"I hope my wife remembered to get more toilet paper at the grocery store..."
For whatever reason, our society has shown, and continues to
show, a tendency to associate "complicated" ideas with higher orders
of intelligence, while at the same time dismissing "simple" ideas as
the mere daydreams of amateurs. This
post will attempt to strike back against such thinking. In other words, simple trumps complicated.
Well thought out programs focus on only a handful of
concepts for the athlete: (1) training the body as "one piece," (2)
minimizing their chances for injury, (3) building strength, and (4) improving
mobility. Other concepts like building
aerobic base or improving balance coordination are secondary in importance,
only because most athletes reap these benefits to a sufficient degree through
the previous four. You think me
wrong? Attempt a 20-rep max back squat --
if you have never given the "window maker" a run before, try it with
70-75% of your one-rep max – and check your heart rate. I would venture to bet
its north of 170 beats per minute. The same basic concept applies to higher
rep, combination movements, like front squats and push presses (i.e.
thrusters), power cleans and push presses, power snatches and overhead squats,
etc.
Athletes who require a more developed aerobic base, such as swimmers,
track athletes, rowers, speed skaters, etc., should build this capacity
primarily through the practice of their sport, but supplementary conditioning at
different times of the year could also come in the form of burpees (shudder),
KB work (snatches, clean and presses, getups, swings), or intervals on a rower
or airdyne (shudder, again). In the
absence of sport specific conditioning, supplementary work could indeed prove
beneficial, especially for the layman.
This conditioning would be shorter in nature, less than ten minutes in
total length as a rough benchmark, but very high in intensity (expressed in
terms of heart rate). Conditioning at
this high intensity level carries many benefits for the athlete and layman,
alike: (1) it builds confidence, (2) provides an opportunity to simulate the
"suck" of racing/competition for athletes, and (3) develops
efficiency at lower heart rate levels.
Improved coordination and balance are other concepts that
can be addressed through barbell strength training. Higher skill exercises like
snatches, cleans, jerks, and their respective power variations will develop
levels of improved coordination and balance that will carry over to other everyday
tasks, like dance classes (I know this from firsthand experience). Two good KB exercises for improving balance
are the getup and the Romanian Deadlift.
Both could be incorporated at the end of a workout or on an “active rest”
day.
Throwing together a random set of exercises – like half
squats on a BOSU or bizarre med ball exercises – in a "secret sauce"
type of “matrix” might convince a novice of your "expertise," but
such complication only reveals a lack thereof to the educated. No, sets of five in the back squat are not
imaginative. No, eating more broccoli
will not land your diet on the front page of the New York Times “Lifestyle” section.
But at the end of the day you will be both stronger and healthier, and
probably more so than the vegan balancing on the BOSU ball over in the corner.
PS - I love this post from Justin Lascek over at 70sbig.com.
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