Have you been training a while and hit a plateau? Have you spent numerous hours in the gym with limited results? Strict dieting with minimal results? Are you strength training with no increases in weight? When was the last time you hit your personal record? Most athletes who have been lifting for quite some time end of coming to a plateau in their lifting or training protocol. It is good to be consistent with your training protocol, however sometimes you need to shake up the regimen. When your inputs remain the same, the training can become stale and stagnant. The Overload Training … [Read more...] about Training with a Purpose: The Overload Principle
How to recover from an athletic injury
Sports today have taken over many athletes lives. As a result of year-round athletics, athletes are getting injured more frequently and at younger ages. If you look back at how athletics was run 20 years ago, most athletes played a sport for a single season. Then they had several months to partake in another sport or just recover from the season. The problem nowadays is that athletes are training in the same sport all year long with no breaks or any type of cross-training. This has lead to a monumental rise in the number of injuries athletes are incurring. Not only are they getting injured … [Read more...] about How to recover from an athletic injury
Gym New Year’s Resolutioners
Well it's almost that time of year as we are approaching the Christmas and New Year's holiday, that people suddenly decide that after a month or so of gorging themselves on decadent food and alcohol that they must now repent for their sins by joining the gym. Every year it is always the same thing, the day after New Year's Day the normally reasonably full gym now becomes like most stores on Black Friday where it is a mob of people fighting for equipment. I have been in the industry for 20 years now and it is ALWAYS the same. What is confusing to me is why do you have to wait until after New … [Read more...] about Gym New Year’s Resolutioners
Sugar and Weight Loss: How Sugar Affects Your Weight Loss Goals
Sugar is one of the prevalent added substances to almost every aspect of processed food items. Food manufacturers have taken the liberty to adding sugar to things like spaghetti sauces and packages of crackers. In years past, people would typically add a spoon full of sugar to various items that they may have prepared, but with the food industry already doing that, it is no longer necessary. As a result of the increase in sugar intake over years past, the rise of sugar related health issues has increased exponentially. Diseases such as diabetes, high blood pressure, and obesity have … [Read more...] about Sugar and Weight Loss: How Sugar Affects Your Weight Loss Goals
Supplements for Runners: From Training to Recovery
The goal of exercise is to break the body down. Yes, you read that correctly. Looking back at our evolutionary biological roots, when we put our bodies through difficult situations, we wanted them to adapt–maybe to go for longer without food, maybe so we could detect a smell that told us certain berries were poisonous, maybe to jump higher to reach fruit in a tree. Whatever the goal, we always had to fall short the first few attempts. Adaptation took failure, centuries of bodily breakdowns (and lucky DNA mutations) before our primordial ancestors developed the physical tools they needed … [Read more...] about Supplements for Runners: From Training to Recovery
Your Season Started, How Do You Maintain Your Strength Training Program Effectively?
If you are a Fall athlete, chances are you have already completed your preseason and the regular season has now begun. Many athletes struggle to maintain their normal strength training protocol throughout the course of the season because of either lack of time or their body is fatigued from practices and games. If you are in school all day and then have a two or three hour practice, by the time you get home and eat you probably still have a fair amount of school work to do. This is a pretty common occurrence amongst high school and even collegiate athletes. If you do have the time to go to the … [Read more...] about Your Season Started, How Do You Maintain Your Strength Training Program Effectively?
Are you ready for your PreSeason?
It is that time of year when August rolls around that many sports begin their preseason training. If you play football, you will probably be experiencing two or three a day practices for a week or so. Some of the other sports like field hockey, soccer, and so forth have similar requirements to the two a day training protocol. It does not matter really what sport you are playing, but more so what have you done to prepare for the preseason training protocol. There are some players who have taken the summer to work on their strength, speed, agility, and flexibility. There are also quite a few who … [Read more...] about Are you ready for your PreSeason?
Many High School Pitchers Suffer Pain as Pitch Counts Mount
New research shows that more than half of all high school pitchers are likely to suffer discomfort in their throwing arm during the season. "We found that the number of injuries peaked early -- only about four weeks in -- and then slowly declined until the end of the season," said James Onate. He's associate professor of health and rehabilitation sciences at the Jameson Crane Sports Medicine Institute in Columbus, Ohio, part of Ohio State University. "We see a lot of kids who didn't prepare in the offseason, and when their workload goes through the roof they're not prepared for the demand of … [Read more...] about Many High School Pitchers Suffer Pain as Pitch Counts Mount