Workout of the Day: Monday, April 30th

 A1:  Front Squats:  3×10

A2: Chin ups: 3×10

B1:  Step ups: 3×10

B2:  Push ups: 3×10

C: Leg lifts: 3×10

30 sec’s rest between sets, 2 min’s between exercises. As always, stretch well your hamstrings, quads, glutes, calves and shoulders afterwords.

The Chinese Weightlifters are among the best in the world.  One of the reasons for that is that they never neglect abdominal training.  They believe the abs are like a second backbone.  I fully agree.

Among my favorite exercises for the abs are Leg lifts (as pictured above), the Ab Wheel, and a related exercise that I call “Jackie Chan Push ups” (because I saw him doing them in a documentary once).

A Jackie Chan Push up is basically a push up, except that you place your hands very close together, and then move them away from your feet, past your head.  This means that your body now is in a position not unlike a diving position.  Then, you do push ups.  Obviously the range of motion is less, but its brutal on the abs.

Pay close attention to ab training and you will be far less prone to back injury, and you will be a heck of a lot stronger.

Workout of the Day: Friday, April 27th

A1: Dumbbell Thruster: 4 x 12, 10, 8, 6

A2: Chin ups: 4x 12,10,8,6

No rest at all between sets, going back and forth (Eg. 12 FsPP, 12 chins, 10 FSPP, 10 Chins, etc)

Can You Do This? If you live in the Portland Area and would like to Learn how, Contact me: Coach@dojoathletics.com or goto DojoAthletics.com

(The video is of Natalie Woolfolk, USA Weightlifting National Champion)

A new study, published in the Journal of Neuroscience, provides further evidence that a diet high in Omega-3 Fatty Acids helps to prevent the onset of Alzheimer’s.

In Alzheimer’s disease, lesions known as “plaques” and “tangles” form in the brain, due to the abnormal clumping of two proteins called beta-amyloid and tau. The mouse study found that a diet rich in the fatty acid DHA might interfere with this process.

Workout of the day, Wed, April 15th

 A:  Power Cleans: 4×8

B:  Deadlifts: 4×8

C:  Back Extentions:  2×15

Rest periods should be 2-3 minutes between each set.

The US has long reigned supreme when it came to the scale.  We’ve been the biggest nation on the block for some time.  But, Europe’s Obesity rates are on the rise.

Some 30 percent of children in Britain are obese or overweight, and percentages are rising in southern Europe, while in new European Union states in eastern Europe, rates of obesity are surging at a time when health spending is being curtailed.

Sound Familiar?  That’s what happened here.  Huge cultural shifts toward a fast food economy, a growing overweight population, and lowered access to medical care are a telling precursor of an epidemic of Obesity.

We all know that smoking is bad for our health.  But, here’s some proof that there may be a genetic component.  (I’m joking)

The Workout of the Day is a new feature where I’ll post a new workout for you to try 3-5 days a week. Since not everybody lives in Portland and has access to me training them in person, this is the next best thing. It isn’t Ideal, and if you can find yourself a local trainer that knows their stuff (not as easy as it sounds), then I still recommend that you go that route. A Trainer, in person, can correct flaws in your technique, listen to your concerns, modify a routine based on your own personal needs and history, etc. But, in lieu of that, these workouts can help you go in the right direction.

You don’t need to do them on the days they are posted, but doing them in the right order is not a bad Idea. So if I post 3 workouts in a week on Mon, Wed, Fri. Then you could do those same workouts on Tues, Thurs, Sat, respectively.

First thing’s first: The warm up. I’m not going to go too far into it here, but suffice it to say, that warming up is absolutely essential. For more on specific warm ups, see my post, “Don’t Forget The Warm-Up: A Few Techniques“.

We might as well just dive right in (I’ll have a bit about terminology at the end of the post).

Workout of the Day (WOD), Monday, April 23st

 Warm up

A1:  Front Squats:  3×12

A2:  Pull Ups:  3×12 (if you can’t do pull ups, do either pull downs, or use a Pull Up assist machine.)

B1:  Step ups:  3×12

B2:  Push ups:  3×12  (Start with Wall push-ups, then once you get better, you can do these from the floor.  If you’re really good at push ups, do clap push ups, or put your hands on Medicine balls, etc)

C1:  Dumbbell Swing:  3×12

C2:   Ab Roller:  3×12

A Key to Terminology:

When I write A1, A2 that means that you treat everything in the A-set as a superset.  Unless I say otherwise, I’ll always mean you should do one set of one exercise, then rest for 30-60 sec’s, then do an exercise of the next exercise in the A-category, then do the second set of the the first, etc.  Once you’ve done all the A-sets, then you move on to the B’s, then the C’s.

Between the A, B, and C categories you should rest about 3 min’s.  That means that the entire workout won’t take all that long at all.  But, it will be VERY hard.  By the time you get to the ab rollers, you’ll be panting like a dog.

A disturbing trend has taken hold in the South.  With rising Obesity rates, Diabetes, hypertension, and a lack of access to doctors and medical care, Child Mortality rates are rising.