the next set—I simply work on implementation. The following week when I film, I will be able to see if the feedback I gave myself is working.

Sometimes what I see on my videos is something I need to work on separately to make the skill better. For instance, let’s say I’m not pointing my toes, and when I do point my toes, my feet cramp. This is not a matter of “do more of the same thing in the same position.” Instead, I need to work on just pointing my toes strongly in lower level positions so I can build up the strength to do it successfully. Only then will the carryover to the L-sit be successful.

Since I started this conversation using an L-sit as an example, I will stick with that theme, but I have done this on a variety of skills, including deadlifts, rolling variations, and handstands. The thing that separates people who perform a skill masterfully from the ones who are more average is the willingness to work on every aspect of the movement.

Cue Yourself

Other than filming and watching myself after the set is over, one of the most useful ways I have found to give myself feedback over the years is to write down a couple of words when I am finished. The next time that particular skill is in my program, I glance at my notes from last time. It triggers what I need to work on and gives me a focal point.

Let’s say for the L-sit I could feel I wasn’t getting my hips off the ground as much as I wanted. I might write something like “hips stayed low. Press more next time.” These cues will help me focus my attention during my practice.

Making notes also enables you to monitor improvement. For instance, if I struggled during my last round of tuck holds last week and I noted that in my training log when I do tuck holds this week if I don’t struggle with my last round, that indicates some form of improvement. If I happened to film myself, I can see whether the quality of the movement looks a little bit better this time or if it just feels better.

What if you aren’t sure what you are looking at or what you are feeling? Go to YouTube and pull up video of people that are competently performing the skill. If it’s a tutorial, listen to what the instructor says and pause the video to see if you can identify visually what he means. Can you imagine yourself performing the movement the same way? There is research that suggests if you spend time visualizing yourself successfully performing a skill, there is a learning effect- imagining helps you learn how to do the skill faster.³ If you can’t visualize it, you haven’t internalized the movement yet.

Don’t just watch video of one person; watch video of several people. Observe the similarities and observe the differences. Mimic the ones that look like they are performing the skill efficiently by identifying how they perform it. How do they place their hands? Where are their feet located? How wide are their hips?

The Work Is Worth It

Learning how to identify inefficiencies that are holding you back from performing a skill requires a little bit of work, a lot of self-reflection, honesty, and a fair amount of patience. However, the gains you make and what you will learn about yourself along the way make the extra effort worth it.

References:

1. Swinnen, S.P., Schmidt, R.A., Nicholson, D.E., & Shapiro, D.C., (1990). Information feedback for skill acquisition: instantaneous knowledge of results degrades learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 16(4), 706-716.

2. Schmidt R.A. (1991). Frequent Augmented Feedback Can Degrade Learning: Evidence and Interpretations. In: Requin J., Stelmach G.E. (eds) Tutorials in Motor Neuroscience. NATO ASI Series (Series D: Behavioural and Social Sciences), vol 62. Springer, Dordrecht

3. Lacourse, M.G., Orr, E.L.R., Cramer, S.C., & Cohen, M.J., (2005). Brain activation during execution and motor imagery of novel and skilled sequential hand movement. Neuroimage, 27(3), 505-519.

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A placebo is anything that seems to have a “real” effect based on the power of suggestion, but it is really inert. Some common examples are fake pills, shots, or treatment. The word “placebo” has a bad connotation, since they are often used as deception. However, we might be able to use this effect to our benefit.

Could the placebo effect help you lift more weight?

Lifting and the Placebo Effect

Imagine taking a placebo energy drink that makes you believe you have greater strength. Subsequently, you lift more weights. Researchers Maganaris, Collins, and Sharp tested this theory by having competitive powerlifters take a sugar pill a few hours before lifting. These powerlifters, who were told the pill was a steroid, lifted about 4% heavier weights.

“The word ‘placebo’ has a bad connotation, since they are often used as deception. However, we might be able to use this effect to our benefit.”

What is interesting about this research is that a second group was told they were receiving a placebo. Even knowing the substance was a placebo, they still lifted heavier weights than they did without taking it. And in any case, the lifters had knowledge that steroids take weeks to add strength and muscle. Taking them a few hours before a competition should have had limited effects. Thus, their knowledge of this fact should have canceled out any potential effects – but it didn’t.

And that’s not the only study:

• In a 2009 study published in The Gunderson Lutheran Medical Journal, researchers tested the placebo effect in endurance athletes. Runners were given “super oxygenated water,” which was actually just plain water. These trained athletes ran 8% faster. This effect was consistent across runners as 84% of the runners tested ran faster after taking the placebo water.
• In a 2007 study published in Applied Sport Psychology, researchers found almost a 20% strength increase in untrained athletes who were told they were receiving amino acids that would increase their strength.
• In a 2008 study published in the European Journal of Neuroscience, results showed a 22% strength increase in trained athletes who thought they were taking caffeine. What is interesting about this study is how the researchers conditioned the athletes into thinking the placebo was more powerful. After giving the participants the placebo, researchers told the participants that they were lifting more weight than they were actually doing. Imagine being told you were squatting 200kg, but you were really squatting 180kg. The weight would feel easy and you would think that the “drug” was even more powerful than it was. It is a double placebo effect.

Researchers found almost a 20% strength increase in untrained athletes who were told they were receiving amino acids that would increase their strength.

We could discuss hundreds of research articles on this topic. Research has shown that placebos have powerful effects on strength, endurance, and pain tolerance. But as much of the legal and non-legal supplements people take are unregulated, we don’t know how much their effect is related to placebo.

In regulated industries, like antidepressant medications, researcher Irving Kirsch estimates that 50% of the effect is related to placebo effects. This indicates that many people who are depressed would benefit from taking only a placebo pill – and then would also benefit from the lack of side effects.

How You Can Use Placebos to Your Benefit

One interesting aspect of the placebo effect is that it involves more than motivation. Actual changes occur in our brain and, in the case of pain tolerance, in our pain receptors. We are physiologically changing ourselves when under the influence of a placebo. What we tell ourselves is important, but the body changes because of it.

“Maybe the majority of supplements do not work and taking supplements is analogous to playing the lottery. The placebo effect and the suggestion of a supplement’s power might be worth the value of the purchase.”

Statisticians supposedly don’t play the lottery because they know the odds of winning are so small. But according to economists, the pleasure we get from imagining winning is determined by us to be worth the one-dollar purchase price. Maybe the majority of supplements do not work and taking supplements is analogous to playing the lottery. The placebo effect and the suggestion of a supplement’s power might be worth the value of the purchase.

And the more hype we believe, then the greater outcomes we will potentially reap. Maybe the Surge Extreme Partitioning Anabolic Pulse Activator will help you lift heavier weights. I feel stronger for just making up the name (can’t wait to try the SEPAPA Extreme formula).

The pleasure we get from imagining winning is determined by us to be worth the one-dollar purchase price.

Try It Out Yourself

I’m going to be writing more on other suggestions as to how we can benefit from the placebo effect. But let me leave you with this – a 2008 study by Antonella Pollo and colleagues gave us another hint at what a good coach or training partner can do to help:

We can tell the person in question that he is doing much better than he believes and attribute it to something he is doing. “Those new compression pants are making your lifts look so easy. You are up 20kgs from last week.” Or, “Those new mobility drills you are doing are helping your form quite a bit.” Try it on one of your clients or someone you train with and see what happens. Let us know how it goes in the comments below.

The placebo effect is powerful and, if it can be harnessed, research shows it has the ability to increase our performance between 4-20% – even if we know the substance is fake. Furthermore, these effects are much greater than simple motivation as this whole process actually changes the way our body responds.

Further Reading:

• Are the Benefits of Aerobic Exercise All in Your Head?
• The Most Effective Ergogenic Aid for Your Performance
• Is Chocolate a Weight-Loss Food? How to Be a Reasonable Skeptic
• New on Breaking Muscle Today

References:

1. Benedetti, Fabrizio, Helen S. Mayberg, Tor D. Wager, Christian S. Stohler, and Jon-Kar Zubieta. 2005. “Neurobiological Mechanisms of the Placebo Effect.” The Journal of Neuroscience 25 (45): 10390–402.

2. Kalasountas, Vasandreas, Justy Reed, and John Fitzpatrick. 2007. “The Effect of Placebo-Induced Changes in Expectancies on Maximal Force Production in College Students.” Journal of Applied Sport Psychology 19 (1): 116–24.

3. Kirsch, I., and G. Sapirstein. “Listening to Prozac but Hearing Placebo: A Meta-Analysis of Antidepressant Medication.” Prevention & Treatment; Prevention & Treatment 1, no. 2 (1998): 2a.

4. Maganaris, Constantinos N., Dave Collins, Martin Sharp, and others. 2000. “Expectancy Effects and Strength Training: Do Steroids Make a Difference?” Sport Psychologist 14 (3): 272–78.

5. Pollo, Antonella, Elisa Carlino, and Fabrizio Benedetti. 2008. “The Top-down Influence of Ergogenic Placebos on Muscle Work and Fatigue.” European Journal of Neuroscience 28 (2): 379–88. doi:10.1111/j.1460-9568.2008.06344.x.

6. Porcari, John P., Jennifer Otto, Heidi Felker, Richard P. Mikat, and Carl Foster. 2006. “The Placebo Effect on Exercise Performance.” Journal of Cardiopulmonary Rehabilitation and Prevention 26 (4): 269.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

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Researchers found no significant differences in performance time between trials worn by the competitive runners during the 10km distance. With prices for compression tights and compression clothing starting at over $100.00 more research needs to be conducted to assess the overall efficacy of these garments with a variety of athletes.

The post Compression Tights May Not Be Worth Hype for Performance Benefits appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Historically, the world has not been kind to that tenth person, to the concept of “left.” For instance, some ancient and indigenous cultures view/have used the left hand for “unclean” tasks, frowning on the use of that hand for human interaction. Additionally, in the Bible, Matthew 25:31-46 chronicles what will happen on Judgment Day: “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne…and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world…’ Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” Pretty intense!

Less direly, many household items and modern contexts favor people who are more comfortable using their right hand. Tools like scissors, baseball gloves, and guitars are physical manifestations of the assumption that a given user will be right-handed; this is not unreasonable given the aforementioned percentage of lefties. But while research is inconclusive on whether lefties die more frequently as a result of accidents related to using tools that are designed for the hand they are less comfortable using, these issues can be a nuisance

nonetheless.

A New York Times article from earlier this year notes, that the stigmas noted above, as well as the tendency to try to “fix” lefties by making them use their right hands for tasks for which they naturally want to use the left hand, have largely dissipated. What have persisted, however, are questions about correlations between handedness and conditions like schizophrenia; handedness and risk of death from accidents; causes of handedness; whether there is an evolutionary advantage to being right-handed that would explain the prevalence of righties in the population; and, conversely, whether there is an evolutionary advantage to being left-handed that would explain the persistent minority of lefties.

There are some sports-related benefits to being left-handed. Left-handed batters line up on the side of home plate that is closer to first base, while right-handed batters have to line up on the far side. Left-handed tennis players put an unexpected spin on the ball, and their forehand, which is more powerful than the backhand, comes in at a different angle than a rightie’s forehand. Rocky Balboa had an advantage because he was a southpaw boxer.

The post What We Know about Handedness appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Researchers and strength and conditioning professionals still debate over the efficacy of a dynamic warm up vs. .a static warm up. Research has noted the benefits of a dynamic style work out for potentiating jump performance. New research again examines dynamic and static warm ups for eliciting lower body explosiveness.

Researchers in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, assessed 3 different warm up conditions; dynamic, static, and control group, and measured stationary vertical jump, and standing long jump. Researchers assessed 17 baseball players during the training season for collegiate level competitive baseball.

The dynamic warm up conditions included; forward lunge with forearm to opposite instep, backward lunge with rotation, jackknife or inchworm, knee to chest, toe touch, straight leg march, straight leg march with skipping, lateral shuffle with countermovement, lateral leg swings, straight leg swings, hip rockers, reverse hip rockers, inverted hamstring, lunge fast, carioca short, carioca long, falling starts, backpedal with a turn, and backpedal with 2 lateral turns.

The static warm up condition included; standing hamstring stretch to the right, left, and middle, standing quadriceps stretch on the right and left, calf stretch to the right and left, deep side lunge to the right and left, squatting butterfly stretch, straddle stretch to the right, left, and middle, sitting butterfly stretch, seated stretches to the right and left, torso twist to the right and left, performs stretch to the right and left, and laying quadriceps stretch to the right and left.

Measurements were taken including; countermovement jumps for vertical jump height and long jump distance.

The post Dynamic Warm Up Increases Jump Height and Distance appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

This research is noteworthy because of the longitudinal nature of the study. These results suggest that strength and conditioning coaches should be aware that the more aggressively that an athlete trains off the field, the higher the risk for injuries on the field. Coaches should also take note that heavy loaded strength and power training protocols may be related to more field injuries. Coaches should examine their programming, training loads, rest and recovery sessions to take steps to avoid these training related injuries.

The post Researchers Warn High Training Loads Increase Field Injuries appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Why do we require students keep a journal?

First and foremost because keeping a journal accelerates the learning process. Starting a new workout routine can involve learning new skills and new jargon. By writing down your workouts you are taking an additional few minutes to process what you have learned, repeat the concepts and terminology to yourself, and engrain it into your brain. Plus, if you forget what an exercise is called, you now have an easy reference.

Logging workouts also helps you remember the appropriate weights to use on a workout. Sometimes from workout to workout it can be hard to remember which kettlebell you used or which weight dumbbell you lifted. You might be working out on your own and there’s nobody to ask, or maybe you wanted to do a little more than last time, but you’re not sure how much weight you had put on the barbell. Having a journal to double check can quickly give you an answer that’s possibly even more accurate than what your coach may estimate.

As a coach, I find that if you as a student are journaling, I have a greater ability to help you on your fitness journey. if you have a detailed log of your workouts, it aids me in giving advice on how to progress because I know exactly what you have been doing, instead of guessing. Perhaps your progress has stalled out and you’re not sure why. If you have a journal we can sit and look through your workouts and try to pinpoint the problem. This is especially helpful if you are also logging details like sleep, water intake and nutrition. Logging isn’t just for workouts!

Finally, the best part of journaling is being able to track your progress. This is a great benefit both for when you are having a good day at the gym and when you are having a bad day. I have been doing CrossFit for a little over six years and I have a stack of journals, one for each year. It’s a lot of fun to be able to look back and see how far I have progressed. And, when I’m having a day where I’m being hard on myself, it’s encouraging to see I really have come a long way already and that the journey is full of peaks and valleys.

What are the basic benefits of journaling?

• Faster learning
• Remembering weights
• Having information to analyze
• Tracking progress

And remember – journaling isn’t just for CrossFit. You can keep detailed records of your workouts no matter what your exercise regimen. For example, you can log your run times and distances, you can log the new yoga moves you learned and what was challenging about them, or you can log your weightlifting numbers. Personally, I keep a kickboxing journal where I write down any new combos or techniques I learned in class.

So what all can you write in your journal?

• Warm-up routine
• Skill practice or new movements learned
• Workout and “score” of the workout
• Weights used and any scaled movements
• Post-workout stretching or mobility work
• Hours of sleep
• Water intake
• Mood
• Any circumstances surrounding the workout
• What the BEST part of your workout was!

No matter what you are doing for your health and fitness, journaling is a valuable tool that will help you remember details and accelerate your progress.

The post Coaching Tip: The Importance of Journaling appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

A recent study conducted by the Department of Kinesiology at California State University, Fullerton and published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research examined the effects of weight-cutting on lower body power, grip strength, and mood, starting from ten days prior to a collegiate level wrestling competition.

Measurements were taken at 10, 6, and 2 days prior to competition, as well as the day of the event. The physical and mental tests chosen were selected because of their similarity to the strengths needed in wrestling matches.

Wrestlers were allowed to conduct their mass loss according to their own methods. Subjects lost anywhere between 0-8.1% of body mass over the 10 day period of the study, the majority of it in the final 2 days before the competition.

The results of the study concluded that wrestlers were more affected on a mental level by their weight-cut, rather than physical.

There was a noticeable increase in confusion on the mood tests, however, there was no significant effect on lower body power or grip strength. The amount of weight cut and the increase in tension and confusion were directly related.

The study concluded the change in cognitive abilities could have a negative impact on the wrestler’s performance and decision making abilities, despite the lack of impact weight-cutting had on their physical capabilities.

The post The Impact of Weight-Cutting on Collegiate Wrestlers appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

With the popularity of elite snowboarding and the Winter Olympics, top snowboarders are now training as professional athletes. The need for specialized, off-hill strength and conditioning is essential for extreme sports including snowboarding.

What Are The Physical Demands of Half-pipe?

Research in the Open Sports Medicine Journal outlined objectives for strength and conditioning programming for these diverse and dynamic athletes. The research examined the specific areas that snowboarding athletes need to develop. Researchers focused specifically on the half pipe event.

Half pipe is the most well-known snowboarding styles, and elite snowboarding half pipe is a highly technical sport that requires a complex set of physical skills. Half pipe athletes snowboard in a giant pipe and perform a series of technical jumps and tricks. These skills are judged by their degree of difficulty and technical execution. Researchers point out the importance of strength training for these athletes due to the risks associated with tricks and jumps.

What Does It Takes To Program Training For Snowboard Half-pipe?

One of the critical element of this sport in is the landing. Strength and conditioning coaches should be encouraged to program training that engages the muscle groups and skill areas required for snowboard landings. Coaches and athletes must have an understanding of the stress imposed on the bodies from the various mechanics of snowboarding. Coaches can play an important role in an injury prevention, athlete development, and performance. Coaches should have an understanding of volume, intensity, and energy systems required to facilitate training phases and competition during on and off seasons.

1. Joint mobility and range of motion work in all of the major joints.
2. High intensity muscular endurance training.
3. Core strength and smooth coordinated body movement.
4. Maximal strength training including high load eccentric power work.
5. Gymnastics skills including flexibility, stability, balance, trunk rotation and extension, and hip and trunk flexibility.
6. Off-season dry land training including plyometric exercises, springboard diving, large and mini-trampoline training, and foam-pit work.

The post Strength and Conditioning Components for Elite Snowboarders appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Researchers assessed 9 inexperienced male athletes, who completed three 90-minute cycling sessions and 15-minute time trials. The rate of perceived exertion and performance measurements were taken every session, and each of the trials were separated by 8 weeks. Results indicated that BCAA supplementation did not influence aerobic performance and no difference was noted between the BCAA effected athletes and the placebo group. Additional research should be conducted to test BCAA among a wider demographic of athletes and conditions.

The post BCAAs May Not Augment Athletic Performance appeared first on Breaking Muscle.