Saturday, December 13, 2008

Why do we lift heavy weights?

A: To get better at our sport of choice.

I did heavy cleans and speed squats today. I felt pretty spent after the squats but I tested my vert (along with basically everyone at CP) and jumped a couple 33's before a couple 34's and a 34.8''. Not too great but pretty awesome considering all the work I had done before. I finished it up with some heavier (225lb) sled pushes. I am working mainly on the initial push and first couple steps, as my top end speed is pretty good but I need to learn how to accelerate more powerfully.

My weight is up a bit again, but I just need to keep eating more. Tomorrow is a day off, and I'm back in for training on Monday again.

So remember, your squat, deadlift, or bench don't matter unless you can use that strength to your advantage in your sport (unless you're a powerlifter in which case it works out anyway--you're welcome, Dan). On the other hand, if used properly in a smart training program, there is nothing that can help you get faster and more powerful than strength training.

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Sled Pushes are fun

I was training at Cressey Performance today did some sled pushes. Here is one:




I need to gain a LOT of strength still but my weird back does some magical things for me in pushing. Basically I have a hyper mobile lumbar spine that hinges at a weird point and it allows my spine to rotate while also going from flexion to extension quickly and with force. While this is probably not good for upright running, its a huge advantage for running bent over like I do for skeleton pushes-- Think greyhound spine:

This:


to This:


Exciting stuff, eh?

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Training....

Has been going well so far. I'm still a bit underweight but I did some heavy cleans yesterday that felt pretty good. Had an upper body day today and I felt pretty good on the bench and especially good on the pullups. Tomorrow is another lower body day and I'm going to be sprinting and doing sled pushes along with it so it should be a fun day. I'll update you about it later.